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4 Important Articles re the Chemical Weapons Attack in Idlib and Trump’s Decision to Bomb Syria

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(The guided-missile destroyer USS Porter conducts strike operations while in the Mediterranean Sea, April 7, 2017. (Navy photo by Petty Officer 3rd Class Ford Williams))

For those attempting to make some kind of rational sense of how we have arrived at Trump bombing Syria within literally a few days of his administration suggesting that regime change in that country was no longer being actively pursued, I would recommend the following four articles to understand the context and as a call for skepticism regarding these actions.

The first article is by Vijay Prashad, an international relations expert who teaches at Trinity College and has provided some good in depth analysis of the Syria war in the past.  I reproduce his article, which originally appeared at Alternet, in its entirety.  It  is fairly concise and urges the reader to ask questions and not allow propaganda and manipulative appeals to emotion to overtake reason when it comes to a country in which both nuclear superpowers have a military presence:

At the United Nations Security Council on April 5, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley held up pictures of children killed by a gas attack in Khan Shaykhun, south of the Syrian city of Idlib. Estimates suggest about 50 to 60 people died in this attack. The United States, the United Kingdom and France placed a resolution before the Security Council condemning the attack and asking for an investigation of it. There is no call for armed action against anyone because the Council is divided on who perpetuated the act.

Strikingly, Ambassador Haley then said, “We don’t yet know about yesterday’s attack,” meaning nobody had definitive intelligence about the attack. Yet, there was a hasty dash to judgment in the West that the perpetrator was the government of Bashar al-Assad—perhaps with Russian assistance.

How do we know what happened in Khan Shaykhun? The sources for the Western media outlets are mainly “opposition activists,” as BBC put it in one of its early reports. A BBC story from April 4 (Syria Conflict: ‘Chemical attack’ in Idlib kills 58[3]) lists the various sources it has relied upon:

1. Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR). Founded in 2006, SOHR is based in the United Kingdom and receives funding from the European Union and—most likely—the United Kingdom. It relies upon a network of opposition activists across Syria to provide raw information, which its director, Rami Abdul Rahman, then digests. SOHR is openly anti-Assad.

2. Khotwa (Step) news agency. Founded by opposition activists in late 2013, Khotwa—as they say—aims to “bring the world’s attention to the suffering of the Syrian people.” Its 40 correspondents are mostly based in rebel-held areas. In 2014, its director, Mohammad Hrith, was in the news in Turkey due to a fracas between Hrith and the Prime Minister of the Syrian interim government Ahmed Touma. Touma’s people suggested Hrith came to demand funds from them.

3. Local Co-ordination Committee (LCC) of the town. The LCC is part of a network of local groups emerged to coordinate protests after 2011. They represent the politics of the area in which they are established. Their general tenor is anti-Assad.

4. Hussein Kayal, a photographer with the pro-opposition Edlib Media Center. Kayal and the Edlib Media Center are part of a network of journalists including those involved with the Aleppo Media Center. They are affiliated with the Syrian Expatriate Organization, led by Mazen Hasan, who is a leading figure in the Syrian opposition that is based in the West and a key person in the Washington, D.C.-based Coalition for a Democratic Syria. The Coalition has been urging U.S. armed action to overthrow the Syrian government.

5. An AFP news agency journalist (unnamed). Some of the main photographs from Idlib came from two Agence France-Presse photographers, Omar Haj Kadour and Mohamed al-Bakour. Both offered vivid pictures from the hospital in Maaret al-Numan and Khan Shaykhun. Omar Haj Kadour’s Twitter account shows he is decidedly on the side of the opposition. The account by the stringer al-Bakour seems utterly sincere. He says, “My job is to take pictures. To cover this attack. To show this horrendous crime to the world.”

Neither of the AFP reporters confirms who used these weapons on the civilians, many of them young children. They merely document the act. They are not experts. Their evidence includes foam at the mouth of one of the victims and the smell (“The first thing that hits you is the smell”). Most nerve agents are odorless. The photographers describe what they experience. To analyze their information would take a great deal more time on the ground. The others quoted by BBC do not hesitate. They point their fingers at Assad. Those with the densest relationship to the armed opposition are the first to claim that this attack was done by the government.

Investigation

The Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), which had previously worked in Syria to destroy all banned chemical weapons, now says it will investigate the attack in Khan Shaykhun. The OPCW has announced that the Fact Finding Mission (FFM) is already in “the process of gathering and analysing information from all available sources.” The FFM has had a very controversial history since its establishment on April 29, 2014.

Scholars Karim Makdisi and Coralie Pison Hindawai have authored an important study[4] of the U.N. role in the investigation of chemical weapons in Syria. In this study, they write that the FFM was from its inception seen by many well-regarded people in the U.N. as “highly political.”

That the FFM was sent into Syria, led by Malik Ellahi, to find out about chlorine use was itself a problem, Makdisi and Hindawai write, since “investigating allegations of use [of chlorine] would prove extremely challenging at best, and the actual use almost impossible to establish scientifically.” The FFM’s work was criticized for lacking in professionalism and for its methodology.

At any rate, the main point here was that the West seemed to want to push these investigations, knowing full well the difficulty involved in ascertaining use of chlorine, in order to create a narrative of chemical weapons use. The FFM’s reports became the basis for the U.N. Security Council Resolutions 2209 (2015) and 2235 (2015), both of which threated Syria with Chapter VII (armed) action by member states of the UN.

Denials

During the debate on UNSC resolution 2235 in August 2015, the Russian ambassador Vitaly Churkin voted for the resolution. However, Churkin raised the “question of who had used chemical weapons.” He hoped an investigation would keep these questions alive and not begin with the assumption that the government had used these weapons. The Russian military intervened in Syria the next month. Between August 2015 and April 2017, with the Russian forces in Syria, there has been no serious allegation of chemical weapons use against the government.

Syria’s ambassador to the U.N., Bashar Ja’afari, said at the August 2015 meeting that his country had “warned the Council of the danger of chemical weapons use by terrorist groups, some of which were affiliated with al-Qaeda.” He pointed his finger at the Khan al-Assal incident of July 2013, which was not taken seriously in the West. SOHR posted a video which showed Syrian soldiers on the ground, as if gassed. Both the al-Qaeda affiliate, Jabhat al-Nusra, and the Ansar al-Khalifa brigade had conducted this attack. No investigation was held.

In June 2016, in eastern Ghouta, the Syrian army said its soldiers had been hit with toxic gas. The Saudi proxy in the area, Jaish al-Islam, denied the use of any chemical weapons. But video evidence suggested that there was some kind of atmospheric weapon used against the soldiers.

Russia and the Syrian government now suggest that there was perhaps a stockpile of such weapons in Khan Shaykhun, which combusted perhaps by a Syrian Air Force strike. There is no confirmed evidence of any such warehouse, although the Russian Defense Ministry says that this information is “fully objective and verified.” Whether aerial bombardment can have this effect on gas housed in a warehouse will need to be investigated.

The Politics of the Moment

The Syrian armed opposition was disheartened at the Geneva V talks. The Syrian Army and its Russian and Iranian allies have made gains across the country. The armed opposition’s political leadership in Geneva openly called for U.S. intervention to help them. They feel utterly isolated.

A few days later, the administration of Donald Trump said plainly what had been clear since the Russian intervention of September 2015: that regime change in Damascus was off the table. This had been the policy of the Obama administration for the past two years, but it did not directly say so. Trump’s people acknowledged reality: with Russia and Iran in the picture, removal of Assad would take a fierce international conflict far greater than the tragedy that has befallen Syria.

With Turkey now drifting toward the Russian-Iranian narrative and Jordan dragged into chaos by the refugee crisis, easy borders to resupply the rebels are no longer available. The defeat of the armed opposition, including the al-Qaeda proxies and others, in Aleppo was the greatest blow.

