Monday, April 30, 2018

The Period of American Dominance Has Passed. Russian Missile Tech has Made America’s Trillion Dollar Navy Obsolete. Russia’s new missiles can be launched from thousands of kilometers away, are unstoppable, and it takes just one to sink a destroyer and just two to sink an aircraft carrier.


The Period of American Dominance Has Passed



The Period of American Dominance Has Passed

Russian Missile Tech has Made America’s Trillion Dollar Navy Obsolete

Dmitry Orlov

For the past 500 years European nations—Portugal, the Netherlands, Spain, Britain, France and, briefly, Germany—were able to plunder much of the planet by projecting their naval power overseas. Since much of the world’s population lives along the coasts, and much of it trades over water, armed ships that arrived suddenly out of nowhere were able to put local populations at their mercy.

The armadas could plunder, impose tribute, punish the disobedient, and then use that plunder and tribute to build more ships, enlarging the scope of their naval empires. This allowed a small region with few natural resources and few native advantages beyond extreme orneriness and a wealth of communicable diseases to dominate the globe for half a millennium.

The ultimate inheritor of this naval imperial project is the United States, which, with the new addition of air power, and with its large aircraft carrier fleet and huge network of military bases throughout the planet, is supposedly able to impose Pax Americana on the entire world. Or, rather, was able to do so—during the brief period between the collapse of the USSR and the emergence of Russia and China as new global powers and their development of new anti-ship and antiaircraft technologies. But now this imperial project is at an end.

Prior to the Soviet collapse, the US military generally did not dare to directly threaten those countries to which the USSR had extended its protection. Nevertheless, by using its naval power to dominate the sea lanes that carried crude oil, and by insisting that oil be traded in US dollars, it was able to live beyond its means by issuing dollar-denominated debt instruments and forcing countries around the world to invest in them. It imported whatever it wanted using borrowed money while exporting inflation, expropriating the savings of people across the world. In the process, the US has accumulated absolutely stunning levels of national debt—beyond anything seen before in either absolute or relative terms. When this debt bomb finally explodes, it will spread economic devastation far beyond US borders. And it will explode, once the petrodollar wealth pump, imposed on the world through American naval and air superiority, stops working.

New missile technology has made a naval empire cheap to defeat. Previously, to fight a naval battle, one had to have ships that outmatched those of the enemy in their speed and artillery power. The Spanish Armada was sunk by the British armada. More recently, this meant that only those countries whose industrial might matched that of the United States could ever dream of opposing it militarily. But this has now changed: Russia’s new missiles can be launched from thousands of kilometers away, are unstoppable, and it takes just one to sink a destroyer and just two to sink an aircraft carrier. The American armada can now be sunk without having an armada of one’s own. The relative sizes of American and Russian economies or defense budgets are irrelevant: the Russians can build more hypersonic missiles much more quickly and cheaply than the Americans would be able to build more aircraft carriers.

Equally significant is the development of new Russian air defense capabilities: the S-300 and S-400 systems, which can essentially seal off a country’s airspace. Wherever these systems are deployed, such as in Syria, US forces are now forced to stay out of their range. With its naval and air superiority rapidly evaporating, all that the US can fall back on militarily is the use of large expeditionary forces—an option that is politically unpalatable and has proven to be ineffective in Iraq and Afghanistan. There is also the nuclear option, and while its nuclear arsenal is not likely to be neutralized any time soon, nuclear weapons are only useful as deterrents. Their special value is in preventing wars from escalating beyond a certain point, but that point lies beyond the elimination of their global naval and air dominance. Nuclear weapons are much worse than useless in augmenting one’s aggressive behavior against a nuclear-armed opponent; invariably, it would be a suicidal move. What the US now faces is essentially a financial problem of unrepayable debt and a failing wealth pump, and it should be a stunningly obvious point that setting off nuclear explosions anywhere in the world would not fix the problems of an empire that is going broke.

Events that signal vast, epochal changes in the world often appear minor when viewed in isolation. Julius Caesar’s crossing of the Rubicon was just one river crossing; Soviet and American troops meeting and fraternizing at the Elbe was, relatively speaking, a minor event—nowhere near the scale of the siege of Leningrad, the battle of Stalingrad or the fall of Berlin. Yet they signaled a tectonic shift in the historical landscape. And perhaps we have just witnessed something similar with the recent pathetically tiny Battle of East Gouta in Syria, where the US used a make-believe chemical weapons incident as a pretense to launch an equally make-believe attack on some airfields and buildings in Syria. The US foreign policy establishment wanted to show that it still matters and has a role to play, but what really happened was that US naval and air power were demonstrated to be almost entirely beside the point.

