Tag Archives: Vladimir Putin

Also in Media: Mark Galeotti on “How Russia Manages Its Political War in Europe”

02 Monday Oct 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Also in Media, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Notes On Reading BackChannels, Political Psychology, Political Spychology, Politics

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ECFR218-Graphic-PSA

Source and Recommended Reading

http://www.ecfr.eu/page/-/ECFR228_-_CONTROLLING_CHAOS1.pdf

“Listen: we engage in foreign policy the way we engage in war, with every means, every weapon, every drop of blood. But like in war, we depend on both the strategy of the general in the High Command, and the bravery and initiative of the soldier in the trench.”

Russian former diplomat, 2017

Russia sees ‘active measures’ (aktivnye meropriyatiya) – from supporting populist parties through disinformation and espionage campaigns, all the way to incidents such as the attempted coup in Montenegro – as an essential part of its efforts to influence Europe.  Along with the usual instruments of foreign influence, such as diplomacy and economic levers, Russia is especially active in using covert and non-traditional means, from intelligence operations to military pressure and even organised crime, all of which have been the foci of recent policy briefs for ECFR.3 This final publication in an informal series seeks instead to consider the extent to which these campaigns are carefully planned and coordinated – and, if so, by whom.

Approximate date of publication: September 2017.

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Also in Media: “When The Left Longed For Russian Political Interference” – The Daily Beast – January 29, 2017

29 Sunday Jan 2017

Posted by in Also in Media

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Today, tweets from the President of the United States Donald J. Trump seem to suggest both trust of and a growing friendship for today’s Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Of course, Putin was himself a former KGB agent, who obviously learned well the methods of disinformation and propaganda taught him in KGB school decades ago. Now he used these techniques to, as the CIA report put it, to order “an influence campaign in 2016 aimed at the US presidential election. Russia’s goals were to undermine public faith in the US democratic process, denigrate Secretary Clinton, and harm her electability and potential presidency.”

Source: When The Left Longed For Russian Political Interference – The Daily Beast

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Address: Christopher Steele’s 2016 Report Involving President Elect Donald J. Trump

17 Tuesday Jan 2017

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, Political Spychology, Politics

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Mark Schoofs, Investigations and Projects Editor at Buzzfeed (Twitter page), appears to have uploaded to “Document Cloud” the Christopher Steele report on President Elect Trump:

Company Intelligence Report 2016/080: US Presidential Election: Republican Candidate Donald Trump’s Activities in Russia and Compromising Relationship with the Kremlin

Of note cogent to the ever philosophical BackChannels: this wrap in the first point:

Source C, a senior Russian financial official said the TRUMP operation should be seen in terms of PUTIN’s desire to return to Nineteenth Century ‘Great Power’ politics anchored upon countries interests rather than the ideals-based international order established after World War Two.  S/he had overheard PUTIN talking in this way to close associates on several occasions.

The “Great Power politics” noted would seem to jive with BackChannels assertions about “Medieval Political Absolutism” vs “Modern Democratic and Checked Distributions of Political Power.”

Additional Reference

The US intelligence community has made no determination as of yet on the contents, but has deemed the documents sufficiently credible to warrant further investigation and included a summary of the dossier in briefing materials for both President Obama and President-elect Trump. It is worth noting that these leaders are all career professionals, including two non-political appointees, FBI Director James Comey and NSA Director Mike Rogers, who have zero incentive to pick a fight with their future boss.

The author, former British intelligence Russia expert Chris Steele, is a highly regarded and experienced professional known for his integrity and professionalism; not the kind of guy to invent stuff out of thin air.

Dowling, Nick.  “Is the Christopher Steele dossier fake news?”  CNN, January 17, 2017.

Updated Reference – From January 25, 2017

The assertion that he was the source of the document’s unsubstantiated (and refuted) claims about a Russian government videotape of Trump in a compromising position was first reported online Tuesday by The Wall Street Journal. The Journal quoted Millian saying in an email that the information in the dossier was “fake news (created by sick minds)” and was “an attempt to distract the future president from real work.”

Ross, Brian and Matthew Mosk.  “US-Russian Businessman Said to Be Source of Key Trump Dossier Claims.”  ABC News, January 24, 2017.

Related on BackChannels

Note: datelines appear embedded in the URLs cited.

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/01/19/ftac-america-the-robust-democracy/

https://conflict-backchannels.com/2017/01/18/trust-putin/

Additional Comment

Americans have been told that there are such things as “Alternative Facts” or that we are living in a “Post-Fact World”.

Neither claim is true.

While there are limits to what journalists may discover — especially online! — there are in the foundations of our political and social realities such things as plain facts.  We may dress up the same observed and measured as “factual data”.  However, where disingenuous and partisan communications fill media and public memory, it becomes the reader’s responsibility, in part, to challenge information with what critical research skills may be mustered for the task.

On the topic of throwback Soviet-style “kompromat”, BackChannels has chosen to present sources that are themselves querying the topic.  Ultimately, Americans must rely on the integrity and investigating prowess of their intelligence services.