For the Syrian government at this time to use chemical weapons in such a public way would not only be foolhardy, it would invite a U.S. attack. It seems only an utterly arrogant and blind leadership in Damascus would have committed such a crime. But the leadership in Damascus has shown it is crafty, using openings of all kinds to ensure its survival. This is not to say it would not have necessarily done such an attack. Eagerness to end the war before it can impose a political settlement on the rebels could have led to the use of such weapons. But this is not considered likely.

Over half a million Syrians are dead. Half the population is displaced. There is sadness across Syria, from one side of the firing line to another. Aerial bombardment by the Americans, the Russians, the Syrians and others continues to devastate Syria and Iraq. The Americans recently admitted to a major atrocity in Mosul, where 200 civilians have been killed. That attack did not seize the Security Council or bring forth fulminations from the Western press. Hypocrisy is central to the morals at the Security Council. This does not mean one should not be horrified by what has happened at Khan Shaykhun.

But more than anything, the international community must urge a thorough investigation of these events before rushing either to a forensic judgment about what happened and to a response—particularly a military response—in retaliation. Sober heads need to prevail. War is rarely the answer. Particularly when we don’t as yet know the question.

 The second article is an excerpt from Robert Parry’s latest, Trump’s ‘Wag the Dog’ Moment.   According to Parry’s sources in the intelligence community, the narrative being offered by the corporate media and Trump administration officials that Assad was automatically to blame for the chemical weapons attack earlier this week in Idlib province was far from a consensus view by intel analysts.  They also claim there was a major split between’s Trump’s non-insider advisers (e.g. Bannon and Kushner) and the insider Neocons represented by new NSA McMaster:

 

There is also an internal dispute over the intelligence. On Thursday night, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said the U.S. intelligence community assessed with a “high degree of confidence” that the Syrian government had dropped a poison gas bomb on civilians in Idlib province.

But a number of intelligence sources have made contradictory assessments, saying the preponderance of evidence suggests that Al Qaeda-affiliated rebels were at fault, either by orchestrating an intentional release of a chemical agent as a provocation or by possessing containers of poison gas that ruptured during a conventional bombing raid.

One intelligence source told me that the most likely scenario was a staged event by the rebels intended to force Trump to reverse a policy, announced only days earlier, that the U.S. government would no longer seek “regime change” in Syria and would focus on attacking the common enemy, Islamic terror groups that represent the core of the rebel forces.

The source said the Trump national security team split between the President’s close personal advisers, such as nationalist firebrand Steve Bannon and son-in-law Jared Kushner, on one side and old-line neocons who have regrouped under National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster, an Army general who was a protégé of neocon favorite Gen. David Petraeus.

White House Infighting

In this telling, the earlier ouster of retired Gen. Michael Flynn as national security adviser and this week’s removal of Bannon from the National Security Council were key steps in the reassertion of neocon influence inside the Trump presidency. The strange personalities and ideological extremism of Flynn and Bannon made their ousters easier, but they were obstacles that the neocons wanted removed.

Though Bannon and Kushner are often presented as rivals, the source said, they shared the belief that Trump should tell the truth about Syria, revealing the Obama administration’s CIA analysis that a fatal sarin gas attack in 2013 was a “false-flag” operation intended to sucker President Obama into fully joining the Syrian war on the side of the rebels — and the intelligence analysts’ similar beliefs about Tuesday’s incident.

Instead, Trump went along with the idea of embracing the initial rush to judgment blaming Assad for the Idlib poison-gas event. The source added that Trump saw Thursday night’s missile assault as a way to change the conversation in Washington, where his administration has been under fierce attack from Democrats claiming that his election resulted from a Russian covert operation.

If changing the narrative was Trump’s goal, it achieved some initial success with several of Trump’s fiercest neocon critics, such as neocon Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham, praising the missile strike, as did Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. The neocons and Israel have long sought “regime change” in Damascus even if the ouster of Assad might lead to a victory by Islamic extremists associated with Al Qaeda and/or the Islamic State.

And, of course, most of the corporate media and politicians from both parties are bobbing their heads up and down in agreement (aside from some procedural quibbles), with news anchor Brian Williams of MSNBC describing American bombs flying into the air and hitting their targets as “beautiful” several times in what has to be one of the more vomit-inducing moments in recent memory and a new low for the corporate media.   So much for objectivity.

Glenn Greenwald outlines several points in his article The Spoils of War: Trump Lavished with Media and Bipartisan Praise for Bombing Syria.  Two of them relate to what I just discussed above, the craven media and bipartisan cheer-leading of (fascist buffoon – remember those descriptions of Trump?) Trump’s unleashing of violence and destruction on a foreign land which is wrapped in the usual self-righteous rhetoric, as well as the institutionalized illegality of the action.  I will excerpt a few of the points:  

2. Democrats’ jingoistic rhetoric has left them no ability – or desire – to oppose Trump’s wars.

Democrats have spent months wrapping themselves in extremely nationalistic and militaristic rhetoric. They have constantly accused Trump of being a traitor to the U.S., a puppet of Putin, and unwilling to defend U.S. interests. They have specifically tried to exploit Assad’s crimes by tying the Syrian leader to Trump, insisting that Trump would never confront Assad because doing so would anger his Kremlin masters. They have embraced a framework whereby anyone who refuses to confront Putin or Assad is deemed a sympathizer of, or a servant to, foreign enemies.

Having pushed those tactics and themes, Democrats have painted themselves into a corner. How could they possibly do anything but cheer as Trump bombs Syria? They can’t. And cheering is thus exactly what they’re doing.

For months, those of us who have urged skepticism and restraint on the Russia rhetoric have highlighted the risk that this fixation on depicting him as a tool of the Kremlin could goad Trump – dare him or even force him – to seek confrontation with Moscow. Some Democrats reacted with rage yesterday at the suggestion that their political tactics were now bearing this fruit, but that’s how politics works.

Much as George H.W. Bush was motivated to shed his “wimp” image by invading Panama, of course Trump will be motivated to prove he’s not controlled by Putin via blackmail by seeking confrontation with the Russian leader. And that’s exactly what he just did. War is the classic weapon U.S. Presidents use to show they are strong, patriotic and deserving of respect; the more those attributes are called in question, the greater that compulsion becomes:

Trump is the prime author of his wars, and of this bombing in Syria. He, and he alone, bears primary responsibility for it. But Trump is not an island of agency; he operates in the climate of Washington. A major reason why it’s so dangerous to ratchet up rhetorical tension between two major nuclear-armed powers is because of the ease with which those tensions can translate into actual conflict, and the motivation it can create for Trump to use war to prove he’s a patriot after all.

Whatever else is true, Democrats – with very few exceptions such as Rep. Ted Lieu and Rep. Tulsi Gabbard – have refrained from criticizing Trump’s bombing campaign on the merits (as opposed to process issues). Indeed, Democratic Party leaders have explicitly praised Trump’s bombing. They will have to continue to do so even if Trump expands this war. That’s what the Democratic Party has turned itself into to; indeed, it’s what it has been for a long time.

 

3. In wartime, US television instantly converts into state media.

As it always does, the U.S. media last night was an almost equal mix of excitement and reverence as the bombs fell. People who dissent from this bombing campaign – who opposed it on the merits – were almost entirely disappeared, as they always are in such moments of high patriotism (MSNBC’s Chris Hayes had two guests on after midnight who opposed it, but they were rare). Claims from the U.S. government and military are immediately vested with unquestioned truth and accuracy, while claims from foreign adversaries such as Russia and Syria are reflexively scorned as lies and propaganda.

