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[First a small announcement: I will contact the "Saker correspondents" over the week-end with details about how we will get organized and the kind of stuff we will do. Over 40 people have responded to my offer and I am happy to announce that we got all five continents covered. Another seven candidates have not answered my request to confirm their desire to participate: "fsd", "cc", "sl", "y", "aa", "ov" and "fg". If you are still interested, please email me over the week-end.]
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Listening to Kerry today I went through a series of rather contradictory emotions. First, I felt disgusted, then my disgust turned to anger, then to outright amazement and, by the end, I actually felt rather happy. Let me explain why.
First, of course, my stomach turns every time I hear this prototypical representative of the 1%er plutocracy speaking to the world as if he was some kind of Emperor-schoolteacher scolding a class of rather dumb and unruly kids for their bad behavior and promising them a spanking. We all know that folks like Obama or Baby Bush are just puppets, a mostly empty shell shown to the zombified public as "The President and Commander in Chief" while in reality these guys are basically spokesmen. Not so Kerry. He is in the Dick Cheney or James Baker class, not quite at the top of the power pyramid, but much higher up. These are the folks who step in when the mindless puppet makes a mess and some brains are needed on the frontlines. I find these people profoundly repulsive (though I could not help admiring James Baker's fantastic diplomatic skills).
My initial disgust turned into rage when I heard Kerry speak such lies that out to make even a politician feel ashamed of himself. Most of what Kerry said could quite literally be turned around by 180 degrees and become true. Even though I am now 50 years old and I have seen all sorts of lies, deceptions, betrayals and falsehoods over the years, I still have a naive voice in me screaming "how can he say that?", "does he not feel horribly ashamed?", "how can he live with himself?". I know. I am naive and idealistic. I just cannot get used to it. Even after 50 years.
Eventually, my rage turned into outright amazement. At this point, I was beyond good and evil, I was marveling at the nerve it takes to go on world-wide TV and basically state that he earth is not round, but triangular, that 2+2=317 and that black is pink with green dots. He even added that it was impossible to turn black into grey, that black was just that, black. At this point I was awed.
And then, suddenly, it hit me. Kerry and the interests he represents are really terrified and frustrated. His statement is a desperate attempt to do what the lawyers call the "last resort rule". It goes like this: “If you have the law, hammer the law. If you have the facts, hammer the facts. If you have neither the law nor the facts, hammer the table”. Kerry was hammering the table really very, very strongly and that, I realized, was an implicit admission that neither the (international) law nor the facts were on his side. Had the facts or the law been on his side, there would have been no need for table hammering, of course.
His panic and frustration also showed in his rather clumsy attack on the Russia Today TV channel. Here is what he said:
In fact, the propaganda bullhorn that is the state-sponsored Russia
Today program, has been deployed to promote – actually, Russia Today
network – has deployed to promote President Putin’s fantasy about what
is playing out on the ground. They almost spend full time devoted to
this effort to propagandize and to distort what is happening or not
happening in Ukraine. Instead, in plain sight, Russia continues to fund,
coordinate, and fuel a heavily armed separatist movement in Donetsk.
But think about it: Russia Today does not broadcast in Ukrainian or Russian. It broadcasts in English, Spanish and Arabic. The only thing RT does broadcast in Russian are its documentaries on its dedicated website: http://doc.rt.com/on-air/. This is a tiny fraction of what the channel really does and its audience in Russia or the Ukraine is minute compared to the one of the big Russian TV channels. So why did Kerry single our Russia Today? The answer is obvious, of course, it is because Russia Today is a very popular TV channel outside Russia or the Ukraine. According to Wikipedia,
The network's signal is carried by 22 satellites and over 230 operators, which allows some 644 million people to watch the channel in more than 100 countries. RT America is available to 85 million people in the United States. In 2011 it was the second most-watched foreign news channel in the U.S. after BBC World News, and the number one foreign station in five major U.S. urban areas in 2012. It is also very popular among younger American people, U.S. college students, and in U.S. inner city neighborhoods. In 2013 RT has become the first TV news channel in history to reach 1 billion views on YouTube. According to the Broadcasters' Audience Research Board between 2.2–2.3 million Britons tuned their televisions to RT during the second half of 2012, making it the fourth-most watched rolling news channel in Britain, behind BBC News, Sky News and Al Jazeera English.
