Friday, April 24, 2015

GO AWAY, DR. STRANGELOVE!



 by Ray Jason           

When I receive emails from anonymous strangers asking me where I am located, my usual response is, “AVENTURA is 30 miles west of Somewhere.”  This cautious approach is because my essays have undoubtedly earned me a spot on various governmental “person of interest” lists.  After all, one cannot gleefully describe the folks in charge of the modern world as Malignant Overlords, without aggravating them.  But my impact is probably so puny that I am less of a nuisance than a sardine to a supertanker.
            There is only one factor that dominates my personal choice of location.  I always try to keep my little ship close enough to the Panama Canal so that I can sail there in a few days.  That’s because of all of the various Armageddon scenarios a nuclear war is the one that worries me the most.  To survive it, AVENTURA needs to get through that canal and into the Southern Hemisphere.  This concern is not just the ranting of a lunatic screaming, “The sky is falling - the sky is falling - and it’s full of plutonium.”  No, this fear is based on a mounting body of disturbing evidence, which I will now share with you.


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            In January 2015, the Doomsday Clock was adjusted to 3 minutes before midnight.  Only one time in the clock’s 68 year history has it been set in a more dangerous position.   That was in 1953 when the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. first tested hydrogen bombs, which are enormously more destructive than atomic bombs.  And in 2015, the scientists who position the hands of the clock - and this includes 17 Noble Prize laureates – are so concerned that they issued a cautionary statement that concludes with these words:
            “The probability of global catastrophe is very high, and the actions needed to reduce the risks of disaster must be taken very soon.”
            The two main concerns of these atomic scientists are the fact that both Russia and the U.S. have begun modernizing their nuclear weapons and also that they have ceased negotiating reductions to the existing stockpiles.  Although these developments are critical, they are not what have me so concerned.
            I am frightened because the Washington chapter of The Malignant Overlords has decided that they will demonize Russia and commence a new Cold War.  Even though the Mainstream Media seems incapable of asking the most obvious question, I will gladly raise it.
                                                           
                                                 WHY?
           
