Ukraine - 15 February 2015

 "Shelling suddenly stopped at midnight in the eastern Ukrainian city of Donetsk after President Petro Poroshenko gave the order to government forces to halt firing in line with a ceasefire agreement reached last Thursday.

Poroshenko, wearing the uniform of the armed forces supreme commander, said in a televised address in the capital Kiev that there was still "alarm" over the situation around Debaltseve, a key transport hub, where government forces are hard pressed by encircling Russian-backed separatists.

And he warned that Ukraine, if it was slapped once, would not offer the other cheek.

But, seated alongside armed forces chief of staff Viktor Muzhenko, he added: "I very much hope that the last chance to begin the long and difficult peaceful process for a political settlement will not be wasted.""  Reuters 

http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/14/us-ukraine-crisis-idUSKBN0LH14T2015021

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 "Trust has been eroded to the point of almost being destroyed," said Nunn. "You got a war going on right in the middle of Europe. You got a breakdown of the conventional forces treaty, you got the INF (Intermediate­Range Nuclear Forces) treaty under great strain, you got tactical nuclear weapons all over Europe. It's a very dangerous situation." In late January, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists set its "Doomsday Clock" to three minutes to midnight. The last time it was set to that time was in 1983, "when US­Soviet relations were at their iciest point," as the group of scientists explained. The only other time when the situation was even worse was in 1953, when the clock was set to two minutes to midnight. Unchecked climate change and the "nuclear arms race resulting from modernization of huge arsenals" pose "extraordinary and undeniable threats to the continued existence of humanity," the group's statement read. The current rhetoric coming from the rivals in the East and West seems poorly suited to reducing the threat. "The Russian aggression is a direct threat to NATO," British Defense Secretary Michael Fallon said at the Munich Security Conference. The situation is made more complicated by the fact that Russia's actions in Ukraine are difficult to define. With camouflage, trickery and deception, the Russians are applying the full arsenal of so­called hybrid warfare,.."  Spiegel

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 Three minutes to midnight...  pl 

 http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/munich-conference-warns-of-greater-threat-of-nuclear-conflict-a-1018357-druck.html

Comments

[BabelFish]

If I could get our collective neocon/izziecon/R2Pcon, etc. folks to clearly see one image, I would tell to picture banging on a landmine with a hammer. The hammer is in their hand. If it goes off, it will take all of us with it.

[Fred]

"It is common knowledge that some of these weapons are also stationed in Germany. Up to 20 B61 aerial bombs..."

I might not have the terminology correct however isn't the USAF responsible for most of the nuclear weapons in our national arsenal? Haven't they had repeated failures in command and control in the last half dozen years? If we can't trust those who are responsible for safeguarding nuclear weapons this is very dangerous indeed; especially in light of the 1995 incident reported in the link. I'm surprised a repeat (or false flag event) hasn't occurred.

[Harper]

The Spiegel piece was backed up this week by Reagan's former Ambassador to the Soviet Union, Jack Matlock, who spoke at the National Press Club and warned about the folly of the Obama and NATO policy regarding Ukraine. He gave a detailed history of the terms under which the Cold War was ended, including the breakup of the Warsaw Pact, the German reunification under NATO, etc. There was a top-down "gentlemen's understanding" that was corroborated by the head of NATO at the time, that there would be no eastward expansion of NATO and that Ukraine, in particular, would be a neutral buffer state, independent of both Russia and the EU/NATO.

Now, the added danger is that Obama has a personal grudge against Putin, which dates to the early days of his presidency. He expressed this disdain by sending Michael McFaul, a specialist in color revolutions, as Ambassador to Russia, rather than a seasoned professional diplomat. Things have gotten worse over time.

When Angela Merkel came to DC last week, prior to the Normandy heads of state meeting in Minsk, which hopefully resolved at least a cease-fire in eastern Ukraine, she was blunt with Obama, on behalf of the German and French consensus: The danger is that there is no direct communication between the US and Russian heads of state and this could lead to disaster. Sam Nunn, Igor Ivanov and Des Browne all agree (see link in the Spiegel Online article to a Feb. 3, 2015 piece the three of them wrote on the eve of the Munich Security Conference) that the threat of a breakdown of communication leading to the unthinkable could occur.

Maybe Obama got the message from Merkel. He called Putin the next day and at least had a conversation. He did seem to make a blunt warning to Putin about Russia violating the pending cease-fire deal in Ukraine, so things are still very fragile. I recently have read a new biography of JFK, which pointed out that there was a secret and personal exchange of letters between Kennedy and Krushchev prior to the Cuban Missile Crisis, in which both shared their fears over the danger of a nuclear war obliterating humankind. No doubt, this frank and personal exchange was a factor in the resolution of the missile crisis, where both men stepped back from the brink, despite pressure from hardline advisors to push the envelope of confrontation.

Unless and until there is some restoration of actual adult communication between Obama and Putin, the hair-trigger will remain. USAF General Philip Breedlove, the NATO Supreme Commander, has called for the restoration of the Red Phone between NATO and Russian military commanders, obviously reflecting the felt sense of dangerous lack of communication channels, since the Ukraine crisis resulted in the shutting down of the NATO-Russia Council and the previous Red Phone connections.

