http://web.archive.org/web/20081211042022/http://covertaction.org/content/view/46/75/
In one of the republics, Chechnya, according to Le Monde Diplomatique [Ignacio Ramonet, "Chechnya and Chaos," Le Monde Diplomatique, Feb. 2000.]:
"In return for political support...[Yeltsin's government] tolerated the creation of a generalized system...under which the most lucrative sectors of the economy (oil, currency, alcohol, tobacco, caviar, drugs, arms, etc.) were handed over to mafia gangs and local clans....
``The rise of the mafia was accompanied by...a revival of Sunni Islam...the message of the Wahhabi missionaries, who arrived with substantial financial backing from Saudi Arabia. They preached the fundamentalist brand of Islam that had already won over many of the Afghan resistance fighters in the 1980s.... The Chechen...Shamil Basayev [named after the historical figure, Shamil] belonged to this branch of Islam...
``[T]he Wahhabis were setting up Islamist fiefdoms in which they imposed Islamic law, the sharia, against the wishes of many in the local communities.... Mafia activities and banditry became widespread. A pillage economy developed, based on the looting of isolated farms, the smuggling of anything that could be smuggled and most notably the kidnapping of hundreds of people (particularly foreigners) for ransom."12
hmmm IS..IS that starting to sound familiar? Daesh, where the heck do we see stuff like that going on?
Then, came the U.S., joining pro-western Arab states, and Muslim fundamentalist fighters who had a coincidence of interests in using this region as a crowbar to force a way into Russian territory. The common goal is to plunder Russia's resources (especially oil and gas), continue to bankrupt the economy, and to set up Islamic fundamentalist states.
Professor Robert Bruce Ware wrote that the Chechen war is financed by the same forces of "international terrorism against which the West has long been struggling."13
The dire living conditions of the Russian people—more than half the inhabitants of Moscow live below the poverty line, and they are better off, by far, than the rest of the Russian population14—is a result of the economic policies drafted for Boris Yeltsin by western advisers. But the Russians are "no longer content to dine on the scraps the West deems fit to dispense from the table of the IMF."15
Draconian Laws and "Shock Therapies"
In 1990 and 1991, Boris Yeltsin, as Chairman of the Russian Supreme Soviet (elected at its first session, May 29, 1990), with the participation of the elected parliament and U.S. "experts," adopted measures which pulled the economic and political rug from beneath the U.S.S.R. From June 1990 through the beginning of 1991, Yeltsin set the stage for the dissolution of the U.S.S.R. by initiating these laws and decrees which declared that all land, raw materials, resources, and state enterprises, etc., within its territory, be transferred from the Union, to the Russian Federation.
Yet, in a referendum on March 17, 1991, much to the chagrin of Yeltsin and the West, 75.3 percent of the Soviet people voted overwhelmingly to preserve the U.S.S.R. This will of the people was totally ignored and a month following the vote, Yeltsin amended the constitution, granting himself extraordinary powers over the Union president, Mikhael Gorbachev.
The "Coup" that Finally Toppled the U.S.S.R.
How were the monumental changes which wiped out the U.S.S.R. and turned the reins of state power over to Russia and the other Soviet Republics finally implemented? The key to this was the August 1991 attempted "coup."16 This "soap opera coup" was implemented while Mikhael Gorbachev, the President of the U.S.S.R., was vacationing in the Crimea. Boris Yeltsin, as President of the Russian Soviet Federation of Socialist Republics (RSFSR), became a "hero" when he stood on top of a tank, ostensibly to defend Russia against the "coup plotters." There were genuine forces, including some in the military, who sought to preserve the Union when they realized what had been taking place. But Yeltsin's stand, supported by some members of parliament who rejected Gorbachev's "catastroika," helped pave the way for state power to be removed from Gorbachev and turned over to Yeltsin. Gorbachev stayed on the sidelines prepared to move in either direction, depending on how events unfolded. The theatrical "coup" resulted in his being deposed.
Yeltsin boasts in his memoirs that "after August 19, the Union disappeared all by itself: it was gone in a day."17 But this was hardly the case. There were remaining tasks to be carried out to accomplish the final demise of the Soviet Union. Between September and December 1991, Yeltsin stripped U.S.S.R. deputies of all their rights and privileges, banned the Communist Party, and initiated two decrees which granted him emergency powers to promote "economic reforms."
Then in December, the Minsk Agreement creating the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) was adopted, and in a secret meeting, with only two other former Soviet territorial presidents (Ukraine and Byelorussia), the agreements formalized, with the stroke of Yeltsin's pen, the breakup of the Soviet Union.18
Yeltsin and his American handlers were free to destroy the economy, betray the national interests of the people, and subvert their national security.
Enter the Chechen Warlords
Dzhokhar Dudayev, a former Soviet Air Force commander of Chechen origin, was in Moscow supporting Yeltsin in the August "soap opera coup." Dudayev had fought for the Soviet Union against Islamic forces in Afghanistan in the 1980s. He later actively took part in supporting secessionists while stationed in the Baltic Republics.19
Immediately after the "coup" attempt, in September 1991, Yeltsin's top economic aides took Dudayev to Chechnya to unseat Doku Zavgayev, head of the Soviet government there.20 Taking advantage of the turmoil in Moscow, Dudayev and his supporters hurriedly organized elections. Only 15 percent of the electorate participated in the sham election in which Dudayev became President of Chechnya and promptly declared independence.21 All of this was taking place as Yeltsin was busy dissolving the U.S.S.R. and establishing the CIS, in the months after his first visit to the U.S.
Also supporting Yeltsin's coup d'etat in Moscow was Shamil Basayev, a Chechen fundamentalist who was trained in Afghanistan (in March and May of 1994)22 and in fighting in numerous wars in the Caucasus afterwards, for the purpose of setting up Islamic fundamentalist states. Before long, Dudayev began to recall that he too was Muslim and even to deny that he fought on the side of the Soviets in Afghanistan. Under Dudayev's rule, Basayev and other Chechens began to sabotage the Russian oil line transporting petroleum through Chechnya to the Black Sea.
With the breakup of the Soviet Union, the stage was set for the western powers to continue to foment strife and to break up the Russian states in the Caucasus pitting local populations against each other and using Muslim fundamentalist warlords to wrest control of the Caspian Sea oil, the pipelines, and refineries from Russia. (See article: "Chechnya: More Blood for Oil.")
Yeltsin's Follies
By summer 1993, Yeltsin had lost support of the parliament and the people because of his increasingly bizarre and autocratic behavior and his virtually unilateral economic decrees. The latter facilitated the burgeoning rise of the Russian mafia (also known as the "oligarchs") as well as the devastating economic suffering of the Russian population.23
On September 21, when tensions between the president and parliament had reached a breaking point, Yeltsin, with U.S. advice and encouragement, signed a decree that would change the course of parliamentary government in Russia. With another stroke of his pen, Decree 1400 declared Parliament, the Supreme Soviet, and later, the Constitutional Court, dissolved. He also called for new parliamentary elections in three months.24
Denouncing Yeltsin's actions as the real coup d'etat, Parliament named its own government. Many parliament members and their staff refused to leave the Russian White House (the parliament building) for several weeks, even after Yeltsin had cut off the water, electricity, and telephones. Thousands of citizens from all over Russia massed in Moscow in support of the parliamentarians and the constitution. With the blessings of the Clinton administration, the CIA, and the American Embassy in Moscow, Yeltsin ordered a brutal military attack on the White House, the night of October 3-4, killing what a Russian security official estimated to be up to 1500 people.25 After the arrest of the parliamentary leadership, many of the bodies in and around the White House and the TV station—victims of the attacks and of later executions—were secretly removed and "disappeared" during the night.26
Yeltsin also banned 15 periodicals, dismissed editors of newspapers and officials of the Ministry for Press and Information, and introduced even more repressive censorship. In December 1993, on the day of the new parliamentary elections, despite maneuvers to confuse voters and create apathy, and to the chagrin of Yeltsin and his American advisers, 85 percent of the people who participated in the elections voted against pro-Yeltsin candidates.27
Over the next year, Yeltsin's popularity continued to plummet. In December 1994, in the wake of continuing Chechen pipeline sabotage by the warlords, he ordered a military assault on Chechnya, without even bothering to submit a proposed decree as required by his own new constitution.28 Russian troops were led by the same General, Pavel Grachev, who had commanded the forces that stormed the Russian White House.
