The
lanes of history are littered with men who have behaved as Putin
currently does over Crimea and the Ukraine. Nowadays there are many
who are likening him to Hitler or Stalin. If we go further back in
history the name of Napoleon springs to mind. Still further, during
the heyday of the Roman Empire, the image of Nero looms large.
But Putin is Putin, living today with his peculiar demons and not with those of others.
Putin steals, but he is not a common or garden thief. Putin steals in public. It is universally known that he stole the ring of Robert Kraft in the full glare of public view! And then, to add insult to injury, alleged a lapse of memory
But Putin is Putin, living today with his peculiar demons and not with those of others.
Putin steals, but he is not a common or garden thief. Putin steals in public. It is universally known that he stole the ring of Robert Kraft in the full glare of public view! And then, to add insult to injury, alleged a lapse of memory
“You know, I do
not remember either Mr. Kraft or the ring," Putin said, as
reported by AFP. What thief, in the history of thievery, consciously
committed a public act of thievery and afterwards claimed a lapse of
memory of even meeting the person from whom he stole? To allegedly
prevent a diplomatic scene, Robert Kraft then publicly stated that,
yes, he did give the ring to President Putin. But, the plot thickens.
Later Putin, rather nonchalantly, offered Mr. Kraft another ring in
recompense, also suddenly claiming that the stolen ring was
originally given to him by Mr. Kraft. Amazing how Putin emerges from
a total lapse of memory to total recall.
One
of the hallmarks in the field of espionage is training in the ability
of concealment. Indeed, the devious art of concealment can be said to
be somewhat central to the persona of a spy. I might add that this
art is also practised by politicians, amongst others. It is the pivot
upon which the world of diplomacy rotates. That Putin is a rather
poor practitioner of this art could be explained by the fact that
during his years in the KGB he only attained the somewhat lowly rank
of lieutenant colonel, подполковник.
Thus, when he first became President of Russia and, a few days
later, addressed a
meeting of 800 of the FSB (formerly the KGB) top brass at the
Dherzinsky Club, he smilingly and proudly pronounced, “The FSB
wanted to return to power. I am pleased to announce that we have
succeeded.!”
He made public what, in the world of espionage, should
have been concealed! No doubt many officers in the audience winced
inwardly at this pronouncement. Is this the devious KGB mind of Putin
that New York historian Nina Krushcheva, the grand-daughter of Nikita
Khrushchev, so admiringly speaks of? Thus there was only a ripple of
polite applause from the audience. And today? As reported in the
Russian press, during a session of the board of the FSB security
service in Moscow on April 7, 2014, Putin urged that,
“We
[the FSB] must clearly differentiate between legal opposition
activity, as is in every democratic country, and extremism, which is
built on hatred, inciting national and international discord, and
defying the law and the constitution [of Russia]”.
These
words ring hollow in international ears when currently applied to
Ukraine because his Russian groups of provocateurs that have
currently infiltrated Donetsk, Luhansk, and Kharkiv are actively
inciting national discord, hatred, and defying the law and the
constitution of Ukraine in an attempt to dismember Ukraine before the
impending presidential elections on May 25th
2014. More than anything else, what those words underline is that
Putin's real inner circle is nothing more nor less than a committee
of the FSB, the Russian doll concealed within the Russian doll
concealed within the Russian doll concealed within the Russian doll.
Unlike George Bush, who saw a sort of kindred soul when looking into
Putin's eyes; Colin Powell was correct when he remarked that when he
sees Putin he sees KGB. Yet it is the tiny concealed Russian doll
that Putin himself is unaware of that should give us real cause for
concern. Was it not Disraeli who candidly stated that, “ … the
world is governed by very different personages from what is imagined
by those who are not behind the scenes ...”. Putin should be under
no illusions. He is basking in the shadow of Kirill, Patriarch of
Moscow,
seeking from it the comforting solace that his 'New Russia'
illusion is real. But in whose shadow is Patriarch Kirill basking?
