PUTIN'S RUSSIA

Charles Robertson, Global Chief Economist of Renaissance Capital in London, would appear to be something of a fan of Putin's Russia.

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/7ef67f4e-ab38-11e1-b675-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1x6be6UtX

He points out that under Putin:

1. There have been significant improvements in Russian life expectancy and a rise in the birth rate. 

2. Gross domestic product has risen 10-fold in just over a decade.

3. Russia is the only Bric country with accelerating growth, and at a rate exceeding Brazil’s over 2011-12. 

4. Russia has enviably low public and private debt ratios, a current account surplus and $500bn of foreign exchange reserves.

Russia by ODEROV

Charles Robertson refers to Putin's idea that the west's focus on humanitarian intervention in Syria is a veil for hard-headed energy realpolitik. 

Charles Robertson writes that "events in Libya did not disprove Mr Putin’s thesis."

Moscow by shirley_turner

1966 Bilderberg documents leaked

PUTIN HELPS NATO

Kenny's sideshow: Putin Fails the 9/11 Litmus Test

In March 2012, it was reported that Russia is planning to let NATO use one of its airfields as its Afghan hub.

Russia 'has expressed willingness' to allow NATO to use an airfield in Russia as a transit centre for moving troops and 'nonlethal' cargo into Afghanistan.

The USA is having problems with supply routes through Pakistan.

Reportedly, the USA is thinking about 'speeding up its withdrawal from Afghanistan'.

Russia opposes a fast exit of troops from Afghanistan.

This is reportedly because of worries about militant Moslems and drug trafficking.

Afghan heroin floods into Russia and has increased rates of HIV-AIDS.

Putin and friend

Currently, NATO relies on overland routes beginning at ports in Latvia or Georgia that require the cooperation of Russia and certain Central Asian nations.

The USA's Gen. William M. Fraser III says: "We now have a two-way approval to move equipment back out of Afghanistan through Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan. Also, Russia has approved this and Uzbekistan recently approved this."

The cargo moving through Russia gives Russian freight companies more than $1 billion a year in business.

Andrew C. Kuchins, a Russia expert at the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington, says Russia will use its position to reassert "a greater hegemonic role" in Eurasia.


Curently, Russia allows the United States to fly troops into Afghanistan through Russian airspace.

General Fraser says that withdrawal from Afghanistan will be impossible without reopening the Pakistani routes.

Russia is to check the NATO cargoes for drugs - official: Voice of Russia
NATO's Afghan cargoes going through Russia will be checked for drugs, Russia's deputy Foreign said following talks between Moscow and NATO on the issue.

Website for this image

According to Reuters, on 6 April 2012, "Syria faced pressure from all sides at the United Nations on Thursday as UN Arab League envoy Kofi Annan set a precise deadline for an end to the conflict with clear backing from Russia, China and the rest of the UN Security Council...

"Russia and China ... in a diplomatic setback for Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, have recently supported several statements urging Damascus to accept Annan’s plan..."

Syria pressured from all sides at UN to halt violence‎

~~

MOSSAD PLOT TO KILL PUTIN?

RUSSIA AND ISRAEL

Is Putin a puppet?

RUSSIA AND ISRAEL

Israeli veterans of the Red Army (http://www.forward.com/articles/103839/)

During the Cold War, Russia and Israel did exchange secrets.

Is Russia still in bed with Israel?

According to WikiLeaks: Russia gave Israel the codes for a defense system which Russia sold to Iran.

"WikiLeaks has released an e-mail exchange between employees of Stratfor, the US-based global intelligence company, which reveals Israel and Russia made a deal to swap access codes for defense and surveillance equipment.

"According to the leaked document, Israel gave Russia the 'data link codes' for unmanned aerial vehicles that the Jewish state sold to Georgia, and in return, Russia gave Israel the codes for Tor-M1 missile defense systems that Russia sold Iran."

Aangirfan considers that Wikileaks is used by the CIA to destabilise certain countries.

