{"id":222073,"date":"2022-10-17T12:00:18","date_gmt":"2022-10-17T11:00:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/?p=222073"},"modified":"2022-10-15T05:21:16","modified_gmt":"2022-10-15T04:21:16","slug":"the-thin-red-line-nato-cant-afford-to-lose-kabul-and-kiev","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.transcend.org\/tms\/2022\/10\/the-thin-red-line-nato-cant-afford-to-lose-kabul-and-kiev\/","title":{"rendered":"The Thin Red Line: NATO Can\u2019t Afford to Lose Kabul and Kiev"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russia will not allow the Empire to control Ukraine, whatever it takes. That\u2019s intrinsically linked to the future of the Greater Eurasia Partnership.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Illustration by Mr. Fish<\/p><\/div>\n

12 Oct 2022 –\u00a0 <\/em>Let\u2019s start with Pipelineistan. Nearly seven years ago, I showed how Syria was the ultimate Pipelineistan war<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Damascus had rejected the \u2013 American \u2013 plan for a Qatar-Turkey gas pipeline, to the benefit of Iran-Iraq-Syria (for which a memorandum of understanding was signed).<\/p>\n

What followed was a vicious, concerted \u201cAssad must go\u201d campaign: proxy war as the road to regime change. The toxic dial went exponentially up with the instrumentalization of ISIS \u2013 yet another chapter of the war of terror<\/em> (italics mine). Russia blocked ISIS, thus preventing regime change in Damascus. The Empire of Chaos-favored pipeline bit the dust.<\/p>\n

Now the Empire finally exacted payback, blowing up existing pipelines \u2013 Nord Stream (NS) and Nord Steam 2 (NS2) \u2013 carrying or about to carry Russian gas to a key imperial economic competitor: the EU.<\/p>\n

We all know by now that Line B of NS2 has not been bombed, or even punctured, and it\u2019s ready to go. Repairing the other three \u2013 punctured \u2013 lines would not be a problem: a matter of two months, according to naval engineers. Steel on the Nord Streams is thicker than on modern ships. Gazprom has offered to repair them \u2013 as long as Europeans behave like grown-ups and accept strict security conditions.<\/p>\n

We all know that\u2019s not going to happen. None of the above is discussed across NATOsan media. That means that Plan A by the usual suspects remains in place: creating a contrived natural gas shortage, leading to the de-industrialization of Europe, all part of the Great Reset, rebranded \u201cThe Great Narrative\u201d.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, the EU Muppet Show is discussing the ninth sanction package against Russia. Sweden refuses to share with Russia the results of the dodgy intra-NATO \u201cinvestigation\u201d of itself on who blew up the Nord Streams.<\/p>\n

At Russian Energy Week, President Putin summarized the stark facts.<\/p>\n

Europe blames Russia for the reliability of its energy supplies even though it was receiving the entire volume it bought under fixed contracts.<\/p>\n

The \u201corchestrators of the Nord Stream terrorist attacks are those who profit from them\u201d.<\/p>\n

Repairing Nord Stream strings \u201cwould only make sense in the event of continued operation and security\u201d.<\/p>\n

Buying gas on the spot market will cause a \u20ac300 billion loss for Europe.<\/p>\n

The rise in energy prices is not due to the Special Military Operation (SMO), but to the West\u2019s own policies.<\/p>\n

Yet the Dead Can Dance show must go on. As the EU forbids itself to buy Russian energy, the Brussels Eurocracy skyrockets their debt to the financial casino. The imperial masters laugh all the way to the bank with this form of collectivism \u2013 as they continue to profit from using financial markets to pillage and plunder whole nations.<\/p>\n

Which bring us to the clincher: the Straussian\/neo-con psychos controlling Washington\u2019s foreign policy eventually might \u2013 and the operative word is \u201cmight\u201d \u2013 stop weaponizing Kiev and start negotiations with Moscow only after their main industrial competitors in Europe go bankrupt.<\/p>\n

But even that would not be enough \u2013 because one of NATO\u2019s key \u201cinvisible\u201d mandates is to capitalize, whatever means necessary, on food resources across the Pontic-Caspian steppe: we\u2019re talking about 1 million km2 of food production from Bulgaria all the way to Russia.<\/p>\n

Judo in Kharkov<\/strong><\/p>\n

The SMO has swiftly transitioned into a \u201csoft\u201d CTO (Counter-Terrorist Operation) even without an official announcement. The no-nonsense approach of the new overall commander with full carte blanche from the Kremlin, General Surovikin, a.k.a. \u201cArmageddon\u201d, speaks for itself.<\/p>\n

There are absolutely no indicators whatsoever pointing to a Russian defeat anywhere along the over 1,000 km-long frontline. The spun-to-death withdrawal from Kharkov may have been a masterstroke: the first stage of a judo move that, cloaked in legality, fully developed after the terrorist bombing of Krymskiy Most \u2013 the Crimea Bridge.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s look at the retreat from Kharkov as a trap \u2013 as in Moscow graphically demonstrating \u201cweakness\u201d. That led the Kiev forces \u2013 actually their NATO handlers \u2013 to gloat about Russia \u201cfleeing\u201d, abandon all caution, and go for broke, even embarking on a terror spiral, from the assassination of Darya Dugina to the attempted destruction of Krymskiy Most.<\/p>\n

In terms of Global South public opinion, it\u2019s already established that General Armageddon\u2019s Daily Morning Missile Show is a legal<\/em> (italics mine) response to a terrorist state. Putin may have sacrificed, for a while, a piece on the chessboard \u2013 Kharkov: after all, the SMO mandate is not to hold terrain, but to demilitarize Ukraine.<\/p>\n

