Outlaw US Empire's Anti-Truth War Continues

Propaganda and censorship by the Outlaw US Empire has been ongoing for 125 years if not longer when we add the twisting of history to fit a very longstanding narrative that began in shortly after the Treaty of Paris in 1783 granted the 13 British colonies their independence regarding democracy, the wisdom of the so-called Founders and the sanctity of the coup they performed in 1787 to oust the very popular and democratic Articles of Confederation and replace it with what’s now known as the US Constitution, which enabled that Era’s Oligarchy and gave them command. Madison, the main theoretician, argued in the propaganda known later as the Federalist Papers, specifically in the one known as #10, that democracy was a great danger to order. The 1787 Constitution was approved by less than 5% of the people living in the now 13 states. In no US History school text at any level are any of the above facts told in that manner. The potential problem with the executive was noted by those known as Anti-Federalists who termed the position an elected king. Their worries were appeased by appointing George Washington as the first president. But he used executive repression just as any king would do, and his followers abused the new Bill of Rights, waged clandestine wars with France, England and Spain, and of course waged genocide on the natives so their land could be stolen. Many laud Jefferson, but he was just as bad as any other president when it came to breaking the law and running secret wars. The point here is cover-up, propaganda, and false narrative designed to obscure truth and create a mythos is a longstanding practice as old as the nation.

The War on Truth was escalated with the advent of the expansion and creation of the Outlaw US Empire first in Hawaii then in the American War on Spain, which was followed shortly by WW1 and the massive war waged on German-Americans who were the second largest ethnic group having their own schools, newspapers, towns, and other institutions. Of course, most readers know nothing of that. And over the years it’s grown progressively worse as most realize with the treatment of Julian Assange, although others suffered just as badly but without the public notoriety. And yes, Gitmo’s prison is still full of innocents. Putin coined the term Empire of Lies which is 100% correct. To list and provide a brief description of those lies since WW2 that are known would take several volumes of 1000 pages each. And then there’re the truths that have been confessed but never publicized so US citizens could learn just how wantonly disgusting the ruling oligarchy had become and the great need to oust the entire lot. A famous rock band asked “Watergate does not bother me Does your conscience bother you? and was applauded for promoting the War on Truth—It’s legal when the president does it. Bull shit!

Today, we have another escalation in the War on Truth that began in 2015 (well, we could say 911 or choose from several other chronological markers) but has recently taken on a new dimension with the great shift in electoral politics in the EU and within the Empire itself. A few bits of this have been reported here at the Gym before, but not in the manner that follows. The first item to examine is Alastair Crooke’s SCF essay, “Enabling a “Brutus” to slay the Elon Musk “Caesar,”” followed by a very unique testimony provided by Dmitry Simes Sr. in his interview by Kommersant correspondent Elena Chernenko which RT translated and reported in full, “‘Biden is out to get me’: A Russian-American TV host facing 60 years in an American jail speaks out”—essentially what’s become known as the Assange Treatment. We’ve already seen how Scott Ritter was attacked and how US-based social media platforms have censored and outright banned people from telling or showing the truth. When Musk acquired Twitter, he revealed the depth of conspiratorial alliance that existed between its executives and D-party goons. And once released form his illegal arrest, Mr. Durov described his ordeal and the gross violation of his rights and Macron’s utter idiocy by telling the world via his Telegram. These are very perilous times for the continuance of honest governance within the West as the Oligarchy cannot abide by having its position usurped and will use everything it can to keep its position—think Ukraine’s Maidan without any “regular” people. And I should say we’ve had visitors stealthily promoting the ‘whole of society’ idea in the comment threads here and elsewhere. And with all that as an intro, here’s Crooke’s essay:

In the Washington Post on Monday, the headlines read: Musk and Durov are facing the revenge of the regulators. Former U.S. Labor Secretary, Robert Reich, in the British Guardian newspaper, published a piece on how to ‘rein-in’ Elon Musk, suggesting that “regulators around the world should threaten Musk with arrest” on lines of that which befell Pavel Durov recently in Paris.

