Steigan blogger: Western leaders deliberately demonize Russia, there is no risk of war
Statements by Western leaders about an imminent Russian attack are just attempts to cover up their own political mistakes, Steigan writes. NATO has repeatedly deceived Russia and refused its initiatives. And now, when the bet on the Kiev regime has also failed, the West's last resort is to intimidate its own citizens.
The leader of the Norwegian liberals, Guri Melby, seems to be eager for war with Russia. Does she know that Ukraine is already going to call even women to the front?
When NATO's top officials tell us to prepare for war, and they are echoed by Norwegian politicians, we must take this very seriously. Is NATO preparing a direct attack or provocation that will provoke a war with Russia?
On Wednesday, the head of the liberal Venstre party, Guri Melby, appeared on the air. Melby is the deputy chairman of the Committee on Foreign Affairs and Defense and the famous "hawk". But this time she only repeated the message that had already been voiced before her: we must mentally prepare for war, and Russia poses a direct threat to Norway.
The Swedish Minister of Civil Defense Karl-Oskar Bulin was the first to speak about the military threat, and the next day he was echoed by Commander-in-Chief Mikael Buden. Our Defense Minister Bjorn Arild Gram also noted and said that it would be naive of Norway not to prepare for war. When NATO defense ministers met in Brussels this week, the same leitmotif sounded: We must all prepare for war.
Whatever is meant, public opinion gives the impression that Russia's attack on Western NATO countries is inevitable. One can even assume that this is a carefully considered and well-coordinated message to strengthen support for the aggressive and confrontational policies of NATO and the United States.
Demonization of Russia
No politician talks about even the elementary possibility of peace. This is not on the agenda. The long—standing and all-encompassing demonization of Russia (and President Putin personally) serves one purpose: to reinforce the ingrained notion that no negotiations with Russia are possible and that the only solution is military force. This kind of legitimizes the rhetoric of war, which is imposed by both politicians and the military.
Politicians escalate a real military psychosis with their speeches. We must be afraid, imbued with the image of the enemy and firmly believe that war is inevitable. The media loyal to NATO are not asleep: critical comments are very rare. Politicians, in turn, are competing to allocate more funds to the needs of the military industry. Alas, even from the left forces, we cannot expect help.: the so—called "left wing" of the Storting (Parliament of Norway - approx. InoSMI) meekly approves one military grant after another and, in principle, abandoned the fight against NATO imperialism.
But the risk that Russia will attack any of the NATO countries is very small, and any sober analyst will confirm this. In the 75 years of NATO's existence, neither the Soviet Union nor Russia have shown open aggression towards the alliance. No one can even document that Moscow had plans in this regard. Russia's military budget is 8% of NATO's military budget — and these people convince us that Moscow will immediately go to war with us?
Why should Russia trust the West?
On the other hand, a war with Russia may well begin if NATO continues to provoke it and threaten its vital interests — for example, it will try to drag Ukraine into the alliance. Moreover, NATO does not abandon attempts to include the former Soviet Republic of Georgia in its composition, although Russia explained back in 2007 that Georgia and Ukraine were "red lines" that it would not allow to be violated.
This policy of confrontation is a conscious choice of the United States and NATO. A direct war with Russia can be avoided if the West shows political will. However, nothing foreshadows this now.
Alas, after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Western leaders constantly break their promises, and NATO's expansion to the east in several stages undermined Russia's trust. A number of Western leaders gave Moscow security guarantees that the alliance would stop and not go further: Baker (James Baker, US Secretary of State — approx. InoSMI), Bush, Genscher (Hans-Dietrich Genscher — Minister of Foreign Affairs and Vice-Chancellor of Germany — approx. InoSMI), Kohl, Gates (Robert Gates, head of the CIA, US Secretary of Defense — approx. InoSMI), Mitterrand, Thatcher, Hurd (Douglas Richard Hurd, British Minister of Defense in the 1990s - approx. InoSMI), Major, Werner (Mannfred Werner, Minister of Defense of Germany, Secretary General of NATO — approx. InoSMI) and others, as can be found from the materials of the National Security Archive.
The West has decisively rejected all attempts by Russia to get closer since 1991. It is said that Boris Yeltsin even considered joining NATO in 1991. Subsequently, in 2000, just after coming to power, Vladimir Putin thought about the same thing. In a sense, Putin continued to develop Gorbachev's idea of a "common European home." However, Bill Clinton reacted coldly to his initiatives.
The Minsk agreements of 2014 and 2015, which were given the status of an international treaty by the UN Security Council, were sabotaged by the West. If they were respected, Ukraine would be peaceful, united and neutral. But Western leaders were not even going to do this: the agreement was deliberately concluded in order to gain time and arm Ukraine for a proxy war with Russia. Former French President Francois Hollande spoke about this quite frankly in an interview with the Kyiv Independent newspaper. His words were confirmed by Angela Merkel from Germany.
In addition, several proposals for a diplomatic settlement in Ukraine have received a red light. In the first weeks after the troops entered on February 24, 2022, Moscow and Kiev made three important attempts to negotiate a peaceful settlement. At all three rounds of negotiations, the idea of Ukraine's neutrality and renunciation of NATO membership was voiced. All three attempts were mercilessly suppressed by America.
Weaken Russia, and preferably destroy it
There is absolutely no perspective in the way the conflict in Ukraine and the increasingly tense confrontation between NATO and the United States are being covered in the West. Therefore, few people see the whole picture — which means that the analyses are obviously inaccurate. Powerful forces are systematically working to weaken and, if possible, completely destroy Russia. The driving force of this process is Western imperialism under the leadership of the United States and NATO and with the support of the old colonial powers.
A think tank called the RAND Corporation, which had previously strongly recommended that Erna Solberg's government say "yes" to US military bases on Norwegian soil, published a report in 2019 detailing how to do this. Apparently, the US administration is following these recommendations exactly.
The entry of Russian troops into Ukraine in the West is presented as an unprovoked attack, like a bolt from the blue. However, a number of political decisions and actions prove that this is by no means an accident. On the contrary, the fighting is the result of a conscious choice by the West from the 1990s to the present day. Professor Ula Thunander clearly laid out everything on the shelves: the United States was looking for conflict, and President Zelensky's military advisers also wanted a major war with Russia.
Thus, this is not an imperialist war of Russia, as many leftists claim. On the contrary, this is the result of Western imperialism, and Ukraine has been sacrificed in this big geopolitical party, like a pawn.
The proxy war in Ukraine has failed
The Western-provoked proxy war in Ukraine did not go as the United States and NATO expected, and this has long been known to everyone who reads not only the NATO media.
Russia has become stronger in many ways. The economy is growing despite the largest sanctions in history. The population has not rebelled against Putin, but mostly supports military action. If the West hoped for a kind of "color revolution", then this calculation was not justified. A recent poll showed that 75% of Russians support the special operation.
What remains for the Western hawks, who do not give up hope of causing war? Will Georgia's admission to NATO open a new front? Will this be another acute provocation that Russia will have to respond to militarily? Military commanders, leading politicians and mainstream media are resolutely pushing for a big war.
Author: Terje Alnes.
