Germany at the Crossroads: It’s the System, Stupid │ Gerry Nolan

Germany, once Europe’s industrial juggernaut, now stumbles in a state of managed decline. With elections looming, the theatre is set. But let’s be clear: this isn’t about who wins, but whether Germans can reject the system that’s strangling their sovereignty. Because unless they do, these elections are nothing more than a distraction, a masterclass in divide-and-conquer.

 

» Know your enemy. «

  Sun Tzu.

 

Scenario 1: Banning AfD, A Gamble with Fire

Banning AfD wouldn’t be a show of strength but a desperate move to silence over a quarter of the electorate, especially in the former DDR where resentment still burns over decades of economic neglect. Friedrich Merz, obedient globalist and former BlackRock operative, would become Chancellor. The result? More war, deindustrialization, and blind subservience to the US. But silencing AfD won’t kill populism, it’ll fuel it. BSW would emerge as the strongest opposition, carrying the banner for those abandoned by the establishment.

  » Election isn’t about who governs. «

Scenario 2: AfD Grows, But the System Holds

AfD and CDU dominate the elections, but the anti-AfD cordon sanitaire holds. Merz scrambles to cobble together a coalition with Greens and SPD, a circus of contradictions. Meanwhile, AfD becomes the largest opposition party, and with BSW rising in tandem, Germany’s parliament turns into a warzone of populist resistance.

 
But the cracks widen as Germany faces three brutal realities: NATO’s inevitable defeat in Ukraine, an economic crisis fueled by sanctions and energy dependency, and mounting unrest from a population tired of being sacrificed on the altar of vassalage. 

 

Scenario 3: AfD Triumphs – The System Strikes Back

An AfD victory would trigger nothing short of institutional war. Mockingbird media, and globalist puppeteers would unleash chaos: mass protests, endless scandals, “mystery” corruption charges, and lawfare targeting AfD leaders. Color revolution tactics, international condemnation, and Soros-funded street movements would all be in play.

 

» It’s the System, Stupid. «

 

These scenarios expose a single rigged system. This election isn’t about who governs, it’s about maintaining control while gaslighting the public into thinking change is possible. Divide and conquer, with AfD voters demonized as extremists and BSW supporters dismissed as utopian dreamers, all while the establishment engineers the decline.

Here’s the uncomfortable reality: Germany’s democracy is theatre, scripted to ensure one outcome, continued vassalage to Washington. The Nord Stream sabotage was a declaration of US dominance over Europe. Germany’s leaders didn’t even flinch. Their silence was an endorsement of their own country’s humiliation.

If Germans want real change, it’s not about winning elections within a rigged system, it’s about rejecting the system itself. Imagine a post-SMO world where Germany reclaims sovereignty, realigns with Russia and China, and embraces BRICS. Imagine restoring its industrial base, securing cheap energy, and forging a just peace in Europe. This isn’t a fantasy, it’s a choice. But to make it, Germans must first wake up to the fact that their political elite serves Washington, not Berlin.

» Yankee, Go Home « – German cry for sovereignty.

 

The 80’s saw mass protests demanding the removal of US missiles and troops. It’s time for Germans to rediscover that spirit, to say "Yankee, go home" and reclaim their sovereignty. NATO has turned Europe into an American buffer, draining its resources, compromising its security, and hijacking its future.

A sovereign Germany could help lead Europe in a multipolar world, standing with the Global Majority rather than kneeling before the US. The alternative? Continued decline, economic ruin, and an electorate manipulated into fighting itself while the true oppressors profit from the chaos. The real question isn’t about CDU, AfD, or BSW, but whether Germans can see through the charade. The rigged script won’t save them; only rejecting NATO servitude and imagining a future aligned with the Global Majority can.

Quoted from:
Gerry Nolan (November 20, 2024) - Germany at the Crossroads: It’s the System, Stupid. 

See also:

RT (November 20, 2024) - Germany knew in advance about Nord Stream attack.
Gerry Nolan (November 20, 2024) - Nord Stream: Germany’s Quiet Admission of Vassalage.
Cyrus Janssen (May 8, 2024) - How the US Destroyed the German Economy.

