Click here for Exit the Cuckoo's Nest's posting standards and aims.
Source: Dialogue Works
Go to source, above, to hear Dmitry Orlov's usually blunt, incisive answers to Nimo's question. The video doesn't show up here when I try the usual means and it's not worth my time to mess around trying to make it when all you have to do is click the source link.
Click here for Exit the Cuckoo's Nest's posting standards and aims.
Source: Edward Curtin
Hold the Applause for Trump, the “Peacemaker”
There is history worth remembering as Trump is lauded in certain circles on the so-called “right” and “left” as a peacemaker with Russia over the US/NATO proxy war against Russia via Ukraine: President Richard Nixon, who ran as the peace candidate in 1968 with a “secret plan” for peace in Vietnam that was actually a plan for more war, visited China in February 1972 in a move to exploit the Soviet-China split, and yet the US war against Vietnam went on until April 30, 1975 when the U.S. was driven out of Vietnam.
I think extreme caution is advised when it comes to Trump’s plans to end the U.S. proxy war against Russia, which, following the Nixon-Kissinger script, seems to be aimed at splitting the Russian-Chinese partnership now threatening U.S. world domination.
Trump, like his predecessor Joseph Biden who presided over the proxy war against Russia and the genocide of Palestinians by Israel, is no man of peace. He is fully in support of the extinction of the Palestinians and behind Israel’s war aims in the Middle-East. So when it comes to his recent overtures to Russia and a resolution to the U.S./NATO proxy war against Russia, one needs to reflect on history and Trump’s inclination to make “a deal.” The man, after all, was a reality-television star and has long reveled in radical reversals of previous statements and intentions. For example, in his first term, he often talked of withdrawing from NATO but never did; NATO, in fact, expanded under his watch. He talked about ending the U.S./NATO support for Ukraine’s bombing of Russian-speaking areas of eastern Ukraine, only to withdraw from the Minsk Accords and send military equipment to Ukraine to bomb those areas.
Those who are praising him now say he is a changed man after time “in the wilderness” these last four years (one is reminded of Nixon’s wandering wilderness days from 1960-1968). Would a changed man have Elon Musk as his right-hand man or have as Vice President JD Vance whose career has been backed by Palantir Technology’s Peter Thiel?
Investigator journalist Whitney Webb has reported extensively on Thiel and Vance’s ties and the interconnections between them and other supporters of the surveillance state tied to the Democrats, such as former Google CEO Eric Schmidt, among others. If you assume the surface war between Trump and the Democrats is the real deal, Webb’s work will have you wondering. They have their differences, of course, but a reading of history would suggest both fully back the surveillance panopticon that has stolen American’s freedom and privacy in the name of what else – freedom and privacy.
Now Trump-Musk-Vance are touting their dedication to free speech and their opposition to censorship, which are clearly admirable goals. But one needs to remember Marshall McLuhan’s adage that the medium is the message, and that the medium touted by Trump – front and center – is represented by the omnipresence of Elon Musk, whose face symbolizes the smirking machine and the use of digital technology to accumulate and exert power. In a digital age, technological technique is King Propaganda, and technique transforms everything it touches into a machine.
As in Lewis Carroll’s Through the Looking Glass, the brothers Tweedledee Democrat and Tweedledum Republican fight over their rattle as the audience focuses on their battle while their joint racket goes unattended.
‘I know what you’re thinking about,’ Tweedledum; ‘but it isn’t so, no how.’
‘Contrariwise,’ continued Tweedledee, ‘if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.’
‘I was thinking, Alice said very politely, ‘which is the best way out of this wood: it’s getting so dark. Would you tell me please?’
It is dark. Of course, the way out is to stop reacting and do what the press is obligated to do: be skeptical, question authority, and don’t be cheerleaders for anyone in power, whether they be Biden or Trump or someone else.
The opposite of such skepticism has been happening, and many in the alternative press, who [including me] have correctly accused Biden and the Democrats of war crimes, lies, censorship, Russiagate propaganda, etc., are now awash with grandiose praise for Trump, many calling him a revolutionary in a good sense. This is absurd.
