A RAND Corporation report dated 25 Jan. 2022 proves that Washington, not the Kremlin, is the aggressor in this conflict, with the EU and Germany as Washington's main objective
Sorry to break it up to you, but not everything is about Germany. And not everything is a conspiracy. The poor choices Germany has done to destroy its energy sercurity during past decades have been done by Germans, not foreign countries, either due ideology or stupidity, or both.
Germany has had piss-poor leadership since (in my estimation) the mid-1970s, and a fair amount of blame is to be directed at them, no doubt about this.
I can also understand US policy here: Germany's a vassal that once was a competitor and might, due to EU integration and/or partnership with Russia and China, once more become a true competitor.
There's no way I'm going to 'blame' the USG for this course; it's natural as there are no 'friendships' or the like in int'l relations.
That said, I'm sitting in a European country that will also suffer come winter, hence I'm rather inclined to call this out.
Also, I'm not blaming the American people for this--one must distinguish between the gov't and the people--even if that's extremely hard to do (for not doing so opens the proverbial gates of hell in terms of hatred and blanket violence against an entire people).
I do, and another telling issue is that virtually everyone in academia, legacy media, and politics talks about WW1 as 1914-18, even though it's the first conflict in history that ends with the armistice, as opposed to the peace treaty.
Implications incl. the factoring-in of civilian casualties that resulted from the British blockade in winter 1918/19, which would qualify as 'war crime', eh?
But then the Good vs. Evil narrative which is the lynchpin to US (and british) supremacist exceptionalism collpases, so any and all facts must be memoryholed.
I don’t think that a few photos and opinions are enough to verify something like this.
Not that I would put it past the party in power ( Democrats) to engineer something like this to stay in power...
BUT, how do you know that this document wasn’t forged by the Russians to divide the US from our Allies in Europe? We didn’t make your country dependent on Russia. You (as a country) did that yourselves despite Donald Trump warning you not to do it.
I’ve even seen a clip of your UN Reps giggling when Trump warned against the pipeline.
Mark, it's a fair point--I do acknowledge that I'm not in possession of said report, yet I'd point to the facts on the ground (80+ percent of civilian casualties since 2018 were on the 'breakaway republics' side of the line of contact'), a number of Russian claims that turned out to be correct, and the fact, e.g., that the US Congress initiated procedural works to pass a Ukrainian Lend-Lease Bill on 19 Jan. 2022, on which see here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/3522/all-info.
I do admit it's a possibility, but then again: Larry Johnson is quite someone with a lot of inside-the-USG experience; it was reported on that website by Thomas Röper two weeks ago (that's two mentions independent of each other), and the fact that it has been US policy for about a century to drive--and then keep--Berlin and Moscow apart (see George Friedman's 2015 [iirc] talk at youtube)--this all suggests plausibility.
Yes, Mr. Trump told the Germans--but you know how problematic Mr. Trump's tenure as president has been for the US establishment ('deep state').
Bottom line: I do think that the facts bear out the claims made in that document, and whether or not it's a forgery, the consequences of the energy shortfall will be somewhere in the ballpark outlined by the above report, which, truth be told, is totally spot-on with respect to the incompetence and zealotry of the German Greens: take, say, German Foreign Secretary Annalena Baerbock who lied about her academic track record, is super-hawkish, a Young Global Leader of the WEF, and sits in on the Leo Baeck Foundation, on of Germany's foremost hardcore ultra-nationalist Israeli lobbying groups, among other things.
Hence, if that above-cited report is forged, there's so much accuracy in there that one would have to take it seriously 'even if' its proximate origins would be Russian.
The more that I look at this, the more I think it’s a fraud.
I thought that I recognized Larry Johnson’s name (not in a good way) so I looked him up..... and remembered why. I don’t think that he is a credible source of anything.
When it comes to Germany’s energy needs....... didn’t even Ronald Reagan even warn against Germany becoming dependent on Russia?
Lastly, just because our ‘deep state’ hates Trump doesn’t make him wrong...... maybe the German government should have listened to Trump ...... and not our deep state. German energy policies are an astounding failure, and the Democrats are trying to bring the same policies here...... f-ing morons
When one cannot attack the message, one attacks the messenger. It's absolutely infuriating what this document says, but, unfortunately, the fact that most, if not all, high-level politicians were itching for a war with Russia and tried to do anything to disrupt Germany-Russia economic ties (including DJ Trump) is something that was obvious from even the most mainstream media.
Trump was trying to warn Germany to not become dependent on Russia. Germany is supposed to be an ally of the US and a member of NATO.... not a Russian vassal state.
Of course the US doesn’t want a real German-Russian relationship (for lack of a better word).
Yes, last time when US tried to prevent this alliance, it was really a "blessing" for both Russia and Germany with millions of people dead and complete devastation, but a true windfall blessing for the US which has built its wealth on death and blood. Why not repeat it again, who cares millions of people in Europe will die again, as long as US is thriving... There could be peace and prosperity in Europe now, but US just cannot let it happen. US is such a great ally for both Germany and Ukraine...
Nothing like revisionist history. Are you really trying to tell me that the US had ANYTHING to do with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact ?
And the only reason that there IS peace and prosperity in Europe is because of the US.
Remember the two World Wars ?
Neither of which was started by the USA.....
And yeah, to a certain extent, we do watch Germany’s foreign policy.....After the events of the 20th century I think we have a right to be on guard.
I am not one of those people who thinks that Germany started the first war, but they sure as hell started the second one and the US paying attention is not a bad thing.
Sep 13, 2022·edited Sep 13, 2022Liked by epimetheus
Sorry, but no one should take this as real absent a lot of evidence, and a bunch of people seeing it on each other's blogs doesn’t qualify as evidence.
Since 2nd Smartest Guy in the World deduces that “[t]he main author of this report was most likely a Brit given the writing style and use of certain words,” I’ll note that even a quick perusal reveals several grammatical errors, leading me to deduce its original author is a citizen of the nation of Lazy Fakers.
Michael Hudson’s perspective has value, I believe. It does him no favors to name him in the context of something like this.
Also, the spelling etc. is indicative of non-native speakers writing, or someone writing in a hurry.
Also, it's not easy to guess if it's authentic or not, but it certainly could be (see my other comment below). As to its authenticity, it could be fake, sure, but I think that the consequences outlined are not only plausible, but they are quite upon us in terms of economic dislocation, hence I'm unsure it matters at this point (other than to, say, historians like me).
That said, I'd also be able to offer a 'speculation' (I hate to call it 'theory' in terms of Occam's Razor): grade inflation, particularly problematic in high-profile places (e.g. Oxford, Cambridge, the Ivies, etc.), also render it possible that someone whose mother tongue isn't English got a good (enough) degree, went to work for RAND or someone else who then pushed the document up the food chain with no-one really bothering to proof-read it…and there you go.
It is quite true these days that something being amateurish and not-proofread is no indication that it was not actually produced in a professional setting. I will definitely grant you that one!
And if this document turned out to be genuine, it would still be far from the strangest thing I’ve encountered over the last three years.
That said, I don’t understand why, after having failed to authenticate it in other ways, you opted to consider a photograph of a document anyone could easily have composed and printed out at home (in fact, could have done so in 1992, technology-wise) as sufficient.
I assure you that whether something is fake still “matters at this point” to some of us. I learn a lot at Die Fackel 2.0, and will keep coming back, but please keep in mind that credibility is a precious commodity, and getting more so.
Ha, I noticed I didn't address your Hudson-related comment.
I meant to say: it's almost irrelevant if the doc is fake or not, for the piece merely lays out what Hudson and others have been saying for quite some time now. I didn't meant to drag his good name into any kind of questionable association. I also value his insights a lot, hence I mentioned his piece--as it quite clearly shows the results of the past couple of months to be almost identical to what he predicted back in February.