About Our Great Victory | Yuliana Titaeva

Every year on the eve of May 9th, a battle for historical memory of our great victory begins in the media space. Do those who repeat the clichés about "this day of mourning," "why the parades ?" or "is this victory necessary ?" realize that these are not their own judgments, but narratives cynically imposed on them by the very propaganda from which they avidly hide in "alternative sources of information" like YouTube and Meduza? And that the memory of the fact of our victory has long been, systematically, and deliberately destroyed? "By whom ? " the liberal will ask, and I will answer "by those who paid for this war."

Raising the Russian Soviet flag over the Reichstag during the Battle of Berlin - May 2, 1945.

And it was paid for by the US Federal Reserve and the Bank of England. Having profited from the First World War and boosting their industrial sector and economy, the US needed continuation. A new war promised to solve problems according to the principle of "everything everywhere at once": rivers of oil in the form of fuel and lubricants would bring dividends to Standard Oil, industrialists like Ford would sell military equipment, American banks would lend money to all warring sides, and the unfinished business of Europe in the First World War and the burgeoning USSR would be "chopped down to the last" soldier. The planned action was phased and stretched in implementation for almost 20 years.

First, the US intentionally attacked the economy of Germany, which had sunk into an economic crisis due to reparations payments after losing the First World War, then offered its own help to it - in the form of loans and active penetration of American capital into the German industry, which in a few years rose to second place in the world, but with a small nuance: it all belonged to American owners. The German Farbenindustrie was under the control of Standard Oil, General Electric controlled the electrical industry through AEG and Siemens, Opel belonged to General Motors, Henry Ford owned 100% of Volkswagen's shares, and by 1933, under the wing of American capital, large banks such as Deutsche Bank and Dresdner Bank were also.

 

 Western tanks and military hardware captured by Russian forces in Ukraine on display in Moscow at an exhibition

entitled "Trophies of the Russian Army". It is being held outside a museum celebrating the victory over Nazi Germany in 1945. 

The Russian military said it showed "Western help would not stop us winning this war".  - May 9, 2024.

At the same time, with American capital money, the Nazi party and personally Hitler were prepared and sponsored. To bring a new political figure onto the big stage, the United States first intentionally withdrew its loans from the German economy, causing a sharp crisis there, then let all the dogs loose on the current government and offered the electorate a familiar solution: "you need a new leader, like a comedian or an artist, and we have him! ". History always repeats itself twice.

What was done in 20 years completely prepared Germany for war. Apparently, it was promised that "we will take the Soviet Union quickly, and you, Dolphi, will receive the Nobel, the cover of Time, a house in Nice, a place in history, and a bucket of cocaine" (or was this promised to another president?) But of course, no one was going to take the Soviet Union quickly. The US needed a long, drawn-out, exhausting war, in which they would feed, finance, and ruthlessly exterminate every one of its participants. The winner didn't matter, but we ended up paying the huge price.

 

US White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre re-vealing world history - May 7, 2024.

They pay for the war today, implementing the same plan right before our eyes. They also pay for the revision of history, erasing any information about their interests in the Second World War and gradually shifting the blame for its outbreak onto the winner, while appropriating the fact of victory for themselves. They instill in immature minds something about the futility of holding parades, suggesting "quietly mourn at home," and hit the target with it precisely because they know that every historical symbol must be loud and noticeable, and what is not repeated en masse, as truth, from generation to generation, is simply forgotten forever. 

 

They made hundreds of films about the Jewish people, but not a single film about our 28 million victims, who fell so that Standard Oil would have something to fuel its oil. We did not ask our ancestors for this sacrifice, nor did they ask for it: the historical moment came to give it away, and they did. But now it's our turn to sacrifice and fight for our memory and victory with parades, conversations about the important viewings of "The Dawns Here Are Quiet" and festive posts on May 9th. And we give this sacrifice, it's necessary.

Happy Victory Day.

Yuliana Titaeva

 

 May 9, 2024

 

Russian President Vladimir Putin addressing attendees

of the annual Moscow Victory Day military parade - May 9, 2024.

