So the Ukraine now lay crushed; its Church destroyed, its intellectuals shot or dying in labour camp, its peasants — the mass of the nation — slaughtered or subdued.
Robert Conquest
In his book, The Harvest of Sorrow, historian Robert Conquest outlined the genocide Moscow’s agents carried out against Ukraine in the 1930s. “It certainly appears that a charge of genocide lies against the Soviet Union for its action in the Ukraine,” wrote Conquest. “But whether these events are to be formally defined as genocide is scarcely the point. It would hardly be denied that a crime has been committed against the Ukrainian nation….” (pp. 272)
And what was that crime, specifically? Conquest offers us the following table (p. 306):
Peasant dead: 1930-37 —11 million
Dying in camps later — 3.5 million
Total —14.5 million
These deaths occurred because of communist social programs having to do with the reorganization of agriculture. The Ukrainian figure of 5 million dead from Stalin’s terror famine amounted to 18.8 percent of the population of Ukraine. By comparison, in World War I less than 1 percent of the populations involved in the war died. Thus, for Ukraine, communism was about twenty times more lethal than World War I. In fact, World War I, as a way of life, is preferable to peace under communism. Conquest then makes a few comments about these death figures:
Let us once more emphasize that the figures we have given are conservative estimates, and quite certainly do not overstate the truth. And if we cannot be more exact, it is because the Soviet regime will not let us. It is not only a matter of Stalin concealing the true facts back in the 1930s.
We owe a number of useful details to honest and courageous Soviet scholars and writers: but, even today, Moscow permits no real investigation of these monstrous events. Which is to say that to this degree the regime remains the accomplice, as well as the heir, of those who fifty years ago sent these innocent millions to their deaths.
Robert Conquest wrote those words in the 1980s. Today Moscow repeats its crime by invading Ukraine, by denying the existence of a Ukrainian nation. Think also of Russia’s accomplices in the West — those monstrous liars and accessories after the fact, who say that Ukraine and NATO are responsible for the war in Ukraine, or say that we must (for our own sake) allow the Ukrainian people to be butchered and oppressed again. It was shameful enough that the world stood by and believed the lies and tolerated Stalin’s genocide against Ukraine. But now, today, it unfolds again! And the dictator in Moscow finds no shortage of apologists and helpers in the West. They misrepresent those, like myself, who think Ukraine should be assisted, by calling us warmongers — as if we are advocating war with Russia. But there is no such advocacy. Ukrainians are already fighting because they have been invaded. It is their war, not ours. But we do have a moral obligation to help them. Furthermore, the evil they are fighting also wants to destroy us.
As Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr wrote in 1849, “plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose” (the more things change, the more they stay the same). Karr also wrote, “Every man has three characters — that which he exhibits, that which he has, and that which he thinks he has.” Of these three characters the third is most dangerous; for there is nothing more dangerous than the falsification of self-knowledge. When we refuse to see evil in the world, it is often because we are incapable of seeing it in ourselves.
For a final insight, we may invert Karr’s aphorism to read, “The world has three faces — that which it appears to be, that which it is, and that which we place upon it.” Shall we put a false face to reality and deny the existence of objective evil? Or will we confront evil and deal with it?
Stalin and Moscow Center wanted to eradicate Ukraine as a nation. This eradication forms the backdrop to the present war in Ukraine. If you want to understand why the Ukrainians are fighting so hard against a country three times their size in population and industry, this is the reason. After outlining Stalin’s attempt to eliminate all Ukrainian literature by killing or exiling all Ukrainian writers, Conquest wrote that “the purge of Ukrainian nationalism was not over, indeed would never be over as far as the Soviet regime was concerned.” (p. 270) And now we see that the purge of Ukrainian nationalism continues today. We might ask in what ways Russia has changed? The goal under Stalin was to eradicate Ukraine. The goal under Putin is the same.
The reason I took up writing about communism, about Russia and China, was the view from my kitchen window (metaphorically). I could see from a comfortable place that terrible crimes were being committed, and that the criminals were never held accountable. NEVER. If we dared to look at the communist bloc, if we dared to peek behind the Iron Curtain, we would find millions of people suffering imprisonment, persecution, even death. Here was real evil that most people did not wish to confront. Why did so many wish to deny or downplay the reality of communist evil? I read the testimonies of gulag prisoners. I read of torture, forced labor and death. I read page after page — sitting in a comfortable house, in a comfortable country, well-fed and free. “Why make yourself upset by reading all that?” someone said to me. “Enjoy your life.”
Is it that easy? Really? — And then I saw communists operating in our universities, deploying the same arrogance in America that killed 14.5 million in Ukraine. Our academic communists have been working to make a Soviet republic out of comfortable people whose chief conceit was, “It can’t happen here.” Yet it can, and it will happen here — in some form or another. And these comfortable people, who were unconcerned about the suffering behind the Iron Curtain, had no sense of where they were headed. Their many compromises with the communists of China and Russia would be their undoing. I was convinced that nothing would get them to change course. They were blind, deaf, and dumb. And they still are.
I remember being criticized by one of my high school students in the 1980s. She said to me, “The problem with you is that you believe in the Devil.” This was rather profound for a fifteen-year-old. She realized that I had seen something evil, and was deeply concerned with it. Like most Americans, and most of her generation, the rule was to SEE NO EVIL. Life is good and one should not waste time by tilting at windmills.
How might I explain the reality of evil, right now, to that fifteen-year old? On July Fourth I went to see the movie Sound of Freedom. It was about battling evil. While the movie is a form of entertainment, the following discussion between Jordon Peterson, Jim Caviezel and Tim Ballard comes very close to explaining what evil is.
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217 responses to “A Question of Evil”
That’s better than having acceding to the Minsk Accords, yeah?
Are you a moral idiot?
The Minsk Accords was the legal remedy which in fact grants autonomy to the Donbas.
You mean, an illegal remedy that slices off a chunk of sovereign Ukraine — a country whose established 1991 borders Russia was obligated to respect by the terms of the Nuclear non-proliferation treaty. Russia signed the Budapest Memorandum to that treaty. So if you want to go by the book, then go by the whole book.
Okay, so much the better. What’s the problem with that? Even Putin wrote Biden before Russia recognized the Donbas as two, independent countries, that he wanted a return to the Minsk Accords.
How about returning to the Budapest Memorandum? Ukraine is a sovereign country with a fixed border. How about that? Have a problem with Russia’s signing on for that? Let them keep their word, by which they got Ukraine’s nuclear weapons. Moscow thought it was a fair trade at the time. They promise to respect Ukraine’s border, and Ukraine gives over its nuclear weapons. But then, Russia breaks its promise. Do you excuse that?
How are the Minsk Protocols illegal? Ukraine Parliament ratified the Donbas as an autonomous region, but it was never implemented on the ground by the ethnic Russians who lived there at the time. I suppose they were waiting for Ukraine to bake them a birthday cake? Are you saying that it was against International Law, or in what jurisdiction?
Russia promised, in a solemn treaty, to respect Ukraine’s borders in 1994. In exchange, Ukraine handed over its nuclear weapons. Now the Russians go back on their word and invade. Does Ukraine get their nuclear weapons back? Why don’t you advocate for the legal borders of Ukraine instead of a treaty Moscow tried to impose on Ukraine under threat of invasion?
“Russia signed the Budapest Memorandum to that treaty. So if you want to go by the book, then go by the whole book.”
Mr. Nyquist, I am so glad to finally hear someone mention that. I do not understand why no one seems to mention the Budapest Memorandum.
In Putin’s letter to Biden, Putin pleads for a return to the Minsk Protocols. Putin does not mention the granting of autonomy to the Donbas by Ukraine’s Parliament. To me, that suggests that Putin was willing to renegotiate. For instance, Putin states that he feels that Eastern Europe is (was at least until donating arms to Ukraine) capable of defending itself, so therefore no need for NATO in Eastern Europe, but he said that he is willing to discuss that aspect. Putin’s demand for NATO to exit Eastern Europe, however, was unconditional. Nevertheless, everything is negotiable and it would be for Biden to counter. I’d tell Russia to get it’s nuclear armed submarines away from US coast lines at the least, in exchange.
Petunia: Don’t you feel ashamed trolling for a murderous dictator?
Re:
[ JEFF NYQUIST says:
JULY 12, 2023 AT 6:08 PM
…”Russia breaks its promise. Do you excuse that?” ]
I don’t find the timeline for what you assert. Some context would clarify. Are you saying that the Ukraine Parliament only granted autonomy to the Donbas under duress of threat of invasion by Russia? When did Russia invade? Are you talking about Odessa after the neglect of implementing the granted autonomy, or what?
The Minsk agreement provisions were never implemented. They ultimately required Ukraine to change its constitution — which was not politically possible as the Ukrainian people opposed the changes. So the treaty was not accepted by the Ukrainian people. Also, the Russian side never upheld their end, as usual.
I prefer diplomacy to war. Russia is not some third World rouge nation to be ignored. The Ostrich hides his head in the sand and gets his tail feathers blasted. Balance of Power, Mutually Assured Destruction, and Spheres of Influence, worked well enough for decades. The CIA adventure beginning in 2014 was ill conceived.
You prefer trolling for Russia.
