Comrades, the new Horsemen of the Apocalypse are upon us and will shape 2023.
US Military Industrial Complex
They just gained an obscene $858 billion for next years budget. The way the US mIlitary Industrial Complex has profited from the Ukrainian War the West goaded Putin into has been exceptionally profitable, as it always is…
One key reason the U.S. advocated the expansion of NATO was that it would open up new markets for American arms dealers. A little-known but significant figure named Bruce Jackson cofounded an NGO called the Committee to Expand NATO in 1996 — all the while serving as vice president for strategy and planning at Lockheed Martin. He was also co-chair of the finance committee for Bob Dole’s 1996 presidential campaign. Jackson was still at Lockheed in 2002, the year he became chairman of the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq.
This had led to many merry Christmases, indeed. With dividends reinvested, Lockheed’s stock is up over 1,600 percent since the liberation of Iraq commenced on March 19, 2003, It’s up 25 percent just since Russia’s attack on Ukraine last February. Jackson currently owns a chateau and vineyardin the Bordeaux region of France.
…we can righteously criticise Putin for the butchery and mass murder his contemptible invasion of the Ukraine has been and continues to be, but let’s not ignore the coup in Kazakstan, the Wests involvement with the Ukrainian coup and the years of shelling and conflict in the Donbas that all lead up to this nor should we ignore the war mongers selling weapons being accelerants here.
We keep telling ourselves Putin has miscalculated.
I hope so.
I was one of the few who called Putin invading after the Kazakstan coup, and argued he was doing so because he had concluded the West will always expand into Russia’s sphere of influence and because he was looking down the corridors of time to asses his place in Russia’s pantheon of hard men and as a defender of the true Christian faith.
He bullied and tricked his military into invading and has been sowing chaos ever since.
He has us in a Black belt submission hold and sees that only in . world of chaos outside the ordered hegemony of American capitalism can Russia dominate again.
He is a brutal KGB thug who understands only force.
If his own plutocracy don’t kill him in a Palace coup, Putin will continue to escalate and conflict will erupt on numerous fronts.
For Israel, a nuclear Iran is a red line that they will launch military strikes against. It would be in Russia’s interests to give Iran the final technology to successfully test a nuclear weapon and spark conflict with Israel to start a new Middle East uprising that America couldn’t control.
We are in a more dangerous place with war in 2023 than we appreciate.
Covid
I think we are in denial about Covid.
We hated its restrictions and the costs to protect us and we want to believe it is just a flu we are dealing with.
Firstly, long Covid and its risks are unique each time and the more and more times you catch it, the more run down your system gets, the more chance of long term health decline. It is not a bloody flu!
Secondly, the damage Covid is causing China could trigger social unrest, economic carnage and the desperate need to start a Nationalistic conflict outside their borders.
Thirdly, the decision to not spend $50billion to vaccinate the entire planet has ensured an unvaccinated pool of billions for the virus to mutate into and without warning start a new far more deadly subvariant.
10 new billionaires were made from the vaccine, and yet our refusal to spend a mere 0.05 percent of the world’s annual gross domestic product to vaccinate the entire planet makes those new billionaires wealth even more repugnant.
Covid has not finished with us by any means and it will continue to destabilise global institutes throughout 2023 with a possibility of becoming a far larger mass death event if it mutates into something more dangerous.
Catastrophic Climate Change
Consumerism must die because the biosphere it exploits is dying…
The Earth, as we know it, is fucked. We’re currently at 417 parts per million of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, up from 280 ppm pre-capitalism. And that’s still not enough to satiate the shrieking, sucking mouth of the market.
Russia sees the melting Arctic and has decided this is a wonderful opportunity to extract the region’s hitherto inaccessible oil. Burning this will melt the Arctic further, making more oil available, in a virtuous circle of suicide. While making false promises in the fight against the climate crisis, America took the lead in crude oil production last year. Right behind us are the world’s other oil producers, from the despots of Saudi Arabia to the bland democracy of Canada. It’s like a “Murder on the Orient Express”-style mystery, where humanity is killed by every passenger.
It’s getting pretty close to night-night time for ocean life, most of the insects on Earth, half of the birds, too. Oh, and a third of the trees. When this will take out people is hard to predict, just as you never know which piece you have to remove to cause everything to collapse in a game of Jenga.
If you find this distressing, consider the more distressing fact that even if we develop massive amounts of green energy and stop global warming, capitalism will still probably destroy a livable biosphere.
…we are so far off the maps in terms of pollution and what that dramatic sharp increase in heat will do to our biosphere.
