“A significant share of responsibility for the faith of the average citizen in our quick and beautiful victory lies with me personally. I created an illusion at that time so that we would survive. Today I am destroying it so that we can survive.”
Alexey Arestovich, Ukrainian political adviser, (2023)
Time has run out for President Zelensky and Ukraine. The Ukrainian nationalist fought a war for glory, and lost. This country is now ruined, and rumours of collapse, and some last minute American regime change to manage appearances, are proliferating. The grand illusions of Ukraine have been dispelled by war and history. But will all those who stood with Ukraine, on a sunlit stage in 2022, now fall with Ukraine, as it staggers into a deep winter?
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World Crisis Glimpses
Great Power Rivalry - Has Australia Returned to Dialogue and Diplomacy?
The Australian Prime Minister visited China and met with Xi Jinping. It was the first meeting of these mismatched trade partners for seven years. Does this meeting suggest Australia might pursue an independent relationship with its superpower trading partner (China), and objectives that are not dictated by the grand strategy of its superpower security partner (USA)?
On Pearls and Irritations, Jocelyn Chey is optimistic that there may be a turn. She is a Visiting Professor at Australian universities who has held diplomatic posts in China and Hong Kong. She has edited a series of articles on Australia-China relationship, and writes:
We should be greatly encouraged by Prime Minister Albanese’s visit to China. Isolation is always a bad thing. Dialogue is essential for relationships to be sustained or nourished. This is the most important aspect of the visit, far outweighing in importance any specific outcome.
(Jocelyn Chey)
By contrast, in the same journal, Mark J. Valencia (an maritime policy analyst at the National Institute for South China Sea Studies, Haikou, China) doubts there are firm grounds for hope that the Albanese Government will reset our diplomacy.
But to date, Australia has been sleepwalking into kinetic conflict with China in the South China Sea. Is this what the Albanese government wants?
(Mark J. Valencia)
There was extensive discussion of the visit on the Global Times, with a general tone that supported Australia beginning to understand China and approach diplomacy more respectfully. The visit is one of several tests of US sincerity to improve relationsips. However, the photo of the meeting with Mr Albanese is not featured on the Chinese Foreign Policy home page, unlike President Xi’s meeting with leaders of Laos, Vietnam, Sri Lanka, Colombia, Brazil, and California. There appears to be no readout of the meeting yet on the website of the Chinese Foreign Ministry.
However, China has agreed to resume annual strategic discussions with Australia, and this is a small step to Australia and China becoming “trusting partners”, as reportedly Xi commented. China may well be applying to Australia Joe Biden’s gratuitous advice to Albanese on how to conduct diplomacy with China. “Trust but verify”, the US President sneered; without mentioning the fact that Xi so little trusts Biden that a meeting is difficult to arrange. America has failed the verification test for too many times.
Political Order - Is Israel-Gaza changing the tone of politics in the West?
The war in Israel-Gaza has triggered political conflicts within Western states. There are large protests on the street, passionate arguments behind closed doors, and friction in social media. These conflicts have not been welcomed or even anticipated by the political elites. I recall, when the events first occurred, Alex Christoforou from The Duran predicted Western leaders would use the war to get everyone to rally behind the West, as defeat in Ukraine loomed. There were moves to replicate the “Stand with Ukraine” movement. But the horror of the events since October 7 undermined any plan for unanimity.
A single view on the cluster of issues that Gaza exposed was an over-ambitious communications plan. With underlying, long-established differences of views on Palestine, Islam and diplomacy, there was always going to be debate, division and protest on this issue, unlike the Cancel Russia movement. But for five years Western political elites have grown accustomed to managing societies and virtual reality states in which there is but one view on the current thing. They forgot that to agree is convenient; but to disagree is democratic.
So in the weeks since October 7, elites attempted to repeat the playbook, used in COVID, Ukraine and other public emergencies, of preemptive consensus, exclusion of disagreement by labelling it misinformation, and mass repetition by controlled media of a single highly moralised narrative.
But it has backfired. Free speech advocates became shrill repressers of difference. Attempts to take the moral high ground have been undermined for apparent acceptance of unacceptable civilian harms. For example in Australia, a statement signed by six former Prime Ministers attempted to put one single view on this issue, and to slur disagreement as linked to antisemitism. The letter contained some admirable sentiments, but was soon made to look like wishful thinking by the course of events. The Prime Ministers wrote that: “Israel promises it will do all it can to avoid civilian casualties, we urge it to do so with all of its humanity and skill.” Several hospital, ambulance and refugee camp mbombings later, the Prime Ministers have not surfaced to retract. Rather, they have been exposed as willing dopes who bought another broken promise.