How the US Destroyed the German Economy | Cyrus Janssen

"To be an enemy of the US is dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal." This famous quote from Henry Kissinger is now unfolding in real time: Germany, Europe's largest economy and its industrial powerhouse, is now collapsing. Last year, Germany posted the worst performance among all major global economies, with its economy being the only one to actually shrink by 0.3%. Just last month, Germany's economic minister, Robert Habeck, stated that the German economy is performing "dramatically badly." Yet, the Western media has concealed the true cause.

 

» NATO's purpose is: Keep the Russians out, the Americans in, and the Germans down. «
Lord Hastings Lionel Ismay, NATO's first Secretary General, 1952.

 » Fuck the European Union! «
Victoria Nuland, US Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs, 2014. 

 

Even worse, this bleak situation shows no signs of improving. There were high hopes that 2024 would turn things around and be a comeback year for Germany. Until recently, the German government projected a growth rate of 1.3%. However, shockingly, they have now been forced to slash this forecast to a mere 0.2%. The scariest part is that most economists and business leaders agree: this isn't just a temporary recession, but a deeper structural problem with the German economic model. If you think this is an exaggeration, consider that, by now, an astonishing two in three German companies have left Germany or at least partially relocated abroad, with most citing sky-high energy prices, inflation, over-regulation, and endless political debates as their reasons for leaving. What or who is causing this catastrophic collapse of Germany's long-standing economic and industrial prowess?

 

   » Halting Russian supplies can well create a systemic crisis that would be devastating

for the German economy and, indirectly, for the entire European Union. «

 RAND Corporation, 2022.

 

Germany has been played by the United States and continues to score own goals in tackling this economic crisis. The country's dire situation is caused by three main factors: first, the sky-high energy prices; second, reduced exports to Russia and China; and third, increased military expenditure.

 

   » China called the Nord Stream pipeline blast an act of international terrorism,
and an act of war against Germany and Russia. «

Hans-Benjamin Braun, 2023.

[...] As much as the US is to blame here, astonishingly, almost all of Germany's political elite, mainstream media, and general population have eagerly obeyed America's wishes to demonize and decouple from Russia and China. This is absolutely bizarre and frankly foolish, as numerous experts and German business leaders have repeatedly warned that decoupling would destroy the German economy. The sad truth is that much of Germany's political and media establishment has a long history of blindly accepting US-formed policy narratives at face value—even when they themselves are the ones getting harmed. The best recent example of this is the bombing of the Nord Stream pipeline, whose sole purpose was to transport natural gas from Russia to Germany and the rest of Western Europe.
 

 » Germany's establishment has been one of the biggest cheerleaders for severing its energy ties with Russia.

You seriously can't make this stuff up. «

Cyrus Janssen - March 12, 2024.

[...] After the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Germany and the EU introduced sanctions against Russia, while Russia responded by sharply decreasing its delivery of natural gas to Europe. This caused Germany's energy prices to skyrocket and severely damaged its economy. Before the invasion, Germany imported a staggering 55% of its gas from Russia, and it was precisely this cheap Russian gas that enabled Germany to become an economic and industrial powerhouse. Of course, sanctioning your main energy supplier was never the smartest choice to begin with. The fallout cannot be understated: in the same year the war started, the market price for natural gas increased more than tenfold.

 Biden vows that the US will 'bring an end' to the Nord Stream 2 pipeline if Russia invades Ukraine, and German vassal Chancellor Scholz simply agrees. - February 7, 2022.

 

But it's not just ordinary Germans who have suffered. An astonishing 70% of Germany's mechanical engineering, industrial goods, and automotive sectors have relocated abroad, making it clear why Germany's economic and industrial power has collapsed so rapidly. The US role in Germany's energy crisis is much larger than merely taking advantage of the Germans. Not only did the US openly wish to eliminate Germany's energy relationship with Russia, but it also shares significant blame for causing the war in Ukraine, which led to Germany's crisis in the first place. However, once again, Germany shares the blame: the country's establishment is in virtual lockstep with the United States and has been one of the biggest cheerleaders for severing its energy ties with Russia. You seriously can't make this stuff up.

 

Quoted from:
Cyrus Janssen ( March 12, 2024) - How America Destroyed the German Economy. (video)

 » Ukraine's victory: whatever it takes, as long as it takes. «

German vassal chancellor Scholz - May 7, 2024.

See also:

Martin Armstrong (May 1, 2024) - Will Russia Push the Button?

