The Picture Says it All. Dmitry Medvedev, Deputy Chairman of the Security Council of the Russian Federation, spoke about Russia's approach to the formation of a new world order at the Znanie.First marathon of the Russian Znanie Society that was held at the World Youth Festival in Sochi earlier this year which I covered in
I noticed right at the end of the Medvedev presentation a clear warning to the Baltic trio- the three states run by fascist emigres- involved in the racist persecution of Russian speaking people, on which the Donbas persecution post 2014 was modeled, states which also, in a manner closely related, celebrate Nazi military 'victories' including massacres of civilians.
Medvedev makes it clear that this has to change. It is to the eternal discredit of our own countries that our governments, and public opinion, do not second Medvedev's simple and civilised plea. Let them go to the beaches of Normandy and explain to the world how, eighty years after D-Day we march side by side with those celebrating the Waffen SS, the Concentration Camp Guards and the 'police' forces which carried out the genocide by bullets.
No wonder the Russians don't choose to attend this hollow parody of the opening of a Second Front.
"...History, of course, will put everything in its place. Sooner or later, the population of Europe will give a harsh assessment of its traitors, who sacrificed its well-being to their overseas masters. But it's not about the grades. The question is what other price Europe will have to pay for the fatal mistakes it has made. And how this will affect the fate of hundreds of millions of its inhabitants..."
This is the passage that first struck me. I have recently read GDH Cole's "Europe Russia and the Future" written in September 1941 in the early phase of Barbarossa.
Among much else Cole-a very influential historian and political actor whose work is still important and deserving of attention- takes the view that European capitalism is finished.
He identifies Europe, in a way that decades of propaganda has tended to obscure, as a place in which every ruling class on the continent had allied itself with Germany in the war against the Soviet Union.
And in which, by the same token, all resistance to those ruling classes came from and was led by working class militants who saw Nazism as the current political expression of capitalist rule.
The exception Cole noted was that of his own country-the UK- in which the government was still wedded, often despite the interests of the war effort and the nation, to the capitalist system.
And Cole recognised that for capitalism to survive after the defeat which it was going to suffer (saving a Nazi victory) in Europe it would be necessary for the United States, in which capitalism reigned supreme, to revive it.
This included his view that only by becoming a satellite of the United States could the capitalists in Britain survive and that this would mean that they would need to act as an agent of US capitalism in Europe.
Eighty years on his analysis, long discounted as NATO and the Marshall Plan, the isolation and de-clawing of European Communist Resistance movements (which dominated the political arena in the summer of 1945, when I first started paying attention to such matters) looks remarkably prescient.
Consider for example that, in allowing the Communists to be sidelined, in encouraging them to lay down their expensively acquired arms and step aside to allow those who they knew had been, months earlier supporters of Hitler's regimes, to come to power, posing as democrats and sponsored by the occupying armies, Stalin and his government were doing exactly what Putin, Medvedev et al did before February 2022- trusting and deferring to their 'valued colleagues' in the West.
The point is that, as Cole noted, the old polity of Europe died in the Second World War and it could only be replaced by an expanded Union of Soviet Republics- in which, as events since have shown to be the case- each nation would preserve and develop its national culture within the limits of a defensive geopolitical bloc. Or by something rebuilt and dominated by US Capitalist interests on the remnants of the Nazi economy- a process that would involve Britain and France becoming, as coadjutors in the Occupation, US satellites. The US price for their surrender being assistance in reconquering their empires in Asia.
Europe is now waking up to the fact that the US Occupation is coming to an end and that the institutional detritia of that occupation, the EU and NATO included, is losing its purpose.
NATO loses its purpose when European states are forced to come to terms with their Russian neighbour. The days when silly cadet statesmen/women from militarily and economically insignificant countries like the Baltic states, Rumania, (the list is as long as the Organisation's membership roll) can jump up and threaten the world with US nuclear weaponry, US armies and US bases is, mercifully, ending. The age of make believe in which the representatives all the sovereign powers met and decided after much discussion and full examination to follow their orders from Washington is ending as the black earth of Ukraine turns green again.
As to the EU, which had the single purpose of stamping out the last traces of the real compromises that "Social Europe" had made after the war, as the price paid for enrolling the support of the Social Democratic movements, Trade Unions and cooperative sectors behind the new 'democracies' with their mixed economies, a task which it fulfilled in Maastricht and Lisbon after half a century in which free schooling, free healthcare, generous pensions, short work weeks, long vacations and a wide spectrum of social benefits and individual rights had characterised the social contract.
Under the EU, in Germany, France, Italy etc austere regimes have almost totally eroded the gains- socialist inspired- made in the post war years. The final cost of agreeing to rescue by US capitalism has been the surrender of all interests to the US.
The Hegemon may be under pressure in West Asia- in Europe his interests reign supreme. And will continue to do so until, as is bound to happen soon, he withdraws to the extreme right of the stage.
And the catalyst has been the war in Ukraine, which is what Medvedev seems to me to be saying: Russia has no ill will towards Europe, it has no particular ambitions, economic or strategic. But it cannot and will not live with rabid enemies poised on its borders- nobody cares if Ukrainians want to indulge in Bandera cults or sacrifice small domestic animals on memorials to the sadists who ran Concentration Camps. Just do it quietly, Don't frighten the neighbours. Sibg the Horst Wessel song by all means, if you must, but don't teach people to hate slavs and dream of eradicating them, Jews, Gypsies or anyone else (immigrant refugees and Chinese being the obvious temptation for them).
And don't spend your mental energy and treasure on whoring arounbd the world looking for powerful nations to do your dirty work for you: no more alliances against Russia, China, Iran or anyone. We all want peace. and the leisure necessary to examine the problems facing us all- the real problems not the idiotic fantasies and fears of the people of declining aristocrats a hundred and fifty years ago.
