Posted on 08/23/2023 9:42:49 PM PDT by SeekAndFind
The BRICS summit is taking place in South Africa this week. BRICS started out as BRIC for Brazil, Russia, India and China but has since added South Africa. The group of nations doesn’t have much in common except a generalized sense of grievance over the US being the most powerful country in the world.
The other BRICS nations have offered little to no protest of the Kremlin’s decision to rush to war. China and India stepped up purchases from Russia as Western sanctions started to bite. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva suggested that the West was at least partially to blame for the conflict and has offered a vague proposal to help forge a truce between Kyiv and Moscow. South Africa’s government equivocated, too, refusing to outright condemn Putin’s regime while bemoaning the war’s ripple effects on supply chains critical to African societies.
In Johannesburg, a big topic of conversation will be the outsize influence of the U.S. dollar in the global economy. Talk of “de-dollarization” is rife among exponents of the BRICS, even though not formally on the summit’s agenda. Some have floated a rival BRICS-backed currency to challenge the greenback’s supremacy. But the invention of a new BRICS currency is wildly ambitious — and probably unfeasible — and the summit is expected to focus instead on options to expand the use of local currencies in trade between bloc members. Dollar-strapped countries like Argentina have already started dealing in the Chinese yuan in certain transactions.
“Why does Brazil need the dollar to trade with China or Argentina? We can trade in our currency,” Lula told reporters recently<, before casting the BRICS bank as a more just potential actor on the world stage than U.S.-led institutions like the International Monetary Fund.
So the general idea of this conference is for these countries to get together as a kind of vague rival to the G7 or the G20. What you don’t want at a meeting like this is signs of confusion or possible problems behind the scenes. But this week China is experiencing both. First, there was this incident in which a Chinese aide seen running after Xi Jinping was stopped by security who, it seems, didn’t know who he was. As you can see in this clip, Xi seems confused and stops and looks back.
At BRICS summit, South African security officers stop Chinese President Xi Jinping's officials who were trying to make their in. Literally had to close the doors prompting the Chinese President to look back several times. pic.twitter.com/EHhsd6IKEH
— Sidhant Sibal (@sidhant) August 23, 2023
It turns out the man who got body slammed into a door was Xi’s translator. You can see the same small guy with glasses in this earlier video shot upon Xi’s arrival.
Chinese President Xi Jinping attending the BRICS summit in South Africa
If you're wondering what small talk between national leaders sounds like:
Props to President Xi pulling out an appropriate ancient proverb, responding to President Ramaphosa's apartheid story at the end. pic.twitter.com/4H0PerqSEm
— Zhao DaShuai 无条件爱国🇨🇳 (@zhao_dashuai) August 23, 2023
But that was a relatively minor incident compared to what happened yesterday. Xi Jinping failed to show up for a planned speech.
Chinese President Xi Jinping failed to show up at the Brics Business Forum on Tuesday in South Africa, where he was expected to deliver a speech alongside his counterparts. In his place, Commerce Minister Wang Wentao read the speech that criticised the US over its tendency toward “hegemony”.
Xi, in the speech read by Wang at the Sandton Convention Centre in Johannesburg, said the US tended to fight countries that threaten its dominance in global affairs and financial markets.
The speech said that every country has a right to development and that people should have the freedom to pursue a happy life. But one country, he said in a thinly veiled swipe at the US, is “obsessed with maintaining hegemony, has gone out of its way to cripple the emerging markets and developing countries”…
“This should be ‘stop the presses’ news!” Jorge Guajardo, a former Mexican ambassador to China, said in response to Glaser’s post. “An unannounced absence, especially in a multilateral forum (which the PRC seldom misses), after all the ground work with India, is truly newsworthy. If true, something is certainly amiss.”
Again, the anti-US tone is standard fare for this event but the fact that Xi didn’t deliver his own speech is odd. Close watchers of China say this simply never happens without some extraordinary reason.
Xi later attended the summit dinner, but no reason was given for missing the speech. It appeared to be a last-minute decision, as state media articles and social media posts from China’s foreign ministry spokesperson were published as though he had delivered it himself…
The China Global South Project noted this was the second unexplained absence by a Chinese official after former foreign minister Qin Gang – who has not been seen in public for months – also missed last month’s foreign ministers Brics meeting.
“To say [Xi’s absence] is extraordinary is an understatement as Chinese leaders never miss highly choreographed events like this,” it said.
