“O muse, today sing of Jughashvili [Stalin], the son of a bitch,
“He has artfully combined the donkey’s stubbornness and the fox’s cunning,
“By cutting a million nooses he has made his way to power.”Pavel Vasiliev
In John Lewis Gaddis’s 1987 book, The Long Peace, an important question is asked. Why, “given the unprecedented levels of super-power tension that have existed since 1945, has World War III not occurred?”
In the 1980s critical documents from Britain and the United States were declassified which Gaddis used in his attempt to answer the question. This, arguably, was the wrong approach. Documents of that kind will never provide an answer as to why World War III did not occur. The answer only exists within a larger psychological and philosophical framework. In this context, Gaddis was the kind of liberal who did not take Marxism-Leninism seriously as a symptom of a deeper malady. In fact, he did not even try to grasp Leninism’s meaning. Like other scholars, who saw the Soviet Union as an extension of the Russian Empire, Gaddis attempted to relate Soviet motives to old Russian imperial motives. In other words, Gaddis failed to see the differences between Russian and Soviet sensibilities – between tsars and commissars. This failure was a symptom of that same modern blindness that affects most modern men who take materialism as given – whether they are Marxists or not.
What, then, distinguished the Russian Empire from the Soviet Union? Under the Russian Empire God was God, but under the Soviet Union Lenin and Stalin became God. Of all the differences one might list, what could be more significant than this? In Donald Rayfield’s book, Stalin and his Hangmen, there is the following important aside: “When in 1937 writers were commissioned to write about Stalin’s childhood some took as their model the childhood of Jesus Christ….”[i]
Whatever their faults, the Tsars never thought of themselves as messiahs or gods. They never built tombs for themselves as if they were Egyptian god-kings. Yet Lenin was buried in a pyramidal mausoleum, fit for a Pharaoh. Because of this we should never describe the Soviet Union as if it were a continuation of the Russian Empire. Even Eric Voegelin committed this error in some of his writings, though he should have known better. It is, perhaps, because of our inbuilt positivism and materialism (as modern people) that we prefer to think of spiritual factors as having secondary or tertiary importance. In opposition to this tendency, let me suggest that reality is animated, in the first instance, by spirit. Without the organizing principle of the logos there is no ordered universe.
At its base, the underlying criminal impulse of totalitarianism is to destroy – to “deconstruct” – the God-given order. Having erased what is divinely given, the revolutionary stands before a blank canvas as an artist – as God – to paint upon that canvas whatever he imagines. But the question is, what does he imagine? Why did he want to erase God’s creation in the first place?
This negation of God’s work was not the project of the Tsars, of the Russian Empire – or of any empire prior to the Soviet Union. With that union the communists undertook a project nobody ever dared to attempt. Where did the idea for this project come from? What did it grow out of? According to Max Weber, “The fate of our times is characterized by rationalization and intellectualization and, above all, by the disenchantment of the world.” Weber’s original German phrase is “die Entzauberung der Welt,” which can also be translated as “the elimination of magic from the world.”
This “disenchantment of the world” coincides with a profound sense of alienation. Here the soul is trapped in a realm of unremitting darkness. Convinced by materialism that existence is meaningless, accidental, and cruel, the tendency is to believe that only matter is real while spirit is an illusion.[ii] Under that idea, the soul begins to suffocate. In a misguided attempt to break free, the trapped soul turns to revolutionary destruction as a way out. I believe all the abnormal, abhorrent and aberrant impulses of late modernity are rooted in philosophical materialism (which nearly everyone absorbs by osmosis).
These abhorrent and aberrant impulses, of course, are viewed as heroic by the vanguard of the demoralized and disoriented. In this context, Marx’s gangster disciples thought of themselves as heaven-storming Titans. What did they have to lose? Even today, at this late stage of the World Revolution, the movement’s “philosophers” are consciously reaching back to reconfigure the symbols of spiritual rebellion if only to reclothe themselves (Sartor Resartus) in accordance with “the sorrows of the young Teufelsdröckh.” Thus, in 2014, Putin’s court philosopher, Aleksandr Dugin, envisioned a realm between God and man consisting of the shining Logos of Apollo, the dark Logos of Dionysus, and the black Logos of Cybele.[iii] Here the Kremlin sorcerer contemplated “the re-enchantment of the world” while Putin winked. One may imagine that a fire was lit, quietly and perhaps wittingly, by the sorcerer. But rather than serving as a backfire for Vladimir Putin, it might ignite the tinderbox of Russian despair and longing. The evil intention of the sorcerer, under a perverse formulation, is curiously spiritualist rather than materialist. As such, Dugin’s project undermines materialism while bowing and scraping to Russia and China’s materialist bureaucracies. Likening the West’s materialism to the supineness of the ancient Carthaginians in the days before Scipio Africanus destroyed Carthage, Dugin forgot the dominant mystical nocturne of his Kremlin masters:
“A person with a dominant mystical nocturne is prone to seek compromise, is distinguished by conformism and hyper-conformism, is peace-loving, easily adapts to any conditions, is feminine, is drawn towards serenity, and sets comfort, satiety, safety, and harmony above all else, believing that the best is guaranteed to come naturally. Here we can unmistakably recognize the structures of the Black Logos, the noetic world of Cybele, the Great Mother, and the chthonic worlds of the womb.”[iv]
Here Dugin hints at an association between the Great Mother and American consumer culture (with its feminine values). He underscores consumerism’s readiness to surrender. Here Dugin is assuring his pinheaded Kremlin bosses that they are free to rape the Great Mother. But does he understand the twofold aspect of modern materialism and feminism? The Great Mother, as symbol, represents the real revolution of our time (rather than consumerism); that is, the transformation of the ages – aligning more with the allegory of the Holy Grail than with the supineness of capitalist (i.e., Carthaginian) appeasement and its readiness to accommodate totalitarianism (i.e., the Third Rome). In the Grail myth we see that the land is dying. The crops will not grow. The Grail must be recovered before regeneration can begin. Only a purehearted knight can recover the Grail. Dugin suggests that mankind’s salvation is found “in the masculine regime” which Putin’s Russia supposedly represents. In other words, Putin is Dugin’s Percival (i.e., the knight who recovers the Grail). But Putin is a liar and murderer. His heart is not pure, and Dugin knows it. Putin also lacks the evil genius of Stalin. In respect of this, Putin’s military campaigns have all backfired. He does not possess that unique mix of ruthlessness and insight which brought success to Stalin. In his reverence for Stalin, Putin may blame Lenin for the Ukrainian uprising, but Putin is a mediocrity. He neither possesses Lenin’s powers of analysis nor Stalin’s paranoid clairvoyance. If one is to be a great criminal, one must be “great.” Worst of all, Putin shares the failings of all Stalin’s successors rolled into one. His schemes are more harebrained than Khrushchev’s, his bureaucracy more corrupt than Brezhnev’s, while his reforms have failed more miserably than those of Andropov and Gorbachev combined. In short, Putin’s mimicry lacks both sense and art. He is the ape that Soviet man has devolved into. Commenting from Hell, Stalin would say that Putin lacks the nerve to start World War III, especially as he has already failed to follow through on his threats more than once. If Andropov refused to start the war in 1983, the “little Andropov” – as Putin is nicknamed – is even less likely to push the button. The initiative, therefore, passes to China and to President Xi Jinping.