Recent Wikileaks leaks have attacked Syria's Assad.


On 29 February 2012 'Just Another Inside Job' gives the following comments:

http://just-another-inside-job.blogspot.com/2012/02/russia-gave-israel-codes-for-defense.html

"Anyone still trusting Russia must upgrade his/her brain...

"An email dated February 26, 2009, refers to clandestine Israeli-Russian collaboration.

"The source is described as a 'former Mexican cop, Latam military analyst, writes for Jane’s'; has a reliability rating of A and a credibility rating of 1, the highest possibleStratfor rankings...

Israel has a very large Russian-Jewish population.

"Israel and Turkey are alleged to be 'collaborating very closely' following a S-300 sale from Russia to Greece.

"The email also lists the following claim: “Turkey has been cracking the S-300 since the … sale and has been sharing intel on the S-300 with the Israelis to ensure that they retain an advantage over Iran should Iran get them from the Russians.”

Russia may see Israel as an ally against the Islamists?

What is Putin's latest position on Syria?

Putin says the West has fuelled the Syrian conflict.

On 2 March 2012, Vladimir Putin criticized the West for backing the Syrian opposition, saying it has fuelled the conflict.

Putin said that both the Syrian government and opposition forces must pull out of the cities to end the bloodshed.

Putin defended Russia-China veto of a UN resolution condemning Assad's crackdown on protests, saying that Moscow wants to prevent the replay of what happened in Libya


In 2001, Israel-Russia Relations were described by Shlomo Avineri of the Carnegie Endowment Report.

Israel-Russia Relations - Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

According to Avineri:

From 1947-51, Russia supported Israel.

Russia supported the Arab side in the wars against Israel in 1956, 1967, and 1973, as well as during the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982.

The crackdown on Jewish dissidents and refuseniks added to the tension between Israel and Russia.

All this deepened US strategic support for Israel.

Palestine

Gorbachev improved the Russian relationship with Israel.

Almost one million Russian Jews emigrated to Israel in the last ten years.

"The disappearance of the Soviet strategic umbrella deprived Arab leaders of their military and diplomatic insurance policy."

This moved the PLO toward the Oslo Accords and led Syria to agree to serious negotiations with Israel.

Russia acquiesced in the Gulf War.

Israel benefited from its Russian immigrants in terms of technology, the economy and the size of its population.

Russian policy in the period 1991-2001 has been consistently supportive of stabilization and of US peace efforts.

Russia realizes the limits of its power and the narrowness of it's policy options.

Russia is aware of the Arabs' relative weakness and Israel's relative strength.

"The staff of the Russian embassy in Tel Aviv abounds with fluent Hebrew speakers, and they are able to counter-balance the kind of information that flows to Moscow from Arab capitals."

Russian Jews in the USA

Russia worries about its Islamist neighbours.

Hence Russia seeks friendship with Israel, which has political and technological access to the West.

The Arab regimes are seen as ailing and unreliable.

There has been joint Israeli-Russian defense and industrial cooperation.



The war in Chechnya, and Russia's apparent lack of sympathy for Muslims in Bosnia and Kosovo, have diminished Russia's standing in the Muslim world.

There is a belief that Russia and Israel are allies in the struggle against Islamic fundamentalism.

Russians view the one million Russian-speakers in Israel as a major foreign policy asset.

The "Russian" vote is the major bloc of swing voters in Israeli elections.

Nearly one third of the Israeli population are Russian Jews.

~~

Israel Helped Russia Hack Georgian Drones – Wikileaks‎ RIA Novosti

Russia's chief rabbi: Most Jews will vote for Putin.‎ Haaretz

MOSSAD PLOT TO KILL PUTIN?

On 27 February 2012, we learn of the Putin Assassination Plot.

Ukrainian and Russian security services have gathered information about a plot to assassinate Putin, who is due to be elected president on 4 March 2012.

The assassins were detained in the Ukrainian port city of Odessa in early January 2012, after they survived an explosion in a rented apartment.

