Category Archives: Russia

Links – Russia in Syria – Medieval and Absolute Dictatorship

04 Friday Sep 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Facsimile Bipolar Political Sociopathy, Political Psychology, Politics, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Syria

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Despite strong denials from Moscow, Russian airborne troops are preparing to land in Syria to fight Islamic State forces. The surprise attack on Monday, Aug. 31, by ISIS forces on the Qadam district of southern Damascus, in which they took over parts of the district – and brought ISIS forces the closest that any Syrian anti-Assad group has ever been to the center of the Syrian capital – is expected to accelerate the Russian military intervention.

http://www.jewsnews.co.il/2015/09/02/debkafile-russia-gearing-up-to-be-first-world-power-to-insert-ground-forces-into-syria/ – 9/2/2015.

Location: Syria’s Theater of the Real.

Producers: Putin, Assad, Khamenei.

Title of the Show: “Assad vs The Terrorists”.

Cast of extras, dead and alive: 250,000 dead; 9 million displaced or refugee.

Most Memorable Set Design: Homs, fashioned by barrel bombing to look like Hiroshima the day after.

Casting Dilemma: Getting Baghdadi’s fighters and other al-Qaeda-type elements to play their parts without knowing it.

Method: Bomb the al-Qaeda units less than ordinary Syrians.

Why: For Putin, post-Soviet Russia becomes neo-feudal Russia, and he’s the boss; for Assad, in the age of the “War on Terror” no spectacle could be more glorious than playing the lead in “Assad vs The Terrorists”; for Khamenei, a grand and sustained Shiite vs Sunni Battle perpetuates the medieval justification for his authority, however much he may care to abuse it.

CAUTION: From the Second Row Seat to History

Journalists in-country have an observation deck limited to their eyes and ears, but they may with accuracy report what they see and what they hear; journalists scouting the web for opinion and news in any area of interest necessarily receive all information one step removed from Being There and may be vulnerable to disinformation, in this instance information intended to change the character of the Syrian Tragedy — AKA either “Assad vs The Terrorists” or “Assad vs A Good Portion of the Syrian People” — and draw opposed powers into the field.

That noted, the world has seen also its share of barrel bombing videos and stills, read multiple reports involving at least one period of chemical warhead deployment — and seen Russia agree to neutralize and remove those munitions — and followed either the development of large Syrian refugee camps in Lebanon or Turkey, or, this week, witnessed the aftermath of drownings of ordinary people and their children, real people, Syrian refugees.

The world may also recall watching another production — the $52 billion Winter Olympics at Sochi during February 2014.  However, probably overlooked by the public at large that month (February 10, to be exact) was the headline and lede in The New York Times: “Russia and China Skip Security Council Meeting on Humanitarian Aid to Syria”:

UNITED NATIONS — The morning after an aid convoy came under fire when it tried to reach a besieged Syrian city, a meeting here on a draft resolution that would force all parties in the bloody conflict to allow access for humanitarian organizations fell apart when representatives from Russia and China failed to show up, United Nations Security Council diplomats said.

Perhaps Syrians would do well to borrow some mid-20th Century Jewish wisdom: Never Forget.

New evidence proves Russian military directly engaging in Syrian Civil War

The regime’s offensive in the Lattakia Governorate continues to reveal previously unknown details about Russia’s involvement in the Syrian Civil War. Apart from the sighting of recently delivered Russian BTR-82A infantry fighting vehicles (IFVs), new evidence now confirmes Russian military personnel has a key role in leading the offensive on the ground.

http://spioenkop.blogspot.com/2015/08/new-evidence-proves-russian-military.html – 8/29/2015.

“We are aware of reports that Russia may have deployed military personnel and aircraft to Syria, and we are monitoring those reports quite closely,” said spokesman Josh Earnest.

“Any military support to the Assad regime for any purpose, whether it’s in the form of military personnel, aircraft supplies, weapons, or funding, is both destabilizing and counterproductive.”

http://news.yahoo.com/white-house-monitoring-reports-russian-military-syria-213836626.html – 9/3/2015.

http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-34131573 – “Syria conflict: How far is Russia prepared to bolster Assad?”  — 9/2/2015.