Such hyperbole is quite naïve, as has been the calling of Vice-President JD Vance’s Munich Security Conference speech historic and Ciceronian. It was a good speech [text here] in many ways, but . . . .
He rightly ripped the Europeans for their censorship of dissidents and their repression of alternative voices, although his examples were weak and narrowly focused.
His statement, while surely partisan, was true that “I will admit that sometimes the loudest voices for censorship have come not from within Europe, but from within my own country, where the prior administration threatened and bullied social media companies to censor so-called misinformation.”
His defense of democratic mandates was strong when he said:
You cannot win a democratic mandate by censoring your opponents or putting them in jail, whether that’s the leader of the opposition, a humble Christian praying in her own home, or a journalist trying to report the news. Nor can you win one by disregarding your basic electorate on questions like who gets to be a part of our shared society.
When he criticized European leaders for allowing mass migration into their countries, his hypocrisy stood out. As any fair person should recognize, immigration policies have long been an issue in need of reform. But the mass creation of people fleeing their countries for safe havens in Europe are the direct result of US/NATO war policies in Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Serbia, Syria, etc., policies supported by Republicans and Democrats alike and seconded by their lapdogs in Europe.
The same is true for immigration here in the U.S.A. where immigration policy has long been in need of reform that neither party would undertake, but the main contingent of immigrants entering this country comes here to escape horrendous conditions in their home countries due in great part to U.S. foreign policies in support of repressive regimes and economic policies favoring the rich amid U.S. efforts to control Latin America. Without those immigrants, the U.S. economy would collapse.
But Vance’s speech is a minor part of my argument here.
The real issue is Trump and the question of whether or not he is for real in his efforts for peace in Ukraine. I am very skeptical and think it is justified.
I am convinced that the US/NATO war against Russia will not be ending unless NATO is dissolved, which Trump is not proposing. He only wishes to strengthen NATO with European money, not that of the U.S. NATO’s only raison d’être is to destroy Russia as an independent country and create regime change there through multiple means. This has always been so. This is why NATO has existed for so long and has expanded. Open warfare in Ukraine is just one means among many they have used over the years. You can end the overt war and continue the covert.
If NATO is not dissolved, the undermining of Russia will continue under Trump, who seems to recognize that the proxy war is lost on the battlefield, a fact obvious for years despite U.S. government and mainstream media propaganda to the contrary – propaganda so blatantly false that it raises questions about people’s gullibility. How many foreign leaders does such media need to call the new Hitlers before people wise up?
Trump’s theatrical antics will persist, however, and Trump and Putin will probably eventually meet and some deal may be struck on Russia’s terms, but if Russia doesn’t want to be tricked again, it should beware the possibility of a Trump Trojan horse.
Apropos today, in 1964 and then in 1965, the great French sociologist Jacques Ellul published his classic studies. First came The Technological Society to be quickly followed by Propaganda, linked books in which he brilliantly shed an early light on what we now find everywhere – a digital world where propaganda is vital for the state’s functioning and where words like democracy, truth, and fact yield to the technologue’s magic wand.
Another French social thinker, Paul Virilio, spoke of the information bomb, the glut of information produced by digital media and the Internet. One key aspect of this marriage is speed, Virilio’s specialty being dromology, the study of speed. It is worth noting how fast Trump has acted in his first month in office. This is no doubt aided and abetted by his right-hand man Elon Musk, Mr. X., Mr. Space Shot, Mr. Digital World himself, who is prominently displayed by Trump’s side at every photo op. Unlike the Biden warmongers who presented themselves in a more circumspect manner while propagandizing the American public, Trump makes it very clear that digital technology is his key to rule. And flooding the information superhighway with a rapid-fire series of orders and pronouncements is presented as government efficiency at its finest. But things happen so fast one can’t keep pace with them.
Elon Musk and Peter Thiel are two technological billionaires who should be considered crucial to Trump’s plans. As Ellul’s work makes clear, such men are key to effective propaganda. How can anyone consider such men benign supporters of democracy and justice?
I think the talk of a Trump revolution in favor of peace and democracy is hyperbolically irresponsible. It is unworthy of good journalism that requires prudence and patience when the powerful pitch their deals. The propaganda from the Biden administration and their mainstream media accomplices should have taught everyone that. But the appeal of a savior is very powerful.
