By Noel Monteiro for the Saker Blog
NEAR ABROAD OF RUSSIA, CHINA, AND IRAN: Russia is part of the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, like China and Iran, which espouse the principle of multi-polarity, and so we must take a step back and try to discern what else is going on in the Near Abroad of these three states of the main island of Asia, and between the collective rimland West, as per Mackinder. The situation may appear complex, but then a very simple scenario emerges. First what happened on Dec 15, 2021.
RUSSIA: These are only some of the events being recounted, of which we, armchair analyst types, will never know everything, although the Russias know everything happening around their borders, as they should.
— Putin and Xi had a meeting at 11.20AM Moscow time, on Wednesday Dec 15 and some sort of a decision was finalised.
— Ultimatum Papers were handed to US Assistant Secretary of State Karen Donfried on the same Wednesday morning in another part of Moscow, but announced on Friday.
— Tehran Times newspaper published their Israel targetting map on Dec 15.
The situation on Russias western border has been destabilising for the last few months, with reports of chemical weapons being prepared by Ukraine to be used in Donbass; US weapons removed from Afghanistan and appearing in the Ukraine theatre; a build up of all types of military weapons, including nuclear, to bases in Italy, Romania, Poland, and Ukraine; provocations along Russia’s borders, with western aircraft flying straight at Russia’s border to provoke AD radars, so more could be learnt about air defences, really the electronic version of probing attacks; and in the Black Sea, an American battle management ship operational while a British destroyer, sailing off Crimea, played possum.
The HMS Defender was offered sacrifically to Russia for capture (or sinking), but Russia declined the gambit. In any event, it would have been small potatoes, or small change for Russia, which wanted to know what Nato was really brewing in Eurasia’s west.
From the Geographical context, the Ukraine-Black Sea region exists in close proximity to Russia, similar to Syria’s position in 2014, to southern Russia and Iran, as well as the Rzhev area in winter of 1941-42 to the Moscow region. In all three cases, these proximate regions are temporary collection and staging areas, for stockpile of troops and weapons to launch future proximate attacks. From the Russian standpoint, in Rzhev east of Moscow, to enable the German Wehrmacht to be able to launch future attacks on Moscow. In Syria 2014, the 80-nation western coalition to be able to stage attacks on Russia or Iran. And in the present day from western Ukraine, for the Nato coalition to also stage threats of attack on Russia. This is exactly how Russians view their developing situation, and their response to Nato has been naturally, no less blunt and harsh.
IRAN: On Dec 15, 2021, Iran’s Tehran Times English language newspaper put out a map graphic, showing tens or scores of target roundels in red color all over Israel. The main newspaper headline simply read “Just One Wrong Move!”. The graphic image message conveys much more than what words can say. The image appeared on Twitter.
The Tehran Times is an 8-page broadsheet, a small newspaper. It will not have a very large circulation in Iran because the national language is Farsi, not English. As print media in a country where English is not the first language, any simple Farsi language newspaper will have a circulation ten times more than any English language publication. This was the print newspaper situation in Pakistan too where I worked. Therefore my opinion is that the Tehran Times with its small English circulation has been used to pass a simple message to the collective west.
The words “Just One Wrong Move!” and the attendant map can be read as an ultimatum, or a declaration of war, to Israel, framed in simple graphic terms with four blunt words. Very unlike the long-winded, hard-worded message of the Russian proposals.
Units of messages or signals are dynamic things. Thus this headline communication traversing from Iran to the English language West, implicitly could be telling/informing, that we, Iran, are now policing Israel; or have moved on from dealing with Saudi Arabia and its war in Yemen, and our objective has shifted to minding the Israeli heartland itself; or it could mean that Saudi Arabia has thrown in the towel, to SCO, and the world must be informed accordingly; or that the conflict between proxies (USA) Saudi Arabia and (Iran) Yemen is now over, it has been won. Unless the West/Nato, using their own armies, would like to forcibly take over the Saudi oilfield network. The deeper question here is whether Dr. H. Kissinger’s financial mechanism to link the US dollar economy to Saudi oil production output, is still viable after the dollar was delinked from the Gold standard. Or does this Kissenger US dollar/Saudi oil output arrangement, hang on a knife-edge? This Iranian graphic may contain an economic dimension or warning.
In saying this I do not wish to cover Israel’s intentions and actions over Iran, already heavily covered in the western MSM.
CHINA: In the first week of October, a surprisingly emphatic news report in the Pakistan media announced, that a US submarine had been seriously damaged, not sunk, in the near abroad of the South China Sea, and had been sent packing. But nothing appeared in the MSM news for days, except for some propaganda shadow boxing about China wanting to invade Taiwan; China flying 150 aircraft and being warned by a Western armada to the east of Taiwan not to invade Taiwan.
“Oh!” I thought to myself. “There are several fleets gathered east of Taiwan. Why?”.
