The US and its allies have ganged up against Russia because it has taken its own path and refuses to renounce its Christian traditions, the head of the Russian Orthodox Church, Patriarch Kirill, has said.
As far as Monomakhos is concerned, it’s also under attack because the West needs its resources. In addition, Russia has implacable enemies in the West who have long-standing ethnic grievances against her, people like Robert Kagan, Victoria Nuland and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Others, such as the WASP elite of the United States and Great Britain, cannot abide the fact that Russia a resurgent Christian nation while their own countries are turning into anti-Christian, dystopian hellholes.
Speaking about the ongoing standoff between Moscow and the West over Ukraine during a sermon on Wednesday, the Patriarch suggested that Russia and its people have entered “a very special period” in their history.
“Many have turned on us, and I keep asking myself: why have they done so? We are the same as many others. In general, we represent the same European cultural tradition. We are Christians,” he said.
According to Kirill, he eventually came to the conclusion that it happened because “Russia has dared – and it has dared because it is an independent and great power – to follow a different civilizational path,” compared to that of the West.
Now is the time of “God’s special mercy” to Russia and its people, the Patriarch insisted. This understanding “strengthens the hope that the Lord will be with us as long as we do not refuse His guidance,” he said.
The head of the Russian Orthodox Church, who celebrated his 78th birthday on Wednesday, said that all his efforts are aimed at “ensuring that our Orthodox people never change the direction of their spiritual life.”
David says
Misha,
That the Globalists are anti-Christian is clear. However, I think the designation of “militant Christianity” is a misnomer. Warrior. Ascetic. Martyr. All three exist at different times in Christian history (sometimes all at once). The Christian warrior tradition is real, but shouldn’t be overstated as some kind of counterargument or bulwark against modernism. “Militant Christianity” doesn’t exist any more than “Pacifist Christianity” does. Sometimes we fight. Sometimes we don’t (and accept martyrdom, be it red or white). Is a particular thought or impulse the will of God or a temptation from Satan?
I believe the real tragedy of our time is the complete loss of authentic discernment. If the criteria we use is anything other than the Gospel, then we run high risk of making a terrible mistake or becoming deluded.
I think a sober reckoning of what Russia is and is not is vital. Prior to 2014, there was a lot more introspection and sobriety in the Russian Orthodox sphere about “Holy Russia.” Since 2014, that humble reflection has been replaced with triumphalism. Did all of those people staying away from Church suddenly start coming in 10 years? Did they bury Lenin in the ground? Have the banners of the Regicides been consigned to the dustbin of history?
That doesn’t mean NATO is right in the mess they are causing. That doesn’t make the Skittles ideology OK. But as Orthodox I think “the enemy of my enemy is my friend” is a diabolical trap. Sometimes, the enemy of my enemy is also my enemy. They just haven’t gotten around to pulling the knife on me.
Vladimir Putin is not Denethor. He is not “the Steward” for “the Czar to come.” He is a technocrat who goes to Church sometimes. That’s fine, but again, discernment and a sober realism. Russia is looking out for its geopolitical interests. That’s what they are. That those interests may benefit the Church (at the moment) can certainly be argued. What of the future? For every Constantine the Great there is a Julian the Apostate or Constantine Copronymus.
I see a great danger in binary thinking.
Brendan says
* Neocon who wants war with China says we must give up fast on Ukraine. *
https://theduran.com/neocon-who-wants-war-with-china-says-we-must-give-up-fast-on-ukraine/
‘ Dr. Stephen Bryen, who has decades of experience at or near the top both of the U.S. Government and of its biggest armaments manufacturers, said on December 2nd that America is wasting its armaments in order to prolong the war in Ukraine so as to defeat Russia there, which is sapping our vitally needed weapons to Taiwan, which are much more needed there in order to get Taiwan to declare independence from China, so that China will invade its province of Taiwan in order to keep it, and America will then have enough military forces in that region (after reallocating there from Ukraine) so as to invade and conquer China … ‘
“What shall we do after breakfast…?