As to your last paragr., please see the below comment re YYR's posting.
Oh stop. You don't care if it's authentic because it fits your narrative. This is not a real paper, typos aside, it lacks substance and self-contradicts too much. Rand has editors, they would have cleaned it up prior to publication. Someone wrote this USING the current conditions to cause readers to blame others for what Germany is doing to itself.
Basically, you're right, and while I do claim to be 'different' in this regard (I consider myself an issues person), the funny thing is: what would my narrative be?
It does matter if it's fake or not--for if it's a fraudulent we'd learn that most of what the West has been doing in Ukraine is actually due to stupidity, even though real stuff such as the Hunter Biden laptop, the Neocon's role since the 2014 Maidan coup (which is what I consider the régime change), and the bioweapons labs are due to so many different agencies and actors that it becomes extremely hard to ascribe any kind of planning or agency to the actions of the US and its 'partners'.
If the doc is no fake, though, we'd get a glimpse at 'intent', and while I'm way too much of a realist to claim that this behaviour, as much as I personally object to it, is kinda like, you know, 'normal' in international relations. That said, it would also be a quite obvious--and accurate--reflection of the current state of power-relations between, say, the US and its vassals in Europe, in particular Germany and France. Why these two? Well, it's obvious that US global power, apart from its military-technological foundations, since 1945 rested on the twin pillars of its conquered WW2 adversaries, Germany and Japan. So, the threat to US hegemony that a fully sovereign Germany (and Europe) represents cannot be discounted.
Given that past behaviour (think about the timid reaction to the Snowden revelations) is a quite apt indicator of future actions, in particular when it comes to large, complex institutions such as the US (or any other) gov't, and given that Thomas Röper and Larry C. Johnson have been quite correct in their past assessments of the current quagmire in Ukraine, I'm inclined to believe they are onto something here, hence my re-posting.
As an aside, I don't discount your last sentence: it may very well be the case, but I'm asking myself--who would do it?
*RAND or someone in the USG wouldn't stand to gain anything other than a super-pissed off Germany that might actually turn towards Russia (and China).
* Someone in Russia? Sure, could be, for the current quagmire presents the Kremlin with an opportunity to divide 'Europe' and the US (which is, after all, virtually half of the lynchpin of US global power), but then again, Russia appears to be fine by herself and the continuation of the conflict also presents a chance to weaken NATO by draining its resources and possibly splitting it--why stop?
* Someone in China? Sure, could be, but keep in mind that China and the US are so entwined economically that it would not make much sense (it might make sense if China is looking at 'Europe' to replace the US in this dual node, but why would they do that via Ukraine?)
Also, there's plenty of people in politics who day in, day out decry the utter dependency on the US, and while they don't get much legacy media attention, their argumentation runs very differently.
So, bottom line here: lots of unknowns, but the document still could be authentic, even though if that's the case it would be a blunder of epic proportions given its implications.
Question for you, YYR, though: what kind of narrative am I favouring?
Ok, I see one of the errors I caught is not in the photographed alleged original, only in the texts copied into the blog posts at 2nd Smartest Guy and here.
But another thing I now see: the actual RAND style, as in “Extending Russia,” is to leave the first paragraph following a heading unindented. The thing photographed by 2nd Smartest Guy indents all paragraphs.
There are other typographical differences as well, even as the faker is clearly trying to imitate the RAND style.
By the way, if anyone wants to see what an actual sinister RAND Corporation report relevant to the current Ukraine nightmare looks like, they can check out “Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground,” published in 2019.
Exactly, which is also linked in one of my more recent postings, I believe in one of the two "Econ Depression Watch" pieces.
I must confess that I noticed the typos etc., but given the facts on the ground, in particular the things mentioned above in other comments as well as the fact that reasonable people such as M. Hudson, Y. Smith, and many others have all pointed to these shenanigans *without* knowing of (I suppose) of the above document--I think that it's not really relevant whether or not it's authentic or a Russian fake.
The consequences are bearing this out, and if its a genuine RAND piece, I'd say it's either incredibly stupid to write it (everything comes out, eventually) or borne out by sheer malice. That said, however, the US gov't is certainly factoring in the timid, if not outright pathetic, reaction the Snowden revelations have caused: there are, sadly, no consequences to these actions, and as long as there won't be any, the US will continue.
No doubt Washington has been militarized for a very long time, its what props up this false economy - the requisition of other nation's markets & resources. The USA even imported Nazi Germany's knowledge with Operate Paperclip.
Is just the way hierarchy rolls doesn't matter what nation. In the beginning its take others stuff, in the end it costs too much to police it all and then it collapses. Its the USA that is collapsing, our exalted leaders are continuing with ever more desperate moves, some work for a time, its all about time, time is shortening, all the other national collapses are just walks in the park.
Germany has collapsed several times in a century, they have an essence for collapse, the USA will go into shock. All in my lonely view, of course.
Not surprising the crimes a hierarchy will commit to keep the lights on.
I think all the various hierarchies are collapsing with the varying outcomes quite interesting to learn. Of course, all those dependent on a hierarchal arrangement will be called on to serve, and it will use them up.
Start a garden now and begin the process of not being reliant on a hierarchy. Hahahaha!
Funny that you should mention it--it's perhaps not really 'Nazi ideology', as parts of it are certainly quite 'generic', or common, to Western-style 'Modernity' (think: eugenics, progress, the emphasis on materialism, etc.), and, yes, 'Paperclip' certainly contributed to the spreading of a certain kind of 'idea' about the state and society--but I'd also argue that 'Big Gov't' and a thoroughly revamped relationship between the state, society, and the individual took root everywhere in Western (e.g., New Deal, Fascism) and Westernised (USSR) countries as the above-related emphasis shifted from bourgeois liberalism towards an 'active' and super-interventionist state across the 1920s and 1930s. The gov't's heavy and very much visible hand was never withdrawn after WW2, hence…'Postmodernity' is actually useful as periodisation tool.
Start at minute mark 6:18. I don't have any optimism for the near future and looks more like nothing to offer intellectually other than the advice of start a garden now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUYrsA4sJeE
Minute mark 9, how those dependent on this imaginary hierarchy are the first to step up and sacrifice themselves, but I don't entirely buy this premise, all shareholder/investors in this current arrangement will volunteer too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djZXhSea6Yo
Agree about 2SG. He likes to stir the pot so much that while he calls everyone else a troll, I think he's the actual troll trying to get a circular firing squad going. This article convinced me if one thing - to cancel my 2SG subscription!
It's a shame that the veracity cannot be proven, really, because the document looks very much like that kind of policy-analyses, with one exception (and that exception is just my personal instinctive reaction):
It's supposedly american, right? Even for a policy/analysis brief, it is much to short. American documents of that kind are always dradfully verbose, repeating the same talking points three to five times (same as their academic writing really - just look at Haidt's book about postmodernism [where he by the way erroneously connects it to Nietzsche, instead of the ideas of the french and american revolutions which is the real root where every point is hammered several times, inflating it from a pamphlet to a novel]).
It's simply too brief to be american, is my reaction. It is however laconic in its tone which to me points to either slavic parts of Europe or Northern Europe.
Weird, using the RAND Corporation's homepage questionnaire for "other questions", I get a 502 when trying to send my question about this to them.
But that weakening Germany or other competitors from Europe, using Britain as a lap-attack-dog, is is old news. Why our leaders andmedia play along, well, look at what businesses have bought them long ago. Same tactic Putin and the KGB started using in the early 1990s. Buy foreign politicians by giving them sinecures as board members, trustees, honorary doctorates, and so on.
One guess as to why the US is so keen on spreading their lie of "all men created equal" - capitalism has no love for patriotism, etnos or nation anymore than communism does.