Then a Russian fleet left Vladivostok port and fired a missile from the Sea of Japan. Then some photos appeared of the damaged submarine on the Sub Brief YouTube channel. “Ahh-ha…. Military tensions rising east of Eurasia, reflects a mirror image of rising military tensions, recently west of Eurasia. But to what end? “
Then sudden news about a hypersonic missile gauntlet, thrown by China into the sea, in front of the accumulated western armada. The missile was reported to have landed “inaccurately” 40 miles from the nearest military ship. But here is the technical rub. It took less than 20 minutes from launch into space, to hypersonic glide splashdown from directly above the armada. Astoundingly fast. A new Chinese weapon was demonstrated for which no western defense existed. The armada could just watch and do nothing. But US navy FONOPs east of Eurasia are unstoppable.
In late November, riots against Chinese nationals, businesses, and interests erupted in the Solomon Islands, with, most peculiarly, video showing the rioters carrying Israeli flags. A Global Times editorial blamed Australia for fomenting the riots. Fijian and Australian military were sent to police the troubles. One month later Australian media reported China would send an ad-hoc police advisory group to help the island administration. The Solomon Islands finds itself now in the contested geopolitical influence area, between where the Eurasian grinding wheel, and the Western grinding wheel turn.
The most intense, interesting and numerous developments have been along the India-China-Pakistan border, where slowly and surely, in many small ways, India is being methodically tied down, as if into a small straitjacket. I can only write about a couple.
In mid-October, China and Bhutan agreed on a three-step roadmap, to settle their 400km common border issues. There had been 24 rounds of talks since 1984. Pakistan media reported that the deal permits China to station troops legally on its own territory, in a balcony position overlooking India’s Siliguri Corridor (The Chicken’s Neck area). In exchange, Bhutan gets a larger land area from China, attached to itself facing the relatively peaceful north, bordering China. India is now the only state left, not to have finalized a border agreement with China.
A Chinese BRI infrastructure and military buildup continue all along the northern border in Ladakh, Utarakhand, and Arunachal Pradesh, which keeps India subdued. India is peculiar. Too large that it cannot be ignored, nor can it be permitted to get away from Asia, to cause trouble further on, or make unreasonable demands, and, a careful watch must be kept over India as much as possible.
MACROECONOMIC BACKGROUND: This is a very short description of the current western economic situation and background, as described by Alastair Crooke. I would recommend you read his full article, to obtain a whiff of an idea of the rising fear and desperation, all over the western woke camp, against which real political events are unfolding. He says that the window of opportunity to accomplish “The Great Reset” economic program may be closing faster than anticipated or planned, and a visible panic contagion has begun to set, in Zone A.
I think the window of opportunity opened too late, as a result of the general mismanagement of all aspects of the Covid outbreak. But so too did the Inflation Ogre arrive unexpectedly early, and is marching in lockstep with the Reset. Did the lord money managers, churning out the money, not take inflation into consideration? Maybe not.
Populations all over the Western world have become restive. This special and particular smell of fear, the dry mouth, grows as it is beginning to become apparent that the various “transitions” planned under the garb of “The Great Reset”, may never come to fruition.
Outside in Zone B, the SCO states have now got wind of this fear contagion in the West. It is the kind of pit of the stomach fear, where, in the blink of an eye, the tables are turned, and the Nato predator now becomes the hunted. Maybe Russia realizes that this is the correct timing to clean up the Ukraine situation.
CONCLUSION: These messages and events seem to indicate a shift in the geopolitical dynamics, where previously the SCO states hunkered down in defensive consolidation posture in the previous 20 years. Now they are stirring towards a stronger pro-active defensive posture. Metaphorically we see China in Eurasia’s east, holding a strong forearm keeping at bay an untrustworthy India, Australia, and western navies. In the center of Eurasia, Iran, with its thousands of missiles, locks down and immobilizes the main western outpost of Israel. While to the west of Eurasia, we really can’t tell what Russia will do, or when. On the other hand, we may just see Russia delivering at the operational level, a delicately precise PIT maneuver, or a karate chop, to derail and despatch Nato felons and its Article 5. In Syria between September 2015 and June 2016, Russia in concert with other states similarly derailed an 80-state coalition, hell-bent on a path to Persia. Today, it is the Nato coalition that may unravel. I am deliberately understating the situation, as I know, it will not be all hunky-dory. The timing is just about right, and Russia feels it must make haste.
Here I have to pause and ask. Is this the Multi-Polarity Doctrine running in breathtaking dynamic operation, for all to witness?
Myself, I have a sneaking suspicion, (and I fear greatly) that this Russian ultimatum, will turn out, at the geopolitical financial level, to have delivered a crack shot PIT maneuver, with the correct timing, to completely unhinge the collective Western economy from its present state, even as the MSM orchestra, sings the Covid and Reset Symphony to us all in superb propaganda distraction.
References:
——PIT Manoeuvre Technique, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PIT_maneuver
——-Crooke, Alastair, Dec 1, 2021, Now or Never, The Great Transition Must Be Imposed.
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