GRU General: “After the elections, Russia will face famine and Maidan...” Budget: unpleasant surprises may await Russians after the elections What awaits us after the elections
MOSCOW, March 13 — PRIME, Anna Podlinova. Presidential elections are an important stage in the life of the country: changes in leadership, old tasks, new directions of thought and always reforms, transformations, as is commonly believed, aimed not only at strengthening the current government, but also at improving the lives of citizens and society. However, the word “reform” for Russians is rather something negative, almost cursed, which is often associated with cuts, or better said, with the optimization of social benefits for the sake of efficiency that is not entirely clear to the population and is not always tangible.
Nevertheless, transformations cannot be avoided, economists and political scientists believe, although they have different assessments of the upcoming changes and directions of economic policy in the new presidential cycle.
According to a survey conducted by the All-Russian Center for the Study of Public Opinion (VTsIOM), 69% of respondents are ready to vote for the current President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin. The next place goes to the candidate from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation Pavel Grudinin with a gap of 62 percentage points. (7%), followed by LDPR candidate Vladimir Zhirinovsky with 5%. Therefore, experts believe, it is most likely necessary to focus on the existing system and build on the established paradigm, which, by the way, often harms economic development due to ossification and bureaucracy.
During the eighteen-year term of the current leadership headed by Putin, a number of problems remain unresolved, in particular, the growing bureaucracy, the hardening vertical of power, economic inequality of both the population and entire regions, and the lack of qualified personnel. And the most important thing is attitude. The population's perception of the economy, in particular, business, capital, investment, as something negative and alien.
Therefore, experts believe, Russia and its citizens need not only structural changes, but also an explanation of their necessity, a transformation of perception. Otherwise, total dependence on the oil needle cannot be overcome, inequality cannot be overcome and a strong economy cannot be built.
New is well forgotten old
According to the head of the analytical department of the communication holding Minchenko Consulting, Kirill Petrov, after the presidential elections, the trends that were observed in 2016-2017 will continue on the economic agenda - dirigisme, maintaining a high share of the public sector, and a reduction in the share of free markets.
Program director of the Valdai Discussion Club Yaroslav Lisovolik, on the contrary, believes that a key event will occur in economic policy this year - a long-term strategy for economic development will be formulated. “The current year may become a turning point in terms of development horizons, that is, there will be a switch of speed in economic policy from relatively tactical and short-term policies towards longer-term and strategic policies. Many are expecting this, these expectations are based on the fact that a number of centers are preparing their vision of the strategy economic policy," he explains.
It is expected that this year a synthesis of the discussed strategies will be formulated from the Center for Strategic Research (CSR) under the leadership of the former head of the Ministry of Finance Alexei Kudrin and the Stolypin Club, headed by business ombudsman Boris Titov, on the basis of which long-term priorities and directions will be developed in the future economic policy.
According to Lisovolik, after developing a consolidated position, the priorities of the new economic policy will be human capital and high technology. “These are areas whose development requires longer planning horizons and strategy development,” he says, noting that macroeconomic stability was achieved last year, on the basis of which it is now possible to build an economy aimed at accelerated development. “This year, the key guidelines for this kind of strategy will probably be formulated,” he believes.
Director of the Economic Policy Program at the Carnegie Moscow Center, Andrei Movchan, is more skeptical about the further development of Russian economic policy. “It won’t change at all, why should anything change?” he says. Now there has been a local increase in the salaries of public sector employees before the elections. “After the elections, this will no longer be necessary; the increase is unlikely to happen again. After the elections, it will be possible to relax for six years,” he believes.
After the elections, a number of steps will be taken aimed at reducing social support from the state, Movchan believes. “Everything that is quite unpopular, but necessary, has been postponed until after the elections, and everything will be done. For example, raising tariffs, income taxes, the retirement age,” he lists, clarifying that in general, these steps cannot be called sudden, they have been planned for a long time. “Other than that, I think nothing will change,” he said.
The problem of the last 18 years
General Director of the Center for Political Information Alexey Mukhin, discussing the main problem in politics of the last 18 years, calls the lack of qualified personnel. “This is the most important, pressing problem. Large foreign investors say that, in general, we have no other problems,” he notes. “There are resources, there is infrastructure, even the legislation is good, but there are not enough personnel.”
According to Lisovolik, the president himself formulated the problem in his recent interviews - this is reducing the high level of inequality, further measures to reduce poverty. Work in this direction is formulated as one of the key priorities.
He recalls that the level of inequality in Russia, in terms of income distribution, as well as the inequality of regional well-being and poverty of the population, is quite high, but there are opportunities and reserves for further reduction.
