Diplomatically and Politically

Involving Ukraine or Russia

• Putin signed an executive order giving Russia the authority to halt exports and cancel contracts to retaliate against ‘unfriendly actions’ src

Ukraine Wars: Putin Strikes Back

• Russia will take further steps to reduce dollar monopoly as main reserve currency src

• The Non-Independence Of Western-Funded ‘Independent Media’ In Ukraine src

• Ukraine conflict rare ‘inflection point’ in history, says Biden src

President Joe Biden on Tuesday described the conflict in Ukraine as a historic “inflection point [that] comes along every six or eight generations,” and described the US’ role in the conflict as fighting the first “real battle” in a civilizational struggle versus Russia and China. Biden also promised to send billions more dollars worth of aid to Kiev.

Biden, known for his frequent verbal slip-ups, appeared to confuse Russia for Ukraine when he said that prior to the launch of Russia’s military operation in February, “we made sure Russia had javelins and other weapons … so Ukraine was ready for whatever happened.”

Biden also told his audience that Ukrainian parents are naming their newborn children “Javelin or Javelina” in honor of the American-made missiles.

• Ukraine’s Defense Intelligence Chief has said that the Russian invasion would likely end with Putin’s death, and that Ukraine would win. src

• Russian media ran simulations of how their nukes could obliterate the UK and Ireland. ‘Just one launch, Boris, and England is no more’ src src2

“It actually seems like they’re raving on the British Isles,” Kiselyov said. “Why threaten never-ending Russia with nuclear weapons when you’re on an island that is so small? The island is so small that one Sarmat missile is sufficient to sink it once and for all.”

And I like this addition by the article:

Of course, the fact that the U.K. is geographically smaller than Russia is irrelevant for purposes of mutual destruction. However many ICBMs Russia has, what matters is that Britain has four Vanguard-class nuclear-powered ballistic missile submarines, each armed with up to 16 American-made Trident II missiles equipped with multiple nuclear warheads. That arsenal is probably sufficient to turn Russia into a nearly pre-industrial state.

• Who Will Pay For Ukraine’s Marshall Plan? Great timing by MSM, given that Michael Roberts was talking about a potential Marshall Plan for Ukraine a couple days ago. And it comes to similar conclusions - that Ukraine is, more or less, fucked. src

• The CIA is using Instagram to teach Russians how to share state secrets with it src

Europe

• Modi, Macron put Ukraine rift aside to take Indo-French ties to next level src

• Europe Is Better Than the U.S. at Talking to India src

Why have America’s European allies reacted so differently to India’s position on Ukraine? Partly, it’s because Europe thinks about its relationship with India the way the U.S. once did — as a partnership that goes beyond the transactional, in which each partner does not always have to agree. Partly, it is because Brussels has succeeded Washington as the location where consequential decisions affecting countries such as India are made. The U.S. has unquestionably turned inward under successive presidents. Meanwhile, the EU has taken the lead in setting regulations for big tech and for climate finance, and has developed its own strategy for engaging the Indo-Pacific region.

• ‘Embarrassed to be British’: Brexit study reveals impact on UK citizens in EU src

Brexit, and the British government’s handling of the Covid pandemic, strongly affected 80% of respondents’ feelings towards the UK, with responses including “deep shame”, “disappointment”, “a shit show”, “embarrassed to be British”, “shambolic”, and “like watching a house on fire”.

Just over 30% still felt very or extremely emotionally attached to the UK, compared with 75% who said they felt a very or extreme emotional attachment to the EU, and 59% who felt the same in relation to their country of residence.

• 50% of Italians are against the supply of heavy weapons to Kiev.

• Would a Sinn Féin victory open the door to a united Ireland? src

Asia and Oceania

• Japan Says It Needs Nuclear Power. Can Host Towns Ever Trust It Again? src

• Beijing closes 10% of subway stations to stem COVID spread src

• Chinese aircraft carrier leads large strike group into western Pacific as Taiwan tensions rise src

• North Korea fires ballistic missile amid rising animosities src

• Joining ASEAN or not should not matter to Timor-Leste src

• Japan, Indonesia confirm cooperation toward free, open Indo-Pacific src

• Sri Lanka opposition declares no confidence in government src

• The Chinese government has decided to provide emergency humanitarian aid to Sri Lanka again, including medicine, food, and fuels, which are urgently needed now, according to Chinese Embassy in Sri Lanka on Wednesday.

Middle East

• Large protests in Yerevan, demanding the resignation of PM Pashinyan. I’m not sure where the dividing line between the Middle East and Asia is, but whatever.