Let us reconquer Grenada…!”
David says
There seems to be a misunderstanding. I never said to disengage from politics. I said we need to strongly differentiate between Caesar and God. Just because there is a precedent of Symphonia doesn’t mean it is a good thing for our era, necessarily. Saying that doesn’t make me a “liberal.” Different opinions exist in our Church (Possessors vs. Non-Possessors being a big one from Russian history).
“Christian Nationalism” is a spectrum of views. It’s a bogeyman term that Secularists use to demean those who do not compartmentalize their faith and actually vote in accordance with it.
It’s nonsense. But that doesn’t mean everything Moscow does is right, either. Patriarch Kyrill is the Patriarch of a multi-national Church, so him not caring about “international audiences” is just as myopic as the EP’s tone deaf Greek chauvinism.
Russky Mir is akin to Romiosini. A spiritual and cultural designation that has many threads. There are some who go beyond this, and that is troubling to me. Saying so doesn’t make me a “liberal.”
If God grants Russia the victory, it will be to His purpose alone. There are some haughty voices who are forgetting that.
Kingsnorth’s talk is a pointed criticism of Populist “Christianity” and Jordan Peterson style apologetics. I think the “Orthobro” thing is overblown, but it exists.
I am Orthodox. I will remain Orthodox. Being a John Dickenson or Tom Hagan (to use a Godfather reference) doesn’t make me against “the cause” (whatever that means).
George Michalopulos says
David, I think you’ve “threaded the needle” of the Orthodox view of symphonia perfectly. Now, if only it can find such an expression in real life, that would be wonderful!
Misha says
David,
I just get tired of those who assert that Pat. Kirill is committing heresy or doing something out of Orthodox character by supporting the Russian war effort in the Ukraine. The charge seems to be that he is making Russian Orthodoxy a vehicle for ethnic supremacy and expansionism and thus, in some way, is guilty of phyletism – or some such allegation.
I did an entire show on my channel, The Eurasian Century, on what I characterize as “militant Christianity”. My endeavor was to show that it wasn’t an alternative way of looking at the faith but rather the normative way that the faith has been practiced in Orthodox history. I’m working on making a book out of it but I’ve got a lot on my plate at this time, trying to revive the YT program as well.
To me, and to many, it is clear that we are witnessing a battle of light and darkness in the present East v. West conflict. In fact, the darkness is so evil that it has alienated entire civilizations that we might not ordinarily propose as being on the side of the angels. This is due to the deep, dark, bottomless evil of the western Atlanticist regime. They are hell bent on forcibly converting all humanity to their sick ideology.
In the midst of this conflict, Russia has taken a leading role, along with China. But Russia fought back first and therefore appears to be the flagship, though the enemy seems to at least feign more concern about China. The fact that the West is post-Christian and married to the ideology of Liberalism (which is anti-Christian) puts matters in starker relief. Moreover, the fact that Russia is experiencing a renaissance of Orthodox Christianity and, historically, has informally understood itself to be the “Third Rome”, only serves to clarify matters further.
The war has taken on the character of a Sacred War or holy war among Russians – a sort of minor repeat of the Great Patriotic War which was also called a Sacred War. This time it is the Banderite/Not-Z faction in Ukraine backed by the Fourth Reich (neo-cons and neo-libs) currently occupying Washington, DC. Given that Russia is fighting for the independence and survival of its unique spiritual culture against the onslaught of a godless, soulless ideology of materialism and perversion, “holy war” is not an inappropriate term. If Russia were to lose, it would eventually be subdued and broken up with Western ideology imposed by coercive force. Replacing swastikas with rainbow flags and the brown shirt night rallies with drag queen story hour does not make these thing less offensive or alien to Christians.
George Michalopulos says
Misha, I look forward to your book!
Misha says
It seems the dust has cleared to some extent and we’re getting a better idea of what the Oreshnik actually is and can do.