According to Movchan, “these are all slogans, this has been said for 18 years, all previous statements are about this.” “For the first 8 years, while the price of oil was rising, these statements successfully coincided with reality; after the eighth year, reality changed, but the statements remained the same,” he points out. According to him, Russia has been growing slower than all resource countries except Venezuela over the past 20 years. “Since 2012, there has been no growth at all,” the expert believes.
In his opinion, due to the fact that the government has set itself as its main task its own irremovability, ensuring its own stability and the presence of a certain group of elites in power, the economic component suffers. “In order to solve this problem, we had to take serious actions, in particular, to limit the possibility of competition, to limit the access of private and foreign capital, to limit private initiative, and to expand the bureaucracy,” he argues.
In his opinion, the existing system is not conducive to reforms. “She is absolutely rigid, accepts only one method of action - increasing and expanding her powers,” he believes. In such conditions, it is impossible to openly interact with the outside world, even if you want to create something new without breaking the system, Movchan is sure.
Reforms and people's attitude
According to Mukhin, at the moment there is a need for economic reform in Russia, and society is ready for it. “Vladimir Putin to some extent announced economic reform, but since Russians traditionally have a very bad attitude towards the word “reform,” he spoke about radical changes that are being developed by entire teams of economists, including Alexei Kudrin, Andrei Belousov,” says Mukhin. Apparently, it is they who will have to put these initiatives into practice, he adds.
“The need for economic changes, for fine-tuning the economic system, exists permanently. Society relies on Putin with every fiber of its social needs. The contours of this reform will most likely be liberal,” he notes. According to Mukhin, to improve the state of the economy it is necessary to increase the level of labor productivity, as well as the professionalism of personnel.
At the same time, the political scientist explains, reform is not a reduction in spending, but a structural optimization for the economy, which has both costs and benefits. “I don’t think that Vladimir Putin will allow himself, after all the election promises he made, to lower the social status of a citizen of the Russian Federation. Most likely, it will be raised,” says Mukhin.
In turn, Movchan notes that the economy requires a complete change in the management system. “We need to completely change the management system, move away from the vertical, bureaucracy, transform the system into an institutional, competitive one. Further, there is no need for a special program, because private initiative, internal processes, foreign initiative will do their job. After all, the market in the country is large,” - he says.
At the same time, the economist notes, Russia does not need an influx of money, “we have a lot of it.” The Russian economy needs space for development - reduction of risks, costs, social change in attitude towards reform, development, entrepreneurship, business.
According to him, the Russian economy needs space for development - reducing risks, costs, changing attitudes towards reforms, entrepreneurship, and business. “In our country, everything that I have listed is considered socially cursed words. “Reform”, “change”, “development”, “entrepreneurship”, “capital”, “business” - these are all socially cursed words for Russia,” he believes He.
Until the situation changes, building a strong economy in Russia will continue to be difficult, the economist says. “The basic principle will be this: he came to the state, stole and ran away. There will never be real work if you don’t change your attitude,” he believes.
Future direction of the economy
According to Lisovolik, the problems voiced will most likely become directions for the authorities to work in the new presidential cycle, which will be taken into account when developing strategic guidelines for economic policy over the next few years. Within 3-5 years, the foundations can be laid for a serious improvement in the situation. “Examples from other countries show that often breakthroughs, serious improvements in the situation, do not have to last for decades,” he says.
At the same time, one should not expect significant breakthroughs in the short term; rather, this is a matter of medium and long term prospects. “We still have serious structural limitations: inequality, demographic problems,” he reminds, noting that it is impossible to finally solve all problems in 3-5 years, but it is possible to lay the foundations and vectors of economic policy. “Of course, if we talk about problems of inequality, then these are long-term, structural factors that require long-term work,” he explains.
According to Lisovolik, the Russian economy should now focus on reaching a level of economic growth above the world average. In the medium term, this is achievable if conditions for economic growth are improved, that is, investment growth, human capital development, and an improvement in the investment climate are observed. “If investments become a true driver of economic growth, we can expect not only quantitative, but also qualitative improvements in the growth parameters of the Russian economy,” he says.
According to Movchan, the prospects for growth of the Russian economy even at 1.3-1.5% can be considered very positive. The Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) predicts Russian GDP growth of 0.7% in the next 12 years, he recalls. “And in general, everything depends on the price of oil. If it falls, say, by 30%, then there will be no growth, and maybe there will be a reduction in real terms, because the economic dependence on oil has been total and remains so.” , he notes.
In his opinion, it is even greater than in the early 2000s. “Because then the price was low, it was simply difficult to completely depend on it. Now prices have risen. In fact, we are an oil company, everything else we do is as an additional product,” he believes. According to him, in all aspects of economic activity there is a clear pattern that directly follows the oil price curve.
