Eso, June 1 at 9:07 am #

Inherit the Wind. What I have in mind is a very different perspective on history. See Wikepedia at
http://tinyurl.com/n98kmq
and go from there. We cannot argue different perspectives, and I am not asking you to take on mine, but at least be aware that there is another way of looking at how things happened. Very possibly A. Fomenko is right even if the theory needs much polishing by a college of history professors not just a few.
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Pure utter and total crap proposed by a Stalinist historian.  The idea that the historical Jesus lived AFTER the Crusades began is simply ludicrous.  Stalinist history was even more biased (and wrong) than Stalinist genetics (which achieved nothing scientifically).

Flat-earthers, and creationists who portray primitive man living with dinosaurs in a world only 6000 years old are your fit scholarly equals.

Your “chronology” is bullshit.

I’m done discussing this with you.

Inherit the Wind. What I have in mind is a very different perspective on history. See Wikepedia at
http://tinyurl.com/n98kmq
and go from there. We cannot argue different perspectives, and I am not asking you to take on mine, but at least be aware that there is another way of looking at how things happened. Very possibly A. Fomenko is right even if the theory needs much polishing by a college of history professors not just a few.

Eso,
You are so biased you haven’t even recognized that NOTHING I’ve said defends the Crusades.

It’s not that the Crusades weren’t an all-out murderous attack on Islam.  Denying that would be stupid.  What they were, mostly was a FAILURE and the Islamic world triumphed.  That’s not an opinion, that’s simply fact.  The ONLY place the Islamic world lost was in the Iberian peninsula—they never fully conquered it and were mostly (but, contrary to history) not completely kicked out by El Cid.  In fact, there still remained a Moslem kingdom on the peninsula when Ferdinand and Isabella were dispatching Columbus.

Nor do I see Moorish Spain as something “lost” to Europe. In fact, while Europeans were living in mud-floor buildings and not bathing for years at a time, and only priests could read, Spain was an intellectual center.  The Renaissance happened ONLY because Spain, Moorish Spain, was the conduit to Europe of the lost literature of classical times, not lost in the Moslem world, just the Christian one.

But the Crusades ended in the 1400’s.  After that, the battles between Christian and Moslem nations were just that: wars of imperialism and counter-imperialism.  Starting around 1800, the Moslem world started losing the imperialism wars to Europe, with Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt and Jefferson’s dispatch the US Navy and Marines to shut down the Barberry states’ piracy—WHICH EVEN BRITAIN GAVE IN TO!

I’m well aware that the neo-cons in Botch’s admin saw a “crusade” against something they labled “islamofascism” (whatever the f… that is).  I also have ranted and raved MANY TIMES that this was destructive to US interests.

So please cut this crap of trying to insinuate that my view of history is limited to the fable that “George Washington chopt down the cherry tree.”

Inherit the Wind, your analysis of history as you make it read in your last entry is precisely where you come in with the western version of history, the orthodoxy of historian, or whatever you may want to call it. Your “WTF” suggests that you have entered heretofore unvisited territory and are confused—as any Westerner visiting the East is at first likely to be. However, as you get used to a different world, it gets better, at least more familiar.

The fault of the West is that it has lied for so long to itself and the rest of the world that it has come to believe its own lies and, unfortunately, so does most of the world. For my part, I bet on the likelyhood that the inertia that the western version of history is trying to block has enough momentum to make its twaddle soon obvious. No better time to make it obvious when an economic-financial crisis (moreover imbedded within the decline of a virtually global culture) hits the engine of lies itself.

You may Search under “new chronology” to find some of the sites that have a different take on history. I would go to A. Fomenko, Nosovsky, and others. You may call it debunked history (certainly Roh fails miserably at debunking it), but millions of Russians and others are influenced by it, and to them and to me, it makes better sense than the historical ground from which history is appreached and analyzed by the western media.

Given a different historical background of events, it follows that the interpretation of events today take on a very different meaning. Basically that perspective makes it obvious that the “crusades” that began about the 12th century are continuing. No surprise that it is all very bloody and likely to become worse. Even so, my bet as to the winner is on Nature, the East surviving, and the West doing the losing.

