Showing posts with label Moscow. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Moscow. Show all posts

Sunday, June 12, 2022

Defeating Putin In Donbas Is The Cheap, Easy Option

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Tuesday, August 13, 2019

Hong Kong Protests: The World Should Not Watch A Possible Massacre

The political solution is one country, two systems. That is what Beijing accepted when it reclaimed the territory of Hong Kong.

The protests are so large scale. They represent the sentiment of the people in Hong Kong.

This is not about changing the political system in China. This is about keeping the political system in Hong Kong. Beijing should not have problems with that.

More than 10 weeks of protests with the Hong Kong airport shut down --- that is enough. The message is loud and clear and it needs to be heard.

The agreement of one country, two systems was between Britain and Beijing. Britain has a moral responsibility to speak up.

This revolution is being webcast live. China should not think there is a military solution to this. There has not been a police solution. Obviously. What are you going to do that the Hong Kong police has not already done? Any attempt by the Chinese military to try to mow down the protesters out in the streets is going to infect the Chinese mainland. China could see large scale protests inside China itself. 1989 will have come to China.

Or, it could negotiate with the protesters. Accept their demands. They want the CEO of Hong Kong - or whatever her title is - out. Well, let her go. They want the extradition bill scrapped. Well, scrap it. They want the chief executive of Hong Kong to be directly elected by the people of Hong Kong. Well, do it already. They want all members of the Hong Kong legislature directly elected by the people. I say, why not? They want the one country, two systems to be permanent. Make it permanent.

Carrie Lam does not have the authority to accept or reject these demands. The Hong Kong protest leaders seek to negotiate with Xi Jinping.

Accept the demands or prepare for the collapse of the Chinese Communist Party inside China itself. Should that happen, finally the unification with Taiwan can happen. Taiwan is proof Chinese people can prosper without a communist party running the show. Maybe what China needs is to get rid of the communist party to avoid the middle-income trap. You don't want to get trapped.

The Chinese constitution actually has provisions for things like free speech and other parties besides the communist party. But the fact on the ground is otherwise.

A 25% tariff on 100% of Chinese exports to the United States will bring 1989 to China. Hong Kong is leading the way. If there is a military crackdown in Hong Kong, the rest of the world should follow the US lead and also slap tariffs on Chinese exports. You might only have to do it for a few short weeks.

The world can not watch idly by. No massacre can be allowed to happen. When the people revolt like they are revolting in Hong Kong, they are always right.

A 1989 will create a federal China. Tibet will become the Arunachal Pradesh of China.

Military intervention in Hong Kong will be the death knell for the Chinese Communist Party in China. 30 years after 1989, the winds are blowing again.

There are protests also in Moscow.

The Hong Kong protesters are not organized enough. Become one organization with an elected central committee and leadership. Elect one person to be your leader and spokesperson. Basically, form one political party.

So far the protest organizers have focused on organizing the protests themselves. And they have done a fabulous job. The scale of the protests is incomparable to anything in recent history anywhere. But the organization has to go one level up. It has to become political. Five million people need to form one democratic political organization. It can be done quickly through digital tools.

These protests are like New Year's Eve in Times Square, only much, much larger, and much more sustained. One year I stood for 10 hours near Times Square. This has been going on for 10 weeks.

Ordinary citizens in the 100 biggest cities of the world all need to gather in their own cities to express solidarity with the people of Hong Kong. The governments of the world need to speak up against any possible military interventions before they happen.

There are Chinese in Hong Kong. But then there are also Chinese in London, and New York City, and Sydney. They should form the nucleus around which the non-Chinese should also congregate. One solidarity protest gathering on a Saturday or Sunday will send a strong signal to the leaders of the world. The Chinese diaspora needs to wake up.

Freedom is truly an internal matter. It is a matter of the heart.
































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Thursday, October 15, 2015

Russia's Ego Is Geopolitical

English: President Bashar al-Assad of Syria . ...
English: President Bashar al-Assad of Syria . Original background. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)
Russia is such a huge country geographically, never mind it has fewer people than Pakistan, never mind its economy is smaller than India's, but the largest country in the world, geographically speaking, feels the need to prove it is a military superpower on par with the United States. China, on the other hand, has no qualms that its global prestige can not exceed its economic might, and so stays economy focused. A large population can make you do that. Grow or get challenged, from inside. There is also a hunger among ordinary Russians for someone like Putin, someone who will make them feel like the superpower they were.

Geopolitics is very real. All large countries have spheres of influence, just like Jupiter's gravity is felt on its moons. Russia's geopolitical pull will still hold to be true should some day Russia become a democracy in the western sense of the word.

Russia is a big country: deal with it.