Nothing else matters in politics right now more than radical adaptation for the climate crisis that is upon us.
Watch for more climate refugees and the inability for some places to rebuild in time for the next storm as agricultural calendars are irreversibly disrupted.
Late Stage Capitalism
We printed $25trillion in quantitive easing to prevent the greed of the corporate world plunging the planet into an economic depression in 2008 and artificially created the lowest interest rates in 5000 years.
The inflation from that never hit us because just-in-time global supply chains reached into the deepest, darkest most deunionised parts of China and reduced the manufacturing base price for the West.
The problem is China’s zero tolerance Covid policy and geopolitical tensions turned those just-in-time global supply chains into just-in-case supply chains at the same time as two important base product producing countries like Russia and the Ukraine are at war shutting down access to those base ingredients.
This means the West is importing a tsunami of inflation as base production costs and base ingredients shoot up in price and scarcity.
Bloated on a glut of cheap money debt, the enormity of that debt gravity will implode upon itself as Reserve Banks rapidly ratchet up interest rates with the only blunt tools left them.
Economic anxiety will cause cultural friction that will tear at the fabric of society.
***
Each one of these challenges on their own would be difficult enough, the ongoing culmination of them however will become increasingly difficult to manage and the possibility of serious conflict erupting as these tensions finally snap will be the story of 2023.
I do not believe that we are ready for this jelly.
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Putin was more likely to be couped if he hadn’t moved to protect the Russians who have lived in the Donbas for 100s of years.Should he have lain back , sold out Russia to voracious US/EU monied interests and taken the bribes?Allowed the eastern rebels to be slaughtered? Should he have ignored the bellicosity from the US/UK , the de facto Nato membership of Ukraine, the increasing flood of arms into Ukraine with the repression (and killings) of the Russian minority.Lets not forget it was Lenin who for reasons of “balance” moved parts of Russia into Ukraine in the 20,s.This was ok for decades until the nationalistic Ukrainians sought to eliminate all Russians from the newly minted Ukraine (1991)
Who shares the blame here?
Nato/US who absolutely refused to countenance Russian pleas for security guarantees, at every step attempting to block Russia’s energy relationship with Germany and interfering in both Russian and Ukrainian elections.Refusing to pressure Ukraine into implementing the Minsk accords under the Normandy format.In fact, encouraging Ukraine not to implement them , when Germany and France were themselves guarantors of the peace agreement.
Any Russian who can read English knows the West is not their friend
Please tell me what Putin could have done once all diplomatic efforts had been exhausted.I mean how many years have passed since Putin’s famous Munich security forum address in 2007? the same speech in various iterations repeated until the final straw in 2022.
The US/EU and vile UK would like nothing better than to smash up Russia into resource rich components, like Yugoslavia, and feast off the profits until climate disaster and further pandemics do us all in
Incidentally, if Putin is driven by maniacal avarice as so often claimed , he could really cash in by accepting the billions US is clearly ready to spend on ripping apart Russia
I want to know what country in the world would willingly accept a huge hostile military alliance to move to its borders?
You ask what Putins options were Francesca. Well there’s a couple of points here. In my opinion NATO as an alliance would invade nobody. They are there to maintain the security of their members and if that means putting defences on borders so be it. Russia (Putin) may feel aggrieved about the situation in the Donbas so maybe your argument might hold water if he kept his war there. He hasn’t. Deliberately killing civilians and marching through the rest of Ukraine doesn’t look like the acceptable agenda of a reasonable leader with a genuine grievance. Putins total disrespect for human life, including that of his own soldiers is contemptible. Your attempt to justify his actions Is your business and best kept that way.
Nato would not invade anyone?
They have form
Libya and Afghanistan , Nato bombed Belgrade for 78days nonstop, killing thousands, bombing the Chinese embassy to boot and a Serbian broadcasting
station
Where is the guarantee Nato would never attack Russia?
Russia has been asking for security guarantees since the days of Gorbachev
Exactly………….
Nato is not just one country making a unilateral decision to invade another. Russia is and has. NATO is a number of countries who together have to agree to act in any situation. The intervention by NATO in Kosovo was a reaction to the ethnic cleansing by the Serbs. Whether you agree with that is a different matter. We can all have an opinion on the Russian claim to the Donbas Region however Putin never accepted that after losing the civil war there a hundred years ago the region was part of the Ukraine. In my opinion he only has half a claim on the area when looking at the population split. Putin has decided the Soviet Union with Russia controlling it was a better deal than Russia alone. This war seems part of his plan to put Soviet bloc together again. Illegally in my opinion. The now independent countries that used to be part of the Soviet Union look to NATO for security because they could never defend against Putin alone. I’ve got no problem with that.