For all the recent hysteria over RT being a propaganda outlet for the state, U.S. media coverage is barely distinguishable in times of war (which is, for the U.S., the permanent state of affairs). More systematic analysis will surely be forthcoming of last night’s coverage, but for now, here is Brian Williams – in all of his military-revering majesty – showing how state TV functions in the United States:

Adam H. Johnson

✔@adamjohnsonNYC

good thing we don’t have govt-controlled media in this country

And here’s Fareed Zakaria declaring on CNN that Donald Trump has now been instantly transformed into the President of the United States in all of the loftiest and most regal senses of the term:

New Day

✔@NewDay

.@FareedZakaria on Syria strikes: “I think Donald Trump became President of the United States” last night

4. Trump’s bombing is illegal, but presidents are now omnipotent.

It should be startling and infuriating that Trump is able to order a new attack on the Syrian Government without any democratic debate, let alone Congressional approval. At least when Obama started bombing Syria without Congress, he had the excuse that it was authorized by the 2001 Authorization to Use Military Force, since his ostensible targets were terrorist groups (even though ISIS did not exist until years after that was enacted and is hardly “affiliated” with Al Qaeda). But since there’s no self-defense pretext to what Trump just did, what possible legal rationale exists for this? None.

But nobody in Washington really cares about such legalities. Indeed, we have purposely created an omnipotent presidency. Recall that in 2011, Obama went to war in Libya not just without Congressional approval, but even after Congress rejected such authorization.

What happened to Obama as a result of involving the U.S in a war that Congress had rejected? Absolutely nothing, because Congress, due to political cowardice, wants to abdicate war-making powers to the President. As a country, we have decided we want an all-powerful president – one who can bomb, and spy, and detain, and invade with virtually no limits. That’s the machinery of the imperial presidency that both parties have jointly built and have now handed to President Trump.

Indeed, in 2013, Obama explicitly argued that he had the right to bomb Assad without Congressional approval – a precedent the Trump White House will now use.

And, finally, this is from Patrick Henningsen at 21st Century Wire, summarizing all of the propaganda and discredited sources of information in the past about the war in Syria and to keep this in mind when consuming “news” about what is going on currently.  In the excerpt below, he specifically takes issue with some of the BBC’s coverage of the chemical weapons attacks in Idlib and the response to it, illustrating how this all contributed to preparing the public for illegitimate military action:

 

At no point in its reporting does the BBC ever express any skepticism that maybe their ‘activist’ sources could be providing false or misleading information. Ultimately, these reports can be used to trigger renewed calls by Western officials for military strikes against the ‘Syrian Regime’ – which was exactly what happened today after these news stories were circulated. Within a few hours after these reports circulated, Congressman Adam Kinzinger (R, Illinois) came on CNN with Wolf Blitzer who asked Kinzinger point blank: What can be done to remove this regime? Kinzinger then replied by calling outright for US airstrikes to “Take out the Assad Regime in Syria”, including “cratering their airstrips so no planes can take off” and creating a “No Fly Zone” over Syria.

These statements, as bombastic as they may sound, are serious and should not be taken casually. The problem is they are based on a series of lies. Of course, Kinzinger was followed on-air by John McCain protesting against US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s recent comments this week that, “The Syrian people should be able to choose their own (political) future” – effectively holding the overwhelming majority of Syrian in contempt for supporting their government.

CNN Senior Middle East correspondent Arwa Damon also chimed in with Blitzer from New York, and without any real evidence presented as to what has happened and who is to blame, she swiftly concluded that the Idlib “chemical attack” was the work of ‘the regime’ and that America cannot stand back idly and do nothing, and how this would show a “lack of humanity,” 

 I highly recommend reading the full article here:

More Sporadic Posting Through End of May

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Church on Spilt Blood, St. Petersburg, Built at the site of reformist Czar Alexander II’s 1881 assassination.  Russia; Photo by Natylie S. Baldwin, 2015

I will be posting more sporadically through the end of May due to preparations for my return trip to Russia in the first half of May.  I will be visiting Moscow in time for the annual Victory Day celebrations on May 9th, commemorating the defeat of Nazi Germany and will then be heading to St. Petersburg.

I am currently doing research on Russia’s three revolutions (1905, February 1917 and October 1917) and will be asking Russians what they think of the 1917 Revolutions and finding out how the government intends to commemorate it.

Palace Square, St. Petersburg, Russia.  Where desperate workers and peasants hoped to appeal to Czar Nicholas II to implement reforms to improve their lives and were massacred on Bloody Sunday in January, 1905, kicking off the first Russian Revolution; Photo by Natylie S. Baldwin

I will be writing an article on the 1905 Revolution and then another on the 1917 Revolution(s), the latter of which will include information gleaned from my discussions with Russians.

Monument to Soviet Workers Moscow.Edited

Monument to Soviet Worker, Moscow, Russia; photo by Natylie S. Baldwin

I also hope to maybe get a couple of travelogue-style posts in while I’m in Russia, but that will depend on the technology I have available.

Regards,

Natylie

 

Latest on Ukraine; Protests in Russia; U.S. Announces it Has Abandoned Regime Change Policy in Syria, Appears to Be Angling for Partition; Wikileaks Releases “Marble” Files on CIA’s Ability to Conduct Cyberwar and Falsely Attribute to Russia or China

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Firefighters working on the blaze at a Kharkov munitions depot; ©  EPA/SERGEY KOZLOV

Conditions in Ukraine – which were never great – continue their downward spiral as the IMF postponed a decision on whether to keep loaning Kiev money as part of the IMF’s bailout deal for the impoverished country.  Although the official reason given for suspending the payout was to monitor the effect of the Donbass blockade on the Ukrainian economy, it is believed that this was really done to see what the High Court of London will decide in the case before it of whether Kiev’s debt to the Russian government is deemed legitimate.  It is anticipated that the court will rule that it is, which will render Kiev in violation of IMF rules about defaulting on debts owed to governments, making them technically ineligible to receive more funds from the institution.   Alexander Mercouris writes more about this explanation:

 

It is not impossible that a further factor is IMF concern about the outcome of the High Court case in London brought by Russia in connection with Ukraine’s failure to repay the $3 billion debt it owes Russia.  The Russians have applied to the High Court for summary Judgment, and the High Court is expected to rule on this in April.  If the Judgment is in Russia’s favour, then Ukraine will be legally in default to a member of the Paris Club, and according to the IMF’s own rules ineligible for further funding.

Since a Judgment from the High Court in Russia’s favour would call into question the entire wisdom of the IMF agreeing to a bailout plan with Ukraine in the first place, it is understandable if the IMF is unwilling to say anything about it.

Without further help from the IMF the economic pressures on Ukraine will grow.  As Zolotaryov says, Ukraine is already running budget and trade deficits, which the transport blockade and the nationalisation of the enterprises will only make worse.  If IMF funding is cut off following a decision by the High Court in London that Ukraine is in default, then Ukraine will lose its external funding.

Zolotaryov says Ukraine has no option but to cover its existing deficits by printing more money.  If external funding is cut off, money printing will have to accelerate in which case inflation might take off.

A few days ago, the London court granted a motion to have the hearing expedited and reportedly rejected all of Ukraine’s arguments against Russia’s request for the expedited hearing.  This is believed to be a good indication that the court will rule in Russia’s favor.   TASS reported the following:

LONDON, March 29. /TASS/. London’s High Court has ruled to hear the case of Ukraine’s $3 billion sovereign debt to Russia in an expedited procedure, the presiding judge said on Wednesday.

The presiding judge also rejected all of Ukraine’s objections under Russia’s lawsuit.

The court has thus supported Russia’s position on the case’s expedited examination.

The Ukrainian side, on the contrary, insisted on a full-scale judicial process that would include the study of all the political aspects of the case.