The Australian Prime Minister’s letter exposed how separated Western political elites have become from public concerns and international opinion in the Global South/Majority. In Britain and the USA, the precipitate embrace by political leaders of the USA-Israel position has caused problems, such as for Keir Starmer and Robert F. Kennedy. How this will progress I do not know, but it may ultimately be a good thing. Our political order has become a stifled stage for controlled messaging. It needs to loosen up, and to tolerate a little more civil, assertive debate.
Social Fragmentation - Is Work from Home here to stay?
The economic historian, and grand strategist of the Hoover Institution, Niall Ferguson pointed out an interesting research paper on how working from home is evolving in our societies.
The paper the "Evolution of Working from Home" identified some trends in Amercian data on work experiences since the 2020 lockdowns. Working from home levels dropped from the high in 2020 to the new normal of 2022, and then stabilized in 2023. Self-employed and gig workers are three times more likely to be fully remote than salary workers. There are predictable variations by industry (IT high, food service, low), and whether you live in city or country. By age, working from home levels peak for people in their 30s and early 40s reflecting child care preferences. If you are a university graduate with children under 14, you are most likely to work from home. People in their 20s have stronger resaons to go their workplaces (mentoring, socializing and small living spaces). However, the gender splits of working from home did not change much, at least in the USA, before, during and after the pandemic
Interestingly, the study reports that the productivity impact of hybrid working from home is about zero. The productivity impact of fully-remote work varied, and depended on how well managed this is. As a result the study predicts that the level of fully remote working from home will increase.
Productivity is notoriously difficult to measure, despite all the effort to manage it. So these results may not be precise, but perhaps do suggest that patterns of working from home are not really driven by micro-economics. They are driven by broader social patterns. To understand working from home, it is the society, stupid.
Cultural Renewal - To walk across a field at night alone with a horse
I have been learning Russian language over the last two years, and have progressed enough to be able to read some poetry and follow some general texts. It is a very fulfilling experience, although it does require patience for two reasons. First, it takes time to learn the language, especially when there is no functional use right now. Second, if you are a Westerner, who wants to learn Russian language or study Russian history and culture with an open heart, not a suspicious mind, today amidst NATO’s war against Russia, in a country aligned with the USA, then you must wait out the prejudice against all things Russian in the West today. The full fruits of your study may well not come until Russian culture is no longer stigmatised in the West. That day will come, however, after Ukraine’s collapse, NATO’s defeat and the US Empire’s retrenchment. It may be five to ten years away, but it will come.
In the meantime, Russophiles need to walk across a field at night alone with a horse. This line comes from a Russian song, Horse, of which, by chance, I watched a wonderful performance on YouTube during the week. This song was composed in 1994 and has become an anthemic, modern folk song. When you listen and watch you will see how it is a metaphor at once for any individual’s life, and for the endurance of Russians through the catastrophe of the nineties, and their enjoyment of the fruitful years since. The full Russian and English lyrics are below. Please enjoy the video. It is best with the music.
Конь | Horse
Выйду ночью в поле с конём | I will leave in the night to the field with a horse
Ночкой тёмной тихо пойдём | Through the dark night we will silently walk
Мы пойдём с конём по полю вдвоём | We will go with the horse across the field together
Мы пойдём с конём по полю вдвоём | We will go with a horse across the field together
Ночью в поле звёзд благодать | At night the field is full of stars' bliss
В поле никого не видать | No one could be seen in the field
Только мы с конём по полю идём | Only me and the horse are walking through the field
Только мы с конём по по́лю идём | Only me and the horse are walking through the field
Сяду я верхом на коня | I will saddle up on my horse
Ты неси по полю меня | You carry me through the field all across
По бескрайнему полю моему | Through my endless field
По бескрайнему полю моему | Through my endless field
Дай-ка я разок посмотрю | Let me take a single look
Где рождает поле зарю | At where the field gives birth to the dawn
Ай брусничный свет, алый да рассвет | Ah a cowberry-colored light, oh a scarlet dawn
Али есть то место, али его нет | Either does that place exist or does not
Полюшко моё, родники | Oh my dear field and the springs
Дальних деревень огоньки | Lights of distant villages are seen
Золотая рожь да кудрявый лён | Golden rye and curly flax
Я влюблён в тебя, Россия, влюблён | I am enamoured of you, Russia, enamoured.