On August 22, the Bosphorus Naval News website showed the Alligator-class Russian ship Nikolai Filchenkov, part of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, two days earlier passing through Istanbul’s famed waterway en route to an unknown location in the Mediterranean (hint, hint).

But what was remarkable about the Filchenkov was that military equipment was visible on deck . . . .

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/09/01/russia-puts-boots-on-the-ground-in-syria.html – 9/1/2015.

http://www.ynetnews.com/articles/0,7340,L-4696268,00.html “Russian jets in Syrian skies” – 8/31/2015.

http://www.newsweek.com/why-putin-sending-troops-syria-368436 – 9/3/2015 – (by Elliott Abrams).

http://www.ft.com/intl/cms/s/0/c417e912-5479-11e5-b029-b9d50a74fd14.html#axzz3kz4QStb1 – “US voices concern to Russia over military moves in Syria” – 9/6/2015.

Sideways Related on BackChannels

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2014/12/02/quote-manipulation-about-the-plo-leader-pacepa-and-rychlak-2013/ – 12/2/2014.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2015/05/20/link-yarmouk-played/ – 5/20/2015.

Update: September 29, 2015 – From the Daily Beast, Aug. 23, 2015

Based on extensive fieldwork in one village in the North Caucasus, reporter Elena Milashina has concluded that the “Russian special services have controlled” the flow of jihadists into Syria, where they have lately joined up not only with ISIS but other radical Islamist factions. In other words, Russian officials are adding to the ranks of terrorists which the Russian government has deemed a collective threat to the security and longevity of its dictatorial ally on the Mediterranean, Bashar al-Assad.

http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2015/08/23/russia-s-playing-a-double-game-with-islamic-terror0.html – 8/23/2015.

Update: October 19, 2015: From The New York Review of books, July 11, 2012 – By Michael Ignatius

The Syrian conflict has triggered something more fundamental than a difference of opinion over intervention, something more than an argument about whether the Security Council should authorize the use of force. Syria is the moment in which the West should see that the world has truly broken into two. A loose alliance of struggling capitalist democracies now finds itself face to face with two authoritarian despotisms—Russia and China—something new in the annals of political science: kleptocracies that mix the market economy and the police state. These regimes will support tyrannies like Syria wherever it is in their interest to do so.

http://www.nybooks.com/blogs/nyrblog/2012/jul/11/syria-proxy-war-russia-china/

Update: October 20, 2015: From The Guardian, October 3, 2015

Another FSA officer, Colonel Abdulsalam Almerei, commander of Talbeissa operations in northern Homs, told me two days ago after his brigade was attacked by Russian aeroplanes: “We have no Isis here, we are fighting for our freedom and dignity. We want a united Syria for all Syrians. We do not want to oppress any sect or change one tyranny with another.”

Assad and his backers have jeopardised the national and territorial integrity of Syria. Many Syrians have lost faith in the UN; they feel that the international community has abandoned them to the barbaric killing machines of Assad and Isis. The international law states that the principle of responsibility to protect civilians overrides the principle of sovereignty of states when a government kills its own people.

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2015/oct/04/syria-russia-assad-isis-conflict

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FTAC – Syria – A Terrible Puzzle

01 Tuesday Sep 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Islamic Small Wars, Political Psychology, Religion, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Syria

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The world has been dealt a terrible puzzle: Syndicate Red Brown Green (Shiite) has through “Red” (post-Soviet neo-feudal Russia) a nuclear armed block to its ability to impose its better nature; “Brown Green” — national socialist, Islamist (Sunni side) promotes a program unpalatable most to those whose humanity, sense of justice, and sentiment could motivate intercession despite a nuclear armed Russia and an Iran positioned to acquire a similar capability if given about a year’s lead surreptitiously. Change those politics. I think Putin-Assad-Khamenei cannot get off their track by way of their investment in a medieval world view intended to keep themselves in power to the end of time. Baghdadi is about in the same place, but others might not be.