Re:
[ JEFF NYQUIST says:
JULY 12, 2023 AT 6:57 PM
The Minsk agreement provisions were never implemented. They ultimately required Ukraine to change its constitution — which was not politically possible as the Ukrainian people opposed the changes. So the treaty was not accepted by the Ukrainian people. Also, the Russian side never upheld their end, as usual. ]
This sounds credible to me. Despite your continual prior obfuscations, I’m inclined to believe this. Thank you. Did it kill you to finally answer a fair question?
The aspect which you gloss over though, is that since there was no implementation, there was nothing incumbent upon Russia; no treaty to have to honor. Back to square one.
No. You fail to acknowledge the Budapest Memorandum. Square one, before that, is adhering to the principle of respecting other sovereign country’s borders.
What’s your take on the status of the Falkland Island British citizens? There would seem to be a parallel to that and ethnic Russians, throughout Ukraine. A few years ago, Great Britain sent her flagship nuclear armed battleship down there as a show of support.
There is no parallel, since the Falkland’s have always been British and its inhabitants are British.
‘Are you a moral idiot?’
😆
The parallel is apt, as Great Britain had abdicated while the Falklands were uninhabited when Argentina 414 miles away took claim.
The greater question is, why did Russia create Ukraine as a country for the first time, after the dissolution of the Soviet Union, and abandon the Donbas, if the territory is so vital to Russia’s national interests? I wonder if it was a set up to create a war in the future from then as we see today?
Russia did not “create” Ukraine.
Not only did Russia not create Ukraine, Ukraine birthed Muscovy, which morphed into Russia.
The Minsk accords required that Russia pull all her troops out of the Donbas, and return the border to Ukrainian control. Putin never did that and had been violating Minsk in many other ways. One of those things led to a Malaysian airliner being shot down by a Russian missile crew.
Lanyard and Petunia, you both are such idiots that it’s almost impossible to engage in any meaningful conversation with you. Even for such an eloquent gentleman like our great friend Mr. Nyquist. It is typical for morons like you to highlight such secondary issues like the so called and never ratified “Minsk agreement” while ignoring the fundamental and strategic significance of Budapest Memorandum. At the time of Budapest Memorandum Ukraine was in the possession of app. 1500 nuclear warheads and her armed forces were some 800 000 men strong. With her vast even if primitive nuclear industry this country could easily have today at least 2000 – 2500 nukes including, perhaps, 100 – 150 thermonuclear warheads of a huge yield with delivery systems. Do you really think in your madness that Russia would dare to invade Ukraine projecting such military capabilities? Ukraine not only gave up her nukes but she also reduced her armed forces to pity 130 000 men before invasion.
How in Hell such a weakened Ukraine could consist any threat to resurging Russia? One must be a completely CRETINISED MORON to believe otherwise.
Few days ago I red a short statement made by Bill Clinton himself who said that during his meeting with Putin in 2011 the neo Soviet dictator admitted that he didn’t agree with the letter of Budapest Memorandum and rejected it’s main premise, which, obviously, meant that he effectively rejected the notion of Ukraine’s very existence. Clinton admitted also that he regreted that he had persuaded Ukraine to accede to Budapest Memorandum at all.
In Poland, the country of origin, for example, has NEVER been any illusion about the so called “perestoika”, it’s origin and it’s strategic objective and it has ALWAYS been clear that i’s real purpose was and is to dupe the West, weaken it and then exploit it as an opportunity to rebuild the Soviet empire. In fact, Putler himself was never shy about expressing his real plans in that matter.
Apart from that, the Russian Constitution envisages Russia as an inheritor and continuator of the former Soviet Union and it has also been confirmed in Russia’s readaptation of the old Soviet National Anthem. In such a case, Russia has also taken responsibility for the unspeakable horror of Holodomor and is legally liable to compensate for it.
Then there is a totally idiotic suggestion, unfortunately being spread by many otherwise genuinely conservative pundits in America and elsewhere that the NATO in its enlarged form consists any threat to Russia.
First of all, NATO would NEVER manage to acquire military capability to seriously threaten Russia, secondly NO parliament of any member state of NATO would EVER pass any sort of legislation to authorize any commencement of military activities against her, neither would Supreme Council of NATO itself, nor would it the European Parliament especially in situation when majority of its most prominent members and the Germans in particular, are deeply in the pocket of Putin himself.
It’s is SIMPLY IMPOSSIBLE! And for any imaginable reason.
And then again, since the first invasion of Ukraine in 2014 some 9 000 000 people escaped
the eastern Ukraine. Poland herself has absorbed almost 7,5 million of them, 2 million in 2014 and initially 5,5 million since 2022. Those numbers are easily verifiable, you can just contact the Polish Ambassy and they will confirm them. Of course, majority of those 5,5 million have been now dispersed among other countries and many of them chose to return to their homeland. Some two months ago, the Chief of Staff of the Polish Armed Forces Gen. Jedrzejczyk gave an interview on the American TV network NBC where he gave those numbers I mentioned above.
Also, if those allegedly Russian speaking Ukrainians were so eager to join Mother Russia or were feeling so persecuted or horrified of Ukrainian “Nazis” where are the photos or videos of gigantic crowds of hundreds of thousands of them fleeing Ukraine towards Russia?
There are NONE. And for a very simple reason: They DON’T WANT to live under the whip and a boot of a neo commune fascist regime of VLADOLF (not my term) PUTLER.
Couldn’t be simpler.
Zelensky had continually been attacking ethnic Russians in the Donbas. Putin told him to nock it off. Zelensky persisted with the assistance of the CIA training Azov NAZIS.
Lanyard: Zekenskyy is a Russian-speaking Ukrainian. He has never attacked ethnic Russians in Donbas. Stop repeating Russian propaganda lies.
Suggesting that ethnic Russians ought to move to Russia, is to overlook that most of them were born in Ukraine, and their families have lived there for many generations. Putin has offered to any ethnic Russian, ten thousand rubles and a Russian passport, if they wish to move to Russia, but most of them prefer to stay in the homes that have been in their families for decades.
Maybe it’s the CIA that needs to go back where they came from.
The persecution of ethnic Russians in Ukraine is a Russian propaganda lie. Do you understand?
After I saw the movie and the Peterson interview, both extraordinary and important, I naturally fused every point with all you’ve provided us over the years, adding the thick Communist layer to the rest of he beastly situation and thus feeling even greater emotion and hopefully resolve over that of the typical viewer. It’s been a gloomy week…but necessary. So glad for yor continued posting and inclusion of “The Sound of Freedom” and Peterson interview in your analysis, as I figured you were likely to. Blessings.
👍
Another interview on the film hosted by Tony Robbins briefly addresses a current trafficking situation in Ukraine, with Robbins making the point that war/social upheaval creates the conditions for these predatory rings. Ballard has been involved in rescuing children orphaned in Ukraine. There appear to be no accidents or coincidences in the expression of evil, it does not surprise that where where it flourishes the worst atrocities manifest, and preying on innocence is the worst.
Orphaned children are especially vulnerable because their protectors are gone.
Dear Jeff… your comments are so clear and succinct and to the moral point. Bravo! You wrote: “But we do have a moral obligation to help them. Furthermore, the evil they are fighting also wants to destroy us.”
Your second sentence, about Russia and China wanting to destroy us, is truly the critical point, even if someone might say that “the USA can’t be the world’s policeman.” In my far-less-specialized knowledge about political affairs, I see the distinct possibility that the world could be divided between empires of Marxism and Islam. Britain is on its way to becoming an Islamic Sharī‘ah nation, as are some countries in Europe, including France.
Then, of course, Islam and Marxism will try to swallow each other.
I’m still wondering about the issue of military strategy. Not the evil of Marxism, but their strategies and ours (the free world). Can you share your thoughts on the following?
You’ve written more than once how Russia instructed the Left to pose as anti-Russian and how much Russian propaganda has infected the conservative discourse, with Lenin’s strategy of lies sowing confusion everywhere. I am convinced that’s absolutely true.
Given that reality, between photos of Nazi battalions and the fact that people like George Soros were supporting the Ukraine, it was very easy to believe that Zelenskyy, Biden, Putin, and Xi were all in bed together, creating a swamp of a Ukrainian conflict in which America’s resources—money and arms—would be drained away, leaving us vulnerable to direct attack on our mainland. That’s what I thought at first, which is why I thought we should NOT get stuck in that swamp. That is, pull back from the Ukraine to protect our own borders and military readiness.
Of course, that doesn’t deal with the plight of the Ukrainian people, which I sympathize with. I’m just expressing questions of strategy that I think need to be clarified for the conservative camp.
This version of the “pull-back from the Ukraine” narrative is NOT a pro-Putin position, but rather a military-strategic question. And even if Zelenskyy was not involved in that nefarious scheme and was genuinely fighting, simply for Ukraine’s survival, is it possible that the “swamp” was still a strategy from the others, i.e. Putin, Xi, and Biden?
Your writings have indicated that it was not that nefarious—that Russia simply miscalculated and expected to have won the conflict by now. You’ve also stated that if they win the Ukraine, their position will be strengthened to continue their advance. That’s logical.
I’m not a strategist; I’m only trying to make sense of things.
I DO believe, 100%, your position that Putin and Xi, together with American Marxists, want to eliminate the United States as a free country.
Ultimately, perhaps the question is: given the evil of communism, is the Ukraine THE critical battle that America must win to stop the communist advance? What would Patton and MacArthur do?
Thank you very much for any thoughts you might have on this.
