Morning All :) I started the day off with a continuation of a big conversation with someone on Youtube and will share my latest comment. See what you make of it. This is an interesting conversation which I am happy to keep refining. There will definitely be various forces and motivations at work in any complicated process or large scale subject and to document them all would be impossible here. Aside from that, I dont know them all either, but I attempt to first of all look at the widest context I can first, to get a conceptual idea of the rough landscape. After that I tend to zoom in and out of smaller or medium sizes issues, but mostly the smaller issues have direct relate and relevance to the overall wide context. So from my perspective, the big context here is the central question about how the West sees Russia and then of course, how Russia perceives the West. When I say Russia, I tend to mean the ruling classes and decision makers, especially Putin and his closer associates. All of these people are dictated by their intel or perceptions, whether real or constructed. They are also dictated in part by the perceptions of the Russian people. I strongly believe that the point about western powers wanting a weak Russia is highly relevant today and we can have a really large discussion on this one central point alone, without digressing into other areas. For the sake of clarity and brevity, this is what I will focus on today. I believe the West wants control of Russia for many reasons. It might not specifically want a weak Russia, but it wants to control it. However, whether weak or strong, the control is the primary driver. If one controls a strong power, that control and wielding of power is enhanced, so long as that strength is contained into the larger ruling structure. The dilemma is making this possible with a strong Russia and to be honest, it is usually the case, that a nation must be weakened first, before control can be applied. A target nation must be destabilized in various ways, divided into factions which disagree, upsetting order and also confusing the people. The eventual aim is always to put a nations resources into the aggressors ruling classes hands. So this is not about one nation per se, against another, but one ruling class, using the nations institutionalized systems to extract the wealth of another nations ruling class. This is an important distinction from simply the national context. The West is run by an oligarchy system, not unlike the Russian Oligarchical system before Putin. That system still exists in Russia but it has been clipped by Putin. Putin has been very careful not to cut the head off the beast, but instead to make it work for him. This is generally the way I see it and it is a work in progress. To see that the West is an empire system, we have to look deep at its many systems, its institutions, its methods and its ideologies. We also have to look at its history and the many causes and effects of policies. If for instance we take this same approach with the British Empire, we can see quite clearly what it represented as a whole system. As a whole system, an empire always operates along a certain set of principles. These very same principles are at work within the structure of the Western System because it is not separate from the British System. What it is, is a hybrid globally scaled evolved and mutated form of the British Empire system. This means the control of trade, the control of resources, the control of currencies and markets, the control of decision-making at all levels across the empire and not least military harmonization into one command structure. This is NATO. We can also just sum this up as The Western System, but most people dont really know exactly what the Western System is, how it is directed, by whom and for what objectives. They certainly dont see how the control of currencies and money has a driving factor. As an entire system it is also ideologically opposed to the Russian system. It does not currently have control of Russias resources because Putin has put a stop to it, after Shell and others were looting Sakahalin. I think that you are thinking in terms of Cold War tensions and have this notion that once that ended, the situation settled. If true, that is a big mistake because that is when problems started a new phase. Russia had to be weakened so that the Western System, using banking and corporate power, could begin the wholesale process of looting and selling off Russias State resources and assets. This is what the West wanted and still does. It wants to stick Russia on a table, cut it up and sell off the parts to the highest bidders. It does not want to accept that Russia is its own force and can direct its own affairs. No empire accepts that. In an empire, the system rules everything for the service of the empire ruling elites. Russia is just not playing along with that and what we are seeing, as Russia re-emerges, is the frustration of the West becoming more obvious. The West is not getting its way with Russia. Now whether Putin is good or bad or a bit of both, is not really the main point. The main point is what the West desires for Russia because lets face it, Putin will not live forever or be in power forever. The West as a system thinks long term about the control of resources and this spans the generations. Putin is setting up a system where the West is unable to control Russian resources and one of the best ways to do that is to put resources into the control of the state. This sounds a lot like the old Soviet model but it all depends for what purpose. The State can squander them for its own ruling elite or it can put them in trust for the people. Putin is putting them in trust for the people. Big big difference from that of a dictatorship. But Id argue that a Russian dictatorship is better than a Western controlled one. At least Russia is still its own nation and not a servant to an outside power. Putin has had two major tasks. One is to prevent the West from taking control of Russias economy and the other is to prevent the Russian Oligarchs controlling it. Its a remarkable achievement, but by no means totally complete and it may never be? In a globally integrated system the lines can be very blurred indeed. So for instance, Russias membership into the WTO has an effect on sovereignty. There is some give and take for mutual benefits but Putin takes great care that the balance is right for Russia.
Posted on: Tue, 25 Nov 2014 22:45:35 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015