Did anything extraordinary happen yesterday that might have unavoidably pulled Xi away from his duties? Maybe?
Reports circulating online have claimed that one of China’s Type 093, or “Shang-class,” nuclear submarines had crashed in unknown circumstances at some point in the past few days. Some of the reports claimed the entire crew onboard the vessel had been killed…
There has been no official confirmation of a Chinese submarine running into difficulty in the contentious strait, and experts have been hesitant to speculate. The topic was not mentioned in a press briefing from China’s Defense Ministry on Tuesday and has not appeared in any state news agencies’ reports.
Two points about this. First, if a Chinese nuclear sub did sink in the Taiwan straight that would be a huge story. Second, this definitely seems like the kind of news China would deny and lie about because that’s just what they do anytime their prestige is on the line.
On the other hand, no one seems convinced this happened yet. Taiwan’s MOD put out a statement yesterday saying they hadn’t heard anything beyond the rumors.
“As per my understanding, this information is circulating on social media but I haven't received any official confirmation”- Spokesperson of Taiwan's Ministry of National Defense on the rumours regarding the Chinese submarine accident in the Taiwan Strait
pic.twitter.com/adlPZlphW4— Sana Hashmi | 胡莎娜 (@sanahashmi1) August 22, 2023
Also there’s this:
Taiwan Atomic Energy Council spokesman Wang Chongde said that if a nuclear submarine sinks nuclear fuel could leak However, none of Taiwan's 63 radiation monitoring stations detected a change in bg radiation after reports of a Chinese submarine accident in the Taiwan Strait. pic.twitter.com/F3YhaYenWU
— JohneidpyM01 (@johneidpyM01) August 22, 2023
So at least for now this looks like a rumor with no confirmation at all. It probably didn’t happen. That still leaves the mystery of why Xi Jinping was suddenly unavailable for a scheduled speech yesterday without any notice. Something happened, we just don’t know what it was yet.
Putin invaded Ukraine aiming to make it a vassal state.
That failed.
By that Ukraine won — just as a person set upon by a gang of slavers who walks away bleeding but still free has won.
The very site you gave for your gdp proof says
https://www.imf.org/en/Countries/UKR
2023 Projected Real GDP (% Change) : -3.0
Not -34, but -3
That’s aid.
NATO is not at war with Russia — Russia went to vassalize Ukraine — and failed.
“Ukraine’s goals were NATO membership”
Ukraine’s goal AFTER Putin invaded was to survive and not be a vassal state.
They did that - that’s a victory.
Ukraine’s economy shrunk by MORE than 34% since wars begin.
But while Russia is GROWING at 1.5% in 2023; Ukraine, the obvious winner in this war is shrinking another 3% predicted in this year 2023.
Let me do some basic math for you 34+3= 37% since wars begin. Success! You win! Hands down, you beat Russia when it comes to who can shrink their economy the most!
Now, as you attempt to redefine failure into success, another thing that was predictable from day one of this war, it’s not Russia that lost land, but Ukraine; it’s not Russia that lost a major industrial area, but Ukraine; it’s not Russia that lost a major port city, but Ukraine.
Let me bring your attention to four maps:
https://danieljmitchell.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/russian-in-ukraine.jpg
https://danieljmitchell.files.wordpress.com/2014/03/ukraine-election-results.jpg
And then compare them to this map: https://storymaps.arcgis.com/stories/36a7f6a6f5a9448496de641cf64bd375 (up to date map).
If you look back to my post literally to day one of the invasion, you’ll see that even I, not read on to any secret plans, not part of the administration, state department etc. Predicted this outcome. ***Because it was apparent!***
The Russians took those lands that (1) Are ethnic Russian, (2) historically once were Russian, (3) where in the Soviet era and with Russia assistance things were built up such as the industrial area.
Contrary to the Western Cold War boogyman and Putin mad man arguments, the Russians took those areas where they see they can lay a claim, and which they can reasonably hold without some huge and long term resistance. They are actually very predictable.
Russia has no interest in seizing land which will drain there resources for perpetuity. The land they seized on this operation, just like when they took the Crimea in 2014, is land where the majority of people see themselves as Russian, where it was nationalist Ukrainians that were sending troops for years to put these folks down, had to rig elections to squash local leaders that are pro Russian, close Orthodox churches that spoke out about the abuses, banned the use of the Russian language...