Eso, May 31 at 8:59 am #

Sorry, Inherit the Wind, but you are so convinced by orthodox explanations that you keep repeating orthodoxy. Try going a little beyond self-referential space. Even so, you are in good company, because you are in with the majority.
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I have not idea WTF you are alluding to.

I do know that your description of Islam being a poor, beleaguered religion for 1400 years is not based on fact, considering that they ruled all of northern Africa, Spain, Portugal, conquered Turkey, Bulgaria, Hungary, and most of Yugoslavia, meanwhile moving east into the Indias and as far as modern Indonesia.  They managed to beat the Christians at every turn until the beginning of the 19th century, and even so their decline took until the end of WWI.  For 1200 years the spread of Islam was nearly unstoppable.  That’s not an opinion but a fact. I’m not judging or condemning, merely pointing out your blatant inaccuracy.

So when you post a silly innuendo, I thought I should make clear that you’ve already based your analysis on faulty and inaccurate history, making your analysis invalid.

Inherit The Wind, May 31 at 8:34 am #

Re: the Jewish experience in Mother Russia

I will always remember my grandmothers (mothers mother) narratives about hiding in the basement of the gentile Doctor’s home while Cossacks roamed the village murdering any Jew they found.

One might surmise that, if those twelve Rabbi’s really run this planet, they do a shitty damn job in protecting their own.

Sorry, Inherit the Wind, but you are so convinced by orthodox explanations that you keep repeating orthodoxy. Try going a little beyond self-referential space. Even so, you are in good company, because you are in with the majority.

Yeltsin WAS a drunk, but I remember him standing outside on a tank fighting back an atavistic coup by the old Soviets, putting his life on the line.  I didn’t say he was a democratic leader, I said he was MORE democratic than Putin—and I stand by that.

As for PatrickHenry’s continuous assertions that Jews are behind all the evil in the world, including Russia, you need to do some reality checking.  Jews had it just plain shitty in Russia, facing regular pogroms (making the KKK in the South look like Sunday amateur murderers), apartheid, and the invention of that hideous forgery “The Protocols of the Elders of Zion”. 

Then, after a brief period of freedom under Lenin (whose best bud was Lev Bronstein, aka, Leon Trotsky, a Jew, and whose chief enforcer, Feliks Dzherzhinsky, was also a Jew), Stalin brought back Russian anti-semitism with a vengeance, and it exists in Russia TO THIS DAY! Naturally he had Trotsky and Iron Feliks killed.

To some extent it explains (but does not excuse) Avigdor Lieberman’s intense racism—he’s fundamentally a paranoid Russian who was a victim of Russian anti-semitism.

your historical summary is quite right, Inherit, except for Yeltsin bing a democraticx leader.  He was a drunk who shelled the Russia parlement, killing over a hundred legislators and an unknown unmber of demonstrators outside.  Under US tutalege he gave away government corporations essentially to gangsters, often under Summers, to JEWISH GANSTERS, asn Patrik Henry has pointed out.

I speculate that the intelligence agencies intervened as he got drunker and drunker and put in Putin. 

The Western invasion of the Soviet Uniion is still blanked out of the US history books, especially schoolbook history, precisely for the reason you emphasize, to obscure the realistic reasons for Russian paranoia, and its need fro a strong defense.

@ ESO

The Church of Russia is a direct decendant, from the Church of The great Byzantijn culturel and deep humanistic thinking and the oldest Christian way of living and study, killed and wiped out by the Church of Rome, their vallets the Venetians, toke Constantinopel, looted everything even the Holy Churches, so that Rome with its sick rulers toke the whole power and so the Muslims came in to Europe, something the same as Holbrook with Kosovo and Albanië, selling for money and power from the Saudies, now it are the Arabs than it where the Turks.

Their is no meltdown of the west, their is a blackpower from within a kind of cancer a 5 colonne
who slowly is poisoning the west and Russia, could be the world Zionisme from out of the USA, they don’t like a strong Europeên-Russia block, they want to rule the money machine with arms and wars, they don’t give a shit about commen people, dead or alive.