As should be clear to all now, ‘war’ has broken out. There is no need for further pretence about it. Rather, there is evident glee at the prospect of a crackdown on the ‘Far-Right’ and its internet users: i.e. those who spread ‘disinformation’ or mal-information that ‘threatens’ the broad ‘cognitive infrastructure’ (which is to say, what the people think!).

Make no mistake, the Ruling Strata are angry; they are angry that their technical expertise and consensus about ‘just about everything’ is being spurned by the ‘deplorables’. There will be prosecutions, convictions and fines for cyber ‘actors’ who disrupt the digital ‘literacy’, the ‘leaders’ warn.

Professor Frank Furedi observes:

“There is an unholy alliance of western leaders – Prime Minister Keir Starmer, French President Emanuel Macron, German Chancellor Olaf Scholtz – whose hatred of what they call populism is undisguised. In his recent visits to Berlin and Paris, Starmer constantly referred to the threat posed by populism. During his meeting with Scholz in Berlin on 28 August, Starmer spoke about the importance of defeating “the snake oil of populism and nationalism”.

Furedi explained that as far as Starmer was concerned, populism was a threat to the power of the technocratic élites throughout Europe:

“Speaking in Paris, a day later, Starmer pointed to the far Right as a ‘very real threat’ and again used the term ‘snake oil’ of populism. Starmer has never stopped talking about the ‘snake oil of populism’. These days virtually every political problem is blamed on populism … The coupling of the term snake-oil with populism is constantly used in the propaganda of the technocratic political elite. Indeed, tackling and discrediting snake oil populists is its number one priority”.

So, what is the source of the élite’s anti-populist hysteria? The answer is that the latter know that they have become severed from the values and respect of their own people and that it is only a matter of time before they are seriously challenged, in one form or another.

This reality was very much on view in Germany this last weekend, where the ‘non-Establishment (i.e. non Staatsparteien) parties – when added together – secured 60% of the vote in Thüringen and 46% in Saxony. The Staatsparteien (the nominated establishment parties) choose to describe themselves as ‘democratic’, and to label the ‘others’ as ‘populist’ or ‘extremist’. State media even hinted that what counted more were ‘democratic’ votes; and not non-Staatsparteien votes, so the party with the most Staatsparteien votes should form the government in Thüringen.

These have co-operated to exclude AfD (Alternative für Deutschland) and other non-Establishment parties from parliamentary business as far as legally possible – for instance by keeping them out of key parliamentary committees and the imposition of various forms of social ostracism.

It reminds of the story of the great poet Victor Hugo’s membership rejection – no less than 22 times – by the Académie Française. The first time he applied, he received 2 votes (out of 39) from Lamartine and Chateaubriand, the two greatest men of letters of their time. A witty woman of the time commented: “If we weighed the votes, Monsieur Hugo would be elected; but we’re counting them.”

Why war?

Because, after the 2016 U.S. election, the U.S. political backroom élites blamed democracy and populism for producing bad election outcomes. Anti-establishment Trump had actually won in the U.S.; Bolsonaro won too, Farage surged, Modi won again, and Brexit etc., etc.

Elections were soon proclaimed to be out of control, throwing out bizarre ‘winners’. Such unwelcome outcomes threatened the deep-seated structures that both projected and safeguarded long-seated U.S. oligarchic interests around the globe, by subjecting them (oh the horror!) to voter scrutiny.

By 2023, the New York Times was running essays headlined: “Elections Are Bad for Democracy”.

Rod Blagojevich explained in the WSJ, earlier this year, the gist of what it was that had broken with the system:

“We [he and Obama] both grew up in Chicago politics. We understand how it works—with the bosses over the people. Mr. Obama learned the lessons well. And what he just did to Mr. Biden is what political bosses have been doing in Chicago since the 1871 fire: Selections masquerading as elections”.

“While today’s Democratic bosses may look different from the old-time cigar-chomping guy with a pinky ring, they operate the same way: in the shadows of the backroom. Mr. Obama, Nancy Pelosi and the rich donors—the Hollywood and Silicon Valley élites—are the new bosses of today’s Democratic Party. They call the shots. The voters, most of them working people, are there to be lied to, manipulated and controlled”.

