Ahmed Adel — Aletho News Feb 24, 2023
Although many remember February 24 as the first anniversary of the war in Ukraine, Russia’s special military operation is actually the next phase of a wider conflict that began in 2014. This is a key point often overlooked because the narrative built in the West is that Russia’s intervention was an unprovoked invasion with the sole purpose of territorial expansionism. The international community, which the West incorrectly refers to itself as, has rejected this narrative. To the disappointment of Western leaders, most of the world has instead deepened their ties with Russia.
However, the “unprovoked invasion” narrative has been exposed in the West also as a fallacy. It is recalled that former German Chancellor Angela Merkel admitted in December 2022 that “the 2014 Minsk agreement was an attempt to give time to Ukraine.”
“It also used this time to become stronger as can be seen today. The Ukraine of 2014-2015 is not the modern Ukraine,” she said, adding that “it was clear to everyone” that the conflict had been put on hold, “yet this was what gave Ukraine invaluable time.”
Merkel’s statement confirmed that the Minsk Accords, a series of agreements which sought to end the Donbass war, was only intended to give the Ukrainian state more time to militarily strengthen. It also proves that the Western party of the Minsk Accords never intended to use this mechanism to find peace and address the concerns of local residents.
Therefore, the Russian intervention was not necessarily a surprise, and perhaps the West were even expecting it.
However, what was an absolute surprise for the West was the geopolitical and economic ramifications – all to the detriment of the West and to the advancement of Moscow. It cannot be denied that sanctions had an impact on the Russian economy, but the European Union has demonstrated that it is nothing more than a political dwarf that has no autonomy from Washington. Sanctions have a limited effect on Russia given that it is a completely self-sustainable country, unlike Syria and Iran (which are also heavily sanctioned but without the capacity for self-sustainability).
Rather, the sanctions have actually accelerated the de-Dollorisation of the global economy and deepened the economic crisis in Europe.
Evidently, there was naivety in the West, as there was a false belief that Russia would capitulate to sanctions pressure. Instead, Europe is experiencing an economic crisis that has crushed the Middle Class through a cost-of-living crisis. Meanwhile, Russia has greater prospects for recovery compared to Germany and the UK.
According to a January forecast by the International Monetary Fund, Russia’s economy will grow faster than Germany’s while Britain’s will contract. This is a far cry from the imminent collapse of the Russian economy that was predicted when hundreds of international companies, such as McDonald’s and Boeing, withdrew from Russia and Russians were blocked from using Western financial institutions.
It is recalled that in March 2022, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen boasted that “the Russian economy will be devastated.” Eleven months after Yellen’s statement, the IMF predicts that the Russian economy will start growing again in 2023, expanding by 0.3% and then 2.1% in 2024. Although 0.3% growth is paltry, it is still surprisingly higher than Germany’s 0.1%, a phenomenal situation considering that it is Berlin imposing the sanctions, not Russia on Germany.
The UK is in an even worse situation. Its economy is expected to contract by 0.6%.
India and China are helping Russia alleviate the stress of decoupling from Western financial institutions and trade exchanges. Many experts believe that the 21st century is the “Asian Century” and expect the world’s major financial centres to shift from the West to the East. In this light, Russia’s exclusion from the West has left it with no choice but to strongly project to the East, something that India, China and other countries have enthusiastically taken advantage of.
The 20th century was dominated by the bipolar system and a short-lived unipolar system. Although the 21st century is multipolar in nature, the overwhelmingly dominant economic and military powers are expected to be the US and China, with a host of other Great Powers, such as Russia and India, fully capable of defending their own interests.
What the West does not realise is that in such a global system, it is Russia that hugely influences whether the US or China will triumph. Russia has effectively been given no choice but to pivot towards China. Future generations in the West will learn that this was a strategic blunder – and all for the illiberal sake of defending a neo-Nazi regime in Kiev.
The war in Ukraine was expected to be another advancement of “liberalism” and Western internationalism. However, what has transpired instead is the weakening of Western hegemony. The US expected most countries to fall in line and impose sanctions against Russia, however, this did not trend in Asia, the Islamic World, Africa, or Latin America.
Although the West is persistently and arrogantly defending the Kiev regime against the reality that Russia will triumph in the war, it continues to ruin its own reputation in the eyes of the actual international community by lambasting countries, such as India, for not following their orders. This will have long-term negative ramifications for the West as its influence is weakening and mistrust is deepening.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher
I would think another thing western politicians have misjudged but are finding out now is just how much their own populations resent them and want to see them slapped down.
Translation of this article:
The West has painted itself into a corner.
Merkel and others admitting Minsk’s were faked for time, is a confession of genocide. Clearly Germany, France and UKraine were just what the UK and US wanted them to do. After 8 years of Nazi shelling, when this increased, the SMO was launched.
There’s quite a bit of chat about ceasefires and some sort of discussions, but the terms will prevent this.
First, the Eastern expansion of NATO must be rolled back. That means disarming Poland and Romania, and probably the end of NATO. And if you asked most objective leaders, NATO should’ve been broken up after the Berlin Wall came down.
NATO is a control mechanism on Europe. As SR said yesterday, if Europe went to war with Russia, theyd be out of ammo in two weeks. I don’t believe Stoltenberg and others, that they don’t have the capacity. They made shells and rockets. These machines aren’t abandoned to rust. They are mothballed, put to sleep carefully. My guess is that they have the capacity, but don’t have the political will to do it. Just as I’ve never believed this rubbish that Amerika is having trouble developing hypersonic weapons. I don’t believe a word of it.