Salutation

The undercutting of the East began, roughly, with the 4th Crusade (1204), which destroyed the “Romans” of Constantinople and transfered Rome (a word that means a charismatic center, even a fort) from Byzantium to Rome, Italy. The early Middle Ages happened about the time when the great movements of the people from the East to the West subsided by coming up against the Atlantic and did not yet have ships.

This was also about the time when “ungoverned space”, essentially a borderless sacred land, began to be governed through the efforts of various war lords, princes instead of wandering teacher-priests. The princes did the governing by sword and written law, the latter which could break all rules of the spirit.

The East tried resisting “the letter” in various ways, but did not succeed. Stalin and Mao actually tried to break the spirit of the people further by, both, doing personal will at the same time as force marching their people to catch up with the West. Up to this point the East has not been successful in discovering the essential ingredient for a successful resistance, but that may be because its government is still a mongrel of the West.

Nevertheless, the function of Russia (or a hope) remains to consolidate the resistance and reverse the tide of “globalization” that dumbs down the individual and replaces him with the individual as a corporation. The latter is nothing much more than an updated version of the prince as an oligarch.

Though Russia has not come up with the charismatic idea that will make the members of Pop culture abandon look East (Russian orthodox Christianity, itself a mish-mash of East and West, has no more charisma than the Pope), the West is even less likely to do so, because its relaltive success has made it a self-referencial system even more than the East ever was. If we view the present financial and economic crisis as taking place within a broader movement, one which we might call “the meltdow of the West” (to avoid words such as Armageddon or Doomsday), then we may guess that a radical shift in the psyche of humankind is in the offing.

I suspect that the charismatic element will be discovered when the rule of Law is taken away from those who have turned it into a “letter of the law” by a process of resacralization. In America it is likely it will be the native people who will teach Americans what the charisma is (and was) about.

johannes, May 29 at 11:26 am #

Futher more your country is much more dangeres for the world peace, with its hugh war industrys, with over 30 bases every where in the world, and on the other side some of his citizen are hungry, and without an house for their famelie, the land of the free but hungry.
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You are barking up the wrong tree, Hansie! I fully recognize that George W. Bush was a catastrophic President.  I deem him the worst, by far, America has ever had.  6 years into his rule I thought two from the 1800’s MIGHT be worse (one’s idiocy allowed our Civil War to happen). But after 7 years even they paled next to him.

America, especially the last 8 years, has acted shamefully, and I, an American, am ashamed of our actions.

Obama, I don’t think was involved in FEMA, but he did vote to expand the FISA act, which I do not understand.

But the topic is really how the USA misunderstood Russia’s national security needs over many,many years.

@ Inheret the wind

Some analyses are wise, and some are real beside the
truth, the Americans if they start speaking about Putin, a lot of clichés wil follow, or more stereotyped phrases, so als KGB, And spying, wy you don’t speak about Obema that he has worked fo the FEMA, or that Bsh was a drunkard, and is a member from the famous club SKUL and BONES.

Futher more your country is much more dangeres for the world peace, with its hugh war industrys, with over 30 bases every where in the world, and on the other side some of his citizen are hungry, and without an house for their famelie, the land of the free but hungry.

Salutation

Folktruther, May 28 at 3:07 pm #

This is a real threat that must be faced frankly.  US relaxing the tension against Russia makes it more likely it would ally wwith Western Europe, reduing US world power.  I think historically this is the only solution, which will help push the US into military isolationism.  What do you think Jackpine, or anyone?
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Who are you and what have you done to FolkTruther???

I think (amazingly enough) your analysis is spot-on.  Then again, I’ve long said geography is more important than the political structure of nations. 

The US entry into WWI had nothing to do with “Making the World safe for Democracy” and everything to do about ensuring there was a balance of power in Europe and than neither the German Central powers or the French/British/Russian alliance could dominate.  The Bolshevik 2nd Revolution (October/November after the February/March one) threw a HUGE monkey-wrench into the works as Lenin had foreseen a Soviet Union that reached into Western Europe and, in his vision, had Berlin as the international Soviet capital.

The rise of both the SPD (Socialists) and KPD (Communists) in Weimar Germany further terrified the West and “Roosha” was seen as the source, hence the rising distrust.  The war to crush the Bolsheviks continued on until 1921 and was supported by ALL the Western powers, including the US, with materiel and even men—the US was in Murmansk.