Russian Military Uses Syria as Proving Ground, and West Takes Notice
a public demonstration of new weaponry, tactics and strategy. ..... The strikes have involved aircraft never before tested in combat ..... a ship-based cruise missile fired more than 900 miles from the Caspian Sea, which, according to some analysts, surpasses the American equivalent in technological capability. ...... might soon back an Iranian-led offensive that appeared to be forming in the northern province of Aleppo ......

months of meticulous planning behind Russia’s first military campaign outside former Soviet borders since the dissolution of the Soviet Union

..... a little-noticed — and still incomplete — modernization that has been underway in Russia for several years, despite strains on the country’s budget......

Putin had overseen the most rapid transformation of the country’s armed forces since the 1930s.

..... Russia’s fighter jets are, for now at least, conducting nearly as many strikes in a typical day against rebel troops opposing the government of President Bashar al-Assad as the American-led coalition targeting the Islamic State has been carrying out each month this year....... an increasingly confrontational and defiant Russia under Mr. Putin ...... the operation could be intended to send a message to the United States and the West about the restoration of the country’s military prowess and global reach after decades of post-Soviet decay. ....... we are going to school on what the Russian military is capable of today.” ....... Russian military spending .. has surged to its highest level in a quarter-century, reaching $81 billion, or 4.2 percent of the country’s gross domestic product ...... Moscow’s largest deployment to the Middle East since the Soviet Union deployed in Egypt in the 1970s. ....... their ability to move a lot of stuff real far, real fast ...... Russia is not only bringing some of its most advanced hardware to the fight, it has also deployed large field kitchens and even dancers and singers to entertain the troops — all signs that Moscow is settling in for the long haul ...... American officials say Russia has closely coordinated with its allies to plan its current fight. .......... the Russians are already harvesting lessons from the campaign to apply to their other military operations .....

“Russia is using their incursion into Syria as an operational proving ground.”



Putin Says U.S. Fails to Cooperate in Syria
suggesting that they had “mush for brains.” ..... widespread accusations in the West that Russian warplanes were targeting practically every group opposed to the Syrian government except the Islamic State ...... “Recently, we have offered the Americans: ‘Give us objects that we shouldn’t target.’ Again, no answer,” he said. “It seems to me that some of our partners have mush for brains.” ...... Aside from propping up Syria’s president, Bashar al-Assad, Russia’s staunchest regional ally, the Russian government is believed to be motivated by the idea of ending its international isolation stemming from the Ukraine crisis. It also wants to be treated as an equal partner by the West in addressing the intractable problems facing Syria, which include the spread of the Islamic State extremist group and the need to shape a political transition to end the civil war that has killed at least 250,000 people and displaced millions. ........ For more than four years, the government has held central Damascus while shelling the poorer towns ringing the city, where many residents were among the first to rebel against Mr. Assad. ....... a call by Al Qaeda’s Syrian affiliate, the Nusra Front, for revenge attacks against Russia. ...... urged jihadists from the Caucasus to kill one Russian for every Syrian who had died. ...... He said the horrors to be visited on the Russians would overwhelm the memories of what happened to them in Afghanistan in the 1980s. ..... Jambulat Umarov, the foreign and information minister for Chechnya, also in the Caucasus, called the group “obsolete” and bragged that his region of Russia was the only place in the world that had gained the upper hand against Islamic militants....... Both Russia and the United States have said that the Islamic State is the target of their attacks in Syria. Russia also maintains that removing Mr. Assad now will bring chaos, a position that the West and regional states reject.
U.S. Weaponry Is Turning Syria Into Proxy War With Russia
Insurgent commanders say that since Russia began air attacks in support of the Syrian government, they are receiving for the first time bountiful supplies of powerful American-made antitank missiles. ...... the Syrian conflict is edging closer to an all-out proxy war between the United States and Russia. ..... The increased levels of support have raised morale on both sides of the conflict, broadening war aims and hardening political positions, making a diplomatic settlement all the more unlikely. ..... Spirits are rising on the government side as well. Weapons and morale are “at a new level,” said an official with the newly revived alliance of Russia, Iran and the Lebanese Shiite militia Hezbollah that is fighting on the behalf of Damascus. ..... the alliance is seeking something closer to victory. The aim now is to retake Syrian land that had been given up for lost, take the ouster of Mr. Assad off the table for good and reach a far more advantageous political solution after establishing “new facts on the ground.” ...... One official with a rebel group that is fighting in Hama called the supply “carte blanche.” “We can get as much as we need and whenever we need them,” he said ...... “By bombing us, Russia is bombing the 13 ‘Friends of Syria’ countries,” he said, referring to the group of the United States and its allies that called for the ouster of Mr. Assad after his crackdown on political protests in 2011. ..... Russian attack helicopters swoop low over fields, seemingly close enough to touch, then veer upward to unleash barrages of rockets, flares and heavy machine-gun fire. Explosions pepper distant villages, with smoke rising over clusters of houses as narrators declare progress against

“terrorists.”

....... Both Russia and the United States have declared they are fighting the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, but the two global powers support opposite sides in the battle between Mr. Assad and the Syrians who rebelled against his rule.

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