Europeans will get their wake-up call when Russia closes out the SMO and does nothing more but turn to the task of refurbishing Great Russian lands and helping its people. That action by Russia will have vast repercussions for EU/NATO and their members.
Since 1945 none of these countries has been more than an autonomous region/province exercising powers in, an increasingly limited, set of domestic matters. In terms of international relations they have followed paths set for them by one or other of the Great Powers.
Their behaviour, internationally, has been crudely emotional rather than rational or diplomatic. The Ba.ltic states 'hate Russia' even though, in reality many are Russians and most have enjoyed normal and fraternal relations with Russians- perhaps that is why emigres, who really do hate Russians because they have been taught since birth to do so, are in such demand in politics- they have no problems performing the roles assigned to their nations by the US and the latest Reich.
In fact the Baltic states, when they recognise that there is not going to be regime change and surrender in Moscow and that they have to think in terms of long term normal relationships will find many more common interests, much more reason for close relationships and much more in common, culturally and historically with Russia than they have with any western european, let alone American state.
As to western europe those in power are third and fourth generation collaborators: their countries have been, more or less, occupied since 1940. This is evident from the way in which the 'moderate' collaborators, like Mitterand ('socialist ' has an unusual meaning in France) are replaced by those, such as LePen, even Macron, who openly honour the traitors of Vichy. There is Italy too where Mussolini's fans are back in charge and they are no longer pretending to be anticommunist christians.
And then, of course there is Britain of which the most optimistic view, which I share, is that 'the people of England haven't been heard from yet.'
I hope George Galloway can remain an MP for at least a decade as he has the courage to stand up to the Nazitories, or perhaps they should be called Royalists. AS for the Baltics, they're already atrophying and will become dead states by mid-century. Finland and the other Nordic states will also atrophy as their scant resource base empties. Without Germany as an industrial engine their future is as bleak as the Baltics. Then there're the Balkans, which are perhaps the best hope for Europe. Slovakia's seen the light; will the Czechs? The old fascist base of Italy and France are essentially agricultural nations that have enough resources to keep that part of their national life alive, but heavy industry requires energy to power it. Who will they sell their products to given their fealty to the Outlaw US Empire?
A decade ago, Diesen showed what would become of Europe if they cut their umbilical cord to Russia, and we're now seeing his predictions being fulfilled. The other little nations--Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, etc.--will also return to agriculture as they really have no choice without big energy inputs. Sure, they can all attack themselves financially via their own Neoliberal Parasites. As the Outlaw US Empire slowly becomes an Economic Black Hole, it will suck other smaller economies into it unless they see what's happening and escape first.
The "Expert" article is dated 15 April, so it's not b that's bringing it up now but Russian media. As I discovered at the time, only a synopsis of Medvedev's talk was available that when compared to the total transcript was missing some key info. The synopsis b provided was okay, but reading the whole IMO is required. And now it can. You'll also want to read Medvedev's Telegram note I posted at MoA as it's funny in his manner.
ON HUMAN ECONOMIC & POLITICALLY INTEGRATED ORGANIZATION & PEACEFUL BOUNDARIES
Thank you Dmitry Medvedev for trying to put boundaries in human terms.
Russia's centuries long quest, since Tsarist days to restore 'Community' (Latin 'com' = 'together' + 'munus' = 'gift-or-service') as the basis of humane organization has meant for the world, a small glimmer of hope in our 7000 years of Oligarch commanded & controlled 'exogenous' (L 'other-generated') colonial empires, since Babylon.
Originally 19th Century researchers like Petr Kropotkin, Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels turned to humanity's 'indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') fractal cultural systems or organization & boundaries based in economic collaboration which were worldwide. Kropotkin's Mutual-Aid on his decades among Russia's indigenous peoples & the Guild system, Marx & Engels through Lewis-Henry Morgan's 'Ancient-Society' on his decades among the Haudenosaunee of upper New-York state, Ontario & Quebec. A major hope of the community movement was to restore 'Economic' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') 'Democracy' in the collective Domestic (mostly women), Industrial & Commercial (mostly men Economies as the foundation of Political Democracy. Economic sovereignty implies shared-resource-management by many specialized communities, with all benefitting from the other's efficiencies in their specialty. Such complementary economy means that boundaries have contractual economic definitions & procedures at a micro-level, missing from Political state interactions. Such interdisciplinary management is expressed in the indigenous 'CIRCLE-of-LIFE', which provides checks & balances for multiple life functions over many 10s of 1000s of years with vibrant, abundant, distributed wealth in loving societies. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/a-home/3-indigenous-circle-of-life
Many around the world still aspire to this hope, with Russia & China's leading role.
Sadly in 1917, Russia as the strongest European 'community' movement got violently coopted by 'Wall Street & the Bolshevik Revolution' (Antony Sutton) through Wall Street leader Jacob Schiff funding of Lev-Davidovich Bronstein (Trotsky) & Germany's Warburg financing Lenin, both with millions of 1917 $$. This foreign command, violently imposed false community through false 'Co-operatives' (L. 'co' = 'together' + 'operatives' = 'stakeholders'). It took 3 generations (72 years) for Russia as a whole to wake-up to the contradiction of what Lenin & then Stalin violently imposed. One-member/One-vote does not recognize, account-for or empower the diverse Contributions, Experience, Expertise & Decision-making Acumen of Multistakeholder Participants, in each specialty. Companies & Communities are unable to systematically get both maintenance or new infrastructure / innovation work performed & invested in, without individual & company recognition, compensation & empowerment. Multistakeholder 'Participatory' (L. 'part' = 'share') investment, ownership & Board-Representation in the Multihome-Domestic, industry & commerce is known as ECONOMIC-DEMOCRACY. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/8-economic-democracy
Bureaucracy & inefficiencies in the obtuse hidden role of huge Oligarch parasiting of economy with its Fake 'capital' (L. 'cap' = 'head' = 'collective-intelligence') issued by Oligarch controlled fake trickledown money world is actually much worse than was fake communism.