“The Democratic National Convention in Chicago next month will provide the perfect backdrop and place [for appointing a] candidate, not the voters’ candidate. Democracy, no. Chicago ward-boss politics, yes”.

The problem was that the revealing of Biden’s dementia had pulled the mask from the system.

The Chicago model is not so very different from how EU democracy works. Millions voted in the recent European parliamentary elections; ‘Non-Staatsparteien’ parties chalked-up major successes. The message sent was clear – yet nothing changed.

Cultural War

2016 represented the onset of cultural war, as Mike Benz has described in great detail. A complete outsider, Trump had crashed through the System’s guardrails to win the Presidency. Populism and ‘disinformation’ were the cause, it was held. By 2017, NATO was describing ‘disinformation’ as the greatest threat facing western nations.

Movements designated as populist were perceived as not simply hostile to the policies of their opponents, but to élite values too.

To combat this threat, Benz, who until recently was directly involved in the project as a senior State Department official focused on technology issues, explains how the backroom bosses pulled an extraordinary ‘sleight of hand’: ‘Democracy’ they said, was no longer to be defined as a consensus gentium – i.e. a concerted resolve amongst the governed; but rather, was to be defined as the agreed ‘stance’ formed, not by individuals, but by democracy-supporting institutions.

Once re-defined as ‘an alignment of supporting institutions’, the second ‘twist’ to the democracy re-formulation was added. The Establishment had foreseen a risk that were a direct info-war on populism pursued, they themselves would be portrayed as autocratic and imposing top-down censorship.

The solution to the dilemma of how to pursue the campaign against populism, according to Benz, lay in the genesis of the ‘whole of society’ concept whereby media, influencers, public institutions, NGOs and allied media would be corralled and pressured into joining an apparently organic, bottom-up censorship coalition focused on the scourge of populism and disinformation.

This approach – with the government standing at ‘one removed’ from the censorship process – seemed to offer plausible deniability of direct government involvement; of the authorities acting autocratically.

Billions of dollars were spent in raising up this anti-disinformation eco-system in such a way that it appeared to be a spontaneous emanation out of civil society, and not the Potemkin façade that it was.

Seminars were conducted to train journalists on Homeland Security disinformation best practices and safeguards – to detect, mitigate, dismiss and distract. Research funds were channelled to some 60 universities to found ‘disinformation laboratories’, Benz reveals.

The key point here is that the ‘whole of society’ framework could facilitate a blending back into the policy mainstream of the long timeframe and largely unspoken (and sometimes secret) bedrock structures of foreign policy – on which foundation many key élite financial and political interests are leveraged.

An outwardly bland ideological alignment focused on ‘our democracy’ and ‘our values’ would nonetheless allow for the re-integration of these enduring structures to foreign policy (hostility to Russia; support for Israel; and antipathy towards Iran) to be re-formulated as the appropriate rhetorical slap in the face to the Populists.

The war may escalate; It may not end with a disinformation eco-system. The New York Times in July posted an article arguing how The First Amendment is Out of Control and in August another piece entitled, The Constitution is Sacred. Is it Also Dangerous?

The war, for the moment, is targetted at the ‘unaccountable’ billionaires: Pavel Durov, Elon Musk and his ‘X’ platform. The survival or not of Elon Musk will be crucial to the course of this aspect of the war: The EU’s Digital Service Act was always conceived to serve as ‘Brutus’ to Musk’s ‘Caesar’.

Throughout history, self-regarding and self-enriching élites have become dangerously contemptuous of their peoples. Crackdowns have been the usual first response. The cold reality here is that recent elections in France, Germany, Britain and for the Euro-parliament reveal the deep distrust and dislike of the Establishment:

“The alienation is worldwide, against the postmodern West. Europe will either distance itself from it, or become embroiled in the detestation of the “privileged ci-devant”. The end of the dollar is indeed the analogue of the abolition of feudal rights. It is inevitable, but it will also cost Europeans dearly”.