A bloody two-year war followed, overwhelmingly opposed by the Russian people, that resulted in 70,000 deaths. "The first Chechnya war was a logical extension to the shelling of the White House. Indeed, if you can shoot at the parliament in Moscow, why on earth shouldn't you be able to bomb Dudayev's palace in Grozny?"29
Russian soldiers left Chechnya in 1996, defeated, under a fragile and humiliating cease-fire. In April of 1997, Dzhokhar Dudayev died in a missile attack, and, later that year, the new President, Aslan Maskhadov, signed the Khasavyurt Accords ending the first Chechen war. The administrative power of the republic was transferred to the Chechens, and at Russian insistence, the accords stipulated that a referendum on the final status of Chechnya would take place in 2001.
According to Nicolai Petro, former State Department Policy Adviser on Soviet Affairs during the Bush administration, "During the December 1994-November 1996 war, some 300,000 people were forced to leave their homes, but almost none of them chose to return home to Chechnya after it declared independence! ... The country sank into a perpetual state of banditry and lawlessness ... blamed [on] local Chechen warlords ... unable or unwilling to make the transition from war to civil reconstruction."30 Much of the Russian federal budget allocations for rebuilding Chechnya never made it there, siphoned off by the Russian or Chechen mafia or by Yeltsin's inner circle, also known as "the Family."
U.S. Strategy of Terror
In an extraordinary article in the Military Review, Summer 1997, U.S. Army Major Raymond C. Finch, III, described how Shamil Basayev epitomizes the "face of future battle."
Finch stopped short of admitting to U.S. military aid to the Chechen fighters while praising the "savage courage" of a committed Chechen warlord such as Basayev, saying that he "is an example of the kind of leader who defines the future security environment."He acknowledged that the Chechens knew they could never defend "against a full scale Russian invasion."31 So, Basayev stepped up acts of terrorism against Chechens, Russians, Dagestanis, and other peoples of the Caucasus. Any foreigner—journalists and human rights workers included—became fair game for the warlords' bands of kidnappers.
Finch, writing in 1997, concluded that, although the methods Basayev employed were cruel and vicious and in violation of recognized laws of warfare, "The Chechens, under Basayev's courageous leadership, have won their independence." But Petro, writing in 2000, asks, why then did the Chechen warlords continue their bloody war for independence when the Chechen Republic was already under their control?32
Attacks on Dagestan
In two attacks in August and September 1999, Shamil Basayev and General Khatab (a Jordanian military leader who had trained King Hussein's Chechen body guards) invaded the neighboring Russian republic of Dagestan. They murdered police officers, hoisted the green flag of the "Islamic Republic," and advanced on the capital, Makhachkala.33 They announced "a tripartite military campaign against Dagestan of which ... [the] invasions were merely a component of the first phase."34
The timing of the Chechen invasions of Dagestan is noteworthy, as was pointed out by journalist Brian Becker. The Russian company Transneft had lost complete control of the crude oil pipeline running from Baku through Chechnya to the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. They closed the pipeline and were attempting to move the oil by rail through Dagestan at the time of Basayev's and Khatab's invasion. Was this invasion of Dagestan "part of a larger conspiracy by the U.S. to detach the countries surrounding the Caspian Sea from Russia?"35 According to the Russian Defense Minister Sergeyev, at the time, a "permanent smoldering of a manageable armed conflict resulting [in a weakened Russia] will help the U.S. control...the Northern Caucasus."36
The Chechen warlords' objective, to establish a Muslim state and to chase the Russians from the Caucasus, fits neatly into the scheme of the U.S. and European oil multinationals' efforts to control oil fields, refineries, and oil and gas transportation in the Caucasus. If they could obtain greater control, they could eliminate the competition, since oil from the Caspian basin would then have to be transported through Georgia or Turkey, two client states of the U.S.37 The new pipelines would automatically come under the protection of NATO.38
In March, Russian General Shpigun was captured by the warlords. In August and September, they attacked Dagestan. Then, in September, bomb attacks in apartment buildings in Moscow, Buynaksk and Volgodonsk, killed 292 civilians. Russia blamed the attacks on Chechen terrorists.39 In the beginning of October the Russian army moved into the north and occupied a third of Chechnya, and Chechen President Maskhadov sent his appeal to NATO calling for western intervention.40
The two thousand soldiers of Shamil Basayev who invaded Dagestan were professionally trained, supplied, and armed. They had Stinger-2 rockets with which they destroyed three Russian helicopters, conveniently captured on film by TV cameras.41
Prof. Ware warned: "Many Russians, and most Dagestanis, already believe that the United States is behind the Chechen [warlord] invasions.... The invasions were mounted by Chechen field commanders from bases in Chechnya where guerrillas from Central Asia, the Middle East, Northern Africa, and Eastern Europe were trained with funds from supporters in the Persian Gulf, Pakistan, and Afghanistan." The invasions "were fiercely resisted by the Dagestanis, who firmly wished to remain with Russia...."42
War and Disinformation
The current war is supported by the majority of the Russian people, who want to retain Russia's territory and to protect its other economically vital regions against U.S. expansion. Through its use of fundamentalist fighters, the West has left Russia no choice but to fight for the Russian Federal territory or to cede all the Caucasus to U.S. oil corporations under NATO military protection.
The war against Chechen fundamentalist terrorists has human rights organizations in Russia and internationally up in arms around purported war crimes. Inside Russia, those "human rights" activists are many of the same people who supported Yeltsin's 1993 attack on the elected parliamentarians and his 1994 Chechen war (which was neither sanctioned by parliament nor supported by the people). As for U.S. demands that "the Kremlin...permit international relief organizations, such as the Red Cross, to monitor events in the war-torn republic...it seems oddly to have been forgotten that the reason there are no international relief organizations in Chechnya is that they had all been driven away by Chechen criminality before the end of 1997."43
Already some familiar western disinformation themes used to demonize one side in such a conflict have surfaced, including purported summary executions of Chechen fighters and civilians, and their mass burials by Russian troops. A videotape broadcast throughout the West showed bodies being dragged by a military vehicle and dumped into a mass grave. This dramatic footage—the stuff of Hague war crimes tribunals—was alleged to depict the mass burial of 150 Chechen soldiers and civilians who had been tortured and summarily executed by Russian troops. The German television bureau chief who claimed to have shot the footage eventually admitted he had not been at the scene, and that he had acquired the footage from a Russian Izvestia journalist. Russian officials subsequently proved that the bodies were of Chechen fighters killed in action weeks earlier, filmed as they were temporarily buried for later identification.44
Another case is that of U.S.-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reporter, Andrei Babitsky, who "disappeared" in Chechnya in late January. Constant, daily world news bulletins speculated that the Russian Army had probably executed the journalist, because of his pro-Chechen broadcasts.45 The Russians insisted that they were sure he was alive, that he had been detained by them for questioning about his links with Chechen warlords, but, with his consent, he had been traded to a Chechen warlord friend of his for several Russian prisoners of war. With no word from Babitsky for weeks, the Russian protestations were summarily dismissed.
But on February 25, Babitsky appeared in Makhachkala, the capital of Dagestan, where he was promptly arrested by the Russian authorities for possession of a forged Azerbaijani passport.46 Although he gave several inconsistent stories over the next few days, he admitted he had agreed to be traded, but discovered that the Chechens to whom he was given were not the friends he had been expecting. He said he was held for weeks in a hotel by men in masks and did not know who they were.47 After being taken to Moscow on the passport charge, he was released, but later formally charged.
