Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

[touchring]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

Hong Kong market enters into bull market as the West descends into war.

Emerging Stocks Advance as Shares in Hong Kong Enter Bull Market

By Sharon Cho and Natasha Doff July 28, 2014

Emerging-market stocks rose as as a gauge of Chinese mainland shares traded in Hong Kong entered a bull market, outweighing declines in Russia and Brazil.
China Coal Energy Co. climbed to a seven-month high after the nation’s industrial-profit growth accelerated. Hyundai Steel Co. gained 5.3 percent in Seoul as earnings exceeded analyst estimates. Oil producer Petroleo Brasileiro SA led the Ibovespa lower in Sao Paulo. The ruble declined and the Micex Index sank to an 11-week low on concern Russia will face new sanctions over the Ukraine conflict.

The iShares MSCI Emerging Markets ETF advanced 0.7 percent to $45.09 after climbing 1.4 percent last week. The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index has risen more than 20 percent from this year’s low as government stimulus boosts investor confidence in the world’s second-largest economy. Satellite photos show Russia has shelled across the border into Ukraine, the U.S. said, while the European Union considers its strongest sanctions yet.

“The global environment is relatively supportive of emerging markets,” Lars Christensen, the chief emerging-markets analyst at Danske Bank A/S in Copenhagen, said by phone. “The geopolitical tensions have had a specific impact on Russia, but there hasn’t been widespread contagion.”
The MSCI Emerging Markets index rose less than 0.1 percent to 1,079.24 after a 1.5 percent gain last week. The gauge has advanced 7.6 percent this year and trades at 11.2 times projected 12-month earnings, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. The MSCI World Index has gained 5.2 percent and is valued at a multiple of 15.1.


The Shanghai Composite Index jumped 2.4 percent to its highest level since Dec. 13. China has cut reserve requirements for some banks, accelerated infrastructure spending and loosened property curbs as Premier Li Keqiang seeks to keep growth from falling below his 7.5 percent target.

The Hang Seng China Enterprises Index of mainland China shares traded in the city rose 0.7 percent to 11,072.62. The increase pushed the gain from its low in March to 20 percent, an advance some traders consider a bull market.
The Ibovespa fell 0.2 percent. Petroleo Brasileiro declined 1.7 percent. Brazilian stocks fell as traders bet that a four-week rally based on speculation there would be a change in government was excessive.

The Micex lost 1.9 percent, extending declines from this year’s peak to more than 10 percent, the threshold for a correction. The ruble retreated 1 percent to 35.5024 per dollar. Ukraine’s hryvnia weakened 2 percent.

Yukos Award

Fighting near the crash site of Malaysian Air Flight 17 in eastern Ukraine again prevented Dutch and Australian investigators from reaching the area as German Chancellor Angela Merkel said Europe must agree to new Russia sanctions by tomorrow.
Former majority owners of Yukos Oil Co. said they won a $50 billion award against Russia. Russian President Vladimir Putin’s government dismantled Yukos from 2004-2007 after imposing $27 billion in tax charges. Most of its former assets were acquired in a series of forced auctions by state-run OAO Rosneft, which is the world’s largest publicly traded oil company by output. Russia said it will appeal the ruling.
Rosneft dropped 1.2 percent. OAO Sberbank, the nation’s biggest lender, slid 4.1 percent.

China Coal Energy rose 5.2 percent. Yanzhou Coal Mining Co. rallied 2.9 percent. Chinese industrial companies reported a 17.9 percent gain in earnings in June from a year earlier, the fastest pace since September.

Banks Gain

Financial companies surged in Hong Kong and the mainland after a Reuters report that Bank of Communications Co. applied for a mixed-ownership trial and an agreement by Shenyin & Wanguo Securities Co. to acquire Hong Yuan Securities Co.
Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd., the nation’s biggest lender by market value, rose 2.3 percent after saying it plans to raise as much as 80 billion yuan ($12.9 billion) selling preferred stock in China and offshore.

South Korea’s Kospi index climbed 0.7 percent to its highest close since October. Hyundai Steel rallied the most in 10 months. Korea Electric Power Corp. gained 6.3 percent.

Vietnam’s benchmark gauge lost 1.8 percent after its valuation reached the highest since May 2011. India’s S&P BSE Sensex slid 0.5 percent, while the Philippine Stock Exchange Index retreated 0.6 percent.
To contact the reporters on this story: Sharon Cho in Seoul at ccho28@bloomberg.net; Natasha Doff in London at ndoff@bloomberg.net

To contact the editors responsible for this story: Stephen Kirkland at skirkland@bloomberg.net; Michael Patterson at mpatterson10@bloomberg.net Richard Richtmyer

[FrankL]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

Now look at the phases and ask yourself---how many and which ones have seen being implemented in the Ukraine and Crimea? Then ask which ones can be used in the Baltics, Moldavia and Georgia?

Isn't this quote posted by you showing the core of the current international tension on Ukraine?