BODY & SOCIETY ANALOGY OF ORGANIZATION & BOUNDARIES
'Indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') Great-Good-way-of-kindness, Great-Law-of-Peace & Constitution Society, economy & policy mirrors the gene, cell, tissue & organ Autonomy of the human body with the expert memory retention, decision-making & implementation of each part. We are still mentally trapped in the Oligarch misunderstanding of what they believe is a top-down role. The brain is a Nexus-of-bottom-up communication for facts & actions disbursed throughout the body. But brain is cognizant, mostly (micro-seconds) after events & actions have already happened. The digestive system contains many times more memory & implementation neurons than the brain. There are several Nexus centres throughout the body. Distributed 'ECONOMIC' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') MEMORY is core to the holistic function of the body. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/3-economic-memory
One of the goals here at the Gym is to inform readers about the Russian, Chinese, and other cultures and their methods/pathways that greatly differ from the West. What we're seeing is the emergence of People Centered Development with excellent examples provided by Russia and China. It's all a work in progress.
Karl, Yes People-centered development. Thank you for your ongoing substack posts. During the 1970s, I lived with Russian Doukhobor Communities in British Columbia's West Kootenay region. I also lived among German Mennonite, English Quaker & American Pacifist communities in this region of about 55,000 Anabaptists in all. All adopted fake 'co-op' models of enterprise, as did I during over 20 years. Most of these co-op enterprises fail, as they did throughout the Soviet sphere & in N. America, typically after 70 years or 3 generations, For 35 years I live in a housing development in Montreal with 450 Slav speaking Russian, Ukrainian & Polish speakers. Slav writers & people have important compassionate community cognizant messages for all humanity. We all need 'community' so, I hope we can all learn from the 'Communist' period including all of its (& my) top-down Oligarch imposed mistakes. I helped develop & operate the Natural Food Co-op networks of BC & Quebec 1969- 1990. Both communist & 'socialist' (L. 'socius' = 'friend') imply bottom-up intimate social & 'economic' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture'), regardless that; fake socialist politicians & program administrators can only think of top-down government imposed systems. One saying one is 'anti-communist' is really saying, one is 'anti-community'. My own work has been more successful with helping to transform industry & commerce into Multistakeholder 'Participatory' (L. 'part' = 'share') systems. Our Sustainable Development Association & www.IndigeneCommunity.info major Community-Economy web-based software project is DO-WE-KNOW-WHO-WE-ARE-? based on a) Cataloguing local Multihome & neighbourhood individual & company talents, goods, services, resources & dreams, b) mapping proximal relationships for collaboration, c) Accounting for buying, selling & investing together & d) 'Both-sides-now, Equal-time, Recorded & Published Dialogue' Communication for helping individuals achieve understanding & working contracts as well as Conflict Resolution. http://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/9-do-we-know-who-we-are
Excellent! I've described what I see forming within Russia and the examples of that communal societal building continues on a daily basis, which doesn't always get reported upon here at the Gym. Today will see another example or two.
Karlof Neat conversation on community. The www.indigenecommunity.info web-site after the USA & Canada, is most read in Russia, with 1000s of readers right across almost all Oblasts, Republics, Okrugs & Krais across Russia from west to east having & continuing to visit & read.
I'm involved since my early tweens in 1963 in Student-led learning, solidarity with 1st Nations & 'indigenous' peoples, so I do shudder at many of the mistakes I made myself & was part-of in the "communal" movement across Turtle-Island/N. America. We tended to unconsciously recreate the 'exogenous' colonial culture we were & still are part of. Of the many Russians & those from the Soviet sphere, that I know, these same mistakes are made, of starting with land rather than people. In ~1974 an old Doukhobor (R. 'Spirit-wrestler') Svobodnik (R. 'Sons-of-Freedom') friend I knew, 'knocked-my-socks-off' way up in a Svobodnik community called Krestova. Georges Podmorov shared with me that he felt all the Anabaptist communities of our West Kootenay region had made the same mistake, when they left the cities of Russia, Germany & England to go 'Back-to-the-land'. Georges felt that the most important work is in the midst of the cities, re-humanizing culture & re-naturalizing in the built-environment. The back-to-the-land movement without complex cultural economy has tended to turn into Cottage country with all the excesses of 'Commodifying Nature' in temporary vacations. I moved back to my extended family in Montreal in 1980 & focused on re-acculturating & re-naturalizing in this complexity. 70% of people in the world & on Turtle-Island already live in Multihome-Dwelling-Complexes with an average size of 32 dwelling-units = ~100 people. We are just missing the 'indigenous' (L. 'self-generating') cultural & biosphere aligned practices of all our ancestors. 20% of Multihome-dwellers are extended-families living intentionally in proximity for social & economic collaboration. Multihome-extended-family contribute trillions of $ of the most individually appropriate goods, services, sharing & caring/year as Turtle-Island, N-America's largest essential Economic sector, albeit unrecognized by government, education & institutions. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/1-extending-our-welcome-participatory-multihome-cohousing
What you describe at the end of your comment is generally known as the Black Economy, not denoting good/bad but unseen. The aim is to attain a balance between Nature and human habitation that allows for mutual accommodation. The Help One and All ethos in general is Asia's civic religion that got lost as it traveled further West. Even Germanic Tribes had that as those that remained in Russia prove. That indigenous culture was superior to Western ways is proven in the writings of Westerners, primarily French, published in the 1600s. If the 7/8ths of the planet gets their act together and adopts the path toward Balance and Harmony, then the remaining 1/8th will either join or become an aberration by the 22nd Century.