Despite such exposures, and granting that brutalities always accompany war, the disinformation campaign continues. The European Union's foreign relations commissioner, Chris Patten, seemed quite willing to accept a disinformation level of fifty percent: "Even if only half the stories were true, they would still be horrific."48
It is necessary "to emphasize the brutal character of the force opposing Russia," says Russian writer Vassily Akasyonov, who now lives in the U.S. "Most intellectuals are victims of stereotypes," believing that the little guy fighting is always right. "In actual fact, the little guy can turn out to be a malicious viper." He recalled the words of Anatoly Sobchak, the late mayor of St. Petersburg and a mentor of Vladimir Putin, who said that if the Chechen militants—not the Chechen nation, but "the group of rabid people that has taken shape in its midst"—are referred to as separatists, then in the eyes the West, "they appear to be romantic freedom-loving fighters."49
Still, it is not just a question of a small band of vipers. The Chechen warlords have allied themselves with the most extreme Islamic fundamentalists who have a fascist political agenda using the cover of religion (as is true of many fundamentalist groups of other religions as well).The only government in the world to have recognized the independence of the Republic of Chechnya is the Taliban regime in Afghanistan, in an intense affront to Russia.50 And, on February 3, 2000, President Maskhadov allied himself with Basayev's forces and "announced the suspension of constitutional law and declared a state of Islamic sharia.51
"Several Central Asian states, including Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, have also faced threats from armed Islamic extremists," according to a Reuters dispatch. The response has been a closer cooperation between these states and Russia with plans to establish a new anti-terrorist center to coordinate CIS-wide efforts to fight the terrorists. Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev introduced the proposal for the center at the CIS summit last January. The states of Central Asia have become increasingly reliant on Russia for assistance in fighting Islamic fundamentalism.52
A few weeks before the election for the presidency of Russia, Acting President Vladimir Putin said: "The Chechen people have become a victim of international extremism...ordinary people in Chechnya are suffering from the policy that was pursued in Russia in recent years...Chechnya was granted de facto...full state independence since 1996.... Extremist forces made use of this vacuum....They split the territory of the Chechen Republic into separate small entities...outside of any laws...What happened as a result was a sort of mini-Afghanistan....they began to get weapons from abroad, money and mercenaries."53
"Americans want to make it clear that the Trans-Caucasian region...is a zone of priority importance for them. There is no doubt that this fact catalyzed the recent political agitation in these territories. The Islamic world realizes that, for the U.S., now is just the right moment to detach the Northern Caucasus from the Russian Federation," said Petru Bogatu writing in Tara last November.54
When Muslim-Christian antagonisms have reached heights that rival the days of the Crusades, as in Yugoslavia and Nigeria today, it is difficult to be optimistic. Yet, in 1995, when he was Deputy Mayor of St. Petersburg, Vladimir Putin was asked in an interview if he thought Russia was too oriented to the West. He responded by expressing hope for the future by saying:
"Russia has always been a sort of barrier between East and West. That's a fact, just as it is a fact that Russia itself is a country where Christianity and Islam have peacefully lived side-by-side for centuries. In this is the enormous advantage, the unique nature, of our country. It would be nice if Russia could become not a shield or a barrier holding back some mythical threat, but instead a connecting link."55
Unsung Heroes: The Soviet Military and the Liberation of Southern Africa Author: Vladimir Shubin Deputy Director of the Institute for African Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, and Professor of History and Politics at the Russian State University of Humanities. Before joining the academia he served in the Soviet Armed Forces from 1962 to 1969, and from the late 1960s was involved in political and practical support of the liberation movements in Southern Africa, DEFINITELY NOT SOMEONE WITH A CONFLICT OF INTEREST IN THIS PURELY ACADEMIC MATTER
do you know that colonial relations are concrete and economic?
are you saying the USSR's relationship with its satellite nations wasnt concrete and economic? because by any reasonable person's standards, it was. oh did a central authority extract resources without recompense rather than a corporation? must be clean then, nevermind.
do you know that there is a theory of imperialism?
yeah its basically the theory that only capital/ism can engage in imperialism lmao
can you apply any of these schemas or are you confident in your aggressive bourgeois ignorance?
im confident that you have drilled these schemas (lmao) so thoroughly into your mind that you are incapable of self-examination or self-criticism at this point
russia today is an immensely corrupt klepto-cartel
the USSR engaged in what was essentially a seamless continuation the Great Game by any other name under the pretense of admirable goals.
Chechnya: More Blood for Oil
by Karen Talbot
Media analysts and U.S. officials have been nervously trying to assess the "bewildering" policies of Russia's Acting President Vladimir Putin, especially his actions in Chechnya. As the Russian elections approach in which Putin is favored to win the presidency, he increasingly is being dubbed as a nationalist even though he claims to be defending the territorial integrity and economic base of Russia in the face of escalating incursions on the part of the U.S. and other western countries. That there are grounds for these concerns on the part of the Russians is confirmed by numerous statements and articles in the western press such as the following one by William Pfaff: "The United States also is intervening in the Caspian region to establish an American-dominated oil pipeline route across Azerbaijan and Georgia, cutting out Russia, which is linked to a larger effort to displace Russian influence in the Caucasus and Central Asia."1
Chechnya, the Caucasus, and Caspian Basin Oil
Nine years ago, the peoples of the 15 republics of the Soviet Union voted on the question: Should the Soviet Union dissolve itself, so Russia, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, and the other republics would become independent countries? Boris Yeltsin, supported by the Bush administration, championed such a breakup of the U.S.S.R. in an intense year-long campaign across the country.
On March 17, 1991, 75 percent of the Soviet people voted overwhelmingly to retain the U.S.S.R.; nevertheless, within nine months, the Soviet Union was dissolved as Yeltsin took power.2
Now, those "independent" former republics of the U.S.S.R. are economically and militarily dependent on the U.S., major countries of Western Europe, and pro-western Arab states. Among these are Azerbaijan, Georgia, and Kazakhstan. A tiny group of élites have become super-rich proxies for western corporations while the vast majority of the people are indescribably poor.
These three republics are in the region of the Caspian Sea. Because the Caspian Sea is landlocked, the oil and gas have had to be transported mainly by pipeline. There is a major route through Chechnya and other parts of Russia to Novorossiysk on the Black Sea. In fact, the largest network of pipelines in the world had been built during the Soviet era, when the Soviet Union was the number one producer of oil and natural gas in the world.3 Its gas and oil fields, refineries and pipelines extended from western Siberia, as well as from the Caspian Sea Basin, to the Black Sea, the Ukraine and the Baltic and East European countries.4
The U.S. wants the Caspian Sea under total U.S. domination. A consortium of 11 western oil companies now controls more than 50 percent of all oil investments in the Caspian Basin—these include Atlantic Richfield, Chevron, Exxon-Mobil, Pennzoil, Phillips Petroleum, Texaco, and British Petroleum-Amoco.5 Therefore, Washington is pursuing other routes, some or all of which ultimately may come to fruition. The intent is to bypass Russia, as with a proposed pipeline through Turkey to the Mediterranean Sea—the Baku-Ceyhan route.
So long as Chechnya has been kept broiling with conflict and war, the pipeline through that region usually has remained non-operative. In early August 1999, Shamil Basayev and other insurgents invaded Dagestan, located between Chechnya and the Caspian Sea.6
The Russian government expressed fears that this was part of a larger conspiracy by the U.S. to detach the countries surrounding the Caspian Sea from Russia.7
Lewis Dolinsky, writing in the San Francisco Chronicle said: "The incursion by Chechen warlord Shamil Basayev into neighboring Dagestan, where his guerrillas seem to have little support, was an assault on the integrity of Russia with the stated intention of carving out an Islamic state. In addition, there are stories of ties to Osama bin Laden, Pakistani intelligence, Islamists from several countries and the complicity of former Soviet republics in the movement of arms and fighters into Russia."8
The developments in the Caspian and Trans-Caucasus regions involve a dangerous complex of hostilities fed by growing militarization. "Russia and the U.S.-NATO alliance (and their proxies) may be inching ever closer to a shooting war in Central Asia."9
Georgia: Cozying Up to NATO
"Georgia is...central to U.S. plans to exploit the oil and gas riches of the Caspian basin."10
At the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) summit in Istanbul, November 18-19, Georgia signed several crucial agreements including the Ankara Declaration supporting the building of the Baku-Ceyhan and trans-Caspian pipelines. The proposed trans-Caspian pipelines will go beneath the Caspian Sea from its eastern shore to Azerbaijan and connect with other pipelines, bypassing Russia. Also at the OSCE summit, Russia and Georgia issued a joint statement on the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe (CFE) treaty setting terms for the complete withdrawal of Russian forces from Moldova and Georgia.11
Leading up to the elections in Georgia on October 31, 1999, the removal of Russian bases was a key campaign promise. Georgian President Edouard Shevardnadze asserted that Georgia would "knock on NATO's door." Georgia's regime has accused Russia of using the Gudauta military base to supply the Abkhazians who are engaged in a separatist struggle with Georgia.12 The Abkhazi-Georgian conflict has received little attention in the U.S. media.