I know it’s outside of your CNN and MSNBC paradigm, but you are no liberator in Ukraine. Ukraine is a civil war, where the true underdog (minority) are ethnic Russians and you can give a shit about, because you simply have chosen sides because Russia is always bad in your mind. It’s a Ukrainian internal conflict where the US and Russia, as well as the EU have been meddling for years and because we have chosen sides, are are not fair and impartial, because we have vested economic interests, a peaceful resolution was squandered. The issue which tipped the scale for war was NATO membership unconditionally (which we would also not have accepted of in Russia’s shoes), and that was neither a prudent nor necessary decision by this US administration.
This is a stupid war which never should have happened and even now, the ultimate outcome will be the same regardless of how much of my tax money is wasted or Ukrainians are burned up in a war we caused and are perpetuating.
By ALL measures, Ukraine lost this war (military objectives, political goals, economic outcome). You simply make up your own and new definition of success and then pretend as if Ukraine didn’t lose. Our leaders, the ones responsible, have to keep folks like you convinced of the cause, and not get people to start thinking that Biden screwed up again. However, subtlety even the block heads responsible for this war are beginning to change the narrative (obviously not making themselves responsible): https://www.kyivpost.com/post/21718 Like you, that’s called “changing the goal post” and “managing expectations.”
Pretty amazing what the US media is willing to go along with, how they get their marching orders and simply push a narrative/censor/spin/repetitively push a message may it be Covid, J6, or Ukraine. Sad statement when I need to VPN out of the US so I can get the other sides perspective, or have to read foreign media not associated with the big US and Euro media conglomerates...
Ukraine survived and fought off the invading Russians who were attempting to make it a vassal state.
When an attempted kidnapping victim fights off the kidnappers/rapists and ends up with a broken arm, most people say “she defended herself from evil”.
But you would say “she should have gone quietly with the kidnapper/rapists and she wouldn’t have broken her arm”
I suppose you would advise that to your female family members???
By your measures, Ukraine won the war:
1. Military objectives: survive and not be a vassal state - done
2. political goals: survive and not be a vassal state - done
3. economic outcome: survive and not be a vassal state - done
Are you the kind that blames rape victims?
Vassal state, what does that mean? Ukraine is under American control in every aspect.
Just survive? No. The goal was to stop the Russians from taking the land in the East, then to push them back out. Neither has happened. Abject failure.
It was NEVER Russia’s plan to take all of Ukraine, nor even damage them to much. Realize, most of the damage being done to the Ukraine today is self inflicted, constant counter offensives that go now where at and cost thousands of lives which of course we don’t report on.
If the rape victim went to a bar by herself, got so drunk she blacked out, was hitting on guys and scantly clothed even before blacking out, the answer is “yes,” she is partially to blame for being raped regardless of what society says. Common sense.
Once Ukraine said “yes” to the Biden offer of unconditional NATO membership in October of 2021, the innocence was lost. Ukraine had just put themselves in a position where they are largely to blame with what follows, even if they are just a “vassal state” of the US and doing as we tell them. When we pushed NATO, unconditionally, we were putting Russia in an unacceptable security situation. We were doing something we would never accept ourselves if in Russia’s shoes.
If you want to talk about puppet’s, look no further than Mr Z, someone installed by the US. Someone where our MSM has absolutely no reports about who was financing him, his ties to the US state department, our NGOs (yes, Soros), and intelligence services, and how a young Jewish comedian with zero political weight rose to power at lightning speed. But no worries, nothing to see here... time for another story in our media about democracy, sovereignty, human rights and peace.
The problem: Ukraine and this conflict is because of outside influence. If folks would have really wanted a peaceful solution, if “sovereignty” and “democracy” were the goal, then we should have embraced the Minsk accord which basically is all about ridding outside influence (militarily) from Ukraine. The fact that we were the biggest culprit in violating this agreement tells all about our true intentions: https://www.ft.com/content/21b8f98e-b2a5-11e4-b234-00144feab7de
Reality: https://www.newsmax.com/us/defense-secretary-lloyd-austin/2023/09/19/id/1135000/ We are warming up to the idea of negotiating and ending the war. We are beginning to accept the idea that Ukraine lost this land and population, an industrial area and port city. The narrative is beginning to change at our most senior levels.
Vassal state - means like Belarus.
Ukraine is not under American control like Belarus is under the Kremlin’s control.
Ukraine fought off Putin’s attempt to make it a vassal state - that was Putin’s goal. And Putin failed.
The fact that Ukraine survived - despite the pain - means that it has won. It’s injured, but better than being assimilated into the Kremlin empire
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