I agree with the critique--but keep in mind: the linked 2nd Smartest Guy's Substack notes that this is the executive summary, i.e., not the entire document.
It's also noted that there are certain British English terms and spelling, i.e., it's quite certain this was written by someone with (at least) some experiences in the British contexts. I would also think that it's possible that someone who trained in Britain who's now working with RAND, it can be an 'outsourced' piece of prose, or something that was picked up courtesy of the Johnson gov't or the British 'deep state'.
One last thing: re your last paragraph--I think it's important to differentiate between "the people" and the US gov't, for otherwise collective punishment will become the only option (and that I'd object to).
Missed that about it being a summary. Now I want to dfind the whole thing.
The american people in my experience believe fervently in the quoted phrase. To them it is right and just since they are all americans no matter what ethnicitiy their forefathers once had: witness their confusion re: race/kultur, people (or volk) and so on.
Americans are citizens of the USA, not a people the way europeans are. They always forget the difference, leading to them thinking us racists for not wanting to become multicultural (and having infected our intellectual classes with that thought ince the 1960s) - and we also always forget the difference from our horizon, thinking the way they use "race" smacks of eugenics, nazism and so on, and not understanding what the fuss about the varied pigmentation of their fellow americans is about.
Or that's my sense of it, anyway. Which is also why yes, I do blame them for that idea, since they as a collective perpetuate it, just as I blame the majority of my fellow swedes for having adopted it, leaing to such ridiculous notions as them thinking "swedish" means "in possession of swedish citizenship".
I see the point you're making about the people vs. citizen differentiation.
You know, the post-1945 (at Nuremberg) differentiation was also possible because of the hypothesis that democracies such as the US and the UK, as well as the 'people's' garden variety espoused by the USSR, were qualitatively and esp. morally superior to 'fascism' (I'm using scare quotes here to indicate that this is a value-judgement).
So, to use this kind of argumentation, the German people were 'seduced' by a ruthless dictator, which kinda makes it easy--or hard, as seen from the other side--to equally blame both 'the German people' and 'the German leaders'.
All I'm saying is that it's a bit harder not to factor into any such statements the distinction between the US gov't and the American population (talk about chicken coming home to roost), for…
IF Putin = Hitler, then the distinction should--nay: must--be made, which would preclude the collective punishment of Russia, that is, IF whatever (fake) historical analogies are used aren't just that: propaganda. (In that case, I suspect that the cognitive dissonance among Americans will just get greater until they suffer from a kind of collective schizophrenic breakdown.)
IF the US gov't = democratic (whatever that means), then the American population *must* face collective punishment for the deeds the USG is doing in their name. There's really no other way for there's no way to make that kind of agit-prop omelette without breaking these precious eggs, so to speak.
(The third option, for purely scholarly reasons, would of course be to acknowledge that the Nazi régime was, you know, kinda legitimate and rational, i.e., not the utter and complete evil that esp. US propaganda portrays it to have been, and I'm pretty sure that this is a worthwhile discussion that noone wishes to have…)
Nope, "we" want the operatic, monocle-sporting, Mensur-Schmiss faced, stereotypical nazi, speaking in broken english about how "Ve haff veys off making you talk".
Don't know how much you look at pop-culture, but the fetischism for all things "nazi" as the ultimate evil in US comics both syndicated, published and online tops the actual nazis themselves. It is in itself worthy of a proper postmodern study of how an old enemy is turned into a mythological boogeyman by the grandchildren of those who actually fought it.
One may also note how important it is for US liberals and conservatives alike to keep labelling any and all measures they dislike as fascist, socialist and nazi (all the while conviently forgetting any and all similarities...).
Sorry. The opposite is exactly true - Americans are the ones that tend to put things in a much more concise and simplistic manner, and Russian round-about way of expressing things was always ridiculed by Western consultants in Russia. In reality, there is simply no way to tell the authenticity of the document by the "style" alone. However, it is very much in line with many other pieces on US political strategy, plus it's quite obvious that it's the US/UK camp that is dead set on prolonging the war while "sanctioning" Russia in such a way that it mostly hurts Europe, exactly in line with what this document says. We literally have Western politicians following the policy outlined, to the point of trying to destroy the nuclear plant in Ukraine (unless they are ALL bought by Kremlin which would mean they are traitors and need to be overthrown????)
We have differen experiences then, obviously. I find american academic writing borderline french in needless verbosity and repetition, as if the writer is paid by the pagecount.
Thought: could it be an affect of different disciplines, and different needs for different forms of political correctness?
If you look at the writings of Fukuyama f.e. where he compares nations, he is very careful to avoid anything even tangentially related to that different cultures are differently abled, to borrow a phrase.
Wheras older german or british or swedish writings on the same topic would make no beans about different races (we would say cultures and/or ethnicities instead) make no two beans about different outcomes from similar situations are often if not exclusively due to racial differences.
I mean, it is borderline impossible to get americans to acknowledge that desegregation lead to a sharp rise in crimes committed by blacks against whites but even moreso against other black americans. That it happened and was due to desegregation is a fact, not a normative statement, yet it is impossible to have a level-headed debate as to how to lower the crime rate, poor education, drop-out rate, college being too expensive and all the other problems plaguing black americans.
It's like trying to show Greens that wind power is pretty much the worst possible choice for Scandinavia.
Ha, this is super-funny: I do think that US (English-language) academese is quite different, for sure, relative to their Continental European peers. As a historian, I do raise the issue of discipline-specific jargons, but some fields are so thoroughly 'Americanised' (medicine and the life sciences for sure, yet it looks quite different in the 'hard' sciences such as physics and the like), but it's quite tricky to use such blanket statements in the humanities and some of the social sciences.
My experience is that English-language publications are more refined in terms of style and presentation of the argument, but thy are typically (much) less so in terms of empirical foundations. This may be a particularly strong discipline-related issue, but in terms of writing style ('academic prose'), the English language may appear more versatile for the simple reason that, e.g., in everyday use English-speakers use up to 3X as many words as the average German-speaker.
That said, and while I personally consider 'Postmodernism' somewhere between a fraud and a vacuous pseudo-intellectual enterprise (which, by the way, doesn't discount the fact that some of its ideas have merit and are actually useful, methodically speaking), it's main impact on writing style may actually be the fact that while the humanities and social sciences have embraced it lock, stock, and barrel, the 'other' fields haven't (and if you ever read a bunch of papers by economists, doctors, or microbiologists, you'd probably wish that they, too, would take some writing classes or read more fictional literature…)
I'm inclined to think the document is fake, but - whatever. I don't think it particularly matters. What is obvious is that, when it comes to Europe, the US only cares about weakening Russia. If this leads to a collapse of the German (and by extension, EU) economy, that will be just fine with the Americans. It's also clear that the German leadership (and that of most of the EU) is playing along. What I don't quite get is *why* they're playing along. It's obviously self-destructive. Is it that the Americans can blackmail Europe in a way that makes economic suicide look like the least bad option? Or are EUrocrats so stupid/ideological that they just play along of their own accord, no blackmail needed?
I'm unsure if it's fake or not, but the consequences will be real enough--they are real enough already--and the US aim is also to keep down any European independence.
I may only guess as to whether Eurocrats are stupid/ideological or blackmailed (which is possible, think the Snowden revelations). It's probably both, but there's no denying that the current crop of politicians is quite close to the bottom of the intellectual barrel.
This is so badly written that I call it a forgery. It so desperately tries to make its points from the US narrow interest, but our reality is that US is not the Empire, but just another vassal, though a more important one than Germany. The true decision making is on supra national level where I detect an intent not only to diminish Germany and Europe, but the West in general. The US itself will not fare well in the plans of the Western Imperial Oligarchy.