Wiffle waffle wiffle.. Using what amounts to a bureaucratic argument, and a largely vacant attempt at logical semantics, which, of course doesn’t stand up under any scrutiny whatsoever. Then a set of assumptions that display a worrying lack of understanding of the historical timelines, and the rhetoric surrounding those timelines…
After reading all the ill informed, and, quite frankly. jingoistic drivel that passes for “informed debate” in the various comment sections of practically every blog site, hearing the utterly delusional drivel promoted by every talkback show, current events/news programs in NZ. I can well believe NZers are stupid enough to not just put the very party, in that did so much to turn NZ into a beyond repair cluasterfuck, but to give the most fascist politician in NZ since Syd Holland, David Seymour, The chance to finish off NZ’s options for meaningful self government for the foreseeable future.. Only in NZ are we so stupid and arrogantly ignorant as to stand on our hind legs and bay for our own disenfranchisement..
Nuclear weapons are among the reasons why NATO would never invade Russia. The reverse is also true.
Putin has bought NATO to his doorstep with Finland joining NATO. Russia’s entire Northern border now has NATO nations on the other side. However the intent is clearly defensive. Due to Putin’s war of choice.
So, I have often wondered why Nato has not put boots on the ground in Ukraine.Yes, Ukraine is not part of Nato, but neither was Kosovo .Nato has put boots on the ground in Libya and Afghanistan So whats the difference? It seems as you say, Nato won’t put boots on the ground in Ukraine…overly at least..because of Russia’s nukes.Given that, what protection can Nato actually offer to Finland and Sweden against Russia? Or China for that matter.
Yes I have to agree they don’t just appear to defend NATO members but have appeared to take sides in existing disputes. Afghanistan seems to be in response to 9/11. Many would say we’re better off without them but it’s difficult to look ahead and see where those disputes, as in Libya, would end up. We know Gaddafi wasn’t a model citizen.
You say Putin has brought NATO to Russia’s Borders. No. No. No. The US and NATO have pushed up despite assurances to Gorbachev that they wouldn’t. What is it about facts you don’t get?
“Where is the guarantee Nato would never attack Russia?”
Nato/Ukraine is currently missilling bases 600km inside Russian territory.
NATO would respond to a Russian attack on a member country. We are talking nuclear fusion if that happened. There is no reason the US or any other member country would have, to attack Russia just for kicks. It’s easy for Putin to have his war, knowing the US hands are tied and a direct US attack would cause a nuclear conflict.
Russia is not the problem. Putin and his siloviki thugs are the problem. A moderate Russia led by a Navalny or a Nemtsov would cooperate with its neighbours not bully them. Francesca you have misread Russian history. Let the Ukrainian people decide for themselves what sort of government they want. Don’t assume that it was the US behind Maidan because it wasn’t.
Oh my goodness.Navalny?
Nationalistic Navalny who famously referred to Caucasian Muslims as cockroaches and mimed shooting them.He is also in favour of the Crimean return to Russia.Unfortunately, despite still being allowed to operate social media accounts from within prison (Heard from Assange lately?)the most support Navalny has ever been able to muster within Russia was in 2013 when he ran for mayor of Moscow on an anti migrant platform .He got 27% of the vote and came second.His polling has languished since.
@ new view.
Balls. They’re round and they roll mate.
I really hope the misinformation you espouse is born of ignorance.
CB my comments are opinion. But would like your opinion on what mis information I’m spouting.
Zelensky is about to give up and admit defeat is on the cards within the next 90 days!
Gen. McGregor spills the beans.
‘Colonel Douglas MacGregor to outline the next phase of the war in Ukraine. MacGregor says anyone who thinks Putin isn’t about to launch a massive operation is delusional. He says the invasion will have three main goals.’
https://youtu.be/gNX6hQVgyWQ
Interesting times.
U.S industrial complex ? It’s always been a thing in the modern world, and I for one am grateful they maintain military superiority while weakening the rogue state that is Russia, and facing an expansionist authoritarian Han ethno state in China.
Covid? I don’t think the vaccine really makes much difference other than to severity, and true it’s not identical to the flu, but current mortality rates to omicron are a few times worse than baseline flu so comparable to a nasty flu epidemic although yes long covid is a thing.
Climate change? Is a thing but overhyped, and yes in the same capitalist society which gives us the military industrial complex, we have some people getting very rich from climate change and a bunch of people losing quality of life to pay for it although the new layers of technocrats work very hard to make sure they themselves are not in the second group. EV subsidies for the cities while cutting food production anyone?
