Since the beginning of the war in Ukraine, the logic of the West has rested on the theory that the Russians cannot sustain a long war. In the winter of 2022 the argument was summed up by Francis Fukuyama in this legendarily wrong post. In that post he claimed the Russian army was about to collapse at any minute and maybe take the Putin government down with it. He then followed up on that claim with a similar post, in which he claimed to have been right, amazingly enough.
It is tempting to dismiss Fukuyama as just another brazen hustler that circulates around the managerial class, but he is one of the more successful ones. His famous book, The End of History and the Last Man, was a massive best seller primarily because he pushed all the right buttons for the post-Cold War elites. It was massively successful flattery because the people being flattered believed it. They continue to believe it, which is why they maintain a bellicose foreign policy.
Put another way, these grifters passing themselves off as intellectuals tell us something about the system that hosts them, but also the people they flatter. Fukuyama gets to travel around the empire passing as a sage, because the people hosting him think he is right and that is because they want him to be right. Meanwhile, a guy who has been consistently right, John Mearsheimer, gets called mean names, mostly because he is right and the people calling him names hate him for it.
This blinkered view is how we got the war in Ukraine. This almost religious belief that the triumph of the West in the Cold War was the beginning of the final journey into the promised land, the end of history, has shaped imperial policy, both foreign and domestic, for decades. Fukuyama wrote his book in 1992 and others have been building on it ever since. In his 1997 book, The Grand Chessboard, Zbigniew Brzezinski argued for the breaking up of Russia to finish the Cold War.
In other words, the war in Ukraine is not something that happened for no reason at all, but rather it is the product of a messianic outlook in the West that has existed since at least the end of the Cold War. In fact, the war looks like it comes right from the Western playbook to undermine and topple the Putin government. This study by the RAND Corporation, the most important think tank in the empire, talks specifically about this type of project as a tool to destabilize Russia.
The point of all this is to properly frame the war as part of the overall belief system of the West, rather than just something that happened for no reason at all. Washington expected this war because they had been planning for it for decades. Even though they were wrong in most of their assumptions, there is no reason to think that belief structure has changed. History shows that believers do not abandon their beliefs when faced with disconfirmation. They just believe harder.
That is important to understand when thinking about what comes next. The micro-countries of NATO are now yapping about war with Russia. Hilariously, tiny Estonia is offering security guarantees to Ukraine. The Estonia military is about the size of the Las Vegas police department and probably just as lethal. Lithuania is now inviting in the Germans to build defensive structures for the assumed Russian attack. Perhaps the Germans will bring their broomsticks with them.
The reason these small players are making these noises is the same reason Fukuyama wrote a book, calling the people he wished to flatter, the deliverers of mankind from the clutches of irrationality. These micro-countries organize their foreign affairs around flattering the powerful. Without NATO, Kaja Kallas is as well-known as the mayor of Wichita, but in NATO she can stand on the big stage, just as long as she tells Washington what they wish to hear.
This is what makes the moment so dangerous. Kallas is a simpleton, but an obsequious simpleton, so she often speaks the truth about her masters. Washington has no plan for ending the war other than the total defeat of Russia, something that can only happen if they launch nuclear weapons. The current debate about letting Ukraine use NATO weapons to attack inside Russia is mostly about normalizing the idea of NATO attacking inside Russia, something the Russians will never tolerate.
Compounding all of this is the fact that Ukraine is slowly being ground down by the Russian war machine. All of Ukraine is now forced to ration electricity. Major cities have long blackouts due to the lack of energy. The Ukraine army is desperate for soldiers, but all of the men have gone into hiding to avoid being grabbed off the streets and sent directly to the front. These raw “recruits” are being trained at the front, which means thrown into a trench with a rifle and a few grenades.
The point is we will soon see something like what Leon Festinger, Henry Riecken, and Stanley Schachter described in their study of a UFO cult. Western political leaders have been assured for decades that the promised land lies just after the final disillusion of Russia, which will come any day now. Like the people waiting for the space aliens, they have been waiting for regime change in Russia. Instead, they may be facing angry mobs outside their own palaces as the project collapses.
We live in an age of wonders, but the greatest wonder to be revealed will be when the regime realizes that the future promised to them by the neocons and their fellow travelers was never going to be reality. When the Ukraine army starts to buckle and the politics in Kiev become violent, how will the West react? Will reality suddenly descend upon Washington, or will they do like the cult members in When Prophesy Fails and find some way to internalize it and keep the faith?