You know, ‘if it was so, it might be; and if it were so, it would be; but as it isn’t, it ain’t. That’s logic.’
Click here for Exit the Cuckoo's Nest's posting standards and aims.
Source: Dances with Bears
by John Helmer, Moscow
@bears_with
Compos mentis was missing in the Oval Office on Monday morning. French President Emmanuel Macron recognized it, and was so pleased, he repeatedly said: “Thank you, dear Donald”.
The answers to press questions given by President Donald Trump, sitting beside Macron, revealed that Trump doesn’t understand what end-of-war terms President Vladimir Putin has announced, nor the substance of the conversations, back channel and front in Riyadh, which have been going on between the Russians and Trump’s representatives.
In the 28-minute morning presser, Trump spoke in repeated slogans except for a handful of new briefing points he was given by his staff: the President stressed he has no points of difference with the French, the other Europeans, or NATO on how to negotiate an end to the Ukraine war. “There was great unity in that room”, Trump claimed of the first round of meetings with the Macron delegation, which included a videolink to other G7 leaders.
“Take back some of the land”, Trump then claimed after being asked what end-of-war terms in the Ukraine he has discussed with Macron. “We’ll see if we get some land back”, Trump repeated.
Asked if he planned to go to Moscow on May 9, Trump revealed he does not know the significance of the May 9 celebration in Russia. “If this all gets settled out, sure I would go, and he could come here, too. I don’t know Ninth of May, no – I, err, that’s pretty soon. At the appropriate time I would go to Moscow…Within weeks. I think we could end it within weeks if we’re smart. If we’re not smart, it’ll keep going…” Trump revealed, however, that he has given up his effort to hold a summit meeting with Putin without preparatory agreement of terms for an end of the Ukraine war.
In the Oval Office, and in a simultaneous social media post, Trump repeated his interest in getting “payback” for US war spending in the Ukraine by negotiating a “rare earths” agreement. “I emphasized”, the media post said, “the importance of the vital ‘Critical Minerals and Rare-Earths Deal’ between the United States and Ukraine, which we hope will be signed very soon! This deal, which is an ‘Economic Partnership’, will ensure the American people recoup the Tens of Billions of Dollars and Military Equipment sent to Ukraine, while also helping Ukraine’s economy grow as this Brutal and Savage War comes to an end. At the same time, I am in serious discussions with President Vladimir Putin of Russia concerning the ending of the War, and also major Economic Development transactions which will take place between the United States and Russia. Talks are proceeding very well!”
In repeating to Macron his preoccupation with “rare earths”, Trump revealed in the Oval Office that he has no idea of the geography of the minerals he is negotiating to take over, so that “we get our money back over a period of time. But it is also beneficial to their economy, to them as a country.” Trump does not comprehend that the minerals — “rare earths and other things”, he called them — are mostly located, no longer in Ukraine but in the four new provinces of Russia and on the seabed off Russian Crimea.
Trump also revealed he has no idea of how his proposed US investment in the minerals would be protected and by whom.
Reporters pressed to see if the minerals agreement is subterfuge for a US security pledge to the Kiev regime, substituting for NATO membership. Asked explicitly if the minerals deal will engage a US security guarantee for the Ukraine, Trump answered: “Well, uhh, it’ll be — Europe is going to make sure nothing happens. I don’t think it’s going to be much of a problem. I think once we settle, ahhh, there’s going to be no more war in Ukraine. You’re not go – uhhh, it’s not going to be a very big problem. That’s going to be the least of it.”
Several hours later, when the French president was asked at the second press conference after the talks had concluded, Macron hinted at a division and combination of military “deterrence capacity” between European and US forces which, he said, is a “turning point in my view, and one of the great areas of progress we have made during this trip.” Trump was uncomprehending; he did not remember what Macron had been saying over lunch.
From evidence in Moscow of talks on Trump’s priority “major Economic Development transactions”, Putin has promoted his negotiator, Kirill Dmitriev, to ministerial rank with the title “Special Representative of the President of Russia for Investment and Economic Cooperation with Foreign Countries.” The text of the decree was signed on Sunday evening.