- A US-led group of countries that insist that Russia is projecting its power on (subverting) a sovereign country part of its former Soviet sphere of influence, and ready to do the same on other states if successful

- Russia that sees US/NATO led-power subverting a former client state (Ukraine) and trying to incorporate it into their sphere of influence. They've seen the same thing happening with Georgia, a previously failed attempt in Ukraine, etc. They feel that if they fail to act decisively now, they'll soon be directly half-encircled by countries falling in the US-sphere of influence.


Regardless of what is right/wrong, these countries that are between two power blocks really get screwed over... unless they are sufficiently powerful of their own to act in their self-interests (like Turkey? although even in that country there's a lot of foreign projection of power... what's the status of the Edogan-Gülen power struggle?).

[Shakespear]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

Russia is NOT the Soviet Union. She has fielded no offensive forces to threaten Western Europe or our vital interests there.
These Neocon Nitwits in charge of our "foreign policy" (actually the bankers' foreign policy are juggling dynamite.

Raz I think your post does a great job of presenting the REALITY of the situation in Ukraine. For those that find following this situation closely interesting I suggest they try to grapple with Raz's observation that,

Russia is NOT the Soviet Union.

and not only from a geographic point of view.

To get closer to the heart of the matter , IMHO, one needs to understand the Russian Revolution. The genesis of its leadership and who supported it and where all this led. The support was not coming from THE PEOPLE, for the Bolsheviks were just a tiny party (sort of like what we have in Ukraine today with those who stage the coup). It was coming from those with MONEY. Money is the equalizer in such situations.

Just to get one started, I would suggest to take a look at the famous trip by Trocky from New York and back to Russia. How in the world did he get a US passport ? It was a fluke ?
http://reformed-theology.org/html/bo...chapter_02.htm

Now the elimination of the Romanov Family was the start in the attempt to break-up Imperial Russia. It worked to a point, it destroyed the foundation of Russia which was the monarchy. However the process was stopped with the death of Lenin and the surprise take over by Stalin. The rest is a long story requiring more than a few sentences to explain.

However I agree with the expressed view that the Cold War was simply put on hold. I would say that the Cold War was a "time out" while other objective were being addressed. The Cold War put the Soviet Union/Russia into a cooler in terms of development by keeping it busy wasting its resources chasing plans cooked up by "Beautiful Minds". The US thanks to WW II built a powerful economy which could afford wasting money on plans cooked up by "Beautiful Minds" at RAND. In the mean time the Soviet Union had to play catchup in raising its republics from the world war destruction (consumer economy) AND play the game of keep-up with the the insane Joneses with their "Beautiful Minds" (military economy). I am sure that those who needed to know knew that it was just a matter of time before the Soviet Union would ultimately fail. And here we have one of the early architects of this insane game who would have known, Mr. Z. Brzezinski.
http://www.amazon.com/The-Grand-Ches.../dp/0465027261

In such a Game their is nothing better than to distract the chess player,

After speaking with many of those involved and examining previously classified British and German documents in detail, SPIEGEL has concluded that there was no doubt that the West did everything it could to give the Soviets the impression that NATO membership was out of the question for countries like Poland, Hungary or Czechoslovakia.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/...-a-663315.html
as you are moving your pieces with a completely different intent,
http://www.japantimes.co.jp/culture/.../#.U-XLYvl_hY4

We have all heard about the Cuban Missile Crises and the sneaky positioning of missiles there by USSR at the request of Cuba. Well at the time the US had done the same thing in Turkey and Italy. That sure got people's blood boiling. What would we do today if Russia negotiated a base opening in Mexico and then in Canada?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/JFK_and_the_Unspeakable

Putin and not a drunk Yeltsin is up against this game IMHO. I find Putin's politics quite rational which will not be admitted by European leaders as they are not playing a leading role in this game. Putin is not playing like an idiot at this high stakes game but Russia has made mistakes in the case of Serbia and Libya. Those throwing around the invective that he is a KGB agent and wants to resurrect the Soviet Union need to watch less FOX/CNN and do more reading of history FROM ALL ANGLES. Those are straw-man arguments giving nothing to the discussion except emotional memes. Understanding this Game requires more than high school level understanding of the world which takes time and effort.

[jk]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

i don't think that what's happening in ukraine represents a cold war ii. the cold war was global in its maneuvering, and with the exception of issues around iran's nuclear capabilities, i don't see russia funding proxies elsewhere. [am i forgetting something?] and even in iran, china is both a major weapons supplier and a major energy trade partner, and is competing with russia for influence.

i think the u.s. and russia are in a long term struggle over influence in EUROPE, both eastern AND WESTERN. russia's influence in europe is based on its role as energy supplier, and i second lakedaiemonian's point about the importance of ukraine's energy infrastructure. the sub-baltic pipeline from russia directly to germany was a step towards reducing the importance of ukraine's pipelines' role. a second, parallel, pipeline has been put on hold during the current tensions, but i predict that that project will be resurrected within a few years.