In turn, Petrov believes that GDP growth does not reflect an improvement in the well-being of individual households. “Therefore, setting goals for the GDP indicator in 2018 is a little wrong. This macro indicator is actively criticized, since its formal growth does not always lead to an increase in the well-being of citizens and households. This is the opinion of a large number of economists,” he says.
To increase the efficiency of the Russian economy in the context of the policy of dirigisme, according to Petrov, the new presidential term in Russia will be marked by the digitalization of society. “Emphasis will be placed on the development of information technologies, including in government administration and medicine,” he believes.
Will Russia face a crisis after the presidential elections?
What awaits us after the presidential elections
On March 18, presidential elections will be held in Russia. Their result is predictable: Russia is not a country where elections as such carry an element of surprise. But what awaits us next? Let's try to model the near future based on what is happening now, what is already known about the plans of the leadership and what “leaks” are coming from the Kremlin sidelines.
What's happening
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It's no secret that the Russian economy needs reforms and an impetus for development like air. History knows examples of how countries that were in an economic crisis came out of it by liberalizing the tax system and creating a more comfortable environment for small and medium-sized businesses. For example, M. Thatcher's reforms included a sharp reduction in income tax, the privatization of large state-owned companies and a number of measures to develop free competition. At the same time, the oil and gas sector of the economy was subjected to strict taxation (up to 90% of profits), and incoming funds were invested in the development of production. On the contrary, it is hardly possible to find at least one example of successfully bringing the economy out of a protracted recession by nationalizing the banking system, putting pressure on business and tightening the tax system. But this is exactly what has been happening in Russia in recent years. According to the Analytical Credit Rating Agency (ACRA), the share of state participation in the Russian banking system as of January 1, 2018 was 70%.
This situation is fraught with a number of risks that have already become apparent and will only increase in the future:
- Attracting banks with a high share of government funds to finance ineffective and unprofitable projects;
- Deterioration in the quality of investment and savings products due to decreased competition;
- The need to use complex and ineffective schemes to circumvent sanctions;
- New corruption loopholes and levers of pressure on business.
An even more complex situation arose in the real sector of the economy. The “mortgage crisis” of 2008–2009 showed the complete ineffectiveness of the commodity model, when the relative depth of the fall in the Russian stock market turned out to be the greatest among the top twenty countries. Moreover, if, for example, in the USA the stock market fully recovered and moved to sustainable growth already in 2013, then in Russia the maximum levels of 2007 were reached only by 2018, and even then at a cost of twice the ruble.
The widely publicized import substitution program not only failed, the economy’s dependence on imported machinery and equipment reached critical levels. According to RANEPA experts, if in 2015 30% of industrial enterprises expressed their readiness to abandon the import of equipment, then in 2018 the share of such enterprises decreased to 7%. This means that in the coming years the very possibility of technological development in Russia (even at a minimal pace) is directly related to the ruble exchange rate. At the moment, there are 3 main factors that still allow us to avoid a hyperinflationary scenario:
- Relatively high oil prices;
- Steady demand for Russian government bonds from non-residents;
- Use of National Wealth Fund funds ($66.44 billion as of March 1, 2018) to finance budget expenditures.
These factors worked to their maximum in 2017 to maintain the illusion of stability of the Russian economy. But all good things come to an end someday. From 02/01/2018, the Reserve Fund officially ceased to exist and the remainder of its funds was merged into the National Welfare Fund. At the same time, according to ACRA, the level of under-reserving in the Russian banking system is 2.7 trillion rubles. And this is exactly the gap that the Central Bank of the Russian Federation is filling by issuing the ruble. This is a “time bomb” that can explode with further reduction of the key. Without going into forecasts regarding oil and gas prices, and these are the main sources of foreign currency inflow to Russia, we can confidently state that even at their current level, such giants as Gazprom and Rosneft are gradually losing markets and accumulating debts. Latest events:
- The decision of the Stockholm arbitration regarding Gazprom;
- Exxon Mobile's exit from its partnership with Rosneft;
- Refusal of Western banks to finance Turkish Stream;
- Failure of a deal to purchase a 14.16% stake in Rosneft by the Chinese corporation CEFC;
- Maintaining speculative credit to Rosneft BB+
Events demonstrate the fact that the Russian economy with its flagships is becoming toxic. Rosneft, whose debt exceeds 3.8 trillion rubles, is forced to constantly increase its stock exchange issues. These bonds become a kind of money surrogate, a means of collateral for obtaining loans in rubles and foreign currency. Questionable investments in Venezuela, Kurdistan and other troubled regions bring losses that are covered by the state. So far the ruble is holding. But it cannot stay afloat indefinitely if the foundations of financial stability are destroyed.