Peter
Peter: Very important and interesting question. Is the Ukraine fight the one we should be supporting with arms and supplies? For several reasons, yes. First, our deceptive leaders (Obama, Biden, Macron, Scholz in Germany) are put in a ticklish position by this war. They pretended to be against Moscow, and now they have to follow through on that pretense because of Moscow’s stumble in Ukraine. Just watch how they squirm. Second, Ukraine has the men, the morale, and the will to fight off the Russians. This is amazing, and inspiring. This keeps the Russians from reaching NATO along the Polish-Romanian border. Ukraine thus forms a buffer that protects our weak allies. Third, China and Russia cannot launch a general war against the United States while the Russians are stuck in Ukraine, fighting so close to their heartland. It won’t work for them, positionally and for political reasons.
Last, but not least, the Russian people are learning what their leaders actually think, and seeing how they act, and how they operate along the lines established by Stalin and his successors. There is, in the last few days, signs that the Russian people are fed up with the Kremlin leaders. This is the most positive sign of all and the path to genuine change in Russia without a world war. This does not solve all our problems, but might in time eliminate most of the nuclear weapons aimed at us (thereby weakening China’s strategic position).
Few may realize how blessed we are to have gotten safely to this point. The heroism of the Ukrainians can accomplish with conventional arms something that we could not accomplish even with nuclear arms. Only Ukrainians can show the Russian people that there is a path to reform, a path to freedom, and away from the Soviet past.
I hope this makes sense.
Thank you, Jeff! Yes, your answers make a “whole heap of sense”! You have convinced me. Perhaps Tucker Carlson—God bless him—should read this particular article. 🙂
I also hope that Tucker will be see the light.
“Few may realize how blessed we are to have gotten safely to this point.”
Especially in light of the reckless abandon with which we antagonize Russia, rather than to engage with them diplomatically as when cooler heads prevailed.
I also hope that Archbishop Vigano could read these items, because on many of the “woke” issues, he sounds correct, but it also seems that he believes that Putin is a Christian, etc. And many conservatives are following his views.
Yes. It would be good to have a discussion on this.
Jeff, I’d love to see you interview Archbishop Vigano, and then separately interview Tucker Carlson, on the Ukraine / Marxism issue. No idea if they would, but it would be a VERY interesting and illuminating set of interviews! They probably need the air time that would come with a two-person interview, rather than three.
I do not appear on their radar.
That’s too bad… maybe Trevor Loudon could help wire it, because of his connections to the Epoch Times. Anyway…. your message is important!
Thank you for posting about this, Jeff! Hoping to go see this movie soon. I’ve heard great things from so many people.
Very thankful & relieved that we made it through the NATO summit without an incident.
Just saw this news story a few minutes ago:
https://nypost.com/2023/07/11/wagner-mercenaries-tried-to-steal-nukes-during-mutiny/
I was worried about the Wagner threat and the way nuclear weapons were paired with Wagner in so many stories. It seems to have been a bluff, or they abandoned the idea. Of course, we are not out of the woods yet.
We are being told repeatedly and emphatically that the Wagner Group did not make off with any nuclear weapons. Have you heard anyone expressing concern that Russia is lying to the world about this? Are you concerned at all about that possibility?
I am always concerned about Russia’s intentions. It’s unclear why these rumors are being spread. Possibly it is an attempt to scare people in the West.
Putin’s regime is no better than Brezhnev’s or Andropov’s regime. Russia is back to lying through its teeth. Peter Zeihan got burned by using statistics released by Putin’s regime, only to have his evaluation of Russia being unreliable in their reports confirmed.
Great article Jeff, thank you. Correction. It is now just Ukraine. It is no longer The Ukraine – for your reader. I opine that Prigozhin ran out of ammo and left the battlefield. Putin needs him and they have unfinished business in Syria and Africa. I wonder where Ramzan fits into all of this as he has been mostly quiet. I believe Putin is losing badly and if he fires off a tactical nuke, it will be a sorry day for him. Zelensky has been brilliant with his messaging. His people are brilliant. I do not regret going over there for a minute and I hope to get the opportunity to go back. Slava Ukraini.
Yes, you are right. It is just “Ukraine.” You will notice that I was quoting from Robert Conquest’s “Harvest of Sorrow,” written in the 1980s, and I am not free to correct his language. Yet the book is extremely valuable.
Some countries still say, “the Ukraine”— Australia, for instance, and possibly Britain. There may be others. Many of my Australian friends regularly refer to “the Ukraine.” As Conquest was British, he may have still routinely used the definite article in reference to Ukraine.
A lot of people use the term “The Ukraine” because they will not admit that Ukraine does not belong to Russia anymore. The people that use that term now, are utterly useless as sources.
Not to interfere with other great comments here, but this in addendum to my earlier comment:
Brought to mind an Iron Maiden song illuminating knowing too much about the evil that men do (based partly on a line from Shakespear)…
Love is a razor and I walk the line on that silver blade
Wept in the dust with His daughter , eyes red with the slaughter of Innocence
But I would pray for her, I would call her name out loud
I would bleed for her, if I could only see her now
Living on a razor’s edge, balancing on the ledge
You know
TO KNOW: that the evil that men do lives on and on.
Yes. Evil can live on. Evil is something that has to be confronted. Whenever we look the other way, it grows and spreads.
Thanks for this great posting. Unfortunatley we don’t support as much as they need. They are paying a very high price. Biden and Scholz are under socialist control. Probably in August the Brics will launch a sort of Gold backed Currency, this could lead to a strong devaluation of our currencies but here in Europe we don’t notice that their goal is to destroy us. Every time that i try to speak about how comunism spreaded in our society, that LGBT, Clima Agenda and so on are all sides of the same coin people don’t understand or laugh and absolutley they will continue to live without asking unconfortoble questions.
Yes. People are not asking those uncomfortable questions. If only we could get the blind to see.
The only way to get through the trauma of being exposed to such evil, (which Peterson mentioned as the true source of PTSD) is to do as Tim Ballard does and as you just said: Confront it.
Oh yes. This is a profound answer.
Sadly, I don’t think there is any hope with the Russian people. To quote Gen. Alexander Lebed : “Most Russians don’t care whether they are ruled by fascists or communists or even Martians as long as they can buy six kinds of sausage in the store and lots of cheap vodka.” Putin could bring back serfdom, Russians would probably not rebel. They did not rebel during Brezhnev or Khrushchev. They did not rebel when Yeltsin privatized everything and reduced Russian male life expectancy by 10 years. If Yeltsin had decided to stay in power for another 10 years longer while continuing to let oligarchs steal everything, they would probably not have rebelled and would have accepted to have everything being stolen.
Lebed has been dead a long time. What was true 25 years ago might only be a half truth today.
It may take awhile for the Russians to change their mind, but when it does, Putin had better run for that villa in Venezuela if he wants to live.
Thanks for expanding and explaining requirements for a nation in joining NATO (Liberty Man show).
Just read an investigative journalist’s article about the “go ahead” to fast track Ukraine joining NATO and the under tone seems to me that he might not even know that a prospective nation cannot be engaged in war when trying to join.
Ukrainians do not have a veterans affairs office. Prisoners’ Voice are a group who are dedicated to finding and returning the activists who were rounded up the first few months of the war and moved to prisons in Russia. What they told me was that the government is currently only able to provide approximately 3 weeks of social services once people get out of the hospital. The trauma over there is on everyone’s face. There are many groups who are working very hard to not only hold that country together, but help the suffering people.
He mentions “a neoconservative plan” to defeat Russia militarily and break it up into separate countries…but wouldn’t this go against what you mentioned that happened back in the Bush senior days regarding such a breakup? And that was if this happens, the US would be at a serious disadvantage in knowing where all the potential nukes would be located and would create more problems with multiple locales housing nuclear warheads.
The alleged plan to break up Russia is a Kremlin fiction.
Kremlin fiction?
Today US policy makers? 2023, 30+ yrs later? Because according to your comments to John Moore, at one time in 1992, there was a lot of support to do just that…I’ll let you in on a secret. I trust no one on the Republican side of the aisle any more than the Communists who control the Democrat side.
There was a plan in Washington to break up Russia? No. President GHW Bush begged Ukraine to stay in the USSR and made a famous speech about this. I never said there was support to break up Russia or the USSR. Support from who? It was an internal event, with no inputs from the West. What do you think I said?
GHW Bush did, but by the time Bush Jr came in as Prez, wasn’t the opinion changed as I remember somewhere that neocon Dick Cheney said the opposite?
Russia was our ally in the War in Terror. Don’t you see the photo of them together?
Steps for joining NATO
• Step l: Accession talks with NATO in Brussels
• Step 2: Letter of intent sent to NATO secretary-general
• Step 3: Accession protocols signed by NATO members
• Step 4: Accession protocols ratified by NATO members
• Step 5: Secretary-general invites the potential member to accede to the treaty
• Step 6: Invitees accede to the treaty according to their national procedures
• Step 7: After depositing their instruments of accession with the US State
Thank you, Jeff, for this blog. I saw the movie on July 5th. The only way to expose this horrific evil against children is to shine a very bright light on it. ABC/Disney shelved the movie years ago and it took a long time to finally make it to the theater. That tells you plenty about them.
I’m amazed at the liberals, celebrities, etc. who say it isn’t really happening. Read this from 2 days ago:
https://www.westernjournal.com/arrest-made-phone-left-restaurant-found-hold-footage-numerous-boys-raped/
What you shared about the high school student was revealing. People refuse to see! If they admit there is a problem, they might have to do something about it and they don’t want to be bothered. Thank you also for sharing Robert Conquest’s words. Evil is very real.
