The answer is right in front of our noses. The present clash between Russia and the US/Anglosphere is nothing more than a clash between great powers, empires if you will, about who ends up with what. It is The Great Game on a global scale.

It reminds me of two very big strong friends of mine I once observed elbowing each other out to get the last ice cream in the fridge, which then devolved into a good-natured, bellowing wrestling match on the living room floor.

In a like way, empires rub elbows and try to push each other out of the way. That is just what empires do. It’s all about spheres of influence, in a great zero-sum game, in which to lose, one merely has to sit back and let the other win.

A good book: The Great Game: The Struggle for Empire in Central Asia, by Peter Hopkirk. Things have not changed much. As in Central Asia in the 1800’s, time-tested games are played to influence individual countries/rulers on the great chessboard.

Just make sure that the rubes don’t see the obvious for what it is. They might opt for less empire building, posturing and subterfuge. Then we all go down the shoots!

Enter the Lame Steam Media and the vital role it plays to shunt attention to more rights for gay people, people that have pussies, and the “Rule of Law” when it comes to Crimea (but not when it comes to Israel), etcetera. Just pick an issue, shunt attention, create a narrative, and silently do what you need to do. But then, everybody who reads this site knows that.

So, as others have noted above, the worst fear of the U.S. is to have Europe united with Russia united with China (hell maybe Israel might even see which side is winning and eventually throw in with Russia), leaving the United States as a relatively unimportant island. And hell, the way the U.S. is is going, not very well unified as a nation at present, the chances of being some kind of prosperous non-interventionalist Switzerland seems to be receding.

Same game ad infinitum. It just sucks because we only have one planet.

I watched the above-linked video presentation from Artem Zagorodnov. I appreciate the inside view, unfiltered by the mainstream fake news outlets.

The video hit home. I live in the same region from where he gave his talk (the rain-soaked Alexander Archipilago of southeast Alaska), and had no idea such a thing as the Juneau World Affairs Council (JWAC) exhisted. Some other unfiltered presentations by JWAC popped up as well. So, as someone who just found out about the JWAC yesterday, I recommend it as a possible source for non-lame-stream media viewpoints of world affairs.

Your article and video hit home in other ways, too. As someone who was stationed in Germany at the very end of the cold war, I am amazed (although nothing really shocks me anymore) at the sudden animosity of leftists in the US towards Russia. I viewed the opening of the iron curtain as the fall of a system, and had no ill will. I think most of us felt the same way. What happened? Why the sudden ill-will from the left?

It truly seems that the left has been assimilated by the Borg. Now they are the aggressors and intolerant ones. Who do they think they will get to join their armies and do their dirty work? The chastised, demasculized, normal males? Sure, I’m way past military age now, but I would never volunteer to go overseas for the jokers in power now. Over my dead body. I’m sure a lot of young people out there feel the same way.

Thanks for the BS-countering freedom of this site, Mr Unz.

P.S. Like Artem, I also attended the University of Alaska Fairbanks, and even took a couple of Russian courses (largely forgotten, I hate to say) taught by a couple of very nice Russian women who came over soon after the thaw. Cheers to a fellow former student of UAF.

Also, as someone who learned German, I relate to the false-friend word (in English-to-German as well) Genial.

Peace, and Happy New Years All.