i would again also point out the historic place of ukraine as a part of russia itself. i reiterate here that the origins of russia itself lie in the "kievan rus" "from the late 9th to the mid-13th century." i.e. about 500 years before columbus sailed. that's the same kiev as the one in western ukraine. historically, too, ukraine gave moscow some strategic depth. and the presence of russian speakers who feel much closer to russia than the e.u. is also real. then we have to add the presence of heavy industry in eastern ukraine, again with strong ties to moscow.

the surprise to me is that russia didn't annex eastern ukraine at the same time it took crimea. anyone have a theory about that?

i would guess that putin is kicking himself not for the fact he's supplying moscow leaning ukrainian separatists and building up his own troops on the border, but for not seizing the moment to just take the eastern ukraine at the same time as crimea. that would have got the deed done and fait accompli. in that scenario the west would be, i think, no more shocked than after the seizure of crimea alone. why didn't he do it then?

[don]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

There appears to have been a window of opportunity that was passed up. It's different now. Russia is still in the process of re-building its armed services, from a conscript force to a more professional one with up to date weaponry. The aftermath of Shock Capitalism remains, its a relatively poor country for its geo-political size. Even in a conflict with only the armed forces of Kiev, barring a quick collapse, much built-up materiel would be burned off and have to be replaced. If NATO (the US) supports Kiev with at least airpower, it's another game entirely, at least on the Russian best-units attrition factor. The cutting edge of Russia's military would be substantially dulled on the cheap.

[jk]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

There appears to have been a window of opportunity that was passed up. It's different now. Russia is still in the process of re-building its armed services, from a conscript force to a more professional one with up to date weaponry. The aftermath of Shock Capitalism remains, its a relatively poor country for its geo-political size. Even in a conflict with only the armed forces of Kiev, barring a quick collapse, much built-up materiel would be burned off and have to be replaced. If NATO (the US) supports Kiev with at least airpower, it's another game entirely, at least on the Russian best-units attrition factor. The cutting edge of Russia's military would be substantially dulled on the cheap.

are you suggesting we send nato [mostly u.s.] forces to directly fight in eastern ukraine, and invite the russians to send in the forces to oppose us? are you really ready to risk a potential escalation to ww iii? for the right of goldman sachs to privatize the ukrainian pipelines? if so, i think that idea is really nuts.

[shiny!]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

The analogy falls flat. The Jews herded into the Warsaw Ghetto weren't firing rockets onto German civilians. They were waiting to be taken to the gas chambers and had no where else to go because even if the Nazis would have allowed them to leave no other country would allow them to immigrate.

I'm not a Zionist by any means and I don't like the suffering inflicted upon the Palestinians, but for the most part they have no one to blame but themselves.

Thank you, Raz.

[Shakespear]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

i would again also point out the historic place of ukraine as a part of russia itself. i reiterate here that the origins of russia itself lie in the "kievan rus" "from the late 9th to the mid-13th century." i.e. about 500 years before columbus sailed. that's the same kiev as the one in western ukraine. historically, too, ukraine gave moscow some strategic depth. and the presence of russian speakers who feel much closer to russia than the e.u. is also real. then we have to add the presence of heavy industry in eastern ukraine, again with strong ties to moscow.

the surprise to me is that russia didn't annex eastern ukraine at the same time it took crimea. anyone have a theory about that?

i would guess that putin is kicking himself not for the fact he's supplying moscow leaning ukrainian separatists and building up his own troops on the border, but for not seizing the moment to just take the eastern ukraine at the same time as crimea. that would have got the deed done and fait accompli. in that scenario the west would be, i think, no more shocked than after the seizure of crimea alone. why didn't he do it then?

Good points which few will understand with sufficient clarity to see how critical this information is to understanding what Russia is doing today.

I used to play a lot of chess and I always hated those situations where I did not see the significance of the move made three turns before. I suspect you and Don are right, if Putin was bent on going for Crimea hell he should have just gone for the rest of the pie while at it. But then I am nowhere near to understanding how The Game is played to be able to dream up such moves.

As Raz has stated, Ukraine is not a nation state, it is a nation strictly ON PAPER but to understand this one needs to do some reading at the library. In this respect it reminds me of early America with all the immigrants from various countries forming a jigsaw puzzle which could have exploded thanks to the Civil War. If you focus too tightly on the Civil War you will not see the bigger picture of The Game being played in Europe. You say that this was just our own affair ? Oh is that so ? As always it is about people making money, everything else is secondary.

He knew that we had no vital national interests in Eastern Europe and probably turned over in his grave when Madelyn Halfbright convinced the Neocon Republican fools in the Senate to expand NATO right up to Russia's borders!

Exactly. This is all just to jab at the Bear and turn the attention from other things. Of course any progress here will be used in the future variations on the chessboard.

Lakedaemonian

I just don't see the Palestinian/Israel issue having anywhere near the tangible value to anywhere near the same number of people as the unconventional war over influence/control over Ukraine/Eastern Europe and th associated energy politics.