Are there any lessons to be learned from the Crimean War ( 1853 – 1856 ) ? Perhaps that pertain to the current conflict. Of course many things are different since that time. And it seems that the current conflict is about much more than the Crimea. ( Russia seems to have its sights on Poland, the Baltics, and other countries. )
As a student of history and strategy perhaps you see some things that were illuminated by that conflict.
I have no opinion here ( and little knowledge ). Just looking for more understanding of the situation.
Ukraine is clearly in the right. I hope they can win – and hold on to their country somehow.
This question on whether there will come a revolution on American soil made me recall Fox News “The Five” panel commented a month ago about a CUNY Law School graduate giving a valedictorian speech or something like that at a graduation ceremony; during her speech this seeming Muslim background student denounced systemic white supremacism and the need for a revolution, with a kind of disturbing casualness and smiling approach. It is as Bezmenov said, those who received the demoralization instruction are contaminated, they’ll wreak havoc, you cannot get rid of them, and they are coming out of schools all the time.
Olavo de Carvalho proposed the thesis in politics popularity among the common folk doesn’t mean anything compared with having the power to appoint allies to the key bureaucratic/official positions. Since Stalin got to appoint and carefully choose the people in charge of every relevant position in the USSR, Nikolai Bukharin as a senior and arguably dramatically popular communist party member was, despite his status, rolled-over by Stalin. In Paul Johnson’s Modern Times the latter describes a scene [perhaps during the days of Nikolai Bukharin’s early stages rivalry with Stalin] in which Nikolai Bukharin attempts to address a crowd of party members or communist enthusiasts with arguments and confident/emotional oratory. Stalin then steps in close to Bukharin’s microphone and gives over a short dismissive soundbite that sends the crowd laughing at Bukharin, making the poor man possibly afraid and realizing he had no footing whatsoever in that venue.
It would seem “the Five”‘s reaction to that graduation speech is to a degree evocative of Bukharin’s naive address to that crowd.
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g2V5g8rVrpw&w=560&h=315%5D
I know what you mean. I do not think the Five understand how serious the threat is. For every student who openly talks about the Revolution, there are a hundred who are silently agreeing — who are more pragmatic than to say what they think.
Judge Jeanine did say, I think, that student was voted into giving that speech by other students. Thus, it is probable on this account alone she was backed by a considerable number of other students, if not also faculty. This sort of leftist/marxist ethos can be evidenced in different places, as is well known, Joe Rogan for example recalled once how radical Amherst College, Massachusetts, is; and one Dinesh D’Souza speech in this college, during Q&A, made it very clear a Marxist-like critical theory take on America is close to the students’ hearts. Of course everybody knows this is going on in a way, but I wonder whether there is a comprehensive updated study on it. Olavo de Carvalho believed this kind of assessment was of great moment in the Brazilian context and could reorient the national outlook radically, namely, if students had a well-documented proof they were being subject to ideological abuse and supression of information systematically, this might open some room for change.
This is a totalitarian disease spread by teachers. It creates a hostile environment that can overwhelm a society.
Also Jeff, aren’t these recent previews for the upcoming Oppenheimer movie interesting timing…
I have not seen them. Is it about his communist connections?
I haven’t seen it either, but would bet you a dollar to a donut that it would not.
From the previews the movie seems to be only about the Manhattan Project.
JEFF: I GOT THIS EMAIL ALERT AT SUNRISE 🌞 THIS MORNING. WHAT IS YOUR KNOWLEDGE OF THIS INDIVIDUAL?
Breaking News: Milan Kundera, literary star and Communist Party outcast, dies at 94.
The New York Times
6:03 AM (17 hours ago)
BREAKING NEWS
Milan Kundera, the Czech-born author of “The Unbearable Lightness of Being” and a Communist Party outcast, died at 94.
Wednesday, July 12, 2023 5:59 AM ET
He was known for sexually charged novels that captured the suffocating absurdity of life in his native Czechoslovakia.
https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/12/world/europe/milan-kundera-dead.html?campaign_id=60&emc=edit_na_20230712&instance_id=0&nl=breaking-news&ref=cta®i_id=127946122&segment_id=139076&user_id=c04b5ee9f828b9a8528a5a264bab77fc
They made a movie out of his book, and it starred Daniel Day-Lewis.
I think we can doubt that…
Preview ran in the theater when I saw The Sound of Freedom and the week before with a different movie.
https://youtu.be/uYPbbksJxIg
I despise these kind of depictions. It is neither drama nor history.
‘We’re not Amazon’: tensions with Ukraine surface at Nato summit:
UK defence secretary Ben Wallace says western backers want ‘gratitude’ as Zelenskyy pushes for more
https://www.ft.com/content/dc658252-6acd-44fc-8e0c-51a284009762
OH GREAT:😧
Delays Leave US Navy With Just 31 Ready Attack Submarines:
Almost 40% of the Navy’s nuclear-powered attack submarines are out of commission for repairs:
https://themessenger.com/news/delays-leave-us-navy-with-just-31-ready-attack-submarines
____________________
OH JESUS CHRIST!!
China’s Shipbuilders Are 200 Times More Capable Of Producing Surface Warships And Submarines Than The U.S.
Warzone/The Drive: Alarming Navy Intel Slide Warns Of China’s 200 Times Greater Shipbuilding Capacity
The Office of Naval Intelligence is sounding the alarm about the huge gap in U.S. and Chinese shipbuilding capacity and its implications.
A U.S. Navy briefing slide is calling new attention to the worrisome disparity between Chinese and U.S. capacity to build new naval vessels and total naval force sizes. The data compiled by the Office of Naval Intelligence says that a growing gap in fleet sizes is being helped by China’s shipbuilders being more than 200 times more capable of producing surface warships and submarines. This underscores longstanding concerns about the U.S. Navy’s ability to challenge Chinese fleets, as well as sustain its forces afloat, in any future high-end conflict.
In a statement to The War Zone, the U.S. Navy has confirmed the authenticity of the slide, seen in full below, which has been circulating online.
https://www.thedrive.com/the-war-zone/alarming-navy-intel-slide-warns-of-chinas-200-times-greater-shipbuilding-capacity
[WNU Editor: The Pentagon has confirmed the above slide.]
{The above report confirms what I fear. If a war should break out between the US and China and it lasts for a period of time, the U.S. will be forced to use their nuclear arsenals to offset the conventional military advantages that favor China.}
Wade: you wrote “{The above report confirms what I fear. If a war should break out between the US and China and it lasts for a period of time, the U.S. will be forced to use their nuclear arsenals to offset the conventional military advantages that favor China.}”
Who says that
1) that the war will last for a period of time?
2) that we will still have an operating nuclear arsenal?
3) that the CCP is dumb enough to wage a war that can possibly last a period of time?
4) that the CCP and their allies in Russia won’t use their nuclear arsenals first to decapitate the U.S. militarily and politically?
5) that the nuclear first strike against the U.S. won’t be followed by a ground invasion of the U.S. to prevent us from surviving to rearm and strike back?
6) that the CCP and Soviets don’t know that they need to defeat the U.S. first in order to achieve their other goals?
7) that the CCP and Soviet militaries are really as powerful as they seem on paper?
The writer of the article assumes that we will fight a war like WWII where the U.S. mainland was spared the ravages of war. That was true then because Japan and Germany didn’t have the technical nor manpower resources to attack the U.S. mainland. Today is different. Both the CCP and Soviets together have more nuclear weapons than the U.S. and they’re willing to use them as a first strike. That first strike can neutralize our land-based missiles before they can leave their silos (worse, they have been ordered to absorb a first strike), catch our land-based bomber fleet before they have a chance to get airborne, catch much of our navy while still in port, take out some of our cities (shock and awe ?); to be followed by an invasion that numbers millions, to augment the many thousands already here in the States. World War III will NOT be like World War II.
Articles like that are really short-sighted. They need to take the reality of evil and not sugar-coat it. They need to see today’s realities. Do they realize how dumb they look when they still think that the CCP’s first target will be Taiwan and wait for a U.S. response? Get real!
Mr. Queen,
Take it easy on Our Lord’s name, eh? Unless you are in fact imploring His help, which we so desperately need!
A LOT OF INFORMATION IN THIS ARTICLE:
North Korea Fires Suspected ICBM Off Its East Coast In The Direction Of Japan
BBC: North Korea fires intercontinental ballistic missile after threatening US
North Korea has fired a suspected intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), Japanese and South Korean officials report.
The long-range missile flew for more than an hour before landing short of Japanese waters on Wednesday morning.
Pyongyang’s launch comes after it threatened retaliation against what it said were recent US spy plane incursions over its territory.
Earlier this week it threatened to shoot down such planes.
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-66172284
Reuters: “Countries repatriating gold in wake of sanctions against Russia, study finds”
By Marc Jones
July 9, 20238:07 PM EDT
https://www.reuters.com/business/finance/countries-repatriating-gold-wake-sanctions-against-russia-study-2023-07-10/
“War Effort In Shambles As Hawks Turn On Each Other” At NATO Summit
BY TYLER DURDEN
WEDNESDAY, JULY 12, 2023 – 05:40 P.M.
https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/nato-leaders-tell-zelensky-cool-it-rare-dressing-down-summit
Not exactly a trustworthy source.