Remember the candid admission of Walter Isaacson, chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, who openly declared that,
“We can't allow ourselves to be out-communicated by our enemies, you've got Russia Today, Iran's Press TV, Venezuela's TeleSUR, and of course, China is launching an international broadcasting 24-hour news channel with correspondents around the world [and has] reportedly set aside $6 -10 billion dollars – we have to go to Capitol Hill with that number – to expand their overseas media operations.”
So there you have it. The problem is not that Russia Today is stirring up the people of eastern Ukraine, the problem is that thanks to Russia Today the people in the West are beginning to see through the official propaganda! That is the real reason for Kerry frustrated outburst.
So, to sum things up:
1) The law is not on Kerry's side.
2) The facts are not on Kerry's side.
3) The people in the West are beginning to see through the lies of the propaganda machine.
4) There is nothing the Empire can do about any of that.
If any confirmation of that was needed, it came today with the amazing performance of Mark Levine on today's CrossTalk show. It's not on YouTube yet, but you can watch it here: http://rt.com/shows/crosstalk/154788-ukraine-info-war-russia/. Levine turned CrossTalk into CrossShout, another clear case of "table hammering". Why - for the same reasons as Kerry. Nothing else works for him anymore.
Ever since Putin came back to power, Russia is not playing by the same set of rules as the ones drafted by the Empire. Both in Syria and the Ukraine, Russia has been very carefully but steadily pushing back the international AngloZionist plutocracy and loosening its grip on the planet and this is directly reflected in the impotent rage of Kerry and his fellow 1%ers.
This, I think, is very good news indeed.
Cheers,
The Saker
It is impossible to predict what will happen following the recent meetings between US Secretary of State Kerry and President Putin and Foreign Minister Lavrov in Moscow. After all, all which can come out of such a meeting are only words. Still, words matter, and in the case of the highest level officials of the two major powers on the planet, they matter a lot. And a lot of very important words were spoken in Moscow, in particular about Syria, and I believe that they deserve a closer look.
First and foremost, it is undeniable that the USA has had to back down from its previous "re-interpretation" of the Geneva Agreement. While the Russian side said that all the parties must negotiate together to appoint their representatives and task them with forming a transitional authority, the Americans declared that it was categorically unacceptable to have Assad or his representatives participate in these negotiations. But that was when the State Department was run by this bellicose russophobic and, frankly, imbecile bitch Hillary Clinton. John Kerry is a very different person who is maybe not in the same league as the outright brilliant James Baker, but who is nonetheless a smart and shrewed realist and a competent diplomat. It appears that he understands the futility of Hillary Clinton's ideological stance since he has clearly indicated that it was for the Syrian people to decide who represents them and for the opposing parties to choose their leaders. In other words, the USA accepts to negotiate with Assad.
Foreign Minister Lavrov even indicated that the Russians had carefully coordinated their stance by means of personal consultations with President Assad who was fully informed of, and agreed with, the Russian position. In other words, the Americans are already negotiating with Assad.
Second, Secretary Kerry appeared to fully accept and even endorse the Russian line that external "extremists" are using the Syrian conflict for their own purposes and that these extremists represent a real threat for the entire region. Kerry confirmed this by stating that the USA supports the Syrian territorial integrity and the multi-ethnic and, most importantly, multi-confessional nature of the Syrian society. In other words, the USA is also accepting the Russian thesis that the al-Qaeda types cannot be allowed to seize power in Syria.
