Save Breedlove

The Independent has offered quite a piece of reading: "Nato commander calls for return to service of U-2 spy plane to help conduct surveillance on a resurgent Russia".

Well, I am not going to discuss the evident fact of Russia being resurgent; I'm rather into another evident fact: this is an insufferable event for some of the big guys around there, and Philip Breedlove is not an exception.

The very idea of bringing back U-2 for surveillance over Russia sounds as kind of a mental diagnosis to a formerly brave US fighter pilot and presently NATO supreme allied commander, who is to step down this spring.

56 year ago, on May 1, 1960 a U-2 did a great service in breaking US-USSR relations; Gary Powers did not commit suicide... Surely, for the US military those were good old times and bright hopes; a great war seemed to be round the corner. Luckily, then, in the sixties, big guys succeeded to overcome all crises and kept the strategic peace till now (I am not talking about local wars; those bloodsheds did not threaten the very existence of life on Earth).

Now, in 2016, the Breedlove's idea is not only desperately outdated; it puts under question the very ability of the high-ranked military to perceive reality adequately.

A Dialog with McFaul

I've just had in Twitter.

I find it quite exemplary. I believe it's a good approach for children or, well, private persons willing to calmly reside in their privacy.

But Michael McFaul is an academic and diplomat, ex-ambassador to Russia in 2012—2014. Now he is a Professor of Political Science at Stanford University. And I also believe that such a person cannot afford such a childish approach. Adult politicians usually know: if they close their eyes, world won't change. If they don't listen to this or that opinion, that does not mean this or that opinion doesn't exist. But to take wise, reasonable steps and measures, adult politicians should see the full picture, know the whole spectrum of opinions.

Unfortunately, for the political beau monde of the most powerful country in the world it's not the case. They prefer to hear and know only things they enjoy, things that fit their pattern of good and evil. As a result, from time to time they do wrong steps trying to take care of 'disgusting things' that do happen in the world. And it cost the world human lives.

Well, I don't know who killed Nemtsov yet. Moreover; I am not sure I shall. Shit happens; JFK was assassinated about 52 years ago, but who on Earth can say he or she knows for sure who killed him? We just know who was sentenced for that.

What I know for sure, such an approach to politics is a fault. Not only McFaul's fault, but fault of the very system based on the idea of one country's supremacy.

Barack Obama Goes on Talking

Just some days ago Mr. Obama gave a considerable interview to CNN, in which he put some things pretty straight, though sometimes using kind of a diplomatic speech.

Lucky things we are: there is the freedom of speech in the world, at least somewhere and for some, and we can get more from Mr. President of the USA. From the recently published interview he gave to people from the Vox.com. They covered many, many topics in their conversation, and I am absolutely sure there is plenty of gems in his words. Yet I am interested only in the part devoted to Obama's "foreign-policy realism".

Just some extracts: if you have enough time, you can read (and/or watch) full interview: the link is just above.

... we've got to have the strongest military in the world, and we occasionally have to twist the arms of countries that wouldn't do what we need them to do if it weren't for the various economic or diplomatic or, in some cases, military leverage that we had — if we didn't have that dose of realism, we wouldn't get anything done, either.

He who is more powerful, is always right. Just because the good always wins over the evil, doesn't it?

Who Is to Get out of Ukraine?

On Saterday Mr. Joe Biden (for those who do not care, he's vice-president of the USA). Even the CNN noted that speaking at the Munich Security Conference he "served up some blunt talk".

The American diplomacy looks unbound.

Though the AP does not show his 'blunt talk', and neither does ABC, there are some sources that are not so peculiar and let people hear Biden's unmanipulated words. Listen very attentively from 0:40.

President Putin has to make a simple, stark choice. Get out of Ukraine, or face continued isolation and growing economic costs at home.

What? Who are you, Mr. Biden, to fucking tell Russia or Putin what to do?

Just Another Coming Out

He that hath ears to hear, let him hear.