There are four or five different Russian missiles which have analogous features from which this or that analyst has claimed it derives. I think they are chasing their tails and it is a new missile or at least so different from any prior prototype that it might as well be.
Millenium 7, who is fairly accurate but sometimes gives the West too much credit, has reported that the Ukrainians actually believe it hit the ground at Mach 11.4 or so. My guess is that its cruising speed before descent is about Mach 12 and that due to its aerodynamics and the brief duration of its descent that it looses little velocity.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iL7Hb0fcpbU&t=43s
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mmYLEsAXAX0&t=781s
The name derives from the fact that it drops warheads in clusters of 6 – actually 6 sets of clusters of six. That is what you were seeing in the commonly shared footage of the strike. If you put a dark filter on the footage, you can see six sets of six individual warheads in a cluster coming in together. Hazelnut trees in Russia, when the nuts are developing, appear as a long thin cluster – just like a cluster of these projectiles.
As to damage, the only photo that has come out is of a crater within which you can see multiple underground floors destroyed. The Ukrainians have tight security around the site so reliable evidence is hard to come by, but anecdotal reports from those living in the general vicinity say the entire one square mile area of the munitions plant was reduced to dust and small rubble. Evidently, it penetrated deep and destroyed everything four floors down underground.
Again, this is what you’d expect from a tactical nuke, minus the fireball, fallout and radiation.
The US had thirty minutes prior warning before launch and they didn’t even try to intercept it.
The Russians have some number more of these and they are putting them in general production.
I don’t believe the Biden Regime has any idea what to do about this situation. They are certainly not behaving as if they did. If they had not pushed forward with strikes deep into Russian territory, Putin never would have had to demonstrate this capacity. God knows what else they have.
It’s time to quit digging.
This thing upsets the balance of terror and turns MAD on its head. MAD simply results in the situation where nuclear powers will not launch on other nuclear powers in order to avoid mutual destruction. This can deliver strikes equivalent in damage to tactical nukes while not incurring a nuclear counterstrike out of fear of MAD. You can’t intercept it and, unless you are willing to be the first one to risk using nuclear weapons, you can’t effectively retaliate or deter it.
The thing is, you can’t un-ring this bell. The best, it seems, the West can do is to pretend it didn’t happen or that it somehow doesn’t matter. I wouldn’t compare this to the Manhattan Project, as some have done, but it does “change everything”.
And so the US plowed on and staged several further strikes into Russia, and Russia has promised to retaliate. Conventional wisdom says they will strike something else important in the Ukraine – either a large weapons plant or the Kiev regime’s command and control. If that doesn’t deter further US/UK strikes then they will hit US/UK bases outside of Ukraine.
But honestly, they could take out downtown London if they wanted to and there wouldn’t be a damn thing the West could do about it except blow up the world.
Actually, it reminds me a little bit of the period between August 6 and August 9, 1945.
Brendan says
I am put in mind of August 1914 and its musical harbinger:
* Gustav Holst | Planet Suite No 1 | Mars, the Bringer of War *
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lB8F852qJsU
[Video – 07:21]
Whenever I hear these brutal dissonances, in my mind’s eye
I see old films of Prussian Generals in spiked helmets
and (always) Mackensen with his Hussar’s cap
and his curling handlebar moustaches,
and ask myself the question:
Will we suicide again?
Misha says
The entirety of the opposition to Christian Civilization, Christian Nationalism and to the “entanglement” of church and politics is wrongheaded and contrary to an Orthodox outlook.
It should go without saying that we believe in symphonia, the harmonious cooperation of Church and state. That has been our lived tradition going back to the beginning. St. Paul taught us to cooperate with the state which was established by God. And since the time of St. Constantine, the two have been “entangled” in Christendom up to this past murderous century when they became unentangled.
