Posted on 03/07/2007 6:51:39 AM PST by Ooh-Ah
RUSSIA is to replace its military doctrine with a more hawkish version that boldly identifies NATO and the West as its greatest danger.
In a statement posted on its website, Russia's powerful Security Council said it no longer considered global terrorism to be its biggest danger. Instead, Russia was developing a new national security strategy that reflected changing "geo-political" realities, and the fact that rival military alliances were becoming "stronger" - "especially NATO".
"There have been changes in the character of the threat to the military security of Russia. More and more leading world states are seeking to upgrade their national armed forces. The configuration has changed," the council said.
Though the President, Vladimir Putin, ordered his generals to revise the military doctrine in June 2005, the blueprint reflects the sudden deterioration in relations with the West. In particular Russia has been incensed by the Bush Administration's plans to site two missile interceptor and radar bases in Poland and the Czech Republic.
Senior figures in the Russian military said on Tuesday that they were infuriated by what they regard as NATO's "relentless expansion" into "post-Soviet space" - the countries of former communist Eastern Europe and the Baltic. Russia felt increasingly "encircled" by hostile neighbours, they said.
Russia's Foreign Minister, Sergei Lavrov, said that Washington had failed to explain why it wanted to site missile bases on Russia's doorstep. Mr Putin has ridiculed the US claim that the bases were designed to shoot down rogue missiles from Iran or North Korea, claiming their real target is Russia's nuclear arsenal.
It is not clear when Russia's new doctrine will be in place. But the council is likely to recommend a new strategy by the end of the year, military sources said. The doctrine follows a big increase in military expenditure announced last month.
Analysts said the new doctrine would be "much tougher" than the one adopted in 2000.
"It will be much harsher towards the US and NATO. The doctrine will reflect Russia's concerns about NATO enlargement and the ABM [anti-ballistic missile] system deployment close to Russia's borders," Sergei Kortunov, a former member of the council, and professor at Moscow's School of Economics, said. He added: "Russia is concerned about the US's creation of new arms systems. It is also worried about the dangers to Russia from the US and other Western countries, and their political role in the countries of the post-Soviet space."
The chairman of Russia's academy of military science, Mahmoud Garayev, said Russia could no longer afford to ignore the threat from NATO. Drugs and terrorism were an irrelevance, he said.
The doctrine comes as the Bush Administration has reportedly decided to step up its arguably erratic bilateral engagement with Moscow.
The New York Times has reported that the White House intends to "reach out more often and more intensively" to Russia, an acknowledgment in effect that it has not always consulted Russia on foreign policy and national security plans.
Guardian News & Media
No, Serbia suffered more. That was due to Bill Clinton and the blaming of Milosevich and the Serbs, while protecting "innocent" Muslims.
But I don't think Russia believes NATO is going to bomb them to protect the Muslims and Chinese.
Why not? What was the difference in that aspect between Serbia and Russia, or Islamists in Chechnya or KLA in Kosovo?
The key difference is that Russia was too STRONG to be bombed. The lesson from 1999 war on Serbia is that if you want peace, you need to have proper balance of power. Weakness COMPELS others to attack you.
So if someone else expands his military potential or territorial reach, you need to balance it with your own military buildup. Such is the IRON rule of great politics in EVERY century. See my tagline.
Neglecting this rule is worse than criminal.
This is expected. However, strategically, Putin must decide with whom he will defend. With the Muslims or the Chinese? Please. They have no friends. Only enemies.
I don't have a say in NATO policy, but Putin had better realize that the Muslims and the Chinese will be ruthless in their success. We would respect the Russian Federation to continue on whatever course it decides to pursue. They won't. He is a fool to make us his enemy. Russians are not replacing themselves with a sustainable birthrate. They will be overtaken by...someone. If they don't get their act together. If it's the Muslims or the Chinese...do svidania.
Source?
Joseph Stalin is alive and well...with a new wardrobe and image team.
