Andrew Korybko
Andrew Korybko's Newsletter

Russia isn’t at risk of becoming a Chinese vassal nor is India at risk of becoming an American one.

Russia’s legal information portal recently published the details of last year’s “Reciprocal Exchange of Logistics Support” (RELOS) military logistics pact with India. RT’s Air Marshal Anil Chopra (Retired) wrote a detailed analysis about it here, drawing attention to how it “allows for the simultaneous deployment of up to 3,000 troops, five warships, and ten aircraft to be stationed on each other’s soil.”

There’s more to it, however, as this analysis will explain. Here are the five messages that RELOS sends to the world:

1. Russia & India Remain Each Other’s Special & Privileged Strategic Partner

Pepe Escobar falsely claimed in mid-March that India “betrayed” Russia, yet that couldn’t be further from the truth after RELOS, which restores Russia’s Old Cold War-era permanent military presence in the Indian Ocean Region.

Likewise, India will now obtain an unprecedented permanent military presence in the Russian Far East and Arctic if it so chooses, thus symbolizing the strength of their special and privileged strategic partnership. Speculation about a rift between them is therefore bonafide fake news.

Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture Foundation

From now on, it’s clear that no settlement will be possible – and realistic – without Russian influence.

Talk about an entrance pregnant with meaning!

Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi engaged on a high-stakes diplomacy tour to Islamabad, Muscat and St. Petersburg aboard flight “Minab 168” on Meraj Airlines.

In memory, of course, of the 168 schoolgirls from Minab killed by the Empire of Chaos, Lies, Plunder and Piracy.

Before he set out on his voyage, Araghchi went straight to the point:

Araghchi explained the importance of reviewing negotiations in Pakistan, and “under what conditions negotiations could continue.” Conversations in Oman “will lead to greater expansion in relations with neighbors, especially in the southern regions of the Persian Gulf.”

On the Strait of Hormuz, “consultations with Oman were also necessary…We share many common views with Oman, and it was agreed that discussions would continue at the expert level.”

Araghchi in St. Petersburg did not only meet his counterpart, Grandmaster Sergey Lavrov, as protocol would have it. Himself and his mini-delegation were personally received by President Putin.

James Howard Kunstler
James Howard Kunstler's Substack

“The notion that Europe is able to pose a military threat to Russia does not even qualify as trashy propaganda for sub-zero IQs.” — Pepe Escobar

“The left became hideously, ostentatiously, unapologetically corrupt (as ruling parties tend to do). They sold out bigtime and got bigtime rich. You want to know why none of them want to cut waste anymore? because they’re the ones stealing it.” — El Gato Malo on Substack

Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture Foundation

(These two...individuals have no known connection with this story. -Editor)

The Talmudic psychos are not only obsessed with breathing fire against the Axis of Resistance but now also going after Russian national interests.

A case could be made that Iran’s Ballistic Retaliation Night, a measured response to Israel’s serial provocations, is less consequential when it comes to the efficacy of the Axis of Resistance than the decapitation of Hezbollah’s leadership.

Still, the message was enough to send the Talmudic psychopathologicals into a frenzy; for all their hysterical denials and massive spin, Iron Toilet Paper and the Arrow system were de facto rendered useless.

The IRGC announced that the volley of missiles was inaugurated by a single hypersonic Fatteh 2, which took out the Arrow 3 air defense system’s radar, which is capable of intercepting missiles in the atmosphere.

Well-informed Iranian military sources stated that hackers went into heavy cyberattack mode just before the start of the operation to disrupt the Iron Dome system. The IRGC finally confirmed that just about 90% of the intended targets were hit; the implication was that each target was supposed to be visited by several missiles, with some getting intercepted.

It’s open to speculation how many F-35s and F-15s were ultimately destroyed or damaged on two air bases, one of which, Nevatim, in the Negev, became literally inoperable.

Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture Foundation

The Swiss “peace” kabuki came and went – and the winner was Vladimir Putin. He didn’t even have to show up.

The Swiss “peace” kabuki came and went – and the winner was Vladimir Putin. He didn’t even have to show up.

None of the Big Players did. Or in case they sent their emissaries, there was significant refusal to sign the vacuous final declaration – as in BRICS members Brazil, India, Saudi Arabia, UAE and South Africa.

Without BRICS, there’s absolutely nothing the collective West – as in The Hegemon and assorted vassals – can do to alter the proxy war chessboard in Ukraine.

In his carefully calibrated speech to diplomats and the leadership of Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Putin delineated an incredibly restrained and strategic approach to solve the Ukraine problem. In the context of the Hegemon’s escalatory green light – actually in practice for several months now – for Kiev to attack deeper into the Russian Federation, Putin’s offer was extremely generous.

Pepe Escobar
Strategic Culture Foundation

Both have had enough of being “polite”. You want confrontation? Confrontation is what you’re gonna get.

Something very important happened earlier this week in Astana during the meeting of the Council of Ministers of Foreign Affairs of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).

Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi went straight to the point: he called for SCO members to “maintain their strategic autonomy”, and “never allow external forces” to turn Eurasia into a “geopolitical arena.”

Wang Yi detailed how “a few countries are pursuing hegemony and power, forming small cliques, establishing hidden rules, engaging in interference and suppression, ‘decoupling and cutting off ties,’ and even assisting the ‘three forces’ in the region”, thus attempting to suppress the strategic autonomy of the Global South.

The “three forces” is Chinese code for terrorism, separatism and religious extremism – actually the three main reasons for the foundation of the SCO way back in 2001, a short while before 9/11.