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In a sane and just world, this would be in the NYT editorial page today.
Great hot take, Z.
Wow, those two Fukuyama articles are hilariously wrong. It’s almost SOP for clown world that people who are wrong again and again pay no price, but are instead rewarded and continue to be treated as if their opinions are important.
Sometimes I seriously believe this is about hatred of Ukrainians. Nothing is ever done that remotely helps them or a better way of life. Now this atrocious cannon fodder war which we all know will not end well except for Russians.
of course I do know that rebuilding this country will be very lucrative except that will be Russia’s job. That and the inevitable reveal of western biolabs and foreign aid corruption and kickbacks. God, please give me this?
There is absolutely no doubt that hatred of Russia is driving this, as is the eager willingness to use Ukrainian goyim to fight them.
Recent pieces I read on CNN and WaPo indicate that perhaps elite consensus is coming apart. The CNN clip was about how useless the Abrams tanks are in Ukraine; the WaPo article bemoaned Russia’s superior electronic warfare capabilities, causing (Excalibur?) guided shells costing $100,000 a pop (your tax dollars at work!) to miss their targets. If the Ukrainian front line buckles by October it’s going to be very bleak for Biden.
What if the people in charge were all the descendants of a people with a 2,000 year war against humanity and are still pissed about the baptism at sword point in 1077 at Kiev? What if all this end of history hooha and exposition is just propaganda (side note, neat little book by Bernays) to manufacture consent? Or if not consent at least a ‘paper trail’ for CYA sakes?
Becoming the world leader seems to foster these delusional cults amongst the elites..In 1914, a handful of British elites, including Churchill, dragged England and its small and poorly equipped army into an all out war with Germany’s powerful army and superb Krupp artillery…And they promised that the boys would be home by Christmas, because England never loses..4 years later, 1.1 million men dead, and bankrupt, they got the worthless Versailles treaty…This pattern has doubtless repeated many times in history…
Imagine where Great Britain would be now if they just stayed out of WWI, or at least realized their mistake and stayed out of WWII. They handed over imperial superiority to the united States to get into a useless brother war.
One of the most interesting part of WWII was FDR’s realization that he could suck Great Britain dry and establish U.S. as a global power in its stead. Love or hate the guy, he played an incredible political game.
Well, somebody *did* win that war. The centuries old European elites were destroyed and new elites, as described by Coudenhove-Kalergi, ascended. It only took one more world war to finalize the transition.
Hopefully His Excellency Christian Schmidt is careful on the streets of Sarajevo.
When prophecy fails the falling notion
Don’t report this
Agents of Fortune
… or will they do like the cult members in When Prophesy Fails and find some way to internalize it and keep the faith? I’m far more worried they go the Hale-Bopp route and commit mass suicide by pushing the red button. They may well be convinced that their devotion to diversity, gay pride and trans-ing kids will cause Gaia to carry them up to Heaven after the missles get traded. I find it particularly frightening and indicative of where were headed that the Con., Inc. cucks have been pivoting back to Ukraine recently. The message may have gone out to put… Read more »
As expected, the college protest scene died out when the spring semester ended. Con Inc, lacking any long term vision whatsoever, is just as driven by the Current Thing as everyone else in Clown World.
There are still protests going on – I was reading about one in San Francisco yesterday. The local governments, though, got their orders and are sending in their goon squads to beat them up and cart them off to jail far quicker. Also, too, it seems that the media got their orders and were told not to report on them as much (because, as always, the media’s primary power is the power to ignore).
Yes. Psychopaths are like that.
Kaja Kallas — another insipid girlboss like the ones that bumbled Sweden and Finland into NATO membership.
If there’s anyone left to crawl out of the ruins, one hopes they rethink this women’s suffrage business.
Unfortunately, clown world’s myths will most likely outlive clown world. The ruins will be blamed on not enough dieversity, not enough girl power etc, and that can go on for a good while. If we lack strength, then it must be because we do not have enough dieversity, because dieversity IS our strength.
I think it may be a winning issue if it’s joined with the end of universal suffrage in general. Most of the schemes I’ve seen pitched would exclude me as well (not a veteran, kids are grown, etc.) which I don’t have an issue with as it would be nice for someone to have a say in the government rather than the current situation of no one.