They don’t care about the ramifications.
If you’re an elite Joo running the US, and you say ‘feck the EU’, does that sound like you are in control, or even care?
You know how they decimated large areas of the Middle East, just to plicate the Israelis, well, they’ll decimate Europe and elsewhere for the same reasons.
This is why Trump, even if you think he’s one of them, he doesn’t believe in destruction. Trump is a deal maker, he likes to build. Biden doesn’t know what a deal is, and he’s never built anything, but staggering debts.
“Bipolar” is a tautology and “unipolar” is non-existent, because the number of poles is two, but the Scum can’t stop meddling
It could be argued that treacherous scum like Merkel and the other vermin misruling the EU and North America are war criminals who should be brought to justice.
If Arab nations ally with Russia will that trump the alliance Israel has made with those same Arab nations?
Not looking good for Israel…
Russia will win if needed China will ensure it does. When it now transpires that the German Greens were privy to the Nordstream attack it shows the calibre of the people leading us. This isn’t just the end of the American Empire it’s the end of white exceptionalism. Our stupidity has allowed our inferiors to rule us
“Americans” do not rule the USA. They have not been in control since 1913.
Quote from the article: “Sanctions have a limited effect on Russia given that it is a completely self-sustainable country, unlike Syria and Iran (which are also heavily sanctioned but without the capacity for self-sustainability).”
There was a time sanctions meant something, back then when Iran was sanctioned things were very different, today sanctions simply mean: you trade with your group and we trade with our group, the club of sanctioned countries and the club of countries that impose sanctions; anyone being not part of either will be a loser!
The author compares modern-day sanctions to old-day sanctions and also puts Syria next to Iran which is a very bad comparison. Syria is in a wrecked state primarily due to reasons other than sanctions. And Iran today is at the height of its power.
Modern day Russia and modern day Iran have cooperated for years in different fields and have benefited as a result, however Ukraine war has exponentially expanded this cooperation. Iran has tremendously helped Russia due to geopolitics alone! Consider the north-south trade corridor, most of trade to/from Russia now is directed through Iran, going to south Asian countries, India and elsewhere. The scope of this cooperation was such that for about a year Iran somehow forgot about the 25 year deal with China! But now is actively seeking to wok with China on revival and expansion of the ancient silk road (east-west corridor). Both China and Russia need Iran, otherwise these trade corridors can be easily hijacked or destroyed by wars, revolutions and coups. Other countries along these corridors are dependent and weak, even ones that have Nukes! US toppled Imran Khan and Pakistan became a pro NATO/US country over night! Or consider Saudis, can China really rely on them for long term energy security!? So they did everything they could to cause instability inside Iran, the least of their goals was to delay such regional developments and scare many other countries from trading with Iran.
In terms of military, Iran also helped Russia with super effective drones that are also cheap! The goal was/is to deplete Russia and wear it down, Russia had destroyed Ukraine in early days of war but US/NATO were replenishing Ukraine. In a way EU countries are now being depleted and their people should hold their stupid slave leaders accountable for a war that is supposed to only benefit US. Iran has also sent body-armor plates and other kits for all of those extra 250K soldiers, various artillery munitions and possibly short-range ballistic missiles in the future. Just as US and NATO generals share intel and plan out the war, you can be sure there is such a cooperation going on between Russia, Iran and China. There are also likely rumors that Russia is considering transfer of technology to Iran, probably Iran will be making Su-35 inside Iran just as joint drone factories are being made in Russia.
Russia is heavily involved in the development of the north-south corridor, helping with the new rail-roads, docks, ships, roads inside Iran. Iran is going to make 40 gas-turbines for Russia that interestingly are 0.2% more efficient than the Siemens Turbines! So there is no need to describe the situation, Iran is greatly benefiting from all of this, in fact in 2022 Iran’s Nominal GDP ranked 14th but in 2023 it is slightly above Russian GDP and is expected to rise even more by 2025. The competition in very close so Iran could easily rank 10th by 2025 and this is a country that was supposed to be under maximum pressure and sanctions.
Egypt on the other hand is in deep mess! They chose to work with the West and be a lackey, the author of the article knows better what that path had in store for them!
my two tomans
aim of jew western plutocrates (TPTB) are russias
oil,gas + mineral resources, destroying white race +
europa specialy with WEF reset germany is not
needed anymore since its technical + scientifical
older generation is no more + with its mass parasitical
transdender perverted wellfare recievers even is no
competitor anymore to american declining economy .
https://news.antiwar.com/2023/02/24/white-house-believed-economic-nuclear-weapon-would-end-russian-war-in-ukraine/
White House Believed ‘Economic Nuclear Weapon’ Would End Russian War in Ukraine
Top administration officials thought Russian President Vladimir Putin would back down if Washington stole hundreds of billions of dollars from Moscow.
by Kyle Anzalone Posted on February 24, 2023Categories News
In the days after the invasion of Ukraine, the White House assessed President Vladimir Putin would end the attack if the US froze over $300 billion owned by the Russian central bank. However, the Washington-led economic war on Moscow has failed to have a major impact on the Russian economy.
PUTIN GET YOUR MONEY BACK !
America’s populace does NOT support Ukraine, its government or the American Government. We support Russia, its morals, and its people. The U.S. government will be fighting a 3 front war with China, Russia, and its own people. Death to the Biden Regime!