Telling the Truth© By Lying

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PROPAGANDA, LIES AND NONSENSE, SYRIA, WAR ON RUSSIA

First the US “private, nonprofit” channel PBS (or, as they would say, were it Russian: mostly state-funded broadcaster) passed off Russian footage of strikes on Daesh oil facilities as US coalition strikes. This was easily caught because they left the Cyrillic letters on the footage.

Now their French allies have followed through. On a France 2 broadcast (or as they would say if this were something out of Russia – the fully state-owned France 2 TV station broadcast) while castigating the Russians for indiscriminate bombing, moaning about the very difficult choices that the US coalition have to make to seek out the targets, swaggering that every effort is made to avoid civilian casualties, illustrates the castigation, moaning and swaggering with….

….Russian videos.

This time they had the wit to crop the Cyrillic lettering out.

Watch the video for yourself.

The Collapse of Russia – Coming Soon!! Again!!

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PROPAGANDA, LIES AND NONSENSE, WAR ON RUSSIA

Stratfor – the “Shadow CIA” – has attracted some attention with its recent prediction that Russia will break apart in the next decade.

But Stratfor is very late to the party – the CIA, back around 2005, predicted that Russia “could fall apart at the seams in a decade and split into as many as eight different states”. Summarised here by The Independent.

The report, Global Trends 2015, has sparked a lively debate in Russia about the country’s territorial integrity and triggered passionate denunciations from some of Russia’s leading politicians. Its unflinchingly bleak assessment of Russia’s prospects has angered many at a time when the Russian government is doing its best to talk up the economy.

The fact that the gloomy prognosis comes from its old Cold War enemy makes it all the harder for Russia to swallow. But many ordinary Russians seem to share the CIA’s pessimism.

Blah blah blah, et cetera et cetera.

Oh, and Russia’s population is 13 million more than the CIA said it would be.

But, unfortunately for the CIA’s reputation, 2015, instead of being the Year of Russia’s Collapse turned out to be the Year of the Russian Threat Redivivus. Loudly trumpeted from all corners.

Getting back to Stratfor (The “Shadow CIA“), its prediction for 2025 is:

There will not be an uprising against Moscow, but Moscow’s withering ability to support and control the Russian Federation will leave a vacuum,” Stratfor warns. “What will exist in this vacuum will be the individual fragments of the Russian Federation.”

We expect Moscow’s authority to weaken substantially, leading to the formal and informal fragmentation of Russia” the report states, adding, “It is unlikely that the Russian Federation will survive in its current form.”

The breakout of Russia’s nuclear weapons stockpile will be “the greatest crisis of the next decade,” according to Stratfor.

And the US will have to figure out what to do about it, even if it means dispatching ground troops to secure loose weapons, materials, and delivery systems.

Note the quaint assumption that the USA will be in any sort of condition in ten years to do anything much anywhere.

So, I guess that Stratfor’s claim to the title of “Shadow CIA” mostly comes from its use of the CIA’s old, discarded and worn out crystal balls.

Either that or we have to believe that Russia breaks apart every decade and miraculously re-assembles itself without anyone noticing.

Today’s Putin Quotation

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn QUOTATIONS

I’ve always liked this one because, if you think about it, it really sums it all up. Systems, like communism or naziism, which are based on One Answer to all questions are, sooner or later, going to meet with a question they cannot answer. Democracy, which (properly understood, is simply pluralism), always has, somewhere, the answer to the question no one had earlier thought of.

History proves all dictatorships, all authoritarian forms of government are transient. Only democratic systems are intransient.

История убедительно свидетельствует, что все диктатуры, авторитарные системы правления преходящи. Непреходящей оказываются только демократические системы.

Putin “Russia at the turn of the millennium”, 1999, http://pages.uoregon.edu/kimball/Putin.htm

Growth of the Russian Government

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn HISTORY, PROPAGANDA, LIES AND NONSENSE

This from my Sitrep of 24 Sep 2010 bears repeating, I think. Many many people say Russia’s government is bigger today than it was, usually as part of a bill of indictment against Putin. The statement involves a considerable misunderstanding.