I don't know, but given the facts on the ground, how they played out (and how M. Hudson called this one early on), and the already-existing consequences, the rational behind the document could be true.
Also, note that me saying this doesn't discount the conclusion you drew about "the West" being in the crosshairs.
I have the utmost respect for Michael Hudson, but I believe he is in error in thinking that this is solely an American decision, stemming from the narrow “American” business interests. There is no more “American” business; most everything is owned by 3-4 investment companies, whose owners are only nominally American; most are not. These people do not care about the US, the country or the people. Just take a good look at how American people are actually treated. Take a look at the decades long lack of essential infrastructure investment in the US. The American capital has separated itself from the US to a degree that it cannot be called American and retain its historical meaning.
The British Empire has succeeded into folding back its American colonies. What we see as an American Empire is in reality the continuation of the British Empire, the empire of usurers. They are equal opportunity plunderers. They are destroying the whole West. Germany will suffer disproportionately only because it is still a very productive economy, still making stuff. East India Company’s mentality doesn’t believe in making things. It believes in selling opium from India to addicts in China, it believes in slave economy, and it believes in extracting wealth of other countries.
The US became the most powerful economy because of the American System which was diametrically opposed to British Empire’s way of doing business. Friedrich List took the ideas behind American System to Germany. All other countries which rose significantly in economic development followed the same path - Japan, South Korea, China. What has happened to the US since the British System took over? Total devastation of productive economy and they aren’t done. Malthusianism has an absolute aversion to human betterment. The criminals who talk freely about other human beings as useless eaters are destroying Germany, Europe, North America, and the rest.
And that is just a very short list! There is so much more. 87,000 new IRS agents, Nord stream(?). He could save the world if he would unleash America’s energy sector
So those guys 3 yrs later suggests to take down Germany... but why? If the war stops, if Putin goes back? Because if not US does Bingo! not with Germany but with all EU...
But in the same time what will happen internationally US included in financial markets? They'll implode, inflation will go up to 20%? For how long?
Pretty strange they first do a study that disrupt Russia - EU energy and economic ties, then another one to disrupt Germany's grow... mmmh not sure how they are related.
It would have been different if both studies were done together, so going to disrupt Russia EU ties you also take down Germany and EU economies. I would have believe it real then, just because it's happening txs to USA/NATO war and fucking bloody ridiculous economic Sanctions to Russia (that are in the Rand study linked btw...)
But one thing is sure for me, this is not Russian psyop propaganda, there is no point no interest for Russia to publish that as long as war and sanctions keep doing their bloody US job.
Finally I want to end with a clear file stored in my memory (natural one): March '22, Amerikans and others making jokes of Italians and French complaining about Sanctions to Russia for fashion and jewel businesses...
Amerikans always play double games, the good cop and bad cop, they assure you they're on your side when they already set up with your enemy, they claim bloody muslim terrorist while the finance ISIS against Syrians, and so on and on and on.... They are the real Criminals of the 20th and 21st century!
This is not a genuine Rand paper. It's sloppily written (who says "economy growth rate?"). "Resources" magically move both FROM and TO the US at the same time? What specific "resources?" No details, evidence or citations are included, just lots of lazy hand waving with several syntax problems throughout. What about the second or third order effects, like how a German recession/depression drags America DOWN, not up, and a hungry disenfranchised Germany is a threat to the rest of the EU. I used to read Rand's econ papers, which were well written, thorough and professional. I could have written this tripe in high school.
The "paper" ignores that this is SELF-inflicted misery, not caused by America. Germany could simply keep her nuke plants ON! Trump warned of this exact thing several times including at the UN when the German delegation laughed in his face. You think Biden wants to prove Trump right and make a mockery of his own green agenda? Further, do you seriously believe a miserable Germany is good for America, given how that's gone in the past? Let's be honest. Covid showed us that the rest of the world STILL waits for the Yanks to come to their rescue. The Yanks are tired of it, we have our own problems.
The truth is, this energy quagmire is reversible right now, but your economic minister is just like his public health counterpart, unqualified and stuck on stupid. I want to see the green agenda fail, I hope this abject lesson in reality is learned by all very soon so the left can stop trying to destroy civilization.
And Fackel, you need to accept that the left specializes in genocides and human rights atrocities, not the right. You're about to see it happen again, I fear.
Wasn't the whole purpose of NATO "to keep Germany down and Russia out"? I remember reading early on some time in February that the whole point of the war was not to let Nordstream 2 to happen and not let Russia-Germany economic ties to grow, because such an alliance (Germany's technology plus Russia's resources) would be an unstoppable force while making US/UK a small regional power. Some say even WWII was all about that same goal and was a huge success story for the US, while a tragedy for the whole European continent. There was literally no way to reject cheap and reliable Nordstream 2 in favor of expensive US energy unless some major shock. Ironically, the pipeline was cancelled before the "Putin aggression". To be honest, while I suspected something like what is described in this document, I am actually out of words. It's like reading about a cynically calculated murder planned in cold blood. Surprised by the nonchalance of some commenters, presumably those in the US who stand to benefit from this policy. Why not have the enrichment of the US continue WWII-style at the expense of the European continent, let alone Ukrainian and Russian lives, all while blaming it on "Putin aggression"? If some behavior is rewarded, it is only destined to continue, and the US/UK always only benefitted from all the destruction it brought on other countries.
The US emasculated the EU with the Iraq war... With the UK's help. Look at a map of the middle East. The US defeat of Iraq and hobbling of Syria drew a line connecting Israel to Kuwait with US accessed territory. Thereby blocking the EU's land-access to Saudi and Iraqi oil fields.
Turkey's play to join the EU became moot and is now dead. UK brexits, and Germany turns to Putin for energy.
It's over.. George W Bush, who the EU saw as a country-fool totally kicked the EU's collective ass. He and his oil-men administration (Cheney, Rumsfeld, et. al.) .
What we see today is the aftermath of that action.
The US fear of Europe as an economic competitor has waned. Now it's China, China, China. The US strategy here is to wait for China to collapse, ala Gorbachev's Soviet Union.
bei den deutschen grünen Faschisten wohl zu verstehen.
die deutschland vorsätzlich gegen die Wand fahren.
da muss halt ein anderer her, und da bietet sich der Ami an.
nicht der Russe, der ist ja immer der beste Freund gewesen.
der hat ja auch überhaupt kein Interesse daran dass europäische Nato Staaten in sich zusammen brechen.
wer kommt denn auf solche Gedanken?
genau so hirnspinstig wäre es zu glauben dass die Angela genau das erreicht hat was ihr guter Freund der Alexander ihr vorgegeben hatte, nämlich die Destabilisierung von Deutschland.
da ist der Ami schon ein viel besserer Kandidat.
der hat ja ein klares Interesse daran dass einer der größten Handelspartner und militärischer Verbündeter den Bach runter geht.....
Sorry to break it up to you, but not everything is about Germany. And not everything is a conspiracy. The poor choices Germany has done to destroy its energy sercurity during past decades have been done by Germans, not foreign countries, either due ideology or stupidity, or both.
Oh, no worries, I totally understand this.
Germany has had piss-poor leadership since (in my estimation) the mid-1970s, and a fair amount of blame is to be directed at them, no doubt about this.
I can also understand US policy here: Germany's a vassal that once was a competitor and might, due to EU integration and/or partnership with Russia and China, once more become a true competitor.
There's no way I'm going to 'blame' the USG for this course; it's natural as there are no 'friendships' or the like in int'l relations.
That said, I'm sitting in a European country that will also suffer come winter, hence I'm rather inclined to call this out.
Also, I'm not blaming the American people for this--one must distinguish between the gov't and the people--even if that's extremely hard to do (for not doing so opens the proverbial gates of hell in terms of hatred and blanket violence against an entire people).
amusing comment :)
remember Das Hungerjahr and Hans Joachim Morgenthau, a "German-American" jurist and political scientist?
