It behooves the Pentagon chief and his aides to scrutinize the supposed U.S. intel and to weigh up the political video games of who is playing who.
The 2 most senior military leaders of the United States and Russia participated in phone talks today as unsafe tensions between the nuclear superpowers intensify.
An unsteady ceasefire in Ukraine between U.S.-backed Kiev regime forces and Russia-backed separatists is parlously near straight-out collapse while NATO warships and warplanes increase aggressive maneuvers in the Black Sea on Russia’s southern flank.
For the top-level talks on the American side was Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Personnel General Mark Milley while the Russian side was represented by its top military officer General Valery Gerasimov. By shared contract the conversation was private with no public disclosure of what was talked about. But it’s a safe assumption that the explosive Ukraine dispute was offered concern.
The phone conference comes as elements within the U.S. federal government, enhanced by news media outlets, are recklessly accusing Russia of planning a military invasion of Ukraine. For weeks now, the U.S. State Department has been briefing media outlets and European NATO allies with claims that Russia is amassing soldiers and weapons near its border with Ukraine. Secretary of State Antony Blinken has taken an individual function in leading the claims. An intriguing facet is that the claims seemingly rely on industrial satellite information. Media outlets like the New york city Times and CNN have accentuated the cautions.
Another U.S. outlet, Bloomberg, ran a report on November 21 with the sensational headline: “U.S. intel shows Russia plan for prospective Ukraine invasion”. The report does not specify who the “U.S. intel” sources are exactly but they are cited as declaring that Russia might invade Ukraine by the end of January. The “intel” was once again based upon commercial satellite data attributed to a private U.S.-based company called Maxar which works closely with Washington on national security, according to the company’s website.
The suspicion is that the Central Intelligence Company is driving the narrative declaring Russian military accumulation and hazard of invasion. The State Department and the CIA are long-time bedfellows going back to the early years of the Cold War.
The intel reported by the U.S. media is not objective information, but rather is politicized info. The CIA’s stock-in-trade is political warfare and, to be blunt, fabrication, lies and propaganda.
Russia has dismissed the claims of its military accumulation near Ukraine’s border and threatening to attack its western next-door neighbor. Kremlin representative Dmitry Peskov described the purported satellite information as “poor quality” and the accompanying claims against Russia as “hysterical”. Peskov likewise pointed out that the United States and its NATO partners are the ones who are increasing military forces and facilities near Russia’s borders yet the U.S. absurdly accuses Russia of having troops on its own territory within the country’s sovereign borders.
Another indication of narrative management– instead of in fact existing situations– is that the State Department’s well-publicized alarmism about alleged Russian invasion chimes nicely with claims from the Ukrainian military under the control of the U.S.-backed Kiev program. The Bloomberg report above accompanied dramatic claims from the head of Ukrainian military intelligence, Brigadier General Kyrylo Budanov, who told Armed force Times in an interview that Russia was preparing “to invade by the end of January”– the same timeframe which “U.S. intel” had also contended. That suggests story coordination.
Last week, too, the Ukrainian defense minister Oleksii Reznikov was visiting Washington DC where he was also telling prominent news media of fears over a Russian intrusion. He stated the supposed risk to Ukraine required a boost in the currently considerable U.S. military products to the Kiev regime. The Ukrainian side has been tediously harping on such claims for several years now. However it appears there is a renewed motivation in Washington to amplify the war drums.
The Kremlin has actually cautioned that the real risk comes from the Kiev regime stepping up its offensive on the ethnic Russian population of the Donbas. Western governments and media are neglecting this justification, picking instead to concentrate on alleged Russian hazards. The southeastern region never ever acknowledged the reactionary Russophobic political administration that took power in 2014 after the U.S.-backed coup d’état in Kiev. This is what the almost eight-year war in Ukraine has been all about even though Washington and its European allies have the audacity to implicate Russia of destabilizing Ukraine.
Moscow is warning that the Kiev regime is identified to finally repudiate the Minsk peace accords negotiated in 2015 which mandate it to pay for political autonomy to the Donbas self-declared republics. Instead, Kiev wants to choose a “military option” by releasing a full-on offensive versus the Donbas, according to the Russian foreign ministry.
Thus, all the lurid allegations versus Russia are a cynical cover for the ostentatious and systematic offense of a globally binding peace settlement. The Biden administration is helping and abetting the Kiev routine to ramp up the war, from providing it with deadly weaponry and pushing belligerence, to cooking up the media narrative of an alleged Russian invasion.
When General Gerasimov spoke with General Milley we can be sure that it was discussed to the American side that the U.S. intel promoted by the State Department and Ukrainian military does not match truth. We might make sure that the Russian information offered to Milley can be validated as objectively accurate. Where is the Pentagon’s own intelligence on this matter as opposed to a private business source?
Here however is the amusing irony of the grim situation. Milley is most likely better informed about the supposed Ukrainian advancements thanks to his Russian counterpart in contrast to the dubious briefings from shadowy components within the U.S. government. Aspects, additionally, which have a vested nefarious interest in stiring a conflict with Russia.
Milley has himself revealed earlier doubts about the guesswork of a Russian intrusion. On November 3, he was priced estimate as saying he did not see any threat of Russian hostility towards Ukraine. Milley is right to trust his military gut instincts.
Ukrainian military chiefs were also earlier downplaying reports of Russian accumulation. So, what has altered in the last couple of weeks? Not the realities on the ground, however rather, it is argued here, the propaganda effort by aspects within the U.S. facility to produce “truths” to match policy. This has echoes of the WMD mess and prepared intel that presaged the devastating U.S. war on Iraq in 2003.
It must be noted that the leading Pentagon officer served in the same position during the Donald Trump administration. He notoriously had a falling out with then-President Trump when he preserved that military officers need to not allow their profession to be politicized. Now would be a suitable time for General Mark Milley to verify that principle.
The dispute in Ukraine is being blatantly politicized with incorrect U.S. intel claims that when scrutinized are patently unreasonable. Nevertheless, those claims are resulting in ever-more unsafe stress and a risk of an all-out war that might drag the United States and Russia into a direct military fight.
It behooves the Pentagon chief and his aides to inspect the supposed U.S. intel and to weigh up the political video games of who is playing who. Making the appropriate call refers war and peace.