Moscow's Strategy

J R Nyquist.com ^ | May 2005 | Peter Cibulka

[GOP_1900AD]

The thing that worries me the most is the somewhat surprising resurgence of Russian messianism since the early 1990s. I never really expected that. I figured that indeed, the Orthodox Church would take a greater role than it had taken 1917 - 1989. But I also expected a general advancement to religious freedom. In a truly democratized country, I would expect things to become sort of like the early US. But instead, we now see three main groups:
1) Neo-"Orthodox" Nationalist Messianists
2) Neo-Nazis / NBP / Quasi Pagan National Socialists
3) "Retro" groups who want the USSR back

The third group is pretty much a bunch of old guys so I am not all that concerned about them. It's the first two groups that I find troubling. In the past, they did not get along, however, more recently, group 2 has become more open to Orthodoxy (at least rhetorically) and now are working more closely with group 1. A major example of this is how they support Putin's crackdown on the so called "oligarchs" most of whom happen to also be Jewish. Another thing to note is that some of the most vehement statements against US geopolitical policies (e.g. against our support of Israel, against the war in Iraq, etc) originate in Group 2 then later get adopted in watered down, diplomatized form by Group 1. To me, Group 1 is sort of like Bruning et al, during the Weimar Germany era, and Group 2 are like the young Nazis. Note that Bruning never really was very serious about shutting down the Nazis. Hitler's "overthrow" was non violent and he was all but invited in. I have long suspected secret collusion between many apparent Weimer "democrats" and the up and coming Nazis. Will Russia take the same road?

[GOP_1900AD]

It is highly relevant. As of the early 1990s, Russia's telecom infrastructure was a typical command and control one, with massive concentration at the domestic-international nodes and overall low levels of subscriber penetration as compared with the West. They have not torn it out and reengineered it to be like a typical Western infrastructure. Instead, they have built up from the old base. The concentration factors at the domestic-international nodes far exceeds that of a typical Western system, even today.

[American in Israel]

I wonder if the so-called "Jewish" Neo-Nazi movement in Israel can be connected to these phony Jews?

Indeed, there is a direct link, with some of the neo-nazi's making statements to reporters that they knew they were not Jews, but they liked the benifit package.

[American in Israel]

I'm certain that Russia is using this [false friendship] for strengthening, training and arming surrogate terrorist organizations so they can attack the United States.

Second Seal: Islam rides a Red Horse

3 When He opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, "Come *and see."
4 Another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword.

[BringBackMyHUAC]

==Second Seal: Islam rides a Red Horse

I wouldn't assume that Islam itself makes up the rider on the Red Horse. Don't forget about Russia (red), Red China (red), and the EU of the future (red)...in short the Eurasian Alliance.

[American in Israel]

"And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another;

I think this is the sign of Islam. I suspect that we will not see Russia and China's part in this until the fourth seal. At this rate we will not have that long to wait.

Blessings,

[K. Smirnov]

Interesting that you, as a reputed IT professional, would think that interference in packets destined to or from the West is "tin foil."

Wow! I am a "reputed" IT professional. Thanks a lot for awarding me with the title. Next time when I need a reference, I know where to look for it :)

Anyway. What do you mean by the interference?

1)IP packet sniffing? Surely many countries, USA inclusve do that, especially when it comes to sneak on bad guys. However, though it may seem easy on a small scale, large-scale packet snifing is a costly business. Do names like "Carnivour" or "Echelon" ring a bell for you? These are not Chinese or Russian systems. FYI, in Russia this thing is called "SORM", every ISP provider supposed to get hooked to this system. I guess the same thing applies to ISP providers in US or UK. Will this "SORM" thing spy on everyone? Impossible. It is like tapping every phone in town. However it may happen on a court order. But, IMHO, tapping e-mails and web traffic these days becomes less and less effective - https connections, encrypted traffic, software like PGP that uses 128-bit keys makes the tapped IP traffic useless, since it may take a considerable amount of time to decrypt the information.

2) Blocking foreign IP addresses? Lots of companies do that. Just FYI. Some US companies doing e-commerce will not accept IP addresses from outside US. However this is done via setting up a parameter in their website config files. Blocking content from abroad? Easy, provided that you have the firewall which every ISP in the country is obliged to use. (The idea seems a bit ridiculous to me). It is way easier for the government to oblige ISPs to do that. Lots of commercial companies will block certain IPs on their firewalls (say livejournal.com, playboy.com, etc). Easily done, easily bypassed through so-called access anonymizers. Go and check yourself at anonymizer.com.

What is the conclusion? The reality as always is less intriguing than human imagination.

[GOP_1900AD]

But the key difference is, the US government is very hands off from the telecom infrastructure. And as for Eschelon, that ended up being largely cancelled. The FBI's far more modest efforts, since 9/11 have also been greatly scaled back. As for blocking, sure, individual corporations (and private citizens) do it here in the West, but in the East, governments are doing it.

[K. Smirnov]

Well, what I am against is that you paint Russia and China with the same colour. I do not know ANY examples when my (Russian) government is blocking access to foreign IP addresses. Give me an example or make accurate statement. Otherwise it looks the same as Soviet-era retired cold war enthusuast moaning to his grandsons about the "capitalist atrocities of the West". Equally groundless and far-fetched. Unless you give me the proof I consider that "IP blocking" to be so.

[wildandcrazyrussian]

I was just in Russia last week and used several Internet cafes, which one can find in many places in the big cities (for about $1.50-2.00 an hour). They all look to me to be privately owned and managed, and I never had the slightest thought anything was being redirected or blocked. I even got on FreePrepublic.com every day just to read the news, and certainly this site would be a prime target of targeting of such dictatorships as some people envision! (Not only that but it is the easiest thing to get a private apartment like ours on Novy Arbat, many of which have in-home broadband, which I could have used had I felt like lugging a laptop 5,000 miles.)

I really think the people who are the most vociferous ones asking "can anything good come from Russia" ought to visit Russia at least once in their lives under current-day conditions and really listen to what is happening. Germany is no longer under Nazi dictatorship, the Vikings are not still raiding England, Russia is not still under Communist dictatorship. Things change.