• US representative to the UN: There is a possibility that we will not reach an agreement on the Iranian nuclear deal.

Africa

• Russian paramilitaries killing and torturing civilians in CAR src

• Sergei Lavrov: Wagner in Mali and Libya on a “commercial basis” src

In an interview with Italian television Mediaset, Lavrov reiterated Moscow’s position that Wagner “has nothing to do with the Russian state”.

Wagner, which is reputedly close to President Vladimir Putin, is accused of employing mercenaries who have committed abuses in Mali, Libya and Syria.

• Al-Shabab Raids African Union Military Base src

North America

• US issues visas in Cuba for first time in more than four years src

Washington closed its consular services in Havana in 2017 after US personnel suffered from mystery illnesses.

They’ve finally cured Havana Syndrome!

• White House will host first food insecurity conference in 50 years src

The White House hopes this year’s conference will result in a plan to help reduce rates of diabetes, obesity and hypertension among Americans and accelerate efforts to end hunger across the nation.

If you asked the average American to please eat less than one steak per day, they’d give themselves chronic diarrhoea just to own you. And hunger builds, like, character, or something. I’m not sure what can be done by the government here.

• How the oil and gas industry is trying to hold US public schools hostage src

Here in New Mexico – the fastest-warming and most water-stressed state in the continental US, where wildfires have recently devoured over 120,000 acres and remain uncontained – the oil and gas industry is coming out in force to deepen the region’s dependence on fossil fuels. Their latest tactic: to position oil and gas as a patron saint of education. Powerful interest groups have deployed a months-long campaign to depict schools and children’s wellbeing as under threat if government officials infringe upon fossil fuel production.

“Without oil and gas, we would not have the resources to provide an exemplary education for our students,” she says. “The partnership we have with the oil and gas industry makes me a better teacher.”

She said, blinking in Morse Code.

• Ron DeSantis Likens U.S. Abortion Laws to North Korea, China. src

“As Governor DeSantis noted today, abortion in most European countries is restricted after the first trimester (similar to Florida’s recently passed pro-life law). The position of Democrats in America today more closely resembles abortion policy in China and North Korea,” the statement said.

• Silicon curtain descending: The US is building a ‘digital alliance’ in the Asia-Pacific region with the aim of isolating China src

Global

• BRICS+ 2.0: Toward a polycentric world order. An interview with Yaroslav Lissvolik, program director at the Valdai Discussion Club in Russia. src

AARON MATÉ: Are you suggesting that Russia might face that again?

MICHAEL HUDSON: No, I don’t think it’ll be that serious again, because now it has the support of China, India, and other countries. Before it was completely dismantled from within. Now, it’s not dismantled from within. It’s rebuilt; certainly, it’s military. It’s rebuilt enough of its economy and made enough links with other economies who are politically supporting it. Because Biden has said again and again, ‘We’ve got to destroy Russia because if we destroy Russia, we will cut it off in China, and then we can go against China as our real enemy.’ So, we’ve got to cut up the world potentially opposing us, first Russia and then China, maybe India, too. And he’s been very explicit in this, so you can imagine where this leaves China and India.

India has already said, ‘Well, look, we’re economically linked to Russia. We’re going to continue to link.’ Russia’s foreign reserves were stolen in the West. It’s going to basically work with China to create some kind of mutual currency swaps like United States arranges with Europe and other countries—currency swaps so that they can hold each other’s currency. And China knows that, ultimately, it will be repaid through a new pipeline to deliver gas to China. So, I think a decision has been made in Russia that it’s decoupling with the West. Certainly, decoupling from Europe, decoupling from the United States, except for marginal trade, and [from] reorienting itself towards the West because it can’t afford to deal on these terms anymore. So, yes, it’s going to be painful. But I think the Russian people, who get a very different report of the war and the violence and terrorism that’s going on than the American press [gives], the Russians seem to be 80% behind Putin. It’s not like it was in the 90s when they were utterly demoralized.

The military fighting is not going to end this year or next year. It’s going to take at least 30 years. And it will end probably with a split between Europe and the West on the one hand and Eurasia on the other hand, with more and more of Africa and South America linking itself to the Eurasian economy as Europe and the American economies shrink.

Almost everyone sees shrinkage. I think President Xi of China said the other day, he sees that the American economy is shrinking, and certainly the European economy is shrinking, for a decade or as long as it continues the neoliberal course. And I think that’s pretty obvious—it’s going to shrink. And Xi also said that’s because a centrally planned economy, which they call socialism or Marxism with Chinese characteristics, is more efficient than democracy, because democracy really turns into oligarchy very quickly, and the oligarchy turns into a hereditary aristocracy.

