______________________________
The collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 gave birth to a dangerous American ideology… neoconservatism. The USSR had served as a constraint on American unilateral action. With the removal of this constraint on Washington, neocons declared their agenda of US world hegemony. Now, America was the “sole superpower,” the “unipower,” that could act without restraint anywhere in the world. Washington Post neocon journalist Charles Krauthammer summed up the “new reality” as follows:
We have overwhelming global power. We’re history’s designated custodians of the international system. When the USSR fell, something new was born, something utterly new… a unipolar world dominated by a single superpower unchecked by any rival and with decisive reach in every corner of the globe. This is a staggering new development in history, not seen since the fall of Rome. Even Rome was no model for what America is today.
The staggering unipolar power that history gave to Washington has to be protected at all costs. In 1992, a top Pentagon official, Undersecretary Paul Wolfowitz, penned the Wolfowitz Doctrine, which became the basis for Washington’s foreign policy. The Wolfowitz Doctrine stated:
The first objective of American foreign and military policy is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former USSR or elsewhere, that poses a threat [to American unilateral action] on the order of that posed formerly by the USSR. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defence strategy and requires that we endeavour to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, suffice to generate global power (a “hostile power” is a country sufficiently strong to have a foreign policy independent from Washington’s).
The unilateral assertion of American power began in earnest during the Clinton régime with the interventions in Yugoslavia, Serbia, and Kosovo, and the no-fly zone imposed on Iraq. In 1997, the neocons penned their “Project for a New American Century”. In 1998, three years prior to 9/11, neocons sent a letter to President Clinton calling for régime change in Iraq and “the removal of Saddam Hussein from power”. Neocons set out their programme for removing seven governments in five years. Informed people regard the events of 11 September 2001 as “the new Pearl Harbor” that the neocons said was necessary to begin their wars of conquest in the Middle East. Paul O’Neil, President George W Bush’s first Treasury Secretary, stated publicly that the agenda of President Bush’s first meeting with his cabinet included invading Iraq. They planned this invasion prior to 9/11. Since 9/11, Washington destroyed eight countries in whole or part and it now confronts Russia both in Syria and the Ukraine.
Russia can’t allow a jihadist Caliphate in Syria and Iraq as it’d be a base for exporting destabilisation into Muslim parts of the Russian Federation. Henry Kissinger himself stated this fact; it’s clear enough to any person with a brain. However, the power-crazed fanatical neocons in control of the Clinton, Bush, and Obama régimes are so absorbed in their own hubris and arrogance that they’re prepared to push Russia to the point of having their Turkish puppet shoot down a Russian airplane and to overthrow a democratically elected Ukrainian government that was on good terms with Russia, substituting in its place an American puppet régime. With this background, we can understand that the dangerous situation facing the world is the product of the arrogant neocon policy of US world hegemony. The failures of judgement and the dangers in the Syrian and Ukrainian conflicts are themselves the consequences of the neocon ideology.
To perpetuate American hegemony, the neocons threw away the guarantees that Washington gave Gorbachyov that NATO wouldn’t move one inch to the East. The neocons pulled the USA out of the ABM Treaty, which specified that neither the USA nor Russia would develop and deploy anti-ballistic missiles. The neocons rewrote American war doctrine and elevated nuclear weapons from their role as a retaliatory force to a pre-emptive first strike force. The neocons began putting ABM bases on Russia’s borders, claiming that the bases were for the purpose of protecting Europe from non-existent Iranian nuclear ICBMs. Neocons and their puppets in the US government and media demonised Russia and Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin. For example, Hillary Clinton, a candidate for the Democratic nomination for president, declared Putin to be “the new Hitler”. A former CIA official called for Putin’s assassination. Presidential candidates in both parties are competing in terms of who can be the most aggressive toward Russia and the most insulting toward Russia’s president.
The effect was to destroy the trust between nuclear powers. The Russian government learned that Washington does not respect Washington’s own laws, much less international law, and that it can’t trust Washington to keep any agreement. This lack of trust, together with the aggression toward Russia spewing from Washington and the presstitute media and echoing in idiotic European capitals, established the ground for nuclear war. As NATO (essentially, the USA) has no prospect of defeating Russia in conventional war, much less defeating a Russo-Chinese alliance, any war would go nuclear. To avoid war, Putin is non-provocative and low-key in his responses to Western provocations. However, neocons misinterpret Putin’s responsible behaviour as a sign of weakness and fear. The neocons tell President Obama to keep the pressure on Russia, and Russia will give in. However, Putin made it clear that Russia won’t give in. Putin sent this message on many occasions. For example, on 28 September 2015, at the UN’s 70th anniversary, Putin said that Russia could no longer tolerate the state of affairs in the world. Two days later, Putin took command of the war against ISIS in Syria.