The God (concept) intended by the Jews was thrown out beyond the universe, made greater than even the universe, and with finality separated from humans, even Moses — and not even Moses parts the waters — and this is why. Somewhere between Assad and ISIS, the middle must pioneer its way, cast off the medieval, reach for something more human, more kind, more modern, more present, more survivable, more evolving, more progressing.

Perhaps when Syrians involved in fighting perceive their jihad as one involving the middle against the extremes, they will be on their way to peace.

For this day, dependence on the medieval concentration of power in one dictator, dynasty, junta, or nobility masks off the potential for a greater future.  “Syndicate Red Brown Green” appears to be playing — by having other people die for its privileges –for the feudal mode and the perpetual war needed to keep the criminally powerful and wealthy in business for generations.

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FTAC – Soviet to Syria – Now

01 Tuesday Sep 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Syria

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Blame Berezovsky (the wealthy man who effectively upgraded Putin’s political clout — http://www.thedailybeast.com/…/how-boris-berezovsky…). The Russians, as a people, and Afghanistan as a financial black hole for military expansion, managed to derail the Soviet (dissolved December 26, 1991); however, hardline privileged had already produced a plan to outlive the Soviet (reference: Karen Dawisha – http://www.miamioh.edu/…/cultural…/putins-russia/ – and the results of that today plus the Islamist stance of the opposition (Assad needed “the terrorists” for his play, “Assad vs The Terrorists”) has led to today’s mass murder and destruction in Syria.

Compression and distillation matter.

The ability of the average victims of fascist and feudal sociopaths may depend on a quick pickup on critical information — accurate, clear, complete (delivered honesty and with the highest integrity) — and the independent discernment and both personal and public political decision making it enables.

A good telegraphy should open on to new worlds, truth revealing and trustworthy.

For those with the necessary time and resources (and intellectual freedom), the Russian Section of the Library of this blog provides ample reference for seeing the Putin machinery as it worked across the president’s years in power and across the arc of the impositions of the Soviet Era.

For those horrified by the destruction wrought by Assad in Syria and determined to address it, BackChannels suggests addressing first endemic Syrian anti-Semitism and anti-westernism, which may contribute to blocking greater western intercession — actually, at the moment, any intercession — in Syria.

For a look at the Russian contribution to man’s inhumanity to man as overseen by President Putin, Oryx, a blog oriented to military tactics, provides a look through such articles as “New evidence proves Russian military directly engaging in Syrian Civil War” (August 29, 2015) and “Captured Russian spy facility reveals the extent of Russian aid to the Assad regime” (October 6, 2014) — and there’s more between those dates.

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Ukraine – Orphan?

06 Monday Jul 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Eurasia, Europe, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Ukraine

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Posted to YouTube June 30, 2015.

The Ukrainian Security Service (SBU) has prepared a dossier laying out evidence for what it calls “Russian aggression against Ukraine.”

The report alleges there are some 9,000 Russian troops deployed in Ukraine, forming 15 battalion tactical groups. The force includes about 200 tanks, more than 500 armored fighting vehicles, and some 150 artillery systems, according to the dossier.

Coalson, Robert.  “Who Are The Russian Generals That Ukraine Says Are Fighting In The Donbas?”  Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, July 3, 2015.

In today’s Washington Post, Jackson Diehl notes Russia’s suspension of gas deliveries to Ukraine and the west’s distractions with Greece and Iran, asking at the end of his piece “Will this be remembered as the summer when the West let Ukraine die?”

I won’t give away his answer.

My hope: I hope not.

Remember Yanukovych Leaks and the state-borne internal piracy that drove Ukrainians to give Putin’s stooge the boot.

Remember Putin’s $52 billion Sochi Winter Olympics, which obscene spending ignored and masked off the hundreds of thousands dead in Syria and the nearly 10 million displace while Putin-Assad-Khamenei fairly cultivated “The Terrorists” for Assad’s Big Political Theater and Khamenei’s teleological commitment to bringing forth the Great Shiite vs Sunni Battle.

Remember Yulia Marushveska — says Anna Nemtsova recently, “She’s a Beautiful, Passionate Voice for Ukraine, But That’s Not Enough” (The Daily Beast, June 28, 2015):

“I want you to know why thousands of people all over my country are on the streets,” she said to the global audience, her voice full of feeling. “There is only one reason: They want to be free from a dictatorship. … We are civilized people but our government are barbarians. This is not a Soviet Union.” The video has since been seen by more than 8.3 million people.