"anywhere near the tangible value" , these are not zero sum moves. This is chess. I move a pawn to get a rook, I don't need to move a rook to get a rook. I will leave your analysis at that.

However, Ukraine and other regional border states at risk of falling under increasing Russian influence again do host some very substantial pipelines for supplying Western Europe with a good chunk of it's energy.

They already were and will continue to be under Russian influence, as is Mexico, Canada and others states by US in its neighborhood. History has not changed and neither has The Game.

Compared to the circa 10 million in Israel/Palestine without the same energy geopolitics does it stack up?

So why are we pumping billions of $ to it from the US taxpayers pockets ? No offense but your "math" and logic ,as presented, is not part of how I see The Game being played. Maybe in Checkers it applies but not in Chess.

The analogy falls flat. The Jews herded into the Warsaw Ghetto weren't firing rockets onto German civilians. They were waiting to be taken to the gas chambers and had no where else to go because even if the Nazis would have allowed them to leave no other country would allow them to immigrate.

I'm not a Zionist by any means and I don't like the suffering inflicted upon the Palestinians, but for the most part they have no one to blame but themselves.

I think where Don was going is that the two situations are like a turkey shoot. One side have everything to eliminate that other and the defender has only a sling shot. Maybe Don should have used the Warsaw Uprising in 1944 where this is much clearer. A turkey shoot which consumed 200,000 souls months before the end of the war. An insane thing to do which was started by the Polish underground.

but for the most part they have no one to blame but themselves.

Raz I don't think it is that simple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/King_David_Hotel_bombing

The Jewish political leadership publicly condemned the attack. The Jewish Agency expressed "their feelings of horror at the base and unparalleled act perpetrated today by a gang of criminals", despite the fact that the Irgun was acting in response to the Jewish Resistance Movement, an organisation governed by the Jewish Agency.[22]

There's too much smoke and mirrors in the Middle East to easily say who represents who and in whose interest they are acting. I am very very sceptically over all with information being fed through the news media but especially so by explanations offered by the Israel's gov.

Isn't this quote posted by you showing the core of the current international tension on Ukraine?

Yes FrankL, our friend has provided us with the template (I thank him ) of how some of the chess moves look. This is exactly what is happening in Ukraine. That check list is most helpful.

[Woodsman]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

To get closer to the heart of the matter , IMHO, one needs to understand the Russian Revolution. The genesis of its leadership and who supported it and where all this led. The support was not coming from THE PEOPLE, for the Bolsheviks were just a tiny party (sort of like what we have in Ukraine today with those who stage the coup).

Good morning, Dr. Sutton. Delighted to hear from you again.

"The contradictions suggested by Minor's cartoon have been brushed under the rug of history because they do not fit the accepted conceptual spectrum of political left and political right."
- Anthony C. Sutton. "Wall Street and the Bolshevik Revolution"

And good morning to you Zbig.

"For impressive evidence of Western participation in the early phase of Soviet economic growth, see Antony C. Sutton's Western Technology and Soviet Economic Development: 1917–1930, which argues that 'Soviet economic development for 1917–1930 was essentially dependent on Western technological aid' (p.283), and that 'at least 95 per cent of the industrial structure received this assistance.' (p. 348)."
- Zbigniew Brzezinski. "Between Two Ages: America's Role in the Technetronic Era"

-----------

So much cognitive dissonance. Still, it warms the heart to see all the traditional crusty cons still kicking and making common cause with the ideas of the principled New Left. Well, at least the New Left before the commies and Hoover & Angleton's agent provocateurs took it over and killed it. What a world it could have been had the grownups been able to talk to the kids about the dangers of crazy creepers and come up with avoidance strategies so everybody could play safe.

Hey Bill & Bernardine, nice job bringing it home, guys. Have you seen how Barry's grown! If only Ann could be here to see it. You know, there's nothing like a mother's love:



Now let's throw in something more my speed. Let's see, something perfectly syncretic (psychotic?). Oh yes, Carl Oglesby:

"Let us remember the other New Left—a humane, decentralist, thoroughly American New Left that regarded socialism as “a way to bury social problems under a federal bureaucracy,” in the words of Carl Oglesby, president of Students for a Democratic Society in 1965-66 and a key figure in its Middle American wing, which extended from independent anti-imperialist liberals to trans-Mississippi “Prairie Power” radicals. (“Texas anarchists,” sneered the elite East Coast-schooled red-diaper babies at the hell-raising directional state college Prairie Power kids.)"
- "When the Left Was Right." The American Conservative

Fair warning; building a Theory of Everything based on this work is great fun and a really effective way to beautifying one's own mind.

But who wouldn't go nuts walking around naked in a wilderness of mirrors? And isn't that the whole point of the craft, anyway, to keep everyone thoroughly confused and not knowing what to trust or believe. It's like I said, you choose your propaganda and information op, I choose mine. Potato, potato.