Only 18 years later France and Britain were trying to create enmity between Nazi Germany and the USSR…

Of course, Hitler did attack the USSR in 1941, just like Napoleon had 125-130 years earlier.

Following WWII, the US had something like 10 million men under arms (someone can correct this number) and ALL of them were surrounding the Soviet Union, from Japan, China, Iran, Turkey, and Europe. 

Throughout the Cold War USSR policy was to try to split off major Western nations, with some success with France who pulled out of NATO.

But the US was far more successful in splitting off the former SSRs and buffer nations like Poland, Hungary and Czech Republic and Slovakia.

Is it any wonder the Russians are paranoid? It’s the rational reaction. It’s part of why they abandoned more democratic leaders like Yeltzin in favor of “strong” (ie fascistic) leaders like Putin, who would “stand up” to the US and the West.

Its the Trillion dollar defense budget that needs enemies.  We know now that Russia was massively inflated as an enemy all through the cold war.  After the SU collapsed and people got to see some of the records, they discovered that the CIA’s estimates of Russian defense spending were highly inflated.  This was of course done to justify the spending of massive portions of our national treasure on weapons and defense.  A leader in this was a guy at the CIA named Bill Gates, who is now Obama’s man in charge of running the Pentagon.

After the SU collapsed, even this fictional justification of massive defense budgets went away.  The logical thing for us to do as a nation would be to stop spending huge sums on weapons, and instead invest in our own economy and infrastructure.  Or maybe just let Americans keep more of their hard-earned money instead of taxing it so much.

But there were too many people riding the gravy train.  So instead, we saw a search for new threats and enemies.  Remember the dreaded ‘narco-terrorists’?  That was one attempt at finding a justification for them to keep taking hundreds of billions of dollars from us and giving it to their defense contractor buddies.

Then, they found ‘terrorists’ as a justification.  If anyone today every questions whether we should be spending a trillion dollars a year on ‘defense’, which is much more than the rest of the world combined, we are all told we need to quake in fear of ‘terrorists’.

Of course, its amazing that con has worked as long as it has.  PT Barnum would be proud of the Democrats and the Republicans and how much they’ve managed to steal with that one.  But, surely they themselves have to wonder how long the ‘terrorism’ scare can continue, so they need to find yet more new enemies to make Americans scared and willing to give up a couple of trillion dollars a year.

Thus, Russia is still an enemy.  No reason in the real world behind that.  But something has to justify the theft of trillions.  Especially when some people have been waking up and realizing that the expensive planes and ships that the defense contractors build are basically useless against ‘terrorists’.  Both Bush and Obama have started their terms by pointing to China as an enemy to justify spending billions on such projects.  But that doesn’t have the same emotional impact on the American people as the remnants of 50 years of cold-war propaganda against Russia.  So, Russia is still an enemy.

The historical problem is not just the military-industrial complex or Cold War history, but a geo-stategic concern.  The US powerstate is afrid that Europe may ally with Russia, since it matches up well economically and they are all Whites with a Christian tradition.  this would leave the US powerstate out in the cold insofar as Nato went, contronting a another huge power conglomeration, as well as China.

This is a real threat that must be faced frankly.  US relaxing the tension against Russia makes it more likely it would ally wwith Western Europe, reduing US world power.  I think historically this is the only solution, which will help push the US into military isolationism.  What do you think Jackpine, or anyone?

There has always been a distrust between the USA and Russia.  It all began after the Russian revolution in 1917, when TPTB in the USA became overly paranoid about socialism.  And no doubt the Russians became overly paranoid about capitalism.  Thus the Cold War began and became hot wars in Korea, Vietnam, and Afghanistan.  Afghanistan was the payback for the Russian support for north Vietnam——so we’re all even except Vietnam today is a viable country, Afghanistan is a Hell-hole.  During the breakup of the Soviet Union, The USA under Bush I, promised Russia it would have no aspirations concerning the former Soviet bloc countries.  And then the USA proceeded to pursued these countries to join NATO——a virtual slap in the face to Russia.  It came to a skirmish in Georgia when the Russians had enough of this duplicity.  It will be interesting to see where BHO takes this relationship.