The CFE agreement signed in Istanbul spelled out cuts in Russian military equipment in Georgia and called for the withdrawal of the military bases at Vaziani and Gudauta and the tank maintenance plant in Tbilisi by December 31, 2000. OSCE member countries will provide financial assistance for the program.13
The U.S. Congress was urged to increase financing to Georgia over the next 2-3 years to ensure "Georgia's political and military integration into NATO and Western structures as soon as possible."14
All of this exacerbated the already strained relations between Russia and Georgia. The Russian media expressed outrage that Georgia and Azerbaijan were aiding terrorists in Chechnya. But as we will see things shifted, at least temporarily, following Putin's leadership in the subsequent CIS meeting.
Trans-Balkan Pipeline
Following the OSCE Summit, however, the U.S. began reviving its plan to help finance a trans-Balkan oil pipeline going through Bulgaria, Macedonia, and Albania, thus bypassing Turkey and delaying preparations for the Baku-Ceyhan route. Completion of this pipeline would consolidate U.S. influence in the Balkans while simultaneously avoiding the greater expenses tied to the proposed oil pipeline through Turkey. 15
Interest in the trans-Balkan project was renewed in a meeting, January 12, of international oil investors, U.S. Eximbank, the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development, the World Bank and the U.S.-based Albanian-Macedonian-Bulgarian Oil Company (AMBO).16 The trans-Balkan pipeline is expected to cost only $825 million.17 It would enable Central Asian and Caucasian oil to be transported by tanker across the Black Sea, and then to Western Europe, and would avoid not only Russia, but also the environmental complications of transporting oil through Turkey's Bosporus Strait.18
This strategy may hinder the U.S. in its relations with its NATO ally, Turkey, particularly because it has relied on Turkey to extend U.S. military and political interests in former Yugoslavia and the Caucasus, including in Georgia. With Georgia in confrontation with Russia over the war in Chechnya, the U.S. may want to count on Turkey to intervene. Turkish President Suliman Demirel met with Georgian President Edouard Shevardnadze on January 14, "to guarantee that Georgia's loyalties lie with the West" in advance of the mid-January Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) summit in Moscow under the leadership of then Acting President of Russia, Vladimir Putin.19
Meanwhile, the Clinton administration has yet to place any financial resources behind the Baku-Ceyhan route,20 though it certainly has not been abandoned as one of the several proposed pipeline routes.
CIS Military Exercises
In the tug-of-war for Georgia's loyalties, and those of other states of the region, Russia gained the upper hand, at least temporarily, as a consequence of the CIS summit meeting, January 24 and 25. At that meeting, Russian Acting President Vladimir Putin was rumored to have held separate meetings with Georgian President Edouard Shevardnadze over increasing tensions stemming from Georgia's forging of closer ties with the West and its suspected aid to rebels fighting Russian troops in Chechnya. The Summit produced measures to tighten security and to combat terrorism, Islamic fundamentalism, arms trade and drug trafficking. ITAR-Tass reported that the purpose was to crack down on paramilitary activity along the borders of the three nations.21
As a result, joint military exercises were held in the days immediately following the CIS meeting, "covering the entire Caucasus, including the Russian republics bordering Georgia and Azerbaijan—Dagestan, Chechnya, Ingushetia, North Ossetia, Kabardino Balkaria, Karachayevo-Cherkessia and the Krasnodar region—as well as the Stavropol territory."22
The decision to host those military drills was a turnaround for Uzbekistan. In March 1999, Uzbekistan's military had withdrawn from the CIS Collective Security Pact and the Uzbek military has often trained with direct U.S. assistance.23
The CIS Summit marked a shift in the stance particularly of Georgia and Uzbekistan regarding Russia. Other CIS states including Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Armenia, have maintained fairly strong ties with Russia.24
The West Retaliates
Responding to these recent diplomatic gains by Russia, high-level delegations were dispatched "to entice much of Central Europe to join the western fold." The delegations—which visited Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Romania and Moldova—included European Commission President Romano Prodi, the NATO Secretary-General, and NATO's supreme commander. But most significantly, NATO also sent a delegation to Georgia February 9, "to further prepare Georgia for cooperation with NATO's Partnership for Peace Program." A U.S. delegation began visits on February 7.25
Romano Prodi issued a statement in Latvia, February 10, signaling a major policy change for the European Union from the purely economic to the security realm. Prodi essentially announced de facto NATO expansion under the guise of EU security guarantees.26
The statement made it clear that there are plans "to integrate NATO into the EU." If the EU fully adopts Prodi's plans, it would involve fully absorbing all of Eastern Europe—including the Baltics—into the EU. An economically powerful EU, backed by a militarily powerful NATO, would become entrenched along vast lengths of Russia's eastern border.27
IMF Funds Delayed
In December, the International Monetary Fund (IMF) announced it would continue to delay a $640 million loan payment to Russia. Senior Clinton administration officials acknowledged that Moscow's campaign against Chechnya influenced the decision.28 In Moscow, a spokesman for the Foreign Ministry said: "The language of economic sanctions and diktat is unacceptable, all the more so when it concerns the issue of Russia's territorial integrity."29
In a clear attempt to assuage Russia's growing concerns on all these fronts, and to regain its diminishing dominance over Russia, NATO Secretary-General Lord George Robertson also traveled to Moscow to hold talks with Acting President Putin, a meeting initiated by Russian Foreign Minister Igor Ivanov last December. The session took two months of negotiation to prepare. Moscow had raised disagreements over the agenda and it looked as if the meeting would not take place at all.30 Significantly, these talks also were held one month before the Russian presidential election.
NATO Strengthens Ties with Ukraine
In a demonstration of how lightning fast events are moving, NATO's decision-making body—the North Atlantic Council—met in Kiev, Ukraine, March 1-2, after being hurriedly organized. This was seen as "a direct challenge to the Putin government's assertive new foreign policy."31 Furthermore, it is likely these actions partly were aimed at trying to pressure Putin and the Russian electorate on the eve of the March 26 elections.
Ukraine is viewed as the most strategically important nation on the periphery of Russia. It is economically dependent on Russia but continues to be pushed closer to the West.
Indicative of the deepening military ties between NATO and Ukraine are new plans for naval exercises in the Black Sea—NATO's Cooperative Partner 2000—to be held June 19-30. (See sidebar: "U.S.-NATO Military Operations in the Caspian Basin.")
The vast network of oil and gas pipelines, built during the Soviet era, include routes through Ukraine to Eastern Europe. So Ukraine is another potentially vital country for the transshipment of oil and gas into Europe.
Many Wars
The Caucasus:
Azerbaijan: The oil state of Azerbaijan, on the west shore of the Caspian Sea, is the source of tremendous oil reserves. In order to transport the petroleum to market it must use currently existing pipelines: one running through Georgia to Supsa, which has limited capacity, and another traversing Russia through Chechnya to Novorossiysk. The Azerbaijani leaders along with the western oil companies are going ahead with plans to construct a pipeline through Turkey to Ceyhan, but the expense of that project is causing delays. In order to by-pass Russia, the other alternative is to go through Iran. (The recent parliamentary elections in Iran and the victory of pro-western candidates there may have a major impact on the future of such a pipeline.)