Martin Armstrong (May 1, 2024) - It Is Unlikely That We Can Avoid A Third World War.
Timofey Bordachev (February 19, 2024) - Western Europe could become the new Ukraine.
Hans-Benjamin Braun (August 6, 2023) - Nord Stream Pipeline Blast By US-Nuke.

RAND Corporation (January 25, 2022) - Crush Europe and Strengthen the US.

500 Years of Western Dominance - What Comes Next | Glenn Diesen

Felix Abt: A great European religious war and the first pan-European conflict over superpower status came to an end in 1648. After 30 years of devastating wars and chaos, especially on German soil, with millions of deaths and shattered economies, the Peace of Westphalia brought a new, rules-based order to Europe, as the Western political class would call it today. This included the inviolability of borders and non-interference in the internal affairs of sovereign and equal states; it is regarded as a milestone in the development toward tolerance and secularization. How did this affect the new powers that emerged afterward and their quest for hegemony?

Glenn Diesen: The lesson from the Thirty Years War (1618-1648) was that no one power could restore order based on hegemony and universal values, as the other states in Europe would preserve their own sovereignty and distinctiveness by collectively balancing the most powerful state. This was evident when Catholic France supported Protestant Sweden to prevent the dominance of the Catholic Habsburgs. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 gave birth to the modern world order, in which peace and order depend on a balance of power between sovereign states. The Westphalian system prevents hegemony as other states collectively balance the effort of an aspiring hegemon to establish economic and military dominance, and universal values are rejected to the extent they are used to reduce the sovereignty of other states.

» The Westphalian system prevents hegemony. « 

The 1648 peace treaty between the parties in the Thirty Years' War established the Westphalian system.

 

The principle, known as the Westphalian principle of sovereignty, prohibits interference in the internal affairs of another state, and every state is equal before international law, regardless of its size. Thus, every state has sovereignty over its territory and its internal affairs, to the exclusion of all external powers. But when the European colonial powers used violence to impose their will on other continents, they violated this ideal. Was this the beginning of this principle’s demise?

 

The Westphalian system should in principle be based on sovereign equality for all states. However, it originated as a European security order that later laid the foundation for a world order. Under the original Westphalian system, the Europeans claimed special privileges and the principle of equal sovereignty for states did not apply to everyone. Sovereignty was deemed to be a right and a responsibility assigned to “civilized peoples”, a reference to the Europeans as white Christians. The international system was divided between the civilized and the barbarians. There was one set of rules for the Europeans in the civilized “garden”, and another set of rules when the Europeans engaged with the so-called despotic barbarians in the “jungle”. The interference in the internal affairs of other peoples and the development of vast empires was framed as the right and the responsibility of civilized states to guide the barbaric peoples towards universal values of civilization. This responsibility to govern other peoples was termed the “white man’s burden” and the “civilizing mission”.

 » The gardeners have to go to the jungle. «

Josep Borrell's universal mission.

In our current era, we have abandoned the civilized-barbarian divide, but we have replaced it with a liberal democracy-authoritarian divide to legitimize sovereign inequality. The West can interfere in the domestic affairs of other states to promote democracy, invade countries to defend human rights, or even change the borders of countries in support of self-determination. This is the exclusive right and a responsibility of the West as the champions of the universal values of liberal democracy. As the EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell explained: “The gardeners have to go to the jungle. Europeans have to be much more engaged with the rest of the world. Otherwise, the rest of the world will invade us”.

International law in accordance with the UN Charter defends the principle of sovereign equality for all states. The so-called “rules-based international order” is based on sovereign inequality, which introduces special privileges under the guise of universal liberal democratic values. For example, the West’s recognition of independence for Kosovo was a breach of international law as it violated the territorial integrity of Serbia, although it was legitimized by the liberal principle of respecting the self-determination of Kosovo Albanians. In Crimea the West decided that self-determination should not be the leading principle, but territorial integrity. The US refers to liberal democratic values to exercise its exclusive right to invade and occupy countries such as Iraq, Syria and Libya, although this right is not extended to countries in the jungle.  