The shabbiness and falseness of Putin’s regime leads us to turn away from Gaddis’s history of the Cold War and his question as to why World War III has not occurred. Gaddis’s manifold analysis is unsatisfying from today’s vantage point. His explanation of our avoidance of World War III is so devoid of meaning that nothing is gained by repeating it. Plato, in his dialogue The Sophist, comes to the point more eloquently in an imaginary conversation between Stranger and Theaetetus. The war itself is not what people think it is. There is a larger war that has been going on for thousands of years:
“Stranger: There appears to be a sort of war of Titans and Gods going on amongst them; they are fighting with one another about the nature of essence.
“Theaetetus: How is that?
“Stranger: Some of them are dragging down all things from heaven and from the unseen to earth, and they literally grasp in their hands rocks and oaks; of these they lay hold, and obstinately maintain, that the things only which can be touched or handled have being or essence, because they define being and body as one, and if anyone else says that what is not a body exists they altogether despise him, and will hear of nothing but body.
“Theaetetus: I have often met with such men, and terrible fellows they are.
“Stranger: And that is the reason why their opponents cautiously defend themselves from above, out of an unseen world, mightily contending that true essence consists of certain intelligible and incorporeal ideas; the bodies of the materialists, which by them are maintained to be the very truth, they break up into little bits by their arguments, and affirm them to be, not essence, but generation and motion. Between the two armies, Theaetetus, there is always an endless conflict raging concerning these matters.”[v]
In the course of this “endless conflict,” Putin does not see that his own court philosopher (Dugin) has undermined his position. In fact, Putin has undermined his own position! You can only pretend to be an Orthodox Christian and a Leninist so long. Stalin knew where the battle lines were drawn. Stalin knew that he represented the materialist side in this battle. But Putin is blind to philosophy. “It seems to me,” wrote Richard Weaver, “that the world is now more than ever dominated by the gods [or titans] of mass and speed and that the worship of these can lead only to the lowering of standards, the adulteration of quality, and, in general, to the loss of those things which are essential to the life of civility and culture.”[vi] Building on Weaver’s comment: If you are going to destroy and thereby conquer the world, you have to make sure that your instrument of destruction does not, in the first instance, succumb to the lowering of standards and the adulteration of quality. Lenin and Stalin’s solution was to say that quantity has quality of its own. But Putin does not have the advantage of quantity in the present phase of struggle.
In the battle between Titans and gods, Stalin was the most formidable Titan, representing mass and speed under a regime of quantity. Stalin was formidable because he understood his mission. “The existence of God vexed Stalin all his life,” wrote Donald Rayfield. “Around 1926, reading a Russian translation of Anatole France’s Sous la rose, Stalin was most intrigued by the story of Charles Baudelaire visiting Theophile Gautier, examining a grotesque African carved idol and wondering, ‘Suppose God is really like that!’” Stalin wrote in the margin of the text, “Hah! Sort that one out!” Stalin was nonetheless perturbed by France’s suggestion that “God is the point of intersection for all human contradictions.” Stalin scrawled in the margin, “Reason-feeling, is that really also [a contradiction]?” Was God, then, at the intersection of reason and feeling? As a God-dictator, was Stalin also standing at this intersection? His immersion in theology during his youth prepared him for the demonic role he was to play; that is, to advance a new religion, which was Marxism-Leninism. It was the religion of Antichrist, he knew. For this religion to work he had to borrow, after an inverted fashion, from Christianity. He used both reason and feeling. When necessary he had to depart from Marx and Lenin to make his system work. Marx and Lenin always approved of such expediencies, so Stalin was not really departing from the teachings of his masters. (Let pedants think what they want.) And so, borrowing from Orthodox Christianity, Stalin threatened his disobedient subjects with the gulag, which was the Soviet equivalent of hell. He promised socialist paradise to the obedient, offering a Soviet version of heaven. This is how his system functioned. Only there was one very large problem. Nobody other than Stalin understood how and why the system worked. This led to another question: What would happen when Stalin died? Stalin, after all, was not immortal. For his system to stand, Stalin would need successors who understood what it meant to be God. For that was the core of the communist project. Man was to become God, or a small group of men would take up God’s office. The dictator’s psychological advantage here was simple. Stalin had been a seminarian. None of the other Soviet rulers would grasp the importance of this. Stalin understood the idea of sin, repentance, divine judgment, which influenced his rule in paradoxical ways. A form of control rooted in obedience was his element. Once Khrushchev introduced his permissive Leninism, which further deteriorated into system-wide corruption under Brezhnev, all discipline was lost. As a dictator, Stalin advanced Marxism by employing a Christian Orthodox architecture. Thus, he introduced the “Soviet family,” modeled on the Orthodox family. Thus, he introduced modes of confession through show trials and purges. The thing he could not do, in the case of Lenin, was to present an empty tomb. He could not bring his predecessor back to life, and he was bound to die himself.