I would consider myself to be a reasonably well educated amateur student of irregular/unconventional warfare and part time practitioner and I've only recently become privy to the fringes of a very small but exceptionally important slice of that 1945-89 history. But there's just nothing in open source on it. It's like a black hole.

It's probably the most important component of it, and it's without question the least known with practically zero in open source.

The Cold War(just the European and fringes story) was a pretty nasty less than conventional war we really have limited big picture understanding of and is incredibly relevant to us at this moment.

I don't have a problem with it at the theoretical level. There are bad people(and/or opposing nation states/blocks) whose interests oppose those of me and mine.

But at the practical level I am less than confident that sufficient strategic leadership and benign oversight exists to control it for the better good.

Now that these folks have moved from crawling to walking to running and flying, should we trust that they never "brought the war home" and turned this exquisite machine inward? I don't know, I'm just asking. But when I look at the phases and ask myself how many and which ones I have seen being implemented, should I worry that I get a funny and beautiful feeling in my mind that makes me shiver and want to go watch Spongebob too?

"Deception is a state of mind and the mind of the State.”
— James Angleton

A mansion has many rooms. Anyway, it was a long time ago and we're all grown up enough now to understand it was just business, nothing personal.



Still, who can have perfect confidence that sufficient strategic leadership and benign oversight exists to control it for the better? We're all doing the best we can, but even the masters of the universe and the owners of the country and the world get it wrong sometimes. And even the smartest and most gifted people can misjudge character and intent. Maybe Stephen Spielberg and Tom Hanks will make a movie about the life of Hjalmar Schacht and tie it into a grand narrative we could all get behind in another grand national catharsis. You know, the perfect mix between "Band of Brothers" meets "Forest Gump" meets "Schindler's List" where we all get to learn that bankers & cloak and dagger boys are just people, too and that everybody makes mistakes.

Yesterday's weirdness is tomorrow's reason why.
- Hunter S. Thompson

Shark jump complete with a 7.5 from the Russian judge, the sneaky bolshie.

[Shakespear]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

Good morning, Dr. Sutton. Delighted to hear from you again.

Yes Woodsman, its the same con-men and con but just in different suits and ties. The Game was always Global.


By the way, Good Post Woodsman.

[don]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

are you suggesting we send nato [mostly u.s.] forces to directly fight in eastern ukraine, and invite the russians to send in the forces to oppose us? are you really ready to risk a potential escalation to ww iii? for the right of goldman sachs to privatize the ukrainian pipelines? if so, i think that idea is really nuts.

Quite the leap, doctor, from laying out some of Russia's military realities and advocating war between Russia and NATO.

[jk]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

Quite the leap, doctor, from laying out some of Russia's military realities and advocating war between Russia and NATO.

Russia is still in the process of re-building its armed services, from a conscript force to a more professional one with up to date weaponry. The aftermath of Shock Capitalism remains, its a relatively poor country for its geo-political size. Even in a conflict with only the armed forces of Kiev, barring a quick collapse, much built-up materiel would be burned off and have to be replaced. If NATO (the US) supports Kiev with at least airpower, it's another game entirely, at least on the Russian best-units attrition factor. The cutting edge of Russia's military would be substantially dulled on the cheap.

where's that leap?

[touchring]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

i would guess that putin is kicking himself not for the fact he's supplying moscow leaning ukrainian separatists and building up his own troops on the border, but for not seizing the moment to just take the eastern ukraine at the same time as crimea. that would have got the deed done and fait accompli. in that scenario the west would be, i think, no more shocked than after the seizure of crimea alone. why didn't he do it then?

I think Putin learned from the past experience of the US in Iraq and the SU in Afghanistan.

While Crimea is completely pro-Russian, East Ukraine still has a lot of affinity to Kiev and that includes Russian speakers. There was a Bloomberg Russian correspondent that was captured by the Ukrainian national army Russian speaking soldiers.

http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-0...to-hatred.html

Dubbed “Kolomoisky castigators” and “fascists” by Russian media, my captors turned out to be the same kind of people I met when talking to separatists: bored Russian-speakers, the blood and muscle of a conflict where random hatred reigns on both sides.

If Putin annexes East Ukraine, I think Kiev can easily start an insurgency movement.

Putin is moving very carefully and has a plan, and definitely not reckless or seeking personal glory or the Nobel Peace Prize. ;)

Putin knows that Russia cannot solely depend on Europe as the experience of Cyprus and now the UK has shown.

He knows that he needs to expand trade with China and is probably using the Ukrainian conflict as the pretext to gradually shift Russia's economy towards China. Strategically, this is a very good move as an allied China and Russian Federation will create the biggest economic entity in the world that Genghis failed to create by military force. China has the consumers (now the biggest market in the world for consumer goods) and Russia has oil and gas that China has the money to buy.

But Putin needs to find a way to convince the Russian people that consider themselves Europeans (superiority complex) to look East...