Meanwhile the conflict continues with Armenia over Nagorno-Karabakh, an enclave within Azerbaijan currently occupied by Armenian militias with Russia supplying arms to Armenia. On June 17, the Azerbaijani Minister of Defense Safar Abijev asked that "NATO be involved in solving the conflict." Earlier, Azerbaijani spokesmen had floated the idea of a NATO military base in Azerbaijan. They also have held maneuvers in the framework of NATO's "Partnership for Peace."32
Dagestan: Since the transport of petroleum through Chechnya had been interrupted by the conflict, Russia had been planning an alternative pipeline through Dagestan. But after Basayev invaded Dagestan last August and September, these plans were temporarily thwarted.33
Karachay-Cherkess: Chechnya could also be bypassed to the west by means of a pipeline through the Russian region of Karachay-Cherkess. It clearly is no coincidence that a separatist movement is also flaring up there. On August 27, there was a major confrontation by separatists demanding that Karachay-Cherkess secede from Russia.
According to the historian Rachid Khatuev, the first aim of such a secession is to control the Baku-Novorossiysk pipeline. The Cherkess have a large diaspora abroad, especially in Turkey, where they have considerable influence.34
Armenia: Armenia is strategically significant in the shipment of oil and gas from the Caspian Sea.
In speeches before the summit of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), November 18-19, 1999, both Azerbaijani President Haidar Aliyev and Armenian President Robert Kocharian called for the creation of a security pact in the South Caucasus, involving Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey, Russia and the U.S.35
Until now, Armenia has been Russia's greatest ally in the region. But this pact would require the withdrawal of Russian troops from Armenia, undermining that long-existing alliance. Instead, Armenia would be in the camp of its traditional enemies, including Turkey.
Countries of Central Asia:
Kazakhstan: Kazakhstan is a huge country bordering on the Eastern shore of the Caspian Sea. It too has vast petroleum resources. A substantial portion of the oil reserves are in the Tengiz oil fields in the Caspian Basin. Western oil companies are heavily involved in Kazakhstan, as in Azerbaijan. However, the only way to transport the petroleum to market is through existing pipelines in Russia, especially the pipeline that crosses Chechnya and terminates at the Black Sea port of Novorossiysk. There is feverish activity to construct an underwater pipeline beneath the Caspian Sea which would make it possible to bypass Russia. The major obstacle to this is a treaty requirement that all five littoral states of the Caspian Sea must agree to such a project. That includes Russia and Iran. Serious disputes are raging among the countries bordering on the Caspian over control of the proposed pipelines and the off-shore oil and gas wealth. U.S. officials have been urging that the legalities regarding the Caspian Sea be disregarded in order to move forward with the trans-Caspian pipeline.36
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev recently warned that drugs, terrorism and scarce water resources are the main threats to stability in Central Asia.37
Turkmenistan: Though its oil reserves are not on the scale of Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan—in Central Asia, east of the Caspian—is actively exploring and developing what reserves do exist. It does, however, have significant gas reserves. Consequently, there are plans to construct a trans-Caspian gas pipeline which would terminate in Turkey. Since the country borders on the Caspian Sea it is involved in the bitter ongoing dispute with the other littoral states about how to divide up the riches of the sea.
China has invested heavily to help Turkmenistan with exploration, drilling and construction of refineries. Because it will face oil shortages in the coming decades, China is looking toward the Caspian Basin to help satisfy its energy needs.38
Tajikistan: Tajikistan is made up of many minorities, cultures, clans, and languages, with Tajiks constituting only 65 percent of the population. Since the breakup of the U.S.S.R., the country has suffered from severe economic problems—including a devastating 60 percent drop in GDP, which fuels conflict. In 1992, the Islamic Party of the Resurrection seized power. They were supported from Iran, where the same language, Farsi, is spoken. Later, Kolkhoz farmers rose in armed revolt and brought President Emomali Rakhmonov to power in November 1992, and the Islamic opposition fled to Afghanistan. They returned later, "now sponsored by Pakistan, in neat American uniforms, with Stingers, night vision equipment, Motorola radio stations, and jeeps."39 A bloody civil war followed, causing 200,000 casualties and 500,000 refugees. In June 1997, Rakhmonov conceded one-third of the ministerial offices to the Muslim opposition under a peace treaty which created a coalition government of opposing forces. Rakhmonov again won the presidency in recent elections, part of a three-year-old peace process. Renewed fighting is already erupting. Many of the Islamic fundamentalist factions are backed by forces in Afghanistan and Uzbekistan both of which border on Tajikistan. This border is a major crossing point for Afghan heroin and other contraband. Assassinations and kidnapings are escalating, therefore Rakhmonov requested that Russia reinforce the Russian-led 201st motorized rifle division—a 15,000 to 20,000-strong force.40
Kyrghyzstan: Kyrghyzstan, which borders on China, has not escaped the conflicts fomented in Central Asia. In August 1999, the Uzbek warlord, Juma Namangan, invaded Kyrghyzstan from Tajikistan with 2,000 men. The scenario was identical to Basayev's invasion of Dagestan. Earlier, Namangan had fought with Islamic rebels in Tajikistan, and then had engaged the Taliban in Afghanistan. His forces consist of Tajik, Afghans, Arabs, and Uzbeks.41
Uzbekistan: Uzbekistan lies west of Kirghizistan in Central Asia. As mentioned above, the Fergana Valley which runs through Uzbekistan promises to be the location of increasing conflicts fomented by the same forces as in other Central Asian countries. Under NATO's Partnership for Peace program, Uzbek soldiers have trained with U.S. paratroopers in the Fergana Valley and even larger NATO-sponsored military maneuvers have been held with Uzbekistan.
Afghanistan: From 1979 until 1989, a war raged between Soviet troops allied with Afghan government forces against Islamic fundamentalist factions. The fundamentalist fighters were armed by the CIA with Stinger missiles in the largest covert operation in history, additionally financed by the Saudis and Osama Bin Laden. However, after having dislodged the Soviet army, the U.S. and Saudi Arabia supported the Taliban, a fundamentalist Muslim organization operating from Pakistan. In October 1996, the Taliban captured the capital Kabul and later advanced on the north where they now threaten the neighboring countries of Uzbekistan and Tajikistan.42
U.S. Role in Central Asia
"Stability is already a thing of the past in the Fergana Valley" (extending through Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan—Central Asia's largest population center), observed Barnett R. Rubin of the Council of Foreign Relations.
He stated in an interview quoted on the Soros Institute web site:
"[T]he international community, and the U.S. in particular, are already engaged in Central Asia and the Fergana Valley, looking for oil and gas, planning pipeline routes, pressuring governments on their economic policies, trying to establish a security structure, trying to cooperate with or displace Russia in many fields including the military one, and so on...."
Rubin said that the region from Central Asia through Afghanistan and Pakistan could become "a zone of perpetual violence and conflict like the Great Lakes region of Central Africa, with several ongoing wars that keep spreading.... And in this region there are also nuclear weapons and materials, unlike in Central and East Africa. So the threat...is very serious."43
Alliances
" Group of Three"
In response to the offensive aimed at surrounding and breaking up Russia from the south, new alliances are being delineated. The "Three" (China, Russia, and India) are building an alliance to counter the Group of Seven (G7) (the seven richest countries of NATO). China clearly perceives that if the West succeeds in carving up Russia, it will become the next target. Among the Uigur population of western China, separatism is being stirred up based on the demand for an "independent and Islamic" state of Turkestan in Central Asia. This secession movement is following the lead of Taiwan and Tibet.
China's growing dependence on imported oil is also leading to stronger ties with Russia.
Meanwhile, India is fighting a war with Pakistan over Kashmir. (See related article on Kashmir.)