Meanwhile,
as the tense situation in East Ukraine continues to escalate, history
is blindingly repeating itself. On 16 April, 1922 the Treaty
of Rapallo was
signed at the Hotel Imperiale in the Italian town of Santa Margherita
Ligure between Germany and Russia under which each renounced all
territorial and financial claims against the other following the
Treaty of Brest-Litovsk and World War 1. The two governments also
agreed to normalise their diplomatic relations and to "co-operate
in a spirit of mutual goodwill in meeting the economic needs of both
countries". It is the ghost of this treaty that hovered over the
deal struck between Putin and the German banks and businessmen in
1992. This deal involved the export of $100m worth of raw materials
in exchange for food for the citizens of St Petersburg. The materials
were exported, but the food never arrived, as Marine Salye,
who was
put in charge of a city council investigation into the deal, and who
fastidiously kept the documents from that time, identified Putin's
fingerprints all over it. This deal opened the floodgates for German
businessmen to "co-operate in a spirit of mutual goodwill in
meeting the economic needs of both countries". And to-day,
twelve years later?
Angela Merkel, the scientist Chancellor of
Germany, is coldly and dispassionately upholding the ghost of the
Treaty of Rapallo, wringing her hands in anguish while Putin tramples
over the rights of the Ukrainian people. Is it any wonder that
Gerhard Schroeder, the Chancellor of Germany when that export deal
was struck in 1992, fondly embraced Putin at his recent 70th
birthday party bash?
But
what about the other members of the EU? Cyprus is like a cat on a hot
tin roof, not knowing what it will do if all that stolen Russian
money wings its way out of her banks. Italy's Silvio Berlusconi, on
the other hand, must be sighing with relief whilst carrying out the
community service he was sentenced to for his fraudulent tax scams.
The hot potato of Putin's imperial adventurism has fallen into the hands of Matteo Renzi, Italy's youngest ever Prime Minister. Italy, soon to become the rotating Head of the EU, has oodles of money invested in Russia, of which Putin is well aware. That is why Putin has said that he has “... high hopes that Italy will give a new impetus to the development of relations between Russia and the European Union”, as reported in Ria Novosti on the 17th April 2014. Have events in Ukraine, since then, put something of a damper on Italian-Russian relations?
The hot potato of Putin's imperial adventurism has fallen into the hands of Matteo Renzi, Italy's youngest ever Prime Minister. Italy, soon to become the rotating Head of the EU, has oodles of money invested in Russia, of which Putin is well aware. That is why Putin has said that he has “... high hopes that Italy will give a new impetus to the development of relations between Russia and the European Union”, as reported in Ria Novosti on the 17th April 2014. Have events in Ukraine, since then, put something of a damper on Italian-Russian relations?
Can the young Matteo Renzi face up to
the howling of Italian businessmen not to jeopardize their sucking at
the teats of the corrupt Russian cow?
Can the country that gave us
the Italian Mafia stand up against one of its most ardent emulators, Putin's Russian (FSB) Mafia clan?
If
the political leaders in Germany and Italy have their businessmen to
contend with, the British Prime minister, David Cameron, has to
contend with the trembling 'stiff upper lip' in the boardrooms of the
City of London. Unlike the gas and oil pipelines that connects
Germany and Russia like an umbilical cord,
an invisible 'money'
pipeline links Moscow and the City of London. So much so that Putin
can demand that all street signs in Knightsbridge be written in
Cyrillic script. Bear in mind that David Cameron comes from a
stockbroking family whilst his sidekick, Deputy Prime Minister Nick
Clegg, comes from a banking family. So they are, so to speak,
children of the City of London. The problem that thus confronts David
Cameron is somewhat different from that which confronts Angela Merkel
and Matteo Renzi. We are here talking about the precarious nature of
the flow of digits through the ether, digits which represent the
billions upon billions of dollars that have been blatantly stolen
from the Russian and Ukrainian people and that, until recently,
nestled safely in numerous financial institutions in the West.
But
completely staunching the flow of these digits will have a negative
rippling effects on those financial institutions of the City of
London who, like the Italians and the Germans, are sucking on the
teats of the corrupt Russian cow. But, unlike Germany and Italy in
particular, the City of London was not privy to that deal that Putin
struck with Germany, in particular, when he suckered the people of
St. Petersburg out of $100 million.
However, British companies such
as BP saw a most profitable opening as Russian oilfields began to
shed the shackles of the old Soviet system and beckon, rather
seductively, for them to join the new Russian-oil gold rush. And as
these companies ran into the embrace of the budding Russian oil
oligarchs and the vodka-soaked Yeltsin, then president of Russia,
little did they know that the then KGB was smarting in the
background, licking the wounds they were sustaining during this
cataclysmic change that Yeltsin was ushering in. For the City of
London the 'good times' beckoned. 'Greed is good', as Michael Douglas
in the movie 'Wall Street' so aptly pronounced.
