Have not been writing on here for a while. Various distractions, like Chat GPT/GPT 4, finding some income, the state of residential property in NZ. I have still been reading and thought this is worth sharing.
The author of this piece on China Russia talks, Gilbert Doctorow, is a Belgium based analyst with a strong Russian connection is well worth a read in full. It makes a number of very good points that lead to the firm conclusion that the US unipolar hegemony is well and truly over.
“If you read the torrent of articles which American foreign affairs experts put out daily with respect to the future course and likely outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war, you could be forgiven for thinking that you know something. However, for better or worse, no one really knows the true correlation of forces on the ground in Ukraine at present, nor do they know the strategic merits of the offensive/counteroffensives that the warring parties are planning in secret and will unleash in the coming weeks.”
He is absolutely right about that. Most of what we get in the Western press is utterly biased, although the readers of No Minister comments do have the benefit of Andrei with a different perspective.
“I am predicting an announcement with respect to the Ukraine war, namely formal Russian acceptance Chinese mediation to arrive at a peace settlement built upon the 12 principles laid down by Beijing several weeks ago.”
The evidence for China being able to achieve that is pretty reasonable.
“The world was thunderstruck a couple of weeks ago by the successful conclusion of an agreement reestablishing diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and the Islamic Republic of Iran thanks to mediation by the People’s Republic of China. The importance of that agreement can hardly be overstated: it potentially puts an end to the Yemen civil war, in which the Saudis and Iran had each been giving military support to their preferred factions in the conflict. That war not only created great human suffering in Yemen but for many years has threatened broader regional stability. The settlement opens the way for implementation of Saudi-Iranian letters of intent on commercial and investment cooperation signed back at the beginning of the millennium.
The outstanding feature of the Saudi Arabia-Islamic Republic agreement was that it was mediated by an ‘interested party.’ Yes, China was not an ‘honest broker’ in the sense of a disinterested party seated high on Olympus. It is the world’s largest importer of oil, while Saudi is the world’s largest exporter, much of it going to China. And Iran is also a major seller to China. Accordingly it was in China’s interests that these two suppliers not force it to take sides in their dispute and resolve their differences amicably.
Given the looming confrontation with the United States over its defense perimeter in the South China Sea and its plans for reunification with Taiwan, China would like to see an early end to the Ukraine war that leaves both warring parties viable and eliminates any possibility of revanchisme reviving in a few years time.”
China imports a lot of grain. Imagine a conversation between a senior Chinese diplomat and Zelensky along the lines of:
- You can stop believing the Western media bs and negotiate a peace with Russia and ongoing neutrality/non Nato membership. China will buy grain and invest in Ukraine manufacturing.
- Or, you can continue to fight with American and European weapons. China will not buy Ukrainian grain and will start to supply Russia with weapons. The war will continue for years and Ukraine will be destroyed. There will be no serious American money to rebuild Ukraine and Russia will simply destroy any rebuilding with China support if the war continues.
That is a pretty hard realpolitik view but whoever believed China was soft. America has cretins like Nuland and Blinken who seem quite happy to fight to the last Ukrainian soldier. Zelensky has some hard choices to make but he is smart enough to figure out that China holds all the cards. They have resources and credibility. They will also point out that America took out Nordstream, thereby sabotaging energy supply to it’s close ally, Germany.
Which leads onto the headline. Clowns in America are concerned with wokeness and bank failures. China was able to negotiate a peace between Saudi and Iran using its clout as an oil buyer to bang their heads together whilst the West perpetuates the renewable fantasy. India has clearly chosen to continue its non aligned policy rather than take sides with America.
American educators choose to reduce the standards when none of the children in Schenectady can achieve 8th grade proficiency rather than do something about the teacher unions.
The world is changing.
No Minister 
VVP was in Crimea yesterday before flying by helicopter to Mariupol to inspect the reconstruction going on there
What does that tell you? This is a demonstration of confidence that NATOs proxy forces in Ukraine are impotent
And the longer the West squanders its resources on keeping this war going the better it is for Russia – it is a war of attrition where Russia has a 10:1 advantage over the West and where she is fighting a home match
And while the Governments of the West are pouring 100s of billions of dollars into this project, they are suffering rampant inflation at home and now we are seeing bank failures.