Allies of "The Three"
On August 25, the fifth summit of the "Group of Shanghai" took place in Kirghyzstan. It comprised the presidents of China, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kirghistan, and Tajikistan. Their agenda included the question of terrorism in their respective countries. They expressed objection to using "the pretext of human rights to intervene in the internal affairs of other countries" and pleaded the cause of a "multipolar world." This was a clear challenge to a world dominated by the U.S. and NATO. The alliance has led to the sale of Russian C-30 jet-fighters to China.44
Group of Seven
The G7 countries are seeking to strengthen support for their offensive in the region. Key to this are Turkey (with Georgia and Azerbaijan in its sphere of influence), Afghanistan and Pakistan (which are bases for the Muslim fundamentalist warlords whose goal is to "chase the Russians from the Caucasus"), and the Chechen separatists.45
http://web.archive.org/web/20081211042022/http://covertaction.org/content/view/46/75/
stegosaurus posted:look at the allegedly extractive deals between the rsfsr and other nations bro.
oh, your nation's natural resources are now part of the centrally planned economy that your people totally consented to (98% vote, i hear, lmao) and will be distributed in furtherance of the empire's party's goals. your country has always been part of Russia the USSR and its contribution is appreciated. the harvest has failed in russia and unfortunately we must take a bit extra this year. i also apologize that your longstanding nomadic way of life, your religion, and your values must come to an end, but frankly, in doing this, we are somehow enhancing and furthering your culture. we are lifting you out of barbarism. this narrative is not at all consistent with imperialism, but is rather the pure embrace of revolutionary spirit.
VoxNihili posted:stegosaurus posted:look at the allegedly extractive deals between the rsfsr and other nations bro.
oh, your nation's natural resources are now part of the centrally planned economy that your people totally consented to (98% vote, i hear, lmao) and will be distributed in furtherance of the
empire'sparty's goals. your country has always been part ofRussiathe USSR and its contribution is appreciated. the harvest has failed in russia and unfortunately we must take a bit extra this year. i also apologize that your longstanding nomadic way of life, your religion, and your values must come to an end, but frankly, in doing this, we are somehow enhancing and furthering your culture. we are lifting you out of barbarism. this narrative is not at all consistent with imperialism, but is rather the pure embrace of revolutionary spirit.
lol food was subsidized and available to everyone on a minimum wage along with rent, education and transport. another thing you dont know a god damn thing about. unless you're referring to the 30s in which case, point taken, that was a disaster, but it still wasn't an assault on anyone in particular, the entire country starved not just ukraine or siberia. urban russians weren't eating hogs while peasants ate weeds. no one studying the famine has ever made that allegation.
stegosaurus posted:VoxNihili posted:stegosaurus posted:look at the allegedly extractive deals between the rsfsr and other nations bro.
oh, your nation's natural resources are now part of the centrally planned economy that your people totally consented to (98% vote, i hear, lmao) and will be distributed in furtherance of the
empire'sparty's goals. your country has always been part ofRussiathe USSR and its contribution is appreciated. the harvest has failed in russia and unfortunately we must take a bit extra this year. i also apologize that your longstanding nomadic way of life, your religion, and your values must come to an end, but frankly, in doing this, we are somehow enhancing and furthering your culture. we are lifting you out of barbarism. this narrative is not at all consistent with imperialism, but is rather the pure embrace of revolutionary spirit.lol food was subsidized and available to everyone on a minimum wage along with rent, education and transport. another thing you dont know a god damn thing about. unless you're referring to the 30s in which case, point taken, that was a disaster, but it still wasn't an assault on anyone in particular, the entire country starved not just ukraine or siberia. urban russians weren't eating hogs while peasants ate weeds. no one studying the famine has ever made that allegation.
the party elite werent starving.
it's true the ussr provided its people and its subjects with food and housing when it had the capacity to do so, and the vast majority of people are ignorant of this. for this, it gets this special medal: Officially Better Than The United States
lol @ transit and education. transit was strictly limited. education was in large part propaganda and was at best more akin to training for the vast majority of people.
So, that Afghanistan thing, what was that all about again?
VoxNihili posted:yeah lets add "revolutionary" to every geopolitical action and pretend its 100% morally justified. the revolutionary invasion of afghanistan.
Q: The former director of the CIA, Robert Gates, stated in his memoirs ["From the Shadows"], that American intelligence services began to aid the Mujahadeen in Afghanistan 6 months before the Soviet intervention. In this period you were the national security adviser to President Carter. You therefore played a role in this affair. Is that correct?
Brzezinski: Yes. According to the official version of history, CIA aid to the Mujahadeen began during 1980, that is to say, after the Soviet army invaded Afghanistan, 24 Dec 1979. But the reality, secretly guarded until now, is completely otherwise: Indeed, it was July 3, 1979 that President Carter signed the first directive for secret aid to the opponents of the pro-Soviet regime in Kabul. And that very day, I wrote a note to the president in which I explained to him that in my opinion this aid was going to induce a Soviet military intervention.
http://www.counterpunch.org/1998/01/15/how-jimmy-carter-and-i-started-the-mujahideen/
Since feudal times the landholding system in Afghanistan had remained unchanged, with more than 75 percent of the land owned by big landlords who comprised only 3 percent of the rural population. In the mid-1960s, democratic revolutionary elements coalesced to form the People’s Democratic Party (PDP).In 1973, the king was deposed, but the government that replaced him proved to be autocratic, mismanaged, and unpopular. It in turn was forced out in 1978 after a massive demonstration in front of the presidential palace, and after factions of the army intervened on the side of the demonstrators.
The military officers who took charge invited the PDP to form a new government under the leadership of Noor Mohammed Taraki, a poet and novelist. This is how a Marxist-led coalition of national democratic forces came into office. “It was a totally indigenous happening. Not even the CIA blamed the USSR for it,” writes John Ryan, a retired professor at the University of Winnipeg, who was conducting an agricultural research project in Afghanistan at about that time.
The Taraki government proceeded to legalize labor unions, and set up a minimum wage, a progressive income tax, a literacy campaign, and programs that gave ordinary people greater access to health care, housing, and public sanitation. Fledgling peasant cooperatives were started and price reductions on some key foods were imposed.
The government also continued a campaign begun by the king to emancipate women from their age-old tribal bondage. It provided public education for girls and for the children of various tribes.
A report in the San Francisco Chronicle (17 November 2001) noted that under the Taraki regime Kabul had been “a cosmopolitan city. Artists and hippies flocked to the capital. Women studied agriculture, engineering and business at the city’s university. Afghan women held government jobs—-in the 1980s, there were seven female members of parliament. Women drove cars, traveled and went on dates. Fifty percent of university students were women.”
The Taraki government moved to eradicate the cultivation of opium poppy. Until then Afghanistan had been producing more than 70 percent of the opium needed for the world’s heroin supply. The government also abolished all debts owed by farmers, and began developing a major land reform program. Ryan believes that it was a “genuinely popular government and people looked forward to the future with great hope.”
But serious opposition arose from several quarters. The feudal landlords opposed the land reform program that infringed on their holdings. And tribesmen and fundamentalist mullahs vehemently opposed the government’s dedication to gender equality and the education of women and children.
Because of its egalitarian and collectivist economic policies the Taraki government also incurred the opposition of the US national security state. Almost immediately after the PDP coalition came to power, the CIA, assisted by Saudi and Pakistani military, launched a large scale intervention into Afghanistan on the side of the ousted feudal lords, reactionary tribal chieftains, mullahs, and opium traffickers.
A top official within the Taraki government was Hafizulla Amin, believed by many to have been recruited by the CIA during the several years he spent in the United States as a student. In September 1979, Amin seized state power in an armed coup. He executed Taraki, halted the reforms, and murdered, jailed, or exiled thousands of Taraki supporters as he moved toward establishing a fundamentalist Islamic state. But within two months, he was overthrown by PDP remnants including elements within the military.
It should be noted that all this happened before the Soviet military intervention. National security adviser Zbigniew Brzezinski publicly admitted--months before Soviet troops entered the country--that the Carter administration was providing huge sums to Muslim extremists to subvert the reformist government. Part of that effort involved brutal attacks by the CIA-backed mujahideen against schools and teachers in rural areas.
In late 1979, the seriously besieged PDP government asked Moscow to send a contingent of troops to help ward off the mujahideen (Islamic guerrilla fighters) and foreign mercenaries, all recruited, financed, and well-armed by the CIA. The Soviets already had been sending aid for projects in mining, education, agriculture, and public health. Deploying troops represented a commitment of a more serious and politically dangerous sort. It took repeated requests from Kabul before Moscow agreed to intervene militarily.
