By PEPE ESCOBAR
Future historians may good position Russian President Vladimir Putin’s landmark March 1 speech equally the ultimate game-changer inwards the 21st-century New Great Game inwards Eurasia. The ground is minutely detailed inwards Losing Military Supremacy: The Myopia of American Strategic Planning, a novel volume past times Russian military/naval analyst Andrei Martyanov. Martyanov is uniquely equipped for the task. Born inwards Baku inwards the early on 1960s, he was a naval officeholder inwards the USSR era upwardly to 1990. He moved to the US inwards the mid-1990s together with is at nowadays a lab managing director inwards an aerospace firm. He belongs to an extremely rarified group: top military/naval analysts specializing inwards US-Russia. From quoting Alexis de Tocqueville together with Leo Tolstoy’s War together with Peace to revisiting the ease of mightiness during the Soviet era together with beyond, Martyanov carefully tracks how the alone state on the planet “which tin dismiss militarily defeat the U.S.A. of America conventionally” has reacted to a province of affairs where whatever “meaningful dialogue betwixt Russian Federation together with America’s politicians is virtually impossible.”
What is ultimately revealed is non alone a illustration of disregarding basic Lord's Day Tzu – “if y'all know the enemy together with know yourself, y'all demand non fearfulness the termination of a hundred battles” – but most of all undiluted hubris, turbocharged, amidst a serial of illusionistic positive feedback loops, past times Desert Storm’s “turkey shoot” of Saddam Hussein’s heavily inflated, woefully trained army.
The United States’ industrial-military-intel-security complex profits from a compounded annual budget of roughly US$1 trillion. The alone justification for such whopping expenditure is to manufacture a lethal external threat: Russia. That’s the key ground the complex volition non allow US President Donald Trump fifty-fifty to attempt to normalize relations amongst Russia.
Yet at nowadays this is a whole novel ball game equally the US faces a formidable adversary that, equally Martyanov carefully details, deploys 5 crucial capabilities.
Command, control, communications, computers, intel, surveillance together with reconnaissance capabilities equal to or ameliorate than the US.
Electronic warfare capabilities equal to or ameliorate than the US.
New weapons systems equal to or ameliorate than the US.
Air defence systems that are to a greater extent than than a stand upwardly for for US airpower.
Long-range subsonic, supersonic together with hypersonic cruise missiles that threaten the US Empire of Bases together with fifty-fifty the entire US mainland.
So how did nosotros teach here?
Debunking American armed services mythology
Martyanov argues that Russia, all through the offset decade of the millennium, spent plenty fourth dimension “defining herself inwards price of enclosed technological cycles, localization together with manufacturing.”
In contrast, Germany, fifty-fifty amongst a large, developed economy, “cannot pattern together with create from scratch a state-of-the-art fighter jet,” spell Russian Federation can. Federal Republic of Federal Republic of Germany “doesn’t get got a infinite industry, together with Russian Federation does.”
As for those who transcend inwards the US for Russian “experts,” they never saw these techno-breakthroughs coming; they “simply get got no grasp of the enormous divergence betwixt the processes involved inwards a virtual monetized economic scheme together with those involved inwards manufacturing of the modern combat informational command organization or of the cutting-edge fighter jet.”
Martyanov produces plenty of snapshots. For instance, “Russia …without whatever unnecessary fanfare, launched a consummate upgrade of her naval nuclear deterrent amongst solid ground of the fine art ballistic missile submarines (SSBNs) of the Borey-class (Project 955 together with 955A)…. This is the programme which most Russian Federation ‘analysts’ were laughing at 10 years ago. They are non laughing whatever more.”
A fundamental tenet of the volume is to debunk American armed services mythology. That must include in-depth reappraisal of World War II together with a re-examination of how the Soviet Navy was closing the technological gap amongst the US Navy already past times the mid-1970s, fifty-fifty equally it remained “a dedicated bounding main denial strength designed strictly for deterrent.” The Soviet Navy, equally the Russian Navy today, “was built largely for a unmarried purpose: to forestall a NATO assault on the USSR from the sea.”
Moving to the post-USSR era, it’s inevitable that Russian Federation had to come upwardly up amongst a concerted strategy to counteract the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s relentlessly moving due east – a clear violation of the (verbal) understanding betwixt George Bush Senior together with Mikhail Gorbachev.
And that leads us to the holy of the holies concerning the favorite Beltway mantra, “Russian aggression.” Even equally Russian Federation “does get got the capability to bargain major impairment to NATO,” equally Martyanov reminds us, “why would Russian Federation assault or impairment European countries which are worth way to a greater extent than for Russian Federation complimentary together with prosperous than they would hold upwardly if damaged and, theoretically, subjugated?”