It is the policy of the United States to further assist the Government of Ukraine in restoring its sovereignty and territorial integrity to deter the Government of the Russian Federation from further destabilizing and invading Ukraine and other independent countries in Central and Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. That policy shall be carried into effect, among other things, through a comprehensive effort, in coordination with allies and partners of the United States where appropriate, that includes economic sanctions, diplomacy, assistance for the people of Ukraine, and the provision of military capabilities to the Government of Ukraine that will enhance the ability of that Government to defend itself and to restore its sovereignty and territorial integrity in the face of unlawful actions by the Government of the Russian Federation.

From the first hand: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/2828/text.

Evidently, that is only the USA who can do whatever they want in Central and Eastern Europe, the Caucasus, and Central Asia. Russia has no rights in this world, and the USA will fight against it till the last Ukrainian man.

Hypocrisy rules the world that the USA still tend to look as monopolar.

Geopolitical Physics

From the holy scripts of major religions we know there are the good and the evil. These definitions exist only in tandem: how could one judge if something is good or evil without knowledge of the both?

From the basic course of school physics we know there are always two poles, North and South, plus and minus, positive and negative. Here, terms 'positive' and 'negative' have no good-or-evil connotation, it's just a pair of physical effects, whether electric, or magnetic, or whatever else.

Sometimes you have to choose sides (or poles, for the matter). During the Civil War in Russia after the October Revolution, you could be either Red — a bolshevik/communist yourself, a conscripted soldier fighting for them and with them, or a peasant voluntarily or involuntarily feeding them, or, say, a worker helping them to build up a new state on the ruins of former Russian Empire, — or White, supported by the so called world community (the UK, the USA, Japan, Germany, Poland, etc.) and fighting against or supporting this fight.

During the WW2 the choice was different, yet there was one. One alternative; either you were with Hitler, or against him. At times of great challenges the choices are also great; so the UK, the USA and the USSR were wise enough became allies. (Those who say 'the USSR switched sides during the WW2' just loudly express their shameful, though understandable ignorance in history; I'll come back to the matter later.)

During the so called Cold War world was kind of 2.5-polar: the 'Capitalist World' fought against the "Socialist World' (for propaganda purposes usually called the 'communist' one), and both sides were trying to attract as many third-world-countries as possible; those did not form a general power by themselves, but were developing with assistance of their patrons.

Since the collapse and disintegration of the Warsaw Treaty (and the Council of Economic Mutual Assistance, kind of the EEC for the socialist countries) first and then the USSR itself, the world became monopolar, with the only real super power (with the greatest economy) atop.

Yet was it a time of succes on a global scale? Did the life of all billions of people improved? Or at least that of the Golden one? Did the world become a more peaceful place? Did the number of bloodsheds decreased?

I think there should be no surprise at all that the world tend to come back to a more stable stand, at leats bipolar. And definitely I am satisfied my country takes part in this movements, regaining its strength and weight on the political scene of the world.

And I am definitely dissatisfied with Obama/the USA desperately trying to convince the world they remain the one and only one political being on the world's map which meaning counts. By the way, I've heard the Chinese economy has outgrown that of the USA recently. If not yet, it will definitely do so in the nearest future. And as far as I know loosing its economic leadership is not the only trouble the USA facing now externally and internally. Looks like they desperately need war, as big and bloody as possible to keep thing going, still going monopolar.

However, the newest history knows examples of peaceful consolidation of people around their leaders. For us Russians the (re-)incorporation of Crimea in March, 2014 became such a point. It was done in so a peaceful and purely democratic way that future schoolbooks will definitely describe this incorporation as an exemplary way of settling territorial disputes. And the percentage of those who support our President now is already about 85% here in Russia; I believe your leaders do not even dare to dream of such a figure.


'The West' hypocritically calls the coup-d'etat in Ukraine 'the Revolution of Dignity'; if 'dignity' means blood of the innocent, shelling on the civilians and destruction of economy by Ukrainian nazis (no necessity to follow the CNN or Euronews or RT for the matter; just follow Graham Phillips, a brave and honest British journalist working on site) — we live in different worlds and definitely have opposite ideas of good and evil.

By the way, from my photography-connected background I, just like any photographer out there, know that the most stable support for a camera should have three legs; namely, tripods are such supports; even if the ground below is totally uneven, three legs stand absolutely stable and solid.

Should the world have three poles, to really be a better place?