Whether invented in northern India, eastern China or Central Asia \u2013 from Persia to Turkestan \u2013 chess is an Asian game. In chess, there always comes a time when a simple pawn is able to upset the whole chessboard, usually via a move in the back rank whose effect simply cannot be calculated.<\/p>\n Yes, a pawn can impose a seismic checkmate. That\u2019s where we are, geopolitically, right now.<\/p>\n The cascading effects of a single move on the chessboard \u2013 Yemen\u2019s Ansarallah stunning and carefully targeted blockade of the Red Sea \u2013 reach way beyond\u00a0global shipping, supply chains, and\u00a0The War of Economic Corridors<\/a>. Not to mention the reduction of the much lauded US Navy force projection to irrelevancy.<\/p>\n Yemen’s resistance movement, Ansarallah, has made it very clear that\u00a0any Israel-affiliated or Israel-destined vessel will be intercepted. While the west bristles at this, and imagines itself a target, the rest of the world fully understands that all other shipping is free to pass. Russian\u00a0tankers \u2013 as well as Chinese, Iranian, and Global South\u00a0ships\u00a0\u2013 continue to move\u00a0undisturbed across the Bab al-Mandeb (narrowest point: 33 km) and the Red Sea.<\/p>\n Only the Hegemon is disturbed by this challenge to its ‘rules-based order.’\u00a0<\/strong>It is outraged that western vessels delivering energy or goods to law-breaking Israel can be impeded, and that the supply chain has been severed and plunged into deep crisis.\u00a0The\u00a0pinpointed\u00a0target is\u00a0the Israeli economy, which is already bleeding heavily. A single Yemeni move proves to be more efficient than a torrent of imperial\u00a0sanctions.<\/p>\n It is the tantalizing possibility of this single move turning into a paradigm shift \u2013 with no return \u2013 that is adding to the Hegemon\u2019s apoplexy. Especially because imperial humiliation is deeply embedded in the paradigm shift.<\/p>\n Russian President\u00a0Vladimir Putin, on the record, is now sending an unmistakeable message: Forget the Suez Canal. The way to go is the\u00a0Northern Sea Route<\/a>\u00a0\u2013 which the Chinese, in the framework of the Russia-China strategic partnership, call the Arctic Silk Road.<\/strong><\/p>\n Map of North-East and North-West Passage shipping routes<\/em><\/p>\n For the dumbfounded Europeans, the Russians have detailed three options: First, sail 15,000 miles around the Cap of Good Hope. Second, use Russia’s\u00a0cheaper and faster\u00a0Northern\u00a0Sea\u00a0Route.\u00a0Third, send the cargo via\u00a0Russian Railways.<\/p>\n Rosatom,\u00a0which\u00a0oversees\u00a0the Northern Sea Route, has emphasized that\u00a0non-ice-class ships\u00a0are now\u00a0able to sail throughout\u00a0summer and autumn, and\u00a0year-round navigation\u00a0will soon be possible with\u00a0the help of a fleet of\u00a0nuclear icebreakers.<\/p>\n All that as direct consequences of the single Yemeni move.\u00a0What next? Yemen entering\u00a0BRICS+ at the summit in Kazan in late 2024, under the Russian presidency?<\/strong><\/p>\n The US-led Armada put together for Operation Genocide Protection, which collapsed even before birth, may have been set up to \u201cwarn Iran,\u201d apart from giving Ansarallah a scare. Just as the Houthis, Tehran is hardly intimidated because, as West Asia analyst ace Alastair Crooke succinctly put it: \u201cSykes-Picot is dead.\u201d<\/p>\n This is a quantum shift on the chessboard. It means West Asian powers will frame the new regional architecture from now on, not US Navy \u201cprojection.\u201d\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n That carries an ineffable corollary: those eleven US aircraft carrier task forces, for all practical purposes, are essentially worthless.<\/p>\n Everyone across West Asia is well aware that Ansarallah\u2019s\u00a0missiles\u00a0are capable of hitting\u00a0Saudi and Emirati oil fields,\u00a0and\u00a0knocking them out of commission.