I do, and another telling issue is that virtually everyone in academia, legacy media, and politics talks about WW1 as 1914-18, even though it's the first conflict in history that ends with the armistice, as opposed to the peace treaty.
Implications incl. the factoring-in of civilian casualties that resulted from the British blockade in winter 1918/19, which would qualify as 'war crime', eh?
But then the Good vs. Evil narrative which is the lynchpin to US (and british) supremacist exceptionalism collpases, so any and all facts must be memoryholed.
Exactly, as I just said in another reply to your post below.
I don’t think that a few photos and opinions are enough to verify something like this.
Not that I would put it past the party in power ( Democrats) to engineer something like this to stay in power...
BUT, how do you know that this document wasn’t forged by the Russians to divide the US from our Allies in Europe? We didn’t make your country dependent on Russia. You (as a country) did that yourselves despite Donald Trump warning you not to do it.
I’ve even seen a clip of your UN Reps giggling when Trump warned against the pipeline.
Mark, it's a fair point--I do acknowledge that I'm not in possession of said report, yet I'd point to the facts on the ground (80+ percent of civilian casualties since 2018 were on the 'breakaway republics' side of the line of contact'), a number of Russian claims that turned out to be correct, and the fact, e.g., that the US Congress initiated procedural works to pass a Ukrainian Lend-Lease Bill on 19 Jan. 2022, on which see here: https://www.congress.gov/bill/117th-congress/senate-bill/3522/all-info.
I do admit it's a possibility, but then again: Larry Johnson is quite someone with a lot of inside-the-USG experience; it was reported on that website by Thomas Röper two weeks ago (that's two mentions independent of each other), and the fact that it has been US policy for about a century to drive--and then keep--Berlin and Moscow apart (see George Friedman's 2015 [iirc] talk at youtube)--this all suggests plausibility.
Yes, Mr. Trump told the Germans--but you know how problematic Mr. Trump's tenure as president has been for the US establishment ('deep state').
Bottom line: I do think that the facts bear out the claims made in that document, and whether or not it's a forgery, the consequences of the energy shortfall will be somewhere in the ballpark outlined by the above report, which, truth be told, is totally spot-on with respect to the incompetence and zealotry of the German Greens: take, say, German Foreign Secretary Annalena Baerbock who lied about her academic track record, is super-hawkish, a Young Global Leader of the WEF, and sits in on the Leo Baeck Foundation, on of Germany's foremost hardcore ultra-nationalist Israeli lobbying groups, among other things.
Hence, if that above-cited report is forged, there's so much accuracy in there that one would have to take it seriously 'even if' its proximate origins would be Russian.
The more that I look at this, the more I think it’s a fraud.
I thought that I recognized Larry Johnson’s name (not in a good way) so I looked him up..... and remembered why. I don’t think that he is a credible source of anything.
When it comes to Germany’s energy needs....... didn’t even Ronald Reagan even warn against Germany becoming dependent on Russia?
Lastly, just because our ‘deep state’ hates Trump doesn’t make him wrong...... maybe the German government should have listened to Trump ...... and not our deep state. German energy policies are an astounding failure, and the Democrats are trying to bring the same policies here...... f-ing morons
Oh, I wouldn't think hating Trump makes his statements less true.
Don't get me wrong, I do think Trump was a lot of things, but he certainly wasn't the moron the 'liberal media' and 'Democrats' make him to be.
When one cannot attack the message, one attacks the messenger. It's absolutely infuriating what this document says, but, unfortunately, the fact that most, if not all, high-level politicians were itching for a war with Russia and tried to do anything to disrupt Germany-Russia economic ties (including DJ Trump) is something that was obvious from even the most mainstream media.
Trump was trying to warn Germany to not become dependent on Russia. Germany is supposed to be an ally of the US and a member of NATO.... not a Russian vassal state.
Of course the US doesn’t want a real German-Russian relationship (for lack of a better word).
It was such a blessing last time....
Yes, last time when US tried to prevent this alliance, it was really a "blessing" for both Russia and Germany with millions of people dead and complete devastation, but a true windfall blessing for the US which has built its wealth on death and blood. Why not repeat it again, who cares millions of people in Europe will die again, as long as US is thriving... There could be peace and prosperity in Europe now, but US just cannot let it happen. US is such a great ally for both Germany and Ukraine...
Nothing like revisionist history. Are you really trying to tell me that the US had ANYTHING to do with the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact ?
And the only reason that there IS peace and prosperity in Europe is because of the US.
Remember the two World Wars ?
Neither of which was started by the USA.....
And yeah, to a certain extent, we do watch Germany’s foreign policy.....After the events of the 20th century I think we have a right to be on guard.
I am not one of those people who thinks that Germany started the first war, but they sure as hell started the second one and the US paying attention is not a bad thing.
How is it better to make Germany dependent on the US? It was doing quite well using cheap Russian energy...
Sorry, but no one should take this as real absent a lot of evidence, and a bunch of people seeing it on each other's blogs doesn’t qualify as evidence.
Since 2nd Smartest Guy in the World deduces that “[t]he main author of this report was most likely a Brit given the writing style and use of certain words,” I’ll note that even a quick perusal reveals several grammatical errors, leading me to deduce its original author is a citizen of the nation of Lazy Fakers.
Michael Hudson’s perspective has value, I believe. It does him no favors to name him in the context of something like this.
Also, the spelling etc. is indicative of non-native speakers writing, or someone writing in a hurry.
Also, it's not easy to guess if it's authentic or not, but it certainly could be (see my other comment below). As to its authenticity, it could be fake, sure, but I think that the consequences outlined are not only plausible, but they are quite upon us in terms of economic dislocation, hence I'm unsure it matters at this point (other than to, say, historians like me).
That said, I'd also be able to offer a 'speculation' (I hate to call it 'theory' in terms of Occam's Razor): grade inflation, particularly problematic in high-profile places (e.g. Oxford, Cambridge, the Ivies, etc.), also render it possible that someone whose mother tongue isn't English got a good (enough) degree, went to work for RAND or someone else who then pushed the document up the food chain with no-one really bothering to proof-read it…and there you go.
It is quite true these days that something being amateurish and not-proofread is no indication that it was not actually produced in a professional setting. I will definitely grant you that one!
And if this document turned out to be genuine, it would still be far from the strangest thing I’ve encountered over the last three years.
That said, I don’t understand why, after having failed to authenticate it in other ways, you opted to consider a photograph of a document anyone could easily have composed and printed out at home (in fact, could have done so in 1992, technology-wise) as sufficient.
I assure you that whether something is fake still “matters at this point” to some of us. I learn a lot at Die Fackel 2.0, and will keep coming back, but please keep in mind that credibility is a precious commodity, and getting more so.
Ha, I noticed I didn't address your Hudson-related comment.
I meant to say: it's almost irrelevant if the doc is fake or not, for the piece merely lays out what Hudson and others have been saying for quite some time now. I didn't meant to drag his good name into any kind of questionable association. I also value his insights a lot, hence I mentioned his piece--as it quite clearly shows the results of the past couple of months to be almost identical to what he predicted back in February.
As to your last paragr., please see the below comment re YYR's posting.
Oh stop. You don't care if it's authentic because it fits your narrative. This is not a real paper, typos aside, it lacks substance and self-contradicts too much. Rand has editors, they would have cleaned it up prior to publication. Someone wrote this USING the current conditions to cause readers to blame others for what Germany is doing to itself.
Basically, you're right, and while I do claim to be 'different' in this regard (I consider myself an issues person), the funny thing is: what would my narrative be?