And the West is not a democracy anymore. The West is turning into a hereditary aristocracy. And the Chinese are trying to prevent the financial class from becoming an independent class, pursuing policies that impoverish labor, because for them banking and credit is still a public utility. That’s the most important sector to be [saved] in China, and that’s what makes China so different from the United States. You could say that bankers and Wall Street are the central planners of the US, and their central planning is in favor of the finance, insurance, and real estate sector, and bankers are in charge of China through the Treasury, which is run by party officials that are not seeking to make capital gains for wealthy families but are using finance to build up their industry and infrastructure and make themselves independent of the West, so that America can never do to China what it did to Russia.

AARON MATÉ: And if you were to predict the first places where we’re going to see a major fallout, major unrest as a result of higher commodity prices due to this war on Ukraine, where will it be?

MICHAEL HUDSON: I would say Latin America, Africa, third-world countries that have not followed World Bank policy for the last 70 years and not produced their own food, but produce the export crops, so they’re dependent on importing food, primarily American grain and importing American energy. And probably the central economic game of the NATO war against Russia was to reconcentrate control of the world energy trade in the hands of American, English, and Dutch oil companies.

So, basically the oil companies and the US are going to let the third-world countries go into a crisis. If they default on their bonds, then the United States and the bondholders get to treat Latin America like they treated Argentina or Venezuela and grab whatever assets they have outside of their country. Like Venezuela had investments in the United States and gold that it left in the Bank of England that were grabbed.

There’s going to be a huge asset grab. That is supposed to be how this unfolds, and the most obvious assets to the grabbed are going to be in Latin America and Africa. Maybe some Asian deficit countries. So, this is the weakest link, and that’s why there’s this fight within the IMF at the upcoming meetings, to create these special drawing rights to give them money on the condition that there is a class war.

So, what we’re seeing, really, isn’t a war between NATO and Russia. It’s a class war of the neoliberals against labor across the world to establish the power of finance over labor.

AARON MATÉ: And so, do you think that there’s a threat of an even worse hunger crisis in this world, one that we’re not talking about and should be preparing for it?

MICHAEL HUDSON: A threat? That’s the objective! Yes, of course. That’s what they’re aiming at. If you read what Klaus Schwab says at the World Economic Forum, he said there are 20 percent too many people in the world, especially in the Global South. This is what all the big foundations are for. The billionaires, they all say, ‘We’ve got to thin out the population, there’s too many consumers that don’t produce enough wealth for us.’ If they produce wealth for themselves, that doesn’t count because that’s not for us and we don’t get it. So, yes, that’s not going to be an accident. Obviously, anyone who looks at the basic economic trends can see that this is inevitable—and you have to assume that this was discussed as part of the whole big neoliberal plan of the Biden administration and the Deep State behind it.

KATIE HALPER: How different is this from what we saw with Trump, how continuous, or how much of an aberration do we have between the different administrations?

MICHAEL HUDSON: It’s pretty much the same. The same groups are still in control. Trump was going to appoint that general who was going to basically clean out the State Department and the CIA, but his son-in-law convinced them not to appoint this person. And Trump didn’t have anyone in his administration able to close down this whole neocon group there. So, basically, he let them destroy, essentially. They just ignored what he did. He wanted to withdraw troops from Syria and the Army just refused to withdraw the troops. Nobody followed his orders. So, he was an aberration politically, but the presidency of the US these days is pretty much a figurehead for the Deep State behind it. So, I don’t think there’s that much difference. The Republicans are as much behind this plan as the Democrats.

AARON MATÉ: Let me ask you about the economic toll on Ukraine from this conflict, and not just from Russia’s invasion, but the last eight years since the US-backed coup. And maybe we can start with what happened in the fall of 2013, because the conventional story that we get told a lot in the US is that basically this whole crisis began when Ukraine was in talks with the EU under Yanukovych, the ousted president. And Yanukovych was going to sign this agreement with the EU and that’s what most Ukrainians wanted. It would have brought liberty to Ukraine, and then Russia basically sabotaged it and ordered him not to. And that’s when Ukrainians came out to protest…

KATIE HALPER: This is not…you’re not saying this, Aaron, right? You’re saying this is the mainstream narrative that we’ve been fed.

AARON MATÉ: Yes, this is the mainstream narrative that we’ve been fed. And so that’s when Ukrainians came out to protest with the Maidan revolution, as it’s called, and that’s what led to the coup in February of 2014 that ousted Yanukovych.

Can you talk about what that narrative gets wrong, especially the actual terms of the agreements that Yanukovych was being asked to sign by the EU and what that would’ve meant for Ukraine?