As readers of this blog may remember, Poroshenko’s political fortunes have evaporated since he took over the presidency of a nation that has become a political and economic nightmare.  He is essentially hogtied in terms of implementing the Minsk Agreement because of the increasing influence and violence of the right-wing ultra-nationalists who have threatened him if he should make any concessions (real or perceived) to the Donbass region.  The groups that comprise this movement, such as Svoboda and Right Sector, have recently held a conference and released a Manifesto outlining their vision for the country.   Anatoly Karlin provided the following commentary and translation of the Manifesto:

On March 16, representatives of the political party Svoboda, Right Sector, and the National Corpus (i.e. the Azov batallion’s political wing) gathered to sign a National Manifesto.

The document affirms the ideological unity of the three main forces of Ukrainian nationalism, and conveniently summarizes its core vision.

Considering the Poroshenko’s governments ever greater submissiveness before Ukrainian nationalist forces, and the specter of them assuming an even more central role in the regime that might well soon replace his, it is now all the more vital to understand their vision for Ukraine.

Below, I provide a translation of this document, stressing readability over word-for-word accuracy.

Read Karlin’s translation here:

http://theduran.com/the-manifesto-of-ukrainian-nationalism/

As a result of this increasing mentality in Ukraine, there were violent attacks against the Polish consulate with damage to the roof and windows but no casualties.  This, in turn, prompted the Polish government to close their consulates in the country temporarily.   Reutersreported the following:

Poland temporarily closed its consulates in Ukraine after a grenade attack overnight at one of its buildings near the Polish border that Kiev said was intended to harm bilateral ties with Warsaw.

Relations between Poland and Ukraine have deteriorated in the past year in a row over World War Two atrocities [including the official revering of Stepan Bandera – the ultranationalist Ukrainian who actively colluded with Nazi Germany during WWII and played a role in atrocities against Poles and Jews – Natylie], although Warsaw still strongly supports Western sanctions imposed on Russia for the 2014 annexation of Ukraine’s Crimea Peninsula.

Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko and Polish president Andrzej Duda both condemned the attack, which took place in the early hours on Wednesday in the town of Lutsk near the border.

No one was hurt but the roof of the Polish consulate there and some windows were damaged. Ukraine’s Security Service said the weapon used appeared to be a rocket from an RPG-26, a disposable anti-tank launcher developed by the Soviet Union.

“The investigation considers several options of the incident, including act of terrorism,” the security service said in a statement.

The Ukrainian government, of course, found a way to try to blame Russia as the statement by the Ukrainian security service continued:

“The provocations against the Republic of Poland, which once in a while occur in Ukraine, are of benefit only to one party – the Russian Federation. Its methods of operation can be seen from far off.”

….The head of Poland’s National Security Bureau, Pawel Soloch, said: “Undoubtedly, this was a provocation.”

“The question is: who did it and for what purpose? We know the context – there is a Russian aggression against Ukraine,” he said on Polish private RFM-FM radio.

Between overthrowing American democracy, current programs to undermine upcoming European elections, and creating myriad provocations in Ukraine, the Baltics and the Balkans,  those Russians sure are impressive.   I wonder if Putin puts on a cape and tights before he leaps those tall buildings in a single bound.

How does he do it all and still manage to be dating those scores of women the western media told us about as well as overseeing an empire of wineries, villas, castles and mansions all over the world?  Is he on meth?

Back to Ukraine…

As if this all wasn’t enough, an explosion and fire raged for several days at what is believed to be the largest munitions depot in Europe, located in the Ukrainian region of Kharkov.  This prompted the evacuation of around 20,000 residents.  RT had the following details in the early hours of the disaster:

Thousands of people are being evacuated from Balakleya in the Kharkov region of Ukraine, as a massive fire has broken out at a munitions depot, which is said to be the largest in the country. There are reports of explosions and shattered windows.
Chaotic scenes with hundreds of vehicles stuck in traffic jams were reported on social media after the Balakleya city administration ordered an emergency evacuation of most of the city.

Videos uploaded by local residents show a huge blaze with what appears to be a missile flying off in a random direction and falling to the ground, as detonations are heard in the background.

 ….More than 16,000 people have been evacuated from the city of Balakleya, home to 29,000 people, the Ukrainian Emergency Ministry reported. Over 3,500 people were also evacuated from nearby villages.

On March 28th, TASS reported that the fire had finally been put out and residents were returning to their homes.

KIEV, March 28. /TASS/. Fires at a military depot in northeastern Ukraine’s Kharkov region have been extinguished now and the evacuated citizens have returned home, the State Emergency Service of Ukraine said on Tuesday.

“As of 7 a.m. on March 28, no fires caused by munitions explosions are registered in Balakleya and the nearby settlements. The territory of Balakleya and the neighboring villages in the emergency zone has been cleared of explosives,” the service said in a statement.

The town’s power supply has been fully restored and gas supply has been resumed in 50% of the areas.

Nearly 1,500 explosive objects have been seized since the effort began. Pyrotechnic specialists are now examining the area and clearing of explosives the territory close to the depot.

….The depot may house up to 150,000 tonnes of armaments. Media reports say some 125,000 tonnes of munitions had been there before the incident.

*********************************

As readers may recall from a recent post on this blog, Alexei Navalny released a report on Russian prime minister Dmitry Medvedev’s alleged corruption.  This led to demonstrations in Moscow and St. Petersburg as well as other smaller cities and towns throughout Russia, in response to Navalny’s call to protest.  Estimates vary from a few thousand to tens of thousands of protesters total.  I hate to burst anyone’s bubble but that is not much in terms of Russia’s total population, especially in the big cities like Moscow with a population of millions.  I’m not saying it’s nothing, just that those westerners who are hot for a regime change in Russia should temper their expectations.  As my previous post made clear, Medvedev is not terribly popular in Russia anymore and, according to recent polling from Gallup and Levada, the larger issue of corruption and the lethargic economy are not adversely affecting Putin’s overall approval rating, but they have hurt Medvedev who has made comments that make him seem out of touch with and unsympathetic to the concerns of average Russians.   It is also possible that, in time, Putin will use this as a good reason to dump Medvedev and pursue a different path, being able to argue that Medvedev and the ideas he advocated were given a chance and did not work.
The Washington Post’s David Filipov tweeted the following observation of the protests in Moscow on March 26th:

 

There were some pretty rough arrests, & 1 officer was hospitalized but for most of the day police in #Moscow were generally patient w crowds

The Kremlin’s official response via spokesman Dmitry Peskov follows, in part, courtesy of Johnson’s Russia List:

 

MOSCOW, March 27. /TASS/. The Kremlin respects the citizens’ right to take part in rallies provided they are conducted in accordance with the law, Russian Presidential Spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

When commenting on the protests that took place in a number of Russian cities on Sunday, he said that “the Kremlin respects people’s civil position and their right to express it.” “But we respect it when civil activism is expressed in accordance with the law and in places where the law prescribes,” Peskov added.

He added that the Kremlin “cannot respect those who deliberately misguide people and who instigated these illegal activities yesterday.” “We cannot respect those who deliberately misled underage minors promising them some payment in return for participating in an unauthorized protest, thereby exposing them to danger. We cannot accept, nor respect this,” Peskov added.

The Kremlin is not worried about any possible repetition of such protests, but is concerned that some elements will manipulate civil activists for their goals, the spokesman said.

The thing is not about fears. We are afraid that someone will continue using civil activists, people who are actively engaged in civic activities, for their goals, calling on people to take part in illegal and unauthorized events. We are concerned about this, not about the manifestation of civil activism and holding various events in line with the law,” Peskov explained.

The Kremlin spokesman noted that there is a rather active dialogue with the civil society through different channels and at various levels. He stressed that the president actively contacts with people who work in different fields. “During this dialogue there is a constant exchange of information and the possibility is given to understand the current problems and if people are dissatisfied and their assessment on the positive outcome of the authorities’ work,” he said.