Late stage capitalism? The fate of China determines our fate in the next 20 years and the fate of western capitalism. War and territorial expansion are distinct possibilities that will overshadow other minor details in our part of the world. Failing to ensure energy security by ceasing oil and gas exploration and allowing Marsden Point to close, is just another treasonous colossal fail from the current government. No military to protect our fisheries or assets.
Fun times ahead and we have been poorly prepared by consecutive weak governments
Putin is winning! Who’s freezing to death! Who’s running out of weapons? Who cant recruit military personnel?
Not Russia!
WWIII will kick off near the middle of this year. The US election kicks in next year and a good old fashioned war usually gets you elected again.
The only problem the US & Europe have is that they’ve already spunked there load already!
All out! General strike until N.A.T.O honours the Two Plus Four Agreement! All N.A.T.O bases back to the Gensler Line!
Down tools! All wage cuts reversed now! End all restrictions on supply of energy!
Down with the far-right Kiev putsch regime! Remove all bans on the opposition parties and press outlets! New elections now!
Down with fascism! Defeat the Azov Regiment! Arrest all Banderite Fascists in Ukraine! Jail the traitors who broke the Minsk Accords!
No to chauvinism, yes to C.I.S reunification! Honour the March Referendum, and implement the New Union Treaty! Defeat U.S. attempts to break up Russia!
Martin,
Mostly Kremlin talking points. Even so, no regrets about the donation to TDB. Happy New Year.
Yeah, because everyone wants to live under the New Axis, killing its own citizens with pestilence and war.
The people and the truth are simple. The Left, from forty years of frustration make it complicated. Sanders and Reich lead the way.
Witness my innate dislike of your cul-de-sacs and love of them.
It is insane, the military budget — goes to the heart of the Yank plutocracy. Illegitimises them.
Francesca’s comment should have been the lead article in this space. Bomber lists all the obvious reasons why Putin had no choice in this matter but then, for some unknown reason, claims he is motivated by avarice. Come on Bomber, in the circumstances you clearly understand Putin was facing, tell us what he should have done.
What should he have done? the only thing the yanks and their paid overseas footsoldiers understand, Capitulation. So send the soldiers to the battlefields to die. Hunde, wollt ihr ewig leben?
@ M.E.
Professor Jeffery Sachs talks to Russell Brand here. He has excellent insight ( IMO) into the so called ‘war’ between Russia and Ukraine.
NATO which is Neocon which is the hot, smoking machine gun of fascist capitalism for which the phrase ‘Greed is Good’ was coined. Under the current regime of fascist capitalism there will never be peace because there’s no money in it for the .001%
https://youtu.be/wfXIJd5J_VA
Ultimately, it probably is time war should be fought on America soil. Therein lies the answer because they won’t want it to happen.
A new doctrine should be introduced to the UNSC that any bif the US is involved in directly or indirectly by providing arms, intell, troops equipment and subcontractors, should be fought on American soil in America.
Who can we get to propose this at the UN? Jacinda!? Or Nanaia?
Or Winston after the 2023 General election!
“In the competition between men, capitalism is war of all, against all” As Marx said.
According to Lenin. The war of all against all, fought by the capitalist robber barons of 19th Century America was traditionally carried out with dynamite. Lenin went on to say, that was until the state reserved unto itself the monopoly on violence.
The monopoly of violence by nation states may have stopped the use of violence in the competition between capitalists, but it didn’t stop the use of violence in the competition between capitalist states.
War is capitalist competition writ large.
The history of capitalist competition in this part of the world is as ugly and violent as anywhere. (And promises to be again).
https://www.thecoconet.tv/coco-docos/tales-of-time/tales-of-time-the-samoan-war-you-didnt-know/
“War is a Racket” ,,,, Jacinda is in the South Pacific sales department.
They are liars,,,,, lying to everyone about everything.
False advertising and we don’t get our money back ….
This 8 year war is nearly over.
The mercenary forces, Azov, kraken, Mozart, are struggling to recruit personnel because they’re all looking in the same places for new cannon fodder. North Africa, Sudan, Somalia, and then Syria, Isis, Afghanistan,Taliban and all of those terrorist organisations with experienced fighters.
With 50% of their infrastructure knocked out, they have no chance of coming back once the ground hardens from the winter ice.
Russia is just going to sit in wait and lob missiles that ukraine is incapable of defending itself from.
The US sending one battalion of a SAM Patriot system is at least 5 months away! They might as well send them sling shots!
The best option Juan Guaido Zelensky has is diplomacy and surrender to save lives.
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