[don]

Leading German Financial Paper (Handelblatt) Editorial

The West on the wrong path

08.08.2014, 13:53 Uhr

In view of the events in Ukraine, the government and many media have switched from level-headed to agitated. The spectrum of opinions has been narrowed to the width of a sniper scope. The politics of escalation does not have a realistic goal – and harms German interests.


Düsseldorf Every war is accompanied by a kind of mental mobilization: war fever. Even smart people are not immune to controlled bouts of this fever. “This war in all its atrociousness is still a great and wonderful thing. It is an experience worth having“ rejoiced Max Weber in 1914 when the lights went out in Europe. Thomas Mann felt a “cleansing, liberation, and a tremendous amount of hope“.

Even when thousands already lay dead on the Belgian battle fields, the war fever did not subside. Exactly 100 years ago, 93 painters, writers, and scientists composed the “Call to the world of culture.“ Max Liebermann, Gerhart Hauptmann, Max Planck, Wilhelm Röntgen, and others encouraged their countrymen to engage in cruelty towards their neighbor:

“Without German militarism, German culture would have been swept from the face of the earth a long time ago. The German armed forces and the German people are one. This awareness makes 70 million Germans brothers without prejudice to education, status, or party.“

We interrupt our own train of thought: “History is not repeating itself!” But can we be so sure about that these days? In view of the war events in the Crimean and eastern Ukraine, the heads of states and governments of the West suddenly have no more questions and all the answers. The US Congress is openly discussing arming Ukraine. The former security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski recommends arming the citizens there for house-to-house and street combat. The German Chancellor, as it is her habit, is much less clear but no less ominous: “We are ready to take severe measures.“

German journalism has switched from level-headed to agitated in a matter of weeks. The spectrum of opinions has been narrowed to the field of vision of a sniper scope.

Newspapers we thought to be all about thoughts and ideas now march in lock-step with politicians in their calls for sanctions against Russia's President Putin. Even the headlines betray an aggressive tension as is usually characteristic of hooligans when they 'support' their respective teams.

The Tagesspiegel: “Enough talk!“ The FAZ: “Show strength“. The Süddeutsche Zeitung: “Now or never.“ The Spiegel calls for an “End to cowardice“: “Putin's web of lies, propaganda, and deception has been exposed. The wreckage of MH 17 is also the result of a crashed diplomacy.“

Western politics and German media agree.

Every reflexive string of accusations results in the same outcome: in no time allegations and counter-allegations become so entangled that the facts become almost completely obscured.

Who deceived who first?

Did it all start with the Russian invasion of the Crimean or did the West first promote the destabilization of the Ukraine? Does Russia want to expand into the West or NATO into the East? Or did maybe two world-powers meet at the same door in the middle of the night, driven by very similar intentions towards a defenseless third that now pays for the resulting quagmire with the first phases of a civil war?

If at this point you are still waiting for an answer as to whose fault it is, you might as well just stop reading. You will not miss anything. We are not trying to unearth this hidden truth. We don't know how it started. We don't know how it will end. And we are sitting right here, in the middle of it. At least Peter Sloterdijk has a few words of consolation for us: “To live in the world means to live in uncertainty.“

Our purpose is to wipe off some of the foam that has formed on the debating mouths, to steal words from the mouths of both the rabble-rousers and the roused, and put new words there instead. One word that has become disused of late is this: realism.

The politics of escalation show that Europe sorely misses a realistic goal. It's a different thing in the US. Threats and posturing are simply part of the election preparations. When Hillary Clinton compares Putin with Hitler, she does so only to appeal to the Republican vote, i.e. people who do not own a passport. For many of them, Hitler is the only foreigner they know, which is why Adolf Putin is a very welcome fictitious campaign effigy. In this respect, Clinton and Obama have a realistic goal: to appeal to the people, to win elections, to win another Democratic presidency.

Angela Merkel can hardly claim these mitigating circumstances for herself. Geography forces every German Chancellor to be a bit more serious. As neighbors of Russia, as part of the European community bound in destiny, as recipient of energy and supplier of this and that, we Germans have a clearly more vital interest in stability and communication. We cannot afford to look at Russia through the eyes of the American Tea Party.

Every mistake starts with a mistake in thinking. And we are making this mistake if we believe that only the other party profits from our economic relationship and thus will suffer when this relationship stops. If economic ties were maintained for mutual profit, then severing them will lead to mutual loss. Punishment and self-punishment are the same thing in this case.

Even the idea that economic pressure and political isolation would bring Russia to its knees was not really thought all the way through. Even if we could succeed: what good would Russia be on its knees? How can you want to live together in the European house with a humiliated people whose elected leadership is treated like a pariah and whose citizens you might have to support in the coming winter.

Of course, the current situation requires a strong stance, but more than anything a strong stance against ourselves. Germans have neither wanted nor caused these realities, but they are now our realities. Just consider what Willy Brandt had to listen to when his fate as mayor of Berlin placed him in the shadow of the wall. What sanctions and punishments were suggested to him. But he decided to forgo this festival of outrage. He never turned the screw of retribution.