Karl, RE: "BLACK-ECONOMY" strange how the most important & productive Domestic economy is least seen in our Oligarch system.
There's an interesting difference between:
1) all humanity's 10s of 1000s of years worldwide 'indigenous' Bottom-up Time-based Equivalency Accounting on the String-shell Value System (eg. Wampum on Turtle-Island/N.America, Quipu in S.America & Cowrie in indigenous Celtic-Slavic Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia & all islands). String-shell integrates a) Capital (L 'cap' = 'head' = 'collective-intelligence'), b) 'Currency' ('flow', compensation), c) 'Condolence' ('Social-security'), d) Collegial mentored apprenticeship 'education' (L. 'educare' = 'to-lead-forth-from-within') Credit, e) time-math Communication, f) professional Costume public identification of essential service providers. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy
Such recognition & empowerment shows in the Archaeological record as times of many 1000s of years of peace, when combined as: A. ~100 person intergenerational Multihome,
B. Council-Process
C. Time as the universal common denominator in human society. Indigenous nations & Production societies worldwide recognized this formula as the 'Great-good-way-of-kindness, Great-Law-of-Peace & world Constitution.
VERSUS
2) Oligarch Top-down fake metal-coin 'money' (Greek 'mnemosis' = 'memory') deliberate system of popular amnesia of the past 7000 years since Babylon's Oligarch 'exogenous' (L 'other-generated') degradation. Oligarchy's game has been endless war without stop. Without recognition for the Domestic Economy Women's (& some men) specialty & empowerment in Circular Multihome Economy is derailed now for 7000 years.
Indigenous Domestic 'economy' (Gk. 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') mostly women is core with Industry & Commerce as Domestic supportive subsets mostly men. Domestic is the collective work of Food growing, preparation, storage, Accounting, Medicine, child, elder, handicapped, injured, sick care & animation, coordinating apprenticeships, clothing manufacture & repair among diverse other ~100 (50-150) person Multihome critical-mass, economies-of-scale work. This recognition, compensation & empowerment of all multistakeholder contributions. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/2-participatory-accounting
Russian count & anarchist Petr Kropotkin lays out some of Slavic Europe & Russia's Indigenous heritage in Mutual-Aid, a factor of evolution.
Is your name Sanchez from Mexico or in the Americas? These indigenous economy, accounting & governance practices are strong throughout the indigenous Americas but as well represented in the Celtic traditions of the Basque & others in Portugal & Spain.
Excellent recap sir. Medvedev has certainly grown a tongue recently. Whatever or whomever kept him milquetoast before is certainly no longer a concern. He's flat out gone biblical calling the west demonic recently. One point you emphasized, his
"Our most important interest is not the acquisition of new lands, but a competent, predictable, sovereign government in neighboring countries, acting for the benefit of its citizens and the international community."
harkens back to a reality where everyone must now admit that a majority portion of the global population, the east or global south, have rulers that have determined and outright state publicly that western rulers do not act in accordance to the best interest of their citizens or international community, and are unpredictable.
The final part I'd argue against. 15 years ago maybe 10 years ago maybe but with certainty in the past 5 years the east has
learned to predict the west's actions with remarkable accuracy by just by taking a moment to whiteboard what would an elite multinational alliance of bloodline-linked powers subservient to demons hell bent on the destruction of humankind would do. They've figured it out. They know and understand Disney and hollywood aren't profiting off movies made bad on purpose. They know budweiser is making decisions fully comprehending the easily predictable results. They know ford and chevy us automakers are intentionally making business decisions that do nothing but hurt their own companies. They know germany if not all the EU is being deindustrialized intentionally and with full consent of its elected rulers. These aren't dumb mistakes of one political wing or the other. These aren't mysteries any longer, the east now knows. Western rulers aren't acting in their own interests even, let alone their citizens. They're subordinates following orders and the ones giving the orders don't have human motivations.
Medvedev and his Russian cohorts and their Chinese counterparts know full well now western rulers serve an ancient evil and are carrying out long held desires of the nephilim mystery religion. Medvedev outright agrees and is telling everyone publicly and in english even. I wonder what all the east, Russia specifically has uncovered. Declassified ussr docs reveal esoteric studies parallel if not further along than america's. I wonder what they've really put together so far. Have they accepted the entire expansion to north america from templar christopher columbus following his creepy light in the ocean to the immediate expansion into the already known about areas of mounds to masonic occultist george washington to the federal reserve being founded atop a site of sacrificial alters on jekyll island, it would be very fascinating to discuss such topics with Medvedev to see what they've concluded and how far they've delved and what their more esoteric forces have brought to light. How good are they at focusing on canals? Did they uncover the real purpose of the 1893 columbia exposition? Surely they know of DC's grid layout and the true purpose of the two washington monuments (one above ground one below) and the ancient occult relics buried in the cornerstones but have they looked beyond DC and seen it all? With modern GIS and The Holy Spirit I bet they know far more than any top brass in the us military is ever shown. It would almost be worth getting on social media to contact Medvedev. He could save a lot people. Can you imagine having Medvedev on a podcast for an hour discussing and comparing notes on what they've theorized repeating angular alignments between airports and race tracks to be? On how active they're becoming on the spiritual warfare front? The new Medvedev could spill beans and build bridges. Anyway good recap, thank you for sharing it.
I noticed right at the end of the Medvedev presentation a clear warning to the Baltic trio- the three states run by fascist emigres- involved in the racist persecution of Russian speaking people, on which the Donbas persecution post 2014 was modeled, states which also, in a manner closely related, celebrate Nazi military 'victories' including massacres of civilians.