Будет добрым год хлебород | There will be a good fruitful year
Было всяко, всяко пройдёт | Different it was, and different will pass
Пой, злотая рожь, пой, кудрявый лён | Sing gold rye, sing curly flax
Пой о том, как я в Россию влюблён | Sing of how I'm enamoured of Russia.
Пой, злотая рожь, пой, кудрявый лён | Sing gold rye, sing oh curly flax…
Мы идём с конём по полю вдвоём | We are walking across the field with a horse.
World History View
The Ruin of Ukraine
“A significant share of responsibility for the faith of the average citizen in our quick and beautiful victory lies with me personally. I created an illusion at that time so that we would survive. Today I am destroying it so that we can survive.”
Alexey Arestovich, Ukrainian political adviser, (2023)
Time has run out for President Zelensky and Ukraine. The Ukrainian nationalist fought a war for glory, and lost. This country is now ruined, and rumours of collapse, and some last minute American regime change to manage appearances, are proliferating. The grand illusions of Ukraine have been dispelled by war and history. But will all those who stood with Ukraine, on a sunlit stage in 2022, now fall with Ukraine, as it staggers into a dark winter?
Alexey Arestovich, President Zelensky’s former spin doctor and now exiled political challenger, wrote recently that he had created “the illusion” of a “quick and beautiful victory” by Ukraine in 2022 “so that we could survive.” However, with between half and one million Ukrainian soldiers dead, and millions more citizens fled to the EU, Russia and other countries, the time for illusions is over. “Today I am destroying” this illusion, Arestovich tweeted, “so that we can survive further.”
The sorcerer’s apprentice of “Stand with Ukraine” no longer stands by his own magic tricks. This conjurer of illusions, in truth, is not in control of the destruction of his illusion. He speaks from exile and was removed from office. The Russian Army and now the people of Ukraine, are patiently destroying the illusion of Ukrainian victory. It is not controlled by the scripts of some hetman’s spin doctor. Arestovich appears to be jockeying for the next regime, but shows remarkably little remorse for all the people he sent to their deaths, or sold into prostitution, shouting Slava Ukraina.
The deeper question is why did so many loyalists of the NATO world succumb to Arestovich’s confessed fabrications. The memories may be fading for some, but for me the cultural shock of the cancel Russia campaign in 2022 remains. Many leaders said things that one day they may apologise for.
One day someone ought to produce a documentary of this extraordinary witch craze. The media and journalists were among the worst, and routinely replicated the staged illusions, produced by Arestovich and a team of American communications professionals. In the early days of the war I remember the same photgraph of a woman, claimed to be enduring the torments of war, appearing on the front page of every major newspaper. That same woman would appear many times again in staged shoots of various alleged atrocities. Political leaders threw caution and diplomacy to the wind. At one point Australian Prime Minister Albanese told “Putin to back off.” I imagine the Kremlin did not bother to brief Vladimir Vladimirovich. Many military strategists went misty eyed and a little sour with their pronouncements on the incompetence of the Russian army, and the prospects of success of brave Ukraine and its upcoming counter-offensive. They all made fools of themselves. A few braver, souls, like Colonel Douglas Macgregor, looked more honestly into the face of war, and saw Russia has been winning for a long time. Colonel Macgregor showed up the four-star generals as fools.
Then, there are the Historians. Dominic Sandbrook of the Rest is History podcast became a partisan early. In fact, he declared Ukraine’s history has always been brave and glorious. He would probably have applauded Jaroslav Hunka too. Serhi Plokhi produced another bad book in May 2023, that seemed to have been timed to ride the crest of Ukraine’s triumphant counter-offensive. It is another work of bitter ethno-nationalism. And there have been so many more who have predicted Russia’s instant collapse, and Ukraine’s pure European, democratic roots. Truly, history is the second casualty of war.