This trick of using a Christian Orthodox architecture served Stalin well. It also confused leading Western Soviet analysts, from George Kennan to Francis Fukuyama. The conventional Sovietologists had many virtues, but they did not see that Stalin’s admixture of Orthodoxy and communism was a stronger poison because it was better and more durable on account of its Orthodox mimicry. In his Stalin biography, Volume I, Stephen Kotkin recognized Stalin’s unique genius – which no other revolutionary leader could replicate. Vladimir Putin’s attempt to follow Stalin’s pattern, to borrow from Orthodoxy, has failed because Putin was not a seminarian. Ultimately, Putin never knew how to weave the Orthodox and socialist systems together. He was doomed to pass further and further into Karl Marx’s icy cynicism and decadence. To rule the house that Stalin built without Stalin’s unique genius was not something a mediocrity could competently do.
In Stalin’s library there was a copy of Dostoevsky’s Brothers Karamazov. “The chapters that Stalin underlined most heavily have nothing to do with murdering one’s father or the right of the individual to do what he wants once God is shown to be dead,” Rayfield explained;
“what held Stalin’s attention was the philosophizing of Dostoevsky’s monks. Father Zosima’s musings about the nature of ‘active love’ for one’s fellow human beings are underlined by Stalin: ‘active love, compared with dreaming love, is a cruel and terrifying business.’”[vii]
It was this cruel and terrifying business that Stalin understood. It built the Soviet Union into a superpower, and Stalin’s successors were not capable of understanding any of it. Stalin was all about bureaucratizing divinity, bringing salvation through politics, reordering the entire world through a process of loving destruction – of negation and war. He was consciously performing the role of Antichrist.
I was told the following story by an Orthodox clergyman decades ago: Stalin had a young priest arrested and brought to the Kremlin. Stalin invited the priest into his office and showed him a Bible open to the Apocalypse of St. John. He told the priest that he was fulfilling the word of God. “Go out and tell your flock,” Stalin told the priest. “I am doing what the scriptures say in the Apocalypse of John.” Stalin then ordered the priest to return to his flock and ordered the secret police to leave him alone.
Consider, in contrast, the fool that now occupies the Kremlin. When Putin says Leninism and Christianity are the same, he is mouthing a formula he does not understand. Why doesn’t Putin understand? Because Putin is not a reader of important texts. He parades around bare-chested, engages in martial arts competitions, and attends hockey games. Did Stalin waste his time like that? In terms of being a dictator, Putin does not understand the formulas he uses. And because Putin only reads trivia, he has nothing to offer but absurd rants on Russian and Ukrainian history. Putin never fails to bewilder his listeners as he wraps himself in one tangle after another. “The most common mistake of Stalin’s opponents was to underestimate how exceptionally well read he was,” noted Rayfield. “That he was erudite we now know from the remnants of his library of 20,000 volumes….”[viii]
Nothing of the kind can be said of Putin, whose inferiority complex always gives him away; sometimes with visibly trembling hands, sometimes with empty threats. When did Stalin make empty threats? He was, after all, everyone’s friend – right up until they were arrested, accused, and executed.
All the greatest leaders of modern times were readers. Cicero once explained that reading was the key to oratory and statesmanship. So it was with America’s Founding Fathers – Washington, Adams, Hamilton, John Jay, and James Madison. It matters little that Stalin was outwardly deceptive and dishonest in his use of what he read. He knew the difference between a lie and the truth even if others did not. Stalin was not fooled by ideology. For him, ideology was a weapon. Even more important, Stalin knew the kind of scum that surrounded him. Consequently, nobody killed more communists than Stalin.
This leads us to Eric Voegelin’s insight: “The overt phenomenon of intellectual dishonesty then raises the question of why a man will indulge in it.”[ix] The reason is this self-same alienation that animates all the totalitarian movements. This alienation thinks murder is fun, said Voegelin: “The fun consists in gaining a pseudo-identity through asserting one’s power, optimally by killing somebody – a pseudo-identity that serves as a substitute for the human self that has been lost.”[x]
Stalin had this in common with Marx and Lenin and Mao. They all built a pseudo-identity for themselves. All of them had fun killing people. Consider, in light of this, the mediocrity of their successors – Russian and Chinese. If you pick up a copy of President Xi’s Jinping’s famous little book, you will not find anything worth reading. It offers nothing comparable to the insights of Mao Zedong. Like Putin, Xi is a mediocrity. Such people can follow a blueprint, but they cannot improve on it. Every change they introduce weakens the whole. When it is time to make war, they offer peace (as in the 1980s). When it is time for peace, they stupidly make war (as in 2022).
The only black master the latter-day dictators can understand, when Lenin and Stalin are set aside, is Hitler. This is why Marxism-Leninism has gradually moved closer to National Socialism, in Russia and in China. The communists dare not admit this to themselves, yet all preparations for world war tend to affirm Hitler’s approach. And yet, this false nationalism – as Hitler was false to his core – limps from the outset. There can be no critical or open discussion of its underlying values. There is only an effort to spread incoherence on every side. All the dictators see is Hitler’s determination to fight a world war. It follows, therefore, that only the adoption of Hitler’s mentality (at this late hour) serves the Kremlin and Beijing. Thus, we have a reversion to Russian nationalism and Han Chinese nationalism, respectively. Even as Lenin is criticized and kept in the background, the Hitler model percolates to the surface. Everything in this formulation is corrupt, especially the language. In fact, the more corrupted the language the closer to world war the dictators come and the crazier they seem.
Why didn’t World War III happen in the 1960s, 70s, or 80s? Because Stalin’s successors valued comfort and survival. Stalin mockingly called them “blind kittens” who would fail without him. Arguably they missed their one and only opportunity to win World War III in the early 1980s. Clinging to their dachas and rich food, they reverted to liberalization in the late 1980s. Today, of course, they have assembled an arsenal made doubtful by pilfering. They have an advantage in weapons for the foreseeable future, in theory. However, that advantage is only in strategic weapons. Someone forgot to tell them that nobody has attempted mass nuclear strikes and nobody really knows how such strikes will work in practice. Worse yet, these Russian and Chinese leaders do not understand the fundamentals of Leninism. One begins to doubt if they have the nerve to push the button after so many instances of blustering. “You are blind like young kittens,” said Stalin to his Politburo. “What will happen without me? The country will perish because you do not know how to recognize enemies.” He added, “Without me the imperialists with throttle you.”