Of course, all of this is terrible news to the US military and foreign policy establishments, as well as to the many US Congressmen in whose districts military contractors operate or military bases are situated. Obviously, this is also bad news for the defense contractors, for personnel at the military bases, and for many others as well. It is also simply awful news economically, since defense spending is about the only effective means of economic stimulus of which the US government is politically capable.

Obama’s “shovel-ready jobs,” if you recall, did nothing to forestall the dramatic slide in the labor participation rate, which is a euphemism for the inverse of the real unemployment rate. There is also the wonderful plan to throw lots of money at Elon Musk’s SpaceX (while continuing to buy vitally important rocket engines from the Russians—who are currently discussing blocking their export to the US in retaliation for more US sanctions). In short, take away the defense stimulus, and the US economy will make a loud popping sound followed by a gradually diminishing hissing noise.

Needless to say, all those involved will do their best to deny or hide for as long as possible the fact that the US foreign policy and defense establishments have now been neutralized. My prediction is that America’s naval and air empire will not fail because it will be defeated militarily, nor will it be dismantled once the news sinks in that it is useless; instead, it will be forced to curtail its operations due to lack of funds. There may still be a few loud bangs before it gives up, but mostly what we will hear is a whole lot of whimpering. That’s how the USSR went; that’s how the USA will go too.

This post first appeared on Russia Insider.

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https://russia-insider.com/en/russian-missile-tech-has-made-americas-trillion-dollar-navy-obsolete/ri23242 

N.B. the following articles collected by Paul Craig Roberts get deeper into the currant issues: 


The Idiot Neoconservatives Will Get Us All Killed


The Idiot Neoconservatives Will Get Us All Killed

http://www.unz.com/article/the-implications-of-russias-new-weapons/ 

http://www.unz.com/tsaker/war-with-russia-two-great-american-myths/ 

Saturday, April 14, 2018

Here Paul Craig Roberts analyzes why the US Secretary of War, Mattis backed down on Trump's illicit plan to attack Syria. He knew that if the U.S. Navy ships were to approach the Syrian shores and open fire, they would be destroyed by the Russians.


Are We Over the US/UK Fomented Crisis In Syria?

Are We Over the US/UK Fomented Crisis In Syria?

Paul Craig Roberts

It appears from the very limited US missile attack, most of which were intercepted and destroyed by Syrian air defenses, that the US military prevailed over the crazed John Bolton and carefully avoided a strike that would have resulted in a Russian response. No significant Syrian site appears to have been targeted, and no Russians were endangered. https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/04/in-depth-syria-stuns-world-thwarts-us-attack/ 
 
The US ambassador to Russia said that the US strikes were coordinated with Russia to avoid a great power confrontation. https://www.rt.com/news/424132-us-russia-syria-strikes/ Russia Insider concludes that the exercise was a face-saver for Trump https://russia-insider.com/en/out-whimper-trump-blinks-delivers-limited-strikes/ri23132 

The main effect seems to be that Trump has further discredited himself and the US by violating the UN Charter and international law and committing an act of aggression, which is a war crime for which Nazi civilian and military officials were executed. Russia’s President Putin said that the wanton and illegal use of force by Washington has had “a devastating impact on the whole system of international relations” and called for an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council. China also condemned the illegal US attack. https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/04/china-says-us-led-attacks-against-syria-are-illegal-and-against-international-law/ 

How was the feared conflict between the US and Russia avoided? From what I have been able to learn, the US Joint Chiefs of Staff would not accept the risk of conflict with Russia. The reason is not that the Joint Chiefs are more moral, more caring about the deaths and injuries that would result, or less inclined to go to war based on lies. Their objection was based on the lack of protection US Navy ships have from the new Russian weapons systems. An attack that brought a Russian response could sink the US flotilla and present the US with a humiliating defeat that would discredit American military prowess. 

Bolton’s position was that Putin is a pussy who, as in every previous case, will do nothing. Bolton’s postion is that the Russians are so scared of US military might that they will not respond to any US attack on their forces and Syrian forces. The Russians, Bolton says, will do what they always do. They will whine about the crime to the UN, and the Western media will ignore them as always.

The US Secretary of War, Mattis, represented the Joint Chiefs opinion. What, Mattis asked, if the Russians have had enough and do what they are capable of and sink the US flotilla? Is Trump prepared to accept a defeat engineered by his National Security Adviser? Is Trump prepared for a possible wider conflict? 

The Joint Chiefs would rather use the orchestrated “Syrian crisis” to argue for more money, not to go to war that could be terminable of their retirement plans. The Joint Chiefs can tell Congress: “We couldn’t risk conflict with Russia over the use of chemical weapons in Syria because we were outgunned. We need more money.” The older American generation will rementer the fantasy “missile gap” of the Nixon/Kennedy presidential campaign that was used to boost US defense spending.

