Masopher's Mind

After the second world war, when Europe collapsed in the most dramatic fashion since the fall of Rome: When Russian and American tanks roamed freely along Austrian, German, French and English roads, something unique happened. More so than Hitler’s horrific rise, it dawned on Russian and American leaders one thought even more monsterous: The world was theirs to take.

For Americans it may have been a desire to spread the plum candy liberal democracy of being able to spin a wheel and get money, for Russians it may have been a hard working sombre but highly educated man wiping his brow after a day working in “the peoples” field but in both of these imaginations they totally disregarded the core concept of free will and self determination.

After decimating the Japanese empire with nuclear weapons, there really were no alternative ideologies left to give pause to the onslaught of liberal capitalism and communism, except for each other, and so; with German scientists at their command, America and the Soviet Union began to mutually threaten the world with Armageddon.

Once they reached the stage of MAD (mutual assured destruction) other weapons were soon employed the most potent of all being….the simple lie.

When a child discovers the art of misrepresenting the facts it is a glorious event. The child lies just to see what its all about. It lies because lying is possible. It lies for attention, it lies so it doesn’t look bad, it lies to avoid stress the child lies because its parents lie. Mom and dad lie to them about beings that give them stuff for being good in case of the fat red man, free as in the case of the bunny or in exchange for something, like the tooth fairy. One can see why lies were appealing to thinkers in Moscow and Washington DC.

The lie has always existed in state affairs. Propagation of truth is always mixed judiciously with exaggerations and opinions as the propagator sees it and would like to be seen. Weilded correctly, the truth is a devastating weapon. My former professor, a military IO (information operations) man, once said that the best weapon is the truth. I agree, but unfortunately the truth is an expensive weapon in a society of morally corrupt individuals and even though one drop of truth has the potency of 100 Hiroshimas, a thousand lies are just as effective and easier to make.

France, a badly broken and belittled belligerent in the bellicose of the early 20th century was first to jump onto this fact. Perhaps fostered in the courts of Louis and Napoleon, the DeGaullists, desperate to denounce the dualism in the world spread rumours (perhaps via their cousins in Britain and Moscow) which helped to ratchet up the rhetoric and tensions between the two super powers. Once they obtained their own nuclear deterrents (and began proliferating technology to Syria, Saddam’s Iraq and Libya) they perhaps began to feel slighly more at ease. At ease, because they too can now trigger the deaths of millions.

The lies, cloaked truths, creation and spread of secrets was perhaps the most devastating weapon used in the cold war. Devastating because unlike the weapons of science, the weapons of the “humanities” were used indiscriminately.

20 years after the fall of the iron curtain, we live with a nuclear legacy that continues to endanger the lives of billions of people who don’t give a shit about the choice between capitalists raping us or communists enslaving us. In truth we probably want neither, nor do any of us care for nuclear weapons. Now all 6 billion of us have to deal with a few thousand Islamists grabbing those same weapons and exterminating us in their war against a few hundred imperialists.

American President, Barrack Obama has admirably made great steps on the trudge back to “Global zero”.  It will take 30 years just to get rid of half of the current capability. We will have to deal with cold war nukes for a long time to come but the lies that were also created and continue to be created will last even longer.

In early 2010 Russia and NATO badboy France tentatively agreed a deal where an amphibious assault ship made in France would be sold to the Russian Navy. The ship and the ability to make copies of the ship, (transfer of technology) was agreed to be sold in the background of France and Europe’s continued frustration in selling military technology to a market saturated by American products. America is literally a no fly zone for EADS planes and France is having a hell of a time getting countries like Kuwait and Brazil to accept their perfectly good contender, the Raphael, which is going up against the faithful but old American F-18 Super Hornet. Because the French Government is so intimately tied to its arms industry this would be a great case of real politik: If we can’t sell to the Americans and they keep nicking our other customers then we’ll sell to the Russians!

This represented the first time that a NATO country would sell military technology to NATOs natural enemy. Later the deal hit a few snags where France wanted to water down the product and Russia wanted a fully operational weapons platform.