Remember “Syndicate Red Brown Green” and the smaller feudal and mafia-style relationships: Putin-Assad-Khamenei; Putin-Khamenei; Jobbik-Iran; Putin-Orban; Putin-Erdogan, which looks shaky today.

Remember how Assad nurtured Syria’s al-Qaeda Typicals.

Remember Milan Kundera’s famous statement about remembering: “The struggle of man against power is the struggle of memory against forgetting.”

The main purpose of keeping the Donbas conflict in a smoldering state is to let Putin remain in power. The Donbas war will distract the Russians and help Putin stay in power, the ex-FSB officer said.

Zik.  “Ex-FSB officer throws light on Putin’s games around Donbas.”  July 6, 2015.

The BackChannel’s term for what Putin (and Putin and Khamenei together) represent in contemporary political possibility: “21st Century Neo-Feudalism”.

Dzerzhinsky may be a Communist saint, but the symbolism of the prince’s statue is inescapable. It will celebrate the new Vladimir, not just the old one. This may be obvious, but the subject is avoided in polite conversation.

There are other topics — rising prices, the fighting in Ukraine, the shape of things to come — that people don’t like to think about, even though these subjects are at times unavoidable. The economy is entering “a full-fledged crisis,” former Finance Minister Alexei Kudrin told Parliament recently. He warned that Russia’s gross domestic product is forecast to be 4 percent lower this year than it was in 2014. Meanwhile, food prices are rising. Official figures indicate a 23 percent jump for the year ending in March, but an informal survey of grocers in my neighborhood suggests a 30 percent jump is more realistic.

Trudolyubov, Maxim.  “Russia’s Virtual Universe.”  The New York Times, July 5, 2015.

But Vyrypaev’s wider summing-up was admirably succinct: “This means that [the state] has the right to intervene, to control, direct, grow, regulate, monitor, and finally to develop the cultural process. It means that the state assumes the role of a kind of spiritual and educational shepherd for the people.”

Birchenough, Tom.  “theartsdesk in Moscow: Free thought vs cultural politics
How heavy is the official hand bearing down on Russian culture today?”  The Arts Desk, July 5, 2015.

While Obama has for the public paired Putin with Soviet revanche, it’s not the Soviet that Putin (and the KGB cum FSB organization) have brought to Russia: “feudalism”, “state capitalism”, “neo-feudalism” better describe what Putin has done — is doing —  to the Russians.

Related Reference

AP. “Land mine explosion in eastern Ukraine kills 5 soldiers, wounds 3 as fighting grinds on.”  Fox News, July 5, 2015.

Avedissian, Karena.  “The power of Electric Yerevan.”  Open Democracy, July 6, 2015: “The corruption and mismanagement of ENA reflect wider problems of governance and the political environment in Russia. When Russian state-owned companies (in which theft is not the exception but the norm) take over infrastructure in neighbouring countries, this is, in effect, ‘exporting corruption’.”

Batchelor, John.  “Obama’s ultimatums to Putin fall on deaf ears.”  Al Jazeera, July 3, 2015.

BBC.  “Nemtsov daughter condemns Russian media ‘propaganda’.”  June 9, 2015.

Castner, Jennifer.  “In Putin’s Russia, Environmentalists Face Stiff Repression.”  Earth Island Journal, June 30, 2015.

Center for Transatlantic Relations.  “This Week in Ukraine” (viewed as compiled July 2, 2015).

Connolly, Kate.  “Obama lambasts Putin: you’re wrecking Russia to recreate Soviet empire.”  The Guardian, June 8, 2015.

Gray, Rosie.  “Pro-Putin Think Tank Based in New York Shuts Down.”  BuzzFeed News, June 30 2015.

Gutterman, Steve.  “Russia blocks internet sites of Putin critics.”  Reuters, March 13, 2014.

Horvath, Ani.  “Hungary’s Viktor Orban antagonizes European Union with border fence, Russia embrace.”  The Washington Times, July 2, 2015.