“Christian Civilization” is really the material expression of the Christian mindset or phronema. It is Liberalism that objects, for Liberalism is a jealous false god. It was only after Protestant Christians had been completely corrupted by the so-called “Enlightenment” that they could endorse separation of Church and state.
In the current conflict in the Ukraine, Russia just happens to be right. So there is no reason for Patriarch Kirill to rebuke President Putin. If he retreated from support for the Church or for a Christian Russia, then the patriarch would be right to rebuke him.
We are engaged in a great war for “civilization” against barbarism. But too many have their parties incorrectly identified and there is much confusion. The Banderites are the barbarians, and the Israelis and, frankly, the American political leadership. And currently, Washington DC is the focus of evil in the modern world.
Christianity (Russia), Confucianism (China), Hinduism (India) and Shiite Islam (Iran) have banded together with others in order to destroy this latest ideological heresy which has vexed the planet with mass murder on a scale unprecedented in human history – that being Enlightenment Liberalism and its progeny: Communism, Nazism and Western “Liberal Democracy”. And though we may have extensive theological conflicts with our allies, these are nothing compared to the soulless atheism of the enemy.
So disregard those who oppose our cause and those who say we should keep religion out of politics. I will be extremely charitable and simply state that they are deeply confused.
What Europe used to be . . . in a word . . . is Christendom.
And that is precisely what Russia is once again. That some oppose it says much more about the state of their souls than about Patriarch Kirill or Vladimir Putin.
Brendan says
“We are engaged in a great war for “civilization” against barbarism.”
The Scottish poet Hugh MacDiarmid addressed the matter thus:
TO NEARLY EVERYONE IN EUROPE TODAY
A war to save Civilisation, you say?
And what have you to do with it, pray?
Some attempt to acquire it would show truer love
Than fighting for something you know nothing of.
Brendan says
“We are engaged in a great war for “civilization” against barbarism.”
The Scottish poet Hugh MacDiarmid addressed the matter thus:
TO NEARLY EVERYONE IN EUROPE TODAY
A war to save Civilisation, you say?
And what have you to do with it, pray?
Some attempt to acquire it would show truer love
Than fighting for something you know nothing of.
Keep going to your wars, you fools, as of yore.
I’m the Civilisation that you’re fighting for!
Brendan says
* French TV channel fined €100k for accurately stating
abortion is world’s leading cause of death *
https://www.lifesitenews.com/news/french-tv-channel-fined-e100k-for-accurately-stating-abortion-is-worlds-leading-cause-of-death/?utm_source=more_news&utm_campaign=usa
‘ French TV channel CNEWS has been fined 100,000 euros for accurately stating that abortion is the leading cause of death worldwide after the nation’s media regulator decided that ‘abortion cannot be presented as a cause of death. … ‘
David says
George,
I agree totally that “Woke” ideology is destructive and anti-Christian. I am glad that Kamala Harris lost. But, as you note, it doesn’t necessarily mean Trump is great. A lot of Trump voters this time around were anti-Harris votes, not necessarily votes FOR Trump. The Republicans don’t seem to have the humility to take that to heart. The Libertarian-Populist “wing” of the Party is ascendant, so where does that leave Christians going forward?
As we know, “elders” are not infallible. I recall the famous example of St. Porphyrios rebuking St. Paisios (and other “elders” speaking of apocalyptic prophecies). St. Ambrose of Optina once gave advice to a merchant that turned out to be wrong, prompting the Saint to lament how the people come to him as a “guru” and not for repentance. Elders (and Saints) are human, and subject to mistakes.
The Lord has allowed all of this to happen. So, in that sense, Russia is acting according to God’s will. If Russia has a “special destiny,” that is something that hindsight and humility will reveal, not jingoistic pronouncements.
Is the Moscow Patriarchate the conscience of Russia or a chaplaincy for its national interests? Would Patriarch Kyrill rebuke Putin, as Patriarch Pavle did to Milosevic?
