Why Russia No Longer Fears the West

Politico ^ | March 2, 2014 | Ben Judah

[annalex]

Why Russia No Longer Fears the West

By BEN JUDAH March 02, 2014

Western leaders are stunned because they haven’t realized Russia’s owners no longer respect Europeans the way they once did after the Cold War. Russia thinks the West is no longer a crusading alliance. Russia thinks the West is now all about the money.

Putin’s henchmen know this personally. Russia’s rulers have been buying up Europe for years. They have mansions and luxury flats from London’s West End to France’s Cote d’Azure. Their children are safe at British boarding and Swiss finishing schools. And their money is squirrelled away in Austrian banks and British tax havens.

Putin’s inner circle no longer fear the European establishment. They once imagined them all in MI6. Now they know better. They have seen firsthand how obsequious Western aristocrats and corporate tycoons suddenly turn when their billions come into play. They now view them as hypocrites—the same European elites who help them hide their fortunes.

Once Russia’s powerful listened when European embassies issued statements denouncing the baroque corruption of Russian state companies. But no more. Because they know full well it is European bankers, businessmen and lawyers who do the dirty work for them placing the proceeds of corruption in hideouts from the Dutch Antilles to the British Virgin Islands.

We are not talking big money. But very big money. None other than Putin’s Central Bank has estimated that two thirds of the $56 billion exiting Russia in 2012 might be traceable to illegal activities. Crimes like kickbacks, drug money or tax fraud. This is the money that posh English bankers are rolling out the red carpet for in London.

Behind European corruption, Russia sees American weakness. The Kremlin does not believe European countries – with the exception of Germany – are truly independent of the United States. They see them as client states that Washington could force now, as it once did in the Cold War, not to do such business with the Kremlin.

When Russia sees Spain, Italy, Greece and Portugal outbidding each other to be Russia’s best business partner inside the EU (in return for no mention of human rights), they see America’s control over Europe slowly dissolving.

Back in Moscow, Russia’s hears American weakness out of Embassy Moscow. Once upon a time the Kremlin feared a foreign adventure might trigger Cold War economic sanctions where it hurts: export bans on key parts for its oil industry, even being cut out of its access to the Western banking sector. No more.

Russia sees an America distracted: Putin’s Ukrainian gambit was a shock to the U.S. foreign policy establishment. They prefer talking about China, or participating in Israeli-Palestinian peace talks. Russia sees an America vulnerable: in Afghanistan, in Syria and on Iran—a United States that desperately needs Russian support to continue shipping its supplies, host any peace conference or enforce its sanctions.

Moscow is not nervous. Russia’s elites have exposed themselves in a gigantic manner – everything they hold dear is now locked up in European properties and bank accounts. Theoretically, this makes them vulnerable. The EU could, with a sudden rush of money-laundering investigations and visa bans, cut them off from their wealth. But, time and time again, they have watched European governments balk at passing anything remotely similar to the U.S. Magnitsky Act, which bars a handful of criminal-officials from entering the United States.

All this has made Putin confident, very confident – confident that European elites are more concerned about making money than standing up to him. The evidence is there. After Russia’s strike force reached the outskirts of Tbilisi, the Georgian capital, in 2008, there were statements and bluster, but not a squeak about Russia’s billions. After Russia’s opposition were thrown into show trials, there were concerned letters from the European Union, but again silence about Russia’s billions.

The Kremlin thinks it knows Europe’s dirty secret now. The Kremlin thinks it has the European establishment down to a tee. The grim men who run Putin’s Russia see them like latter-day Soviet politicians. Back in the 1980s, the USSR talked about international Marxism but no longer believed it. Brussels today, Russia believes, talks about human rights but no longer believes in it. Europe is really run by an elite with the morality of the hedge fund: Make money at all costs and move it offshore.

The Kremlin sees its evidence in the former leaders of Britain, France and Germany. Tony Blair now advises the dictatorship in Kazakhstan on how to improve its image in the West. Nicholas Sarkozy was contemplating setting up a hedge fund with money from absolutist Qatar. And Gerhard Schroder is the chairman of the Nord Steam consortium – a majority Gazprom-owned pipeline that connects Russia directly to Germany through the Black Sea.

Russia is confident there will be no Western economic counterattack. They believe the Europeans will not sanction the Russian oligarch money. They believe Americans will not punish the Russian oligarchs by blocking their access to banks. Russia is certain a military counterattack is out of the question. They expect America to only posture. Cancel the G-8? Who cares?

Because Putin has no fear of the West, he can concentrate on what matters back in Russia: holding onto power. When Putin announced he would return to the presidency in late 2011, the main growling question was: why?

The regime had no story to sell. What did Putin want to achieve by never stepping down? Enriching himself? The puppet president he shunted aside, Dmitry Medvedev, had at least sold a story of modernization. What, other than hunger for power, had made Putin return to the presidency? The Kremlin spin-doctors had nothing to spin.