Isachenkov, Vladimir.  “Putin: Russia is going to spend $400 billion upgrading its military.”  AP via Business Insider, June 26, 2015.

Popova, Polina.  “Freedom of speech under fire in Ukraine.”  The Hill, June 16, 2015.  (The story becomes convoluted as official Ukraine responds to the assault of Russian propaganda: writes Popova, “Some journalists fear that the ministry was actually created to muffle internal opposition, rather than tackling Russian propaganda. It’s not surprising that it has earned the Orwellian nickname “the Ministry of Truth”).

Not a few Russian intellectuals, depressed by the Orwellian state of Russian public discourse, have come to see Ukrainian cities as the hope for the future of Russian culture. In this light, the Russian invasion of Ukraine to protect freedom of speech in the Russian language is perhaps better compared to America invading Canada to save the welfare state or North Korea invading South Korea to protect capitalism.

Snyder, Timothy.  “Ukraine’s easy, misunderstood Babel.”  Politico, July 2-3, 2015.

The Chosunilbo.  “Russia Bans Internet Database Archive.”  July 6, 2015.  (The story concerns the “Wayback Machine” and, indeed, the suppression of questionable material).

Vasilyeva, Nataliya.  “Russian opposition star campaigns against apathy, but Kremlin media drowns him out.”  U.S. News & World Report, July 1, 2015.

Weiss, Michael.  “The Kremlin’s $220 Million Man: Igor Shuvalov, Russia’s deputy prime minister, is supposed to have the cleanest hands in the Kremlin. So where’d he get a quarter of a billion dollars?”  Foreign Policy, October 29, 2014.

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The Big Fade – Or Not? Where Goes the Phantom of the Cold War?

23 Tuesday Jun 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, FTAC - From The Awesome Conversation, Iran, Lebanon, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Syria, Ukraine

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Yesterday left off with “Putin, Erdogan meet face to face, but don’t see eye to eye” (Al-Monitor, June 19, 2015).

Trouble in “Hellidise” for the world’s most fabulous feudal lords?

Hmm.

Should some friction not attend Syria’s fragmenting implosion brought about by the implied bloody script this blog has referred to as “Assad vs The Terrorists”?

Sanctions have been up for a while; oil prices have been down for a while: such broad conditions brought about by large maneuvers, like “North American energy independence“, may have effects.

As a trading partner, Erdogan may have a little more edge with Putin these days; as a Sunni Muslim looking over the border and watching Daesh and other al-Qaeda-type groups continuing to rough up and tear apart Syria’s landscape, he has cause to let the scouring continue.  The teleology on which he has campaigned pits him against Putin-Assad-Khamenei’s interests on the Hezbollahian (militant Shiite) side of the great divide most immediately applicable to the continuing Great Struggle of Evil Against Evil in Syria, the modern and moderate, whoever they may be (ye shall know them one still distant day by their pro-Semitic / pro-Zionist lingo), having been killed, dispersed, rendered irrelevant, or otherwise sidelined for some years now.

This day appears to be closing (for me) with tomorrow’s news (gotta love the International Dateline): “US to deploy heavy weapons on NATO’s eastern flank” (AFP, Yahoo, June 24, 2015).

From my portion of The Awesome Conversation:

While generally attaching Erdogan to Putin-Khamenei as another medieval-minded autocrat with strong interest in sustaining feudal models of power against the democratic west, there may be some unraveling within this drift as depressed oil revenues (for Russia), other punitive measures (like sanctions), and some military repositioning take place in response to Russia’s aggression in Crimea. For Erdogan, whether he likes it or not (I’m starting to appreciate that phrase), Turkey remains a NATO member with a significant modern constituency. While Erdogan wants his White Palace — I think he’s moved in, I’m not sure — the whole world is watching in an open and robust global information environment. For that, both leaders may have a little less operating room as despots than they may have had 25 years ago.

&

The “big picture” — how the feudal world may change as the modern one moves around it — is easier (for me) to see today than was the case just a few years ago.

