Does the Kremlin Know What It Is Doing?

Guest Post by Paul Craig Roberts

Earlier today I posted my take on the economic and military developments on the Russian front.  Based on news reports, I envisioned a gold ruble dethroning the US dollar and collapsing the Bretton Woods system which has enabled the US and its financial sector to exploit the world.  I wrote at the time that the Western news blackout on reporting from Russia in order for Washington to control the narrative left actual facts hard to ascertain.  https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2022/03/29/the-western-world-has-had-its-run/

During today a little more information has reached me. The information has caused me to develop concerns that the Russians are not sophisticated enough to see that they can bring down the Bretton Woods system and dethrone the US dollar by creating a gold ruble, and in conjunction with China’s gold Yuan, create a bloc that rules financially.  I think all the Russians are doing is fixing the price of gold inside Russia so Russians fearing the sanctions don’t desert the ruble and flee into gold.  Possibly the internal gold/ruble price fix can develop into a broad system, but why give the enemy warning and time to prepare roadblocks?  Is the conclusion that the Russians don’t have a clue?

Russian economists were brainwashed during the Yeltsin years by American economists who trained them to be servants of Washington’s empire, and now they hold senior positions.  Consequently, Russian national assets were looted, and Russia was left exposed to Western sanctions and other punitive measures.  Here we have a case of a superior military power disarmed by its own intellectuals.

It is absolutely incredible that the Kremlin has relied on anti-Russian de facto Western-agents like Alexei Kudrin, Elvira Nabiulina, and Anatoly Chubais.  These three serve not Russia but the oligarchs and the pro-western Atlanticist Integrationists. They can’t help it and are not really traitors, just American brainwashed poor souls.  Their obvious replacement is Sergei Glazyev, who at least partially understands what Russia must do.  But he is demonized by the West and although the Kremlin keeps him around is wary of him.  Until recently, the Kremlin has favored those of whom the West approves. These people are seen as Russia’s entry into the West.

Russia will never be able to successfully protected itself from the West as long as the Kremlin is constrained by the desire of elites to be part of the West.  This constraint, in my view, will result in nuclear war.  Washington will push and push against a government that has elements who desire to be part of the West until that final red line is crossed.  Then the world blows up. Washington’s idea is that pressure will collapse the leadership that values Russian sovereignty, and Washington will install a puppet as in Ukraine.

As for the reporting on the peace agreement between Russia and Ukraine, it is extremely strange that the Victor of the conflict is making concessions to the Loser. This is an indication that the Kremlin itself has been affected by the West’s psyops operation against Russia. The Kremlin is on the verge of making peace partially on Ukraine’s terms in order to shut down the West’s psyops campaign against Russia.

To repeat myself.  As I have said many times, my goal is to prevent nuclear war.  But nuclear war is what Washington and its European puppet states are driving us toward.  To avoid kicking the can down the street, Russia should sign no agreement unless it contains Ukraine’s acceptance that Crimea and Donbass are not part of Ukraine.  It is unclear that Washington will allow its puppet Zelensky to sign the agreement, or keep it if it is signed.  Washington will continue to cause problems for Russia.  Russia should consider if Ukraine can be trusted to keep any agreement when Ukraine refused to keep the Minsk agreement. Western Ukraine is likely to remain a US puppet, so how can Ukraine be neutral in fact? Russia should keep in mind that she is the victor, not Ukraine, and not accept an agreement for the sake of peace, or the trouble will reappear.  Ukraine is losing the conflict and perhaps just wants to save as much of itself as it can.  There were guarantors of the Minsk agreement, and they did nothing.

Putin and Lavrov have said many times that it was a mistake to trust the West.  So why repeat the mistake again?

I think the only successful agreement would be one in which Ukraine allies with Russia and looks to Russia for protection.  Unclear how Ukraine can be in the EU and be neutral.  Austria is a neutral country and a EU member.  Did Austria participate in the sanctions against Russia?  After the treaty, would Ukraine participate in future sanctions against Russia?

Ukraine has been part of Russia for centuries.  It has never been part of the West. Russia must reclaim Ukraine, if not by conquest then by diplomacy. Whether conquest or diplomacy, Russia must deal decisively with Ukraine NOW, and leave no room for the reappearance of the issue.

The Kremlin made its fundamental strategic error in 2014 when the Kremlin refused the request of the Donbass Russians to be reunited with Russia.  The Kremlin was afraid of offending the West beyond its reunification with Crimea and afraid of confirming Western propaganda that Putin was rebuilding the Soviet Empire. From this amazing stupid blunder by the Kremlin came 8 years of Ukrainian shelling of the Donbass Russians, massive loads of Western weapons delivered to Ukraine, massive propaganda against Putin and Russia, protests by Russian patriots within Russia at the Kremlin’s acceptance of the Ukrainian Nazis killing Russian people in Donbass, thus setting the stage for the present Western psyops against Russia. And, as I predicted, required more decisive action from Russia than was needed in 2014 by honoring the Donbass request.

The question before the world is: Will Washington’s exploitative empire over the world prevail because Russia and China and India haven’t a clue?

Because Russia has elites who had rather be part of the West than sovereign?

Will the naivete of Russia and China result in the encouraged West crossing red lines that end in nuclear war?

What the Kremlin’s go-slow war, so-anxious-to-negotiate persona has done is to defeat the image of Russia as a military power. Here is Bloomberg News:  Russia’s cease fire and pullback from Kiev came because “Putin is simply looking to cut his losses after a month-long invasion that failed to take a major city and reportedly cost him thousands of dead soldiers.”

In other words, Putin is begging Ukraine for mercy and will make concessions for an end of the conflict.

A top US general says Russia’s military failure in Ukraine indicates “an intelligence gap in US that caused US to overestimate Russia’s capabilities.” https://www.cnn.com/2022/03/29/politics/tod-wolters-intelligence-gap-us-russia-ukraine/index.html

Whatever the actual facts are, the impression created by the presstitutes among Western peoples is that what Putin has accomplished is a demonstration of Russian military weakness.  This belief will result in more provocations against Russia and end in nuclear war.

As I feared, the West does not take Putin seriously

Nuclear war will be the consequence

Impotent France to Powerful Russia–we won’t pay in rubles

The Russian plan was rejected by the EU and the G7 earlier on Tuesday.

As long as Putin walks around like goody two shoes, the West will never take him seriously

https://www.rt.com/russia/552940-france-russia-gas-rubles/

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