» The so-called “rules-based international order” is based on sovereign inequality, 

which introduces special privileges under the guise of universal liberal democratic values. «

In 1945 fifty countries established the United Nations System. With the help of this supra-national governance

system the Anglo-Frankish-Zionist-Dönmeh-Wahhabi-Takfiri elites of the UK, France, Turkey, Saudi Arabia, the US and

some others, expected to secure their hegemonies beyond the foreseeable demise of traditional colonialism. 

The Bretton Woods conference, World Bank, IMF, nuclear bombing of Japan, dividing Korea 

and creating the State of Israel in Palestine are early show cases of what Pax Americana and UN are all about.

[...] The Ukrainian conflict is essentially an extension of American geopolitics, which aims to carry out Mackinder’s aforementioned stanza, “He who rules Eastern Europe rules the world.” What are your thoughts about it?

Preventing Germany and Russia from controlling Eastern Europe means that much of the Eurasian continent becomes landlocked. US control over Eastern Europe implies that Russia can not bridge Europe and Asia, but rather becomes an isolated land-locked region at the dual periphery of Europe and Asia.

Brzezinski outlined the strategy for developing and preserving US global primacy, which relies on the age-old wisdom of divide-and-rule. Brzezinski wrote that the US must “prevent collusion and maintain security dependence among the vassals, to keep tributaries pliant and protected, and keep the barbarians from coming together”. Historically, the British and the Americans have worked to prevent Germany and Russia from coming together as it would form an independent pole of power. Hegemony requires conflict between Germany and Russia, as Germany becomes a dependent ally and Russia is weakened. This logic is also applied to why it is beneficial to perpetuate tensions between the Arabs and Iran, or between China and its neighbors. The US has been very concerned about the economic integration between the Germans and Russians, which is why the US was so hostile to the Nord Stream pipelines and most likely was behind the attack on these pipelines. 

 

 Anka Feldhusen, a fine example of a German Neonazi apparatchik of the 21st century.

March 22, 2023.

 

 Wehrmacht 2.0 south of Kiev. 

There will be hell to pay.

March 22, 2024.

The problem is that the world is no longer Western-centric and by pushing Russia away from Germany, the US has pushed Russia towards China – a technological and industrial power much greater than Germany. In the mid-19th century, the British fought against Russia in the Crimean War with the explicit purpose of pushing Russia back into Asia, where it would remain technologically and economically backward and stagnant. NATO’s war in Ukraine is a repeat of the efforts to push Russia back into Asia, although this time Asia is much more dynamic than the West. The failure of the West to adjust our grand strategy to this new reality has been a mistake of immeasurable proportions. We have not subordinated Russia, rather we ended Russia’s 300-year-long Western-centric policies in which Moscow looked to the West for modernization.

What is driving this stunning anti-Chinese obsession in the United States against a country that upholds the principle of non-interference in other countries, that used its mighty navy only for trade and not for gunboat politics when it was a superpower in the past, and that follows the millennia-old concept of “Tianxia” (天下), which literally means “everything under heaven”, that is, an inclusive world full of harmony for all?

China does not threaten the US, but it threatens US dominance as the foundation for the unipolar world order established after the Cold War. The US is currently attempting to weaken China through economic warfare, convincing its allies to decouple from the Chinese economy, and knocking out Russia in Ukraine as a vital partner of China. If the US fails to achieve its objectives, then it will likely stoke conflicts between China and its neighbors to make the neighbors more dependent and obedient, and also create instability for the Chinese that will bleed it of resources. The ideal would be greater tensions between India and China, as India would have to make itself more reliant on the US and it would be an important ally to weaken China. If all fails, then the US could also fight an indirect war through a proxy similar to the way they are using Ukrainians to fight Russia – by for example pushing for Taiwan’s secession. Besides securing its supply chains and building a military for deterrence, China should prioritize resolving its disputes with India as any friction with China can be exploited.

» This is a Westphalian system with Eurasian characteristics. « 

Since 2009 BRICS is establishing a Multipolar World Order based on Westphalian principles and controlled by the 

Eurasian great powers China, India and Russia. Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates joined BRICS

on January 1, 2024. To date 15 more countries have formally applied to join.

Finally, in your new book you say that a new Westphalian world order is reasserting itself, albeit with Eurasian characteristics. Can you explain this in more detail?