European governments, especially Germany and the UK, are complicit in the move toward nuclear war. These two American vassal states enable Washington’s reckless aggression toward Russia by repeating Washington’s propaganda and supporting Washington’s sanctions and interventions against other countries. As long as Europe remains nothing but Washington’s stooge, the prospect of Armageddon will continue to rise. At this time, we can only avoid nuclear war in two ways. One way is for Russia and China to surrender and accept Washington’s hegemony. The other way is for an independent leader in Germany, the UK, or France to rise to office and withdraw from NATO. That’d begin a stampede to leave NATO, which is Washington’s prime tool for causing conflict with Russia and, thereby, is the most dangerous force on earth to every European country and to the entire world. If NATO continues to exist, NATO, together with the neocon ideology of American hegemony, would make nuclear war inevitable.
28 December 2015
Paul Craig Roberts
Paul Craig Roberts: Institute for Political Economy
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2015/12/28/why-wwiii-is-on-the-horizon-paul-craig-roberts/
Editor:
Now, one can see why the Western media vilifies Jeremy Corbyn… he bids fair to pull the UK out of NATO. If he did so, the American policy would fall of its own weight. Without the UK, the USA would lose its best base near Europe (as the UK is on a series of islands, it’s immune to Russian land-power and uniquely suited to defence by American seapower… the only place in Europe so situated). You can also see why that self-same media excoriates and pooh-poohs Bernie Sanders… he’s Corbyn’s American analogue. If Corbyn were to become PM and Sanders POTUS… the neocon fancy would fall into the dust, dead. You can see why the media is frantic about both… it does its best to tell us how fringy and unelectable they are. I do detect an agenda in both cases… no doubt, you agree.
If you wish to avoid Thermonuclear Ragnarök, vote for Corbyn and Sanders. If we don’t survive, nothing else matters. If the house is on fire, termites in the storage shed don’t matter… do think on that.
BMD
Voices from Russia 
OFFICIAL Address of LNR Head of State I V Plotnitsky to the People of Kherson Oblast
Tags: civil unrest, Igor Plotnitsky, Kherson Oblast, LNR, Lugansk People's Republic, Novorossiya, political commentary, politics, Russia, Russian, Ukraine, Ukrainian Civil War, war and conflict
______________________________
OFFICIAL
Dear residents of Kherson!
I know that the citizens of the Lugansk People’s Republic watch your suffering from the looting and banditry committed by Kiev-junta aggressor battalions and so-called “Crimean Tatar” (who now call themselves “Kherson-Turkish”) militants with great concern and sympathy. These events resemble the ones we experienced in the spring of 2014. Then, the people of the Donbass staged peaceful demonstrations, to demand respect for their constitutional rights. However, Kiev didn’t engage in dialogue with a significant part of its citizens; instead, it unleashed the so-called “Anti-Terrorist Operation” against us. We had to take up arms… we had to endure bombing, shelling, siege, and lack of light and water. It came at a dear price, but we will defend our freedom, our legal right to be masters of our native land, not slaves! I hope that you’d will take into account our bitter experience. If we a fire breaks out in your house, you can’t just sit there, lock the door of your room, and refuse to get a bucket of water to put out the blaze. We need rapid, decisive, and substantive actions. Don’t wait until the terrorists impose their diktat in your cities and villages… they’ll accuse you of having brought the shelling on yourselves.
The current temporary junta in Kiev doesn’t need either peace or prosperity in the Donbass, or in Tavria, Volyn, Galicia, or the Slobozhanshchina. Present-day Kiev acts like a giant pump, ruthlessly and shamelessly sucking out all the life-juices from the weakening regions. Unfortunately, the LNR and Kherson Oblast don’t share a common border. Therefore, we can’t send you a humanitarian aid convoy directly. However, if your chosen people’s representatives come to us, we’d figure out a way how to help you. I’m sure that the struggle of Ukrainians for their constitutional rights will find sympathy in the Russian Federation, and even in the USA. It was no accident that US Vice President Biden, speaking before the Verkhovnaya Rada on 8 December, called on the people’s deputies to emulate the American model of a federal state. Unfortunately, Kiev didn’t hear his appeal. Together, we can make the oligarchs in power act in the interests of the people, not just their own bank-accounts.
Long live the future Kherson People’s Republic! Long live the coming United States of the Ukraine!
I V Plotnitsky
LNR Head of State
Official Website of the LNR Head of State
http://glava-lnr.su/content/obrashchenie-glavy-lnr-iv-plotnickogo-k-zhitelyam-hersonskoy-oblasti
Editor:
This is the first mention of a “United States of the Ukraine”… however, the word for “state” used is that for a sovereignty, not a US-style state. This means that Igor Venediktovich speaks of a CONFEDERATION… NOT a FEDERATION. That is, a collection of sovereign states with a common foreign policy, armed forces, and currency. This has the fingerprints of V V Putin and S V Lavrov all over it (especially, the latter). If such a polity were to emerge, it’d put the onus on the USA. Russia wouldn’t annex the Ukraine… it’d control it. That’s Putin’s preferred method… he’s not a cruel and sadistic Anglo American toddler (as one can see in Ted Cruz, Chilly Hilly, and Ben Carson). What’s more, any successor state would repudiate the debts of the junta… which’d fry the ice of the Yanks good and hard. It looks like Putin has the American neoliberals (“conservatives”) behind the Eight Ball. It couldn’t have happened to nicer folks…
BMD