Moscow was rocked by mass protests in December 2011. More than 100,000 gathered within sight of the Kremlin demanding Russia be ruled in a different way. The protesters were scared off the streets, but the problem the regime had in justifying itself remained. Putin had sold himself to the Russian people as the man who would stabilize the state and deliver rising incomes after the chaos of the 1990s. But with Russians no longer fearing chaos, but rather stagnation as the economy slowed – it was unclear what this “stability” was for.

This is where the grand propaganda campaign called the Eurasian Union has come into its own. This is the name of the vague new entity that Putin wants to create out of former Soviet states — the first steps toward which Putin has taken by building a Customs Union with Belarus and Kazakhstan, and he had hoped with a Ukraine run by Viktor Yanuvokych. This is not just about empire; it is about using empire to cover up the grotesque scale of Russian corruption and justify the regime.

Russia would rather have swallowed Ukraine whole, but the show must go on. Russian TV needs glories for Putin every night on the evening news. Russian politics is about spin, not substance. The real substance of Russian politics is the extraction of billions of dollars from the nation and shuttling them into tropical Western tax havens, which is why Russian politics needs perpetual PR and perpetual Putinist drama to keep all this hidden from the Russian people. Outraged Putin has built up a Kremlin fleet of luxury aircraft worth $1 billion? Angry that a third of the $51 billion budget of the Sochi games vanished into kickbacks? Forget about it. Russia is on the march again.

This is why Crimea is perfect Putin. Crimea is no South Ossetia. This is not some remote, mountainous Georgian village inhabited by some dubious ethnicity that Russians have never heard of. Crimea is the heart of Russian romanticism. The peninsula is the only part of the classical world that Russia ever conquered. And this is why the Tsarist aristocracy fell in love with it. Crimea symbolized Russia’s 18th and 19th-century fantasy to conquer Constantinople and liberate Greek Orthodox Christians from Muslim rule. Crimea became the imperial playground: In poetry and palaces, it was extolled as the jewel in the Russian crown.

Crimea is the only lost land that Russians really mourn. The reason is tourism. The Soviet Union built on the Tsarist myth and turned the peninsula into a giant holiday camp full of workers sanitariums and pioneer camps. Unlike, the Russian cities of say northern Kazakhstan, Crimea is a place Russians have actually been. Even today over one million Russians holiday in Crimea every year. It is not just a peninsula; this is Russia’s Club Med and imperial romanticism rolled into one.

Vladimir Putin knows this. He knows that millions of Russians will cheer him as a hero if he returns them Crimea. He knows that European bureaucrats will issue shrill statements and then get back to business helping Russian elites buy London town houses and French chateaux. He knows full well that the United States can no longer force Europe to trade in a different way. He knows full well that the United States can do nothing beyond theatrical military maneuvers at most.

This is why Vladimir Putin just invaded Crimea.

He thinks he has nothing to lose.

[caww]

......” the most important thing to keep in mind is the US, UK and EU have colluded to put in power a neo-nazi bunch of thugs. They were not elected, thus they are illegitimate.

In a democracy when you’re dissatisfied with your elected leaders you impeach them or, you wait it out until the next election when you vote for the other guy. What’s the argument in favor of the violent overthrow of a legitimately elected president? “.....

I believe there are many Americans who fail to see how the United States, Europe/Nato and the UN has used revenues, personnel, which they have organized on the grouds to incite the people, use thugs and supported them,to depose nation leaders who are not co-operative with the Globalist push for World Governance......Then they claim it’s the people seeking freedom. Then it’s seen as “clean hands”...for the politicians who push this.

It took SISI of Egypt to calm the Islamist takeover in Egypt.....and Putin in Syria.....because both these men understand that unfortunately there are many country’s people who cannot adopt to anything remotely democratic....there are simply to many tribal fractions who have no understanding of democracy....

Look at Libya, Somalia, Syria, Aphganistan, Iraq, Yemen etc. etc. and all the others where they’ve done this and the country’s are a mess...and the death tolls rise.

As much as we don’t want to admit it...and the harshness of dictatorships... they have kept those countries from all the fighting and or quickly put them down when they rose.

Our understanding of foreign nations culture and makeup cannot be compared to what we know....the mindset is much different and will never adapt.

We’ve stopped fighting wars and now are the worlds force to change the world to the Globalist demands....and it’s our men that will continue to pay the price for “re-building nations..and our revenues as well.

[Marguerite]

Check out my post

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/3130736/posts?page=27#27

[Marguerite]

Nothing to add.
You said it all.

[annalex]

I don’t understand what and where you are asking me to “look closer”. Yes, Ukraine exchanged its nuclear capability for territorial guarantees, and yes, the developments now entitle Ukraine to begin work on re-arming itself with nuclear weapons, and no, nuclear proliferation is not a good thing.