We are returning to a Westphalian system based on a balance of power between sovereign states. However, the former Westphalian system was based on sovereign equality among the Western powers while the “barbarians” or “despots” outside the West were not deemed to be qualified for the responsibility of sovereignty. It was a dual system of collective hegemony of the West, with sovereign equality between the Western states. In the new Westphalian system, there are several powerful states that are not Western, with China as the leading economy in the world. The Eurasian powers such as China, Russia, India and others are developing the economic foundations for this system with new technologies, transportation corridors and financial instruments. The Eurasian powers are more prepared to include the Global South as sovereign equals. The Eurasian powers reject the so-called “rules-based international order” based on sovereign inequality, as Western dominance should not be legitimized by a civilized-barbarian or liberal democracy-authoritarian divide.

The Western powers over the past centuries have had an inclination for dominance and empire by controlling limited maritime corridors. Russia’s Eurasianism in the 19th century was a hegemonic strategy by dominating the Eurasian landmass through land corridors, although under the multipolar distribution of power the Russians do not have the capability or intentions to pursue hegemony. Instead, Eurasian integration entails moving from the dual periphery of Europe and Asia, to the center of a new Eurasian construct. Even China as the leading power does not have the capability or intention to pursue hegemony. Countries like Russia are content with China being the leading power, although they would not support China if it demanded dominance and hegemony. The Chinese demonstrate that they are not attempting to limit Russia’s economic connectivity with other states to make itself the only center of power. In the Global Civilization Initiative, the Chinese are also advocating for respecting civilizational differences and that all states have their own path to modernity, which implies that China is not claiming to represent universal values that legitimizes interference into the domestic affairs of other states. The West assumed that the Russia-China partnership was a “marriage of convenience” and that they would clash over influence in Central Asia, but this never happened because neither side demanded hegemony. Instead of sabotaging each other’s relations with the region, China and Russia harmonized their interests in Central Asia. China, Russia, India and other Eurasian powers have different visions and interests in terms of Eurasian integration, but they all need each other to realize their goals and pursue prosperity. Hegemony is not an option. This is a Westphalian system with Eurasian characteristics.

Quoted from:

500 Years of Western Dominance: Is it Coming to an End and What Comes Next?

Felix Abt talks with Glenn Diesen. In: Eastern Angle - March 22, 2024.

 

See also:

Glenn Diesen (2024) - The Ukraine War & the Eurasian World Order. 

Zbigniew Brzezinski (1997) - The Grand Chessboard: American Primacy and Its Geostrategic Imperatives.

Carl Schmitt (1950) - The Nomos of the Earth in the International Law of the Jus Publicum Europaeum.

Western Europe could become the new Ukraine | Timofey Bordachev

The real causes of major armed conflicts such as world wars are always linked to socio-economic factors. For the naturally cautious German nation to become a bunch of cannibals, it first had to sink into the economic misery and moral oppression of the 1920s. Before that, demographic growth and the unresolved social problems of industrialization created the necessary mass of people willing to kill and die on the fields of the First World War.

 

 » Both the Minister for Economic Affairs and the Minister of Finance have come to the conclusion

that Germany is no longer sufficiently competitive. It is inconceivable that this will not lead to political changes. «
Christian Lindner, German Minister of Finance, Feb 12, 2024.

In any case, any great aggression against neighbors has required a very large number of poor and morally degenerate people. This is roughly what happened to Ukraine during the 30 years of its failed statehood. In other words, the ability of the Western Europeans to unleash armed aggression against us depends on how their own affairs are going.

This is why, from the Russian point of view, it is now of the utmost importance to observe what is happening in the Western European economies. The irrational policy of sanctions against Russia and the partial breakdown of trade and economic relations between us have already led to serious losses for their business sectors. Added to this are the accumulated domestic problems, competition from American and Chinese companies, and the general recession in the global economy.

 

» Ukraine must win this war. If Putin had his way, this would only be the beginning. « 

 Boris Pistorius, German Defence Minister, Feb 18, 2023.

 

For example, one of the Western news agencies recently published a story about how large manufacturing companies, industry leaders, are leaving Germany in search of more favorable locations and investment conditions. Other major Western European states are going through their own worrying processes. If these economic difficulties begin to erode the established model, the mood of the citizenry may change.