An eco-system of propaganda does not restore trust. It erodes it. [My Emphasis]

As I’ve written many times, the use of many different tools to attain divide and rule have been used against people for many centuries but needed to become very sophisticated during the Industrial Age and the rise of Labor Unions and worker solidarity. And we’re seeing the truth to the maxim: If voting changed things, it would be made illegal. Well, the NY Times suggested just that, and the EU politicos beholden to the Outlaw US Empire are saying very similar things. In Europe, it seems rather clear that methods beyond voting will be needed to affect change and free Europe from its colonization by the Outlaw US Empire. How this campaign is being waged against individuals who don’t have the billions of a Musk of Durov is important for it reveals very well just how despicable the Outlaw US Empire is—it didn’t stop with Assange; it wants to shutdown all voices spreading the truth just like your ordinary totalitarian nation. Now for the Dimity Simes interview; the Qs are bolded; all emphasis original:

The US Department of Justice has accused the 76-year-old – a former adviser to the late US President Richard Nixon who now hosts a talk show on Russian TV – with sanctions violations and money laundering. His wife Anastasia has also been indicted.

Born in Moscow, Simes left the Soviet Union at the age of 26. He had fallen afoul of Leonid Brezhnev-era officials for protesting against the USSR’s involvement in the Vietnam conflict. In the US, he was a professor at Johns Hopkins University. He also ran the Soviet policy program at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and taught at the University of California at Berkeley and at Columbia University.

Simes then served as President of the Nixon Center and later as president and CEO of the Center for the National Interest, a major Republican-party aligned think tank.

In 2013, Carnegie honored him as a “Great Immigrant and Great American.” He left National Interest in 2022 and returned to Moscow, where he hosts the show ‘The Great Game’ on Russia’s Channel One.

In an interview with Kommersant correspondent Elena Chernenko, Simes has commented in detail on the allegations made by American officials.

- According to the US Department of Justice, you allegedly participated in schemes to “violate US sanctions on behalf of Channel One” and to “launder funds obtained as a result of this scheme,” and your wife allegedly also participated in a scheme to “violate US sanctions” in order to receive funds from a blacklisted Russian businessman. How would you respond to these allegations?

- Lawlessness and blatant lies. A combination of half-truths and outright fabrications. I’m accused of money laundering. But of what, according to the US Department of Justice? It’s from my salary, which went into an account at Rosbank in Moscow, the bank used by Channel One, I transferred some of the money to my bank in Washington. And why do you think? To pay my American taxes [the US has dual taxation for citizens working abroad – RT]!

In my opinion, not only was there nothing illegal about it, there was nothing unethical about it either. They [the US authorities] say that, somehow, I was hiding something. That I could not transfer money directly from a Russian bank to an American bank. That it’s impossible because of American sanctions. So, I had to transfer money through a third bank. This, of course, complicated the process, but there is nothing illegal [about it] in either Russian or American law. It is simply outrageous to call it money laundering.

As for the accusation that I allegedly violated the US sanctions imposed on Channel One, first of all I would like to remind you that there is one thing that the Biden administration does not take seriously. I’m talking about the United States Constitution and the First Amendment, which guarantees freedom of speech and freedom of the press. And I insist that everything I have done as a journalist I have done within the framework of the First Amendment of the American Constitution.

Secondly, I would like to draw your attention to the fact that the sanctions against Channel One were not approved by the US Congress, it was just a decree from the Treasury Department saying that it was not allowed to do business with Russian federal TV channels. But this ban was very vaguely worded. It could have been interpreted as a prohibition on helping the federal channels in any financial way, through any kind of payment or donation. Or it could be interpreted more broadly as a ban on any interaction.

- How did you interpret it?

- After this decree appeared, I was told that there was a conversation between representatives of the Russian Foreign Ministry and the US State Department, during which the American side explained that the main purpose of these sanctions was to prevent Russian federal channels from receiving Western funding. And they should not affect the work of journalists.

- So you believed that your work at Channel One did not violate US sanctions?

- That’s what I was told. But I was not satisfied. I personally spoke to a senior US administration official about this. I was told that, of course, we do not approve of your work at Channel One, and if you continue to work there, it will not help your reputation and career in America, but this sanctions decree is aimed at curbing the channel’s financial revenues, not at preventing journalists from working.

