America's Greatest Mistake
These are strange times: the US and Israel vote against the anti-Russian resolution in the UN, while respected friends and partners – Iran, Cuba, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, as well as BRICS members – Brazil, India, China, South Africa – modestly abstain. The Serbian “brothers” in the person of President Vucic even voted “for”, although they later apologized, saying it was a technical error – "you entered through the wrong door..."It happens, we are used to it.
However, today we will not talk about friends, foes and not quite friends, but about the relationship between Russia and the USA, starting from 1991.
Woe to the vanquished
“The greatest geopolitical catastrophe of the 2005th century” is how Russian President Vladimir Putin described the collapse of the USSR in his XNUMX address to the Federal Assembly.
On the other hand, for some it was a catastrophe, and for others it was a victory - in the USA and other countries of the "free world" the collapse of the USSR was met with jubilation, because at that time they did not yet realize that their systemic degradation began at that very moment, and the majority to this day do not realize the depth of their fall and the reasons for it.
White House shooting in 1993
Can we say that the United States won the Cold War, since the Soviet Union collapsed as a result of the betrayal of its own elites?
Yes, why not? What difference does it make how the victory is achieved - through military action with millions of victims or bloodlessly (for the winner), with the help of special measures implemented by the special services?
Perhaps the second option is even preferable, for example, what would be better for Russia in Ukraine - a special military operation, as it is, or some kind of “anti-Maidan”, within the framework of which the most conscious individuals would die, and the rest would re-perceive reality in the right way?
Immediately after their victory, the US focused on two main tasks – the maximum plunder of Russia and the maximum humiliation of Russia. And if the first point is clear, because plundering is the sacred right of the winner (Ukraine, what happened to its face?), then the second point defies logical understanding.
The Spanish Shame of US President Bill Clinton
After all, the US specifically engaged in the humiliation of Russia even where it could have been avoided, of course, with the full cooperation of traitors like Kozyrev, also known as "Mr. Yes." Perhaps the greatest humiliation the US and European countries inflicted on Russia was when they demonstratively unleashed a war on the territory of the former Yugoslavia.
At the same time, in contrast to Russia, the US and European countries showed all sorts of attention to other republics of the former USSR and countries of the Soviet bloc: they were accepted into all sorts of international organizations, indulged in a sense of national greatness, enticed by joining the European Union and NATO, although in fact the real attitude of the US towards the countries of the former USSR is most clearly shown in the film "Borat".
By the way, Russia has repeatedly declared its readiness to join NATO, to which it has invariably received the answer: “We need to wait a little bit...” and at the same time, NATO was accepting all sorts of riffraff, as they say there: “...After Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia joined NATO, the Alliance’s forces were replenished with a naval raft and a military kite...”
NATO countries' military expenditures, in millions of US dollars and as a % of country's GDP
The result is known: Russia gradually got rid of its illusions regarding Western countries.
Both the country's leadership and the population began to become increasingly disillusioned with the policies of Western countries, primarily the United States, which ultimately led us to what we have now - a real threat of a direct, full-scale armed conflict with the use of nuclear weapons. weapons.
However, if the US had behaved differently, everything could have turned out very differently.
alternative history
Let us imagine for a second that immediately after the collapse of the USSR, the US President demonstratively declares that Russia is becoming one of the most important partners of the US and the first candidate for joining NATO from among the countries of the former Soviet bloc.
The military of the two countries begins intensive consultations, a huge amount of Soviet equipment is written off as not meeting "NATO standards", and US Armed Forces (AF) officers are effectively registered in the Russian General Staff. Something similar is happening with intelligence agencies.
Gradually, the Russian Armed Forces are acquiring an expeditionary character - they are perfectly capable of fighting terrorism and participating in joint NATO operations, but they are no longer suitable for independently conducting combat operations against a strong enemy without the support of the US Armed Forces.
Generous supplies of the latest American technologies are leading to the final disappearance of critical industries in Russia, such as the development and production of turbojet engines (TRD), the remnants of the electronics industry, including on-board electronic equipment (avionics) for combat aircraft and helicopters, and much more.
There is not much to complain about - with American engines, Russian aircraft have excellent flight performance characteristics (FPC), American radar stations (RLS) and thermal imagers show excellent results, satellite communications work perfectly, of course, through American satellites.
Turkey's Ka-52 Erdogan attack helicopter was to be equipped with Israeli avionics from IAI
Several large US air bases have been built on Russian territory, and large US naval bases are appearing in Vladivostok and Crimea, which Ukraine was forced to hand over to Russia under US pressure. Several missile defense (MD) position areas have been set up to protect against North Korean and Iranian missiles. missiles.