"I'm not going to start the third world war for you," General Sir Mike Jackson, commander of the international K-For peacekeeping force, is reported to have told Gen Clark when he refused to accept an order to send assault troops to prevent Russian troops from taking over the airfield of Kosovo's provincial capital. http://www.guardian.co.uk/Kosovo/Story/0,2763,208123,00.html
for starters...........
Secret Russian Troop Deployment Thwarted
By Robert G. Kaiser and David Hoffman
Washington Post Staff Writers
Friday, June 25, 1999; Page A1
Russia's surprise deployment of 200 troops to the Pristina airport on June 12
was part of a scheme to send into Kosovo a contingent of 1,000 or more men
who could have tried to stake out a Russian zone in the northwest sector of
the province, Western intelligence analysts have concluded.
The carefully planned operation was thwarted when the governments of Hungary,
Bulgaria and Romania, prodded by the United States, denied Russian requests
to use their airspace to fly more Russians into Kosovo.
When senior U.S. officials realized what the Russians had in mind, they
lobbied the Eastern Europeans on overflight rights and began pursuing their
Russian counterparts by telephone "at ungodly hours" on Sunday, June 13,
according to one official. The Americans warned the Russians that their
unilateral military moves risked obliterating the good will generated by
their help in reaching a peace agreement.
Western analysts still dispute whether Moscow's intention was to seize a
Russian zone in Kosovo or simply to send in more troops to strengthen
Russia's hand in negotiating peacekeeping arrangements. Either way, the
unilateral deployment of a large contingent would have caused "grievous harm
to support for Russia" in Washington, said one senior State Department
official.
The Russians nearly succeeded in adding to their forces on the ground,
briefly winning permission from Hungary for six IL-76 military transport
planes to fly over that country on June 11, before it was clear that the
Russians were sending 200 men from their Bosnian peacekeeping force to the
airport in Pristina, Kosovo's capital. But before those Ilyushins could get
into the air, the United States asked Hungary to deny the Russians use of
its airspace, and the Hungarians agreed, telling the Russians that only an
act of the Hungarian parliament could grant overflight rights.
A reconstruction of the events surrounding the Russians' unexpected
deployment into Kosovo, based on reporting in Washington, Moscow and
Brussels, indicates that the Russian operation was thoroughly planned,
deliberately deceptive and considerably more ambitious than its
accomplishments would suggest. Many questions remain about who in Moscow was
in charge of the decision-making that led to the operation.
When the NATO allies realized, late on June 11, that the Russians were moving
men toward Pristina, Gen. Wesley K. Clark, the NATO commander, speedily
devised a plan to deploy NATO troops by helicopter to the Pristina airport,
creating the possibility for the first NATO-Russia confrontation since the
end of the Cold War. But British Gen. Michael Jackson, head of the
peacekeeping force, argued that such a move would upset the delicate
arrangements he had negotiated with Yugoslav officers on their withdrawal
from Kosovo, and Clark's plan was dropped.
In Moscow, Russian generals were openly frustrated at their inability to
complete the deployment. "When the Russian military saw how popular their
first little glorious victory was," said one senior U.S. official, referring
to the arrival of the 200 troops at Pristina's airport, "the effort to score
again [with additional deployments to Kosovo] became more intense, and more
important from their point of view. If they'd been able to keep on going,
you could have had a very serious breakdown in confidence, and maybe in our
ability to organize a peacekeeping effort in Kosovo."
Western officials are still debating the Russian moves, wondering both why
the Russian military took the risks it did and what role President Boris
Yeltsin played in the decisions.
Senior intelligence analysts in Washington have concluded that there was a
strong consensus among Russian officials in Moscow, including Yeltsin, that
Russian troops had to play a role in Kosovo after Yugoslav President
Slobodan Milosevic accepted peace terms. One official said Yeltsin agreed in
general terms that Russian troops would have to be deployed in Kosovo at
least as soon as NATO forces were. "Whether he [explicitly] approved the
idea of going in first, we aren't sure," this official said.