- Have you spoken to lawyers?

- Of course I have. I consulted American lawyers and they had the same point of view. Now I am facing criminal charges, just for doing my job as a journalist.

- You have not been in the US since October 2022. Were you worried that the case might not be limited to a verbal expression of displeasure?

- I had a feeling that there might be a problem. But I wasn’t certain, and I had even less of an expectation that it could lead to a prosecution. I think the White House decided to go ahead and stir up the issue of Russian interference in the American election again. I had nothing to do with any interference and have nothing to do with it. Moreover, I am absolutely certain that there was and is no large-scale interference. And when I hear that charges have been brought against me as part of a campaign against Russian interference in American elections, I have the feeling that this is not only politicized, but completely fabricated.

- Yes, the New York Times, in describing the situation, wrote that the charges against you were ‘part of a broader government effort to thwart Russian attempts to influence American politics in the run-up to November’s presidential election.’

- I work for Channel One and everything I do is, by definition, very open. It’s all in Russian. Channel One does not broadcast in the United States. I could not and cannot influence the American domestic political situation in any way.

As far as interference is concerned, it would probably be more interesting to look at the demands of Ukrainian officials who have been urging the White House to take action against me for a long time.

The “[Andrey] Yermak- [Michael] McFaul Expert Group on Russian Sanctions” [run by Vladimir Zelesnky’s top advisor and a former US ambassador to Russia, to develop recommendations on sanctions] is working on this conspiracy. This is a legalized form of high-level Ukrainian interference in decision-making in Washington.

And I would be very interested to understand how it was that when my house [in the US] was searched [in August], which lasted four days, and things were taken out by trucks with trailers, how it was that on my lawn, according to the neighbors, there were about 50 people, many of whom came not in official cars, as the FBI usually does, but in private cars. And how was it that these people, some of whom later turned up in a shop in a neighbouring small town, somehow spoke Ukrainian? I would really like to understand what role Ukrainian interference in American politics played in this situation.

- Will you and your wife try to fight the charges in an American court?

- I will have to discuss this with my lawyers and until I have spoken to them in detail I will of course not make any decisions. If we have to come to the United States to contest the charges, then no, I am not in the least tempted to do so.

Knowing the methods of this administration and knowing what they are capable of with regard to the former – and possibly future – president of the United States, I mean Trump, I know that an objective consideration of my case is out of the question.

But, of course, this situation is extremely unpleasant for me. My accounts have been frozen, I cannot pay taxes on my house and other related expenses.

And at least from a moral point of view I think I’m doing absolutely the right thing. And I’m going to fight it, I’m going to actively work to make sure that such actions by the Biden administration do not go unpunished.

- It is clear that most of your colleagues in Russia actively support you, but what about in the US? Have your colleagues there reacted in any way to this situation?

- They reacted in a very resounding way – with sepulchral silence. I have not heard anyone condemning me in any way, but I have not seen any support either. My colleagues there are disciplined people, they understand the American situation. Even someone like [prominent American economist and professor] Jeffrey Sachs, who was on my show the other day, has disappeared from leading American TV channels, and even he is not allowed to publish in leading American publications.

I say ‘even him’ because he was considered one of America’s leading economists and political scientists. And even he is cut off from expressing his views there. There is a climate of totalitarian political correctness in the US, where it’s impossible to even discuss the issue of relations with Russia, because as soon as a person starts to say something that differs from the general Russophobic line, they are immediately told: ‘Oh, we’ve already heard that from (Russian President Vladimir) Putin.’

- Some Western media call you a ‘propagandist’ and a ‘mouthpiece of the Kremlin.’

- For them, a ‘propagandist’ and a ‘mouthpiece of the Kremlin’ is anyone who deviates from the ‘correct’ American political line. Not only do I deviate from it in no uncertain terms, I do not accept it at all. As for being a ‘mouthpiece for the Kremlin,’ I am not aware that anyone has appointed me to that position or given me that authority. If you look at the two events in which I participated and in which Putin was present, you will see that both times I argued with him.