It would be a mistake for anyone to conclude that common sense has prevailed and the conflict has been resolved. What has prevailed is the Joint Chiefs’ fear of a defeat. The next crisis that Washington orchestrates will be on terms less favorable to Russian arms.

Bolton, the neoconservatives and the Israeli interest that they represent will go to work on Mattis and the dissenting generals. Leaks will appear in the presstitute media that are designed to discredit Mattis and to foment Trump’s distrust. The neoconservatives will advance military men more in line with the neoonservatives’ aggressiveness to positions on the Joint Chiefs.

Syria is not about any chemical weapons use. Ahmet Uzumcu, director general of the Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, reported that all chemical weapons had been removed from Syria. “Never before has an entire arsenal of a category of weapons of mass destruction been removed from a country experiencing a state of internal armed conflict, and this has been accomplished within very demanding and tight time frames.” https://www.military.com/daily-news/2014/06/24/last-of-syrias-chemical-weapons-removed.html 

Syria is not about dictatorship or building democracy. It is not about the alleged 70 victims of chemical weapons. It would take a complete idiot to believe that Washington and its European vassals, who have killed, maimed, orphaned, and displaced millions of Muslims in seven countries over the last 17 years to be so upset over the deaths of 70 Muslims that they are willing to risk war with Russia.

Syria and Iran are an issue, because Syria and Iran supply the Lebonese millita, Hezbollah, with money and weapons. This support from Syria and Iran gives Hezbollah the capability of preventing Israel’s occupation and annexation of southern Lebanaon, whose water resources Israel covets. 

Twice the vaunted Israel Army has been chased out of Lebanon by Hezbollah. Israel’s military reputation cannot risk a third defeat by a mere militia, so Israel is using its control over US foreign policy and its rock solid alliance with the neoconservatives to use the US military to destabilize Syria and Iran as the US did to Iraq and Libya.

Additionally, there is the crazed neoconservative ideology of US world hegemony. The interests of Russia and China are in the way of US hegemony. Therefore, these two countries are defined as “threats.” Russia and China are not threats because they intend to attack the US, which neither has shown any indication of doing. They are threats because they are in opposition to US unilateralism which overrides their sovereignty. In other words, to be clear, the US cannot tolerate any country that has an independent foreign or economic policy.

That Russia and China have independent policies is the reason that they are “threats.”
It would be a mistake to conclude that diplomay has prevailed and common sense has returned to Washington. Nothing could be further from the truth. The issue is not resolved. War remains on the horizon.

Even though the Scenario turned out to be the best ever, if you are truly interested you should play the link below, which will tell you what is really going on in Syia. Hint: it is opposite of what you would hear in the U.S., UK, and EU. (They are all liers)


The Worst Case Scenario Is Now Our Reality



 
Felicity Arbuthnot Lays It On The Line

https://www.globalresearch.ca/trump-and-syria-the-worst-case-scenario-is-now-our-reality/5635749

Thursday, April 12, 2018

Ten Days Before The End Of The World. Do you believe it? Do you even think about it? Well, I do. The people who are pushing this are in the U.S. (particularly Trump and his insane warmongering govement). I hope that the Russians handel it well to save the world.



Ten Days Before The End Of The World

Ten Days Before The End Of The World

Paul Craig Roberts

The criminally insane governments of the US, UK, and France are sending a flotilla of missile ships, submarines, and an aircraft carrier to attack Syria in the face of Russian warnings. What is the likely outcome of this outrageous act of aggression based entirely on an orchestrated and transparent lie, an act of reckless aggression that is more irresponsible and more dangerous than anything done by the demonized Nazi regime in Germany?

There are no protests from European governments. There are no protesters in the streets of European and US cities. Congress has not reminded Trump that he has been given no authority by Congress to launch a military attack on a soverign country that is likely to ignite a war, possibly World War 3. Everyone seems content with the prospect of the end of the world. The moronic American presstitutes are egging it on.

Here are possible outcomes:

(1) The Russians, trapped in the deluded belief that facts and evidence matter to the West and that common sense will prevail, accept the attacks. This outcome is the most dangerous of all, because this outcome will encourage more attacks until Russia is backed into a corner and has no alternative to a direct nuclear attack on the US.

(2) Russia takes the initiative in the brewing conflict and escorts the US missile ship, USS Donald Cook, out of attack range of Syria before the attack flotilla arrives and declares a perimeter line beyond which the Western flotilla becomes target for attack. This should force a showdown between Trump’s warmonger government and the US Congress that would challenge Trump’s ability to unilaterally commit the US to war.