The Kremlin was asked if Dmitriev has been promoted to ministerial rank, and if in future negotiations with the Americans he will be equal in precedence with Foreign Minister Lavrov and Presidential Assistant Yury Ushakov, the Kremlin spokesman said: “I don’t know.”
Dmitriev was talkative in Riyadh on February 18 on the prospects for the return to Russia of US businesses, product brand-names, and investors. But on the US agreement with Kiev for takeover of coal, iron ore, oil, gas and other resources in Novorossiya and the Crimea, Dmitriev has been silent.Late on Monday evening at his country residence, Putin called in a reporter to respond to the Oval Office record. “We would be ready to offer [cooperation] and our American partners, when I say partners, I mean not only administrative and government structures, but also companies – if they showed interest in working together… We would be happy to work with any foreign partners, including those of American ones. Yes, by the way, as for the new territories, the same thing: we are ready to attract foreign partners, and the so-called new our historical territories, who have returned to the Russian Federation, there are also reserves certain. We are ready with our foreign partners, including with American ones, work there too.”
The display of Trump’s incomprehension was emphasized by Macron who prompted him at several points.Click to follow the 28-minute Oval Office press conference: https://x.com/
Note the presence at right of Vice President J.D. Vance. Sitting next to him was Secretary of State Marco Rubio. Behind them was Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent. Bessent made a single remark; Vance and Rubio remained silent.
Replying to a question of whether he is preparing to abandon the Ukraine, Trump insisted: “No, we’re going to help Ukraine like nobody’s ever helped Ukraine before.”
He then became confused when asked what form this US help would take. “European troops may go into Ukraine as peacemakers [sic]…I don’t think that’s going to be a problem.” Asked if such a European force would have US backing, he said: “Well, we’re going to have a backing of some sort. Obviously, the European countries are going to be involved. And, errr, I don’t think you are going to need much backing. It’s not going to be a problem. Once an agreement is signed, Russia is going to get back to its business, and Ukraine and Europe are going to get back to their business. I don’t think it’s going to be a problem.”
“We’re trying to do some economic development deals with Russia. They have a lot of things we want, and we’ll see – I mean, I don’t know if that will come to fruition. But we’d love to be able to do that. We could — you know, they have massive rare earth – it’s actually the largest, in terms of land, it’s by far the largest country. And they have very valuable things we could use, and we have things they could use, and it would be very good if we could do that.”
As Trump stumbled over what he could remember and was trying to say, his staff published a tweet on the Truth Social platform, repeating Trump’s idée fixe on rare earth minerals, and insulting Canada’s Prime Minister Justin Trudeau once again.
Source: https://truthsocial.com/
It is apparent that if Trump’s staff and advisers have drawn his attention to the US Geological Survey (USGS) tabulation of rare earth mineral reserves by country, Trump cannot remember. The table published in January 2025 shows that China leads in both production and reserves; that Russia trails in fifth place; and that the Ukraine’s rare earth reserves are minuscule by comparison.
RARE EARTH MINERAL PRODUCTION AND RESERVES, BY COUNTRY, JANUARY 2025
Source: https://pubs.usgs.gov/
In Putin’s response to the Trump tweet, the Russian president corrected Trump’s geography: “we have an order of magnitude – I want to emphasize this – an order of magnitude more resources of this kind than in Ukraine. Russia is one of the undisputed leaders in the reserves of these rare earth metals. We have them in the North – in Murmansk, in the Caucasus – in the Kabardino-Balkaria, in the Far East, in the Irkutsk region, and in Yakutia, in Tuva. These are quite capital-intensive investments, projects capital-intensive. We would be happy to work with any foreign partners, including those of American ones… Pavel Zarubin: In the new regions too? Vladimir Putin: Yes, of course.”
Following further talks with Macron over lunch at the White House, a second press conference was held. This ran for 43 minutes. Trump began by reading from a script which repeated the slogans of his Oval Office presentation. Click to follow here. Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_icClkj0Eo
The White House House has released the videotape, but after almost 24 hours, it has issued no transcript. There is also no official White House listing of the US officials who participated in the talks.