- The St Petersburg International Economic Forum and the Valdai Forum.

- Yes. And I have a clear feeling that on Channel One in general I am given the opportunity to say what I want to say. In times of war, of course, there is and can be no complete freedom, and I don’t need to be censored in this respect. I myself know that war is war. But no one has ever given me instructions. I have heard that they exist, but not only have I never seen them, no one has ever said anything like that to me personally.

At the same time, of course, I am interested in the opinion of the Russian authorities. If I were not interested, I would not be doing my job. It would be quite strange to be a TV presenter in a war situation and not be interested in the position of the decision-makers. But here it’s a completely different dynamic. I am the one asking questions to understand the situation and the positions of the decision-makers. But there is absolutely no question of anyone giving me instructions, even in the most veiled form.

- You have, of course, an amazing biography. You were persecuted and even arrested for dissent in the Soviet Union, and now you are facing a huge sentence in the United States, also, one might say, for dissent.

- Yes, but in the Soviet Union I was not given a huge sentence, I was given two weeks, which I served honestly in Matrosskaya Tishina [prison]. Nevertheless, when I left the Soviet Union I was allowed to take with me what belonged to me, even if it was very little. And the main thing is that when my parents – human-rights activists who had been expelled from the USSR by the KGB – left, they were able to take with them paintings and icons that belonged to our family, and even some of their antique furniture.

During the search of our house [in the US] all this was confiscated. At the same time, these things had nothing to do with my wife’s work. These are things that have belonged to us for many years, and in the case of the paintings and icons, for many decades, because they belonged to my parents. And now everything has been taken from the walls in what I can only describe as a pogrom. The roof is broken, the floor is damaged. What has this got to do with a legitimate investigation?

Interestingly, they left my gun in a conspicuous place. In general, the first thing they confiscate in a search like this is your means of communication. But they were not very good at that in my case, because I had not been there for almost two years, and all my devices are with me here. But they found my gun and for some reason they left it in a prominent place. I don’t know, maybe it was some kind of hint to me that I should shoot myself or that they might do something to me, I can’t read other people’s minds. Especially the minds of people with a slightly twisted imagination and a dangerous sense of permissiveness.

- I suppose I have one last question, but it’s a bit of a thesis. Recently, as part of another project, I was digging through the archives, looking at news footage from the spring of 2004, when Sergey Lavrov had just become foreign minister. I was surprised to discover that you were the first representative of the expert community, not just internationally but in general, to be received by the newly appointed minister. You discussed Russian-American relations and Lavrov said at the time that there were no strategic differences between Moscow and Washington, only tactical ones. Twenty years have passed and the sides have only disagreements, tactical and, what is worse, strategic. In your opinion, who is to blame for everything that has gone wrong?  

- First of all, thank you for reminding me that I was the first representative of the expert community to meet Lavrov after his appointment as Minister. This was probably not unusual, as I had known him for a number of years when he was Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN in New York.

I was very concerned at the time about how many Russian diplomatic leaders, and not just diplomats but government agencies in general, were willing to play a game of give and take with the US. I was sure that this could not lead to anything good. Lavrov stood out from the others in this respect: of course, he was committed to cooperation with the US at that time, but at the same time he was able to speak in a more confident tone and showed a good, slightly sarcastic sense of humor when dealing with his American colleagues’ open attacks on Russian interests, on Russian dignity.

In 2004, I remember, we had one of the Russian leaders, not Putin, but quite an important person, who spoke at the Center for the National Interest shortly after the American invasion of Iraq. And he said that Russia does not support what the US has done in Iraq and thinks it is dangerous but will not interfere and will not try to gain political capital at the expense of the US. And he went on to say that maybe if we had a different relationship, a more engaged relationship, we could support America, but we don’t have that relationship and it’s not on the horizon yet. I think that, in 2004, despite, of course, a great deal of dissatisfaction with American actions in Yugoslavia in 1999, Russia had a great willingness to cooperate with the US and a general acceptance that it was the only real superpower.

