Dear Friends + Interlocutors,

The Soviet Union imploded in 1989. The Warsaw Pact shortly thereafter, when the communist satellites of the USSR imploded in turn. A chain reaction. All Well and good. That was that. 

Or was it? Ever wonder why NATO did not also disband soon after the Warsaw Pact did? It would be logical. It would confirm the new, enlightened status in non-communist Eurasia.

There is no legitimate justification for a military alliance between Europe and the U.S. when there is no actual enemy to fight. The Soviet Union was a definite threat to Europe, and had been since its inception during the Great War. Now it was gone.

The new arrangements included the reunification of Germany, all peacefully achieved in 1990. A wonderful and natural occurrence, although one which both London (Maggie Thatcher) and Paris (Francois Mitterrand) ardently opposed behind the scenes.

Not only did NATO not disband, but soon started expanding eastward toward Russia proper, incorporating former Russian satellites. Washington had promised Gorbachev not to do that, to help facilitate German unification. So much for Washington's promises. 

Now NATO is at the front porch of Russia and the Kremlin is naturally concerned. Vlad Putin put it succinctly at his recent annual press conference: “The United States is standing with missiles on our doorstep. How would the Americans react if missiles were placed at the border with Canada or Mexico?”

And further: “Sometimes it seems we are living in different worlds. They said they wouldn’t expand, but they are expanding.” The question is why? Why would NATO, under the determined neocon and neoliberal leadership of Washington, want to expand? 

Remember what George Kennan wrote prior to the implosion of the USSR: “Were the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial complex would have to remain, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.”

The upshot of all this is the present crisis, centered on Ukraine. I will let John Mearsheimer take it from here. He was the only expert who warned front the start against the folly of getting involved in the Ukraine imbroglio when Washington initiated regime change in that country in 2014.

Here is the YouTube video of Professor Mearsheimer’s 2015 lecture  at the University of Chicago. It is based in large part on his September 2014 bombshell essay in Foreign Affairs, entitled “Why the Ukraine Crisis Is the West’s Fault”.

Patrick

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