To rely so heavily on secret creatures in the West, like the Clintons or Obama or Biden, was something Stalin would never have done. However corrupt or Marxist these Western elites might be, they are nonetheless Western. What is a traitor worth? A little influence here or there? A few stale secrets? One trick in the Great Game? The fact is, you cannot bribe a man to cut his own throat. If you put him in a position of power, he might begin to dictate terms to you. Stalin understood all this. He understood there could be no winning without fighting a world war. His successors, as blind kittens, did not. Deception and subversion only work to a point. Beyond that we find the words of Carl von Clausewitz illuminating:
“Now, philanthropists may easily imagine there is a skillful method of disarming and overcoming an enemy without causing great bloodshed, and that this is the proper tendency of the Art of War. However plausible this may appear, still it is an error which must be extirpated; for in such dangerous things as War the errors which proceed from a spirit of benevolence are the worst. As the use of physical power to the utmost extent by no means excludes the cooperation of the intelligence, it follows that he who uses force unsparingly, without reference to the bloodshed involved, must obtain superiority if his adversary uses less vigor in its application. The former then dictates the law to the latter, and both proceed to extremities to which the only limitations are those imposed by the amount of counter-acting force on each side.”[xi]
In light of this, what did Vladimir Putin do when his strategy of winning without fighting failed in Ukraine? He started a war with a hollowed-out kleptocratic regime. And now he opts for a meeting with President Trump. Will Trump save Putin? Only a blind kitten would rely on Trump to pull Russia’s fat out of the fire. Of course, Moscow has time on its side. Russia also has China. World War III can still begin, at any time. But isn’t the Chinese communist regime a kleptocracy as well?
Right now, we do not have all the answers. In theory, Russia and China are growing stronger than the United States because they started their military buildup earlier. The optimal window for attack is not this year. That is all we can say for now.
Hope springs eternal.
Johnny & Jimmy with Nevin Gussack
Links and Notes
[i] Donald Rayfield, Stalin and His Hangmen (New York: Random House, 2004), p. 14.
[ii] See, especially, the philosopher Bernardo Kastrup’s book, Why Materialism is Baloney: How true skeptics know there is no death and fathom answers to life, the universe, and everything (Washington: Iff Books, 2014), p. 201: “As such, much more than a proclamation of the dominance of mentation, my metaphysics is an attempt to eliminate the artificial separation between mind and matter that has led to the ‘hard problem of consciousness.’ Nonetheless, I still chose to label it ‘idealism’ and continue to use the word ‘mind’ in order to establish a clear contrast with the reigning materialist paradigm, particularly with regards to survival of consciousness beyond physical death. Let there be no ambiguity here: it is a direct and unavoidable implication of my worldview that your consciousness – your subjective experience of being, right now – will survive your bodily death.”
[iii] https://eurasianist-archive.com/2019/08/22/alexander-dugin-the-three-logoi-an-introduction-to-the-triadic-methodology-of-noomakhia/
[iv] Ibid.
[v] Translator uncertain, as quoted by Dugin from Plato’s work, The Sophist.
[vi] Richard Weaver, Ideas have Consequences, (Kindle edition), Loc 227.
[vii] Rayfield, p. 20.
[viii] Ibid, p. 21.
[ix] Eric Voegelin, Autobiographical Reflections (Baton Rouge and London: Louisiana State University Press, 2005), p. 45.
[x] Ibid, p. 47.
[xi] Carl von Clausewitz, trans. Anatol Rapoport, On War (Middlesex, England: Penguin Classics, 1982), p. 102.
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70 responses to “World War III and the House that Stalin Built”
Yes! Finally, another interview with Nevin! He’s my favorite of your interviewers.
Hi Janelle! Many thanks for your support. I appreciate your kind words. Have you subscribed to my Substack essay newsletter Wilderness of Mirrors?
Hello, Nevin! Thank you for taking the time to respond. I have heard you mention the Substack column before, but no, I am not currently subscribed to it. I will get on that.
I also wanted to say that you and Jeff complement each other well.
“Hope springs eternal.” Can we hope that Donald Trump really understands Stalin, Putin, Xi, and Communism? Can he learn in time to win our victory? Yes, hope springs eternal!
Let us hope.
Such a keenly interesting analysis and conclusion with this essay, Jeff. Thank you! And yes, not only Hope but reason to not Despair. These Enemies are not Titans…and their getting stuck in pretending offers opportunity to us, if not to be so insightful and bold as to crush them, yet at least to survive beyond them.
Exactly.
While you should never underestimate any enemy, the communist bloc, for all their shills and propagandists (knowing or not) talking them up and about how helpless the West is, two of the biggest events of the past five years actually prove Jeff’s thesis about our enemy’s figureheads and their mediocrity. Things like, I don’t know:
– Burning almost all of your economic and social bridges with useful idiots in the Free World, losing half a million men and most of your Soviet inheritance on unsuccessfully putting down an uppity union republic.
– Releasing a biological weapon that, while making the West more like China, also almost destroying YOUR OWN economy in the process (Presumably, this is what Chi was reprimanding Xi about).
It shouldn’t be a huge surprise that I’m a pessimist by nature. Hell, my handle is literally a reference to 1984 and being a generation removed from it. But given the recent performances from the communist bloc, I can’t help but be at least cautiously optimistic. Now the only problem is what exactly happens when they see no other way out of their (largely self-inflicted) corner…we all know what a cornered beast is like.
Another brilliant entry. I really wish more people could read it, but how many would really get it?
“This is why Marxism-Leninism has gradually moved closer to National Socialism, in Russia and in China. The communists dare not admit this to themselves, yet all preparations for world war tend to affirm Hitler’s approach.”
I have noticed this pattern, starting already years ago. This is why I tell others that the regime that is closest to Hitler’s national socialism is Xi’s China. An example of this is found in Chi Haotian’s speech, “But the term ‘living space’ (lebensraum) is too closely related to Nazi Germany. The reason we don’t want to discuss this too openly is to avoid the West’s association of us with Nazi Germany, which could in turn reinforce the view that China is a threat.” I also noticed how they organized economics that reminded me of Nazi Germany. But I am a nobody, a linguist, who’s only book I have read deeply is the Bible, so people don’t listen to me. It doesn’t matter that I lived in Germany, speak German, and kept my eyes open. I have also been to China.