Why did the tainted myth of little Ukraine’s national liberation against the evil empire of Russian ‘orcs’ persuade so many Western elites to become cheerleaders for this moral travesty? Why were such bad histories, gross stereotypes, blatant misinformation, crude prejudice and violent vilification allowed to flourish? Why did Western elites fan a bushfire of hatred towards Russia from February 2022. What happened to the moral fabric of our culture that allowed so many to become Arestovich’s, Zelensky’s and Biden’s willing executioners?
Were they all in on the performance? Was it an elaborately orchestrated and well-paid information operation? Did “Stand with Ukraine” just play with their own distorted perception, their deep-seated prejudice against Russia and in favour of “Western civilization”?
In any case, as many better judges, like Colonel Douglas Macgregor and I predicted long ago, the illusions did not hold, and NATO has lost this war. In the process, Joe Biden, has destroyed Ukraine. Not Biden alone. All his long-term aides, Anthony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and Victoria Nuland, the US political class, NATO, EU leaders, the managed media, at least two Australian Prime Ministers, and all those summer soldiers and sunshine patriots, who put a foreign flag in their bios, they have all ruined Ukraine.
Simplicius the Thinker has suggested that Ukraine is the prime victim of Western propaganda. They might have actually believed Russia was weaker than them, but if they did it was their own prejudice mixed with the illusions of a “quick and beautiful victory” that their sorcerer’s apprentice conjured. And most recently he has highlighted the outbreak of internecine conflict within the Ukrainian regime, following the apparent assassination of General Zaluzhny’s chief-of-staff. Here at least Ukraine is being true to its history.
Ukraine now is ruined. I will not belabour the point, but some simple assessments need to be shared to prevent the Western media illusionists declaring this a ‘stalemate’ from which they can cut and run. Its offensives failed, and Russia is breaking through across a broad front. Its navy, air force and several rounds of armies are ruined. It has lost the four territories, and much of Ukraine’s most productive economic assets. Millions have fled the country, and its prime age workforce has been devastated by the Azov killing fields. Its social fabric, never strong, has been rent into a thousand pieces by persecution of the Orthodox church and Russian language speakers, and irredeemably stained by the toxic ideology of Ukrainian ethhno-nationalism. Its culture has been impoverished. Its politics are ravished by its national heroes’ complicity with Nazism, its elite corruption, and its current leadership’s vassalage to Imperial War Faction of the USA. Its government institutions are deranged by incorrigible cronyism, and wartime’s excessive use of coercion. Its economy, even in the eyes of the ‘Stand with Ukraine’ acolyte, Adam Tooze, is a big job to fix. The Americans through USAID are even running out of money to pump up the budget. Maybe the Americans don’t care, if Blackrock can pick up its chosen strategic assets more cheaply. Stand by Ukraine… until you can steal its land?
With its customary morality, the American grand strategists have turned to replacing the once New Churchill, Zelensky, with another yet to be named made-for-television figure. The Time magazine profile of yesterday’s hero portrayed him as delusional, isolated and no longer speaking solely from Hollywood authorised scripts. Some gentle interference in another democracy’s internal affairs might bring a fresh to the March 2024 Ukrainian elections, if they proceed. They might keep the illusion going that Ukraine is a democracy. They might persuade a few doubters that the USA, EU, NATO and Australia made a good investment in Ukraine. All my indicators of ruin cannot compare to giving a bump to some geriatric American politician in the polls. Just don’t mention how many Ukrainians died and suffered to keep the illusion of American hegemony going for a few more Presidential terms.
American diplomacy has shown its habitual supremacism, and its constant failure to negotiate with Europe and Russia security arrangements in their shared continent. Yet again the USA imagines some clever dick in Washington DC can replace one actor on a broken stage with another, and never change the play. Never mind the stench of death, theft and betrayal in the theatre.
But, after Ukraine, BRICS+, the G20 New Delhi Declaration and now the travesty of American complicity with events in Gaza, the world has turned against realities as defined by Americans. Time is running out on the USA’s grand strategy and great games. How fast that time runs out will depend on events that are beyond our control. But I suspect, after the events in Gaza, that time is short; and the masters of the universe in Washington DC no longer control events of their own election cycle. Winter came to Ukraine in 2023. It may come to America in 2024.
The earthquake that reshaped the multipolar world in 2022 is still shuddering. We will see who really leads the world and how, when the quaking ends. At that time, Western political elites will face the reckoning they deserve. But in the meantime, Western intellectual elites and social media followers need to account for their own tragic illusions about Ukraine, and the deadly consequences they have caused.