{"id":121003,"date":"2022-06-19T09:39:47","date_gmt":"2022-06-19T13:39:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=121003"},"modified":"2022-06-19T09:39:47","modified_gmt":"2022-06-19T13:39:47","slug":"jeez-finally-russia-is-done-with-the-west","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/?p=121003","title":{"rendered":"

Jeez! Finally! “Russia is done with the West.”<\/h1>"},"content":{"rendered":"

Russia\u2019s New Rules<\/strong><\/h1>\n

\"\"<\/p>\n

Tom Luongo
\nGold, Goats, ‘n Guns blog<\/p>\n

Russia is done with the West. The divorce is nearly complete. In the past few days we\u2019ve heard from all major Russian leaders the same thing, \u201cThe West will play by our rules now.\u201d<\/p>\n

You can decide for yourselves whether Russia is writing checks they can\u2019t cash, but in the words of Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov telling the BBC bluntly, \u201cWe do not care about the eyes of the West.\u201d Lavrov has always been the soul of politeness and discretion when dealing with European media.<\/p>\n

His open hostility towards his BBC interviewer was not only palpable, it was hard to argue with.\u00a0He followed that up with:<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t think there\u2019s even room for maneuver left anymore,\u201d<\/em>\u00a0Lavrov replied.<\/p>\n

\u201cBecause both [Prime Minister Boris] Johnson and [Foreign Secretary Liz] Truss say publicly: \u2019We must defeat Russia, we must bring Russia to its knees. Go on, then, do it.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Russia\u2019s leadership never talks in such openly blunt terms. It\u2019s almost like Lavrov was channeling comedian Dennis Miller who used to say, \u201cFeeling froggy, take that leap.\u201d<\/p>\n

See where it gets you.<\/p>\n

Russia knows it has the West on the ropes. We need what they produce and now they are determined to set the rules on who gets them and for what price. It knows that European leaders are puppets with Klaus Schwab\u2019s hand up their asses.<\/p>\n

And it knows\u00a0Davos<\/em>\u00a0has zero leverage over Russia\u2019s actions from here on out.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to the statements linked above by Gazprom CEO Alexei Miller,\u00a0speaking at a panel at the St. Petersburg Economic Investment Forum<\/a>\u00a0(SPEIF) who just put the situation in the starkest terms there is.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe game of nominal value of money is over, as this system does not allow to control the supply of resources. \u2026Our product, our rules. We don\u2019t play by the rules we didn\u2019t create.\u201d<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Miller\u2019s statement should be thought of as a statement of principle across all theatres of operation for Russia. This doesn\u2019t just apply to natural gas or oil. This is everything, all of Russia\u2019s dealings with the West from here on out will be on its terms not the West\u2019s.<\/p>\n

This is clearly the biggest geopolitical middle finger in the post WWII period.<\/p>\n

Miller is clearly laying out the rules for a new, commodity-centric monetary system, one based on what Credit Suisse\u2019s Zoltan Poszar called \u2018outside money\u2019 \u2014 commodities, gold, even bitcoin \u2014 rather than the West\u2019s egregious use of \u2018inside money\u2019 \u2014 debt-based fiat and credit \u2014 to perpetuate old colonialist behavior well past its use-by date.<\/p>\n

I laid out the basic problem\u00a0in an article from March<\/a>\u00a0after Russia soft-pegged the ruble to gold.<\/p>\n

Today\u2019s \u201cInside Money\u201d standard, known colloquially as the Dollar Reserve standard, is actually what I like to call \u201cMilton Friedman\u2019s Nightmare.\u201d It is nothing more than a system of competitively devalued and inflated debt-based scrips running around drinking each other\u2019s milkshakes until everyone\u2019s glass is empty.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Miller is definitely a glass full kinda guy now.<\/p>\n

These comments came after Gazprom began cutting gas flows to Europe through the Nordstream 1 pipeline using the cover story of repaired gas turbines trapped in fascist Canada which couldn\u2019t be shipped back to Siemens because of sanctions.<\/p>\n

Now Germany and Canada are trying to figure out how to circumvent the sanctions to get these turbines back.<\/p>\n

At the same time\u00a0Miller pledged more gas to China<\/a>\u00a0(up 67% yoy through May) because Russia is interested in energy stability for its friends, while its enemies can starve.<\/p>\n