“You can only pretend to be an Orthodox Christian and a Leninist so long.”
Reminds me of a statement popular with A. Lincoln, “You can fool all men some of the time, some men for all of the time, but you can’t fool all men for all of the time.” Already years ago, I recognized Putin as a pagan.
Lenin too had introduced a type of permissive Marxism, particularly in the realm of sexual matters. But that permissiveness had dire consequences. It ripped society apart. Even though the destruction of sexual mores was part of the war against Christianity, its negative effects weakened the country. As a result, Stalin tried to put the genie back in the bottle, make society more puritanical, at least outwardly. Today it is common that men have at least one mistress, often someone else’ wife.
China, on the other hand, never had a puritanical model to follow. Mao was a sexual monster. Jo-Enlai left behind at least one half-German son, and maybe others elsewhere? Drug use was rampant. Theft and economic cheating was/is common in China. In short, China is a moral cesspool. In that milieu, human life is of little value, even one’s own life.
“The initiative, therefore, passes to China and to President Xi Jinping.”
How free is Xi Jinping to choose his timing? With the country on the brink of revolution, how much longer can he wait? James 5:1–6, especially verse 4, describes much of what is going on in China today—people not being paid for months, cutting back on wages, social security payments disappearing somewhere—these are just some of the problems. People are starting to go hungry. How much longer can this go on before there is an explosion? What better way to stave off the explosion than to start an external war? That’s why I would not be surprised if the war starts this year.
Thanks again for an informative essay.
Jeff’s point that a fundamental conflict is fought between those who deny the possibility of a charmed universe and those who believe that this understanding is the essential pre-requisite for human living, is key.
Great essay!
Of interest: https://stevenmoore.substack.com/p/journalists-are-bad-at-math
Also of interest: https://www.malone.news/p/western-public-health-a-socialist
and his replacement is…Rick Crawford?
https://www.axios.com/2025/01/16/mike-johnson-turner-intelligence-committee-anger
(in current events news)
If the suspicions of some House members are true, the House Freedom Caucus appealed to the incoming Trump Team to get Speaker Johnson to oust Mike Turner from his position as chair of the House Intelligence Committee. Turner was replaced with Rick Crawford, who is decidedly not a supporter of Ukraine. A lot of members of the bipartisan committee are not pleased with the ouster. We better hope this is not a sign of things to come from the Trump Administration.
Exactly
Of interest: https://www.breitbart.com/tech/2025/01/16/americans-get-first-taste-of-chinese-censorship-after-fleeing-tiktok-for-rednote/
An excellent work as usual.
Yes, Stalin was in fact, an antichrist heading and building an antichrist system, his heirs, for as much as their “masterful” planning have been talked up (both by detractors and proponents, mind you) and as much as he may idolize the Man of Steel, antichrist Putin has simply never- and I mean never- shown that combination of traits that made Stalin so dangerous. Sure, they might share the Chekist disregard (or even contempt) for human life. But cunning, charisma, a level of brutality that saw even his greatest enemy emulate him, philosophical grounding and understanding of what exactly it was he was trying to do? I’ve only seen and read really pseudo-historical ramblings by Putin that can be dismantled by any history freshman worth his salt.
Likewise, for as much as he postures as the new Mao, Xi also is, also a mediocrity. As far as I’ve seen, he lacks that combination of qualities that made the masses not just believe in him, but almost deify him. That said, I still consider Xi the more dangerous- the sharper blade in the scissors strategy- if for no other reason than the fact that he is also a genocidal maniac with TWO active, ongoing genocides of the Uyghurs and Falun Gong as opposed to just Ukrainians.
Of interest: https://redstate.com/bobhoge/2025/01/16/breaking-ceasefirehostage-deal-officially-signed-by-israel-hamas-us-and-qatari-officials-n2184455
Some deeper analysis of the topic: https://pjmedia.com/robert-spencer/2025/01/15/hamas-celebrates-ceasefire-deal-in-gaza-and-with-good-reason-n4936026
…but what did he get wrong? At the least, Stalin’s ripping off religious concepts to “convert” Russian peasants is a logical extension of the “Red Czar” trope. That trope is basically mainstream, and Stalin was openly pointing out the Russian tendency toward czarism since the 1920s, justifying having a single, paramount ruler. This article basically fleshes out some of the Orthodox concepts used to shore that up (and more).
Looks like Shipwreck/DasVibe/whoever’s comment got axed, so this response is now just free-floating
I do not like that Russian troll posting here. Never honest. I cut them without even reading them. Always full of empty accusations. No use debating dishonest people.
“[Putin] started a war with a hollowed-out kleptocratic regime. And now he opts for a meeting with President Trump.”
It’s concerning that Trump has agreed to meet with Putin without even so much a pre-condition that Russia scale back its opening position to something more reasonable. As you noted on this week’s John Moore Show, Putin has not budged an inch from the position that Russia must be allowed to annex occupied territories and that Ukraine must be fully demilitarized. Given how badly the war is going for them, why isn’t Trump putting the Russians on notice that he will drive a hard bargain? Why is he giving them a lifeline by agreeing to meet with Putin? Just last week Trump threatened Canada with 25% tariffs if the border issues are not resolved. But he seems to be taking a kid gloves approach with Russia. Why? Maybe there’s something to be said for the vast quantity of alt-reality propaganda that Russia has been pushing for 3 years, since not enough people in the West realize that Russia is on the ropes. I really hope Kellogg briefs Trump on the war situation so we that don’t end up with Trump and Putin alone in a room together, and Trump coming out the loser. The Ukraine “peace deal” could end up being another case of the Communists losing the battle and winning the war, as with Vietnam.
I hope that Gen Kellogg and anyone sensible who talks to Trump *is heeded*, since it could wind up like Ali G’s “ice cream gloves” pitch…
Add to that the claim of TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew being at Trump’s inauguration…
To commit to a summit without any appropriate starting agenda…..
Can you finish that thought? Do you have any behind-the-scenes information on the Trump-Putin meeting?
