Stop Imperialism - Episode 3
Dec 12th, 2011 by ericdraitser
In this week's episode, Eric focuses on the attempted "color revolution" in Russia, the latest developments in Iran, Syria, and Pakistan, the mobilization of the Chinese military, the world economic crisis, recent happenings in the Occupy Movement, and the latest on Obama's reelection campaign.
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Eric, great analysis on last week’s events. Here are some thoughts.
Concerning the Russian elections, I have followed Edinaja Rossija (United Russia)’s campaign closely, as I observed campaign workers in southern Russia late last summer. They have easily the largest and most organized campaign machine in the country. And I can assure you: if ER had committed the sort of widespread fraud of which it has been accused, they would NOT have lost the all-important Constitutional Majority they have enjoyed for so long. They would surely have stuffed ballot boxes to exceed the 67 to 70 percent to maintain such a critical lynchpin of power in the Duma. It may be circumstantial evidence, but in the light of Russian politics and history, its not invalid by any means.
Keep in mind, there IS widespread discontent across Russia, and it cuts across age groups. This has to do with high inflation. Prices have skyrocketed in the last year and, combined with rampant corruption on all levels, have caused hardship for Russian citizens, especially pensioners and young people. Dumping Kudrin was a smart move on Medvedev’s, as he had made financial blunders leading to a drop in the Ruble’s purchasing power.
Now, I personally know many young Russians who denounce Putin and Medvedev for this, and in Krasnodar Kraj at least, they voted Communist as a protest. (Until the previous elections, which finally won the territory for ER, Krasnodar had the world’s oldest Communist government, 1919-2008). But a lot of older people voted for Putin as the strong, stabilizing leader that Russia traditionally leans upon, particularly in hard times.
News coverage of the protests is suspect as well. Reports from inside Russia suggest its only occurring in Moscow and St. Petersburg, and its being organized by Yabloko and other, small parties that scored one percent of the vote. How ironic that the most vocal and active young people, genuinely concerned about rising prices and a tough future, are the one percent. But then, that is the irony of Russia.
Among those parties is that led by the oligarch Prokhorov, famous for owning the New York Nets. He just declared his candidacy for the Presidency. It is important to note that he is worth billions and has very narrow links to the average students protesting in the streets. If he intends to ride to power on a color revolution, he will be disappointed.
This is because Russians have had ample time to observe the color revolution in the other former soviet republics: the Orange Revolution in Ukraine, the Rose Revolution in Georgia, and the Tulip Revolution in Kyrgyzstan.
In all of those cases, the mass strike actions were fomented and directed by very wealthy oligarchs in those countries. In Ukraine’s case, it was Julia Tymoshenko, whose fortune exceeds a billion dollars. Kyrgyzstan has been handed from one oligarch, Akajev, to another, Bakijev, to a ruling council composed of mining consortiums, I believe. In Georgia’s case, Shevardnadze left office in peace when he learned Saakashvili had the army’ confidence.
Russians understand that none of these color revolutions did ANYTHING to address their peoples’ needs and concerns. Poverty and backwardness remain endemic in the former soviet republics. To wish for a color revolution in Russia — which is materially much more advanced in spite of tremendous corruption — is out of the question.
Eric, you might wish to examine the recent U.S. Senate resolution by Sen. Marco Rubio, which was blocked by Sen. Rand Paul. This resolution would have demanded that President Obama recommend NATO membership to Georgia at this week’s NATO summit in Chicago. Such a move would be extremely dangerous, and reflects the neverending lobbying by Randy Scheunemann, who was 2008 Candidate John McCain’s foreign policy advisor while simultaneously working for the Georgian government. It was Scheunemann who advised McCain to declare “We are ALL Georgians now” even as President Bush chose nonintervention in a war deliberately provoked by Scheunemann’s employer, President Saakashvili of Georgia.
Abkhazians and South Ossetians both view Saakashvili’s regime with contempt, and both declared formal independence, clearly with Russia’s connivance; until the 2008 attack by Georgia, Russia continually rebuffed the two states’ demands for independence as a gesture toward pro-Moscow policies of Shevardnadze.
Asked Pat Buchanan in an August paper, “Who are we to demand that [Abkhazia & South Ossetia] return to the rule of Tblisi?” Simple: We are the United States of America, with strong vested interests in keeping Georgia’s dictator (and well-known drug smuggler) Mihail Saakashvili, permanently in power. Buchanan was then criticising the Senate, at Sen. McCain’s direction, for Resolution 175, which “affirms that it is the policy of the United States to support the sovereignty, independence, and territorial integrity of Georgia and the inviolability of its borders, and to recognize Abkhazia and South Ossetia as regions of Georgia occupied by the Russian Federation, etc.” It was a unanimous voice vote of present Senators. A list of those present seems to be unavailable, but surely belong to the Scheunemann faction of the GOP.
What’s interesting is that Abkhazia held their Presidential election in the same week. It was open, honest, clean, and gave a convincing victory for Prime Minister Alexander Ankvab.
How unlike in Georgia, where the 2008 election gave Saakashvili an unconvincing victory. Evidence of fraud caused 100,000 protesters to occupy Tbilisi’s main square for weeks. These protests were larger than the so-called “Rose Revolution” of 2004 that swept Saakashvili into power. Police used extreme brutality against the protesters, and many have been tortured in prison as the wave of repression has grown tighter and tighter. (To keep things fair, South Ossetia held their election last Sunday, but came up with a disputed outcome with accusations of fraud on both sides.)