When he was awarded the Noble Prize for Peace he shed light on what went on around him in the hectic days when the wall was built: “There is still another aspect – that of impotence disguised by verbalism: taking a stand on legal positions which cannot become a reality and planning counter-measures for contingencies that always differ from the one at hand. At critical times we were left to our own devices; the verbalists had nothing to offer.“

The verbalists are back and their headquarters are in Washington D.C. But nobody is forcing us to kowtow to their orders. Following this lead – even if calculatingly and somewhat reluctantly as in the case of Merkel – does not protect the German people, but may well endanger it. This fact remains a fact even if it was not the American but the Russians who were responsible for the original damage in the Crimean and in eastern Ukraine.

Willy Brandt decided clearly differently than Merkel in the present, and that in a clearly more intense situation. As he recalls, he had awoken on the morning of August 13, 1961 “wide awake and at the same time numb“. He had stopped over in Hanover on a trip when he received reports from Berlin about work being done on the large wall separating the city. It was a Sunday morning and the humiliation could hardly be greater for a sitting mayor.

The Soviets had presented him with a fait accompli. The Americans had not informed him even though they had probably received some information from Moscow. Brandt remembers that an “impotent rage“ had risen in him. But what did he do? He reined in his feelings of impotence and displayed his great talent as reality-based politician which would garner him a stint as Chancellor and finally also the Nobel Prize for Peace.

With the advice from Egon Bahr, he accepted the new situation, knowing that no amount of outrage from the rest of the world would bring this wall down again for a while. He even ordered the West-Berlin police to use batons and water cannons against demonstrators at the wall in order not to slip from the catastrophe of division into the much greater catastrophe of war. He strove for the paradox which Bahr put as follows later: “We acknowledged the Status Quo in order to change it.“

And they managed to accomplish this change. Brandt and Bahr made the specific interests of the West Berlin population for who they were now responsible (from June 1962 onwards this also included this author) into the measure of their politics.

In Bonn they negotiated the Berlin subvention, an eight-percent tax-free subvention on payroll and income tax. In the vernacular it was called the “fear premium“. They also negotiated a travel permit treaty with East Berlin which made the wall permeable again two years after it was put up. Between Christmas 1963 and New Year’s 1964, 700 000 inhabitants of Berlin visited their relatives in the east of the city. Every tear of joy turned into a vote for Brandt a short while later.

The voters realized that here was someone who wanted to affect the way they lived every day, not just generate a headline for the next morning. In an almost completely hopeless situation, this SPD man fought for western values – in this case the values of freedom of movement – without bullhorns, without sanctions, without the threat of violence. The elite in Washington started hearing words that had never been heard in politics before: Compassion. Change through rapprochement. Dialog. Reconciliation of interests. And this in the middle of the Cold War, when the world powers were supposed to attack each other with venom, when the script contained only threats and protestations; set ultimatums, enforce sea blockades, conduct representative wars, this is how the Cold War was supposed to be run.

A German foreign policy striving for reconciliation – in the beginning only the foreign policy of Berlin – not only appeared courageous but also very strange.

The Americans – Kennedy, Johnson, then Nixon – followed the German; it kicked off a process which is unparalleled in the history of enemy nations. Finally, there was a meeting in Helsinki in order to set down the rules. The Soviet Union was guaranteed “non-interference into their internal affairs“ which filled party boss Leonid Brezhnev with satisfaction and made Franz Josef Strauß's blood boil. In return, the Moscow Communist Party leadership had to guarantee the West (and thus their own civil societies) “respect of human rights and fundamental freedoms, including that of thought, conscience, religion or belief“.

In this way “non-interference“ was bought through “involvement“. Communism had received an eternal guarantee for its territory, but within its borders universal human rights suddenly began to brew. Joachim Gauck remembers: “The word that allowed my generation to go on was Helsinki.“

It is not too late for the duo Merkel/Steinmeier to use the concepts and ideas of this time. It does not make sense to just follow the strategically idea-less Obama. Everyone can see how he and Putin are driving like in a dream directly towards a sign which reads: Dead End.

“The test for politics is not how something starts but how it ends“, so Henry Kissinger, also a Peace Nobel Prize winner. After the occupation of the Crimean by Russia he stated: we should want reconciliation, not dominance. Demonizing Putin is not a policy. It is an alibi for the lack thereof. He advises condensing conflicts, i.e. to make them smaller, shrink them, and then distill them into a solution.

At the moment (and for a long time before that) America is doing the opposite. All conflicts are escalated. The attack of a terror group named Al Qaida is turned into a global campaign against Islam. Iraq is bombed using dubious justifications. Then the US Air Force flies on to Afghanistan and Pakistan. The relationship to the Islamic world can safely be considered damaged.

If the West had judged the then US government which marched into Iraq without a resolution by the UN and without proof of the existence of “WMDs“ by the same standards as today Putin, then George W. Bush would have immediately been banned from entering the EU. The foreign investments of Warren Buffett should have been frozen, the export of vehicles of the brands GM, Ford, and Chrysler banned.