It does matter if it's fake or not--for if it's a fraudulent we'd learn that most of what the West has been doing in Ukraine is actually due to stupidity, even though real stuff such as the Hunter Biden laptop, the Neocon's role since the 2014 Maidan coup (which is what I consider the régime change), and the bioweapons labs are due to so many different agencies and actors that it becomes extremely hard to ascribe any kind of planning or agency to the actions of the US and its 'partners'.
If the doc is no fake, though, we'd get a glimpse at 'intent', and while I'm way too much of a realist to claim that this behaviour, as much as I personally object to it, is kinda like, you know, 'normal' in international relations. That said, it would also be a quite obvious--and accurate--reflection of the current state of power-relations between, say, the US and its vassals in Europe, in particular Germany and France. Why these two? Well, it's obvious that US global power, apart from its military-technological foundations, since 1945 rested on the twin pillars of its conquered WW2 adversaries, Germany and Japan. So, the threat to US hegemony that a fully sovereign Germany (and Europe) represents cannot be discounted.
Given that past behaviour (think about the timid reaction to the Snowden revelations) is a quite apt indicator of future actions, in particular when it comes to large, complex institutions such as the US (or any other) gov't, and given that Thomas Röper and Larry C. Johnson have been quite correct in their past assessments of the current quagmire in Ukraine, I'm inclined to believe they are onto something here, hence my re-posting.
As an aside, I don't discount your last sentence: it may very well be the case, but I'm asking myself--who would do it?
*RAND or someone in the USG wouldn't stand to gain anything other than a super-pissed off Germany that might actually turn towards Russia (and China).
* Someone in Russia? Sure, could be, for the current quagmire presents the Kremlin with an opportunity to divide 'Europe' and the US (which is, after all, virtually half of the lynchpin of US global power), but then again, Russia appears to be fine by herself and the continuation of the conflict also presents a chance to weaken NATO by draining its resources and possibly splitting it--why stop?
* Someone in China? Sure, could be, but keep in mind that China and the US are so entwined economically that it would not make much sense (it might make sense if China is looking at 'Europe' to replace the US in this dual node, but why would they do that via Ukraine?)
Also, there's plenty of people in politics who day in, day out decry the utter dependency on the US, and while they don't get much legacy media attention, their argumentation runs very differently.
So, bottom line here: lots of unknowns, but the document still could be authentic, even though if that's the case it would be a blunder of epic proportions given its implications.
Question for you, YYR, though: what kind of narrative am I favouring?
Ok, I see one of the errors I caught is not in the photographed alleged original, only in the texts copied into the blog posts at 2nd Smartest Guy and here.
But another thing I now see: the actual RAND style, as in “Extending Russia,” is to leave the first paragraph following a heading unindented. The thing photographed by 2nd Smartest Guy indents all paragraphs.
There are other typographical differences as well, even as the faker is clearly trying to imitate the RAND style.
By the way, if anyone wants to see what an actual sinister RAND Corporation report relevant to the current Ukraine nightmare looks like, they can check out “Extending Russia: Competing from Advantageous Ground,” published in 2019.
Exactly, which is also linked in one of my more recent postings, I believe in one of the two "Econ Depression Watch" pieces.
I must confess that I noticed the typos etc., but given the facts on the ground, in particular the things mentioned above in other comments as well as the fact that reasonable people such as M. Hudson, Y. Smith, and many others have all pointed to these shenanigans *without* knowing of (I suppose) of the above document--I think that it's not really relevant whether or not it's authentic or a Russian fake.
The consequences are bearing this out, and if its a genuine RAND piece, I'd say it's either incredibly stupid to write it (everything comes out, eventually) or borne out by sheer malice. That said, however, the US gov't is certainly factoring in the timid, if not outright pathetic, reaction the Snowden revelations have caused: there are, sadly, no consequences to these actions, and as long as there won't be any, the US will continue.
Please excuse me for not acknowledging that you also cited “Extending Russia.” I quite likely saw it here, but didn’t remember.
No worries!
There is always a very simple test - see who benefits from it, and you will see the most likely culprit.
I think so too, and in this case, it's obvious: the US, but it wouldn't mean that others aren't in it, too.
I don't like the second smartest Guy, I don't even think he is all that smart at all, a political hack in my view.
Off the top its wrong to think nuclear is cheap, with a few choice words to a search engine revealed this news: https://www.pveurope.eu/markets/energy-policy-fairy-tale-cheap-french-nuclear-power
No doubt Washington has been militarized for a very long time, its what props up this false economy - the requisition of other nation's markets & resources. The USA even imported Nazi Germany's knowledge with Operate Paperclip.
Is just the way hierarchy rolls doesn't matter what nation. In the beginning its take others stuff, in the end it costs too much to police it all and then it collapses. Its the USA that is collapsing, our exalted leaders are continuing with ever more desperate moves, some work for a time, its all about time, time is shortening, all the other national collapses are just walks in the park.
Germany has collapsed several times in a century, they have an essence for collapse, the USA will go into shock. All in my lonely view, of course.
Or maybe, the Nazi ideology has strengthened under many guises, one having taken root in the USA, a nutso article:: https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/specter-germany-rising
Not surprising the crimes a hierarchy will commit to keep the lights on.
I think all the various hierarchies are collapsing with the varying outcomes quite interesting to learn. Of course, all those dependent on a hierarchal arrangement will be called on to serve, and it will use them up.
Start a garden now and begin the process of not being reliant on a hierarchy. Hahahaha!
Funny that you should mention it--it's perhaps not really 'Nazi ideology', as parts of it are certainly quite 'generic', or common, to Western-style 'Modernity' (think: eugenics, progress, the emphasis on materialism, etc.), and, yes, 'Paperclip' certainly contributed to the spreading of a certain kind of 'idea' about the state and society--but I'd also argue that 'Big Gov't' and a thoroughly revamped relationship between the state, society, and the individual took root everywhere in Western (e.g., New Deal, Fascism) and Westernised (USSR) countries as the above-related emphasis shifted from bourgeois liberalism towards an 'active' and super-interventionist state across the 1920s and 1930s. The gov't's heavy and very much visible hand was never withdrawn after WW2, hence…'Postmodernity' is actually useful as periodisation tool.
Start at minute mark 6:18. I don't have any optimism for the near future and looks more like nothing to offer intellectually other than the advice of start a garden now: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mUYrsA4sJeE
Prepare yourself.
I‘m no going to argue with you, Rick, and it's one of the key reasons we moved to the countryside…
Yeah, well, I like to keep the explanations simple. Us peasants mostly just want to know who we can stick the hay fork into.
Minute mark 9, how those dependent on this imaginary hierarchy are the first to step up and sacrifice themselves, but I don't entirely buy this premise, all shareholder/investors in this current arrangement will volunteer too. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=djZXhSea6Yo
Agree about 2SG. He likes to stir the pot so much that while he calls everyone else a troll, I think he's the actual troll trying to get a circular firing squad going. This article convinced me if one thing - to cancel my 2SG subscription!
It's a shame that the veracity cannot be proven, really, because the document looks very much like that kind of policy-analyses, with one exception (and that exception is just my personal instinctive reaction):
It's supposedly american, right? Even for a policy/analysis brief, it is much to short. American documents of that kind are always dradfully verbose, repeating the same talking points three to five times (same as their academic writing really - just look at Haidt's book about postmodernism [where he by the way erroneously connects it to Nietzsche, instead of the ideas of the french and american revolutions which is the real root where every point is hammered several times, inflating it from a pamphlet to a novel]).
It's simply too brief to be american, is my reaction. It is however laconic in its tone which to me points to either slavic parts of Europe or Northern Europe.
Weird, using the RAND Corporation's homepage questionnaire for "other questions", I get a 502 when trying to send my question about this to them.