(3) Russia escorts the Donald Cook away from the scene and simultaneously wipes out the military capabilities of Saudi Arabia and Israel, removing Washington’s ground-based allies in its attack on Syria, thus loading the odds in Russia’s favor, and making it clear that Russia is going to pre-empt attack, not respond to one.

(4) Russia, in the deluded belief that it must prove itself in the right, accepts the attack and its unpredictable damage before responding. This outcome is almost as bad as the first, as this lets the war start in contrast to options (2) and (3) which have some possibility of preventing a US/Russian confrontation by forcing common sense on the Americans.

(5) Senior German politicians inform Merkel that Britain and France’s support of the US strike on Syria could commit NATO to a war with Russia. Germany has had one devastating experience with the Russian military and does not need another. They could pressure Merkel to withdraw Germany from NATO. The resulting consternation/confusion would likely halt the US attack on Syria/Russia.

(6) The US Joint Chiefs of Staff could easily and honestly conclude that in the event of a Russian response to an attack on Syria, the entire flotilla could be lost, carrier included, inflicting a humiliating defeat on US arms, and that in view of this possbility, the Joint Chiefs recommend against the announced attack. Possibly this has occurred and explains Trump’s latest tweets, which suggest that doubts might have entered Trump’s mind.

Even if a hopeful outcome such as (5) and (6) occurs, we are left with the dangerous situation that some elements in the US and UK governments were able to orchestrate two events—the alleged Skripal poisoning and the alleged Assad chemical attack—and use the events to leverage unsupported accusations against Russia and Syria as justifications for an illegal military attack on a sovereign country. That such an outrageous orchestration is possible proves that there is no democracy or constraint on government in the US and UK.

Wednesday, April 11, 2018

The idiocy of Trump, French president Macron, and UK prime minister May may be bringing the end of the world.


Idiocy Is Bringing The End Of The World

Idiocy Is Bringing The End Of The World

Paul Craig Roberts

Here is Jason Ditz on the coming end of the world:
https://news.antiwar.com/2018/04/10/trump-builds-coalition-for-war-against-syrian-government/ 

Vladimir Soloviev explains the failure of Putin’s policy of appeasement:
https://russia-insider.com/en/breaking-defining-moment-putin-stand-usisrael-empire-chaos-or-fold/ri23052 

If you were the president of France or the prime minister of the UK, would you permit criminally insane Washington to drag you into military conflict with Russia?  
https://www.infowars.com/get-ready-russia-trump-takes-to-twitter-to-threaten-strike-on-syria/
I didn’t think so. I wouldn’t either. So what’s with Macron and May? What’s with the French and British governments? What’s with the French and British media? I read recently that former UK Labour prime minister Tony Blair is now worth $100 million, his payoff for lying to the UK government and people in order to support the George W. Bush regime’s invasion of Iraq. Have Macron and May been promised the same?

It makes no sense for the UK and French governments to make themselves targets of a military power against which they have no possibility of defense. It makes no sense that their peoples and media sit silently while one French president and one British prime minister endanger not only France and the UK but the entirety of Europe. What’s with the European Union? There is only silence as Europe, and the world with it, are taken to the brink of annihiliation. This makes no sense. https://www.globalresearch.ca/taking-the-world-to-the-brink-of-annihilation/5635456 

People in Ghouta, doctors in Ghouta, and Russian experts who have arrived on the scene report that there is no sign of any chemical attack. Not only did Syria not use chemical weapons against the civilians that it liberated, there was no chemical attack, not even a false flag one staged by the US supported mercenaries who have been driven out of Ghouta by the Syrian Army. In other words, the chemical attack is entirely a hoax.

To keep the hoax from being confirmed by independent investigation, Washington vetoed a UN Security Council resolution to send in neutral experts to evaluate the claim of chemical attack. Why would Washington prevent an investigation that would prove Washington’s allegation? Clearly, Washington would only prevent an investigation that would disprove the false allegation. There is no doubt whatsoever that Washington’s allegation is false and is being used as an excuse to force Russia to fight or to accept Washington’s hegemony in the Middle East.

What if there was a chemical attack? Why does it matter to people who are killed whether it was by bullets, bombs, missiles, or chemicals? Why is it so bad to use chemicals instead of Hellfire missiles? Why is it OK for Washington and Israel to blow up schools, hospitals, weddings, funerals, market places, and homes full of women and children with missiles, but not OK to kill people with chemicals? Why is it worth starting World War 3 over a hoax chemical weapons attack or a real one?

Americans, for the most part a clueless people, have no awareness of the risk that the criminally insane government in Washington is taking with their lives. What if the Russians mean what they say and do not again turn the other cheek and back down? What happens if Russia replies to force with force? 

Why is it that only a few Internet sites are asking this question?