From an amateur’s perspective, the smaller pictures might require country specialization and language ability. It’s just easier following heads of state than the numerous personalities, agencies, and committees involved in producing the world’s political landscapes and their narratives.

The long diplomacy and now evident maneuvering have been dangerous, of course, but even portrayed as playing poker against Obama’s chess, Putin’s own programming has a predictable aspect to it.  Via the day’s e-mail feed, World Affairs promoted “Imperial Ambitions: Russia’s Military Buildup” (May/June 2015):

In September 2014, Russian President Vladimir Putin boasted that he could, at will, occupy any Eastern European capital in two days. This apparently spontaneous utterance reveals, probably more than Russia’s new official defense doctrine, Moscow’s true assessment of NATO’s capabilities, cohesion, and will to resist. In an echo of Soviet tactics, it also reflects Putin’s reflexive recourse to intimidation—e.g., unwarranted boasting about Russian military capabilities and intentions—as a negotiating strategy. In 2014 alone, Moscow repeatedly threatened the Baltic and Nordic states and civilian airliners, heightened intelligence penetration, deployed unprecedented military forces against those states, intensified overflights and submarine reconnaissance, mobilized nuclear forces and threats, deployed nuclear-capable forces in Kaliningrad, menaced Moldova, and openly violated the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty of 1987.

Much of Putin’s tenure has been about a Russian feudal revanche complete with “New Nobility” and a $51 billion winter spectacle (Sochi, while Syria’s Assad was barrel bombing millions of Syrians out of their lives and homes to make way for The Terrorists by refraining from doing the same to them at the time).

As noted in passing, while Khamenei may be going gangbusters with wars by proxy, one may wonder today how much the same have cost him by way of the continuing faith and loyalty of those patronized.  The public talk-and-walk by Nasrallah may not change much, and, indeed, if the enemy nearby is Daesh or another of the type, the situation demands that he inspire and prepare his community for greater challenges to come, and that he keep his backers happy, but the same now take place in an atmosphere of stalemate over a wartorn landscape.

Such combat proves not a fast game but an agonizingly slow grind.

Where the finger-pointing takes place — how could it not be taking place offstage? — some portion must point back to Moscow and Tehran — Putin and Khamenei — for perverting a mild people’s revolution in Damascus to hold together the Ghosts of the Soviet and the maintenance of old and new privileged through time-honored and familiar but perfectly despicable feudal practices.

Sideways and Forward

Laub, Karin (AP).  “New think tank in Jordan watching Israel shows discreet, growing ties between countries.”  U.S. News & World Report, June 22, 2015.

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Link – Ukraine – On War

28 Thursday May 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Links, Politics, Russia, Ukraine

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War robs you of everything including your humanity. After the war, things are never like they used to be – it takes several generations to eradicate or simply to forget its tragic consequences.

However, all the valuable things, including peace, have their price. Most Europeans naively believe that it’s been paid by their grandparents and great-grandparents during WWI and WWII, but the truth is that this valuable thing is extremely fragile and requires continuous work to keep it alive.

Lidžita (Translator: Albina Griniūtė): “War at our doorstep, or what we are calling for.”  Free Ukraine, May 28, 2015.

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Link – Criticism of Patrick Cockburn Also Tells About A Post-Soviet “Theater of the Real”

28 Thursday May 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Iran, Iraq, Islamic Small Wars, Middle East, Politics, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green, Syria

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By contrast, Cockburn takes a generous view of the regime’s belated and brief confrontation with ISIS. He has pronounced Assad’s army its “main military opponent,” deserving of Western support. But facts tell a different story. According to a Carter Center study, the regime has spared ISIS in 90 percent of its attacks; and an IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Center (JTIC) study finds that in 2014, the regime targeted ISIS in only 6 percent of its attacks. (ISIS in turn directed its fire on the regime in only 13 percent its operations.)

Ahmad, Muhammad Idrees.  “Who’s Lying About Syria’s Christian Massacre?”  The Daily Beast, May 27, 2015.