Unfortunately,
down the road, the Russian cow reverted to type under Putin and
turned back into a growling Russian bear,
as BP and the City of
London have discovered to their dismay. And the current events in
Crimea and in the East of Ukraine has caught many in the financial
boardrooms of the City of London with their pants around their
ankles. So, just like Angela Merkel, they too are wringing their
hands in despair in the face of Putin's growling Russian bear. But,
unlike Angela Merkel, the City of London can simply pull up its
trousers by the braces of financial control that it exerts over the
value of those Russian digits rushing through the 'money pipeline' to
all those financial institutions that the City of London controls.
Ironically, it was the late Boris Berezovsky who exposed those 1999 killings in Moscow flats as having the fingerprints of Putin and the FSB all over it.
Thus
Putin has shown by his actions against the Russian people in 1999,
and now in Ukraine, that he can cock a snook at the West because the
West does not want to precipitate a fighting war with the current
Russian leader. So Putin surrounds Ukraine with a readied army and
blatantly foments and stokes dangerous unrest, especially in Eastern
Ukraine. After all, if he could cynically kill Russian men, women,
and children to bolster his image, why not dismember Ukraine to do
exactly the same, irrespective of the consequences? Is it not
Patriarch Kirill who has recently and publicly placed upon Putin's
shoulders the warm cloak of the saviour of Mother Russia?
 | |
| The question is," Who started this St. George Ribbon Campaign in 2010?" |
If
Patriarch Kirill could raise Putin's status to sainthood, as Pope
Francis recently did with John Paul II, he would do so gladly, and
with all the pomp and splendour at his command. And if, in the
process, the Russian people are once again reduced to serfdom, then
so be it. Was it not during the era of the Czars, when the vast
majority of Russians were serfs, that the Russian Orthodox Church was
at its zenith? Ironically, the utter failure of the Bolsheviks to
excise the power of the Russian Orthodox Church from the heart of the
Russian people has given Putin the perfect vehicle with which to
emulate St. George, with the active help and support of Patriarch
Kirill.
One can only wonder at what is currently being disseminated
amongst the people of Russia by the footsoldiers of the Russian
Orthodox Church. The deafening silence of the Russian pulpits about
the evil been done by Putin in Ukraine has, after all, its historical
counterpart in Germany under Hitler. There is, truly, nothing new
under the sun.
Let
us now take a slight detour to examine the possible origin of some of
the fears of Putin and the kleptocratic FSB clique, this den of
thieves, that he has surrounded himself with.
When,
in 2004, Yuschenko defeated Putin's candidate, Yanukovich, in the
Ukrainian Presidential elections one
could almost say that Putin was, somewhat, apopletic with rage.
But
his rage was a controlled rage; a rage that only he understood. Those
around him did, indeed, witness this rage, but could not quite fathom
its meaning. Yet now, in June of 2014, as is always the case with
hindsight, we have 20-20 vision.
There is a strange question mark
that hangs over the jailing of the braided Yulia Tymoshenko by
Yanukovich. Why is this so? Yushenko was poisoned, but this rather
backfired on Putin. In any event, Yushenko was weak, an
'intellectual' who became a banker and who tended to see events
through a bankers spectacles. Yulia, on the other hand, was a child
of the Soviet educational and, more importantly, cultural system. As
a Ukrainian from her mother's side, she has the blood of Scythian women flowing through her
veins.
Now Scythian women are really not to be messed with. As Hippocrates warned, “They [Sarmatian (or Scythian) women] have no
right breasts…for while they are yet babies their mothers make red-hot a
bronze instrument constructed for this very purpose and apply it to the
right breast and cauterize it, so that its growth is arrested, and all
its strength and bulk are diverted to the right shoulder and right arm.”
The whole
Pussy Riot thing of those Russian girls highlights the
difference between Ukrainian Scythian women as
opposed to Rossiya i.e Russian, women. Rus as opposed to Ros.
Personally I
think that Putin, the Russian wife-beater, rather admired Yulia. In
her he thought he saw a kindred spirit.
(to be continued ...)
(to be continued ...)