Although I’m still firmly of the belief that the regime will never let Trump enter the White House, I’m coming to the realization that despite all the demographic-border issues, the single most important reason for a Trump victory is that it would throw sand in the gears of this inexorable march toward war with Russia.
We’re going to see U.S. troops officially in the trenches by Winter, and cries for blood when they start getting blown to bits with drones. Russia will not escalate and follow their successful grinding strategy. I have doubts the U.S. will go for full air superiority though, as the casualties would be catastrophic.
If there’s to be a major western boots on the ground presence in Ukraine, it would have to come mostly from Poland, with a leavening of other NATO participants. The capability (and manpower) for it to be otherwise just isn’t there. Since they just got their desired regime change in Poland, it could happen.
I listen to John Mearsheimer and Jeffrey Sachs on Glenn Greenwald’s show. They are on the show quite often, and I am sure a big reason for that is that nobody in the mainstream media has any interest in talking to them. They have both been correct about this war from the beginning. Now, while I think they are both intelligent men, it’s not because they are prophets. It is because this outcome was incredibly easy to predict for anyone who is outside of the imperial court (something both of them have acknowledged). After the Snake Island/Ghost of Kiev stuff,… Read more »
They both regularly talk to Andrew Napolitano and the Duran guys as well.
That really is the thing, isn’t it? I wrote from the start that there was no scenario for a Ukraine victory other than NATO nuking Russia. I was not working from secret knowledge, but stating the obvious. The reason the “nationalist” all hate me now is I said it was suicide for Ukraine to go to war on behalf of Washington. How they could not see that still perplexes me, but self-delusion is a popular drug for a reason.
If mankind is in the clutches of irrationality (lol), the US government (followed closely by Germany) stands front and center above all. And I would say it’s more like insanity rather than irrationality – you know, doing/saying the same things over and over and expecting a different or desired result. The forces of darkness run deep and wide in Washington DC.
Is Saudi Arabia giving up the petrodollar on June 9th?
I predicted that the Russian strategy is a return to a modernized Kabinetskreig, a couple years back, rather than Western bifurcated “strategy” that swings wildly from Fourth Generation Forever Wars of choice fought by volunteers who take no casualties to reviving Total War concepts that owe more to 1944 than 2024. The Western political and military elites cannot conceive of the kind of war the Russians are fighting on a geopolitical level, much less a strategic or operational level, and thus have no conception of how to respond to it. AINO has never fought a Kabinetskreig, and won’t learn now,… Read more »
Two questions for zman and others –
2) Sheinbaum is so obviously a puppet that they are pretending she’s AMLO’s puppet, instead of a tool of “international finance”. She is, however, just as powerless against the cartels as her predecessor, which could pave the way for eventual annexation.
That’s one way to deal with the immigration issue, at least. 😣
There is always Taiwan they can start focusing on. They are increasingly pushing for war with China over it. I am sure the US can easily handle two big wars without any negative consequences.
The UKR counteroffensive was probably the most outrageous thing I’ve seen from NATO planners. They literally made their base assumption that the Russians would run away like the Iraqi army in 1991.
I’m sure their internal projections for a war with China also assume similar levels of incompetence. Probably assuming that the Chinese ships are made out of wood.
Whatever insanity befalls us in the coming weeks, the average Joe at the bottom of the social pyramid can do nothing to impact these macro-events. Anxious worrying just induces useless despair, so focus on yourself and family. The spring is winding tighter faster now, so the explosion of anger is just waiting on a trigger. Most people will strike out locally at the most convenient object, but there is a better way. Those responsible for these calamities are still among us. Justice demands that they be the sole bearer of necessary consequences, or the disease will persist. The pathogens must… Read more »
Folks there is no problem. The below article on Zero Hedge shows how the US/NATO will arrange to send troops from everywhere to stop those dreadful Russians should the need arise. Look at all of the corridors they will use. Russia will be overwhelmed and NATO/US will probably drive Ivan all the way to the Pacific Ocean. It worked in Iraq right? Of course the article doesn’t explain that the Russians, unlike Iraq, have submarines, very good air defense and long range missiles that might make moving all of those troops problematic. But hey, let’s not spoil the elites fantasies.… Read more »