BUREAUCRACY. The Finance Minister said the other day that the number of federal bureaucrats was to be reduced by 100,000 over the next 3 years. World experience shows that this is much easier to say than to do. By the way, one of the many wrong things repeated by the Kommentariat is that Russia’s bureaucracy is bigger than it was in the Communist days. Not so: they forget the enormous CPSU structure that paralleled and directed the government structure. The overall total of state functionaries is surely much lower today. There was a sort of coup that took place in the 1990s in which the local GorIspolKoms (ie “government”) took over the local GorKom (CPSU) building. This can be seen in towns all over Russia if you look: the huge building on Lenin/October/Revolution Square that used to be the local Party HQ is now the City government. Vide Smolniy in St Petersburg.

Really Stupid Things Said About Russia

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PROPAGANDA, LIES AND NONSENSE, QUOTATIONS

but why not try to measure Russia’s greatness by its ability to build a free and prosperous country, a good global citizen at peace with its neighbors? This kind of Russia might also fare better at the Olympics. The four leading medals winners in Vancouver are free-market democracies.

“The Pride of Russia: An Olympic lesson for the Kremlin”, The Wall St Journal, 27 February 2010

 

Today’s Quotation About Putin

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PUTIN DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, QUOTATIONS

The Western enthusiasm for Mr Putin is difficult to understand. As befits a spy, his track record is almost invisible. He worked briefly for one of the country’s best-known reformers, Anatoly Sobchak. But his successful career in the FSB (as the KGB is now known) suggests that liberalism is not always his prime concern.

Only on one issue can we see just where Mr Putin stands. Very depressing it is, too. His conduct of the war in Chechnya – where civilians are as flies to wanton boys, killed for the Kremlin leaders’ sport – has been a cynical disgrace. There is mounting evidence, too, that the lethal bombings that provided popular support for the assault on Chechnya may have been the work of agents provocateurs.

The Independent, editorial, “Mr Putin Does Not Deserve Praise Unless He is a Catalyst for Change”, 28 march 2000, http://www.russialist.org/archives/4204.html

How to Read the Western Media

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PROPAGANDA, LIES AND NONSENSE

HOW TO READ THE WESTERN MEDIA. When they say Kiev forces have re-taken the airport, know that they have lost it. When they say giving up South Stream was a defeat for Putin, know it was a brilliant counter-move. When they say Russia is isolated (a stopped clock, here’s The Economist in 1999!), know that it is expanding its influence and connections every day. When they say Russians are turning against Putin, know that the opposite is true. When they speak of nation-building in the new Ukraine, know it’s degenerating into armed thuggery (see video). Know that when they speak of Kyrzbekistan, they’re not just stenographers, they’re incompetent stenographers. Take what they say, turn it upside down, and you’ll have a better take on reality.

RF Sitrep 20150129

Today’s Quotation About Putin

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn PUTIN DERANGEMENT SYNDROME, QUOTATIONS

We’re still hoping to get that glimpse of Mr. Putin’s soul that President Bush talked about last month — the one that convinced him that the Russian president “is a straightforward, honest man” and “a remarkable leader” whom his administration can trust. In the absence of such insight, we must rely on Mr. Putin’s public acts — which continue to be those of a budding autocrat who is systematically liquidating his country’s free press, responding to restless minorities with lies and dirty war and seeking to restore Russian influence in the world by supporting and encouraging such enemies of the United States as Iraq.