\u00a0Reuters is\u00a0reporting<\/a>\u00a0that \u201cRussia\u2019s Gazprom\u00a0increased gas supplies to China by 67% in the first five months of this year<\/strong>, the company\u2019s CEO Alexei Miller said on Thursday.\u201d<\/p>\n

It was also on Wednesday that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping held their second phone call since the Ukraine war began. Xi told Putin that China is\u00a0\u201cwilling to continue to offer mutual support (to Russia) on issues concerning core interests and major concerns such as sovereignty and security,\u201d\u00a0<\/strong>as quoted in\u00a0state broadcaster CCTV.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The arrogance of EU commissars never ceases to amaze me. These people all but declare war on Russia and then act shocked (Shocked, I say!) that Russia then treats them like that.<\/p>\n

On the same day that four members of the EU Commission \u2014 France, Italy, Germany and Romania \u2014 approve fast-tracking Ukraine\u2019s membership application, France\u2019s Emmanuel Macron urges Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy to go to the bargaining table with Russia.<\/p>\n

Even if Zelenskyy were to make those overtures to Russia, given his public statements on what his terms are, there would be absolutely zero chance that Russia would agree to show up for talks.<\/p>\n

At this point I see nothing more than Russia continuing to grind out the Ukrainian army, taking what territory they want and then shepherding through local elections by the conquered territory to either become independent states or part of Russia.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s likely the latter at this point since Russia is now issuing Russian passports in regions they\u2019ve taken from Ukraine, which the EU, of course, will refuse to honor until no one cares what they think anymore.<\/p>\n

The rules are changing rapidly. Looking ahead there is a real danger that what Russia has set in motion leads to something no one wants to contemplate. Of course the West helped create this situation by forcing Putin\u2019s hand to invade Ukraine, so who\u2019s to blame about where this all leads to may, ultimately, be an irrelevant point.<\/p>\n

Let\u2019s hope the noises coming from the West about the sanctions having gone too far and the chest-beating of the worst US and British neocons is no longer being taken seriously by anyone with their fingers anywhere near the launch codes.<\/p>\n

If that\u2019s the case than these new rules will be grudgingly accepted only after a lot of borders have been redrawn, new alliances formed and a different world order established.<\/p>\n

This morning at the President Putin declared\u00a0the old world order dead<\/a>. He finished his speech where he detailed how the West was committing suicide to suit the wishes of\u00a0The Davos Crowd<\/em>\u00a0with the following definitive statement:<\/p>\n

\u201cRussia is entering the coming era as a powerful sovereign country. We will definitely use the enormous new opportunities that time opens up for us. And we will become even stronger.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Putin is correct here. Russia is getting stronger by the day. The West took their best shot at destroying Russia and missed the mark. He clearly identified the real culprits for Europe\u2019s and the US\u2019s problems, subservience to an oligarch class who feel entitled to rule the world.<\/p>\n

When the war started I wrote about what I thought Putin\u2019s intentions were. Then it was speculation:<\/p>\n

Russia held all the cards in the negotiations over Ukraine and we recklessly pursued a policy of insults and amateurish propaganda, refusing to believe Russia wouldn\u2019t make her final stand.<\/p>\n

By putting boots on the ground, planes in the air and missiles up the ass of every Ukrainian military installation across the country, Russia turned the \u2018might makes right\u2019 argument of the US and Europe on its head.<\/p>\n

The game has changed because the rules have changed. It\u2019s no longer a game of rhetorical chicken and virtue signaling.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

Today it is fact. When Putin made his move on Ukraine the ultimate goal was the end of Russia treating the West as an equal and leading the Global South out of what he has called \u201cvassalage.\u201d The reason Putin is hated is because he realizes there are two types of countries, \u201csovereigns\u201d and \u201cvassals.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s been his life\u2019s work to make Russia into a \u2018sovereign\u2019 state free from the West.<\/p>\n

From Russia\u2019s perspective their military operation in Ukraine was their Declaration of Independence from the old \u2018rules-based order\u2019 of the post-WWII era. Justified or not, we are now in a new age.<\/p>\n

The question is now, how many will survive into it.<\/p>\n

___
\nhttps:\/\/tomluongo.me\/2022\/06\/17\/russia-new-rules\/<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Russia\u2019s New Rules<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-121003","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121003","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=121003"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/121003\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=121003"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=121003"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/stateofthenation.co\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=121003"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}