Meanwhile in the non Western world Nations are seeing the writing on the wall and are moving to new settlement systems for international trade which bypass Western financial institutions which have been exposed as being untrustworthy
Ahhh the Axis of Evil expands ….
China … Will it hold together long enough to achieve its global ambitions or will it collapse as the West removes access to their markets via shifting manufacturing to another developing nation?
China is not as strong as people say. If the USA reneges on US Debt owned by China where does that leave Chinas reserves?
The death of the US is often over hyped….
Hilarious – how do you think the people of developing nations view the West, Trev?
Let me enlighten you – with CONTEMPT.
Did you see the President of Congo give that pansy Macron a dressing down the other day.
No! You wouldn’t have because it wasn’t covered by New Zealand’s State propaganda outlet TV ONE News or any of the other Neo-Liberal Globalist organs of disinformation that are funded keep you in blissful ignorance as you are transformed into a docile serf who might willing accept an ugly middle aged man can compete as a female weightlifter at the Olympic games.
And while you personally might have thought this was absurd and mumbled under your breath how ridiculous it was you did nothing about it
Just as you doubtlessly compliantly lined up at the supermarket with you face nappy on during the lockdowns
What is your jab quota – 1, 2 or 3 or more?
Be honest
Get a grip Andrei…. Its been stated on this blog previously i havent taken the vaccine.
As for hatred and contempt for West…. Yeah sure Andrei….. People want to migrate to the West they aint queue up in great masses to get into the Congo or Vlads Tsarist Russia revisited fantasyland.
One has to ask why you are in NZ given your mildly unhinged rantings…. Or are you just a Russian troll bot account….
Russia as the CCCP was a paper tiger which destroyed itself… Russians love their country so much they drink themselves to early deaths to escape the motherlands frigid, unsatusfying grip…
And the PRC is another paper tiger based on repression, bullying and stolen IP.
Count the West out at ya peril…
Sleep well comrade
Hmmm… well it’s not like I’m not unaware of the crap we’re dealing with here in the West BUT… we’re dynamic societies and this shit happens a lot. Woke is starting to eat itself alive. And if that means universities, starting with the US ones, start to collapse well…
Millions are already turning away from Public systems of education because of this crap, and may soon also start turning away from things like Public Health simply because they’re tired of waiting in the queues.
In short millions of individual citizens are doing what they always have, gaining independence, this time from their own State systems.
Meanwhile Russia, China and a bunch of others are still in stuck in their worlds of gigantic, centralised, technocracy and autocracy. That works for a while BUT
…
Russia and China in particular are heading for a demographic crash even worse than ours.
The West, especially America, has shitloads of natural resources. We’ve just fucked ourselves up because if Green insanity and cost, exploiting cheaper ones overseas. But if push comes to shove we’ll develop our own for either military or commercial purposes. I assume you all recall how the infamous Huppert Curve was proven wrong by fracking, horitzontal drilling, Bush Admin pushing it, Obama Admin dismissing it and Trump pushing it to the max. It’ll be the same with other resources if push come to shove, as in Dec 7. And on that note…
I’ve read the same shit about “The Failing West” from National Socialist and International Socialist sources in the 1930’s, plus the militarists in Japan – including Western laments about our Hollow-chested Men. How’d that work for those folk in their fight against the West?
We can change fast when we have to and we’ve proven that in the past.
You?
Have you ever been to Russia…
…or China?
Or do you just unquestionably accept Christiane Amanpour as an oracle of truth?
Make no mistake neither place is Nirvana, that is for sure – A human Utopia is elusive
But as this post articulates – the era of the unipolar world is over!
No. I’ve read the history of both countries, often by Russian and Chinese authors.
Christiane Amanpour?
Jesus, I thought you had more respect for me than that, but okay, fuck you.