I have long believed that anyone who is juvenile enough to give himself a pen name from pop culture (from the movie Fight Club) is no one who should be taken seriously.
Zero Hege is a propaganda channel for the Putin regime.
It has been, yes.
Mmm, I’ve followed Zerohedge for years. Curious, how is this site a Russian propaganda channel? Is there specific reporters? Owners? Editors that are sympathetic to Communist moves, actions?
I only see that they are sympathetic to Putin. I would not expect them to be communists. I doubt they understand things in that way.
How so, Jeff? Tyler Durden? He’s the main guy I’ve read over the years…I get it with RT. But how does one truly know indeed of an alternative news feed spewing Propaganda courtesy the Russians or otherwise?
I mean really…I used to think Ben Swann was a legit independent journalist/reporter until I saw him start being interviewed and then doing interviews via RT. After that? I don’t even follow him or his reporting. He went dark after “Pizza Gate” for months and I wondered then, but I lost respect for his integrity long ago with association with RT. A lot of Ron Paulers (I have been hip to Ron Paul for a while myself) are cool with RT but my gut always said otherwise….
I am also disappointed by libertarians like Ron Paul.
I won’t disagree. But many of those folks are full faith involved in liberty and freedom and to somehow insinuate that some of these alternative news sources are mere propaganda??? Seems like a witch hunt as what our own country experienced 200+ yrs ago….
I’m sorry, I do not remember saying they were mere propaganda. They just take a pro-Russian position, based on Russian propaganda points. This is not the only thing they write about. That was not my point.
Me too, man. Me too.
Oh oops this in response to followers of Ron Paul…
Unless you spend a lot of time looking into people, you cannot say for sure what motivates them. In this case, Tyler Durden is a character from the movie “Fight Club.” I do not know the authors behind this name. From what I’ve seen, they do not seem to be following an overt communist line. Like many today, they believe the Russian government is no longer communist and are therefore subject to other misunderstandings. They would not credit my analysis.
I must admit at first, I didn’t like your comments or analysis, period. But over the past year or two, I’ve heard your comments, read your books, and research myself (and I’m a book nerd and read anyway). Only to discover that indeed you’re spot on with a lot of what you report and comment on. Actually, truth is, you should be a foreign policy expert advisor to these idiot nitwits that get elected somehow to sit in the residence for 4 years courtesy Pennsylvania Avenue…
It is easy to be misunderstood. In criticizing conservatives or libertarians I am not throwing the baby out with the bath water. The free market is the only way to go, as long as people are good stewards. My larger qualifiers are aristocratic, after the fashion of Joseph Schumpeter. You need a warrior class to defend the bourgeoisie; for the bourgeoisie is not a proper ruling class. The plutocratic tendency is self-defeating. That being said, I am disappointed in how politics is understood by many libertarians and latter-day economists of the Austrian school. I would have hoped for more sophistication, and never wanted to try and explain these things in print. But that’s how it goes.
Well, you’ve earned my respect Jeff. I have learned much from your writing and interviews these days. I find myself scouting sites just looking for another interview and insight into Communism. That said, I may not agree all the time but I figure not every one agrees with my viewpoints either.
That said, I’m over half way through Red Jihad and am disappointed that you and Cliff never really address the Moscow Islam connection in detail. Brief paragraphs but mostly
…the usual commentary of Russian disinformation and “strategic deception”. Briefly mentions of the various Islamic leaders who have been schooled via Patrice Lubumbashi University in Moscow…now called People’s Friendship University, but no real expansion or details…Palestinian Prez Mahmoud Abbas speaks fluent Russian? Yasser Arafat was a Soviet agent? This is news?
“Lumumba”
As I mentioned to you privately, Stephen Coughlin explains in detail how the Muslim Brotherhood and Islam has taken over our domestic policy now after infiltrating in the 50’s….Robert Spencer has written volumes of Jihad being waged against America as well as fundamentalists themselves (Seyyed Qutb, Milestones). No mention of Russia or Communist influence…
The best lecture on Lenin’s use of Islam was given on YouTube by Konstantin Preobrazhenskiy. If you can find it. All your questions may be answered there.
I’ll look it up. Thanks
Seems that has been scrubbed from YT. However, I did find a couple of other interesting reads in my search…
https://www.thespecterofcommunism.com/en/en-chapter-15/
And this….
http://users.jyu.fi/~aphamala/pe/issue5/terroris.htm
Islam is a longer-term problem that we have faced for many centuries.
Agreed, all the way back to when Jefferson finally took action against the Barbary pirates (Muslims) attacking our merchant ships. Even Washington paid the tribute while he was Prez…and as I’ve said over and over…most people (even so called experts today) here refer to it as “radical” Islam with the so called “lone wolf” events….when it should be called out for what it is. “Fundamentalists” following exactly what their holy books tell them to do.
I did not pick the title of the book. I write my section based on the information and analysis I had at the time. Not much can be said about these shadowy relationships. But Alexander Litvinenko’s testimony is dynamite.
I’m not a fan of Cliff Kincaid frankly. Just another right wing activist reporter much like a guy I used to respect in Leo Hohmann…
British Defense Minister Says Ukraine Needs to Show More Gratitude:
According to The Washington Post, US officials were ‘furious’ over Zelensky complaining about the NATO communiqué
by Dave DeCamp Posted on July 12, 2023
https://news.antiwar.com/2023/07/12/british-defense-minister-says-ukraine-needs-to-show-more-gratitude/
Given that Ukraine is holding back Russia, which has every intention of threatening NATO — and has threatened NATO — the Ukrainian president understandably feels what he feels.
Ukraine is fighting for us.
They are fighting for themselves, but we have benefitted mightily.
“Karr also wrote, “Every man has three characters — that which he exhibits, that which he has, and that which he thinks he has.” Of these three characters the third is most dangerous; for there is nothing more dangerous than the falsification of self-knowledge. When we refuse to see evil in the world, it is often because we are incapable of seeing it in ourselves.”
Yes. The starting point in my personal worldview is to acknowledge who/what is good and who/what is evil. (As I’ve heard you say, “we must identify the enemy”.) And to realize any one of us is on the swift path of evil if we sear our consciences as if there was no evil. (In us, or others.) That we’d have our eyes open- and be able to look in the mirror to see ourselves and then the world AS IT IS.
That is it. Yes.
In 1924, moderate Russian socialist and anti-Soviet historian Sergei Petrovich Melgounov (who by then was living in Germany, later in France) published a collection of horrifying reports – newspaper articles, eyewitness accounts, but also official declarations on the part of the Bolshevik authorities – about what was actually going on inside the Soviet state under the title, “Red Terror” in Russia: 1918 – 1923. One such item was this extract from a Red newspaper article:
“The carp enjoys being seethed in cream, and the bourgeois being slain by a Power which is stern, and ready to kill him… Even though our souls may revolt from the task, let us use strong measures, and bring the bourgeoisie to their senses, seeing that we need but shoot a few dozen of the fools, of the wastrels, and make the rest clean the streets, and set their womenfolk to scour out Red Guard barracks (though even this is too great an honour for them!), for the bourgeoisie to realise that our Government is a Government come to stay, and that it is useless to look for help from Englishmen or Hottentots.”
Over this whole century, they haven’t changed one iota. They are still the same infernal criminals and mass murderers that they were under Lenin & Dzerzhinsky, then under Stalin and even under Khrushchev. Only their scale of operations has widened, which now includes the drug trade, human trafficking, and a new pandemic of sexual slavery. – And yet, the “good, traditional Christians” in America support this unchanged Bolshevist regime. There is no excuse for such blunder. Shame on them!
Sergei Petrovich Melgounov: “Red Terror” in Russia: 1918 – 1923. First published in 1924:
https://ia804502.us.archive.org/28/items/RedTerrorInRussia1918-1923/S.P.Melgunov_Red_Terror_In_Russia_1918-1923_En.pdf
Maybe a better read would be the historical English translation of the book, published in 1926 by J. M. Dent & Sons Ltd., London, Toronto:
https://ia-petabox.archive.org/details/redterrorinrussi0000serg/page/n7/mode/2up
Excellent example of Bolshevik attitudes. These attitudes persist, incredibly.
Thank you for this reminder of Robert Conquest’s great book Harvest of Sorrow. I so relate to your experience in being shocked to discover the horrific communist corruption and lying of so much of American academe which endlessly proclaimed communism’s supposed victories in providing food and health care for all. The “iron rice bowl.” There was a slight turnaround to this madness in the 80s and 90s with Reagan, and, I suppose, Bush I. But Freddy is back, with a vengeance. I read for the first time recently the great essay by Richard Pipes, “Three ‘Whys’ of the Russian Revolution,” and, on a re-read, noted the following line: “The collapse of the Soviet Union, a state which appeared as solidly entrenched to us as the tsarist Empire did in its day, was not triggered by social unrest: there were no strike waves, no massive demonstrations, no widespread violence. The USSR disintegrated because of political decisions made at the top.” It is a subtle confirmation of the Golitsyn thesis.