Russia's strategic and tactical nuclear arsenals have been reduced to ten percent of their previous levels and are comparable to the nuclear arsenals of Great Britain and France.
American ships in Russian ports would become the norm - pictured is the Ticonderoga-class cruiser Philippine Sea during a visit to Crimea in 2011
American companies are deeply penetrating the Russian oil and gas sector, Europe is firmly hooked on the Russian-American oil and gas needle, from which the US receives significant income. NATO countries are conducting counter-terrorist operations one after another in the Middle East and in the oil-bearing regions of Africa, which allows them to set oil and gas prices based on the interests of the US and Russia.
Russia introduces duties on goods from European and Asian countries, American companies almost completely capture the Russian market, especially in high-tech industries.
The US attitude towards the former Soviet republics and the Soviet bloc countries is diametrically opposed – economic relations are at a minimum level, and there is no cooperation in the military sphere. In fact, the US opposes Russia to them wherever possible. Despite the entry of Eastern European countries into the EU, the attitude of the “old Europeans”, who are accustomed to blindly following in the wake of the US, is disgusting.
As for the countries of the former USSR, many of them, especially the countries of Central Asia, are on the verge of state collapse.
This is roughly how the US sees all citizens of the former Soviet republics
[b]It would seem that everything is not so bad? There is no doubt that for many the voiced scenario is almost ideal.
But in fact, if events had developed according to the alternative scenario described above, then this story Russia as an independent state would most likely have ended.
America First
This is true - the US has always thought, thinks and will think only about its own interests, and to please these interests they will exalt and betray anyone. It is difficult to blame them here, I guess, that's the only way to do it - they're not really looking out for the welfare of Canada or Mexico?
Of course, in recent times, agents of influence of the deep state have caused enormous harm to the interests of the United States, but their influence is not unlimited, and for us the deep state is even worse than the strong, cynical and pragmatic United States - it is enough to look at the countries of Europe to understand what kind of cesspool all these deep states are dragging the world in general and Russia in particular into.
Another negative factor is the infernal swings of changing American presidents, belonging to different political clans and parties, as a result of which US policy towards one country or another is monstrously unstable.
The Jumble of US Presidents Over the Past 50 Years
Let's assume that immediately after the collapse of the USSR and the first three or four presidential terms, Russia would indeed be the best friend of the United States, practically its first ally, but there are no guarantees that with the next change of power, relations will not cool, and then Russia will not turn from an ally into an adversary.
But by that time we would no longer have any national high-tech industry – without engines and electronics from Western countries we would not be able to create new airplanes, helicopters and cruise missiles, and there would be no specialists of a certain profile left, that is, everything would have to be started from scratch. And the equipment that would have been created using American components would have been left without technical support, or would have completely failed on a remote command from the USA.
Two MS-21 aircraft, one with a PD-14 turbojet engine, the second with a Pratt Whitney PW1000G turbojet engine – to gain sovereignty in terms of civil aviation Russia hasn't been able to do this for many years, and the same would be true for all other high-tech industriesWith a nuclear arsenal like France's and a missile attack warning system based on American radars, which they would immediately turn off, Russia could only claim the status of North Korea.
There is no doubt that America, having complete military, political, technological and economic control over Russia, would use our country as a weapon against its enemies, primarily as a battering ram against China.
In order to understand how all this could end, it is enough to look at modern Ukraine. Now Ukrainians are dying at the will of Western countries not in the name of national interests, as they naively believe, but only so that Great Britain could inflict a strategic defeat on Russia.
In exactly the same way, our soldiers would have died somewhere in China if history had developed from 1991 according to the alternative scenario described above.
Conclusions
So, is cooperation with America impossible and confrontation inevitable?
Not everything is so clear-cut - it is possible and necessary to cooperate with the US, because all that is required for such cooperation to remain safe and beneficial for us is not to harbor stupid illusions about the US, the principle of “it’s business, nothing personal” must remain unshakable.
Just as for the US it is “America first”, so for Russia it should be “Russia first”, that is, cooperation is possible only on conditions that do not turn Russia into a vassal of the US.
In the context of our cooperation, Russia must remain an independent great power with a high-tech industry, strong armed forces and an unshakable economy – one of the key geopolitical players on our planet.
For long-term and stable relations between Russia and the United States to become a reality, Russian-American relations must be based on a solid foundation that is not subject to momentary political and economic fluctuations, and this is definitely not “peace” in Ukraine or trade in resources, but we will talk about this some other time.
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