Russia Beyond the Headlines filed the following report (excerpt) on March 27th:

 

On March 26, protests against corruption were held across Russia, the largest of which took place on Moscow’s main central street, Tverskaya. According to the Interior Ministry, around 7,000 to 8,000 people rallied in the capital, although the protest organizers are yet to release their estimates.

The protests were fueled by the government’s failure to respond to the investigation by opposition leader Alexei Navalny’s Anti-Corruption Foundation (FBK) into Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev. It’s claimed he has embezzled a secret empire worth $1.2 billion.

Most of the demonstrations, including the Moscow march, had not been sanctioned by the authorities, resulting in multiple arrests and clashes with the police. In the Russian capital alone, some 850 people have been detained.

Since the FBK film – “He is not Dimon to you” – making the allegations against Medvedev was released online, it has received 13 million views. Several days before the protests, the Moscow police said they could not be held responsible for unsanctioned rallies. Four hours before people protested on Tverskaya scores of special vehicles and buses with riot police lined the streets. Demonstrators, many of whom looked like ordinary people out for a walk, marched south towards the Kremlin. The large majority were peaceful, did not seek clashes with the police, and urged against rash actions. They objected to comparisons with Ukraine’s 2014 Maidan revolution and took pictures with riot police in the background.

What do you want?

“How shall we recognize our own? Are they with the authorities or not?” – these were the questions being asked in the somewhat confused crowd 15 minutes before the protest. People were coming out of the subway and joining the masses watching the police with suspicious, worried eyes. “Look, are they all for corruption, since we are against it?” asked a surprised elderly lady pointing at the officers, who were staring back at the growing crowds. Features typical of opposition protests were missing: There were no leaders, megaphones, or a clear plan of action. People didn’t know if they should be standing or moving.

Many were watching live broadcasts from other parts of Tverskaya. “In Pushkinskaya [square], a guy holding a placard that read ‘Corruption kills’ has been detained,” a man with a selfie stick and a large smartphone announced loudly. People immediately surrounded him, thinking he was the best informed among them. Another man suggested that the police would not be able to put a crowd of 500 people into police vans: “To stop a crowd like that, the only option is to start killing them”.

“What do we want? Do we want to fight or what?” asked an intellectual looking young man. “I and you know one thing – the dialogue with the authorities is over. We want change. Not promises. The first thing why we are here is to demand the resignation of the government, not just Medvedev.”

From the other side of the square, somebody suggested deciding there and then whether “Crimea is ours or not ours”, but this was quickly dropped as others said this discussion was for another time, as this was not what the protest was about.

A man called Oleg standing with his elderly mother also spoke out: “We all demand an answer to the film that Navalny released. The media are silent, the authorities are silent, as if nothing had happened. Although that film very much looks like the truth. Why have they not denied anything, why have they not sued Navalny for libel if it’s a lie?” He also told me his parents continue working beyond their retirement age because they do not have enough money to buy food. “The authorities ask us to be patient, but why don’t they tell us what for? It is time they explained at least something,” he added.

Somebody in the crowd suddenly shouted: “Let’s go” and people start moving towards the Kremlin. Oleg and his mother followed without hesitation. Aren’t you afraid of clashes with the police? – I ask him. “It is time we stopped being afraid, we are tired of being afraid. Something needs to be done,” he replied.

The Irrussianality blog, run by British Russia expert Paul Robinson, provided some contextual information as to whether Russia’s youth is, in fact, becoming more liberal or western-oriented or significantly turning against Putin:

 

So which is it? Are young Russians turning against the state, or do they idolize Vladimir Putin and ‘more than any other generation are proud of their country’? Will a new generation liberalize Russia, or not? To answer that, we need to move beyond anecdotal stories and look at the hard data of sociological surveys. These are quite revealing.

For instance, sociologist Olga Kryshtanovskaya surveyed young Russians in 26 cities. She concluded that ‘there is widespread cynicism among Russia’s young people’, but ‘despite their alienation, most young Russians are not clamoring for democratic change.’ She found also that:

  • About 25 percent of those polled consider themselves “liberals” or “democrats,” but relatively few people understand what those terms mean.  Many respondents would like to see a nationalist, monarchist or anarchist party.
  • The younger the respondent, the more likely he or she is to believe that Russia is a great power.
  • Putin remains the most popular politician among younger Russians.  …
  • Russia’s young people are more inclined to support “the complete destruction of the system”—even by revolution—than gradual change. But many consider revolution difficult to achieve.
  • Young people put little stock in the opposition or anti-Kremlin leaders such as Alexei Navalny.

Kryshtanovskaya concludes that ‘there is potential support among young people for a wide range of outcomes, not just a Russia that is pro-Western and democratic.’

Interestingly, other surveys suggest that young Russians are more optimistic about their country than older people. One poll, for instance, concludes that, ‘those ages 18 to 29, are the most likely to hold positive views about the economy’.  This perhaps helps in part explain why Putin’s popularity is higher among young Russians than among older ones. As the Levada Centre noted, in a 2014 poll ‘Eighteen-to-24-year-olds … backed Putin more than any other age bracket’.  Later polls have shown a similar picture. Julia Ioffe admits, ‘Russians between the ages of 18 and 24 approve of him [Putin] at a higher rate than any other age group: 88 percent.’ This hardly suggests that Russian youth are turning against their political leadership en masse.

As for more general political attitudes, Pew Global concludes that, ‘Older Russians ages 50 and older are more willing to say NATO is a major military threat (55%) than Russians ages 18 to 29 (43%)’, but also says that, ‘Nearly equal numbers of men and women and young (18-29) and old (50+) think homosexuality is morally unacceptable.’ Thus while, younger Russians may be less hostile to the West than their parents and grandparents, they are not obviously more socially liberal.

All in all, therefore, sociological data suggests that on the whole young Russians are politically apathetic, but in so far as they do have political opinions they are in fact more patriotic than their elders, more optimistic about the future, more supportive of the country’s president, and just as socially conservative. The hype about youth participation in last Sunday’s protests is probably just that – hype.

Again, I don’t think Russians are going to overthrow Putin any time soon.  Western journalists and politicians – even ones as high up the ladder as to serve as advisers to presidents – who believe this are showing that they have absolutely no understanding of Russians as they actually are.  This is why Obama’s advisers, who thought that implementing some economic sanctions and possibly manipulating oil prices in league with Saudi Arabia, would force Russians into the streets to call for Putin’s head were woefully ignorant of both Russia in particular and political psychology in general.  Any time a leader – even one who is not popular among their people – is perceived to be getting beat up on by a foreign power, they will rally around their leader, increasing his popularity.   Moreover, due to Russian’s culture and history, they have a high degree of stamina.   A modest recession was not going to turn Russians into pitchfork-wielding mobs baying for blood in front of the Kremlin.

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During a press conference in Ankara last Thursday, U.S. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson, stated that the Syrian president’s fate “will be decided by the Syrian people.”

Washington’s UN representative, Nikki Haley, also announced that the ousting of Assad is no longer a priority:

You pick and choose your battles and when we’re looking at this, it’s about changing up priorities and our priority is no longer to sit there and focus on getting Assad out…

According to Reuters, another (unnamed) administration source confirmed that regime change is no longer being pursued in Syria.

A recent interview with Wikileaks’ Julian Assange covers what Assange believes to be behind the change in policy with regard to Syria and the conflict between Trump and organs of the national security state, particularly the CIA, which have vested interests in regime change in Syria.

Speaking of Wikileaks, late last week the organization released documents relating to the CIA’s “Marble” program whereby the intelligence agency can conduct cyberwarfare while making it look like their operations are originating from Russia or China.

You’d think this might be newsworthy but, as of Friday afternoon, I could only find a major story in the UK Mirror as well as coverage by RT and one Huffington Post columnist who didn’t appear to have many readers.

No mention by Amy Goodman, Common Dreams, or The Real News Network.

Is it that Wikileaks isn’t reliable?  Well, no.  They have a 100% authenticity rate over the decade that they’ve been publishing.