A separate topic is corruption and misuse of budget funds. In June 2017, the Chairman of the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation T. Golikova announced the following figures: for 2016, about 966 billion rubles. were spent for other purposes. The growth compared to 2015 was 87%. At the same time, the line between “misuse” and theft is very arbitrary. There are no data for 2017 yet, but taking into account the dynamics of recent years, the situation has hardly become better.
What are you planning to do?
Let's now see what measures management is going to take to correct the situation. According to RBC, citing sources in the Kremlin, the presidential administration is preparing new “May decrees” by analogy with 2012. By the way, the very fact of preparing such decrees hints at the conventionality of the event called elections. According to available information, it is planned to provide targeted support to the most needy categories of the population. For this purpose, various options for tax maneuvers and special transfers to regions experiencing the greatest difficulties are being explored. In general, this means an increasing concentration of the financial system in the hands of the federal center and the continuation of its work as a fire brigade. The tax maneuver option being discussed in the government involves reducing insurance premiums to 22%. Lost income will be covered by increasing VAT to 22%. Considered a system liberal, A. Kudrin believes that it is quite possible to gradually increase the average amount of pensions to 70% (currently approximately 35%) of the salary that the employee received immediately before retirement.
This will require taking a number of measures, including increasing the retirement age by 3 years. A. Kudrin does not specify how increasing the total length of service by several percent will allow the pension to be doubled. On the contrary, M. Delyagin, who is considered a conservative, believes that the line pursued by the current leadership will lead to economic collapse and proposes reducing VAT to 10%, and exempting small manufacturing businesses from taxes altogether.
“To collect taxes, you need to develop production,” says M. Delyagin. On March 1, V. Putin delivered a message to the Federal Assembly. Once again, the task has been formulated to reach economic development rates higher than the world’s, increase non-resource exports and create millions of jobs. And again, no specific approaches to solving these problems. There is an opinion that the military industry and related industries will receive priority development, and all this together will become the locomotive that will take the economy forward. But what is a powerful military industry? These are thousands of research institutes and design bureaus, huge factories equipped with the most modern equipment, well-established transport logistics, hundreds of thousands of highly qualified employees with excellent education and work experience, a management mechanism that completely excludes even a hint of corruption.
Is there any of this in Russia? In addition, even an advanced military industry does not guarantee economic growth: tanks do not plow the land, do not transport cargo, and do not create everyday goods. At one time, the much more powerful, but one-sided military-oriented economy of the USSR collapsed precisely for this reason. There is only one conclusion that can be drawn: the problems will get worse. However, this is clear to everyone. Another thing is interesting: how deep the collapse can be and what those who have them can do to at least somehow protect their assets. The master of “coming true” forecasts, S. Demura, gives fairly clear guidelines for 2018-19:
- A sharp drop in GDP (up to 30-40%);
- Short-term strengthening of the ruble to 55.5 per dollar with further weakening to 97-125 or more;
- The only reliable asset for the coming years is the dollar.
These are not horror stories, but just an extrapolation of those processes that are gaining momentum and to which, apparently, nothing will be opposed within the framework of the existing political system. I would like to know your opinion, forecasts, as well as ideas for preserving assets in the acute phase of a systemic crisis. Let's discuss.
Profit to everyone!
According to the Krasnoyarsk astrologer, the stars do not give Russians much hope.
“If we talk about a period of 6 years, then until 2020 everything will be as it is. Maybe a little worse in places. And from 2020 we will get out of the crisis. But given the fact that the whole map indicates that we are conservative and stable. A miracle won’t happen and we won’t take leaps and bounds,” said astrologer Evgenia Golovina.
The artist Vasily Slonov made a plaster sculpture of Vladimir Vladimirovich immediately after the elections. It will complement the series of mini-sculptures “Bright Thoughts” and will be called “Bright Thoughts of a Patriot.”
According to the artist, when completed, the bust will look something like Voltaire, or an image of Buddha. The president's head will be illuminated by three beams - in the colors of the tricolor.
Earlier, Slonov made another of his “elective” creations – the “cotton waiter”. This is a metaphor for the patience of the Russian people, humility and eternal waiting for something.
“This is the apotheosis of beauty this season. This is the most photogenic creature that has appeared on the surface of the earth. The Russian mentality cannot be described better than by cotton wool. I think that when 6 years have passed, we will all be shocked by the changes that have occurred.I measure life by myself, by my own ideas, by beauty. I have never been deceived and I believe that we live in the best of times, at the peak of the urgency of the moment,” artist Vasily Slonov shared with TVK News.
Economists, in turn, do not predict much growth or dramatic changes.