What did Russia do to earn this sudden switch from ally to enemy?  From the way the West has suddenly ganged up on Vladimir Putin, one would suspect that he must have suddenly had an Ali Akbar epiphany and became a suicidal jihadist vowing to vaporize The Great Disney Empire.  
 Witness the infamous cover of Newsweek which literally describes him as “The Pariah.”  It is so preposterous and cartoonish that I assumed it must have been designed by Lindsay Graham and John McCain.  And what did Vladimir suddenly do to become the “West’s Public Enemy Number One?” 
Well according to the Western media, he invaded the Ukraine.  This is a classic example of Orwellian “Double-speak” whereby the truth is the exact opposite of what is being stated.  Here is what the evidence indicates actually happened.
Victoria Nuland, the top U.S. State Department official in the region, bragged about funneling 5 BILLION dollars through various NGO front organizations to fund dissident groups that would attempt to unseat the democratically elected head of the country.  Then she personally selected the puppet replacement for that president.  This is not conjecture.  The tape recording of her discussing it with the U.S. Ambassador to the Ukraine was leaked and can be easily found on the Internet. 
To make this even more like an episode from Bizarro-World, the government she installed was chock full of ultra-Nationalists.  So the tragic old aphorism that goes “Well he may be a despicable tyrant, but he’s OUR despicable tyrant” could now accurately be stated like this: “They may be Neo-Nazi thugs, but they are OUR Neo-Nazi thugs!”      
Now even though the Mainstream Media ignores it, Russia and the Ukraine have a history together that stretches back over 500 years.  In fact, it was part of the Soviet Union until the 1950s.  Most of the people in Eastern Ukraine and the Crimea speak Russian rather than Ukrainian.  But more importantly to Vlad the Pariah, Crimea has a long standing treaty with Russia to allow it a naval base there.  This is strategically very important since Russia’s other ports are inaccessible in the winter.
The U.S. claims that its intention is to “spread democracy,” but they incited the removal of a democratically elected President and replaced him with an appointed leader.  What the Yanks really want to spread is … NATO.  And more specifically they want Ukraine as a base for anti-ballistic missile bases.  This would be comparable to the Russians having anti-ballistic installations in Toronto and Montreal.  It is the Cuban Missile Crisis in reverse. 
This would totally shift the nuclear balance of power since Russia’s retaliatory ability would be diminished, making them far more vulnerable to a first strike.  But as bad as this is, it is only the latest shift in American nuclear war strategy that surely is of grave concern to Mr. Putin.  Here are some examples:
·        In 2006, Foreign Affairs magazine, which is highly regarded by U.S. foreign policy makers, published an article entitled “The Rise of U.S. Nuclear Primacy.”  This piece argued that the Russians and the Chinese had fallen far behind the U.S. in nuclear weapons technology – implying that America might be able to “win” a thermo-nuclear war.
·        What surely disturbs Putin is that this lunatic concept - that a nuclear war can be “won” - dovetails nicely with the grotesque “Wolfowitz Doctrine.”  This directive was secretly created in the early 1990s during the reign of Malignant Overlord Bush the First.  It essentially codifies the masturbatory dream of every imperialist, by stating that the U.S. has the right to use any means necessary to prohibit any nation from becoming a threat to its dominance.  And the wording specifically singles out the “former Soviet Union.”
·         And more recently, the U.S. has shifted away from its 50 year stance that nukes would only be used as a retaliatory response and never as a “first strike” weapon.  Here is the exact wording from the 2013 Nuclear Employment Strategy: “The 2010 Nuclear Posture Review established the Administration’s goal to set conditions that would allow the United States to safely adopt a policy of making deterrence of nuclear attack the sole purpose of U.S. nuclear weapons.  Although we cannot adopt such a policy today, the new guidance reiterates the intention to work towards that goal over time.”
·        The untrustworthiness of the United States in recent years towards Russia is dazzling in its audacity and disrespect.  Gorbachev agrees to allow the reunification of Germany, even though it is in their best interests to keep Germany weak, since they have attacked Russia repeatedly during the centuries.  In exchange, the U.S. says it will not extend NATO one inch towards the East.  Instead, they do the opposite and surround Russia.  Obama orates about his determination to decrease the threat of nuclear war, fetches his Nobel Peace Prize, and then in Jan 2014 authorizes the largest nuclear weapons budget in history.  Then The Great Pariah has to witness the U.S. topple the Ukrainian government while blaming it on Russian aggression.
·        And a bleak diplomatic future appears imminent.  Hillary Clinton, the 2016 Democratic front-runner for the Presidency, has called Putin a new Hitler.  On the Republican side the prospects are equally disturbing.  Jeb comes from the Bush Imperium which probably recites the Wolfowitz Doctrine before sitting down to breakfast.  And Marco Rubio is the new darling of Bill Kristol the kingpin of the Neo-con Insanity Brigade. 

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So, if I am walking a Siberian Mile in Vladimir Putin’s shoes, here are some of the things that I am thinking.  I am being maliciously and FALSELY vilified by the leaders of a nation that is desperately seeking to continue to rule the world.  They are a failing empire that is losing both its economic and military power. The almighty dollar, which was once omnipotent because of its status as the global reserve currency, is rapidly relinquishing its grip on the world.  Their military power is all swagger and no substance.  This is comically obvious since their only victories in recent decades have been in Grenada and Panama.
And Vlad the Pariah also realizes that throughout history failing empires become flailing empires.  In their death throes they lash out in a desperate attempt to maintain their immense power.  That is when they are the most dangerous.  And when there are enough thermonuclear weapons lurking out there in the ground, sea and air to destroy the planet a dozen times over, “dangerous” does not describe the peril.   

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Ten months ago I addressed this topic in another essay entitled “Mutually Assured Incineration” which you can find here if you are so inclined.  After reading it again, and after a week of trying to tame this one, I realized that I had omitted something of consummate importance.  Almost all of my focus has been on the geopolitical gamesmanship that dominates the political headlines. 
But a philosopher’s duty is to dig deeper – to tunnel down to the core essence of any issue.  And at its most basic and elemental level this is our plight.  We are ensnared in a situation whereby a single individual or small group of people can completely annihilate the human race.  How insane is that?             
                                               
                         
                    

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