Thank you, Lynn. As people do not know Golitsyn’s work, they get two things wrong: They think Golitsyn was proven wrong by the fall of the Soviet Union, not realizing that 94 percent of his correct predictions were visible 30 years ago. Second, Golitsyn’s prediction of a controlled (from the top) liberalization in Russia did not say whether this liberalizing strategy would work, or if some countries would wriggle free under the new conditions. What is clear, from subsequent history and testimony, is that the Communist Party had to rely on KGB personnel at the highest levels, and on front men (oligarchs) who sometimes broke free and disobeyed. That three decades passed under these arrangements further weakened the communist structures as a new generation rose in the former Soviet Republics. Georgia broke free, the Baltic States, and Ukraine got away in 2014. This last event was potentially a mortal blow and had to be answered. The degeneration of the KGB structures and oligarchs into a kleptocracy further contributed to the military weakness we now see in Russia. None of this disproves Golitsyn’s thesis, which was already shown to be correct by 1992. What it shows is the political genius of Stalin as opposed to Bukharin, regarding the NEP of the 1920s. Stalin knew the system could not tolerate freedom in the countryside for more than several years. In 1929 he brought NEP to an end. He then turned to collectivizing agriculture, to mass repression and mass murder. While Putin came to power as PM in 1999, his repressive measures were insufficient, and mainly directed at the free press and Chechnya. Putin’s terror was focused on journalists and dissidents — not on the country as a whole. Down in Hell, Stalin was shaking his head. “No, no, no! You are doing it all wrong!” The communist party had no easy path to regaining full control of society (though they controlled the government). No mass murder, no return if communism. Notice that open Soviet symbols have appeared most where Russian forces have prevailed in Ukraine. Here we see severe repression and killing goes hand in hand with overt communist control. Communism is so hated, only mass violence can overawe the public into full obedience.
They lost a power in all Eastern Europe, they kept power in Russia but with some problems. But in “exchange” China has been built up and is now the 1st manufacturing power and 1st GDP (PPP) in the world. China is now building a big nuclear arsenal.
Yolo: I think you are generally correct, although I have questions about Hungary and Bulgaria at the government level. We also see that the Russian hold on Central Asia has weakened over the years. A tremendous atrophy has occurred. China has become the real successor, it seems, of the Soviet state. And don’t forget how the end of the Cold War helped the political careers of many radicals in the West — who posed as centrists and moderates (from Lula to Obama).
Well, why not read things straight from the horse’s mouth: Gorbachev (or his ghostwriters) spelled it all out quite unambiguously in their 1987 programmatic book, Perestroika: New Thinking for Our Country and the World (though hardly anybody in the West appears to have read the book, or understood it):
“We will proceed toward better socialism rather than away from it. We are saying this honestly, without trying to fool our own people or the world. Any hopes that we will begin to build a different, nonsocialist society and go over to the other camp are unrealistic and futile. Those in the West who expect us to give up socialism will be disappointed. It is high time they understood this, and, even more importantly, proceeded from that understanding in practical relations with the Soviet Union.” (p. 37)
“There are different interpretations of perestroika in the West, including the United States. There is the view that it has been necessitated by the disastrous state of the Soviet economy and that it signifies disenchantment with socialism and a crisis for its ideals and ultimate goals. Nothing could be further from the truth than such interpretations, whatever the motives behind them.
“Of course, perestroika has been largely stimulated by our dissatisfaction with the way things have been going in our country in recent years. But it has to a far greater extent been prompted by an awareness that the potential of socialism had been underutilized. We realize this particularly clearly now in the days of the seventieth anniversary of our Revolution. We have a sound material foundation, a wealth of experience and a broad world outlook with which to perfect our society purposefully and continuously, seeking to gain ever greater returns — in terms of quantity and quality — from all our activities.” (pp. 10)
“The life-giving impetus of our great Revolution was too powerful for the Party and people to reconcile themselves to phenomena that were threatening to squander its gains. The works of Lenin and his ideals of socialism remained for us an inexhaustible source of dialectical creative thought, theoretical wealth and political sagacity. His very image is an undying example of lofty moral strength, all-round spiritual culture and selfless devotion to the cause of the people and to socialism. Lenin lives on in the minds and hearts of millions of people. Breaking down all the barriers erected by scholastics and dogmatists, an interest in Lenin’s legacy and a thirst to know him more extensively in the original grew as negative phenomena in society accumulated.
“Turning to Lenin has greatly stimulated the Party and society in their search to find explanations and answers to the questions that have arisen. Lenin’s works in the last years of his life have drawn particular attention. I shall adduce my own experience to corroborate this point. In my report of 22 April 1983, at a gala session dedicated to the 113th anniversary of Lenin’s birth, I referred to Lenin’s tenets on the need for taking into account the requirements of objective economic laws, on planning and cost accounting and intelligent use of commodity-money relations and material and moral incentives. The audience enthusiastically supported this reference to Lenin’s ideas. I felt, once again, that my reflections coincided with the sentiments of my fellow Party members and the many people who were seriously concerned about our problems and sincerely wanted to rectify matters. Indeed, many of my fellow Party members felt an urgent need for the renewal of society, for changes. However, I should say that I also sensed that not everybody liked the report, but felt that it was not as optimistic as the time required.” (pp. 25)
“There is a term in historical science and also in political vocabulary: ‘revolution from above.’ There have been quite a few such revolutions in history. But they should not be confused with coups d’etat and palace revolutions. What is meant is profound and essentially revolutionary changes implemented on the initiative of the authorities themselves but necessitated by objective changes in the situation and in social moods.
“It may seem that our current perestroika could be called a ‘revolution from above.’ True, the perestroika drive started on the Communist Party’s initiative, and the Party leads it. The Party is strong and bold enough to work out a new policy. It has proved capable of heading and launching the process of renewal of society. The Party started the effort with self-improvement. I spoke frankly about it at the meeting with Party activists in Khabarovsk, in the summer of 1986. We must begin with ourselves, I said. Everyone must assume the responsibility: in the Politburo, in local bodies, and in grass-roots Party organizations. We must be better than we are. We shall help those who can’t improve themselves. The main thing is to be conscientious. We have grown accustomed to many practices when there was no openness. This applies to both the rank and file and high officials.” (p. 55)
“They tell us that nothing will come of perestroika within the framework of our system. They say we should change this system and borrow from the experience of another socio-political system. To this they add that, if the Soviet Union takes this path and gives up its socialist choice, close links with the West will supposedly become possible. They go so far as to claim that the October 1917 Revolution was a mistake which almost completely cut off our country from world social progress.
“To put an end to all the rumors and speculations that abound in the West about this, I would like to point out once again that we are conducting all our reforms in accordance with the socialist choice. We are looking within socialism, rather than outside it, for the answers to all the questions that arise. We assess our successes and errors alike by socialist standards. Those who hope that we shall move away from the socialist path will be gready disappointed. Every part of our program of perestroika — and the program as a whole, for that matter — is fully based on the principle of more socialism and more democracy.” (p. 36)
“I think we had every reason to declare at the January 1987 Plenary Meeting: in its essence, in its Bolshevik daring and in its humane social thrust the present course is a direct sequel to the great accomplishments started by the Leninist Party in the October days of 1917. And not merely a sequel, but an extension and a development of the main ideas of the Revolution. We must impart new dynamism to the October Revolution’s historical impulse and further advance all that was commenced by it in our society.” (p. 50)
“Fourteen out of fifteen citizens living in the USSR today were born after the Revolution. And we are still being urged to give up socialism. Why should the Soviet people, who have grown and gained in strength under socialism, abandon that system? We will spare no effort to develop and strengthen socialism. I think that a minimum of the new system’s potential has been tapped so far.
“This is why we find strange proposals — some even sincere — to alter our social system and turn to methods and forms typical of a different social set-up. People who make such suggestions do not realize that this is just impossible even if there were someone wishing to turn the Soviet Union to capitalism. Just think: how can we agree that 1917 was a mistake and all the seventy years of our life, work, effort and battles were also a complete mistake, that we were going in the ‘wrong direction’. No, a strict and impartial view of the facts of history suggests only one conclusion: it is the socialist option that has brought formerly backward Russia to the ‘right place’ — the place the Soviet Union now occupies in human progress.” (p. 42)
Everybody should read this book. It’s all there, in black and white:
https://archive.org/details/perestroikanewth00gorbrich/page/n3/mode/2up?view=theater
The phrase, “gready disappointed” in the quote from p. 36 should of course be “greatly disappointed”. I tried to eliminate all automatic reading errors from copying and pasting these paragraphs, but this one escaped my attention.
One of the interesting things about the interview is Tim Ballard says Tony Robbins was, if involuntarily, doubtful whether the rescuing children missions were real or not. And Mr. Ballard himself seems to have felt doubtful whether or not there was any realistic chance-taking to his crusade. Aristotle essentially says in a tyranny the tyrant makes laws superstitious to give reality an artificial and fantasy appearance so people become doubtful of their own judgements and regading the line between reality and fantasy, so they better abstain from judging the bad behavior of the tyrant. One lives today immersed in an atmosphere of social media editing, NFTs prestige, thousands of cryptocurrencies, out of control fiat debt and political and entertainment talking points and premises which seem to elude sincere as clear as possible definitions. The thought the two things are not unrelated, namely, increase in international organized crime exertion and an increasing artificial quality to the world that challenges one’s ability to judge, is a bit scary.
Yes. The promotion of all kinds of evil and chaos is essential for evil’s success within society writ large.
Some time ago Peter Schiff shared on twitter this funny video which captured I think in a remarkable way this cultural atmosphere of artifice and chaos :
https://youtu.be/GUs5y9leCyA
[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUs5y9leCyA&w=560&h=315%5D
The so called holodomor seems to be a hoax created by Nazis or Khruschev. Definitely appeared only after WW2. It is almost impossible to find original sources documenting the event.