“We won’t see global growth. It will be a smooth, gradual, stagnant production, all in the same vein. In order for there to be explosive growth, there must be certain economic reforms that will spur production. If this does not happen, then all 6 years will simply pass in vain,” notes financial expert Dmitry Zotov.
But despite the stagnation of the economy, there will be changes, economists themselves say so.
According to experts, rates on mortgages and consumer loans will fall. Moreover, they will fall in such a way that people will flock en masse to low interest rates, as if they were a tasty morsel. Thus, the debt burden of the population will increase.
Economists also say that food prices will not hurt your wallet - they will remain approximately at the current level, because they are not low even now - they have soared by 100% in 3 years.
Real incomes of the population will increase slightly. But in general, everything will remain as it was.
Political scientists say that everything changes noticeably when power changes. We haven't had this for 18 years. We add the next 6 years to this figure.
“The problem of a successor certainly exists with the current president. We don’t know how he will solve it. But in 6 years, some option for extending his political powers will probably be looked for. We have no counter-elite, no real political opposition, no competition. Therefore, any changes that will occur will occur only in Putin’s circle,” says political scientist Sergei Komaritsyn.
In the meantime, even without experts it is clear that in 6 years Russians will have elections. And most likely, the same as this year.
May 29th, 2016 , 09:14 pm
Whether willingly or not, we expect a lot from the results of the US elections. Therefore, some citizens of the Russian Federation already sympathize with Hilary Clinton, who may become the first female president, but Donald Trump is no less popular.
However, all these “experiences” are from the category of what is included in the famous phrase of Hamlet from the play of the same name by W. Shakespeare about the actor moaning about the heroes of the Trojan War: “What is Hecuba to him?”
To put it simply, in the current environment, in the context of the US elections, we have to choose between bad and even worse. I'm not even talking about the fact that there is no real choice, because... it does not depend on us in any way.
What awaits us?
The election campaign in the United States, due to the benefits of non-system candidates, provides such scope for analytical imagination that it is difficult to find “options” that have not already been considered. But one consideration expressed by several experts at once - that there is a confrontation between the “nationalist” Donald Trump and the “globalist” Hillary Clinton - needs special attention. Because from this very controversial, to put it mildly, premise, if we take it as a basis, only an incorrect forecast can arise. And it’s easy to fall for this premise: you really want to see on the other side of the ocean at least one single chance that “everything will be o’key.”
Will not be! Because there is not a single bearer of that “good” that is good for us on that side of the ocean . The burden of problems overwhelming the United States - from the 17, and according to some unofficial data, 35 trillion national debt to the Russian-Chinese rapprochement, leaving the United States in the position of the doomed side of the geopolitical triangle, against which the other two are playing - is such that Washington has no time for jokes. He would have to get out on his own, at the expense of the rest of humanity, as usual. There can be no talk of any emergence of truly “untied” non-system candidates in such a situation; the non-systematic nature of both Trump and Sanders is very conditional; she is just a copy of the supposedly “non-systemic” zigzag of the shadow “puppeteers” of the USA. There is no talk about Hillary - she is not just a system candidate, but flesh of the system. And since the best impromptu is a prepared one, it is precisely as a prepared impromptu that all this should be perceived. And nothing else! Simply to deceive naive observers and lull the vigilance of potential victims, the system pretended to disappear and dissolve. And so it was as if the “populists”, these “nuggets”, were pushed to the top.
A dangerous misconception that can be costly!
Let's start with who in America can be considered a nationalist. There are a number of rather profound expert opinions, the authors of which, due to their connection with the intelligence community, can hardly be suspected of lack of information. Therefore, I do not name specific names and materials, as well as media outlets, although they are available; in the end, it's not that important. The important point is that nationalism in the United States is a much more marginal periphery than even in Russia. We turn our backs on our own nationalism, and rightly so, because it is very often in conflict with both the imperial principle of geopolitical organization and with civilizational messianism, without which there is no Russia. In the United States, the situation is even more complicated: unlike our country, where there is a territorial and cultural core, multinational, multi-confessional, but constituting the axis of identity, there is no such core there. The Federation, unlike us, is symmetrical and does not encourage creativity in state building. WASP standard? What ever-decreasing percentage of the population does it cover? And does it take into account that this is still a very big question, “English speaking” this percentage, at least initially, or “Deutsch Sprechende”? The question of which of these languages to write the Declaration of Independence was very seriously discussed even then, and the positions of the German ethnic elite groups led by the Rockefellers have been and remain unshakable to this day.
