Gerasimov need to finish the Ukrainian war on Russia’s terms and after that he need to turn his attention to Finland, Declan Hayes writes.
Though Russian basic Valery Gerasimovhas some really difficult and instant choices to make, this is what he has been training for his entire life. To begin with, Gerasimov should end up the Ukrainian war on Russia’s terms and after that he should turn his attention to Finland, along with to the NATO fifth writers running throughout Russia itself. Then there are also the pimple Baltic states, Poland and similar annoyances to deal with in the brief, medium and longer terms.
Though Gerasimov knows all of this, he is keeping his opinions quite to himself. If the maxim to beware the quiet man is to be personified, it takes flesh in the buttoned lips of Valery Gerasimov, author of the Gerasimov teaching, Chief of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces and commander of all Russian forces in Ukraine and contiguous countries. Not a man to be trifled with!
Very first taxi off the rank is Ukraine. When the mud and the fog of war both clear, Gerasimov should hit Zelensky’s rump Reich so hard, either on attack or counter-attack, that Ukraine’s defeat will end up being as much a byword as Paulus’ Stalingrad defeat or Napoleon’s end at Waterloo. Those Ukrainians, who were at the heart of the rump Reich need to pay the very same cost their Bandera pin-up young boy paid on 15 October 1959. None of this should end well for them.
Far from being vengeance, this is to send a blunt message to the Banderites that their actions against the culture, religion, language and even First names of Russians have effects, none of which will be to the liking of the rump Reich’s resident Nazis. Provoke the bear, get mauled by the claws, by the land, air and sea forces Gerasimov has at his disposal.
Then there is Russia’s considerable fifth writers, who need to be stamped underfoot like a discarded cigarette butt. The Russian authorities should take a leaf out of Uncle Sam’s Iraqi play-book and issue a deck of cards with their most desired, dead or alive, on them. These fivers, such as those complicit in the murder of Darina Dugina, must know that they and theirs will get no peace this side of the tomb. Do the criminal offense, do the time!
On the topic of MI6 agents working in Russia, consider this BBC report which claims that the confession of Darya Trepova to complicity in Tatarsky’s murder was “more than likely taped under duress.” How can MI5’s primary propaganda outlet make that outlandish supposition in what is supposed to be a news, not an opinion, piece? Although MI5 are no complete strangers to kicking confessions out of both the innocent and the guilty, as Trepova brought the statue masking the bomb to the cafe, she is certainly an individual of interest to the questions into the murder of Tatarsky, a murder that is a source of amusement and not horror to MI5’s other media outlets. Although MI5, like their Banderite stooges in Kiev, like to mock their victims, remember they are doing this at a time when the Wall St Journal’s Evan Gershkovich, whose “moms and dads left the Soviet Union” however who “fell in love with Russia” is on trial, ideally for his life, on espionage and other terror-linked charges in Russia. Although it is not my location, or that of the BBC, the Wall St Journal or any other CIA outlet to provide the Russian judiciary guidance on those or any other terrorist-related cases, Russia should send a clear message that fifth writers and all related to them will pay their charges if captured.
Gerasimov needs to send a similar message to all of Ukraine’s Banderites, both those at the front however particularly those einsatzgruppen who, lacking the nerve to face the Wagner Group on even ground, instead rough up old women and older priests in Kiev. Do the criminal offense and you and yours will do the time.
The Wagner Group are notable as they show that Gerasimov’s orchestra now has a section for asymmetric warfare to complement their other artists. Gerasimov must get other, similar strings to his bow in both the hot and cold wars. These more strings would include increased financing for Russia’s sports and arts sectors and sponsorships to bring Chinese, Korean, Japanese and other ballet troupes to Russia to mix it with the masters. Organization as usual there to show that, though NATO’s Olympians might savour the shit-strewn boulevards of Paris, Russia has better fare to offer her kids and those of Africa and Asia.
And in the arms’ field, where mutually helpful technology and workers transfers with Chinese, Koreans, and Iranians must be accelerated so the drape can come down that bit faster on Zelensky’s rump Reich and Gerasimov’s look can shift northwards to stop Lake NATO and the direct risk it poses to St Petersburg coming true.
Lake NATO is, obviously, the Baltic Sea where the U.S. has actually encouraged the pimple states of Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia to slap Russia around and for Finland and other nations with significant cocaine issues to back them up and, while doing so, not just to double the border Russia show NATO however to put Russia’s crucial Kola peninsula in the front line. Forget that Finland’s rash action completely vindicates Stalin’s defensive relocations into the Baltic statelets, eastern Poland and parts of Finland but this should not end well for Finland, whose coke-addled leaders have now compromised their own security to keep the bottom line of Uncle Sam’s defence companies and their Nordstream terrorism buoyant.
If Finland’s overlords wish to play by Big Young boys’ Guidelines, reasonable enough. Perhaps the Russian navy can welcome their Chinese, North Korean and Iranian equivalents to pay courtesy contacts us to Kaliningrad, Primorsk and Ust-Luga. And even to station observers and more there and in the Arctic as well. Liberty of navigation and all that. Who is to say?
If the maxim to speak silently but to carry a big stick is to be personified, it remains in the buttoned lips of Valery Gerasimov, Chief of Staff of the General Staff of the Russian Army and Sergey Lavrov, Russia’s urbane Foreign Minister, who has actually lately been flexing his diplomatic muscles in Beijing, where they have a saying to kill the chicken to scare the monkeys. If Ukraine is to be the chicken and the Nordic and Baltic countries are the chattering monkeys, who have no regard for their own welfare well, then, Gerasimov needs to decide which of them is metaphorically next for the slicing block.
There is another stating that, when the going gets hard, the Russians not only draw in the belt however they eat it too. Though Gerasimov, Lavrov and their associates must make some tough and brutal decisions to stop Russia’s days of combating the Wehrmacht and La Grand Armée from ever returning, they can have hope. Sergey Naryshkin, the head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service, has declared that NATO’s objective in Ukraine is to eliminate all things Russian. Russia’s leaders, to put it simply, acknowledge the existential and, certainly, pathological nature of the risk Russia faces, a risk that can be traced back even far beyond NATO’s criminal attacks on Libya, Iraq, Yugoslavia and a host of other nations too lengthy to adumbrate.
Though I am positive all of these most current Biden-inspired squabbles will end to Russia’s advantage, the ball is very much in Gerasimov’s court. When he moves, he needs to win not just video game, set and match but craft this reincarnation of The Excellent Game so that the world can savour the difficult and soft power diplomacy of Lavrov, the Bolshoi Ballet, Kamila Valieva and so many others rather than the pottage of jumped-up criminals Zelensky, Hunter Biden, Ursula von der Leyen and their ilk personify.