I think for us (Orthodox), that is the great challenge of our time: To disentangle ethnopolitics from our ecclesial space, and discern which is which (and act accordingly). The lines are dangerously blurred.
Paul Kingsnorth gave an excellent talk on “Civilizational Christianity,” and how it has taken on the form of an ideology on the Right. He sees this as very dangerous long-term.
Paul Kingsnorth: “Against Christian Civilization” | 2024 Erasmus Lecture
I fear Christians in America (and Russia) are falling into a trap. Satan can wear purple hair or a cassock in equal measure.
Brendan says
* Why the United States Will Lose a War with Russia *
https://www.unz.com/mwhitney/why-the-united-states-will-lose-a-war-with-russia/
‘ … If the United States launches a nuclear “decapitation” strike on Russia that kills President Putin and his Generals, Russia has a backup system in place that will automatically retaliate. The Dead Hand system is designed to collect data from sensors scattered across Russia on radiation, heat and seismic activity confirming a nuclear strike. If the system does not receive instructions from Moscow’s Command Center with a given period of time, the system will autonomously launch 4,000 tactical and strategic intercontinental ballistic missiles at the United States ensuring the complete destruction of the country and the incineration of hundreds of millions of Americans. Moscow’s message is simple: “Even if a preemptive strike takes out our leaders, our ‘dead hand’ will still kill you all.” Dead Hand, Planet Report … ‘
Russia’s *Dead Hand* system:
https://x.com/PlanetReportHQ/status/1858832772606902578?mx=2
[Video – -1:00]
Looks like Kubrik had the rights of it…
* Dr Strangelove, or: How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Bomb *
https://archive.org/details/dr-strangelove-or-how-i-learned-to-stop-worrying-and-love-the-bomb
[Video – 01:34:58]
Oh, and Happy Thanksgiving!
David says
“A very special period.” Language like this is an instant red flag for me. I repudiated American exceptionalism in all of its forms, so why would I sign on for the Russian version, just because it’s adorned with Icons and the Russian equivalent of Norman Rockwell paintings?
Yes, they condemn Western depravity. So do Islamic Jihadis. Yes, they build Churches and Monasteries. Ivan the Terrible built Churches and Monasteries, too. I contrast Patriarch Kyrill’s statements with Patriarch Pavle of Serbia, who said that he would rather see Serbia fall than the Gospel be forsaken. Would His Holiness Kyrill ever say that about Russia?
I am not anti-Russian. NATO is playing terrible games with dire consequences. BUT, that doesn’t mean I’m on board with Russian messianism either. Satan can tempt from “the Right” as well as “the Left.” He could simply say that Russia is defending itself (which is arguable), but he has taken it too far with this “special destiny” language.
George Michalopulos says
Good points, David. Your insights are worth considering.
That said, I do believe (as do many Church Elders) that Russia’s role in the world at present (how shall I put this?) “special”.
We forget that in two iterations –against Napoleon then Hitler–it was the Russians who saved the world. Now that the West has fallen into depravity, is it too difficult to imagine that the Global South, the traditionalist peoples of the earth (what we used to call “normal”) are looking to Russia to protect them from our depredations?
I could be wrong. I could also be wrong about Trump and how his resounding victory signals a return to normalcy. But look at it this way, under the Democrats/Uniparty that aligned behind Kamala vs Trumpists, we had a choice: with Kamala we were playing Russian roulette with all six chambers loaded, with Trump one chamber was loaded. Under the latter, things could go horribly wrong. Under the former scenario, things would go horribly wrong.
Already foreign leaders are starting to dance to Trump’s tune. He forced Mexico to stop the incoming caravans by threatening tariffs. Hamas has asked for a ceasefire. Israel has signed off on a ceasefire with Hezbollah.
Overtures between Iran and the United States are ongoing.
One could say that “peace is breaking out all over”. (Well, except for Biden who continues to poke the Russian bear but that’s a story for another day.)