Moscow even won post-Kharkov: all the Ukrainian military equipment accumulated in the area was thrown into offensives, just for the Russian Army to merrily engage in non-stop target practice.<\/p>\n

And then there\u2019s the real clincher: Kharkov set in motion a series of moves that allowed Putin to eventually go for checkmate, via the missile-heavy \u201csoft\u201d CTO, reducing the collective West to a bunch of headless chickens.<\/p>\n

In parallel, the usual suspects continue to relentlessly spin their new nuclear \u201cnarrative\u201d. Foreign Minister Lavrov has been forced to repeat ad nauseam that according to Russian nuclear doctrine, a strike may only happen in response to an attack \u201cwhich endangers the entire existence of the Russian Federation.\u201d<\/p>\n

The aim of the D.C. psycho killers \u2013 in their wild wet dreams \u2013 is to provoke Moscow into using tactical nuclear weapons in the battlefield. That was another vector in rushing the timing of the Crimea Bridge terror attack: after all British intel plans had been swirling for months. That all came to nought.<\/p>\n

The hysterical Straussian\/neocon propaganda machine is frantically, pre-emptively, blaming Putin: he\u2019s \u201ccornered\u201d, he\u2019s \u201closing\u201d, he\u2019s \u201cgetting desperate\u201d so he\u2019ll launch a nuclear strike.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s no wonder the Doomsday Clock set up by the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists in 1947 is now placed at only 100 seconds from midnight. Right on \u201cDoom\u2019s doorstep\u201d.<\/p>\n

This is where a bunch of American psychos is leading us.\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

Life at Doom\u2019s doorstep<\/strong><\/p>\n

As the Empire of Chaos, Lies and Plunder is petrified by the startling Double Fail of a massive economic\/military attack, Moscow is systematically preparing for the next military offensive. As it stands, it\u2019s clear that the Anglo-American axis will not negotiate. It has not even tried for the past 8 years, and it\u2019s not about to change course, even incited by an angelic chorus ranging from Elon Musk to Pope Francis.<\/p>\n

Instead of going Full Timur, accumulating a pyramid of Ukrainian skulls, Putin has summoned eons of Taoist patience to avoid military solutions. Terror on the Crimea Bridge may have been a game-changer. But the velvet gloves are not totally off: General Armageddon\u2019s daily aerial routine may still be seen as a \u2013 relatively polite \u2013 warning. Even in his latest landmark speech, which contained a savage indictment of the West, Putin made clear he\u2019s always open for negotiations.<\/p>\n

Yet by now, Putin and the Security Council know why the Americans simply can\u2019t negotiate. Ukraine may be just a pawn in their game, but it\u2019s still one of Eurasia\u2019s key geopolitical nodes: whoever controls it, enjoys extra strategic depth.<\/p>\n

The Russians are very much aware that the usual suspects are obsessed with blowing up the complex process of Eurasia integration \u2013 starting with China\u2019s BRI. No wonder important instances of power in Beijing are \u201cuneasy\u201d with the war. Because that\u2019s very bad for business between China and Europe via several trans-Eurasian corridors.<\/p>\n

Putin and the Russian Security Council also know that NATO abandoned Afghanistan \u2013 an absolutely miserable failure \u2013 to place all their chips on Ukraine. So losing both Kabul and Kiev will be the ultimate mortal blow: that means abandoning the 21st<\/sup> Eurasian Century to the Russia-China-Iran strategic partnership.<\/p>\n

Sabotage \u2013 from the Nord Streams to Krymskiy Most \u2013 gives away the desperation game. NATO\u2019s arsenals are virtually empty. What\u2019s left is a war of terror<\/em>: the Syrianization, actually ISIS-zation of the battlefield. Managed by braindead NATO, acted on the terrain by a cannon fodder horde sprinkled with mercenaries from at least 34 nations.<\/p>\n

So Moscow may be forced to go all the way \u2013 as the Totally Unplugged Dmitry Medvedev revealed: now this is about eliminating a terrorist regime, totally dismantle its politico-security apparatus and then facilitate the emergence of a different entity. And if NATO still blocks it, direct clash will be inevitable.<\/p>\n

NATO\u2019s thin red line is they can\u2019t afford to lose both Kabul and Kiev. Yet it took two acts of terror \u2013 on Pipelineistan and on Crimea \u2013 to imprint a much starker, burning red line: Russia will not allow the Empire to control Ukraine, whatever it takes. That\u2019s intrinsically linked to the future of the Greater Eurasia Partnership. Welcome to life at Doom\u2019s doorstep.<\/p>\n

_______________________________________________<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Pepe Escobar, born in Brazil, is a correspondent and editor-at-large at <\/em>Asia Times and<\/em> columnist for<\/em> Consortium News and<\/em> Strategic Culture in Moscow. Since the mid-1980s he\u2019s lived and worked as a foreign correspondent in London, Paris, Milan, Los Angeles, Singapore, and Bangkok. He has extensively covered Pakistan, Afghanistan and Central Asia to China, Iran, Iraq and the wider Middle East. He is the author of <\/em>Globalistan<\/a> (2007),<\/em> Red Zone Blues<\/a> (2007), <\/em>Obama Does Globalistan<\/a> (2009), <\/em>Empire of Chaos<\/a> (2014) and <\/em>2030<\/a> (2015), all by Nimble Books. Pepe was contributing editor to <\/em>The Empire and The Crescent and<\/em> Tutto in Vendita in Italy and is also associated with the Paris-based European Academy of Geopolitics. When not on the road he lives between Paris and Bangkok. <\/em><\/p>\n

Go to Original \u2013 strategic-culture.org<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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