[annalex]

That America is turning itself into its former antithesis with the foreign policies of past several administrations, I don’t dispute at all, by the way. But I condemn the recent American policy for the same reason I applaud the Ukrainian revolution: because I am a nationalist and I want both Russian Federation and the United States to mind the interests of their own nations.

[caww]

My point is there is so much more happening, and groups operating in Ukraine then what is being reported in MSM. Here is an example..and this guys a nutcase terrorist bad guy!...but they are willing to consider these thugs...we know nothing of these militia's operating within Ukraine...but you can bet Putin does!

The leader of the 'Ukrainian radical group Right Sector', Dmitry Yarosh, has reportedly 'demanded' the country’s authorities open military arsenals for the group’s fighters. Enrique Ferro's insight:

Many of its violent acts carried out by the group have been well-documented by media and published on YouTube......The fighters used clubs, petrol bombs and firearms against the Ukrainian police....... Even after the coup, some members of the movement continued to use rifles and pistols. On Wednesday, a proposal was submitted to the Ukrainian parliament suggesting that Right Sector be pronounced a regular armed unit.

Coup-appointed Prime Minister Arseny Yatsenyuk dismissed three deputy defense ministers over the refusal to support the proposal.

Also on Wednesday, Russia put Yarosh on an international wanted list and charged him with inciting terrorism after he urged the notorious Doku Umarov, one of the most-wanted terrorists in the world, to attack Russia over the Ukrainian conflict.

[annalex]

against the Ukrainian police

Against militarized Berkut units who used stun grenades, rubber ammo and clandestinely, live ammo, while the protests were still in a peaceful stage.

Yes, Yarosh is a nationalist and a militant with possible ties to Chechen separatists. Another allegation, if I am not confusing him with someone else, was that he had ties to the Israeli commandos. Yarosh had run military-style camps in the West. The Right Sector was instrumental in bringing the revolution to victory. Revolutions are usually done by men like that. Good for them and good for Ukraine.

[caww]

Unfortunately for the US Putin's been calling it right from the start.....and no wonder he's been doing what he has..and likely will do. If the US attempts this they will create a war in Ukrainet...Putin isn't about ready to allow our missles on his border...

With Puppit Yatsenyuk now at the helm in Kiev, Ukraine is being steered inexorably into debt bondage by the West....(another story)....BUT WORSE... this week the new Ukrainian ambassador to Belarus, Mykhailo Yeshel, 'admitted' in a media interview that loans (lures) from Washington were being offered... ON CONDITION UKRAINE PERMIT THE DEPLOYMENT OF AMERICAN MISSSLE SYSTEMS ON IT'S TERRITORY– right on the border with Russia! The emerging picture is clear. Despite all the hysterical 'nonsense' being spouted by Western leaders and their media propaganda machine, demanding Russia to «back off» from Ukraine, the Western regime-change operation in that country is not just being consolidated – it is being ramped up. http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2014/03/06/ukraine-washington-hysteria-towards-russia-hides-us-regime-change.html

[annalex]

Ukraine is broke and indeed it would prefer to borrow in the West.

Putin, indeed, is likely to raise the stakes for a military conflict. I’l read your link tomorrow.

[tet68]

The problem is we haven’t slagged anybody in 60 years.
Other players have figured out how to game us even
when we have superiour firepower but are constrained
to use it, and we have a short attention span.

America isn’t at war.
The Marines are at war.
American is at the mall.

[caww]

...”while the protests were still in a peaceful stage”...

do you really believe that?

I watched early on and reported right here of how the Islamist’s said “peaceful” over and over again...while their terrorists and Islamic thugs invaded Egypt....I can name that tune that's playing out in Ukraine in similar fashion...different players, same game board.

What our media is reporting is not what's going down there..regardless of how much freedom you want for Ukraine or not...that is not what is at play here at all....

Did you read Kissinger’s take on this?...not that I agreed with him on every point.... but he was right saying that Ukraine should NOT go with Nato or the EU.....He saw it and so do I....they are going to, and are already beginning to suck the very life out of Ukraine....they are not going to have the independent nation they hoped for...rather they will be controlled by the IMF and Western dictates.

The ousting of Ukraine's President followed months, if not more, of American/Nato/EU sponsored destabilization that has culminated in a new government composed of neo-Nazis and other fascist thugs. This will more and more be seen as things become more chaotic there...and other players become known. Unless Putin shuts it down.

The sense of fear which has been gripping Russians in Ukraine is not the imaginations of the Russian people or Moscow’s political rhetoric..... The cadres of ‘Svoboda’ and its ‘Right Sector’ paramilitaries’ have publicly warned of ‘ethnic cleansing’ against Ukraine’s Russian communities as well as any other perceived political enemies...and their attempts to follow through on this are barely just beginning.