I am currently reading “The Next 100 Years: A Forecast for the 21st Century” by George Friedman, what do you know about this book and author? i found many dubious points such as using countries as subjects, regardless of ideological groups and moles. He says the XXI century will be the north american century and that the US will remain supreme while Russia and China struggles with disintegration risks, he repeats that Russia is making moves that seems to be aggressive but they are defensive measures. Also he claims the financial relations with China creates a new class on the coast and that will press the central government, either China will become neomaoist (he wrongly uses the nationalist card) or be tore apart as it was before the communist takeover with regional war lords. Since i read only 130 pages, those are the points i marked.
I have this book. Friedman is very good on the Middle East. He does not understand China and Russia.
You ask “Why didn’t World War III happen in the 1960’s 70’s or 80’s ?” It is because mortal men of flesh and blood do not rule the kingdoms of this world that they claim to possess.
“Job 4 :17 Shall mortal man be more just than God? shall a man be more pure than his maker? 18 Behold, he put no trust in his servants; and his angels he charged with folly: 19 How much less in them that dwell in houses of clay, whose foundation is in the dust, which are crushed before the moth? 20 They are destroyed from morning to evening: they perish for ever without any regarding it. 21 Doth not their excellency which is in them go away? they die, even without wisdom.”
God in Heaven has set his time of judgment, and when that time has come, and the Devil and his angels are cast out unto the earth, these political persuasions of various ideologies will be unmasked, as they bow in total submission and give their kingdoms unto the beast who will wage his war upon the saints.
God Almighty says,
Genesis 6:17 And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and every thing that is in the earth shall die.
Deuteronomy 32:39 See now that I, even I, am he, and there is no god with me: I kill, and I make alive; I wound, and I heal: neither is there any that can deliver out of my hand.
Isaiah 43:11 I, even I, am the LORD; and beside me there is no saviour.
Isaiah 43:25 I, even I, am he that blotteth out thy transgressions for mine own sake, and will not remember thy sins.
Ezekiel 34:11 ¶ For thus saith the Lord GOD; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out.
Men are the puppets of God? We simply bounce around like robots and never think, act, or choose?
“How did the KGB survive?”:
https://youtu.be/84tlXaLc1uo?t=924
Constantin, a Russian emigrant reflecting critically on the state of his country, pointing out that already in 1955 Andropov prepared the power structures to get through the Perestroika unaffected.
My apologies, corrections needed:
Konstantin is the spelling of the youtuber’s name, and the actions of Andropov took place in the eighties, while in 1955 the central comite made ground laying decisions.
Jeff, what do you think of this text from Duigin?
Alexander Dugin: Die Ideologie des Trumpismus wird die USA und die Welt verändern (Teil I)
Der russische Philosoph und Soziologe Alexander Dugin analyisert in einer Artikelserie den Trumpismus. Im ersten Teil der dreiteiligen Reihe zeichnet Dugin die jüngste US-Geschichte nach. Dugin beleuchtet das politische Umfeld, das die Entwicklung von Trumps Postliberalismus ermöglichte.
Von Alexander Dugin
Trumps Revolution
Jetzt sind alle in Russland und in der Welt perplex: Was geschieht in den USA? Nur wenige Experten in unserem Land – insbesondere Alexander Jakowenko – haben wirklich Verständnis dafür, wie gravierend die Veränderungen in den USA sind. Jakowenko meinte zu Recht, dass “dies eine Revolution ist”. Und das stimmt tatsächlich.
Der designierte US-Präsident Trump und seine engsten Vertrauten – in erster Linie der passionierte Elon Musk – zeigen eine geradezu revolutionäre Aktivität. Zwar ist Trump noch nicht im Amt – das wird am 20. Januar passieren – doch Amerika und Europa geraten schon jetzt ins Wanken. Es ist ein ideologischer und geopolitischer Tsunami, mit dem – ehrlich gesagt – niemand gerechnet hat. Viele hatten erwartet, dass Trump nach seiner Wiederwahl – wie es während seiner ersten Amtszeit als US-Präsident bereits der Fall war – zu einer mehr oder weniger konventionellen Politik zurückkehren würde. Auch wenn er dabei seine charismatischen und spontanen Züge beibehält. Es lässt sich jedoch schon jetzt sagen, dass dies nicht zutrifft. Trump bedeutet eine Revolution. Gerade in dieser Übergangszeit des Machtwechsels von Biden zu Trump macht es also Sinn, sich ernsthaft mit der Frage zu befassen: Was passiert in den USA? Denn dort passiert definitiv etwas – und zwar etwas sehr, sehr Wichtiges.
weiter hier: https://deutsch.news-pravda.com/world/2025/01/17/287392.html
Dugin’s statement is a wordy nothing. He uses the term “Revolution” without indicating what that means. Elsewhere he says Trump will be a worse enemy than Biden. That is the real message, which he dares not pronounce to German readers yet.
What Dugin writes about the Deep State is also an eloquent distortion of the facts. Jeff, you once wrote two articles about it, which are translated into German by Torsten Mann on his Weltoktober page.
https://www.weltoktober.de/deepstate1.html
https://www.weltoktober.de/deepstate2.html
Jeff, it’s a pity that you only briefly touched on Dugin.
But that’s what the Germans believe. Someone sent it to me by e-mail and wrote the following:
“It’s been clear to me for a long time: Trump is a Russian agent, always has always been. Now he is being celebrated in Russia by the chief ideologue Dugin because he will bring the communist revolution worldwide according to Marxist dialectics. Only fools fall for Trump.”
I did not find this in the English edition of Pravda.
The Germans are probably being stirred up.
Yes. Dugin dares not attack Trump openly in certain languages. They love to sow confusion.
It is the media, driven by almost all politicians, that has ‘beaten the fear of Trump’ into most Germans. Then there are the surveys commissioned by politicians and the media, which prove this and at the same time suggest that this assessment is justified. Almost three quarters of Germans (71 per cent) recently expected global problems and crises to worsen if Donald Trump won the election. As far as the war in the Gaza Strip is concerned, the opposite has already been proven. And things will continue in the same way; it is to be hoped that the Germans will give up their infantility as quickly as possible.
I believe Ayesha Rascoe was the one who once described Alexander Dugin as Vladimir Putin’s brain. If that is indeed the case, I really have to worry about Mr Putin.
Dugin’s usual string of phrases is nothing more than getting rid of the racial mastermind Coudenhove-Kalergi, placing the Eurasianism developed in the 1920s at the center of all thought and being, and presenting the end of the Cold War as what it really is: communism has triumphed … unfortunately.