It’s interesting that Liberals and Democrats praised Wikileaks years ago when their leaks were perceived to be exposing the Bush administration or the various institutions responsible for enabling Bush’s crimes.

Now, when it’s somehow perceived that Wikileaks’ leaks are making Trump not look bad, Liberals and Democrats are calling Assange and Wikileaks Russian stooges.  The comments section of the NYT is filled with this kind of mentality in response to the Vault 7 leaks exposing the CIA’s nefarious activities in violation of Americans’ privacy rights, in addition to their unaccountable crimes in the foreign policy realm.

Regardless of how one feels about Trump (and I find most of his policies abhorrent),  this is childish and intellectually dishonest.

People will have to face up to the fact, sooner or later, that Democrats are just as bought off as their Republican counterparts.  This is why Democratic party leaders have shown no evidence that they’ve learned anything from the election.  Nancy Pelosi has stated that the Democrats don’t need to change and more recently slurred out an incoherent answer to Anderson Cooper’s inquiry as to who the leaders of the Democratic Party were in an interview.

Furthermore, Tom Perez – the new milquetoast leader of the DNC – spewed platitudes in response to being asked what the Democratic Party stood for.  Instead of articulating a program of policies that would create concrete improvements in Americans’ lives and revive the party, like a $15 an hour minimum wage, Medicare for All, or pulling out of our wars and investing the money in infrastructure and a green jobs program, he sputtered on about “leading with our values.”

They aren’t going to do this because their elite donors will not let them.  The party leadership recently voted to keep taking corporate money from these same elites.  Is it because they have to?  Well, no. Bernie Sanders proved they didn’t have to when he raised more money overall than Clinton with small donations and nothing from corporations.

It is not that the Democratic Party leadership can’t change, it doesn’t want to change because it is too invested in its corrupt ways.  Of course, they will not admit this to the American public so they must keep up the circus of Russiagate as a distraction.

Meanwhile, the American people will continue to suffer and tensions with the world’s other nuclear superpower will continue to be ratcheted up.

Evacuation of Armed Rebels from Homs Seen as Breakthrough Right Before Heavy Fighting Broke Out in Damascus; 60% of U.S. Government PR Budget Goes to Pentagon; German-Russian Thaw?; Dem Party Officials Now Trying to Prepare Base for Letdown on Evidence of Russia-Trump Collusion/Election Meddling

Syrian (L) and Russian soldiers oversee safety of evacuation plan from city of Homs on March 18, 2017. Nearly all residents are remaining in the city (Omar Sanadaki, Reuters)

The recent evacuation of armed rebels and their families from the Syrian city of Homs marked what many considered to be a turning point toward peace in the country, as Homs was considered a major base for the armed rebellion from the beginning.  According to a Reuters report:

Several buses drove out of the al-Waer district in Homs, which was an early centre of the popular uprising against President Assad. Between 10,000 and 15,000 rebels and civilians would evacuate in batches over the coming weeks under the deal, according to opposition activists in al-Waer and war monitor the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.

The Britain-based war monitor said the buses would go to the Jarablus area held by Turkey-backed rebels in the northern Aleppo countryside.

Syrian state television said that under the agreement, fighters could stay in al-Waer if they handed over their weapons and settled their affairs with the government. Homs governor Talal Barazi said he expected 1,500 people to depart on Saturday for rebel-held areas north-east of Aleppo, and that most of al-Waer’s residents would stay.

….Along with the Syrian Arab Red Crescent (SARC), Russian and Syrian forces were overseeing the evacuation, which would take about six weeks, he added.

“The preparations and the reality on the ground indicate that things will go well,” Governor Barazi said. “The first stage is expected to move up to 500 rebels with their families to the countryside of Aleppo [province].”

The Syrian government described such deals as a “workable model” that would bring the country closer to peace after six years of conflict.

But the opposition decries them as a tactic of forcibly displacing people who oppose Mr Assad after years of bombardment and siege.

Governor Barazi said there was communication with other rebel-held areas north of Homs city to reach similar deals. “We are optimistic that the full exit of armed [fighters] from this district will pave the way for other reconciliations and settlements,” he said.

However, days later, a jihadi offensive into eastern Damascus resulted in heavy losses (~70 – 100 for each side) though the Syrian government pushed back the offensive within a day or so.   The Duran reports that at least one of the rebels groups who signed on to the ceasefire had participated in the offensive:

However ominously one of the groups that has joined the Russian-Turkish brokered ceasefire is reported to be joining the fighting in Damascus on the Jihadi side.  If that sets a trend then it could endanger the whole ceasefire, which would make Moscow very concerned.

Latest reports suggest that the Syrian military backed by the full force of the Russian air force is readying for a counter-attack.  In the meantime the phone lines between Moscow and Ankara will be busy.

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According to a GAO report on federal spending on public relations in general, it was revealed that 60% – or $626 million – went to the Pentagon to promote its agenda.

This report is from October of 2016 but represents the most recent data on the U.S. government’s spending on P.R..

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German Chancellor Angela Merkel is scheduled to visit Moscow on May 2nd.   Much speculation is being made as to the reason for the trip (with Germany’s elections not far off and Merkel’s support sagging) and what might be desired, particularly on the part of Germany.

Alexander Mercouris provides a detailed analysis of these issues:

As to why Merkel might think that, at its simplest, with crises (eg. Brexit, Le Pen, the refugee crisis, relations with Turkey, Poland, Grexit etc) rapidly building up all around her, Merkel – rather like Erdogan in June 2016 – probably has come to realise that with a difficult election coming she needs to start solving problems more quickly than she is causing them.  With her other problems both intractable and largely beyond her control it is understandable why she might be looking to improve relations with Russia where at least some progress is possible.

Having said this, there are three pressing issues that must be causing Merkel concern, and which may explain why she is looking to mend at least some fences with Moscow now.

The first is the rapidly deteriorating situation in Ukraine.  Some time ago one of Merkel’s aides let slip that Merkel regards the crisis in Ukraine as by far the biggest crisis she faces, and that it is the one that keeps her awake at night.

With the situation in Ukraine going rapidly from bad to worse, it is understandable if Merkel wants to talk about it with Putin to see how the crisis might be contained.  The fact that she was on the receiving end of a furious lecture from Putin a short while ago during the military crisis in Avdeevka will have spelled out to her how important it is as the situation in Ukraine deteriorates that she keeps her lines of communication to Putin open.

Significantly criticism of Putin and Russia over Ukraine from Merkel and other Western leaders has been surprisingly muted over recent weeks, even as Russia recognises the validity of the documents issued by the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, and even as the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics have nationalised Ukrainian businesses located on their territories in retaliation for the Ukrainian transport blockade.

Another fact that is probably causing Merkel to reconsider her hardline policy towards Russia is the coming of Donald Trump.

It is becoming increasingly clear that Donald Trump is not going to be driven from the White House because of the ‘Russiagate’ scandal, and Merkel must calculate that once he has put this essentially fake scandal behind him he will be able to press ahead with his stalled plan for detente with Russia.

Certainly Merkel will have noticed – even if most Western commentators have not – that since Trump arrived in the White House the US and Russian militaries have been quietly talking to each other, and have even been quietly cooperating with each other in Syria.

If the drive for detente between the US and Russia is renewed, perhaps in the summer, then Merkel does not want to be left high and dry, clinging on to an anti-Russian policy the US is no longer intent on.

I must admit that, upon hearing of Merkel’s plans to travel to Moscow in May to “mend fences” with Russia after her recent meeting with Trump, my initial reaction was much simpler:  after personally getting a taste of Trump, Merkel is starting to appreciate Putin’s steady and rational temperament.