BTW, you want to keep playing the whole racist “Anglos” game, knock yourself out, but I have a shitload of Slavic relatives who are – to say the least – not in love with your 21st century replication of Kutuzov.
I do have more respect for you actually – choosing her is a rhetorical device which goaded you into an expectative.
I enjoy robust debate, your expletive along with the woke invocation of the term “racist” offends me not.
My idealization of the perfect world might be cricket on the village green with the local Anglican vicar sitting in a deck chair puffing on his pipe while completing the Times cryptic crossword on a hot summer afternoon.
That’s a lost world that maybe never really existed…
… but I wish it did
WOW! Not since the days of Psycho Milt have we seen the Left so impassioned, so bold, so certain of the new world order.
Look at Andre he is positively electrified. All we need is a third contributor and they’ll formed have a soviet.
The glow on the horizon is the new world order taking shape, or is it the implosion of the old, sterile and intellectually bankrupt remnants of the old oppressive order, that masked itself under the guise of freeing the people from their oppressive overlords.
Ummmm, personally I’ll run with the telltales of 150 years of history.
Dont let that door slam you on the arse guys on your way out.
But Im going to enjoy the debate in the meantime
I really, really, really hope that Psycho Milt comes out of retirement to deal with this bullshit.
Interesting comments. It appears I am being classified as a leftist now because I don’t buy the Biden/Blinken/Nuland bs. Mkay, crack on.
I have a different view of Andrei to the rest of this community, having lived in Eastern Europe for a number of years and travelled through Russia and a number of the former Soviet republics. He has a raw unblinkered view. That was a lovely Amanpour jibe Andrei, I liked Tom’s reaction and would have felt equally affronted 😉
It is a fair point to argue that the West has a good history of bouncing back when attacked and China/Russia have huge demographic issues. But 150 years is too short a timeframe to argue that everything is benign. The West made a massive strategic error in the late 90’s by taking advantage of the collapse of the USSR and the commercial naivity of its people, even the highly educated and intelligent. They allowed wild west capitalism and oligarchs to rule. They also extended Nato far to the West. Russia has warned numerous times that admitting Ukraine to Nato is a step too far. The 2014 invasion was a reaction to the Nuland led coup in Ukraine and the invasion in Feb 22 was a reaction to Biden talking about Ukraine entering Nato.
The approach taken should have been like post war Germany and Russia, heavy financial support and building strong institutions with regulation to safeguard the common citizen. Hindsight is easy though. Western peoples did not want to pay the price and have their own issues.
The right timeline would be 2000 years of history. The fall of the Roman empire did not happen overnight. The corruption of the American civilization started in the 60’s and is coming to a peak now.
I have concluded that Western environmentalism is simply a reaction to the lack of family and religion, having been destroyed by the progressive socialist left. These people really believe the bs they spout and are more unwilling to face logic and science than believers in a sky fairy. I cannot honestly see hgow America and the West will abandon the mass formation psychosis and move to more fracking and cheap energy. India is far more dynamic now than most of America. Musk is a foreigner, American universities are worse at regimented indoctrination than NOrth Korea according to a director. But hey lets ban mean tweets and vote for young attractive politicians who spout the right platitudes
“They also extended Nato far to the West. Russia has warned numerous times that admitting Ukraine to Nato is a step too far.”
Russia was welcomed into the NATO Partnership for Peace Program in 1994 and the 1997 NATO–Russia Permanent Joint Council as pathway for its eventual membership. The welcome mat was there for it to join just as it chose to do with other international institutions such as BASEL, the G8 and though later than China, the WTO.
Udea
Agreed that joining those international institutions was certainly on the table. Putin is on record at the time not opposing Eastern European nations joining NATO.
The problem was the Russian economy being plundered by oligarchs and Russian realisation that simply having McDonald’s in red square did not create the society they wanted. Russian manufacturing was hopelessly uncompetitive and the loss of jobs and identity a cause of despair of the common man. They turned to alcohol and life expectancy tumbled.
The problem was never national security. More national identity.