I have studied Russian policy in detail since the end of the Cold War, and with the exception of [Prime Minister Yevgeny] Primakov’s plane turning over the Atlantic in 1999, I have generally not seen any Russian actions that could have caused serious dissatisfaction within the US. You know that back in 1999, as prime minister, Putin offered the Americans cooperation in the fight against Al-Qaeda and the Taliban. The reaction of the Clinton administration was: it’s not that the Russians want to be really good partners, they want the Americans to tolerate the new Russian influence in Central Asia. And US ambassadors, on the contrary, were instructed to oppose this Russian influence in every possible way.

Then came 2007 and Putin expressed his concerns about US and NATO actions in the famous ‘Munich speech,’ but relations were still more-or-less normal. Russia had in principle been very restrained for a very long time, in Georgia, Ukraine and elsewhere, although it was less and less willing to accept American hegemony and imposition of rules. But when it came to decision makers in Moscow, it seemed to me that no one was looking to bring the matter to a head.

You are right, this is a long and complicated conversation about how we came to live like this. But I am convinced that since the late 1990s and early 2000s, the idea of preventing Russia from being an independent force on the international stage has become more and more dominant in Washington. And I did not see during that period, and I do not see now, any signs of interest among decision-makers in the United States in a serious discussion of the problems that have accumulated.

After Putin’s 2007 speech in Munich, a number of people who were there told me that he had done it for nothing. One very distinguished former American diplomat, who was generally regarded as pro-Russian, said to me: ‘This was not helpful’. And I asked him: helpful to whom? And he replied that nobody would agree to meet the demands and concerns that Putin was expressing. So, you see, even such a sensible and experienced person, who, among other things, was a consultant to major Russian companies, it didn’t even occur to him that what Putin was saying should be taken seriously.

So, it seems to me that the main responsibility for what has happened lies with the US and, above all, with the American deep state, the deep state most of whose representatives, as I found out over many years of working in Washington, are hostile to Russia. They were not interested in any rapprochement with Russia, no matter what was said publicly. I discussed this topic on air with Sachs, and he has the same feeling that this deep state ensures the continuity of this kind of Washington policy, regardless of the preferences of this or that president in the White House.

Of course, presidents, secretaries of state and national security advisers are all people with their own views and approaches to Russia. But if we talk in general, in my estimation, starting with Bill Clinton, it somehow turned out that it was people who were either critical or hostile towards Russia who in practice played a decisive role in formulating Washington’s policy towards Moscow.

- You just reminded me of the memoirs of the former US Ambassador to Russia, John Sullivan, which we wrote about recently. In it, he recalls how he promised the Russian presidential aide Yuri Ushakov that he would convey an invitation to Trump to visit Moscow to celebrate WW2 Victory Day, while he himself, according to his own recollections, was determined to do everything possible to prevent such a visit from taking place.

- I did not meet John Sullivan but, in the past, when I flew from Washington to Moscow, I was always invited to meetings with the heads of the US diplomatic missions. They were good and different, the most impressive was Bill Burns. 

- The current head of the CIA.

- Yes. I always thought they were basically decent people. But every time it turned out that no matter how reasonable they were, in the end they followed the ‘party line,’ which is very hostile to the recognition of Russia as an independent great power.

A very impressive story. Simes forgot to mention the fact that the sanctions are illegal under international law. Simes personal property got the same treatment as Russian state property that was confiscated by Obama, then Trump. The War on Russian media is global in scope as no truth is to emerge to challenge the Establishment Narrative. At the Moon of Alabama blog, I recall many arguments supporting the idea that the Deep State doesn’t exist. We don’t see those much anymore as its existence is even more overt. History shows Totalitarian states are either defeated via war or fall apart from the weight of their own contradictions; none has yet fallen to a mass popular uprising. After the Eastern Economic Forum and China’s Forum on African-Chinese Cooperation, the outlines of the two major Blocs are now very visible and will become more so during the UNGA Debate that concludes September. I see many subscribers didn’t read the eastern Economic Forum’s transcript for whatever reasons. I suggest reading this recap by Pepe Escobar that provides some of the highlights.

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