Therefore, “nationalists” in the United States are understood only as so-called “paleoconservatives”; the presence of their ideological leader - Patrick Buchanan - is in no way compensated by their adequate organization. "The Tea Party Movement?" It is not they who rule the roost, but the brothers David and Charles Koch, etc. “Nationalists” in the USA are a truly marginal, narrow, far-right wing of the Republican Party, which has neither big names nor the resources to claim power. At least 80, or even 90% of the Republican spectrum and all 100% of Democrats are globalists . The USA was created as, on the one hand, a prototype of the United States of the World, and on the other, as Schopenhauer’s “mountain of muscles”, a physical duplicate of the global elite Britain sitting on its shoulders . At some historical moment, this program produced a “system failure” that brought to life such epoch-making events as the Civil War of 1861-1865, the true background of which should not be found in the “freedom-loving” tendencies of the “democracy” of the American prairies, where up to At the end of the 19th century, everything was decided by “Colonel Colt.” And in the widely known controversy between one of the founding fathers, the third President Thomas Jefferson, and the first Secretary of the Treasury, Alexander Hamilton, the topic of which was the issue of the financial system. And it consisted in whether it should be national, independent, or supranational, oligarchic; that is, will the government print money, like Abraham Lincoln with his “greenbacks,” or will the Central Bank, independent of it, do this, lending money to the government at interest, which, like the proceeds from the sale of currency to the population, will go into the pockets of the oligarchs who control it. And the government itself is under their control . Ironically, the decisive argument in this controversy, which stretched throughout almost the entire 19th century, came not from the White House or Capitol Hill, but from Foggy Albion. And it belonged to Cecil John Rhodes, the ideologist of British imperial expansionism and the founder of the shadow structures of the highest, conceptual, “power circuit” that later spread from Britain to the USA; so in 1877 the demand was put forward to “return the United States to the British Empire.”
Judging by the fact that the Federal Reserve System (FRS) appeared in 1913, Hamilton's followers prevailed, invariably getting rid of all the presidents who interfered with their plans - from Lincoln and William McKinley to John Kennedy . This is how the USA was turned into the fiefdom of a global oligarchy , where everything national is decisively and unconditionally - whether someone likes it or not - is suppressed and subordinated to the interests of the global. The “oligarchization” of the country was also formalized dynastically: a direct descendant of Hamilton was John Pierpont Morgan, who, as a partner of the Rothschild clan, spent almost a year familiarizing himself with the experience of European central banks, and then took an active part in the creation of the Federal Reserve System, joining forces with the Rockefellers (today The personification of this union is one of the members of the “Big Ten” of so-called “total investors”, companies that own, without exaggeration, all Western assets - J.P. Morgan Chase bank).
A fact that does not seem to be fully understood by the heralds of the “successes” of American nationalism: The USA does not have its own currency . This, strictly speaking, is not a country, not a state, but a certain territory mandated by oligarchic capital . Take a green piece of paper and read: “Federal Reserve Note.” A play on words? But President Kennedy paid with his life, and his clan was cursed by the “powers of this world,” not for the resignation of Allen Dulles from the CIA after the failure of the special operation in the Bay of Pigs. And just for the release of red dollars marked “U.S. Note", which, unlike the green ones, were not gold, but silver plated (Decree No. 11 110 of June 4, 1963). And how long did he have to live from that day until November 22? And what was the first thing Lyndon Johnson did? Canceled that decree, removing the “red dollars” from circulation? And this despite the fact that Kennedy was the scion of a family that precisely belonged to the “strong” ones. Would Trump, who is not so related, still be alive if he were actually a “nationalist”?
So what does a hypothetical victory for each of the Big Three remaining in the game mean?
Sanders, with his slogan of “democratic socialism” and the aura of an exposer of the oligarchic machinations of the Federal Reserve, is the “party of perestroika” that came into circulation together with Gorbachev. He has practically no chance left, despite the unofficial support of Barack Obama. In words he supports Hillary Clinton, but in reality he puts a spoke in her wheels. Then he will remember Libya with his “repentance”. Then in the “primaries”, where they cheat much more sharply than ours, she will intervene, interrupting the chain of nomenklatura, by lot, victories of the ex-Secretary of State, after which she immediately begins to lose state after state, but the train has already left.
“Perestroika” in the United States, about which our own spotted “perestroika” gushed, was relevant right at the beginning of Obama’s presidency, with stable American leadership. After Russia and China “broken down” the corresponding project of global default, under which the 2005 Texas agreements on a single currency area of the USA, Canada and Mexico and the creation of a North American Union on this territory by 2010 had already been prudently introduced, the 2008 crisis -2009 had to be stopped. Filling it with the help of a series of “quantitative easing” programs, the unofficial part of which was then announced to the public by Senator Sanders, also postponed the second part of the plan - the formation by 2015 of a global British Empire with the pound sterling, the axis of which in the Texas agreements was proclaimed the North American alliance and the European Union . Since Hillary Clinton is an ardent supporter of the TISA (Trade-In Services Agreement) agreement that replaced them in 2012, she strongly supports both the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) already concluded within its framework and the upcoming Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP). And it was Hillary, at the APEC summit in Honolulu, back in 2011, who proclaimed the “return” of the United States to the Asia-Pacific region (APR), that is, her strategy is directed against China. And the crisis that is rapidly escalating after the signing of the TPP in the South China Sea is, without a doubt, directly related to it.