I believe the following block presents the oath taken by those who have chosen to engage directly in the defense of the United States of America.

The wordings of the current oath of enlistment and oath for commissioned officers are as follows:

“I, _____, do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; and that I will obey the orders of the President of the United States and the orders of the officers appointed over me, according to regulations and the Uniform Code of Military Justice. So help me God.” (Title 10, US Code; Act of 5 May 1960 replacing the wording first adopted in 1789, with amendment effective 5 October 1962).

“I, _____ (SSAN), having been appointed an officer in the Army of the United States, as indicated above in the grade of _____ do solemnly swear (or affirm) that I will support and defend the Constitution of the United States against all enemies, foreign and domestic, that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same; that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; and that I will well and faithfully discharge the duties of the office upon which I am about to enter; So help me God.” (DA Form 71, 1 August 1959, for officers.)

http://www.history.army.mil/html/faq/oaths.html

The above represents all that may stand between the existence of America’s classically liberal democracy and the many predictably capricious, willful, and violent forms of politically absolute autocracy.

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Putin – Yanukovych – Manafort – Trump

27 Friday May 2016

Posted by in 21st Century Feudal, American Domestic Affairs, Conflict - Culture - Language - Psychology, North America, United States of America

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The hint came through a review in the New York Review of Books:

On February 22, Yanukovych fled to Russia. (Two years later, his political strategist, Paul Manafort, would resurface in the US, playing the same role for Donald Trump.)

Snyder, Timothy.  “The Wars of Vladimir Putin.”  Reviews of books by Paweł Pieniążek, Karl Schlögel, Peter Pomerantsev.  The New York Review of Books, June 9, 2016 Issue.

Why lookee here at this beautiful lede:

Mar-a-Lago, Donald Trump’s palace, is impressive by the standards of Palm Beach—less so when judged against the abodes of the world’s autocrats. It doesn’t, for instance, quite compare with Mezhyhirya, the gilded estate of deposed Ukrainian President Victor Yanukovych. Trump may have 33 bathrooms and three bomb shelters, but his mansion lacks a herd of ostrich, a galleon parked in a pond, and a set of golden golf clubs. Yet the two properties are linked, not just in ostentatious spirit, but by the presence of one man. Trump and Yanukovych have shared the same political brain, an operative named Paul Manafort.

Foer, Franklin.  “The Quiet American: Paul Manafort made a career out of stealthily reinventing the world’s nastiest tyrants as noble defenders of freedom.  Getting Donald Trump elected will be a cinch.”  Slate, April 28, 2016.

And here at this disclosure:

Manafort was a principal at the lobbying firm Black, Manafort, Stone, and Kelly (along with another top Trump ally, Nixon alum Roger Stone), a K Street powerhouse with close ties to the Reagan and George H. W. Bush administrations, as well as top Republicans on Capitol Hill.

But over the years, they made millions by representing a rogue’s gallery of clients far away from D.C.’s genteel corridors of power: dictators, guerilla groups, and despots with no regard for human rights—including one man responsible for mass amputations, and another who oversaw state-sanctioned rape.

Woodruff, Betsy and Tim Mak.  “Top Trump Aide led the ‘Torturers’ Lobby’: Paul Manafort and the partners at his firm made a fortune repping some of the most despicable dictators of the 20th century.”  The Daily Beast, April 13, 2016.

Welcome to the Age of Image.

Who is that precious vote going to — the candidate or the candidate’s handler and stage manager?

The Woodruff and Mak piece rolls around to this from Yanukovych’s election in Ukraine:

At the time of the election, Manafort had spun that Yanukovych was merely misunderstood, and that “the West has not been willing to move beyond the cold war mentality and to see this man and the outreach that he has extended.”

Recall the web site Yanukovych Leaks.

Ukrainians had developed cause for pique at the potential for the endless validation of corruption had they not risen to revolution for the rule of law.

Another gem —

That Trump would choose the Center for the National Interest as the place to premier his new seriousness on foreign policy has Manafort’s fingerprints all over it. For Manafort and the Center have something very important in common: both have ties to the Russian regime of President Vladimir Putin, (whose ambassador to the United States sat in the front row for Trump’s address).

Kirchick, James.  “Donald Trump’s Russia connections: Realists with Moscow ties are lining up behind Republican frontrunner.”  Politico, April 28, 2016.

BackChannels had gotten the sense that Vladimir Putin and Donald Trump appreciated one another as strong men but had no idea how close that molecular bond might be through the agency of a quiet but major political operator in the figure of Paul J. Manafort.

Addendum – October 24, 2016

According to The New York Post, former campaign chairman Paul Manafort and ex-”core” aide Rick Gates have financial ties to a biometric security company that lobbied the Putin administration on behalf of technology that would help it spy on its own citizens.

Manafort was a major early investor for EyeLock — and owned up to 10 percent in the company, the Post reported — while Gates was an independent contractor hired to build business for them in Middle Eastern countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates.

Rozsa, Matthew.  “Donald Trump’s former campaign chairman Paul Manafort was lobbying Vladimir Putin through a company he owned.”  Salon, October 24, 2016.

