HARPER: DR. STRANGELOVE RIDES AGAIN

US Defense Secretary Ashton Carter has revealed himself to be the 21st century's answer to the original Dr. Strangelove.  Last week, while touring US nuclear weapons facilities, Carter threatened that the US was prepared to use nuclear weapons to defend against the new emerging Russian threat in Europe.  Carter held a press conference at Minot, North Dakota, with a B-52 in the background, pressing for a $1 trillion budget to modernize and expand the US nuclear arsenal to "catch up" with Russia.  In the meantime, the US is already moving ahead with a modernization of the B61-12 theater nuclear weapon, for deployment in Europe, that will blur the line between conventional and nuclear warfare, by increasing the accuracy and range and decreasing the payload.  No longer will the US nuclear arsenal in Europe be strictly a deterrent.

 

At the same time, the Obama Administration has walked away from the Geneva negotiations with Russia, aimed at ending the nearly six years of war in Syria, through a joint US-Russian effort against the main jihadist forces--Al Qaeda (Nusra Front) and ISIS.  On October 5, the Principals Committee huddled at the White House to consider three options for Syria:  Create a no-fly zone over all or most of the country; create safe zones along the Turkish and Jordanian borders inside Syrian territory; bomb the entire Syrian Air Force out of existence in a 24 hour display of "shock and awe;" or arm the Syrian rebels--ie. jihadists--with manpads and other anti-aircraft weapons as part of a prolonged insurgency directed against the Assad government, which will increasingly be dominated by the very terrorist forces that the US and Russia were jointly targeting up until this week.

 

As Col. Lang has been writing for months, the Russian President has finally concluded that the US is not sincere in proposing joint operations against the jihadists of ISIS and Al Qaeda, and so he has thrown his military support behind an assault on Aleppo, to wipe out the terrorist pocket and effectively defeat the insurgency militarily.

 

The first three options taken up by the Principals at the White House mean direct war against Russia, a war that would, in light of Strangelove Carter's recent remarks, likely lead to a nuclear exchange--and not at the tactical level.  Option four means the US is aligned with the jihadists in a prolonged, ie. permanent war in the Near East--hardly a much better option.

Comments

[Ken Roberts]

Madness. I thought the Saker had a good article on the topic:

http://thesaker.is/russian-options-against-a-us-attack-on-syria/

[Nick Schandlbauer]

Fred Reed agrees:

http://fredoneverything.org/an-obsolescent-military-bombing-everything-gaining-nothing/

[ISL]

Very scary summary. I cant believe that the borg would risk nuclear war - its the ultimate lose lose choice, no matter what the children's brigade wargames.

Its also hard to imagine pushing the us in that direction before the election, so Manpads it is. Would the Russian's aggressively then arm the Houthis with manpads? One can imagine that leading to rising oil prices (which inadvertently would help Russia dramatically) - without manpads, the Houthis have been able to take Saudi territory.

[Tol Tapen]

IMO the US "leadership" no longer cares about the impression its statements produce in the USA and elsewhere - it says what it says just because it has to say something, anything.
No one is expecting to hear something like: "Crap! Our protection racket business model is being dismantled! They all gonna burn for this!"
Yet, there can be no guarantee that the mainland USA is spared once the larger war is ignited. "Breakfast at Twilight" story by Philip K. Dick (the same guy who wrote "Blade runner") is probably the first literary exploration into the consequences.

[paulj]

Phillip K. Dick also wrote "Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn't go away".

[Jack]

Harper

This is Obummer policy. Carter and Brennan and Clapper are following his diktats. And he is the more restrained one in comparison to the Borg Queen. At least he pulled back from his red line when al Qaeda scammed him with sarin. If the Borg Queen is elected next month we can see what escalation really means. They really do believe that Putin will cave if they act crazy enough. But if he does then the Borg Queen in her triumphalism will escalate further. Next, closer to Russia's borders and even internally. The Borg Queen's supporters in their visceral hatred for Trump will create an existential threat to the US. Of course they will never accept any responsibility which is part and parcel of their PCness and the nanny state.

[Degringolade]

Truthfully, I am wondering how much of this crap is just folks who realize that they might be out of a job soon. When folks look to lose power, they start running their mouth. I think that the actions of a pufferfish might well prove instructive.

Folks around the world are starting to call our bluff. It is illustrative to watch a person in a poker game when this occurs. Folks that I tend to like just toss their cards on the table and laugh.

I think that what we are seeing here is the behavior of folks that I don't usually like. When you call their bluff, they threaten and eventually leave the game in a pout (with the notable exception of SP4 Horner, whose ass I was privileged to kick).

[Lemur]

There's a Russian military buildup in Syria going on with the dispatch of three new missile corvettes, more Su-24s/34s, Su-25s on standby to deploy, an the new S-300 Gladiator system.