<\/strong>\u00a0So it is little wonder that Riyadh and Abu Dhabi would never accept becoming part of a US-led maritime force to challenge the Yemeni resistance.<\/p>\n Add to it the role of underwater drones now in the possession of Russia and Iran. Think\u00a0of fifty of these aimed at a\u00a0US aircraft carrier: it\u00a0has no defense. While the\u00a0Americans\u00a0still have\u00a0very advanced submarines, they cannot keep the Bab al-Mandeb and Red Sea open to western operators.<\/p>\n On the energy front, Moscow and Tehran don\u2019t even need to think \u2013 at least not yet \u2013 about using the \u201cnuclear\u201d option or\u00a0cutting\u00a0off potentially\u00a0at least\u00a025 percent, and up,\u00a0of the world oil supply. As one Persian Gulf analyst succinctly describes it, \u201cthat would irretrievably implode the international financial system.\u201d<\/p>\n For those still determined to support the genocide in Gaza there have been warnings.\u00a0Iraqi\u00a0Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani\u00a0has mentioned it explicitly. Tehran has already called for a total oil and gas embargo against nations that support Israel.<\/p>\n A total naval blockade of Israel, meticulously engineered,\u00a0remains a distinct possibility.<\/strong>\u00a0Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC)\u00a0Commander\u00a0Hossein Salami said Israel may \u201csoon face the closure of the Mediterranean Sea, the Strait of Gibraltar, and other waterways.\u201d<\/p>\n Keep in mind we\u2019re not yet even talking about a\u00a0possible blockade of the Strait of Hormuz<\/a>; we\u2019re still on Red Sea\/Bab al-Mandeb.<\/p>\n Because if the Straussian neo-cons in the Beltway get really unhinged by the paradigm shift and act in desperation to \u201cteach a lesson\u201d to Iran,\u00a0a chokepoint Hormuz-Bab al-Mandeb combo blockade might skyrocket the price of oil to at least $500 a barrel, triggering the implosion of\u00a0the $618 trillion derivatives market and\u00a0crashing the entire\u00a0international\u00a0banking system.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Mao Zedong was right after all: the US may be in fact a paper tiger. Putin, though, is way more careful, cold, and calculating. With this Russian president, it\u2019s all about an asymmetric response, exactly when no one is expecting it.<\/p>\n That brings us to the prime working hypothesis perhaps capable of explaining the shadow play masking the single Ansarallah move on the chessboard.<\/p>\n When Pulitzer-winning investigative journalist Sy (Seymour) Hersh proved how Team Biden blew up the Nord Stream pipelines, there was no Russian response to what was, in effect, an act of terrorism against Gazprom, against Germany, against the EU, and against a bunch of European companies.\u00a0Yet Yemen, now, with a simple blockade, turns global shipping upside down.\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n So what is more vulnerable?<\/em><\/p>\n The physical networks of global energy supply (Pipelineistan) or the\u00a0Thalassocracy, states that derive their power from naval supremacy?\u00a0<\/strong><\/p>\n Russia privileges Pipelineistan: see, for instance, the Nord Streams and Power of Siberia 1 and 2. But the US, the Hegemon, always relied on its thalassocratic power, heir to \u201cBritannia rules the waves.\u201d<\/p>\n Well, not anymore.\u00a0And, surprisingly, getting there did not even entail the \u201cnuclear\u201d option, the blockade of the Strait of Hormuz, which Washington games and scaremongers like crazy.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.zerohedge.com\/s3\/files\/inline-images\/53bab4f8-a5a9-11ee-ae7b-00163e02.jpg?itok=9sioX5JM\")
<\/picture><\/a><\/p>\n<\/picture><\/a><\/p>\nThe new architecture will be framed in West Asia\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n
The paper tiger is in a jam\u00a0<\/strong><\/h2>\n