Thirdly, in regards to the canard about the Syrian military using chemical weapons, Kerry did say that these claims must be very carefully investigated before any conclusions are drawn. At this point Foreign Minister Lavrov revealed that the US and Russian intelligence services would work very closely to draw a common conclusion about what actually happened on the ground. Foreign Minister Lavrov said that "we all know that there are parties to this conflict which have a demonstrated capability to organize "provocations" (which, in the Russian language, really implies what is called "false flag" operation in the West) and that the USA and Russia had agreed not to allow that to happen. Secretary Kerry was clearly not to eager to comment about all this, but he did acquiesce and he most definitely did not contradict Lavrov. In other words, the USA has dumped any plans it might have had of blaming Assad for using chemical weapons.
I don't know about you, but to me this looks like a full-spectrum victory for the Russian diplomacy who appears to have forced the USA to yield on all key points concerning the Syrian conflict.
There was a rather amusing and very uncharacteristic moment at the end
of the joint Kerry-Lavrov press conference when Lavrov suddenly asked
the reporters "do you know who won the Russia-USA hockey match today?"
(the two teams were playing each other in the playoffs for the world
championship) with a totally innocent look on his face. And when Lavrov
"learned" from a Russian reporter that Russia had beat the US (with a
score of 5-3 if I remember correctly) - he turned to Kerry and said "it
appears that Russia has won!!!". Kerry, being an savvy diplomat,
also laughed at that, and the two were soon back-slapping each other.
Frankly, I think that Lavrov made the American pay with this little
comment for all the stupid crap that this bitch Clinton had said about
Russia. Yes, the Russians would kindly agree to work with the USA, but
only on Russian terms which they had stated from Day 1 and on
which they yielded nothing. Lavrov really sent a clear message to the
American elites: "if you play by civilized rules and treat us as
equal partners, we will do our part. If you f**k with us, then you are
on your own and we and the Chinese will watch you fail". That is, I believe, what this "it appears that Russia has won" really meant. A kind tease, but a very serious message.
The credit for this positive, if provisional, outcome goes to the firm yet careful stance of the Russian diplomats and to Putin personally for having had the patience to carefully play his hand. But even before any credit is given to the Kremlin, the one party which deserves the most praise and gratitude is the Syrian military whose excellent performance, courage and skills on the battlefield nothing forced the Americans to come back to the negotiating table. Had the Syrian military collapsed (as so many had predicted) there is absolutely nothing the Russians could have done to force Kerry to make all the concessions he has made.
This conflict is far from over. For one thing, there are forces inside the USA - the "deep state" if you wish - who hate Obama, hate Kerry, hate Syria and, above all, hate Russia and who have huge resources which they can use to sabotage Kerry's approach. Furthermore, the current US and Russian position is placing a wedge between the al-Qaeda crazies (who represent primarily foreign interests and, therefore, also most of the firepower) and the more moderate opposition (who probably represents more Syrians than the al-Qaeda crazies) and it remains to be seen how these two groups will deal with each other.
Still, if - and that is a big "if" - a small step was finally made to force the West to accept that Syria will not be handed over to the Wahabis, partitioned or turned into another failed state a la Somalia, then this is truly thanks to the patriotic courage of the Syrian soldiers and, in particular, the Syrian officer corps which resolutely stood in defense of their country.
And this is how it should be. Russia, China or Iran cannot "save" Syria. Nor should they. Only the Syrians can save Syria, of course. What Russia, China and Iran can do is stand by those forces in Syria who are carrying the heavy burden of fighting against the US/NATO/al-Qaeda/Israeli coalition. So while the behind the scenes role of China, Iran and even Hezbollah does not appear to have much to do with the events in Moscow, I am also sure that Russia alone would appear much weaker to the Americans than a informal but nevertheless highly effective alliance of Russia, China, Iran and Hezbollah.
To repeat - this is only a small but victorious skirmish in a much larger battle of a even bigger war and this is a small victory of words only, not of actual facts on the ground. Things can still change a million times over and over again.
But even with these caveats and disclaimers, I call this one as an unequivocal victory for Syria and its *real* friends.
The Saker