Hillary, who practically defeated Sanders, albeit using “administrative resources,” in a democratic casting - on the one hand, of course, “Mrs. status quo,” but on the other, it is very similar to “Mrs. Great War” in the Asia-Pacific region. This scenario is supported by the lifting of the American arms embargo on Vietnam and the change of power in the Philippines and Taiwan with the formation and strengthening of their alliance with France and the United States. And the most important thing, involving India in bloc politics with the goal of creating with its participation some kind of analogue of an “eastern NATO”
.
The recent Russia-ASEAN summit, including our rapprochement with Malaysia, the return of the military base in Cam Ranh to the negotiating table, and the resolute diplomatic support of the PRC regarding Taiwan should be considered in line with far-sighted counteraction to this logic. The aggravation of the situation in Syria, including American obstruction of the principles agreed with Moscow on the separation of “moderate” oppositionists and radicals from Jabhat al-Nusra, is a response to precisely these steps; It is no coincidence that Hillary Clinton has a reputation as the “commander in chief of ISIS” and a person who has certain leverage over Erdogan.
Now about Trump.
As Henry Kissinger wrote in his doctoral dissertation more than 60 years ago, it is a fallacy that radicals once in power will “civilize” and will not carry out their threats; they will do exactly what they announced on their way to power.
Here are just some of the “ideas” and initiatives released in “trial balloon” mode by Trump during the “primaries”:
I will come to an agreement with Putin, but “from a position of strength,” and if I don’t reach an agreement, then “I will leave the negotiating table”; and I will shoot down foreign (that is, Russian) planes approaching American ships;
Let Europe pay for its security within NATO; we don’t need parasites; does not want to pay, including repayment of debts, we will slow down NATO activities;
Trans-Pacific and Trans-Atlantic partnerships are not needed;
American debt? To whom you owe money, “we forgive everyone,” you won’t receive debts.
What does this mean in practical terms? In relation to Russia - a cold war, because it will not be possible to reach an agreement . By and large, there’s nothing to talk about:
There is no mutual trade, and it is not expected,
- “containment” of Russia, including “soft power”, has not been canceled, and no one is going to do so,
Disarmament issues are outdated. In view of a) the US withdrawal from the ABM Treaty, b) the expansion of NATO and our forced reciprocal renunciation of the flank restrictions of the CFE Treaty, c) the build-up by the Americans of these “flanks” in Poland and the Baltic states, d) the unacceptability, in view of this, of further reductions and even restrictions in the nuclear sphere .
Regarding Europe - “the cat abandoned the kittens...”. In essence, this is an encouragement to strengthen the right and far-right forces, because the “suspension” of NATO, on the one hand, will create a feeling of insecurity and increase belligerent rhetoric, and on the other, will require an increase in defense spending, which will require belt-tightening. But the main thing is that it will encourage and untie the hands of junior NATO members, relieving the “seniors” of the need to stand up for them.
As for debt and partnerships, this is an interconnected program of returning to the Texas Accords, but in a new guise, without continental Europe. Without it for now, what next?.. Did any of the experts notice how immediately after the signing of the Paris climate agreement was followed by an “umbrella” agreement between the USA, Mexico and Canada on a common absorption resource for the entire North American region, of course, at the expense of Canada. And in Ottawa no one even dared to make a word! And Mexico, according to information provided by our regular author Viktor Potapov, will soon be given the right to nominate its representative for the post of executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
Far-right Europe, without NATO, without partnership with the United States, while the Anglo-American alliance is not going anywhere, with a pack of anti-Russian regimes on the eastern borders with military support from the United States and absent obligations to partners in the (former?) European Union, - what's this? Isn’t this a copy of the balance of world forces as seen in the second half of the 1930s? Just don’t have any illusions about the “pro-Russian” nature of the European right; Le Pen, Hofer, PEGIDA with the “Alternative for Germany” are intermediate options, “pilot projects” like spineless Italian fascism, after which will come the real, “pan-European” one, with a German core. And it will not grow out of nowhere, but from existing European institutions, primarily from the Council of Europe. That is, its formation will again be controlled from Washington and London.