STHU!
Commit: You live in an old Stalinist bubble, believing the old lies. When will you be up-to-date? Why cling to such false views? The truth if the Holodomor is well established. Have you read Mr. Conquest’s footnotes?
This recalls Whittaker Chambers’ reference to a casual luncheon with Ruth Stout circa 1929. Hers is perhaps the most terrifically disastrous approach to gardening that my wife and I have had the misfortune of attempting. It begs the question if her methodology was reported to the Central
Committee and implemented in the Ukraine.
I saw “Sound of Freedom”, Tuesday. Powerful! Thank you for this article and being willing to take on the challenging call to look into an abyss of evil on earth, to expose and resist it. Many do not have the courage to devote themselves to God, truth and proclaiming truth and warning like that. There is a burden and stigma that comes with such a calling. Thank you for remaining steady thru the decades, despite being told to “cheer up”, lighten up and give up. You are in good historical company, however. (Ezek 8, for just one. ) “Wisdom will be justified by her children.”
Well, since we are on the topic of evil and sex trafficking, now is appropriate time to ask this.
One of your readers here posted this within the last 18 months, or so. Not sure when. Just wanted to ask, do you still feel this is the most complete picture, as far as you are aware, or would you edit, delete, or add any new information to this reprinted article from Joshua Philipp’s 2018 interview with you? I pass this on quite a bit and want to provide the most complete, truthful picture in this arena as possible. This seems key to understand clearly where some of this onslaught of evil has been wickedly and purposefully sown in our culture, in stealth mode, to destroy it foundational values and family structure.
https://fitzinfo.net/2020/07/08/soviets-created-child-trafficking-rings-in-the-west-for-blackmail-scholar/amp/
As I noted in the interview, there is testimony from Soviet/Russian and Ukrainian sources, that sex trafficking of children — organized similarly to drug trafficking — has had encouragement from a special Soviet KGB department, approved by Yuri Andropov when he was head of the KGB. The purpose of KGB-directed sex trafficking in children is to obtain blackmail on important people in the West. This fits with the KGB pattern of using organized crime, drug trafficking, and money-laundering networks. Operation Friendship of Nations begain in 1960 under Khrushchev, and was all about narcotics trafficking (initially heroin). I would add to this, that not all drug traffickers are affiliated with the KGB or Chinese special services. According to the research of Joe Douglass, about two-thirds of the international drug trade was Russian or Chinese-connected in the late 1980s; that is, connected to their intelligence services and agent networks. What is the percentage today? We have no recent studies to point to. Regular criminals were essentially trained and coopted by Russian or Chinese services in decades past. In the 1960s the Russians set up drug trafficking schools in Czechoslovakia. I have heard (as a rumor) that the KGB pedophile networks were set up in East Germany and/or Czechoslovakia, but I have no confirmation of this. The Russians got into narcotics trafficking for the purpose of acquiring political blackmail, intelligence, and money-laundering advantages. I would assume the same holds true for child sex trafficking (which would use similar techniques for recruitment of targets), but I have no detailed knowledge. This area is murky, and I would want to consult with people who go after traffickers, and ask questions about past cases, looking for connections to Russian, Cuban, or related crime organizations/intel services. This is an area of research and investigation which nobody has delved into, and would require considerable resources which I do not have. On the surface, we have the Jeffrey Epstein case, which is pretty well documented and we have Epstein’s suggestive connection to suspected KGB agent Robert Maxwell’s daughter, Ghislaine Maxwell (who worked closely with Epstein). Also, Epstein was going after high-end business and political targets, and we know he was videotaping these targets for blackmail purposes. This raises the question as to whether this operation was connected with Russian intelligence. I think that is a very real possibility.
Another clue, which you could not have missed, appears in the “Sound of Freedom” movie itself, which ends up taking us into the FARC zone of Colombia, where a communist rebel commander acquired a young girl as sex slave. This is remarkable, because it shows that the pedophile ring in question was indeed connected to the communists. Otherwise, how did they end up selling a little girl to a communist rebel commander in the jungle? This connection is not proof that the communist services are in control of this particular ring. It proves, merely, that the communists were sufficiently connected as to purchase a child. The communist bosses in the area could not have missed the advantages that working with that ring might bring in terms of blackmail on American or Colombian pedophiles. That is the only suggestive detail in the movie that there is a connection between the pedophile network of the movie and the communist movement. Only exact knowledge of the criminal network can answer our questions regarding Cuban, Chinese, or Russian involvement.
Thank you for the further clarification.
Regarding Hungary and Bulgaria, there is Russian influence in Hungary yes but Bulgaria has supplied weapons to Ukraine. The big difference between China and Soviet Union is that Chinese leaders are less “brutal” and more cunning. They pretend that they don’t want to export communism. After Pinochet’s coup d’etat in 1973, China led by Chairman Mao maintened relations with Chile while all other communist countries broke relations. The Chinese pretend they only care about communism in China. Correct me if I’m wrong but I think that Marxism-Leninism says that a World Revolution is necessary
I had not followed Bulgaria closely enough in their assistance for Ukraine. Evidently, Bulgaria has undergone some interesting changes over the last decade plus? Last time I spoke with a Bulgarian journalist, he gave a very disturbing report of communist influence there.
It is incredible that I reached that part of the comments regarding Bulgaria because I am Bulgarian. I personally don’t believe that Bulgaria is a democratic country despite its membership in EU and NATO and sending weapons to Ukraine. The communist influence wherever it is is always directly or indirectly the influence of the Chekists and GRU in Moscow (not a pretty sure about China but I only suspect it). Whatever. Here in Bulgaria all main parties DPS, GERB, BSP and the coalition PP/DB are products of the local Komsomol and the local KGB and Communist party. All little parties are practically a product of the Bulgarian KGB and the party of Kiril Petkov and Asen Vasilev called PP (Prodylzhavame promyanata) is a product of the Bulgarian KGB agent Tento. Bulgarian analysts even suspect that the family of Kiril Petkov has some connections with the Chinese army! So when we talk about the export of weapons to Ukraine we must say that Bulgaria is one of the many battlefields where the tandem FSB/SVR (all Chekists) and the army’s GRU fight against each other. The same happened in Moldova, Sudan and even Tajikistan. In Bulgaria GRU poisoned Emiliyan Gebrev who worked for Bulgarian KGB and Kintex – the same company which traded with arms and drugs during the communism (and probably still does it). They poisoned him because he exported weapons to the Ukrainian army – it was all done before the invasion in 2022. So that’s why I’m sure that there is a battle behind the scenes between GRU and FSB/SVR regarding the Bulgarian arms export to Ukraine. And this is not the only case of the internal fight between Russian special services. Now Bulgaria wants to export 100 military fighting vehicles to Ukraine which I oppose bearing in mind our so small army. Otherwise, we export other weapons to Poland and then to Ukraine.
Stefan: So glad you posted here. I had good information on Bulgaria 15 years ago, but lost track of my journalist friend since then. I think his publication was called Democracy Now, or something like it. Kintex, of course, was an important company for the KGB moving heroin into Europe through Bulgaria in the 1960s-80s. Probably still doing it, as you noted. The communist criminal and political networks are extensive in Bulgaria, and are connected to networks in Turkey (in a complex set of relationships). One only has to look at the involvement of these networks in the attempted assassination of the Pope by Ali Agca, who came from Turkey through Bulgaria. Here we find a left-right collusion with Islam and communism in the mix.
There is a red terror operation currently in Bulgaria that will extend out west as Golytsyn and Lunev predicted. Weapons factories there have “mysteriously” been blown up and yet cricket criket is all you hear. This should be front page news like the 911 attack. The sabotaging pink/grey terrorists looting in Paris and stealing San Franciso are connected to this red terror more direct sabotage of key strategic infrastructures by direct Moscow agents and close sympathizers in country.
Russia Detained Several Senior Military Officers in Wake of Wagner Mutiny
Gen. Sergei Surovikin is being held and interrogated in Moscow; others were detained, suspended or fired
https://www.wsj.com/articles/russia-detained-several-senior-military-officers-in-wake-of-wagner-mutiny-35a696e4
This was an amazingly hopeful article. Forty to fifty thousand Chinese are renouncing the Chinese Communist Party not yearly… not monthly… but daily!
“July 1 this year is the 102nd anniversary of the founding of the CCP, which has seen 415 million Chinese people worldwide publicly withdraw from the CCP’s organizations—a global movement that began in November 2004 and has recently seen an average of 40,000 to 50,000 people daily renouncing the CCP.”
…
“The CCP regime is like sitting on a powder keg, and the awareness of the ‘crisis of the death of the party’ is pervasive within the party,” said Yi Rong, chairwoman of the Global Service Center for Quitting the CCP, to The Epoch Times on July 1.“
…
“Chinese society is brewing giant changes, and the regime’s collapse is imminent,” Mr. Li said.”
“Xi Jinping Warns of a Ruling Crisis, Fearing CCP Will Share the Fate of the Soviet Union”
https://www.theepochtimes.com/xi-jinping-warns-of-a-ruling-crisis-fearing-ccp-will-share-the-fate-of-the-soviet-union_5395767.html
(Jeff, if you have thoughts on this, I’d sure be curious to hear them. With numbers like this, it can’t be just the Chinese diaspora, but also people within China who are quitting the CCP. How is this happening? Are there simply too many people leaving the CCP for party officials to be able to retaliate against them?)