But William, it’s the oldest truth in the books: leadership’s power within the state is in direct proportion to the number of enemies, real or perceived, that lie outside the state.  Power NEEDS enemies.

ITW,

It wasn’t just Bush.  Clinton had the chance of a generation and blew it in the worst way by running NATO up to the borders of Russia, after the first Bush administration promised not to do just that.

Bush made it worse, but not right away.  He did push the missile “defense” and meddled in Georgia and Ukraine…but note that SoS Clinton has talked about Georgia having an “open door” to join NATO.

And then there’s the back story of Clinton and Yeltsin…the banksters like Summers and the oligarchs.

Team-B runs the show, and Team-B is bi-partisan in the worst way.

Our posture toward Russia has continued to baffle me.  We seem to yearn for the good old days.  Perhaps, as others have suggested, this is the military-industrial complex wanting it’s enemy back, although with the great good fortune of Islamic extremism this no longer seems necessary. 

Russia could be helpful in so many ways.  Why do we give a rat’s patootie about Georgia (or even Ukraine).  Is it just that we continue to be suckers for someone prattling on about how ‘democratic’ they are (whether true or not).  You think we would have learned our lesson after Ahmed Chalabi pulled our chain and suckered us into the great Iraq adventure.

ardee,
You may find the situation re:Europe’s natural gas to be not quite as simple as you imagination.

http://europe.theoildrum.com/node/4929

The fiasco of American policy towards Russia since the end of the Cold War is about maintaining the flow of tax dollars to the U.S. military-industrial complex after the other side dropped the ball in the protection racket they had going with the Soviet Union.  The U.S. MIC didn’t want to loose their enemy so they kept on provoking it until the other side responded in kind.  The antagonistic relationship that exists now is exactly what they wanted.

Fadel Abdallah, May 27 at 10:52 am #

Kiss my grits, ITW!
And up your nose with a rubber hose!
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As usual Fadel brings in irrelevant topics and then insults on top of that neither of which have ANYTHING to do with the thread, nor his mis-understanding of US/Russian relations.

Finally he ends up with two “curses” from 70’s sit-com TV shows—that were barely funny back then!

The only thing greater than his confusion and ignorance is his untargeted rage.

ROFLMAO!

Dear Sirs, Russia is the biggest country in the world. Inside you find still about 50 differend languages who are more or les spoken.

All the Europeên people came from about the same spot, in the southeren steppes of Russian, the Caucasis, the indo Europeên languages where spoken deep in to India, Perzia well most of smaller Azia, just to the borders of Peking, bij the Tocharian people.

Thinking on that how it comes that one should be bether as the other, no it are the same people with the same wishes, peace, happyness, well a good long live.

It are this money loving people who make every thing so rotten between us, power they want and how many have to die for this, well they are not interested, in our pain, look to your new President how he moves like a balletdancer, speaks for ours, an on the end he is as the rest, sending more troops, killing people from out of the sky with his drones, well this the real god forgiving way of killing people, you don’t see them you do it from out your chair, with a small butten like god himself.

Salutations

By Inherit The Wind, May 27 at 8:47 am #

“As usual Fadel reveals he understands NOTHING, not realizing that, as Ardee explains “West” and “East” refer to the Cold War blocs.  Plus, Fadel needs to take ANOTHER look at his map.  Russia is the BIGGEST nation in Asia, bigger than China.  It’s also the biggest nation in Europe, too, but most of Europe’s population is West of it.”
===========================
Holy crap!

As the most prominent member of the Z-Gang, this full of hot air ITW insists on handing me more badges of honor when he exerts so much effort to end saying the essence of what I said, while deceiving himself into believing that he said something original or important.

Kiss my grits, ITW!
And up your nose with a rubber hose!

Fadel Abdallah… One erroneous assumption of this article is that it talks about the “West” versus “Russia,” as if Russia is not part of the West. A simple look at a map of Europe….
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What nonsense! Start reading a little of Anatoly Fomenko about Russian history and stop believing all the BS dished out by the West. Yes, I know that BBC would not advertise his books and that many believe him to be a nut, but there is more truth to him than all the self-referential historians of the West put together.