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The Intercept is reporting that many of the Democratic Party officials and their minions in the media who have irresponsibly hyped the “Russia colluded with Trump to manipulate the U.S. presidential election” meme are gradually starting to temper expectations of any substantive evidence coming to light.  Former CIA chief and Hillary supporter Michael Morell’s admission of the lack of evidence for these charges, which I covered in a previous blog post is mentioned, along with some others:

FROM MSNBC POLITICS shows to town hall meetings across the country, the overarching issue for the Democratic Party’s base since Trump’s victory has been Russia, often suffocating attention for other issues. This fixation has persisted even though it has no chance to sink the Trump presidency unless it is proven that high levels of the Trump campaign actively colluded with the Kremlin to manipulate the outcome of the U.S. election — a claim for which absolutely no evidence has thus far been presented.

The principal problem for Democrats is that so many media figures and online charlatans are personally benefiting from feeding the base increasingly unhinged, fact-free conspiracies — just as right-wing media polemicists did after both Bill Clinton and Obama were elected — that there are now millions of partisan soldiers absolutely convinced of a Trump/Russia conspiracy for which, at least as of now, there is no evidence. And they are all waiting for the day, which they regard as inevitable and imminent, when this theory will be proven and Trump will be removed.

Key Democratic officials are clearly worried about the expectations that have been purposely stoked and are now trying to tamp them down. Many of them have tried to signal that the beliefs the base has been led to adopt have no basis in reason or evidence.

Read the full article here

Russia Officially Exits Recession, Inflation Rate Close to Targeted Low; Russian Budget Sees Major Cuts to Defense; Medvedev Corruption Scandal, Will Patrushev Be Next P.M.?; Kremlin Says Hillary’s Team Also Met with Ambassador; Ex-CIA Head & Hillary Supporter Says Claims Against Russia Unsubstantiated; Podesta Group Hired by Russian Bank to Lobby Against Sanctions (!)

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St. Basil’s Cathedral, Red Square, Moscow

According to Bloomberg News, Russia has officially come out of its longest recession in many years, having registered growth for several quarters in a row.  Ironically, Bloomberg states that part of the growth is due to increased military spending, but the new budget figures, released by the Russian Federal Treasury, call for the most significant decrease in military spending since the 1990’s.

Additionally, higher oil prices, a stronger ruble, increased consumer demand and lower inflation were cited.

The Duran is reporting that, according to Russia’s state statistical agency (Rosstat), annualized inflation has reached a low of 4.5%.  The target set by the Russian Central Bank is 4%, which is expected to be reached by mid-year.  Once that target is hit, it means that there is no official excuse not to lower interest rates to allow more lending and a  further increase in GDP.

Suffice to say that less than a year ago the Russian Central Bank was predicting that inflation in Russia would not fall to 5% before April and would finally hit the 4% target at the end of the year.  Inflation has instead fallen to 4.5% less than midway through March, with some forecasts now predicting it will hit the 4% target by mid-year.  Indeed there is now a serious possibility that inflation for the whole year could significantly over-shoot the Central Bank’s target and fall significantly below 4%.

This plunge in inflation is crucial for the economy’s future.  As I have repeatedly pointed out, it is the sky high interest rates (currently 10%) the Central Bank has been imposing to achieve the 4% inflation target which caused Russian economic growth to slow from mid 2012.  Far more than low oil prices it is these high interest rates which are continuing to hold the economy back.  There is a direct historic correlation between the rise of Russian interest rates since the Central Bank began serious inflation targeting in 2012, the decline in inflation in Russia, and the fall in Russia’s GDP growth rate, even if most commentators are blind to it and even if the Central Bank itself downplays it.  I have discussed all this in detail previously here.

So perhaps the Kremlin does not believe that it has to rely on increases to the military budget for economic investment.  Moreover, with the presidential election coming up in 2018, it would behoove Putin and his United Russia Party to find other areas of the budget to invest in, particularly social spending.

Speaking of election politics, there is speculation on what significance to attach to reports that current prime minister, Dmitry Medvedev, owns multi-million dollar real estate and has a wealth of assets.

Gordon Hahn has written a detailed article on the expose of Medvedev’s “assets”:

On March 2 the FBK published an article and video detailing a large empire of foundations. One is a supposed philanthropic foundation ‘Dar’ or ‘Giving’. It appears to stand at the center of the empire’s acquisitions around which others such as ‘SotsGosProekt’ and ‘Gradislav.’ Through Dar’s and the others’ accounts investments are made by Kremlin-tied oligarchs, and various properties, including wineries, yachts, and luxurious residences are held and de facto ‘owned’ indirectly by Russian Prime Minister and former Russian president Dmitrii Medvedev. Navalnyi’s estimation is that the sum of the properties can be valued at R70 billion – approximately $1.2 billion (http://dimon.navalny.com).

Some believe that this information was published with the tacit approval of the Kremlin – or the faction of the Kremlin that opposes the Neoliberal policies that Medvedev has been associated with. There have been rumors for years that there has been a battle in the Kremlin between the “Eurasianists” who advocate a more nationalist economic policy and an economic and geopolitical turn toward the East (China’s One Belt One Road program, SCO, BRICS, and a strengthening/expansion of EEU) and the “Atlantic Integrationists” supposedly embodied by Medvedev which supports a Neoliberal economic model and playing a subordinate geopolitical role to Washington and the various organizations it controls (NATO, WTO, World Bank, etc.).  It has been thought that Putin has been playing a balancing act with the two factions and both sides have been trying to win him more strongly over to their side.

While there are some who believe that the person behind the report, Kremlin nemesis Alexei Navalny, worked with western intelligence to obtain the information on Medvedev in order to give Russia another scandal, others wonder if Putin is finally throwing Medvedev under the bus in time for the elections next year.   Russia analyst, The Saker, predicted this would happen back in November after the arrest of then Economic Minister Alexei Uliukaev, who was considered to be an ally and philosophical fellow traveler of Medvedev:

The way Uliukaev was detained was carefully choreographed to instill the strongest sense of fear possible in all the other 5th columnists still in power because in so many ways Uliukaev was a symbol for all the the “Atlantic Integrationists” (those in the Kremlin who want to integrate Russia into the US controlled international security system): Uliukaev was a known liberal, just like Nikita Belykh, governor of Kirov Region, who was detained in a high-publicity arrest in June for taking a 400,000 Euros bribe. I would even say that Uliukaev could be considered the ultimate symbol of the Atlantic Integrationists and a faithful member of the Russian “liberal” (meaning the “Washington consensus” type) sect who, in the past had worked with Egor Gaidar and Alexei Kudrin and who now has been brought down by the Russian “siloviki”, the top officials of the so-called “power ministries” (defense, state security, intelligence). This was immediately recognized by everybody and the main headline of the popular website Gazeta.ru could not be clearer, it read: “The Siloviki brought down Uliukaev” and featured a photo of the key actors of this drama, including the tough-looking man thought to have brought Uliukaev down, Sergei Korolev, the Head of the Economic Security service of the FSB (shown on photo here).

….The list of potential ‘candidates’ to be purged next is still long and includes names like the Deputy Prime Minister Arkadii Dvorkovich, the First Deputy Prime Minister Igor Shuvalov, the Governor of the Russian Central Bank Elvira Nabiullina, the Minister of Finance Anton Siluanov and, of course, Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev. Uliukaev was only one amongst many more. Still, he was definitely a top-level target and the manner in which he was arrested must have sent a chill down the spine of all the other 5th columnists in the Kremlin. Just the fact that his phone was tapped for so long is quite unthinkable and clearly points to the fact that nobody is safe from Putin’s purges. And that, by itself, is truly a most welcome change: every member of the Medvedev government now has been put on notice that his/her life is now spent under the close scrutiny of the FSB.

Among others speculating about a purge after Uliukaev’s downfall was Newsbud‘s Russia expert, Filip Kovacevic, who wrote an article about the potential for Medvedev to be replaced by Nikolai Patrushev.