Fractous, chaotic war and corrupt politics of the Caucasus are nothing new. Peace is the exception rather than the rule. Petty princes have vied for favour with larger Empires against their own family members for centuries.
For the U.S. Senate to inflame a tinderbox region like the Caucasus is beyond comprehension, especially as it involves Russia, whose claim to the region is based on treaties of protection with the various Georgian despots against Turkey and Persia, all of which were no less legitimate than the treaties the U.S. imposed on the Indians in the same period.
Georgia proper was annexed to the Russian Empire in 1801, two years earlier than the U.S. annexation of the “Louisiana Purchase,” itself a cynical trade to France by Spain in 1799 for the tiny Italian duchy of Parma to one of the Spanish Bourbon royals. In this light, Russia’s claim to Georgia is stronger than, say, America’s claim to the state of Iowa.
Abkhazia was not accorded protection until 1829, and its prince was not disinherited until 1864. Abkhazia rebelled against the Georgian republic in 1918, and Tbilisi went so far as to write the Armenian government that it had no right to open a consulate in Sukhum (Abkhazia’s capital) without Tbilisi’s permission. This showed the extent of Georgian legitimacy in the region.
After the Soviet reconquest, Abkhazia was briefly an S.S.R. on equal terms with Georgia, but in 1923 was combined with Georgia, and other neighboring republics in the Transcaucasian Federated Republic (TSFSR). In 1930, triumphant Communist Party chairman Josef V. Dzhugashvili (a Georgian who is better known as Stalin), attached Abkhazia to Georgia by decree, and the TSFSR For fifty years, the small territory saw much prosperity, and was dissolved in 1936 in a reactionarty policy of pitting nationalities against one another to ease “Russification” policies as a solution beginning in 1938-1940. Nevertheless, hundreds of thousands of Georgians freely emigrated to Abkhazia under the open settlement policy of the Soviet Union.
However, the dissolution of the Soviet state tore open ancient wounds and reawakened old emnities. The fall of the Soviet Union saw the dissolution of the Georgian SSR. Three autonomous republics within Georgia broke away successfully.
In 1994, cease-fires were signed, by which both Russian and Georgian peacekeepers would monitor the frontiers of these breakaway states. This case lasted until 2008.
In 2004, Saakashvili threatened President Shevardnadze with an army mutiny and a riot, as 80,000 protesters gathered in the square. The Rose Revoution was accomplished by Saakashvili’s promise to the army, not to the people.
Saakashvili kept his promise to the army by striking humiliating terms with the United States, trading right of ways for oil pipelines — and Afghan heroine — through Georgia to Europe. In return, U.S. military equipment poured in.
In 2005, Saakashvili launched a surprise invasion of Ajaria, one of the three breakaways. Ruled by a gangster, it fell easily, but there were no peacekeepers to get in the way.
In 2008, Saakashvili got a theoretical green light from Condoleeza Rice (much as Saddam Hussein had gotten concerning Kuwait in 1990). On the morning of August 8th, 2008, Saakashvili signed a cease-fire with a South Ossetian militia, which had been trading live fire with Georgian peacekeepers all summer long.
On the night of August 8th, while the whole world was watching the opening of the Olympic Games in Beijing, Saakashvili opened a rocket bombardment of the civilian city of Tskhinval, the capital of South Ossetia. Not even Hitler’s blitzkrieg on the Soviet Union on June 22, 1941, as brazen a treaty violation as Saakashvili’s. (Hitler at least waited nearly two years before tearing apart the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact; Saakashvili scarcely waited sixteen hours!)
The famous scene of the time was Russia’s Prime minister Vladimir Putin seated next to U.S. President George W. Bush at the Olympics opening ceremony. Putin got a message, leaned close to Bush, and whispered an excuse to leave. What might Putin have said to Bush? Something akin to, “Excuse me, I have to take charge of your reckless robot, Saakashvili”? Only those two men know for sure.
Within an hour after sunrise on August 9th, Russian forces were pouring through the Roki tunnel into South Ossetia, having been warned of Georgian artillery and troop massing along the frontier a few days before. They successfully drove undisciplined Georgian soldiery deep into Georgian territory.
The rest is history: Non-English-speaking Russia was styled the eternal bad guy. Suave, sophisticated, English speaking Saakashvili was a liberty loving hero, a victim of Soviet style repression.
Presidential candidate John McCain declared “We’re all Georgians!” and a month later Sarah Palin expressed that “NATO countries like Georgia have the right to American protection”. Both were embarrassingly mistaken. And now, three years later, public knowledge of the real history of the eternally fractious Caucasus is as flawed as ever.
And the paid agents of foreign governments continue to work behind the scenes on a project that could lead to World War III — without so much of sense of personal responsibility to the future.
Well done Eric. I heard you several times on Webster Tarpley’s weekly show and thought you did a great job. Your podcasts provide a wealth of information and detailed analysis, keep up the good work.
I like the podcast Eric, I think you have an interesting take on the issues. I hope you continue making weekly podcasts as your are currently.
also, I like that term you said “Obamanoid”. I might use that in real life speech. example: “We Progressives are continuously frustrated by these vacuous Obamanoid cheerleaders like Daily Kos, who on many policies criticized Bush 43, but are silent when Obama maintains the same policy”
Eric,
I am enjoying your geo-ecom-politico analysis on your podcasts very much, but would you modulate the volume of your bumper music, which is extremely loud in comparison to your voice audio. Either: volume of voice up or volume of music down please.
Thank you.
Once again Eric, you created a great slang term in “Obamanoid”. Used it a few times, some people I used it with also dig the term.
Your political philosophy is “just right” and your analysis is right on!