 

Additional Reference

Ames, Mark, Ari Berman.  “Kremlin Whores: How McCain’s Staff Served Putin’s Empire.”  The Exiled Online, October 1, 2008.

Burns, Alexander, Maggie Haberman.  “Mystery Man: Ukraine’s U.S. fixer.”  Politico, March 5, 2014.

Gingerich, Jon.  “Trump Hires Manafort for Delegate Push.”  O’Dwyer’s, March 29, 2016.

Ho, Catherine.  “From Ukraine to Trump Tower, Paul Manafort unafraid to take on controversial jobs.”  The Washington Post, April 17 2016.

Kincaid, Cliff and Mark Musser.  “Trump Hires ‘Fixer’ With Soviet Connections.”  Accuracy in Media, April 20, 2016.

Lake, Eli.  “Trump Just Hired His Next Scandal.”  Bloomberg View, April 13, 2016.

Sourcewatch. “Davis, Manafort & Freedman, Inc.”

Wikipedia.  “Paul Manafort” (as viewed August 14, 2016):

 

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FNS – Brief – Putin’s Developing Russia Developing Political Competition

10 Sunday Nov 2013

Posted by in Eurasia, Politics, Russia

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His criticism of Luhansk and its corrupt, thuggish, and authoritarian Regionnaire authorities has remained unsparing. They’re easy to lambast and deserve every bit of his ire. Luhansk suffers from a rust-belt economy, collapsing social services, unhealthy living conditions, and a particularly sedentary Regionnaire elite.

A Ukrainian Blogger for Luhansk Mayor? | World Affairs Journal – 11/8/2013.

Related: Fragile Empire: How Russia Fell In and Out of Love with Vladimir Putin: Ben Judah: 9780300181210: Amazon.com: Books — Published June 2013.

Post-Soviet and Eastern European scholar and political science professor Alexander J. Motyl comments on Russia’s co-evolving dissenting political competition with his take on “Proctologist” blogger Stanislav Tsikalovsky, whom he predicts will climb the web vine up into a local political career between five and ten years from now.

I wouldn’t make such sunny predictions: in Putin’s Russia, a lot can happen in five hours — ask Khodorkovsky (Khodorkovsky’s main advocacy page)– much less five days, months, or years.

I’m less certain of what to make of the nom de blogging guerre “Proctologist” except to note the scatological relationship to “Pussy Riot” and the potential for Putin’s Russia to develop an entire generational legion of brothers and sisters in virtual arms and mutual contempt for what they will perceive as the ethical and moral failings of a regime to which they may relate as moral avatars and otherwise disenfranchised outsiders.

The worse it gets, the worse they’ll get would be my prediction.  Even so, my impression is such a development may not have much room for maneuver as Putin’s post-KGB FSB organizes defensively in relation to them.

Related: http://proctolog.blog.top.lg.ua/ (I like the slogan: “Believe me, for the crazy always tell the truth”).

Related: Truth and Hopelessness in Luhansk | World Affairs Journal – 3/30/2012.

Related: Auk Nr. 8 Clip (PIT No. 8) – IMDb – video trailer, posted in 2010.

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Names!  Dropped with exclamation marks in Backchannels!

Navalny!

Putin!

Honorably mentioned with an exclamation mark:

Russia — Yevgeny Roizman — May He Turn Out a Mensch!

I will try to be more careful with exclamation marks! — now that I see so many of them in one place in relation to related subjects.

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Perhaps not with “Blueberry Hill”, I wonder if Putin could not play Carnegie, setting in his autocratic wake a plethora of great homes and monuments that over time might integrate the greater Russian tapestry.  In that the rich, however they may have gotten there, believe the world should serve them, they may realize they have the obligation to spend it some.  Locally.  Regionally.  Nationally.

Or face taxes.

Or worse.

Eventually.

I jest today.

The emerging oligarchy is not Romanov, and its basis for being rather seems to twine with feudal national building: why not control the initial engines and outflows of the post-Soviet economy to one’s own temporal advantage but also to create an influential class — that “new nobility” — from varied quarters, including old school chums?

Metals and banking tycoons Vladimir Potanin and Mikhail Fridman, who made their fortunes in the 90s, are still high on the list of Russia’s richest men. But the past decade saw a rise of new billionaires who draw their wealth from state contracts and some of whom are known to be the presidents’ friends, like Gennady Timchenko.

Russia’s Wealth Inequality One Of Highest In The World – 10/9/2013.

It reads awfully unfair, but that’s today’s news, not next generation’s news.

For a few Russians, there is a “gilded age” — their own.  What they amass, what they build, what they leave by way of constructive investments spells the fortunes of an era to come.

However he has done it, Putin has organized a state, and that being so, he has given his emerging political competitors a lot to work with.

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Related on the vicissitudes attending wealth and noblesse oblige:

▶ The Astor Orphan by Alexandra Aldrich – YouTube

▶ Andrew Carnegie—Gilded Age Philanthropist (From the Carnegie Hall Archives) – YouTube

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