Russia is an heir to the sacred country that existed before the Trojan horses of the West, the Romanovs, tried to deliver this “backward” piece of real-estate to the West. Through the efforts of Peter the Great, Russia was turned into a mongrel of the West. But the collective psyche of the Russians, demoralized by the trauma of desacralization, has not quite forgotten its past and is unlikely to forgive the West for putting its rockets along its border to continue the “westernizing”.

Johannes and Gotswaddle:
You are saying the same thing.  Traditional Russian paranoia is based on horrible invasions and being surrounded with enemies. As the joke goes “Just because you are paranoid doesn’t mean they AREN’T out to get you!”

Our mis-handling of relations with the USSR, Russia and her former constituent republics has been shameful, but was naturally TRULY f***ed up by the Bush idiots, fantasists and fascists, just like the f***ed it up with Iran, Iraq, the Palestinians, Israel (yes, them too—years of neglect of the situation), Mexico, etc, etc.

It will take YEARS of delicate and careful diplomacy to repair our relations with Russia.  Our leaders need to finally understand that the leadership of other nations actually has very, very little to do with how their national security needs interact with our national security needs.

As usual Fadel reveals he understands NOTHING, not realizing that, as Ardee explains “West” and “East” refer to the Cold War blocs.  Plus, Fadel needs to take ANOTHER look at his map.  Russia is the BIGGEST nation in Asia, bigger than China.  It’s also the biggest nation in Europe, too, but most of Europe’s population is West of it.

@ Godistwaddle

So you think the Russians are paranoid.

They are been invaded a lot.

By the latest invasion they lost 26 Million people,
about 20 million more as the Jews.

They have won the war, and not the Western countrys.

Some American have the same stupid outlook as some old Europeên countrys who think they still rule the world.

Salutations.

Russia has been and is justly paranoid about European and U.S. power.  It’s been invaded a LOT.  I say as one who often deals with the mentally ill paranoid, it’s not wise to prod and poke them.  As above, Russia is JUSTLY paranoid.

William, a belated thank you for your informative and well reasoned portraits of American foreign policy.

Fadel Abdallah, May 27 at 1:29 am #

The usage to which your refer is more a holdover from the cold war, the “us vs.them”, than an accidental or even intentional error in geography.

This entire scenario is nothing more than a battle over profits, with both sides using threats of hostility in order to safeguard future economic health for themselves.

Russia resents the overtures to its former “colonies” as it sees them as natural markets for its gas and oil, while the “west” sees the way Germans shivered in winter because Russia turned off their supplies of heating fuel.

Two great economic powers are fighting over markets. This is what history has always been about in its essentials and, until we throw off the shackles of capitalism, what it always will be about.

If it wash only for the big weapen industrys from the USA, you could understand it.

No it is for an overpowering of all the other countrys in the world, it has nothing to do with freedom, but everything with dominating others.

Slowly but sure the USA is losing all good feelings from his friends, they have to bye them all ready with lots of USA taxpayers money.

We in Europe know that the USA don’t give an dime for our feelings, not so maby the American people who know where to find Europe on the map, they use us
all the time, but not for long anymore, we see and here wath is happening with the rights of the American people, Yes WE CAN, well put it in your pipe
and smoke it.

We want peace, and not people like Holbrook who is an war monger, where he is their is war or will be.

Salutations.

One erroneous assumption of this article is that it talks about the “West” versus “Russia,” as if Russia is not part of the West.

A simple look at a map of Europe will show that half of Russia is located in Europe whereas the other half is located in Asia. In fact, Moscow, which is the capital of Russia, is located almost in the heart of Europe.

Based on the geopolitics of Russia, Russia, appropriately respected and appreciated can play a significant role in bridging the dichotomy between the so-called East and West. But it seems that political Western Europe artificially allied with political-military America seek always to designate other geopolitical powers as enemies to be feared and suspected. This is certainly is never good for world peace!

So the writer of this article and the ones he quotes show themselves as very poor students of geography when using the words “West” and “Russia” is if they were mutually exclusive!