The political structures, think tanks and NGOs named by Dugin, all of which form the Deep State, clearly and demonstrably arose from socialist-communist ideas. Far from Karl Marx’s class struggle, Marxism had to be reformulated to pave the way for local communist tyranny leading to world dictatorship.
This path is designed as a veritable slime trail that is supposed to let us slide wetly into the world network of totalitarianism.
Totalitarianism seems to the acknowledged political default position for modern states. It accompanies bureaucratic managers, it oozes out of media narratives and school curricula. It attends the disconnected, alienated, rationalized arrogance of our latter-day scientism.
Here you go, Heike, Dugin’s paper in English https://news-pravda.com/eu/2025/01/13/973108.html
oh danke Birgit, ich hatte ihn nicht gefunden. Ist es ein identischer Inhalt, denn oft sind die verschieden, je nach Land und wie sie die Gehirne waschen wollen.
Thank you, Jeff! Very good clarification about the essence of Stalin’s character. I read Stalin’s biography, but it didn’t explain things about him which you explained so well. It clarifies to me his relationship with some writers. Bulgakov’s Master and Margarita was written almost like a letter to Stalin.
Also no matter what Stalin underlined in The Brothers Karamazov novel I still think Dostoyevsky described his character best in the story of Grand Inquisitor of the same novel. How tyrants believe they save people from themselves. As if they do not represent only God the Father, but also Christ, the Redeemer.
Yes. This is true.
Haha… love the AI image of Stalin and his kittens!
Clausewitz: “…it follows that he who uses force unsparingly, without reference to the bloodshed involved, must obtain superiority if his adversary uses less vigor in its application.”
The Russian army in Ukraine has been following Clausewitz’s dictum to a tee and not sparing civilians, in contrast to the Ukrainian army. And yet all this bloodthirstiness has not given Russia a victory.
“Why didn’t World War III happen in the 1960s, 70s, or 80s? Because Stalin’s successors valued comfort and survival.”
But to be fair, Stalin’s successor, Kruschev, devised the long-range deception/nuclear war strategy. They prevented Stalin from starting WWIII in 1953 before the Soviet Union was ready, and they’ve been preparing for decades to ensure that when war starts, the Communist Bloc will be the winner. Or are the Russian and Chinese leaders only going along with the plan to give their armies and intelligence services something to do, knowing full well that they don’t have the nerve to bring it to fruition. Are they just treading water or trying to work themselves up to pushing the big red button?
If Stalin’s spiritual heirs were still ruling Russia after his death, what plan would they devise to bring down the capitalist West? Would it be something better, something that did not involve a long-range deception strategy? Or would they keep up the image of the enemy and bide their time until the West was sufficiently weakened, and then attack the US with overwhelming force. At a minimum, the Stalinist successors would probably do everything to maintain the mass and discipline of Stalin’s USSR. Perhaps they would look to repeat the strategy of WWII, and back another rampaging Hitler to keep the West distracted and in need of the USSR’s assistance. It’s interesting to note that the North Korean communist dictatorship is the only one still being referred today as Stalinist. It’s the most dictatorial and fanatical of all the communist regimes, and like Stalin, the Kims have deified themselves to level of demi-gods. The NK Politburo is always banging on the drums of war, and unlike Russia and China, never once attempted a liberalization in order to better engage with the West.
lauraz1986: Why didn’t they start in the 1950s? Even when we were distracted by Vietnam and our traitors in Congress, we were militarily far stronger than the communist front. Then in the 1980s under Reagan, we had such a build up that it has taken generations, starting with Papa Bush, Clinton, Baby Bush, Obama and Biden, for us to get weak again. Even now our technology is beyond the best that China can copy (even with stolen blueprints) or Russia.
An attacking force is expected to have three to six times the size of a defending force. But that doesn’t always work out. The battle of Suomussalmi saw a much smaller force attack and drive out a much larger force, while one division of U.S. marines had a march to the sea from the Frozen Chosin in spite of being surrounded by ten divisions, each larger than one U.S. division, a story that rivals Xenophon’s 10,000. Do the communists have three times the size of the U.S. forces? Will they ever have that ratio? Remember, an attack on the U.S. must include invasion and complete victory, and the invader will have to face not only our regular armed forces, but also the militia as defined in our Constitution. Is that the reason they have not attacked in the past?
Six to one is for an attack at the battalion, regiment level, not across the whole theater of battle. Terrain and weather can negate the strength of a military formation, as happened at Suomussalmi.
Stalin might say that Khrushchev’s deception strategy contained an element of self deception. Marx and Lenin sometimes said the bourgeoisie will not give up their wealth without a struggle.
Of interest: https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2025/01/17/trump-holds-very-good-phone-call-with-chinese-dictator-xi-jinping-on-tiktok-and-fentanyl/
Should we be optimistic? I have my doubts.
Looks like he was a real nut-job.
About Putin: How Otto von Habsburg assessed him
Very good essay, Jeff, which we discussed in a philosophical sense last night.
It is about time we ventured from the outer layers to the inner ones. And Donald Rayfield’s book, which is also available in German, is a good starting point. Andrzej Lobaczewski’s book Political Ponerology – also published in German https://archive.org/details/lobaczewski-politische-ponerologie/page/14/mode/2up – should also be read by anyone who wants to deal with psychopaths and sociopaths in leadership roles. Not everything can be explained by innate narcissism.
The psychopath as a factor in politics is an important ingredient in our crisis. Sensible people usually grow out of ideologies taught to them as children or teenagers.
Jeff it looks like there is a very high chance that there will be an attack or attacks on President Trump’s inauguration on Monday as there are now warnings from multiple sources, some of it from very high levels. With President Trump have ordered moving the inauguration of his swearing in to the Capital Rotunda under the of avoiding cold weather this would be tightening in the security circle for President Trump and for the most of the high profile dignitaries meanwhile it leaves a couple hundred thousand that are expected to be outside as glorified human clay pigeons.
The next few dangerous days lie ahead.
Sam Faddis’ take: https://andmagazine.substack.com/p/it-is-time-to-admit-we-have-lost
I just landed in Washington a few minutes ago. Security is heavy here. Double checks of ID flying in. Storm is coming tomorrow to area. Inauguration to take place indoors. All this suggests an attack would be difficult.