But that weakening Germany or other competitors from Europe, using Britain as a lap-attack-dog, is is old news. Why our leaders andmedia play along, well, look at what businesses have bought them long ago. Same tactic Putin and the KGB started using in the early 1990s. Buy foreign politicians by giving them sinecures as board members, trustees, honorary doctorates, and so on.
One guess as to why the US is so keen on spreading their lie of "all men created equal" - capitalism has no love for patriotism, etnos or nation anymore than communism does.
I agree with the critique--but keep in mind: the linked 2nd Smartest Guy's Substack notes that this is the executive summary, i.e., not the entire document.
It's also noted that there are certain British English terms and spelling, i.e., it's quite certain this was written by someone with (at least) some experiences in the British contexts. I would also think that it's possible that someone who trained in Britain who's now working with RAND, it can be an 'outsourced' piece of prose, or something that was picked up courtesy of the Johnson gov't or the British 'deep state'.
One last thing: re your last paragraph--I think it's important to differentiate between "the people" and the US gov't, for otherwise collective punishment will become the only option (and that I'd object to).
Missed that about it being a summary. Now I want to dfind the whole thing.
The american people in my experience believe fervently in the quoted phrase. To them it is right and just since they are all americans no matter what ethnicitiy their forefathers once had: witness their confusion re: race/kultur, people (or volk) and so on.
Americans are citizens of the USA, not a people the way europeans are. They always forget the difference, leading to them thinking us racists for not wanting to become multicultural (and having infected our intellectual classes with that thought ince the 1960s) - and we also always forget the difference from our horizon, thinking the way they use "race" smacks of eugenics, nazism and so on, and not understanding what the fuss about the varied pigmentation of their fellow americans is about.
Or that's my sense of it, anyway. Which is also why yes, I do blame them for that idea, since they as a collective perpetuate it, just as I blame the majority of my fellow swedes for having adopted it, leaing to such ridiculous notions as them thinking "swedish" means "in possession of swedish citizenship".
I see the point you're making about the people vs. citizen differentiation.
You know, the post-1945 (at Nuremberg) differentiation was also possible because of the hypothesis that democracies such as the US and the UK, as well as the 'people's' garden variety espoused by the USSR, were qualitatively and esp. morally superior to 'fascism' (I'm using scare quotes here to indicate that this is a value-judgement).
So, to use this kind of argumentation, the German people were 'seduced' by a ruthless dictator, which kinda makes it easy--or hard, as seen from the other side--to equally blame both 'the German people' and 'the German leaders'.
All I'm saying is that it's a bit harder not to factor into any such statements the distinction between the US gov't and the American population (talk about chicken coming home to roost), for…
IF Putin = Hitler, then the distinction should--nay: must--be made, which would preclude the collective punishment of Russia, that is, IF whatever (fake) historical analogies are used aren't just that: propaganda. (In that case, I suspect that the cognitive dissonance among Americans will just get greater until they suffer from a kind of collective schizophrenic breakdown.)
IF the US gov't = democratic (whatever that means), then the American population *must* face collective punishment for the deeds the USG is doing in their name. There's really no other way for there's no way to make that kind of agit-prop omelette without breaking these precious eggs, so to speak.
(The third option, for purely scholarly reasons, would of course be to acknowledge that the Nazi régime was, you know, kinda legitimate and rational, i.e., not the utter and complete evil that esp. US propaganda portrays it to have been, and I'm pretty sure that this is a worthwhile discussion that noone wishes to have…)
Nope, "we" want the operatic, monocle-sporting, Mensur-Schmiss faced, stereotypical nazi, speaking in broken english about how "Ve haff veys off making you talk".
Don't know how much you look at pop-culture, but the fetischism for all things "nazi" as the ultimate evil in US comics both syndicated, published and online tops the actual nazis themselves. It is in itself worthy of a proper postmodern study of how an old enemy is turned into a mythological boogeyman by the grandchildren of those who actually fought it.
One may also note how important it is for US liberals and conservatives alike to keep labelling any and all measures they dislike as fascist, socialist and nazi (all the while conviently forgetting any and all similarities...).
2nd Smartest Guy is a terrible judge of credibility. He's got his own, probably nefarious, agenda.
British authorship does not sufficiently explain away the poor quality of the summary.
Per RAND corp website, many of their staff are multi-lingual, and speak 75 languages. So who knows who was writing it...
Sorry. The opposite is exactly true - Americans are the ones that tend to put things in a much more concise and simplistic manner, and Russian round-about way of expressing things was always ridiculed by Western consultants in Russia. In reality, there is simply no way to tell the authenticity of the document by the "style" alone. However, it is very much in line with many other pieces on US political strategy, plus it's quite obvious that it's the US/UK camp that is dead set on prolonging the war while "sanctioning" Russia in such a way that it mostly hurts Europe, exactly in line with what this document says. We literally have Western politicians following the policy outlined, to the point of trying to destroy the nuclear plant in Ukraine (unless they are ALL bought by Kremlin which would mean they are traitors and need to be overthrown????)
We have differen experiences then, obviously. I find american academic writing borderline french in needless verbosity and repetition, as if the writer is paid by the pagecount.
Thought: could it be an affect of different disciplines, and different needs for different forms of political correctness?
If you look at the writings of Fukuyama f.e. where he compares nations, he is very careful to avoid anything even tangentially related to that different cultures are differently abled, to borrow a phrase.
Wheras older german or british or swedish writings on the same topic would make no beans about different races (we would say cultures and/or ethnicities instead) make no two beans about different outcomes from similar situations are often if not exclusively due to racial differences.
I mean, it is borderline impossible to get americans to acknowledge that desegregation lead to a sharp rise in crimes committed by blacks against whites but even moreso against other black americans. That it happened and was due to desegregation is a fact, not a normative statement, yet it is impossible to have a level-headed debate as to how to lower the crime rate, poor education, drop-out rate, college being too expensive and all the other problems plaguing black americans.
It's like trying to show Greens that wind power is pretty much the worst possible choice for Scandinavia.
Ha, this is super-funny: I do think that US (English-language) academese is quite different, for sure, relative to their Continental European peers. As a historian, I do raise the issue of discipline-specific jargons, but some fields are so thoroughly 'Americanised' (medicine and the life sciences for sure, yet it looks quite different in the 'hard' sciences such as physics and the like), but it's quite tricky to use such blanket statements in the humanities and some of the social sciences.
My experience is that English-language publications are more refined in terms of style and presentation of the argument, but thy are typically (much) less so in terms of empirical foundations. This may be a particularly strong discipline-related issue, but in terms of writing style ('academic prose'), the English language may appear more versatile for the simple reason that, e.g., in everyday use English-speakers use up to 3X as many words as the average German-speaker.
That said, and while I personally consider 'Postmodernism' somewhere between a fraud and a vacuous pseudo-intellectual enterprise (which, by the way, doesn't discount the fact that some of its ideas have merit and are actually useful, methodically speaking), it's main impact on writing style may actually be the fact that while the humanities and social sciences have embraced it lock, stock, and barrel, the 'other' fields haven't (and if you ever read a bunch of papers by economists, doctors, or microbiologists, you'd probably wish that they, too, would take some writing classes or read more fictional literature…)
As to
I'm inclined to think the document is fake, but - whatever. I don't think it particularly matters. What is obvious is that, when it comes to Europe, the US only cares about weakening Russia. If this leads to a collapse of the German (and by extension, EU) economy, that will be just fine with the Americans. It's also clear that the German leadership (and that of most of the EU) is playing along. What I don't quite get is *why* they're playing along. It's obviously self-destructive. Is it that the Americans can blackmail Europe in a way that makes economic suicide look like the least bad option? Or are EUrocrats so stupid/ideological that they just play along of their own accord, no blackmail needed?
I'm unsure if it's fake or not, but the consequences will be real enough--they are real enough already--and the US aim is also to keep down any European independence.