Medvedev makes it clear that this has to change. It is to the eternal discredit of our own countries that our governments, and public opinion, do not second Medvedev's simple and civilised plea. Let them go to the beaches of Normandy and explain to the world how, eighty years after D-Day we march side by side with those celebrating the Waffen SS, the Concentration Camp Guards and the 'police' forces which carried out the genocide by bullets.
No wonder the Russians don't choose to attend this hollow parody of the opening of a Second Front.
"...History, of course, will put everything in its place. Sooner or later, the population of Europe will give a harsh assessment of its traitors, who sacrificed its well-being to their overseas masters. But it's not about the grades. The question is what other price Europe will have to pay for the fatal mistakes it has made. And how this will affect the fate of hundreds of millions of its inhabitants..."
This is the passage that first struck me. I have recently read GDH Cole's "Europe Russia and the Future" written in September 1941 in the early phase of Barbarossa.
Among much else Cole-a very influential historian and political actor whose work is still important and deserving of attention- takes the view that European capitalism is finished.
He identifies Europe, in a way that decades of propaganda has tended to obscure, as a place in which every ruling class on the continent had allied itself with Germany in the war against the Soviet Union.
And in which, by the same token, all resistance to those ruling classes came from and was led by working class militants who saw Nazism as the current political expression of capitalist rule.
The exception Cole noted was that of his own country-the UK- in which the government was still wedded, often despite the interests of the war effort and the nation, to the capitalist system.
And Cole recognised that for capitalism to survive after the defeat which it was going to suffer (saving a Nazi victory) in Europe it would be necessary for the United States, in which capitalism reigned supreme, to revive it.
This included his view that only by becoming a satellite of the United States could the capitalists in Britain survive and that this would mean that they would need to act as an agent of US capitalism in Europe.
Eighty years on his analysis, long discounted as NATO and the Marshall Plan, the isolation and de-clawing of European Communist Resistance movements (which dominated the political arena in the summer of 1945, when I first started paying attention to such matters) looks remarkably prescient.
Consider for example that, in allowing the Communists to be sidelined, in encouraging them to lay down their expensively acquired arms and step aside to allow those who they knew had been, months earlier supporters of Hitler's regimes, to come to power, posing as democrats and sponsored by the occupying armies, Stalin and his government were doing exactly what Putin, Medvedev et al did before February 2022- trusting and deferring to their 'valued colleagues' in the West.
The point is that, as Cole noted, the old polity of Europe died in the Second World War and it could only be replaced by an expanded Union of Soviet Republics- in which, as events since have shown to be the case- each nation would preserve and develop its national culture within the limits of a defensive geopolitical bloc. Or by something rebuilt and dominated by US Capitalist interests on the remnants of the Nazi economy- a process that would involve Britain and France becoming, as coadjutors in the Occupation, US satellites. The US price for their surrender being assistance in reconquering their empires in Asia.
Europe is now waking up to the fact that the US Occupation is coming to an end and that the institutional detritia of that occupation, the EU and NATO included, is losing its purpose.
NATO loses its purpose when European states are forced to come to terms with their Russian neighbour. The days when silly cadet statesmen/women from militarily and economically insignificant countries like the Baltic states, Rumania, (the list is as long as the Organisation's membership roll) can jump up and threaten the world with US nuclear weaponry, US armies and US bases is, mercifully, ending. The age of make believe in which the representatives all the sovereign powers met and decided after much discussion and full examination to follow their orders from Washington is ending as the black earth of Ukraine turns green again.
As to the EU, which had the single purpose of stamping out the last traces of the real compromises that "Social Europe" had made after the war, as the price paid for enrolling the support of the Social Democratic movements, Trade Unions and cooperative sectors behind the new 'democracies' with their mixed economies, a task which it fulfilled in Maastricht and Lisbon after half a century in which free schooling, free healthcare, generous pensions, short work weeks, long vacations and a wide spectrum of social benefits and individual rights had characterised the social contract.
Under the EU, in Germany, France, Italy etc austere regimes have almost totally eroded the gains- socialist inspired- made in the post war years. The final cost of agreeing to rescue by US capitalism has been the surrender of all interests to the US.
The Hegemon may be under pressure in West Asia- in Europe his interests reign supreme. And will continue to do so until, as is bound to happen soon, he withdraws to the extreme right of the stage.
And the catalyst has been the war in Ukraine, which is what Medvedev seems to me to be saying: Russia has no ill will towards Europe, it has no particular ambitions, economic or strategic. But it cannot and will not live with rabid enemies poised on its borders- nobody cares if Ukrainians want to indulge in Bandera cults or sacrifice small domestic animals on memorials to the sadists who ran Concentration Camps. Just do it quietly, Don't frighten the neighbours. Sibg the Horst Wessel song by all means, if you must, but don't teach people to hate slavs and dream of eradicating them, Jews, Gypsies or anyone else (immigrant refugees and Chinese being the obvious temptation for them).
And don't spend your mental energy and treasure on whoring arounbd the world looking for powerful nations to do your dirty work for you: no more alliances against Russia, China, Iran or anyone. We all want peace. and the leisure necessary to examine the problems facing us all- the real problems not the idiotic fantasies and fears of the people of declining aristocrats a hundred and fifty years ago.
Europeans will get their wake-up call when Russia closes out the SMO and does nothing more but turn to the task of refurbishing Great Russian lands and helping its people. That action by Russia will have vast repercussions for EU/NATO and their members.
Exactly.
Since 1945 none of these countries has been more than an autonomous region/province exercising powers in, an increasingly limited, set of domestic matters. In terms of international relations they have followed paths set for them by one or other of the Great Powers.