We do not know exactly how Western Europeans will react to the deterioration of their material situation and how long it will take. It is quite likely that the world will not see the practical consequences of this economic decline for another 20-30 years. What is more, we cannot say with certainty that the behavioral algorithms of its inhabitants will be exactly the same as in the first half of the 20th century. History does not repeat itself, which makes thinking about events by analogy a rather dead-end way of understanding what is happening.

Quoted from:
Timofey Bordachev (Feb 15, 2024) - Could Europe become the new Ukraine?

The Defeat of the West │ Emmanuel Todd

Emmanuel Todd, historian, demographer, anthropologist, sociologist and political analyst, is part of a dying breed: one of the very few remaining exponents of old school French intelligentzia. Todd was the first Western intellectual, already in 1976, to have predicted the fall of the USSR in his book La Chute Finale (The Final Fall), with his research based on Soviet infant mortality rates [...] The first nugget concerning his latest book, La Défaite de l’Occident (The Defeat of the West) is the minor miracle of actually being published last week in France, right within the NATO sphere: a hand grenade of a book, by an independent thinker, based on facts and verified data, blowing up the whole Russophobia edifice erected around the 'aggression' by 'Tsar' Putin.

 

Behemoth, the land monster (land forces), and Leviathan, the sea monster (sea forces), killing each other.

Engraving by William Blake (1757–1827).

Todd focuses on the key reasons that have led to the West’s downfall. Among them: the end of the nation-state; de-industrialization (which explains NATO’s deficit in producing weapons for Ukraine); the “degree zero” of the West’s religious matrix, Protestantism; the sharp increase of mortality rates in the US (much higher than in Russia), along with suicides and homicides; and the supremacy of an imperial nihilism expressed by the obsession with Forever Wars. Todd methodically analyses, in sequence, Russia, Ukraine, Eastern Europe, Germany, Britain, Scandinavia and finally The Empire. Let’s focus on what would be the 12 Greatest Hits of his remarkable exercise:

1. At the start of the Special Military Operation (SMO) in February 2022, the combined GDP of Russia and Belarus was only 3.3% of the combined West (in this case the NATO sphere plus Japan and South Korea). Todd is amazed how these 3.3% capable of producing more weapons than the whole Western colossus not only are winning the war but reducing dominant notions of the “neoliberal political economy” to shambles.
2. The “ideological solitude” and “ideological narcissism” of the West – incapable of understanding, for instance, how “the whole Muslim world seems to consider Russia as a partner rather than an adversary”.
3. Todd eschews the notion of “Weberian states” – evoking a delicious compatibility of vision between Putin and US realpolitik practitioner John Mearsheimer. Because they are forced to survive in an environment where only power relations matters, states are now acting as “Hobbesian agents.” And that brings us to the Russian notion of a nation-state, focused on “sovereignty”: the capacity of a state to independently define its internal and external policies, with no foreign interference whatsoever.
4. The implosion, step by step, of WASP culture, which led, “since the 1960s”, to “an empire deprived of a center and a project, an essentially military organism managed by a group without culture (in the anthropological sense)”. This is Todd defining the US neocons.
5. The US as a “post-imperial” entity: just a shell of military machinery deprived of an intelligence-driven culture, leading to “accentuated military expansion in a phase of massive contraction of its industrial base”. As Todd stresses, “modern war without industry is an oxymoron”.
6. The demographic trap: Todd shows how Washington strategists “forgot that a state whose population enjoys a high educational and technological level, even if it is decreasing, does not lose its military power”. That’s exactly the case of Russia during the Putin years.
7. Here we reach the crux of Todd’s argument: his post-Max Weber reinterpretation of The Protestant Ethic and the Spirit of Capitalism, published a little over a century ago, in 1904/1905: “If Protestantism was the matrix for the ascension of the West, its death, today, is the cause of the disintegration and defeat.” Todd clearly defines how the 1688 English 'Glorious Revolution', the 1776 American Declaration of Independence and the 1789 French Revolution were the true pillars of the liberal West. Consequently, an expanded 'West' is not historically 'liberal', because it also engineered “Italian fascism, German Nazism and Japanese militarism”. In a nutshell, Todd shows how Protestantism imposed universal literacy on the populations it controlled, “because all faithful must directly access the Holy Scriptures. A literate population is capable of economic and technological development. The Protestant religion modeled, by accident, a superior, efficient workforce.” And it is in this sense that Germany was “at the heart of Western development”, even if the Industrial Revolution took place in England. Todd’s key formulation is undisputable: “The crucial factor of the ascension of the West was Protestantism’s attachment to alphabetization.” Moreover Protestantism, Todd stresses, is twice at the heart of the history of the West: via the educational and economic drive - with fear of damnation and the need to feel chosen by God engendering a work ethic and a strong, collective morality - and via the idea that Men are unequal (remember the White Man’s Burden). The collapse of Protestantism could not but destroy the work ethic to the benefit of mass greed: that is, neoliberalism.
8. Todd’s sharp critique of the spirit of 1968 would merit a whole new book. He refers to “one of the great illusions of the 1960s – between Anglo-American sexual revolution and May 68 in France”; “to believe that the individual would be greater if freed from the collective”. That led to an inevitable debacle: “Now that we are free, en masse, from metaphysical beliefs, foundational and derived, communist, socialist or nationalist, we live the experience of the void.” And that’s how we became “a multitude of mimetic midgets who do not dare to think by themselves – but reveal themselves as capable of intolerance as the believers of ancient times.”
9. Todd’s brief analysis of the deeper meaning of transgenderism completely shatters the Church of Woke – from New York to the EU sphere, and will provoke serial fits of rage. He shows how transgenderism is “one of the flags of this nihilism that now defines the West, this drive to destroy, not just things and humans but reality.” And there’s an added analytical bonus: “The transgender ideology says that a man may become a woman, and a woman may become a man. This is a false affirmation, and in this sense, close to the theoretical heart of Western nihilism.” It gets worse, when it comes to the geopolitical ramifications. Todd establishes a playful mental and social connection between this cult of the fake and the Hegemon’s wobbly behavior in international relations. Example: the Iranian nuclear deal clinched under Obama becoming a hardcore sanctions regime under Trump. Todd: “American foreign policy is, in its own way, gender fluid.”
10. Europe’s “assisted suicide”. Todd reminds us how Europe at the start was the Franco-German couple. Then after the 2007/2008 financial crisis, that turned into “a patriarchic marriage, with Germany as a dominant spouse not listening to his companion anymore”. The EU abandoned any pretention of defending Europe’s interests - cutting itself off from energy and trade with its partner Russia and sanctioning itself. Todd identifies, correctly, the Paris-Berlin axis replaced by the London-Warsaw-Kiev axis: that was “the end of Europe as an autonomous geopolitical actor”. And that happened only 20 years after the joint opposition by France-Germany to the neocon war on Iraq.
11. Todd correctly defines NATO by plunging into “their unconscious”: “We note that its military, ideological and psychological mechanism does not exist to protect Western Europe, but to control it.”
12. In tandem with several analysts in Russia, China, Iran and among independents in Europe, Todd is sure that the US obsession – since the 1990s - to cut off Germany from Russia will lead to failure: “Sooner or later, they will collaborate”, as “their economic specializations define them as complementary”. The defeat in Ukraine will open the path, as a “gravitational force” reciprocally seduces Germany and Russia.

[...] Whatever the deadline, inbuilt in all this is a total Russia victory – with the winner dictating all terms. No negotiations, no ceasefire, no frozen conflict – as the Hegemon is now desperate spinning.

Quoted from:
Pepe Escobar (January 18, 2024) - How the West Was Defeated.

 

 

See also:
Emmanuel Todd (January 11, 2024) - La Défaite de l'Occident. 

 Serge Bernard (2016) - From Conquest To Affluence To Collapse: The 250 Year Empire Life Cycle.

John Mearsheimer (2001) - The Tragedy of Great Power Politics.

William Strauss & Neil Howe (1997) - The Fourth Turning.  

 Alexander Dugin (1997) - Foundations of Geopolitics.

Samuel P. Huntington (1993) - The Clash of Civilizations.

John Bagot Glubb (1978) - The Fate of Empires and Search for Survival.

Carl Schmitt (1942) - Land and Sea: A World-Historical Meditation.