NATO is Isolating Itself
... as it fails militarily, economically, politically and morally
Published: 2024-02-08
A Drugged Puppet Repeats His Lines
Biden's cocktail of drugs got him to half way through his address to Congress, still in some control of his faculties. He put some more revs into his re-election campaign, which informs us that he thinks he's going to be the Democrat candidate.
In his speech he proposed an answer to the genocide in Gaza: build a port! It might be operational by the time all of the Palestinian Gazans are dead. The port may then be converted into a marina for the Zionist settlers' yachts. The US will continue to use tax dollars to fund its weapons industry which is arming and thus facilitating the genocidal IDF to make way for the settlers.
Both of the core lobbies which participate in US political corruption are on display at once: the Israel Lobby and the 'defence' lobby. Nothing, I repeat, nothing is going to change while this continues. This is the view from the Global Majority outside of the echo chambers of US, NATO and EU. The Uniparty rules and it matters only a little which puppet is speaking.
19 Years and 9 Months
The situation in the Ukraine is so bad and “little Napoleon” Macron's recent response to it wasso idiotic that calm commentators like Alex Christoforou and Pepe Escobar were visibly lost for words in trying to formulate any sensible phrases to describe either.
Various columnists are putting their skills to deconstructing the 'unprovoked' narrative by weight of evidence or elegant argument or both. The realists don't care. We already know what happened. Commentators with military experience have already provided their analysis and prognosis. Ukraine has insufficient soldiers, and there is nothing Ukraine can do to fix this. Soldiers take 19 years and 9 months to make, factoring in one year for training.
This fundamental lack of bodies is what little Napoleon is hinting at. If France deploys its Foreign Legion to Ukraine, the thinking goes, that they can take rear positions which will allow whatever reserves the AFU (Armed Forces of Ukraine) has to relieve their front-lines and thus prevent their collapse. The time provided would allow the next tranche of useless wunderweapons, perhaps F-16s, to be delivered. The EU has announced that it has found 800 000 155 mm artillery shells somewhere, which could also arrive during the time gifted by the Foreign Legion's bolstering of the AFU.
Fine. What happens in September when the Tauras loaded F-16s have been shot down, most of the 155 mm shells are used and the AFU is at 50% of its current strength? Are you going to then withdraw, France? Either Macron is an idiot or he wants to embarrass France or he wants a fully declared war between NATO and Russia, possibly all three.
The response Pepe Escobar reported from Russian military types was:
Bring it! We'll turn the French into mincemeat in under 24 hours.
Based on the schooling Scott Ritter described receiving from Russian General al Adanov recently, this seems a reasonable assessment.
A New Form of War
The Ukraine conflict is a new form of land war. It is not a Cold War era Combined Arms war. It is dominated by ISR (Intelligence, Surveillence and Reconnaisance), drones, anti-missile defense and a range of stand off weapons: FPV drones, artillery, multi-launch rocket systems, glide bombs and mid to long range cruise and hypersonic precision missiles. Any concentration of anything which is exposed to enemy observation is destroyed by long range attack. There are no 'big arrow' offensives because they just don't work. Your men, or machines, or logistics get annihilated before they even get to attack.
If the French (or Germans, or British or anybody else) turns up and expects Cold War era tactics to work they will suffer punishing failure until they learn. Funnily enough, Ritter declares that, right now, the two best land armies in the world are Russia and Ukraine. They both understand the reality of this new form of war. Nobody else does.
Escobar reminds us that Russia has deployed 15% of its military to the conflict. The other 85% are being trained in the doctrine learned from this war. The cobwebs have been blown out of Russia's recruitment process. The US cannot fulfill its quotas for land, air or sea. Russia's military is being built on volunteers. Putting China aside, woe betides anyone who wages a land war with Russia. Some things never change, and right now, Russia would crush the entirety of a combined NATO in a non-nuclear land war, alone. And, were this to happen, they would not be fighting it alone either. It would be entirely the other way around.
NATO is Isolating Itself
The trade flows which emerged to enable Russia to survive the US and EU sanctions and then minimize it's economy's dependence on the West, indicate the rest of the world's likely response, were a declared NATO v Russia war to erupt. Europe would freeze in its first winter as energy exports to Europe are denied by any number of forces in southwest Asia (e.g Yemen, Iran) without them being directly involved in the conflict. The US would huff and puff but what could it do about it? It recently hasn't even dented Yemen's ability to attack its ally's shipping! Europe's militaries would be rapidly defeated because they’d be fighting the wrong war and don’t have the military production capacity to sustain one. The same is true for the US. Anyone got any 155 mm shells? The US could sail around impotently in its aircraft carriers. Why would Russia sink them? They cost a squillion to maintain and they can't do shit in a land war against an enemy with strong air defenses and a capable national airforce. Huff and Puff away!
The US no longer has the ability to bully the rest of the world to do its bidding. It cannot cajole the Global Majority into defeating Russia, because Russia is allied with China and everybody's trade is tied to China. It is economic suicide to side with NATO in a NATO v Russia war.
So, lets ask ourselves’ why it is that BRICS10 has such a long list of nations wishing to join it? No central bank likes the threat of a block of nations stealing its national reserves. NATO/EU institutions have been at this for close to a decade. The Bank of London impounded $2 Billion worth of Venezuelan gold because a CIA trained stooge, Juan Guaido, who had never stood for the position of President in a Venezuelan election had the US' backing to be extra-nationally declared as Venezuela's “interim” president. Nothing has changed since, with the theft of $7 Billion from Afghanistan and $300 Billion from Russia. The EU/NATO banking institutions are internationally toxic. The US runs around the world generating wars for its profit while smashing little countries. The 'rules based order' is a belligerent disorder, and everybody knows it.
NATO has already lost its war with Russia in Ukraine. Its banking institutions are kleptocratic money laundering systems. Many nations within the block have terrifying debt service to GDP ratios. The people living in those nations are suffering an ever widening wealth inequality. Their political leaders and media constantly lie to them. Their leaders are complicit in or not condemning a genocide by Israel in Gaza. The block is failing militarily, economically, politically and morally. There is no future in that system.
Why not join BRICS and maintain trade relations with individual nations in Europe and other places around the world, and hedge one's bets on a system with more potential stability?
The applicants to BRICS10 represent an answer already made to that question, and one of them is Yemen!
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Sources
British-Owned Cargo Ship Sinks Days After Being Hit By Houthi Missile, Dave DeCamp, Antiwar, 2024-03-03
The West's Reckoning?, Michael Brenner, ScheerPost, 2024-03-08
[US] NATO v Russia: 2014 - 2024, YesXorNo, 2024-03-09
Pepe Escobar joins on nato'\''s march to wwiii with russia as putin, china chart multipolar world, Haiphong interviews Escobar, Danny Haiphong, 2024-03-08
Scott Ritter joins on putin'\''s warning to nato, nuland resigns, russia puts germany on notice, Haiphong interviews Ritter, Danny Haiphong, 2024-03-06
Ukraine clutching at straws, as exhaustion sets in, Mercouris and Christoforou, The Duran, 2024-03-06
Culture
The Smashing Pumpkins - Bullet With Butterfly Wings, from their 1995 double album Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness, uploaded 2011-08-02
Copyleft: CC0
Do you know about the natural gas reserves that Palestine has been desperately trying to get funding to access for years? They are located in the sea just off the Gaza Strip. So that port will come in handy… for someone other than the Palestinians.