And the Anglo-Saxons?.. Having let the genie out of the bottle, they will begin to diligently pretend that they are driving him back, and will even negotiate with Russia on “collective security” and curbing the aggressor. At the same time, they blame us for criticizing NATO, in which “such a thing would be impossible.” Only two years ago the project of such an “aggressor” was presented urbi et orbi by the “near-crash” agency “Stratfor” in the form of an arc of the “Black Sea Theater of Military Operations (TVD)”, covering Russia from the north-west, west and south-west. The Axis is a Romanian-Turkish alliance extending north into Poland and the Baltic states, and east into Azerbaijan. With the growing aggressiveness of the current Ukrainian regime, this coalition, firstly, receives a “core” with the strategic depth necessary for a military alliance, and secondly, it enters into a natural confrontation with Russia not only on the arc itself, but also in Syria, where, as As already noted, the situation is escalating. And almost no one remembers the truce.
You need to understand three things.
First: What The electoral split between Trump and Hillary Clinton is a split not between the American electorate, but between Russia and China
. In order to push our elites into a false choice between the conflict in the Asia-Pacific region and in Eastern Europe and the Middle East. Need I say that this external setup is complemented by internal stakes on certain forces on the eve of the election cycle in Russia and the 19th Congress of the CPC in the PRC? It is clear that they are hoping to drive a wedge, prompting Moscow and Beijing to negotiate separately with Washington, so that it will not be for each of them, but for the other. Jesuit policy, but what did you want from the Anglo-Saxons, and even with a Jesuit in the Vatican?
Second. In fact we are not talking about a “choice” between conflicts, but about their connection, addition and linking with a single scenario of a big war, essentially a world war . The created nodes of conflict in specific theaters of war, like seven and a half decades ago, like a hundred years ago, will be undermined gradually and consistently, in accordance with the overall strategic plan . And there is no reason to doubt that Trump, and Clinton, and the played-out Sanders, who is about 8-9 years behind “his” time (if they knew the “buy-in”, they would replace Obama in 2008), - on This chessboard is just pieces. Each of them is simply working out their own scenario.
And third. I already had to write about the fact that competition between oligarchic clans - conspiracy myth; more precisely, that she is very conditional , representing a kind of division of functions and sounding of the effectiveness of a particular scenario, inventory and mobilization of a “package of resources” for its implementation . The decision is ultimately made collectively, during discussion on joint platforms, and the corresponding plan is implemented through joint efforts . “Leaders of the G7 countries link the duration of sanctions against Russia with the implementation of the Minsk agreements. ...Sanctions can be lifted when Moscow fulfills these obligations,” says the final declaration of the G7 summit that just ended in Japan. It means that tensions on the northern, Ukrainian, flank of the “Black Sea theater of operations” are ordered to increase . Actually, this became clear already during the trip to Kyiv of Deputy Secretary of State Victoria Nuland, who set conditions for the Ukrainian authorities that were impossible for them to fulfill. Radicalization of demands is a clear provocation of conflict; Moreover, Nuland, who with her biography personifies the American bipartisan consensus characteristic of “conceptual” centers of power, subsequently visited Moscow, which indicates the involvement of internal forces in Russia in the scenario. From June 9 to 12, the next annual Bilderberg conference will be held in Dresden, Germany, a city destroyed by Anglo-American aviation during the war. And Obama, on the sidelines of the G7 summit, visited Hiroshima, which had been subjected to nuclear bombing. Historical apologies are not included in the plans either. Maybe it's a coincidence, maybe not. And if not, then we are talking about the continuation of the “Great Game”. But in any case it will continue, and the coincidence only reflects the occult symbolism of what is happening.
So the election between Trump and Clinton is not even a study of the scenario of a big war, but of the order and stages of its implementation . And since the general script is being written, and most likely has already been written, not at all in the election headquarters of two simulacra parties, none of these characters, like Sanders certainly, have any, even relative, independence. “The wolf and the hare, tigers in a cage, - / They are all puppets / In dexterous and hard-worn hands,” Makarevich, who was once popular and then “broke” on his popularity, sang, which does not negate the deep meaning of these lines, visionarily written in halcyon Soviet era.
And Trump? If the sequence of steps does not coincide with this candidate, well, it will move. Where will he go? After all, it is known that when “the ball is over and the evening is over,” they will certainly “take the dolls off the long string, / And cover them with mothballs, / They will put them in the form of rags in chests.”
The main thing is not to fall for these manipulative techniques. Neither Moscow nor Beijing.
P.S. In conclusion, I invite the reader to interpret for himself the statement of Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu that in 2016, three new divisions will be formed and deployed in the Western and Southern military districts responsible for the Black Sea theater of operations.