Their behaviour, internationally, has been crudely emotional rather than rational or diplomatic. The Ba.ltic states 'hate Russia' even though, in reality many are Russians and most have enjoyed normal and fraternal relations with Russians- perhaps that is why emigres, who really do hate Russians because they have been taught since birth to do so, are in such demand in politics- they have no problems performing the roles assigned to their nations by the US and the latest Reich.
In fact the Baltic states, when they recognise that there is not going to be regime change and surrender in Moscow and that they have to think in terms of long term normal relationships will find many more common interests, much more reason for close relationships and much more in common, culturally and historically with Russia than they have with any western european, let alone American state.
As to western europe those in power are third and fourth generation collaborators: their countries have been, more or less, occupied since 1940. This is evident from the way in which the 'moderate' collaborators, like Mitterand ('socialist ' has an unusual meaning in France) are replaced by those, such as LePen, even Macron, who openly honour the traitors of Vichy. There is Italy too where Mussolini's fans are back in charge and they are no longer pretending to be anticommunist christians.
And then, of course there is Britain of which the most optimistic view, which I share, is that 'the people of England haven't been heard from yet.'
I hope George Galloway can remain an MP for at least a decade as he has the courage to stand up to the Nazitories, or perhaps they should be called Royalists. AS for the Baltics, they're already atrophying and will become dead states by mid-century. Finland and the other Nordic states will also atrophy as their scant resource base empties. Without Germany as an industrial engine their future is as bleak as the Baltics. Then there're the Balkans, which are perhaps the best hope for Europe. Slovakia's seen the light; will the Czechs? The old fascist base of Italy and France are essentially agricultural nations that have enough resources to keep that part of their national life alive, but heavy industry requires energy to power it. Who will they sell their products to given their fealty to the Outlaw US Empire?
A decade ago, Diesen showed what would become of Europe if they cut their umbilical cord to Russia, and we're now seeing his predictions being fulfilled. The other little nations--Denmark, Netherlands, Belgium, Luxemburg, etc.--will also return to agriculture as they really have no choice without big energy inputs. Sure, they can all attack themselves financially via their own Neoliberal Parasites. As the Outlaw US Empire slowly becomes an Economic Black Hole, it will suck other smaller economies into it unless they see what's happening and escape first.
thanks karl... b's post is missing the picture!!
you ask a good question.. why is moa bringing it up now? slow news day perhaps? who knows..
The "Expert" article is dated 15 April, so it's not b that's bringing it up now but Russian media. As I discovered at the time, only a synopsis of Medvedev's talk was available that when compared to the total transcript was missing some key info. The synopsis b provided was okay, but reading the whole IMO is required. And now it can. You'll also want to read Medvedev's Telegram note I posted at MoA as it's funny in his manner.
thanks karl... will check it out!
The map is interesting. Uzhgorod used to be a part of Czechoslovakia after 1918 😎
Sorry, not exactly on the topic, and I am sure you saw it, but this is really good: https://youtu.be/HmQtnZeLg7U?si=Z_mwUaiYqS2-NmEP. Maria Zakharova.
ON HUMAN ECONOMIC & POLITICALLY INTEGRATED ORGANIZATION & PEACEFUL BOUNDARIES
Thank you Dmitry Medvedev for trying to put boundaries in human terms.
Russia's centuries long quest, since Tsarist days to restore 'Community' (Latin 'com' = 'together' + 'munus' = 'gift-or-service') as the basis of humane organization has meant for the world, a small glimmer of hope in our 7000 years of Oligarch commanded & controlled 'exogenous' (L 'other-generated') colonial empires, since Babylon.
Originally 19th Century researchers like Petr Kropotkin, Karl Marx & Friedrich Engels turned to humanity's 'indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') fractal cultural systems or organization & boundaries based in economic collaboration which were worldwide. Kropotkin's Mutual-Aid on his decades among Russia's indigenous peoples & the Guild system, Marx & Engels through Lewis-Henry Morgan's 'Ancient-Society' on his decades among the Haudenosaunee of upper New-York state, Ontario & Quebec. A major hope of the community movement was to restore 'Economic' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') 'Democracy' in the collective Domestic (mostly women), Industrial & Commercial (mostly men Economies as the foundation of Political Democracy. Economic sovereignty implies shared-resource-management by many specialized communities, with all benefitting from the other's efficiencies in their specialty. Such complementary economy means that boundaries have contractual economic definitions & procedures at a micro-level, missing from Political state interactions. Such interdisciplinary management is expressed in the indigenous 'CIRCLE-of-LIFE', which provides checks & balances for multiple life functions over many 10s of 1000s of years with vibrant, abundant, distributed wealth in loving societies. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/a-home/3-indigenous-circle-of-life
Many around the world still aspire to this hope, with Russia & China's leading role.
Sadly in 1917, Russia as the strongest European 'community' movement got violently coopted by 'Wall Street & the Bolshevik Revolution' (Antony Sutton) through Wall Street leader Jacob Schiff funding of Lev-Davidovich Bronstein (Trotsky) & Germany's Warburg financing Lenin, both with millions of 1917 $$. This foreign command, violently imposed false community through false 'Co-operatives' (L. 'co' = 'together' + 'operatives' = 'stakeholders'). It took 3 generations (72 years) for Russia as a whole to wake-up to the contradiction of what Lenin & then Stalin violently imposed. One-member/One-vote does not recognize, account-for or empower the diverse Contributions, Experience, Expertise & Decision-making Acumen of Multistakeholder Participants, in each specialty. Companies & Communities are unable to systematically get both maintenance or new infrastructure / innovation work performed & invested in, without individual & company recognition, compensation & empowerment. Multistakeholder 'Participatory' (L. 'part' = 'share') investment, ownership & Board-Representation in the Multihome-Domestic, industry & commerce is known as ECONOMIC-DEMOCRACY. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/8-economic-democracy
Bureaucracy & inefficiencies in the obtuse hidden role of huge Oligarch parasiting of economy with its Fake 'capital' (L. 'cap' = 'head' = 'collective-intelligence') issued by Oligarch controlled fake trickledown money world is actually much worse than was fake communism.