THE US thinks they can control it all just like in Egypt and Syria.....it's going to majorly backfire and our leadership will walk away from this when it does....The US cannot demand Us Missiles be allowed in Ukraine without that being a direct threat to Putin's Russia...we wouldn't allow it here either.

IMO with Ukraine...they have not been hard on Putin because if things get too nasty they will “depend on Putin” to stabilize or prevent a full civil war from breaking out, because Europe isn't going to go in their, neither will NATO nor the US.......but they sure will want the oil to flow...which is why Putin will use that tool to keep them at bay.

[dfwgator]

The West is Weak.

[Marguerite]

“Putin isn’t about ready to allow our missles on his border”

“Never poke a bear in the ribs, he might get annoyed”.

[Marguerite]

“You don’t need to educate me”

Far from me the idea if doing that.
We know each other for quite a while now, and I have the utmost respect for your intellectual qualites and multiple competences.

Allow me to sum it up in a non-partisan, non-emotional, realpolitics fashion:

“Vent my folly!” - William Shakespeare

After the fall of Soviet Union, US and NATO believed that it owned the world and acted accordingly, in a ruthless way; they destabilized the whole planet Earth through their interventions.

And here they stumbled upon a tough bone they can’t chew at - V.Putin. They can’t make war to him - he has nukes. They can’t use the gimmick UN against him, he has veto power. They can’t blackmail him, he keeps Europe by its energy needs’ balls. They can’t ruin him, Russia’s soil being filthy rich, with only 10% of this richness exploited. Wait until Putin industrialises Siberia. Besides , he’s got on his side the rising economy stars India and China.

Regards

Daisy

[annalex]

OK, I read it: Ukraine: Washington’s Hysteria Towards Russia Hides US Regime Change.

Mr. Finian is entitled ho his opinion, or rather, to the Kremlin opinion on the events that he shares. The fact remains that it is Putin's unmarked (a war crime in itself) military that is occupying Crimea and yesterday attacked a Ukrainian military base. The fact is that the Ukrainian revolution, while violent, did not achieve its goals through use of force; Yanuk regime fell because it lost the support of the people, at least in Central and Western parts of the country. The fact is also that both US and Russian Federation guaranteed the territorial integrity of Ukraine. There was no clause in the Budapest memorandum about which modes of transition of power are and are not allowed in Ukraine. When a sovereign country goes through a revolution, it still remains a sovereign country.

To use the words "regime change" in this context is a leftist cliche and a lie. When the US occupied Iraq, that was a "regime change" engineered in Washington. When the US and NATO used bombers to suppress Gaddafi's military in Libya, that, too was a "regime change". When Ukrainian rebels burnt tires and lobbed Molotov cocktails at the Berkut, that was genuine popular uprising. Sympathy toward the rebels, who nevertheless armed themselves from street trash, -- is not "regime change" in the connotations anti-American left attaches to it.

I made a post (#61) about the sniper allegation. There is nothing of substance in the transcript that a pro-Putin news organization printed. Everyone is quoting, note, not the actual alleged evidence "she [...] said that as a medical doctor she can say that, the same type of bullets were used on both police and protestors", -- which is a double hearsay based on similarity of bullets, -- but rather a summary "there is now stronger and stronger understanding...", -- which is a statement of opinion. There is, maybe, "understanding" in some heads, -- there is no evidence. In a typical leftist fashion, Finian bypasses facts in order to make hysterical slogans that suit his mood. Freepers should know better.

[annalex]

government composed of neo-Nazis and other fascist thugs

Know what, just relax. You want to swear at the national uprising, that had plenty of internal motives, you are free to do so, but I cannot take hysterical statements like that seriously. At least, learn what the words you are using mean.

[bert]

If Russia no longer feared the west it would have interstates or autobahns.

No hiways thwart invasion. A Ukrainian buffer thwarts invasion

[annalex]

they stumbled upon a tough bone they can’t chew at - V.Putin

Yes, possibly, but it doesn't make me a Putin's admirer. He is a product of the Soviet system and sooner or later will end up on the trash heap where the rest of it is. When someone -- anyone, -- humiliates him and hopefully defeats him, he is bringing liberation of Russia closer.

[annalex]

You are right. The Sovs all fear the West because they know we’ll bury them. Putin, moreover, like all NKVD scum, is a coward. He’ll bluff — easy against Obama, — and then he’ll fold.

[bert]

——they know we’ll bury them——

We, meaning America, are not really the problem and never have been. The Russian enmity towards us was not because of ourselves but because we were defending the Europeans.

The fear is far more primitive. Tens of millions of Russians were slaughtered by invading French under Napoleon and then Germany under Hitler. Both failed but the cost of the lost Russian population has never been recovered. In America, we can not begin to conceive of the loss of life the Russians suffered from Napoleon and Hitler.