Washington Post Editorial, 5 July 2001 https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/opinions/2001/07/05/glimpses-of-mr-putins-soul/ae14ed02-db77-478b-ac26-a600d7253991/

RUSSIAN FEDERATION SITREP 28 January 2016

On By Patrick ArmstrongIn RF SITREP

MY VERY OWN WEBSITE. I hereby announce Russia Observer. I’m gradually back-filling it with stuff I’ve written since I retired in May 2008. Also putting up selections from my extensive list of quotations by and about Putin. He was treated as a monstrum horrendum right from the start. Pity that lazy Western reporters didn’t bother to go to St Petersburg to see what people thought of their Deputy Mayor; we might be in a more rational place today if they had.

LITVINENKO. My thoughts in 2007. Thoughts in 2016: 1) to say “probably” is to admit you haven’t proven your case and 2) a twelve-year old could figure out Putin didn’t do it.

SOMETHING HAPPENING? The Litvinenko nonsense and the Putin-Richest-Man-In-The-World nonsense (where does he find the time to spend it? he’s always working) make me wonder if there is something to the rumour that the US and Russia are trying to do a deal on Ukraine and/or Syria. Given that neither deal would be what Washington originally wanted, maybe it’s time for a little feel-good vilification to distract from two more foreign policy catastrophes.

GOLD. The Central Bank of Russia says it now has 1415 tonnes, up 208.4 last year.

FOOD. More points on the curve: over-supply of potatoes and turkey production up about a third. Even the one-dollar newsmagazine notices: “One of the unintended consequences of Russia’s self-imposed food sanctions has been a strange and wonderful renaissance in its cuisine… that has transformed Moscow into one of the most interesting culinary capitals of Europe.” Ditto.

CORRUPTION. Putin chaired a meeting of the Presidential Council for Countering Corruption and gave some numbers: “In the first 9 months of 2015 alone more than 8,800 people were convicted on criminal charges of corruption. Disciplinary action was taken against almost 11,000 officials for violations of the anti-corruption standards.” Is that a lot or a little? I must say I’m tired of seeing “corruption” used in a simple-minded way as a stick to beat Russia with. Certainly there is a great deal of small corruption there but I suspect that our side has more big corruption. It’s rather simple-minded to explain away Clinton’s enormous speaking fees from interested parties as being due to their understandable curiosity to hear her insights.

SYRIA. A Russian MoD spokesman gives the numbers: since September 5,662 sorties (145 from the big guys) and 97 cruise missiles. Intelligent and well-informed discussion of the state of play here at SST. Some new Russian videos here. Also humanitarian aid.

ENGAGEMENT. Japan’s PM and Canada’s Foreign Minister making noises about engagement with Russia. Hollande also. One can hope, but people are soon jerked back into line, aren’t they?

RUBLE. With Iran back in business as an oil exporter – the first ships are on their way to Japan and China now – the price of oil is likely to drop some more and the ruble to take another hit. Which it has. A good thing says this man, given the decline in energy prices because Russia produces oil in rubles which it sells for dollars.

MEDIA. Ever since a German reporter revealed the extent of CIA control and the lies against Russia went over the top, Germans have been abandoning their media outlets. And a new revelation shows the extent of government censorship. Don’t see the same in the Anglosphere although perusal of comments and all the scare-mongering about “Putin trolls” shows the spinmeisters know their line isn’t selling.

IRAN. UN sanctions lifted and so Iran returns. A victory for Tehran and now we face a world in which the endless US warring in the Middle East has made it more powerful than it would have been. Another unintended result.

TODAY’S ENTERTAINMENT. “The Negativists are Wrong on Ukraine“. “Europe is in crisis. Once more, America will have to step in to save us“. “Poland’s government rails against foreign oppression. But its vision for the country was born in Moscow“. Strong evidence of the existence of a parallel universe. I’d say.

MINSK. Kiev’s envoy at the Trilateral Contact Group says it’s impossible to talk about elections or constitutional changes in Eastern Ukraine without resuming control over the Ukraine-Russia border. Well, the Minsk Agreement pretty clearly says different. So who’s holding up implementation?

© Patrick Armstrong Analysis, Canada Websites: ROPV, US-Russia, Russia Insider, Russia Observer