I may only guess as to whether Eurocrats are stupid/ideological or blackmailed (which is possible, think the Snowden revelations). It's probably both, but there's no denying that the current crop of politicians is quite close to the bottom of the intellectual barrel.
This is so badly written that I call it a forgery. It so desperately tries to make its points from the US narrow interest, but our reality is that US is not the Empire, but just another vassal, though a more important one than Germany. The true decision making is on supra national level where I detect an intent not only to diminish Germany and Europe, but the West in general. The US itself will not fare well in the plans of the Western Imperial Oligarchy.
I don't know, but given the facts on the ground, how they played out (and how M. Hudson called this one early on), and the already-existing consequences, the rational behind the document could be true.
Also, note that me saying this doesn't discount the conclusion you drew about "the West" being in the crosshairs.
I have the utmost respect for Michael Hudson, but I believe he is in error in thinking that this is solely an American decision, stemming from the narrow “American” business interests. There is no more “American” business; most everything is owned by 3-4 investment companies, whose owners are only nominally American; most are not. These people do not care about the US, the country or the people. Just take a good look at how American people are actually treated. Take a look at the decades long lack of essential infrastructure investment in the US. The American capital has separated itself from the US to a degree that it cannot be called American and retain its historical meaning.
The British Empire has succeeded into folding back its American colonies. What we see as an American Empire is in reality the continuation of the British Empire, the empire of usurers. They are equal opportunity plunderers. They are destroying the whole West. Germany will suffer disproportionately only because it is still a very productive economy, still making stuff. East India Company’s mentality doesn’t believe in making things. It believes in selling opium from India to addicts in China, it believes in slave economy, and it believes in extracting wealth of other countries.
The US became the most powerful economy because of the American System which was diametrically opposed to British Empire’s way of doing business. Friedrich List took the ideas behind American System to Germany. All other countries which rose significantly in economic development followed the same path - Japan, South Korea, China. What has happened to the US since the British System took over? Total devastation of productive economy and they aren’t done. Malthusianism has an absolute aversion to human betterment. The criminals who talk freely about other human beings as useless eaters are destroying Germany, Europe, North America, and the rest.
https://m.washingtontimes.com/news/2022/sep/1/joe-biden-must-pay-for-the-lies-death-war-and-mise/
And that is just a very short list! There is so much more. 87,000 new IRS agents, Nord stream(?). He could save the world if he would unleash America’s energy sector
Rand guys are the same one that suggested in 2019 step by step how to provoke the war to disrupt Russia economy and east europe borders.
https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR3063.html
So those guys 3 yrs later suggests to take down Germany... but why? If the war stops, if Putin goes back? Because if not US does Bingo! not with Germany but with all EU...
But in the same time what will happen internationally US included in financial markets? They'll implode, inflation will go up to 20%? For how long?
Pretty strange they first do a study that disrupt Russia - EU energy and economic ties, then another one to disrupt Germany's grow... mmmh not sure how they are related.
It would have been different if both studies were done together, so going to disrupt Russia EU ties you also take down Germany and EU economies. I would have believe it real then, just because it's happening txs to USA/NATO war and fucking bloody ridiculous economic Sanctions to Russia (that are in the Rand study linked btw...)
But one thing is sure for me, this is not Russian psyop propaganda, there is no point no interest for Russia to publish that as long as war and sanctions keep doing their bloody US job.
Finally I want to end with a clear file stored in my memory (natural one): March '22, Amerikans and others making jokes of Italians and French complaining about Sanctions to Russia for fashion and jewel businesses...
Amerikans always play double games, the good cop and bad cop, they assure you they're on your side when they already set up with your enemy, they claim bloody muslim terrorist while the finance ISIS against Syrians, and so on and on and on.... They are the real Criminals of the 20th and 21st century!
This is not a genuine Rand paper. It's sloppily written (who says "economy growth rate?"). "Resources" magically move both FROM and TO the US at the same time? What specific "resources?" No details, evidence or citations are included, just lots of lazy hand waving with several syntax problems throughout. What about the second or third order effects, like how a German recession/depression drags America DOWN, not up, and a hungry disenfranchised Germany is a threat to the rest of the EU. I used to read Rand's econ papers, which were well written, thorough and professional. I could have written this tripe in high school.
The "paper" ignores that this is SELF-inflicted misery, not caused by America. Germany could simply keep her nuke plants ON! Trump warned of this exact thing several times including at the UN when the German delegation laughed in his face. You think Biden wants to prove Trump right and make a mockery of his own green agenda? Further, do you seriously believe a miserable Germany is good for America, given how that's gone in the past? Let's be honest. Covid showed us that the rest of the world STILL waits for the Yanks to come to their rescue. The Yanks are tired of it, we have our own problems.
The truth is, this energy quagmire is reversible right now, but your economic minister is just like his public health counterpart, unqualified and stuck on stupid. I want to see the green agenda fail, I hope this abject lesson in reality is learned by all very soon so the left can stop trying to destroy civilization.
And Fackel, you need to accept that the left specializes in genocides and human rights atrocities, not the right. You're about to see it happen again, I fear.
Wasn't the whole purpose of NATO "to keep Germany down and Russia out"? I remember reading early on some time in February that the whole point of the war was not to let Nordstream 2 to happen and not let Russia-Germany economic ties to grow, because such an alliance (Germany's technology plus Russia's resources) would be an unstoppable force while making US/UK a small regional power. Some say even WWII was all about that same goal and was a huge success story for the US, while a tragedy for the whole European continent. There was literally no way to reject cheap and reliable Nordstream 2 in favor of expensive US energy unless some major shock. Ironically, the pipeline was cancelled before the "Putin aggression". To be honest, while I suspected something like what is described in this document, I am actually out of words. It's like reading about a cynically calculated murder planned in cold blood. Surprised by the nonchalance of some commenters, presumably those in the US who stand to benefit from this policy. Why not have the enrichment of the US continue WWII-style at the expense of the European continent, let alone Ukrainian and Russian lives, all while blaming it on "Putin aggression"? If some behavior is rewarded, it is only destined to continue, and the US/UK always only benefitted from all the destruction it brought on other countries.
The US emasculated the EU with the Iraq war... With the UK's help. Look at a map of the middle East. The US defeat of Iraq and hobbling of Syria drew a line connecting Israel to Kuwait with US accessed territory. Thereby blocking the EU's land-access to Saudi and Iraqi oil fields.
Turkey's play to join the EU became moot and is now dead. UK brexits, and Germany turns to Putin for energy.
It's over.. George W Bush, who the EU saw as a country-fool totally kicked the EU's collective ass. He and his oil-men administration (Cheney, Rumsfeld, et. al.) .
What we see today is the aftermath of that action.
The US fear of Europe as an economic competitor has waned. Now it's China, China, China. The US strategy here is to wait for China to collapse, ala Gorbachev's Soviet Union.
bloss die Schuld nicht suchen bei den Faschisten.
bei den deutschen grünen Faschisten wohl zu verstehen.
die deutschland vorsätzlich gegen die Wand fahren.
da muss halt ein anderer her, und da bietet sich der Ami an.
nicht der Russe, der ist ja immer der beste Freund gewesen.
der hat ja auch überhaupt kein Interesse daran dass europäische Nato Staaten in sich zusammen brechen.
wer kommt denn auf solche Gedanken?
genau so hirnspinstig wäre es zu glauben dass die Angela genau das erreicht hat was ihr guter Freund der Alexander ihr vorgegeben hatte, nämlich die Destabilisierung von Deutschland.
da ist der Ami schon ein viel besserer Kandidat.
der hat ja ein klares Interesse daran dass einer der größten Handelspartner und militärischer Verbündeter den Bach runter geht.....