The moves come in conjunction with some rather curt diplomatic exchanges:

"After US hit SyrianArmy in DeirEzZor, we took measures to prevent such 'mistakes' from happening" - @mod_russia

"Russian Ministry of Defense promise "a surprise" by S-300 and S-400 in Syria for any unidentified object"

"If the Russians actually believed we would shoot down their planes, they wouldn't bomb the safe havens in Syria.- @LindseyGrahamSC"

"French FM to Lavrov: nothing can justify 'deluge of fire' on Aleppo"

"UN Syria envoy De Mistura presser: '900 Nusra (JFS) fighters are in Eastern Aleppo - are 900 people the main reason as to why 275k people are being attacked?'"

Meanwhile new districts are falling in Aleppo.

The Saker discusses escalation scenarios here:
http://thesaker.is/the-war-against-syria-both-sides-go-to-plan-b/

His central point is that a combination of Russian fighters, electronic warfare, targeting AWACs and anti-aircraft systems would inflict a very high cost on a US attempt to impose a no fly zone.

What I should really like to know from those who may be knowledgeable on the subject is the extent to which the Russian systems listed above pose a threat to front line US assets? I've some articles but when technical issues are combined with bias, the layman has no way of knowing.

At any rate, 2016 Syria is looking increasingly like 1914 Serbia...

[Anna]

It seems that the prudes from Mossad and/or NSA have downed Unz Review (http://www.unz.com), which is a great forum for intelligent free-thinkers. The Review's latest article was harsh on Israel; seems that it was too much for the influential Israel-firsters.
Unz Review is published by Ron Unz, an honorable Jewish man - a mathematician, businessman, researcher, and thinker in one person. Unz has become a target of poisonous attacks from ADL for his excellent research in American meritocracy: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/the-myth-of-american-meritocracy/ http://www.adl.org/anti-semitism/united-states/c/ron-unz-controversial-writer.html

[mistah charley, ph.d.]

The following is relevant to the Dr. Strangelove movie, not the geopolitical considerations operative in the theater of war today, but some may find it interesting. Briefly: as filmed, the movie had a more farcical ending - a food fight in the War Room.

"Ironically, Strangelove was being edited around November 22, 1963, the day President Kennedy was assassinated. In the scene as filmed, President Muffley is struck with a pie and Turgidson announced, "Our President has been struck down in his prime!" Because Kubrick considered the action too close to actual events, and too comical as staged (the actors appeared to be enjoying themselves a bit too obviously)[the scene was cut short]."

"Not with a bang, but a food fight"
http://beforenine.blogspot.com/2016/10/this-way-america.html

[Lemur]

Found the video the Russian quotes came from above, subtitled:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQ0cTxABUY8

[Lemur]

damn, hope it comes back online; it's a great site.

For the ADL, anti-semitism is any fact Jews don't like.

[ex-PFC Chuck]

Anna, Is it a DDOS attack? Or something more? I just clicked on my Unz bookmark and it looks like the former.

[LeaNder]

Fake alert, just delete the ")," and you'll be fine.

Ron Unz:
http://www.unz.com/author/ron-unz/

[ked]

Sen. Lindsey was particularly unhinged this AM on some morning talk show (CBS?).
He had no problem w/ risking combat (aka de facto war) w/ Russia over a Syrian NFZ.
"I'm not saying we wouldn't get our hair mussed."

[Keith Harbaugh]

The HTML address in Anna's original post is the problem.
The correct HTML is http://www.unz.com/, not http://www.unz.com),/

[turcopolier]

ked

Graham is a retired USAF reserve JAG officer. "Getting your hair mussed" for him is having a motion denied. pl

[jld]

No, it was NOT a fake alert, the whole UNZ site was down for many hours whatever way tried to access it, even 'wget' (for those who know what it is).

[jld]

Ibidem @LeaNder.

[Peter Reichard]

With the Deir-i-Zor attack it has finally dawned on the Russians that the US had never been negotiating in good faith and that all the cease fires were ruses to allow the rebels to rearm and reposition. I wonder what took them so long to come to this realization. The deployment of the S-400 and other reinforcements represent a line drawn in the sand against a no fly zone or any kinetic operations against the SAA, this is a sea change. Let us pray we do not call their bluff for they mean business. As I recall the nuclear apocalyptic novel "Alas, Babylon" began with an IR guided weapon launched by a US fighter pilot that accidentally locked on to the wrong target in Syria. Let us hope it is not prophetic.

[r whitman]

Does anyone take into consideration that US and Russian nuclear weapons have not been tested for over 30 years. A trillion dollars is a lot for something that may not work.

[Aka]

Belive it or not, in 2008 VP Cheney thought about a "surgical strike" against the Russians before Bush shot it down.

[jld]

I am not so sure that the Russians were so naive, rather that they needed a publicly acknowledged good reason for a stronger posture which was kindly provided by the Deir-i-Zor "mistake".
Unfortunately this may still not be a good enough reason for the world's sheeple.

[Fred]

r whitman,

The principles of physics haven't changed.

[Lurker]

something was "tested" on 911 in the WTC towers' basements