The straightforward translation of Wang’s message points to Beijing being very much aware of the Hegemon’s myriad Hybrid War tactics now deployed all across the Heartland. Still, Beijing excels in politeness, calling for “common, comprehensive, cooperative and sustainable” security cooperation and to work with the “international community”.

The problem is the “international community” is a hostage of the “rules-based international order”.

Pepe Escobar
Harry Vox (Comment)

The postmodernist econo-cultural vision of Europe has failed abysmally, as the ambitions of its architects were always based on false foundations and vastly exceeded their capabilities. More than four-fifths of the world has rejected their evil vision; the active resistance to it has barely even begun to take form. But it is already clear that there will be no Great Reset, and the global imperialists who believed they were destined to rule the world and own everything in it will be lucky to survive the series of regime changes over the next decade that are among the probable consequences of the Euro-Russian War:

The leadership in Moscow is making it very clear, to internal and international audiences, the new deal consists in slow cooking the Kiev racket inside a massive cauldron while polishing its status of financial black hole for the collective West. Until we reach boiling point – which will be a revolution or a putsch.

In parallel, The Lords of (Proxy) War will continue with their own strategy, which is to pillage an enfeebled, fearful, Europe, then dressing it up as a perfumed colony to be ruthlessly exploited ad nauseam by the imperial oligarchy. Europe is now a runaway TGV – minus the requisite Hollywood production values. Assuming it does not veer off track – a dicey proposition – it may eventually arrive at a railway station called Agenda 2030, The Great Narrative, or some other NATO/Davos denomination du jour.

Pepe Escobar
RT.com

December 18, 2014. President of Russia Vladimir Putin during his
tenth annual major news conference at the World Trade Centre on
Krasnopresnenskaya Embankment (Photograph: V. Astapkovich)

Putin's Grasp of, and Response to, Western Moves Are Impeccable

Even facing what under any circumstances is a perfect storm; President Putin delivered an extremely measured performance at his annual press conference and Q&A marathon.

The perfect storm evolves in two fronts; an overt economic war – as in siege by sanctions - and a concerted, covert, shadow attack to the heart of the Russian economy. Washington’s endgame is clear: impoverish and defang the adversary and force him to meekly bow to the ‘Empire of Chaos’ whims. And bragging about it all the way to “victory.”

The problem is Moscow happens to have impeccably deciphered the game – even before Putin, at the Valdai Club in October, pinned down the Obama doctrine as “our Western partners” working as practitioners of the “theory of controlled chaos.”

So Putin neatly understood this week’s monster controlled chaos attack. The Empire has massive money power; a great deal of influence over the world’s GDP at $85 trillion, and the banking power behind that. So nothing easier than using that power through the private banking systems that actually controls central banks to create a run on the Ruble. Think about the ‘Empire of Chaos’ dreaming of driving the ruble down by 99% or so – thus wrecking the Russian economy. What better way to impose imperial discipline on Russia?

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times

Are the United States, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and Russia on a mad spiral leading to yet another war in Europe? Is it inevitable? Far from it.

The US-propelled vassal currently starring in the oligarch dance in Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, last week advanced the proposition that Ukrainians in the near future, after his "reforms", will be asked to vote on whether to join NATO.

Let's be serious here. Many of you will be familiar with the concept of "shatter belt" - territories and peoples that historically have been squeezed between the Germanic Eagle and the Russian Bear.

As we stand, the whole shatter belt - apart from Ukraine and Belarus - has signed up to NATO. A new Berlin wall, this time US-built - from the Baltics to the Black Sea now runs through Kiev. Were Ukraine to become a NATO member in an albeit remote future, the shatter belt buffer zone would disappear. This means NATO - essentially the US - planted right on Russia's western border.

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times

These are bleak times. I've been in serious conversation with some deep sources and interlocutors - those who know but don't need to show off, privileging discretion. They are all deeply worried. This is what one of them, a New York strategic planner, sent me:

The propaganda attack against Putin equating him with Hitler is so extreme that you have to think that the Russians cannot believe their ears and cannot trust the United States anymore under any circumstances. I cannot believe how we could have gotten ourselves into this situation to protect the looters in the Ukraine that Putin would have rid the Ukraine of, and even had the gall to place in a leadership role one of the worst of the thieves. But that is history. What is certain is that MAD [mutually assured destruction] is not a deterrent today when both sides believe the other will use nuclear weapons once they have the advantage and that the side that gains a decisive advantage will use them. MAD is now over.That may sound somewhat extreme - but it's a perfectly logical extension, further on down the road, of what the Russian president intimated in his already legendary interview with Germany's ARD in Vladivostok last week: the West is provoking Russia into a new Cold War. [1]

Mikhail Gorbachev just stressed a few days ago the new Cold War is already on. Princeton's Stephen Cohen says the Cold War in fact never left. The Roving Eye reported about Cold War 2.0 months ago (here, here, here and here). Brits - still stranded in the 19th century new Great Game - prefer to spin the "strident toxic personality" of "diminutive Putin"; [2] he is the "ruthless, charming and ultimately reckless" man who "put the cold war back in vogue". The Council on Foreign Relations, predictably, mourns the end of the post-Cold War world, blasts the current "disorder", and dreams of the good ol' unchallenged exceptionalist days. [3]

For arguably the best detailed background on how we came to this perilous state of affairs, it's hard to beat Vladimir Kozin of the Russian Institute for Strategic Studies. [4] Read him carefully. And yes, it's Cold War 2.0, the double trouble remix; between the US and Russia, and between NATO and Russia.