BODY & SOCIETY ANALOGY OF ORGANIZATION & BOUNDARIES
'Indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') Great-Good-way-of-kindness, Great-Law-of-Peace & Constitution Society, economy & policy mirrors the gene, cell, tissue & organ Autonomy of the human body with the expert memory retention, decision-making & implementation of each part. We are still mentally trapped in the Oligarch misunderstanding of what they believe is a top-down role. The brain is a Nexus-of-bottom-up communication for facts & actions disbursed throughout the body. But brain is cognizant, mostly (micro-seconds) after events & actions have already happened. The digestive system contains many times more memory & implementation neurons than the brain. There are several Nexus centres throughout the body. Distributed 'ECONOMIC' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') MEMORY is core to the holistic function of the body. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/3-economic-memory
One of the goals here at the Gym is to inform readers about the Russian, Chinese, and other cultures and their methods/pathways that greatly differ from the West. What we're seeing is the emergence of People Centered Development with excellent examples provided by Russia and China. It's all a work in progress.
Karl, Yes People-centered development. Thank you for your ongoing substack posts. During the 1970s, I lived with Russian Doukhobor Communities in British Columbia's West Kootenay region. I also lived among German Mennonite, English Quaker & American Pacifist communities in this region of about 55,000 Anabaptists in all. All adopted fake 'co-op' models of enterprise, as did I during over 20 years. Most of these co-op enterprises fail, as they did throughout the Soviet sphere & in N. America, typically after 70 years or 3 generations, For 35 years I live in a housing development in Montreal with 450 Slav speaking Russian, Ukrainian & Polish speakers. Slav writers & people have important compassionate community cognizant messages for all humanity. We all need 'community' so, I hope we can all learn from the 'Communist' period including all of its (& my) top-down Oligarch imposed mistakes. I helped develop & operate the Natural Food Co-op networks of BC & Quebec 1969- 1990. Both communist & 'socialist' (L. 'socius' = 'friend') imply bottom-up intimate social & 'economic' (Greek 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture'), regardless that; fake socialist politicians & program administrators can only think of top-down government imposed systems. One saying one is 'anti-communist' is really saying, one is 'anti-community'. My own work has been more successful with helping to transform industry & commerce into Multistakeholder 'Participatory' (L. 'part' = 'share') systems. Our Sustainable Development Association & www.IndigeneCommunity.info major Community-Economy web-based software project is DO-WE-KNOW-WHO-WE-ARE-? based on a) Cataloguing local Multihome & neighbourhood individual & company talents, goods, services, resources & dreams, b) mapping proximal relationships for collaboration, c) Accounting for buying, selling & investing together & d) 'Both-sides-now, Equal-time, Recorded & Published Dialogue' Communication for helping individuals achieve understanding & working contracts as well as Conflict Resolution. http://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/9-do-we-know-who-we-are
Excellent! I've described what I see forming within Russia and the examples of that communal societal building continues on a daily basis, which doesn't always get reported upon here at the Gym. Today will see another example or two.
Karlof Neat conversation on community. The www.indigenecommunity.info web-site after the USA & Canada, is most read in Russia, with 1000s of readers right across almost all Oblasts, Republics, Okrugs & Krais across Russia from west to east having & continuing to visit & read.
I'm involved since my early tweens in 1963 in Student-led learning, solidarity with 1st Nations & 'indigenous' peoples, so I do shudder at many of the mistakes I made myself & was part-of in the "communal" movement across Turtle-Island/N. America. We tended to unconsciously recreate the 'exogenous' colonial culture we were & still are part of. Of the many Russians & those from the Soviet sphere, that I know, these same mistakes are made, of starting with land rather than people. In ~1974 an old Doukhobor (R. 'Spirit-wrestler') Svobodnik (R. 'Sons-of-Freedom') friend I knew, 'knocked-my-socks-off' way up in a Svobodnik community called Krestova. Georges Podmorov shared with me that he felt all the Anabaptist communities of our West Kootenay region had made the same mistake, when they left the cities of Russia, Germany & England to go 'Back-to-the-land'. Georges felt that the most important work is in the midst of the cities, re-humanizing culture & re-naturalizing in the built-environment. The back-to-the-land movement without complex cultural economy has tended to turn into Cottage country with all the excesses of 'Commodifying Nature' in temporary vacations. I moved back to my extended family in Montreal in 1980 & focused on re-acculturating & re-naturalizing in this complexity. 70% of people in the world & on Turtle-Island already live in Multihome-Dwelling-Complexes with an average size of 32 dwelling-units = ~100 people. We are just missing the 'indigenous' (L. 'self-generating') cultural & biosphere aligned practices of all our ancestors. 20% of Multihome-dwellers are extended-families living intentionally in proximity for social & economic collaboration. Multihome-extended-family contribute trillions of $ of the most individually appropriate goods, services, sharing & caring/year as Turtle-Island, N-America's largest essential Economic sector, albeit unrecognized by government, education & institutions. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/1-extending-our-welcome-participatory-multihome-cohousing
What you describe at the end of your comment is generally known as the Black Economy, not denoting good/bad but unseen. The aim is to attain a balance between Nature and human habitation that allows for mutual accommodation. The Help One and All ethos in general is Asia's civic religion that got lost as it traveled further West. Even Germanic Tribes had that as those that remained in Russia prove. That indigenous culture was superior to Western ways is proven in the writings of Westerners, primarily French, published in the 1600s. If the 7/8ths of the planet gets their act together and adopts the path toward Balance and Harmony, then the remaining 1/8th will either join or become an aberration by the 22nd Century.