Trump continued to repeat himself. Then Macron made the only detailed disclosure of what agreements he and Trump had reached during the day. “Can you confirm there is an agreement,” a French reporter asked, “to send European peacekeeping troops? Will France participate in that? How many troops? What will they be doing?”
“Well,” Trump began, “I guess, this is a little strange question”. He then avoided answering, speaking instead for the third time in the day on the restoration of the Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. “I was there. I saw the work. I’m very good at construction. I know good construction and I know bad construction. They did a beautiful job, and this man has to be given a lot of credit for that.”
Macron responded directly to the question of the end-of-war settlement. He said there had been three areas of discussion on which Trump and the US delegation had agreed during the day at the White House. The first, Macron said, was the terms Vladimir Zelensky will sign in a few days’ time on US takeover of Ukrainian minerals. The second was the sequence of truce, ceasefire, and peace settlement which Trump agreed his negotiators will pursue with the Russians. The third agreement with Trump, according to Macron, was “a clear American message that the US as an ally is ready to provide that solidarity for that approach. That is a turning point in my view. And that is one of the great areas of progress we have made during this trip. And during this discussion.”
What Macron meant is an idea he said he has already worked out with British Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer for preserving the Ukraine politically and territorially with a combination of the NATO forces currently on the Ukrainian battlefield, in a change of deployment and engagement conditions.
“When it comes to troops,” Macron said, “in the past, a year ago specifically, we saw a reason to talk about sending troops for strategic reasons. Today, when we talk about troops, we are talking about sending them in after we have negotiated a lasting peace…. Then at that point … not to go to the front lines, not to go into occupied territory, but as a show of support for — to show we have a negotiated peace, signed by both sides, and that is a peace we will preserve. So these will be peaceful deployments of troops, not for combat. These will be deployments of an assurance force.”
Macron implied that Trump had agreed to provide US military backing for this “assurance force” in the Ukraine. During the talks the US Secretary of Defense, Peter Hegseth, was absent; he was hosting the Saudi Defense Minister at the Pentagon instead.
In his finale at the White House, Macron concluded: “The real change now, compared to 2014, is that we have this deterrence capacity on the American side. We have the capacity for engagement on the European side. And that’s something we are going to continue working on together.”
Trump was unable to respond to the details, nor to the strategic point Macron was claiming Trump has now agreed for a NATO-type military guarantee including US “deterrence capacity” inside the Ukraine. “Emmanuel,” Trump stopped the press conference, ” thank you very much. Great job. And it’s been wonderful being with you. Say hello to your beautiful wife, and we will see you again soon. “
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_icClkj0Eo
NOTE: In his new interview, Putin made a pitch for US investment in low-cost Russian aluminium production as a counter to Trump’s raised tariffs on the imported metal from Canada and to the European Union’s new sanctions on exports of Russian aluminium.
Russian aluminium is controlled by the oligarch, Oleg Deripaska. For the archive on the metal, click. For the history of Deripaska, read the book.
Left, Oleg Deripaska with President Putin; right, the history of Deripaska’s business practices, including his attempt to assassinate me and then expel me from Russia. The book is available here.
“If it is decided to open the American market for our [aluminium] producers,” Putin said, “then we could sell about two million tonnes in the US market. This would not significantly affect the formation of the price, but, in my opinion, it would still have a restraining effect for the stabilization of prices. In addition, and most importantly in my opinion, is that we could, together with American companies, think about a joint work in this area. For example, in the Krasnoyarsk Territory in the Soviet time there were plans to build a new hydroelectric power plant and create additional production of aluminium production. Aluminium is before everything, energy, and preferably cheap energy. Hydropower is cheap, and among other things, it is also environmentally friendly.” Putin implied that Deripaska’s Rusal is already negotiating with US counterparts. “Yes, some of our companies are in contact with each other and such projects are discussed.”
Click here for Exit the Cuckoo's Nest's posting standards and aims.
Source: Strategic Culture Foundation
The greatest (geo-political) showman’s “inside out” political solution
Click here for Exit the Cuckoo's Nest's posting standards and aims.
Source: Strategic Culture Foundation
Urgent lessons for Russia from the Syrian and Armenian nightmares