The problem I have is that this claim about the imminent death of the communist party is identical with Lenin and Dzerzhinsky’s Operation Trust in the 1920s. Nobody will act against a party that is about to be dissolved, or is already controlled by Falun Gong (or the Trust). I am therefore skeptical until actual and genuine changes happen in China.
Oh interesting. What a brilliant safeguard. These people must eat, sleep & breathe lies to have come up with this kind of strategy.
It’s best to be skeptical until we know more.
Indeed! The truth is we don’t really know what is going on inside of China or Russia. Both regimes like to play with people, and both have released disinfo to the world. Peter Zeihan had to make a disclaimer on any predictions on Russia because the info is not reliable, and the same applies to China.
When it comes to the fall of Xi, it may be close, but I will believe it when I see it.
Many in the US are communists and they do not know it. The destruction of moral compass and the family is a start to make people feel nice and yet be evil. One of my bosses in my work experience would claim that humans are inherently good. He was the worst boss ever, completely blind to his own narcissism, selfishness and entitlement corrupted mind. Stay away from people like these. What is worse, is these people think they are patriots because they side with the right football team, with the American flag. You see these bureaucrats going jingoist in tirades about how America is better and yet with their subordinates they act like pre-Soviet persons, redistributing power to themselves and others, picking this or that person working in a key strategic position only to use them as their personal secretaries for their office out of convenience, incapable of understanding the specialty of their subordinates and how it is important for them to keep growing these skills. .
In the justice system it is the same. Cops are used for personal protection by state attorneys for their escapades, attorneys do jobs for judges and do not know their job as attorneys, just as lackeys for someone else. Incompetence and insecurity is basically a must. And these people have made careers in our Armed forces, pi$$ing green in the Army and blue in the Air Force, literally, and yet their local behaviors are utterly Soviet like and corrupt. They think in localist manner, like a schizo dog who if in its circle of domination, will start bark at you with utter disrespect, despite looking nice to others outside that circle.
The problem is that war is a mission oriented work like for prophets. It is not a personal thing. So, of course, when war will come, they will drag feet and pester, feeling like their Office power is being diminished by patriots who have their head in the “game”. They will feel their personal stuff is robbed by this war and will take it so personally as to start sabotaging it all.
Even if the schools and force structure indicate a better way of doing things, integrated, mission oriented, they come back from this training and kick the ant hill that was built there and do things their own way. They disintegrate everything and redistribute the pieces of labor to each other’s offices in fair way like localist schizophrenic children asking mom and dad to be fair amongst siblings. You see them repeat Martin Luther King and JFK, as in “ask what you can do for your country”, but come home doing the exact opposite.
These people are EVIL. They feel they are on the right team, on MLK or JFK’s side, blacks or whites, they think they are in Jesus side because they go to church, and yet they do not feel forewarned by Jesus saying: “[you all] I never knew you”. Do they even stop to think when at church who Christ meant when He said that. Nope, just like those Russians who feel proud of their Orthodox church and feel superior to pagans and yet condone looting and rape in Ukraine the same, it does not register on them.
How many cops, military officer or what not over there would feel offended indeed if truth was told to it that he was a shtbag and a communist not knowing it, corrupt?
It is uncanny, these people who believe humans are inherently good or that their uniform is a proof of their own narcissistic self image of being righteous, they are absolutely dangerous, They are the ones who like dogs can game the system for dogs, who now feel that if they dress as a woman it gives them the dog territory over women bathrooms to bark at others daring to look if they abuse there. These schizo dogs do not realize that even in Indian tribes the transvestites would never dare claim they were of equal strength to women who gave birth and managed the affairs of the world as women since the beginning. Nope, this kind of abstraction goes out the window in the name of this pathological obsession on equality and fair redistribution.
Karl Marx was indeed such a schizo dog wanting to manufacture more dogs. You cannot raise a wolf, a wolf raises himself or herself. Their lesser domesticated kins, the dog, the schizo wolf pup version of it, is the mentally ill one who thinks man and woman do not need to invent each and everyone on their own selves. Man and woman are not wheels to copy, wheels do not need to be reinvented, a person always need to be reinvented, a person is not a wheel to which can be ascribed a work value equality to it.
This is why the Russian is so ruthless in Ukraine and thinks Ukraine was “created” by Russia. They cannot fathom a Ukraine ethnically inventing itself through the process of war indicating a process of running a nation when in peace. To them Ukraine is just another wheel that need not reinventing, and that resurrection of Ukraine grates at these people greatly, and it greats at the coward out west who themselves are on their disorganized schizo way rejecting this conflict, not because it is a war, but because it is a process they reject, a way of doing things they reject. Because these people do love to hurt and nuke people outside the process. They do not care about a person painstakingly inventing himself or herself, they do not care about this planet altogether.
Many posting this on Twitter.
https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-actions/2023/07/13/ordering-the-selected-reserve-and-certain-members-of-the-individual-ready-reserve-of-the-armed-forces-to-active-duty/
Yes, I have read it. I do not know what it is about. Some mobilization of a specific group of soldiers.
Maybe China is about to make a move?
“The CCP is building 18 air raid shelters in Fujian province, adjacent to Taiwan. The regime is also building the world’s largest combat hospital in the region, Mr. Bass added, saying that the move was reminiscent of Russia’s construction of blood banks on the borders of Ukraine in the months leading up to its invasion last year.”
That is a disturbing sign.
Maybe I’m not reading it rightly, but it sounds like they will go to Europe. That wouldn’t help Pacific issues.
I’m concerned it is the purposeful movement of strong, well-trained, community protector types off of American soil, while foreign professional troops are flooding in and being pre-positioned here. Not in Polyanna mode about this.
What is the source of @PrayinginOK’s quote? Is there a link? I’d be interested in knowing more about it. It’s so hard to find information about the Chinese Communists’ nefarious plans for America.
Epoch Times. K linked it below.
Apart from Jeff, I should add.
@PrayinginOK: Thanks.
I wonder if it’s something that was decided at the NATO summit.
Could be.
Hopefully the 3,000 are the training cadre to instruct more Ukrainian soldiers on a large new surge of weapons that we are about to send them.
Thanks for that quote @PrayingInOK! Interesting. Here’s the full article for anyone who’d like to read it:
https://www.theepochtimes.com/china-passing-laws-building-infrastructure-for-wartime-expert-says_5394781.html
Prior to the formation of the Soviet Union, The Ukraine was part and parcel of Russia. The dissolution of the Soviet Union did not automatically result in the formation of Ukraine as an independent nation-state. it was not until President Yeltsin granted independence for the Russian territory to become the independent Ukraine.
Ukraine became an independent country in 1918, due to the Treaty of Brest Litovsk. This happened before the Soviet Union formed. Ukraine was independent when it joined the USSR. Please get off my site with your nonsense.
If you have children or young people you are responsible for, do not let them use the internet unless your own eyes are on the screen. Do not rely on any parent controls whatsoever. Perverts have no honor and online predators are insidious. What evil times we live in.
I don’t post very often, so first I want to offer my condolences.
I think you talked with Jeff Kincaid about the chinese defector Dong Jingwei about two years ago. Now Dan Bongino has been talking recently about that, and Jennifer Van Laar wrote a new article in Red State June 30th. You were sceptical about the autenticity of the defector.
It do seems to tie in to the chinese defence ministers speek from 20 years ago. So, do you have any thougts on this?
Link to Dan Bongino on rumble, he has the article linked in the shownotes. The segment starts at ca 39 minutes.
https://rumble.com/v2z7efe-what-really-happened-with-the-cocaine-at-the-white-house-ep.-2043-07102023.html
I have not seen Sound of Freedom, I’m in Sweden. I’m not sure I really want to either. Saw a polish documentary on youtube that is scary, very scary.
When a defector’s information corresponds with other defector information, and when it agrees with the deeper things we know about communist intentions, he is probably trustworthy. Dr. Yi Meng-Yan has told me this same information, that viruses are the weapon of choice of China.
Churchill deliberately starved way more people in India more recently.
Yep. Starved 50 million just yesterday, didn’t he? Dadnabit, that justifies the Holodomor, doesn’t it? But wait… I thought you said it was a hoax?? Ahhh, well, you’ve probably just had a few vodkas since that comment. I understand.
Let’s say you are right. India got its independence from the UK in 1947. Right and proper. I am sure you favor that. So why not allow Ukraine it’s independence? Right and proper. Why should the capital that starved Ukraine have a right to rule her?
This defines Commit.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=3O9FFrLpinQ&utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email
LOL! That defines a lot of people, and these people are more dangerous and more numerous than we know.
Hahaha! Yessir. He fits right in that bottom left quadrant. Consistently.
This is the life of (ahem) “certain people” in that bottom left quadrant, described in terms of Paddy’s workday here.
Link posted further down
Jeff,
Just so you know, I will be sending this excellent blog to Bill O’Reilly. He wrote me that he is considering talking to you and doing more reporting on the brave Ukrainians who are fighting the Russians.
He did a segment this week on Ukraine. He interviewed a woman from the Quincy Institute who had a less than sympathetic view of the Ukrainians and advocated opening channels of communication with Putin. When Bill said we’ve done that by supporting Pope Francis’s mission and Putin refused the Pope’s overtures, she could not or would not understand. Bill exposed her naivete and pro Russian position quite impressively.
That’s good to hear. I look forward to talking with him.