In Moscow, Russian sources said Yeltsin did approve the deployment in
advance, during a telephone conversation with Gen. Anatoly Kvashnin, chief
of the Russian general staff.
Russian military officials have boasted that the deception involved in the
Pristina airport operation was deliberate. "The operation was very carefully
prepared," Gen. Georgi Shpak, commander of Russia's paratroopers, told a
Russian newspaper. "The main difficulty was to hide the fact that the
operation was being prepared."
One question is the degree to which Yeltsin, frail and ill, participates in
detailed discussions of complex issues. Western intelligence analysts and
many Russian sources say his involvement is minimal.
In late April, Yeltsin complained in a closed meeting of his national
security advisers about Russia's inability to influence the Yugoslav war.
"Why are they not afraid of us?" he lamented, according to a source in
Moscow. His generals had no answer.
Western nations were alarmed when the Russians moved into the Pristina
airport, though not afraid of the small force of 200. Within two weeks the
British were providing food and water for the isolated contingent.
But Clark took the Russian deployment seriously, which led to his plan to
dispatch U.S. troops by helicopter to the airport. Defense Secretary William
S. Cohen and Gen. Henry H. Shelton, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff,
supported Clark's plan. But Jackson and the British government demurred, and
Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov assured U.S. officials that the Russian
force moving toward Kosovo would stop before it crossed into the province.
The Russians' premature arrival in Pristina despite Ivanov's assurance
complicated the diplomatic exchanges over the peacekeeping arrangements. The
Russians insisted that they be given a separate sector within Kosovo,
contributing to the conclusion of some Western intelligence analysts that
they had intended to establish such a sector unilaterally. Other Western
officials argued that the Russian goal was to create a presence on the
ground as a bargaining chip.
The negotiations sharpened U.S. officials' questions about who was in charge
in Moscow. At the meetings in Helsinki to decide on Russia's role in the
Kosovo peacekeeping operation, U.S. officials perceived open disagreements
between Russia's civilian and military officials. They also saw
manifestations of the splits within the Russian military. Marshal Igor
Sergeyev, the defense minister, is regarded skeptically by many of his
colleagues, according to Russian sources. Several sources said Sergeyev may
not have been told by Kvashnin, his chief of staff, about the surprise move
to Pristina's airport.
An especially problematic figure for the Americans was Gen. Leonid Ivashov, a
former Communist Party commissar in the old Soviet Army who runs the Russian
Defense Ministry's international cooperation department. Ivashov is a
long-time hard-liner who has admitted that he agitated in favor of a
military coup against Mikhail Gorbachev in 1990 and who is clearly skeptical
of any Russian cooperation with NATO.
In the Helsinki negotiations, U.S. officials said, little progress was made
until Cohen drew his Russian counterpart, Sergeyev, into private meetings
from which Ivashov was excluded. Even then, disagreement persisted on
whether Russia would have its own sector in Kosovo.
Yeltsin announced last Friday that he had firmly instructed Sergeyev to win
approval for a separate Russian zone, saying he "categorically does not
agree" with the idea of Russian troops patrolling sectors controlled by
other countries. But several hours later, for reasons still not clear to the
non-Russian participants, the Russians agreed to a plan that dispersed their
troops through the British, French, German and American sectors, with no
zone of their own.
At the end of the long negotiations, Sergeyev and Ivanov said they had to
make one last phone call to Yeltsin for his approval of the final deal. They
adjourned to the Russian Embassy in Helsinki, then came back to accept the
arrangements. Had they spoken personally with Yeltsin? "They said it was
Yeltsin," according to one U.S. negotiator.
Correspondent William Drozdiak in Brussels and staff writers Bradley Graham
and John F. Harris in Washington contributed to this report. Hoffman
reported from Moscow.
© 1999 The Washington Post Company
It was the Russians that was willing to escalate the war in Kosovo into a global war and Clark wanted to go along with it if it wasn't for Jackson you and I most likely would be dead right now.