The gang have confessed they were planning to assassinate Putin in Moscow, soon after the March 4 presidential elections.



One of the assassins, Ilya Pyanzin, said that the Chechen militant leader Doku Umarov hired him to kill Putin.

The Chechen militants are said to be linked to the CIA, Mossad and NATO.

Pyanzin came from the United Arab Emirates via Turkey to Ukraine.

The United Arab Emirates and Turkey are said to have close links to Mossad and the CIA.

The alternative to Putin is the Communist Party, which has in the past had firm links to Israel.

Peter Hitchens

According to the Daily Mail's Peter Hitchens:

"Putin stands – as no other major leader does in the world today – for the rights of nations to decide their own business inside their own borders.

"He has underlined that by refusing to join in the rash American-backed effort to destabilise the Assad regime in Syria.

"He has dared to wield a real veto (unlike David Cameron’s disposable cardboard one) and face the consequences.

"He has used his country’s huge oil and gas reserves to maintain an independent state.

"And he has rejected the current mania for privatisation and market forces as the cure for all ills.

"Russia, he believes, has had quite enough privatisation."

PETER HITCHENS: If not Putin, who? I can see the point of this man who stands up for Russia.

The alternative to Assad is the CIA's al Qaeda.

PUTIN AND RUSSIA

Pioneer.

Putin is more popular than Obama.

Pre-elections polls gave Putin's United Russia 50% or more of the vote.

In the December 2011 election, the real result was 49.3%.

"If anything, United Russia rigged the elections against itself!" (The Argument For Compulsory Voting In Russia)


Russian children by misha maslennikov

Anatoly Karlin has written (http://www.sublimeoblivion.com/2009/07/04/top-50-russophobe-myths/):

During Putin’s Presidency, poverty rates more than halved and wages nearly tripled, fueling an on-going consumption boom shared across all regions and social groups.

The birth rate has increased, the death rate has fallen and mortality from murder, suicide and alcohol poisoning has plummeted.

The Russian 'liberals' get low single-digit approval ratings from the Russian population.


Russian by dyorr

Unlike some superpowers, the Russia Federation has yet to invade another country unprovoked. Most of its neighbors view Russia favorably and a plurality of Ukrainians would be happy to join it.

When they had de facto independence, the Chechens created a criminalized, Wahhabi state, practiced ethnic cleansing against local Russians and launched armed raids against border regions.

Russia leads the world in literacy, level of tertiary attainment and the quality of its mathematicians and programmers. It possesses a world-class literary, musical and artistic heritage.

Russia has seen healthy manufacturing expansion.

CONTINUED HERE: http://www.sublimeoblivion.com/2009/07/04/top-50-russophobe-myths/

PUTIN PRETTY POPULAR

According to The Economist (The cracks appear):

"Putin still seems pretty popular, with approval ratings of around 40%.

"Nothing is likely to stop him winning the presidency in March."

There have been allegations of vote rigging in the recent parliamentary elections in Russia.

According to The Economist (Russia's election: Losing their grip):

"Opinion pollsters say that across the country this kind of rigging rarely changes the outcome by much more than 5%.

"The irony is that United Russia could probably have won 45% of the vote anyway."

The main opposition party in Russia is the Communist party.

The CIA may want them to return to power.


A former Indian ambassador, M K Bhadrakumar, at Asia Times, has recently written about Russia.

Bear nettles the eagle, dragon smiles /Bear nettles the eagle, dragon smiles

From this we learn:

1. Putin's United Russia has just won 238 seats in Russia's 450-member parliament.

2. Putin has alleged that 'hundreds of millions' of foreign money was used to influence Russia's elections.

3. China is supporting Putin.

China and Russia are supporting Assad in Syria.

"The Russian-Chinese coordination is at an all-time high level. Their 'joint' veto in the United Nations Security Council over the resolution regarding Syria has no parallel."

4. China and Russia are blocking the US moves to impose additional sanctions on Iran.

5. China and Russia both oppose US-NATO military bases in Afghanistan.