Karl, RE: "BLACK-ECONOMY" strange how the most important & productive Domestic economy is least seen in our Oligarch system.
There's an interesting difference between:
1) all humanity's 10s of 1000s of years worldwide 'indigenous' Bottom-up Time-based Equivalency Accounting on the String-shell Value System (eg. Wampum on Turtle-Island/N.America, Quipu in S.America & Cowrie in indigenous Celtic-Slavic Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia & all islands). String-shell integrates a) Capital (L 'cap' = 'head' = 'collective-intelligence'), b) 'Currency' ('flow', compensation), c) 'Condolence' ('Social-security'), d) Collegial mentored apprenticeship 'education' (L. 'educare' = 'to-lead-forth-from-within') Credit, e) time-math Communication, f) professional Costume public identification of essential service providers. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy
Such recognition & empowerment shows in the Archaeological record as times of many 1000s of years of peace, when combined as: A. ~100 person intergenerational Multihome,
B. Council-Process
C. Time as the universal common denominator in human society. Indigenous nations & Production societies worldwide recognized this formula as the 'Great-good-way-of-kindness, Great-Law-of-Peace & world Constitution.
VERSUS
2) Oligarch Top-down fake metal-coin 'money' (Greek 'mnemosis' = 'memory') deliberate system of popular amnesia of the past 7000 years since Babylon's Oligarch 'exogenous' (L 'other-generated') degradation. Oligarchy's game has been endless war without stop. Without recognition for the Domestic Economy Women's (& some men) specialty & empowerment in Circular Multihome Economy is derailed now for 7000 years.
Indigenous Domestic 'economy' (Gk. 'oikos' = 'home' + 'namein' = 'care-&-nurture') mostly women is core with Industry & Commerce as Domestic supportive subsets mostly men. Domestic is the collective work of Food growing, preparation, storage, Accounting, Medicine, child, elder, handicapped, injured, sick care & animation, coordinating apprenticeships, clothing manufacture & repair among diverse other ~100 (50-150) person Multihome critical-mass, economies-of-scale work. This recognition, compensation & empowerment of all multistakeholder contributions. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/2-participatory-accounting
Russian count & anarchist Petr Kropotkin lays out some of Slavic Europe & Russia's Indigenous heritage in Mutual-Aid, a factor of evolution.
Is your name Sanchez from Mexico or in the Americas? These indigenous economy, accounting & governance practices are strong throughout the indigenous Americas but as well represented in the Celtic traditions of the Basque & others in Portugal & Spain.
Excellent recap sir. Medvedev has certainly grown a tongue recently. Whatever or whomever kept him milquetoast before is certainly no longer a concern. He's flat out gone biblical calling the west demonic recently. One point you emphasized, his
"Our most important interest is not the acquisition of new lands, but a competent, predictable, sovereign government in neighboring countries, acting for the benefit of its citizens and the international community."
harkens back to a reality where everyone must now admit that a majority portion of the global population, the east or global south, have rulers that have determined and outright state publicly that western rulers do not act in accordance to the best interest of their citizens or international community, and are unpredictable.
The final part I'd argue against. 15 years ago maybe 10 years ago maybe but with certainty in the past 5 years the east has
learned to predict the west's actions with remarkable accuracy by just by taking a moment to whiteboard what would an elite multinational alliance of bloodline-linked powers subservient to demons hell bent on the destruction of humankind would do. They've figured it out. They know and understand Disney and hollywood aren't profiting off movies made bad on purpose. They know budweiser is making decisions fully comprehending the easily predictable results. They know ford and chevy us automakers are intentionally making business decisions that do nothing but hurt their own companies. They know germany if not all the EU is being deindustrialized intentionally and with full consent of its elected rulers. These aren't dumb mistakes of one political wing or the other. These aren't mysteries any longer, the east now knows. Western rulers aren't acting in their own interests even, let alone their citizens. They're subordinates following orders and the ones giving the orders don't have human motivations.
Medvedev and his Russian cohorts and their Chinese counterparts know full well now western rulers serve an ancient evil and are carrying out long held desires of the nephilim mystery religion. Medvedev outright agrees and is telling everyone publicly and in english even. I wonder what all the east, Russia specifically has uncovered. Declassified ussr docs reveal esoteric studies parallel if not further along than america's. I wonder what they've really put together so far. Have they accepted the entire expansion to north america from templar christopher columbus following his creepy light in the ocean to the immediate expansion into the already known about areas of mounds to masonic occultist george washington to the federal reserve being founded atop a site of sacrificial alters on jekyll island, it would be very fascinating to discuss such topics with Medvedev to see what they've concluded and how far they've delved and what their more esoteric forces have brought to light. How good are they at focusing on canals? Did they uncover the real purpose of the 1893 columbia exposition? Surely they know of DC's grid layout and the true purpose of the two washington monuments (one above ground one below) and the ancient occult relics buried in the cornerstones but have they looked beyond DC and seen it all? With modern GIS and The Holy Spirit I bet they know far more than any top brass in the us military is ever shown. It would almost be worth getting on social media to contact Medvedev. He could save a lot people. Can you imagine having Medvedev on a podcast for an hour discussing and comparing notes on what they've theorized repeating angular alignments between airports and race tracks to be? On how active they're becoming on the spiritual warfare front? The new Medvedev could spill beans and build bridges. Anyway good recap, thank you for sharing it.
And another sorry but with a joy — another link: https://english.almayadeen.net/articles/analysis/the-management-of-dilemma