The Russians launched their inter fleet out of the Black sea on highest alert to confront our ships in the Mediterranean. Their strategic nuclear command was at their highest alert with planes in the air to hit us.
Remember the agreement that China and India signed with Russia after the attack of the Chinese embassy was that if NATO attacks their troops they will fight. Russia was looking for an excuse to fight and Clark almost gave it to them.
Because with 5,000 nuclear active warheads and enough delivery vehicles to deliver them, they can destroy us in an instant. We don't want a repeat of 1914 where one small event triggered country after country falling into an aggressive posture because of secret mutual assistance treaties. What if the US decides to bomb Iran and Russia says "an attack on Iran will be considered an attack on Russia" like Kennedy said of Cuba. Frankly, mutual nuclear annihilation is a bad thing and should be avoided if possible. I'd rather have Russia on our side than on an opponent's side.
I'm afraid that we are the ones provoking the Russians.....we have been escalating Kosovo into an ethnic cess pool. We have been supporting the Muh and KLA from the beginning; lying our way; "all the way" to targeting the Russian states by setting a precedence of an individual state declaring Independence and getting it by overriding the 1244.....Once we chip away at the Kosovo Indep. we will allow the Albanian terrorist to target south presevo, Macedonia, North Mitrovica....on our merry way to the Baltic states......I told many and wrote much while in the OSCE that Russia and China would veto any change to the 1244 that would give Kosovo independence....
We wanted to escalate the war in Kosovo....but, by proxy...We stirred up trouble in Bosnia....the Serbs responded; heavy handed, granted. we lied about the number of massacres in Kosovo and the story goes on........
no, we were looking for a war, and Clark almost got it started...but General Jackson told the dupe to get lost.
http://www.militarycorruption.com/wesleyclark.htm
COHEN TEACHES CLARK WHO’S “BOSS”
The cagey candidate Clark never uses the word “FIRED” on the campaign trail because it might cause voters to think twice about letting him anywhere near the nuclear button.
Respected columnist Jim Brunelle of the Portland (Me.) PRESS HERALD spelled it out under the headline “WESLEY CLARK WENT TOE-TO-TOE WITH BILL COHEN AND LOST HIS JOB.”
Brunelle, who has built up many contacts and sources over the years, had a direct line into Cohen’s office and knew what the former secretary of defense had to do to reign in his “loose cannon” general.
“Clark sprang to media prominence as supreme allied commander of NATO forces overseeing the air war in Yugoslavia, to halt ethnic cleansing in Kosovo,” Brunelle wrote. “The Pentagon is said to have been upset by what was regarded as loose-cannon behavior by the general, especially in one diplomatically sensitive incident.
“As the war wound down, a small contingent of Russian troops was reported to be rushing toward the Pristina airfield in Kosovo with the intention of occupying the facility.
“Clark called for an airborne assault to stop the Russians, an order that British Gen. Michael Jackson, head of the international force responsible, refused to obey. Jackson reportedly told (Clark) ‘Sir I am NOT starting World War III for you!’
“When all this came out later, Clark insisted the idea for engaging the Russians in a risky military showdown actually originated in Washington, an assertion that did not endear him to his critics.”
Brunelle wrote that “three months before he was scheduled to step down as allied commander, the Pentagon announced Clark was retiring early. The general, it was said, was furious, but helpless to prevent his ouster.”
I'm not a Russian sympathizer as to their government and such, but I do feel for their people. And the enemy of my enemy is my friend.
Sounds like Wesley Clark fancied himself as General Patton, but with far poorer judgement and two less pistols.
:) sure looks that way. Also, notice I said "looks" that way; present tense.
Also, check out the film "The Brooklyn Connection"....where Holbrooke, Clark, and co. are taking donation funds for the Kerry campaign from actual members of the Albania mafia, former KLA; on film. Openly admitting that they received $500,000 dollars. Comment by Krasniqi, words to the effect, "give a politician money and they will do things for you"....on film mind you......
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