[Aka]

All,
"The Russian aggression is a direct threat to NATO"

And NATO action has also been a direct threat to Russia (for a while now)

[Charles I]

Fighting did not and apparently will not stop at Debaltseve. Rebels claim encirclement, Kiev claims road still open.

"“Of course we can open fire (on Debaltseve). It is our territory,” senior rebel commander Eduard Basurin told Reuters. “The territory is internal: ours. And internal is internal. But along the line of confrontation there is no shooting.”

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/news/world/ukraine-rebels-disavow-ceasefire-at-encircled-town/article23006333/

[Aka]

Harper,
"Obama has a personal grudge against Putin",

Why exactly does Obama has a personal grudge against Putin? Putin on the other-hand has more than enough reasons to hate Obama by now.

"He expressed this disdain by sending Michael McFaul"

Did he really? I didn't thought Obama was much of a chess player. I thought he was a guy who thinks that everyone else is (if not should) worshiping his
s--t.

[Harper]

To Charles I: Please do not overlook the fact that the militias linked to the Right Sector and under the control of Ukrainian oligarchs more than the government in Kiev, have rejected the ceasefire altogether and promise to continue fighting. This is fragile and it is of utmost importance that Putin and Poroshenko work to hold back the crazies on BOTH sides. Otherwise, this latest effort will suffer the same fate as the Sept. 2014 Minsk agreement.

[David Habakkuk]

All,

On Ukraine, and also Russia, a blog entitled 'Irrussianality' which was started last year by a very fine British scholar, now teaching at Ottawa, is a valuable resource.

After a first degree at Oxford, Paul Robinson spent five years in British Army Intelligence, then did an MA at Toronto, and ended up back at Oxford writing a thesis on the 'Russian General Military Union', the organisation formed in exile by the White general P.N. Wrangel in exile.

One consequence is that Professor Robinson both has some grasp of military affairs, and also understands the way the revival of pre-Soviet dilemmas and ideas is critical to making sense of Putin and, in some ways even more, figures like Girkin/Strelkov.

Before Strelkov was forced out, clearly at Putin's instigation, his deputy chief of staff, Igor Borisovich Ivanov, was actually the current head of the 'Russian General Military Union'.

Two posts on 'Irrussianality' back in December are relevant to the kind of BS being talked by the current British Defence Secretary Michael Fallon.

In one, the third in a series entitled 'Crackpot theory', Robinson explained that the notion that there is something new called 'hybrid warfare' is profoundly ahistorical nonsense.

(See https://irrussianality.wordpress.com/2014/12/15/crackpot-theory-3-hybrid-warfare/ )

In the immediately preceding post, entitled 'Russia's search for stability', Robinson summarises a presentation on Russian objectives in Ukraine given to the Canadian International Council. The whole is very well worth watching, but the summary is a good substitute for those without the time to view the video.

(See https://irrussianality.wordpress.com/2014/12/14/russias-search-for-stability/ )

It is characteristic of the intellectual collapse of Western elites that, like Michael Fallon, when their predictions turn out hopelessly wrong, they commonly prefer to blame this on the mysterious inscrutability of the people with whom they have to deal.

Grasping the fact that the security of their own societies may depend their making a serious attempt to understand societies they find uncongenial seems, unfortunately, to be beyond many such people.

[Ursa Maior]

The world has gone mad.

[Babak Makkinejad]

You need to re-negotiate the strategic situation with the Russian Federation as well as with Iran and China.

Jockeying for marginal strategic gains, all the while trying to undermine other states will end in a catastrophe like that of 1914.

But I do not see anyone at the caliber of Roosevelt & Marshall - men whose legacy and contributions have been much eclipsed by the myth of Churchill.

[Bandolero]

All

Here is what happened today near Debaltsevo, in the view of the Russians:

Shortly after the ceasefire agreement went into force the Ukrainian forces launched a major attack on the village of Logvinovo (just north of Debaltsevo) which is being held by Novorossiya militias since Feb 9, 2015. The Novorossiya militias succeeded in fending off this Ukrainian attack, but this was the fiercest Ukrainian attack in the whole war and it doesn't look nice. Russian TV reported today live from the village of Logvinovo (You don't need to understand the text to understand the images):

http://youtu.be/ZxAAwHDFXO0

The main message: After this fierce Ukrainian attack the village of Logvinovo doesn't exist any more. The Ukrainian forces completely destroyed this village.

[Tyler]

The fact that thoroughly discredited "climate change" was given as a reason does nothing to change the fact that we are living in dangerous times.

[Tyler]

Aka,

Putin does not bow to the new Western secular orthodoxy of homos n' hedonism. Therefore wrong side of history yadda yadda.