Andrei, an English cricket ground on a sunny summer afternoon is a wondrous thing. But it comes with some hidden downsides in a deeply unequal society. There is nothing wrong with kiwi fulas and fullessas having a barbie with a game of beach cricket including their kids. More egalitarian and just as much fun.
“The world is changing” It surely surely is, and I’d agree the West is in a down phase. NZ is a microcosm but the bald headed idiot, and the child man running the country are not here forever.
Most of us dont have to drink vodka to get through our lives, or as in China look out for the Western technology intruding into your every day life as wielded by their Chinese overlords.
But what is so true, China is the biggest importer of oil. And they are strategically and economically screwed because of it. Those supply lines run right past India. And India and the US will control those lines of supply.
That brokered deal between Saudi and Iran is nothing, and proves nothing. Both are bit players in the big picture, but incredibly important to China.
Russia is finished which ever way the war goes. Should they win, and its doubtful , their next contender is Poland, and the Poles will finish the job started by Ukraine.
And a quick side note in history. The Russian empire, an Empire exporting Communism to rule the world, after WW2 extended to the middle of Germany. Its shrunk like a penis on a frosty morning, contracting so far its difficult to see it .
China is well aware of the real politik. That politik is not running in its favour, to cross the straits would be suicide, China realises that.
As for biased press try reading Pravda, or listening to Radio Free Moscow.
Im sorry chaps but whether you and Andre like it not its Pax Americana.
Oh can we also leave the Congo out of it ? Its a shit hole, behind Russia, but not much. It exploits children to mine cobalt for “green cars” Russia exploits its males between 18-40 to mine a non existant empire in Ukraine. Sad in both cases.
You are a grand master of displaying your abysmal ignorance.
Russia is a major exporter of hydrocarbon energy and has a 5000 km land border with China – and the idiotic Neocons can do diddly to block the pipeline network that is developing between Russia and China to transport that energy
And as for India as we speak they are importing as much Russian oil as they can get their hands on. blending it with ME oil and then selling it to the clown Europeans at a premium because their buffoon leaders have “sanctioned” Russian oil at the behest of their American Masters and too the detriment of their own citizens.
It is all hilariously funny and all made possible by ignoramuses such as yourself who drink the BBC and CNN koolaid
Andre lets just focus on a microcosm of the struggle.
Bakhmut.
Lets just swap roles around for a moment because as you and I both know, Nazism is really just a subset of Communism, but with capital left in the hands of the capitalists.
The Nazi invaders are coming from the West. They have tried their best SS divsions, the Wagner Group., cleaned out of the prisions, full of murders, and psychopaths. They have tried their terror and intimidation tactics.
They are stalled. Notice that over the last 3 months Ukraine has announced the imminent loss of Bakhmut. Also they have allowed a pincer movement by the Nazi invaders to partially surround the city.
Notice also Andre that the Nazi invader has been allowed to occupy the low, poor ground, as well as be stuck on the wrong side of the river, while continually being told they are winning.
Even you Andre must see its Stalingrad in reverse.
Where do you think the Ukrainian armoured thrust will be placed in the coming Spring or Summer that will fold Russia Nazi’s like a pack of cards.
Rossco you do have some strange ideas. Read the post
“If you read the torrent of articles which American foreign affairs experts put out daily with respect to the future course and likely outcome of the Russia-Ukraine war, you could be forgiven for thinking that you know something. However, for better or worse, no one really knows the true correlation of forces on the ground in Ukraine at present, nor do they know the strategic merits of the offensive/counteroffensives that the warring parties are planning in secret and will unleash in the coming weeks.”
For anyone with even a vague familiarity with the various parties involved in Russia Ukraine it is the Ukraine (e.g. Azov battalion although apparently purged now) that has very problematic Nazi affiliated origins rather than the Russians.
The idea that a few Western tanks with lightly trained Ukrainian crews will overcome Russia in short order is in the zone of fantasy.
Sorry W&P and Andre I hate to be right again
“Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi welcomed his Japanese counterpart, Kishida Fumio, to New Delhi on Monday to discuss economic and security cooperation, timing the diplomatic event simultaneously with Chinese dictator Xi Jinping’s visit to Russia.”