Since Aboud Dandachi laid out the shaping of the battle by Assad forces in his refreshingly honest and entertaining history and polemic, The Doctor, The Eye Doctor and Me: Analogies and Parallels Between the World of Doctor Who and the Syrian Conflict (2014), the feudal perversion of a modest pro-democracy protest in 2011 into a brutal epic one might title “Assad vs The Terrorists” has been apparent but the statistics on how it was done never so well relayed.

BackChannels (oh the bias!) commonly invokes the term “Putin-Assad-Khamenei” in place of Bashar al-Assad alone to play up the axis, its Russo-Iranian core, and define the conflict in Syria as other and greater than “civil war”, a mere internal dispute, the greater dispute being that between medieval absolute power and modern democratic distributed or popular power.

Additional Reference

Amazon.com: The Doctor,The Eye Doctor and Me: Analogies and Parallels Between The World of Doctor Who and the Syrian Conflict.  eBook: Aboud Dandachi: Kindle Store – Kindle Edition, 94-101, 2/17/2014.

BackChannels.  “From Syria – The Doctor, the Eye Doctor, and Me – A Damning Statement.”  February 28, 2014.

Pulse.  “Syria: Beyond the Red Line” — “An important discussion on Syria, hosted by the Frontline Club, featuring Jonathan Littell, Orwa Nyrabia, Laila Alodaat, and Nerma Jelacic.”  Video featured.  May 28, 2015.

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Link – Operating in the Good Old Red (Brown)

14 Thursday May 2015

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Politics, Russia, Syndicate Red Brown Green

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In reacting to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and support for pro-Russian separatists in Ukraine in early 2014, the US government did not call the Sixth Fleet into action; it did not ban all exports to Russia; it did not stop all cultural and educational exchanges. Rather, key elites close to “a senior Russian government official”—President Vladimir Putin—were targeted with asset seizures and visa bans.

Probably the most serious international crisis since the end of the Cold War, and the White House targets individuals? It seemed an odd response to some observers. But it made sense. At last, after 14 years of dealing with Putin as a legitimate head of state, the US government has finally acknowledged that he has built a system based on massive predation on a level not seen in Russia since the czars. Transparency International estimates the annual cost of bribery in Russia at $300 billion, roughly equal to the entire gross domestic product of Denmark, or many times higher than the Russian budgetary allocations for health and education. Capital flight totaled $335 billion from 2005 to 2013, or about 5 percent of GDP. But then in 2014, with the ruble and oil prices tumbling, it reached more than $150 billion—a figure that has swollen Western bank coffers but made Russia the most unequal of all economies, in which, according to Credit Suisse, 110 billionaires control 35 percent of the country’s wealth.

Dawisha, Karen.  “The Putin Principle: How it Came to Rule Russia.”  World Affairs, May/June 2015.

Red.  Brown.  Green.

Fascist.

Lawless.

Thieving.

And getting away with it!

There’s now plenty of BackChannels opinion on “Syndicate Red Brown Green”, a clever collection of books (in the “The Russian Section” of the library), but no prescriptions and not much hope for those in the Russian oppositions being ground away or controlled for irrelevance by the “Vertical of Power”.   The states of affairs may be ascertained swiftly with a glance at the web sites of well known critics.

Alexey Navalny

Gary Kasparov

Mikhail Kodorkovsky

Let BackChannels know when the outlook of each brightens.

The report, titled Putin. War, asserts that at least 150 Russian military personnel were killed during a Ukrainian offensive in August 2014. A further 70 — including 17 paratroopers from the city of Ivanovo — were reportedly killed during fighting near the bitterly contested town of Debaltseve in January and February.

Families of those killed in 2014 were given 2 million rubles ($39,000) by the government in exchange for signing a promise not to discuss the matter publicly, the report claims.

Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.  “Nemtsov Reports Says More Than 200 Russian Soldiers Killed in Ukraine.”  May 14, 2015.

Gratuitous.

Posted to YouTube July 2013.

The great forces today are not in the “masses” or the “voting public” but in the construction and intentions of “adventurous governments” and otherwise integrated and stable ones.  Among the “adventurous”: Putin, Assad, Khamenei, Orban, Erdogan, among others; “integrated and stable”: the classically liberal democracies of the world.  The figure of “Everyman” shrugs before, sometimes beneath, these altogether large forces.

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