The caliber of Brzezinski’s nightmare
The book’s Chapter 7, titled “The Failure to Come to Grips amongst the Modern Geopolitical Realignment,” brings us dorsum to unopen to other game-changing moment: the 2015 Victory Parade inwards Moscow, amongst Putin together with Chinese President Xi Jinping sitting side past times side to each other, graphically exposing the worst Zbigniew “Grand Chessboard” Brzezinski nightmare of the “two most powerful Eurasian nations declaring total independence from the American vision of the world.”
And together with thus in that place was Russia’s drive inwards Syria; on Oct 7, 2015, vi 3M14 Kalibr cruise missiles were launched inwards intervals of 5 seconds from the Russian Navy’s small-scale missile ships inwards the Caspian Sea, aimed at Daesh targets inwards Syria. The USS Theodore Roosevelt together with its carrier battle grouping straight off understood the message – exiting the Farsi Gulf inwards a flash.
Since then, the message has been amplified: the Eastern Mediterranean, the Black Sea, or “the Russian Navy’s Pacific zones of responsibility” are becoming “completely closed zones for whatever adversary.”
The lesson from the Kalibr-in-the-Caspian saga, writes Martyanov, is that “for the offset fourth dimension it was openly demonstrated, together with the basis took note, that the American monopoly on symbols of mightiness was officially broken.”
As Martyanov shows how “in both Donbass together with peculiarly inwards Syria, Russian Federation called the American geopolitical together with armed services bluff,” there’s no inquiry this Syria-Ukraine interconnection – which I analyzed here – is the foundation rock of the electrical current “historically unprecedented anti-Russian hysteria inwards the US.”
So the ball – exactly similar the ane offered past times Putin to Trump inwards Helsinki – is inwards the United States’ court. What Martyanov describes equally “the deadly combination of contemporary American elites’ ignorance, hubris together with desperation,” though, cannot hold upwardly underestimated.
Already during his election campaign, Trump announced multiple times that he would competition the post-Cold War international (dis)order. Helsinki was a graphic demonstration that at nowadays Trump’s “drain the swamp” faces a massive immovable object, equally the swamp volition get got no prisoners to save its trillion-dollar power.
In contrast, Russian diplomacy, equally explicitly reaffirmed in ane lawsuit once again this calendar week past times Putin himself, is adamant that anything is permitted when it comes to avoiding Cold War 2.0.
But exactly inwards case, Russia’s new-generation weapons get got at nowadays been formally unveiled past times the Defense Ministry, together with unopen to of them are already operational.
‘Pearl Harbor meets Stalingrad’
It’s crystal clear that President Trump is applying Kissingerian divide-and-rule tactics, trying to cut Russian political/economic connectivity amongst the ii other Eurasian integration poles, Communist People's Republic of China together with Iran.
Still, the swamp cannot perchance contemplate The Big Picture – equally this must-watch conversation betwixt ii of the real few Americans who truly know Russian Federation in-depth attests. Professor Stephen Cohen together with Professor John Mearsheimer teach to the jugular: Nothing tin dismiss hold upwardly done when Russophobia is the constabulary of the land.
Over together with over again, nosotros must teach dorsum to Putin’s March 1 speech, which presented the US amongst what tin dismiss alone hold upwardly described, writes Martyanov, equally “a military-technological Pearl Harbor-meets-Stalingrad.”
Martyanov goes all the way to explicate how the latest Russian weapons systems introduce immense strategic – together with historical – ramifications. The missile gap betwixt the US together with Russian Federation is at nowadays “a technological abyss,” amongst ballistic missiles “capable of trajectories which homecoming whatever variety of anti-ballistic defence useless.” Star Wars together with its derivatives are at nowadays – to occupation a Trumpism – “obsolete.”
The Kinzhal, equally described past times Martyanov, is “a consummate game-changer geopolitically, strategically, operationally, tactically together with psychologically.” In a nutshell, “no modern or prospective air-defense organization deployed today past times NATO tin dismiss intercept fifty-fifty a unmarried missile amongst such characteristics.”
This means, amidst other things – together with stressing it is never plenty – that the whole Eastern Mediterranean tin dismiss hold upwardly closed off, non to advert the whole Farsi Gulf. And all this goes way beyond asymmetry; it’s nearly “the terminal arrival of a completely novel paradigm” inwards warfare together with armed services technology.
Martyanov’s must-read volume is the ultimate Weapon of Myth Destruction (WMD). And dissimilar the Saddam Hussein version, this ane truly exists. As Putin warned (at 7:10 inwards the video), “They did non take away heed to us then.” Are they listening now?
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