Mr. Nyquist welcome to Trump Inaugural II Ground Zero.
As the Jimmy From Brooklyn often reminds us: The enemy (the Communists) are ORGANIZED and they never SLEEP. Be Vigilant.
“While left-wing militants may fail to organize on Inauguration Day due to flagging enthusiasm or bad weather—particularly given the recently announced decision to hold the ceremonies indoors, due to frigid temperatures—the new administration must act swiftly against those organizing for future violence. It should send a clear message: Americans will not permit activists of any political stripe to block roads, attack police, destroy property, threaten officials, or riot in the streets.” Christopher Rufo.
https://christopherrufo.com/p/will-the-left-disrupt-the-inauguration?publication_id=1248321&post_id=155052118&isFreemail=true&r=4fbvk6&triedRedirect=true
This opinion piece was published in a conservative newspaper. Here’s an ex-CIA officer arguing that the US should play the North Korea card against Russia. Apparently Trump could pull it off due to his ‘special relationship’ with Kim Jong Il. I hope this doesn’t become a new foreign policy fad with the MAGA crowd. The idea is even stupider than playing the Russia card against China.
https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2025/jan/16/trump-relationship-north-korea-kim-offers-chance-c/?utm_medium=subscriber&utm_source=Boomtrain&utm_campaign=morning&utm_content=paywall&utm_term=newsletter
“Giving up on North Korea should not be an option for the U.S. and its allies and partners. For 30 years, Pyongyang sought a normal relationship with the U.S., Which would provide North Korea with security assurances, economic development assistance and international legitimacy. An alignment with Russia … is not what Mr. Kim wants. His father, Kim Jong il, and his grandfather, Kim il Sung, would expect more from Mr. Kim.”
The latest news from South Korea isn’t good. Anti-communists there need as much international support as they can get. Any softening of relations between the US and North Korea would be a terrible disservice to them, and could risk the whole peninsula falling to the communists.
https://www.theepochtimes.com/world/south-korean-president-detained-over-martial-law-declaration-5792301?&utm_source=MB_article_paid&utm_campaign=MB_article_2025-01-15-ca&utm_medium=email&est=Jni%2F4sB7yDlmRMbN72KrqnbUdp7NHP512rPp6DpWdBS%2B%2FXRhMeGZ0FBAV1X%2BnAVz&utm_content=more-top-news-1
DeTrani’s essay is deeply problematic to say the least. While I applaud his service to our country in the CIA, the essay has deep flaws to say the least:
1) “For 30 years, Pyongyang sought a normal relationship with the U.S., Which would provide North Korea with security assurances, economic development assistance and international legitimacy.” Of course they do, since American aid and trade would bolster the Workers Party dictatorship of the DPRK. Doesn’t this CIA official know how communist and other anti-US dictatorships utilize engagement and trade to bolster their governments (often to the detriment of US interests)? Haven’t we’ve learned from the failed China pivot started by former President Nixon?
2) “An alignment with Russia … is not what Mr. Kim wants.” Really? Any proof? Kim Jong-Un is more at home with Putin rather than the American liberal system. Both Kim and Putin are committed to the burial of global liberalism.
3) “His father, Kim Jong il, and his grandfather, Kim il Sung, would expect more from Mr. Kim.” Really? Kim Il-Sung was a protege of Stalin who fought in the Soviet Army and was tied to the USSR at the hip. While nationalistic, Kim Il Sung also believed in spreading international communist revolution. Any openings to the capitalist world by North Korea was opportunistic and predicated on building up the DPRK’s military and industrial power. All typically Leninist in fashion.
Geez, we are in big trouble if this is the thinking of the majority of CIA officials and front line personnel. (And no disrespect to the Agency as an institution or patriotic staff).
Agreed. The statement that North Korea’s Kims never wanted an alliance with Russia is the most non-sensical part of the entire essay.
When *wasn’t* North Korea aligned with USSR (its creator) or Russia? The current Russian Federation has had a working relationship with North Korea for decades, and one that has been documented for at least 15-20 years that I can recall (even if Western sources tried to downplay it as Russia getting “cheap labor”).
If this is coming from ex-CIA, no wonder we’re in a mess…!
People make the strangest analysis. I am baffled. Playing North Korea against Russia is like getting a Siamese twin to murder his sibling.
Excellent Essay as usual!
This is interesting. Russian state TV is gleefully reporting how Trump’s Greenland acquisition comments are sowing division within NATO. I think this validates Nevin’s assessment that if Trump wants to strengthen the US’s Arctic defenses, it is best done by cooperating with allies in private rather than making provocative public statements that will only succeed in riling people up against the US.
https://euromaidanpress.com/2025/01/13/danish-intelligence-russia-forged-letter-to-spark-trumps-greenland-purchase-bid/
Oh cool, no one wants to live under Communism. Like the Ukrainians. We shouldn’t stifle them and cheer for their attacker, then, like so many on the American “right” are wont to do.
As far as the preferential relationship, I don’t quite see buying Greenland and having to deal with that as the solution, versus shoving various responsibilities onto the Danes and just upping our military presence under NATO pretenses.
Russia’s in poor shape, and metaphorically “finishing the job” is preferable to this insane habit we have of building our own boogeymen (heck, not even a golem that at least is useful for a limited period of time). Shame we gave Yeltsin lifelines and turned Red China into a monstrosity…
Trump’s talk of the Greenland acquisition is ridiculous. Same as making Canada the 51st State. C’mon. We speak each time on your essays of all the propaganda coming from Russia and their intelligence and this is just as much so but from the political right, here in America, ie MAGA. I do not find this humorous at all.
The perils of starting a business in the neo-Soviet Union: https://www.breitbart.com/radio/2025/01/18/exclusive-erik-prince-american-owned-company-effectively-seized-russia/
Erik Prince does not know what he is talking about in that Breitbart piece. We have not driven Russia into China’s arms. They have been together for decades. They are one clench fist and we are approaching the final phase of open aggression against the USA, and if we think we can drive a wedge between Russia and China, and we apply that as the solution, we will be bombed and invaded by both countries because we relied on them to be against each other instead of relying on our own defenses.