Jihad and Taliban, CIA Style
The Soviet intervention was a golden opportunity for the CIA to transform the tribal resistance into a holy war, an Islamic jihad to expel the godless communists from Afghanistan. Over the years the United States and Saudi Arabia expended about $40 billion on the war in Afghanistan. The CIA and its allies recruited, supplied, and trained almost 100,000 radical mujahideen from forty Muslim countries including Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Algeria, and Afghanistan itself. Among those who answered the call was Saudi-born millionaire right-winger Osama bin Laden and his cohorts.
After a long and unsuccessful war, the Soviets evacuated the country in February 1989. It is generally thought that the PDP Marxist government collapsed immediately after the Soviet departure. Actually, it retained enough popular support to fight on for another three years, outlasting the Soviet Union itself by a year.
http://www.michaelparenti.org/afghanistan%20story%20untold.html
VoxNihili posted:maybe throw in some revolutionary pogroms.
Are you implying the Soviet Union didnt fight wholeheartedly against anti-semites, you anticommunist tool?
"By 1934, when the OGPU was transformed into the NKVD, Jews `by nationality' constituted the largest single group among the `leading cadres' of the Soviet secret police (37 Jews, 30 Russians, 7 Latvians, 5 Ukrainians, 4 Poles, 3 Georgians, 3 Byelorussians, 2 Germans, and 5 assorted others)." (p. 221). "In January 1937, on the eve of the Great Terror, the 111 top NKVD officials included 42 Jews, 35 Russians, 8 Latvians, and 26 others." (p. 254).
"The Jewish Century" by Yuri Slezkine
"In the U.S.S.R. anti-semitism is punishable with the utmost severity of the law as a phenomenon deeply hostile to the Soviet system. Under U.S.S.R. law active anti-semites are liable to the death penalty."
https://www.marxists.org/reference/archive/stalin/works/1931/01/12.htm
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, other major nationalities whose share of party membership exceeded their proportion of the population were the Belorussians, the Georgians, and the Jews (the percentage of Jews in the party was twice their percentage in the Soviet population as a whole). The proportion of Ukrainians and Armenians in the party equaled their share of the Soviet population. Armenians and Jews shared certain characteristics that help explain their relatively high proportion of party membership. Members of these nationalities tended to be more urbanized, educated, and geographically mobile than the norm. These characteristics correlated strongly with party membership. The Georgians, although not as urbanized as the Armenians or the Jews, tended to be highly educated. Other reasons explained the relatively high percentage of party membership among the Belorussians and Ukrainians. These two East Slavic nationalities are culturally close to the Russians. In addition, the central party apparatus has sought to demonstrate that political opportunities for Belorussians and Ukrainians equal those for Russians.
http://www.country-data.com/cgi-bin/query/r-12602.html
On the other hand, Ukrainians, Jews, Central Asians (except Turkmen) and people from the Caucasus were less represented in the GULAG system than in the population of the country; as national groups, they suffered proportionately less in the 1937-1938 terror.
From Getty, J. Arch; Rittersporn, Gabor T. and Zemskov, Viktor N. October 1993. 'Victims of the Soviet Penal System in the Pre-war Years: A First Approach on the Basis of Archival Evidence.' American Historical Review.
http://www.cercec.fr/materiaux/doc_membres/Gabor%20RITTERSPORN/Victims%20of%20the%20Gulag.pdf
It was German practice as they entered Soviet territories to encourage the local populace to engage in pogroms against the Jews as a first stage in their genocidal policy. They had some success in those areas which had become part of the Soviet Union since 1939 but in the Soviet Union proper there was no evidence of spontaneous anti-Semitism.
A Jewish historian commentated that "In Byelorussia, a conspicuous difference is evidenced between the old Soviet part of the region and the area which had previously belonged to Poland and was under Soviet rule from September 1939 to June 1941. Nazi and anti-Jewish propaganda drew a weak response in the former Soviet Byelorussia: we encounter complaints in Nazi documents that, "it is extremely hard to incite the local populace to pogroms because of the backwardness of the Byelorussian peasants with regard to racial consciousness".
Another view of the cause of the racial attitudes in Byelorussia was given in a secret memorandum by a collaborator to the chief of the German army in August 1942. He wrote: There is no Jewish problem for the Byelorussian people. For them, this is purely a German matter. This derives from Soviet education which has negated racial difference . . . The Byelorussians sympathize with, and have compassion for the Jews, and regard the Germans as barbarians and the hangman of the Jew, whom they consider human beings equal to themselves . . ."
The Russians are Coming: The Politics of Anti-Sovietism by V.L. Allen
No, that is impossible. Everyone must love everyone in the Soviet Union … It is against the law to have national animosities.
There is no chauvinism. You can get ten years for it.
In the army, a soldier got seven years for calling a Jew ‘Zhid.’
All are alike. You cannot tell somebody that he is a Ukrainian and brag that you are a Russian or you would be arrested.
It is strictly forbidden by law to offend any member of any nationality, regardless of whether he is a Russian, Ukrainian, White Russian, or anything else.
If you cussed out a member of a minority group, there was serious trouble.
If you call a Jew a ‘zhid’, he can go to the police and you will get a prison sentence.
Terry Martin’s The Affirmative Action Empire
VoxNihili posted:the revolutionary councils that absolutely represent the will + consent of the local populace, as indicated by the completely likely 98% votes in favor of OH MY GOD HOW FUCKING STUPID ARE YOU
got any sources that contradict these figures, you dumb chauvinist pig? because I even posted American, bourgeois historians saying that there wasn't much anti-soviet opposition, and you just got your idiotic anticommunist assumptions from the toilet store
VoxNihili posted:Unsung Heroes: The Soviet Military and the Liberation of Southern Africa Author: Vladimir Shubin Deputy Director of the Institute for African Studies, Russian Academy of Sciences, and Professor of History and Politics at the Russian State University of Humanities. Before joining the academia he served in the Soviet Armed Forces from 1962 to 1969, and from the late 1960s was involved in political and practical support of the liberation movements in Southern Africa, DEFINITELY NOT SOMEONE WITH A CONFLICT OF INTEREST IN THIS PURELY ACADEMIC MATTER
Ah yes, objective objectivism. Objective objective objectivist objective presentation. Are you saying ANC leaders were created out of thin air? Do you have any actual contradictory evidence, you moron?
VoxNihili posted:do you know that colonial relations are concrete and economic?
are you saying the USSR's relationship with its satellite nations wasnt concrete and economic? because by any reasonable person's standards, it was. oh did a central authority extract resources without recompense rather than a corporation? must be clean then, nevermind.
do you know that there is a theory of imperialism?
yeah its basically the theory that only capital/ism can engage in imperialism lmao
can you apply any of these schemas or are you confident in your aggressive bourgeois ignorance?
im confident that you have drilled these schemas (lmao) so thoroughly into your mind that you are incapable of self-examination or self-criticism at this point
russia today is an immensely corrupt klepto-cartel
the USSR engaged in what was essentially a seamless continuation the Great Game by any other name under the pretense of admirable goals.
so you just have your dumb ass ideas that are not based in any concrete facts or material investigation? please, by all means, explain to me how imperialism and colonialism are just rhetorical flourishes that dont have any empirical substance, and just mean whatever you want them to mean. or, ya know, put up some actual data, primary or secondary historical sources, or really anything but anticommunist histrionics
VoxNihili posted:stegosaurus posted:VoxNihili posted:stegosaurus posted:look at the allegedly extractive deals between the rsfsr and other nations bro.
oh, your nation's natural resources are now part of the centrally planned economy that your people totally consented to (98% vote, i hear, lmao) and will be distributed in furtherance of the
empire'sparty's goals. your country has always been part ofRussiathe USSR and its contribution is appreciated. the harvest has failed in russia and unfortunately we must take a bit extra this year. i also apologize that your longstanding nomadic way of life, your religion, and your values must come to an end, but frankly, in doing this, we are somehow enhancing and furthering your culture. we are lifting you out of barbarism. this narrative is not at all consistent with imperialism, but is rather the pure embrace of revolutionary spirit.lol food was subsidized and available to everyone on a minimum wage along with rent, education and transport. another thing you dont know a god damn thing about. unless you're referring to the 30s in which case, point taken, that was a disaster, but it still wasn't an assault on anyone in particular, the entire country starved not just ukraine or siberia. urban russians weren't eating hogs while peasants ate weeds. no one studying the famine has ever made that allegation.
the party elite werent starving.
it's true the ussr provided its people and its subjects with food and housing when it had the capacity to do so, and the vast majority of people are ignorant of this. for this, it gets this special medal: Officially Better Than The United States
lol @ transit and education. transit was strictly limited. education was in large part propaganda and was at best more akin to training for the vast majority of people.