The American tendency to verbal and then also military escalation, the isolation, demonization, and attacking of enemies has not proven effective. The last successful major military action the US conducted was the Normandy landing. Everything else – Korea, Vietnam, Iraq, and Afghanistan – was a clear failure. Moving NATO units towards the Polish border and thinking about arming Ukraine is a continuation of a lack of diplomacy by the military means.

This policy of running your head against the wall – and doing so exactly where the wall is the thickest – just gives you a head ache and not much else. And this considering that the wall has a huge door in the relationship of Europe to Russia. And the key to this door is labeled “reconciliation of interests“.

The first step is what Brandt called “compassion“, i.e. the ability to see the world through the eyes of the others. We should stop accusing the 143 million Russian that they look at the world differently than John McCain.

What is needed is help in modernizing the country, no sanctions which will further decrease the dearth of wealth and damage the bond of relationships. Economic relationships are also relationships. International cooperation is akin to tenderness between nations because everyone feels better afterwards.

It is well-known that Russia is an energy super-power and at the same time a developing industrial nation. The policy of reconciliation and mutual interests should attack here. Development aid in return for territorial guarantees; Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier even had the right words to describe this: modernization partnership. He just has to dust it off and use it as an aspirational word. Russia should be integrated, not isolated. Small steps in that direction are better than the great nonsense of exclusionary politics.

Brandt and Bahr have never reached for the tool of economic sanctions. They knew why: there are no recorded cases in which countries under sanctions apologized for their behavior and were obedient ever after. On the contrary: collective movements start in support of the sanctioned, as is the case today in Russia. The country was hardly ever more unified behind their president than now. This could almost lead you to think that the rabble-rousers of the West are on the payroll of the Russian secret service.

One more comment about the tone of the debate. The annexation of the Crimean was in violation of international law. The support of separatists in eastern Ukraine also does not mesh with our ideas of the state sovereignty. The boundaries of states are inviolable.

But every act requires context. And the German context is that we are a society on probation which may not act as if violations of international law started with the events in the Crimean.

Germany has waged war against its eastern neighbor twice in the past 100 years. The German soul, which we generally claim to be on the romantic side, showed its cruel side.

Of course, we who came later can continue to proclaim our outrage against the ruthless Putin and appeal to international law against him, but the way things are this outrage should come with a slight blush of embarrassment. Or to use the words of Willy Brandt: “Claims to absolutes threaten man.“

In the end, even the men who had succumbed to war fever in 1914 had to realize this. After the end of the war, the penitent issued a second call, this time to understanding between nations: “The civilized world became a war camp and battle field. It is time that a great tide of love replaces the devastating wave of hatred.“

We should try to avoid the detour via the battle fields in the 21st century. History does not have to repeat itself. Maybe we can find a shortcut.

[touchring]

Re: Putin's Pointless Move On Ukraine Leaves It A Vassal To China

This hasn't reached MSM yet, but I think it's significant enough to worth a mention.

UnionPay, unheard of by the man in the street outside China, is the world's largest card payment network and 2nd largest by transaction value worldwide.

It won't be inconceivable if UnionPay can dominate Russia's card payment market within 5 years.


http://paymentmagnates.com/industry-...ched-in-russia

CHINA UNIONPAY IS OFFICIALY LAUNCHED IN RUSSIAAugust 17, 2014

Following sanctions and frozen local accounts placed by Visa and MasterCard, China UnionPay will start offering card services in Russia.

Following rumors of an alleged local card and payment scheme, China UnionPay card will begin to trickle into the region, with an estimated 2 million cards to be issued within the next 3 years. The majority of Russia’s banks, VTB- Gazprombank, Promsvyazbank, Alfa Bank, MTS, and Rosbank are already preparing their systems to support the new card type.


Visa and MasterCard were forced to freeze out Russian accounts in March 2014 following sanctions from the US government regarding Russia’s involvement in the crisis in Crimea.


Started in 2002, China UnionPay quickly grew from a local payment option to international card firm boasting the most cards in circulation with a 34% global stake hold.


“VTB24 already serves China UnionPay cards in its ATM network and now the bank is in negotiations with this payment system to start acquiring retail merchants,” a press release fromVTB24’s stated.
Initial rumors stated China UnionPay would setup a national payment scheme, serving as Russia’s national payment method. No word yet on such plans, or if China UnionPay is compliant with the new regulations and restrictions instilled by the Russian government, regulations and restrictions that may prevent Visa and MasterCard from being fully operational in the area.


As of now, a total of 20,000 cards have been issued in Russia with an order for an additional 100,000 China UnionPay cards to be supplied in September. While local banks have begun to support the new payment cards, merchant support is still scarce.


Sources state the new cards are intended to help Russia ease its dependency on western companies primarily Visa and MasterCard. Plans for an official payment scheme are said to be 16 months-3 years away.


This is not China UnionPay’s first foray into international payments. The Chinese card firm currently operates in a total of 142 countries.]