France has had a very close relationship with Russia even before Communism. France and Russia had very strong pacts defending themselves against Germany which was the global threat of the 19^th and 20^th Century. When Communism rose and Lenin Stalin and Trotsky were fighting against Russian imperialism, France served as a natural escape for much of the Romonov aristocracy. There they stayed in exile until this day, though some have returned meekly to Russia. During Germany’s second bout of belligerence Jews fled to Russia and France from Germany and despite the bad conditions for Semites in these countries they managed to establish themselves.

France has always cast a suspicious eye on the United States, even while American boys were dying to liberate it from the Germans. In my readings I think General DeGaulle suspected that America had reverse-imperialist intentions and hoped to colonize France! Whether this will ever be verified is moot, the Anglo-American connection has always been a sore spot. During the cold war too, France was antagonistic to NATO and was known for reaching out to Moscow.  With an eye to forming a third pole in the polarizing world, Charles De Gaulle left the NATO alliance in 1966 and managed to build his own nuclear power. France has now become a first class supplier of nuclear energy and sovereign owner of its own stockpile, something that Britain failed to do. When the Berlin wall and Iron Curtain fell, France rebuilt its ties with East Germany, and with Moscow. During the Georgia war of 2008, it was Sarkozy and France that stepped in and mediated between the arrogant Georgians and surly Russians. The invasion of Iraq was again, another place where Russia, France and Germany stood off against American intentions and English acquiescence. Together, France and Germany have risen as the true drivers of the EUs success while Britain limps behind, barely out of recession and only able to supply spies and tabloid headlines to this remarkable political experiment.

The laissez-faire, liberal and leftist lean of “le France” compels it into a natural embrace with a very leftist Russia. France’s revolutions and thinking produced many hard left socialist regimes including the one that existed in Moscow.

Will France sell a fully functional Mistral to Russia? I see no reason why not.

The great red bear died suddenly in 1991 and since then, Europe and the United States have struggled to tear off strips of the carcass before it can resurrect itself in some other more malignant form. Georgia, the Ukraine, Poland, the Adriatic countries. Nato and the EU bloated themselves by snapping up and supporting newly independent regimes before Russian hegemony crept back into play. And this is the nature of the struggle in the Balkans and black sea areas: Russian backed breakaways versus European and American backed breakaways. But without ideology to hide behind or blame, there cannot be a cold war. It seems sleight of hand that Russia becomes an open market while maintaining military threat upon the world. The bear isn’t red and it’s a little smaller but it’s leaner, meaner and smarter than before, more of a threat not less. Europe under France unified Germany and two timing Britain has also carved out a niche for itself. From de Gaulle to Schroder and Blair, Europe has finally reestablished itself as a Europe capable of invading countries and interfering with internal affairs rather than being pawns of the US and USSR. China has come to the fore as well implementing its own successful chimera of communism and free market economy. The fifth creature is India that uses Russian weapons but also American consumerism. The world has gone from a great eagle and a great bear to a great number of bear-eagle chimerical creatures each singing different words but with a curiously familiar tune.
Will soviet tanks be rolling into our front yard? Not likely but we must remember that it’s not necessary. Once the bank repossesses your land tanks aren’t needed. You don’t need to be conscripted into the army either. A few months of poverty makes army career seem attractive. Unlike during the cold war, Russia has a firm grip on the global economy. Russia doesn’t need to quote Marx to sell weapons. The world is in state where people are willing to buy weapons from anyone because there is no religion, no ideology, no real definition of friends or foes. There is still a lot of rhetoric and some of that rhetoric may involve religious or ideological themes but it’s just excuses and obvious misquoting. The FARC in South America don’t know communism, Al Qaeda don’t know Islam. Its all just greed and power mongering. Bellum omnium contra omnes is imminent reality with only the global class of wealthy elites benefiting in harmony from the discord and poverty of the plebian underclass.

People with money were never the enemy, in fact they are for the most part good. Rich people dont fight wars, they dont force people to be unhappy, poor, niggardly to each other. You are our own worst enemy, you the poor are the ones who fight in the war, you are the ones that refuse to take part in democracy, you are the ones that steal from and decieve one another. You snipe at each other and ridicule each others ideas despite having none of your own.

In many ways you deserve to be terrorized and set against one another by these factions.

Something truly is rotten in the state of this world.