So, that Afghanistan thing, what was that all about again?
youre fucking stupid bro. do you have any sources whatsoever?
Income inequality in the Soviet Union was mild compared to capitalist countries. The difference between the highest income and the average wage was equivalent to the difference between the income of a physician in the United States and an average worker, about 8 to 10 times higher (Szymanski, 1984). The elite’s higher incomes afforded privileges no greater than being able to acquire a modest house and car (Kotz, 2000). By comparison, in 2010, Canada’s top-paid 100 CEOs received incomes 155 times higher than the average full-time wage. The average full-time wage was $43,000 (Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, 2011). An income 10 times larger would be $430,000—about what members of the capitalist elite make in a single week. A factor that mitigated the modest degree of Soviet income inequality was the access all Soviet citizens had to essential services at no, or virtually, no cost. Accordingly, the degree of material inequality was even smaller than the degree of income inequality (Szymanski, 1984).
https://gowans.wordpress.com/2012/12/21/do-publicly-owned-planned-economies-work/
VoxNihili posted:
While i appreciate you trying to debate the Rhizzone Party Line, it would be nice to see you back up your arguments, with something other than frothing disbelief at the notion that the USSR was actually Good.
Are you implying the Soviet Union didnt fight wholeheartedly against anti-semites
depends, do you want to talk about the official stance or the actual practices as reported by jewish refugees?
got any sources that contradict these figures, you dumb chauvinist pig?
lmao the USSR did not have free and fair elections you dense motherfucker, it was a revolutionary state that devolved into a "revolutionary" state under top-down unilateral control by the party
HUUUUUGE blocks about afghanistan
i know Afghanistan was and remains a feudal society, you dont need to quote more giant blocks of text about it. you cant just fucking invade every shitty, backwards country and impose your ideology on them, dimwit. thats not how marxism is supposed to work whatsoever lmfao
its pretty great that all your sources just happen to be by russians. how the USSR saved africa: by a russian. how the USSR tolerated jews just enough: by a russian lmfao
VoxNihili posted:i know Afghanistan was and remains a feudal society, you dont need to quote more giant blocks of text about it. you cant just fucking invade every shitty, backwards country and impose your ideology on them, dimwit.
lol, edward said would like to have a word with ur jive honkey ass
VoxNihili posted:imagine if i quoted a bunch of articles written by American authors and former members of the CIA about how the US invading Afghanistan was great for its people lmfao
most of my quotations were by American and british bourgeois sources you enormous fucking moron lol
VoxNihili posted:shitty, backwards
much like your posts
VoxNihili posted:i know Afghanistan was and remains a feudal society
-Vadim Noskov
-Crow
Bablu posted:i don't know a lot about apartheid but complaining about soviet support of the south african communist party and the anc seems monstrously stupid
point out where i did this, tia
VoxNihili posted:hmm, the former party members and spooks are now "academics" and agree: The USSR Could Do No Wrong.
yes, the former party members Of the USSR that are uh Africans and weren't party members of the USSR? or are you talking about russian academic sources that somehow have a stake in communist propaganda? because? uh the intrinsic communist nature of Russians or something? you're a huge idiot
VoxNihili posted:Are you implying the Soviet Union didnt fight wholeheartedly against anti-semites
depends, do you want to talk about the official stance or the actual practices as reported by jewish refugees?
you mean the ones quoted by Terry Martin (famous russian name & communist soviet official) that volunteered info about the official policy of prosecuting racism and antisemitism without even being prompted? even tho they were immigrating away from the ussr? or your enormous idiotic confusion between common soviet citizens who may have antisemitic opinions with the disciplined political line of the communists in combating it?
or would you like to explain to me how a party with such a strong stance against antisemitism and with such a strong over representation of Jewish people in it is secretly antisemitic because... well because you feel it in your heart
VoxNihili posted:got any sources that contradict these figures, you dumb chauvinist pig?
lmao the USSR did not have free and fair elections you dense motherfucker, it was a revolutionary state that devolved into a "revolutionary" state under top-down unilateral control by the party
hmmm seems like you have no idea what you're talking about
VoxNihili posted:HUUUUUGE blocks about afghanistan
i know Afghanistan was and remains a feudal society, you dont need to quote more giant blocks of text about it. you cant just fucking invade every shitty, backwards country and impose your ideology on them, dimwit. thats not how marxism is supposed to work whatsoever lmfao
hm that's interesting, maybe you should try reading rather than posting your historical fan fiction
VoxNihili posted:how the USSR tolerated jews just enough: by a russian lmfao
this is probably the funniest part. are you... referring to the Jewish guy I quoted or are you referring to the Georgian that issued an official statement as general secretary of the communist party that linked antisemitism with cannibalism and said that it would be met with punishment up to death? or do you not know what a Russian is?
this is probably the funniest part. are you... referring to the Jewish guy I quoted or are you referring to the Georgian that issued an official statement as general secretary of the communist party that linked antisemitism with cannibalism and said that it would be met with punishment up to death? or do you not know what a Russian is?
Yuri Slezkine is a Russian-born American historian, writer, and translator. Yes, he is jewish. He was also trained at the Moscow State University long after Stalin's death.
hmmm seems like you have no idea what you're talking about
great rebuttal lmao
it's funny how like... completely lost this guy is. it's like a time portal to a college dorm at university of Florida, 2002. Nelson Mandela is, like, a russian, maan *bong rip whilst nodding along to President bush's afghanistan invasion mix*
yeah clearly i support imperialist adventures lmao you silly little man
Yuri Slezkine (Russian: Юрий Львович Слёзкин; born February 7, 1956) is a Russian-born American historian, writer, and translator. He is a professor of Russian history and Director of the Institute of Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies at the University of California, Berkeley. He is best known as the author of the book The Jewish Century (2004). Slezkine holds a PhD from the University of Texas, Austin.
He originally trained as an interpreter in Moscow State University. His first trip outside the Soviet Union was in the late 1970s when he found work as a translator in Mozambique. He returned to Moscow to serve as a translator of Portuguese, and spent 1982 in Lisbon before emigrating to Austin, Texas the next year.
He is currently a W. Glenn Campbell and Rita Ricardo-Campbell National Fellow at Stanford University's Hoover Institution.
ah yes, university of Texas and the hoover institute. Hotbed of pro-Russian communist propaganda. good investigation of the Jewish guy from Russia who was apparently the target of antisemitism but uh somehow thru his wily jewish russian trickery planted a pro-russian fact whilst in deep cover which only now has been discovered as the forgery it is by brilliant historian Voxnihili, whom also post good
VoxNihili posted:the year is 1956. the nation is hungary, which has always been a part of Russia, tbqh. imperialist insurgents attack, but the USSR rightfully restores order and carries out the will of its people.
-Vadim Noskov
-Crow
VoxNihili posted:hmmm seems like you have no idea what you're talking about
great rebuttal lmao
my rebuttal will be complete books on the subject while you're having trouble reading thru names in short excerpts I am quoting, much less any actually substantive work
Edited by Crow ()
VoxNihili posted:it's funny how like... completely lost this guy is. it's like a time portal to a college dorm at university of Florida, 2002. Nelson Mandela is, like, a russian, maan *bong rip whilst nodding along to President bush's afghanistan invasion mix*
yeah clearly i support imperialist adventures lmao you silly little man
you support crude imperial bourgeois propaganda and are such a chauvinist you can't even figure out what a Russian or a Jewish person is, tomato, tomatoe