[robt willmann]

Harper,

Here is the video of the talk by Jack Matlock at the National Press Club on 11 February 2015. The introduction was made by the true Patriot, Chas Freeman. The group sponsoring it is the Committee for the Republic. With a provocative name like that, an undercover FBI agent and one from the NY Police Department's nationwide spying group would be in attendance at each event. They might learn something. The title of former Ambassador Matlock's talk is "The Mistakes We Made With Russia and How to Stop Making Them." The event is about an hour and a half--

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VmP513n78YE

And the announcement--

http://www.press.org/events/mistakes-we-made-russia-and-how-stop-making-them-jack-matlock-us-ambassador-ussr

[ex-PFC Chuck]

Thanks for the Irussianality links. I haven't encountered it before. Judging from these two posts the author has his head on straight.

[Charles I]

"discrediting" anthropogenic climate change ain't gonna stop it.

[Margaret Steinfels]

RW: Many thanks for the link to Amb. Matlock's speech; sobering and much to the point. A bit too restrained about the current State Dept. missteps, mistakes in all of this.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Thanks, one wonder were all the sane Americans are gone...

[Tyler]

Charles,

Much like unicorn overpopulation, a thing has to actually exist before you can stop it.

When youve been massaging numbers for the past 30 years to make them say what you want them to say, its hard to take it seriously.

Honestly , I was told back in 1994 in school that Miami would be 20 feet under water and Id need a spacesuit to play outside. Well Miami is still hosting Columbianas in micro bikinis and I don't own a spacesuit.

Scientists have made a cult of global warming.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Not all scientists.

I think that Dr. Mueller's book, http://www.springer.com/earth+sciences+and+geography/geophysics/book/978-3-540-43779-6, contains the scientific truth about global warming.

Certainly if you were a graduate student in physics or atmospheric physics and related areas you might have tried to tie your fortunes to "Global Change" programs in order to salvage from your now useless education.

[Babak Makkinejad]

Look, just like a glass of water and salt, there is only so much CO2 that you can dissolve in the atmosphere.

Next, CO2 traps the heat, causes increased evaporation which increases the cloud coverage of the planet; which in turn shades the Earth from further warming.

I have no doubt that the Earth is warming but I do not believe that man has contributed significantly to it; the cause is astronomical is beyond human power to alter.

Please see my response to Tyler below.

[Charles I]

And humans have made a cult of technology, religions and violence.

I worship in cult whose celebrations rely on the facts that the earth rotates at a declination off axis as it revolves around the sun with manifest predictability and reliability allowing festive anticipation of illusory fulfillment of my cosmic destiny high in the branches of a tree at Solstice and Equinox. You can't much argue with those facts but you could make mincement of my cosmology I'm sure.

Nonetheless, see

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/vast-methane-plumes-seen-in-arctic-ocean-as-sea-ice-retreats-6276278.html

Arctic seafloor methane releases double previous estimates

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2013/11/131125172113.htm

http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/the-coming-mega-drought/

My favorite, most chilling and scientifically convincing apocalyptic scenario involving a green atmosphere after complete acidification of the oceans leaving two basic strata of anaerobic and aerobic micro-organisms filling the oceans with hydro-sulfuric farting sludge.

"At last there is motion on the sea, yet it is not life, but anti-life. Not far from the fetid shore, a large bubble of gas belches from the viscous, oil slick-like surface, and then several more of varying sizes bubble up and noisily pop. The gas emanating from the bubbles is not air, or even methane, the gas that bubbles up from the bottom of swamps – it is hydrogen sulphide, produced by green sulphur bacteria growing amid their purple cousins. There is one final surprise. We look upward, to the sky. High, vastly high overhead there are thin clouds, clouds existing at an altitude far in excess of the highest clouds found on our Earth. They exist in a place that changes the very colour of the sky itself: We are under a pale green sky, and it has the smell of death and poison. We have gone to the Nevada of 200 million years ago only to arrive under the transparent atmospheric glass of a greenhouse extinction event, and it is poison, heat, and mass extinction that are found in this greenhouse.’"

http://readthescience.com/2012/09/17/climate-change-book-review-under-a-green-sky/

I'd pray for crap your kids will be ingesting, don't have any myself, but my gods don't care a whit about any of that.

[Charles I]

How much hydrogen sulfide do you think can be dissolved int the atmosphere:

See my reply to Tyler above.

Cult or no, its real and its coming.

[Charles I]

Wow, I trust this was not reported on in the MSM?

[Charles I]

and yet Miami streets are now are now subject to tidal flooding, and Moon or no, its going to get worse,

"But the unavoidable truth is that sea levels are rising and Miami is on its way to becoming an American Atlantis. It may be another century before the city is completely underwater (though some more-pessimistic­ scientists predict it could be much sooner), but life in the vibrant metropolis of 5.5 million people will begin to dissolve much quicker, most likely within a few decades. The rising waters will destroy Miami slowly, by seeping into wiring, roads, building foundations and drinking-water supplies – and quickly, by increasing the destructive power of hurricanes. “Miami, as we know it today, is doomed,” says Harold Wanless, the chairman of the department of geological sciences at the University of Miami. “It’s not a question of if. It’s a question of when.”

… “If you live in South Florida and you’re not building a boat, you’re not facing reality.”

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2013/10/20/2806631/miami-herald-flooding-sea-level-rise/