First, Kovacevic defines what a Liberal is in Russia:

We first need to define what it means to be a liberal in the Russian government today. The designation does not refer to political positions (like in the U.S.) as much as it highlights the approach to the economy. Liberals in Russia are those who believe that the role of the state should be minimized and that private, corporate ownership is the best way to run the economy. They are also advocates of Russia’s full-fledged participation in the international economic system dominated by the so-called Bretton Woods institutions, the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank, and the World Trade Organization. Obviously, this means a commitment to the so-called free trade and opposition to any policy of tariffs and import substitution.

The liberals were politically dominant in Russia during Boris Yeltsin’s two-term presidency in the 1990s. Those who brought Putin to power in the late 1990s (the intelligence and military networks) made an uneasy compromise with the liberals, which lasted throughout Putin’s first two presidential terms (2000-2008). The liberals even seemed in ascendance after Medvedev replaced Putin at the helm.

As regular readers of this blog know by now, Yeltsin is the least popular leader of the last 100 years in Russia.  His economic policies are associated with the collapse of Russians’s standard of living in the 1990’s:  massive poverty, loss of life savings, sky-high inflation, food deprivation and the worst mortality crisis since WWII.  Hence, Liberals have no support among the Russian public, with Liberal politicians typically achieving single digit approval ratings and Liberal “activists” and their agenda being spurned more often than not.

Kovacevic next explains the downfall of Medvedev and his policies:

However, soon afterwards, in August 2008, a surprise military attack by the Georgian troops, heavily assisted by NATO and the U.S., on the rebellious enclave of South Ossetia defended by the Russian “peace-keepers” took place. Consequently, the Russian military directly intervened and the Georgians were pushed back. That was the first time since the end of the Cold War that the Russian military crossed the borders of Russia. This created a pattern that will later be repeated in Ukraine, Syria, and no doubt in other places in the future. The genie was out of the bottle.

This was the beginning of the end for the Russian liberals who counted on honest and friendly relations with the West and believed in the existence of a fair playing field for Russia in the global economy. It became clear that the West would allow nothing of the sort. No wonder then that Putin, who initially was ambivalent about running again, returned as the president in 2012.

He goes on to detail how the Ukraine crisis of 2014 only reinforced the distrust of the west and the ideas of Medvedev and his political allies.   He then explains how and why the purge will take place, why Patrushev is in a good position to be Medvedev’s replacement and the likely response of the Russian people:

The ordinary Russian people have no pity for the liberals because they know well the extent to which liberal politicians and their business cronies got rich abusing governmental power for private gain. The recently arrested Ulyukaev is the case in point. Most liberal politicians can easily move to the West – their apartments, yachts, and bank accounts are waiting for them. This is why the majority of the population will support Putin’s purge, even though the purge will be far from democratic and may at times turn violent.

Putin will replace the purged liberals by his trusted allies from the intelligence and military structures. One of them Sergey Naryshkin, the former president of the Russian Parliament, has been appointed to the position of the chief of the Russian external intelligence agency (SVR) immediately after the elections results were in. I have discussed Naryshkin’s appointment in detail in an earlier article,[3] but what is important to keep in mind here is that by appointing a long-time friend and fellow intelligence operative, Putin has cut off any possibility of the liberal insiders at the top leaking national security information to the West. In other words, Putin has built up another layer of protection around the future Russian military and intelligence agenda. In my opinion, he demonstrated that he had no trust left in the West and that he was getting the country ready for a possible military confrontation.

….This is why I think that, parallel with his efforts to develop a detente relations with the U.S. under Trump, Putin will bring in more personal loyalists into the highest offices of the Russian government. Considering the power of the U.S./NATO lobby working against it, the chances of an authentic detente (unfortunately) do not look very good and Putin knows that he must not make a misstep. He may not have another chance.

….Patrushev is one of the top members of the so-called KGB aristocracy of whose mission to lead Russia he himself spoke in an interview more than 15 years ago at the time when Russia was in the midst of the Chechnya crisis that dangerously threatened its very foundations.[6] Such an early mention of this powerful group, which later came to yield tremendous power in the Russian political life, shows that Patrushev was one of its main driving forces.

Over the years, Nikolai Patrushev has been even closer to Putin than Naryshkin. They are almost the same age and their friendship goes back to the 1970s KGB days in Leningrad (now St. Petersburg). In the late 1990s, Patrushev’s rise closely followed Putin’s. It is very significant that it was Patrushev who succeeded Putin as the head of the FSB and held this position for nine years (1999-2008), which is longer than anybody since the Communist Yuri Andropov who was the KGB head from 1967 until 1982 and then became the leader of the Soviet Union (that is, the general secretary of the central committee of the Soviet Communist party).

This analogy may not be accidental. After all, in 2006, there was some speculation that Patrushev would succeed Putin.[7] However, the position went to Medvedev, a member of the liberal camp and not a KGB aristocrat. I believe that now the political tide has turned.

In his interviews with various Russian newspapers, Patrushev, who has a doctorate in law, reveals himself as a serious scholar of the post-WWII global politics. He is a strong critic of the U.S. foreign policy claiming that the U.S. involvement in the world is bent on regime change and state fragmentation.[8] He blames the U.S. for the break-up of Yugoslavia, the numerous so-called color revolutions, the putsch in Ukraine, and the carnage in the Middle East. In fact, he asserts that the wars of the Yugoslav succession were nothing else but the testing ground for the ongoing efforts to break up the former Soviet Republics, including Russia itself.[9] In all of this, he discerns a malicious Western anti-Russian prejudice that is grounded in the historical push for the control of the Eastern territories and resources. This puts Patrushev firmly in the tradition of the Russian Eurasianists. As a result, if chosen by Putin to be the next prime minister, he can be expected to formulate and oversee a very hawkish foreign and national security policy.

It will be interesting to see how this all plays out over the next few months.

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Turning to American politics, as recently reported by the UK Telegraph, the Kremlin spokesman, Dmitry Peskov, announced that members of Hillary Clinton’s team also had contact with the Russian ambassador during the campaign.  So far, nobody seems up in arms about this allegation.  Hmmm.

And in a still stranger and more cynical turn of events, the Podesta Group (the lobbying business of Clinton manager John Podesta) has been hired by Russia’s largest bank to lobby for the end of sanctions. So much for all the sanctimonious shrieking by the Clinton campaign of Trump being Putin’s stooge and being too soft on Russia.

And before we leave the topic of Hillary Clinton and her presidential campaign, it should be noted that one of her biggest and most ardently anti-Russia allies, ex-CIA chief Michael Morell, admitted in a recent presentation to a group of intelligence professionals that there was no evidence to support the allegations of collusion between Trump and the Russians or that the allegations in the Trump “dossier” had any validity:

On the question of the Trump campaign conspiring with the Russians here, there is smoke, but there is no fire, at all.  There’s no little campfire, there’s no little candle, there’s no spark. And there’s a lot of people looking for it….

….[With respect to the dossier] Unless you know the sources, and unless you know how a particular source acquired a particular piece of information, you can’t judge the information — you just can’t.  [The dossier] doesn’t take you anywhere, I don’t think.  I had two questions when I first read it. One was, How did Chris (Christopher Steele, the former MI6 who compiled it – AM) talk to these sources?  I have subsequently learned that he used intermediaries.  And then I asked myself, why did these guys provide this information, what was their motivation? And I subsequently learned that he paid them. That the intermediaries paid the sources and the intermediaries got the money from Chris. And that kind of worries me a little bit because if you’re paying somebody, particularly former FSB officers, they are going to tell you truth and innuendo and rumor, and they’re going to call you up and say, ‘hey, let’s have another meeting, I have more information for you [because they want to get paid some more].  I think you’ve got to take all that into consideration when you consider the dossier.