George_S says
[QUOTE]BUT, that doesn’t mean I’m on board with Russian messianism either. Satan can tempt from “the Right” as well as “the Left.” He could simply say that Russia is defending itself (which is arguable), but he has taken it too far with this “special destiny” language.[/QUOTE]
Speaking as one with Russian roots, the Russian people don’t by and large see themselves in any messianical context, anymore than Greeks (save, as usual, for certain extreme thinking individuals in both camps).
Back in the Soviet times the generation of Russian infantrymen who fought the Nazis were quite different than those in the tsarist army, having grown up under a secular atheist government that was built on class struggle. That doesn’t of course lessen their sacrifice, and it was in fact thanks to the war that a large number of people came to faith.
The facts simply speak to the reality that Russia, as a large geopolitical force, is the only European nation with enough strength and fortitude to tackle the globalist ideological behemoth out there which has already swallowed most of Europe. Perhaps it is somewhat ironic being that Russia itself was once the epicenter of world communism, another force of evil in my view. But a lot has changed over the past near 40 years, one can clearly say there has been a role reversal.
One cannot make the same argument for Islamists, who have by and large stayed very much the same in their fundamental beliefs.
Russians may not be the most churchgoing people out there, but the general moral compass is much more focused on the institution of family which is what the Christian life is all about. Even the Russian left has abandoned by and large its opposition to religion. Sure, you say, Islamists are also family oriented and resent secularist social mores like LGBT and gender bending. But Islamists also have many distinct incompatibilities with Christian morals, otherwise they wouldn’t be who they are. Even a secular Russian who grew up under the Soviet system has a much closer value system to Orthodox Christianity than a Muslim, with the exception of those who have wilfully embraced western secularism in place of the Soviet.
I don’t want to go further into the direction of internal political analysis, but suffice it to say that Putin is no Ivan the Terrible (though Ivan, if we compare him to the Ottomans and even post-Attaturk Turkey, would be quite a docile ruler by comparison). There are many Russians who criticize Putin for being too pro-western and insufficiently decisive with responding to western provocation.
Finally, what concerns patriarch Kirill’s statement, don’t forget he is the patriarch of the Russian people. He speaks to their ears, he is not some Desmond Tutu figure who cares first about an international audience.
Brendan says
The classic description of the British Islanders runs thus:
The Irish don’t know that they want but will fight anyone to get it.
The Welsh pray on their knees and prey upon their neighbours.
The Scots will keep the Sabbath and anything else they can get.
The English, a race of self-made men, saved the Lord the trouble.
As always, there is some truth in such broad brush strokes.
But for every one to whom the description fits,
I can find ten to whom it doesn’t,
some of the time…
🙂
George Michalopulos says
😅😝😜
George Michalopulos says
George S, FWIW Ivan the terrible killled fewer people than Henry VIII of England
Ben says
Sorry for the off-topic post, but I wasn’t sure where else to put this.
I’ve recently tried to find an article I had read on Monomakhos years ago, and had managed to find it on the Wayback Machine (internet archive.org).
I’m not too skilled with computers, but I imagine it should be easy enough to copy-paste those old articles into new entries which are simply backdated:
If it seems like too much of a bother, I understand. Still wanted to make the suggestion, or at least let others know where they can read old articles.
Brendan says
Russia is NOT Europe as Europe has become:
* A transvestite police officer drugged and sexually abused two of his colleagues *
https://www-pronews-gr.translate.goog/kosmos/verolino-trans-astynomikos-narkose-kai-kakopoiise-seksoualika-dyo-synadelfous-tis/?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=en
* She had been elected deputy “women’s representative” (!) in the police *
‘ Judy S., 27, has been suspended since allegations emerged that she took two male co-workers to her apartment to take drugs and have sex before assaulting them.
The men reported suffering serious injuries to their genitals from the attack, German newspaper Bild reported.
Judy S. had recently run for deputy women’s representative in the Berlin police and the results of the election were announced after her suspension.
The transgender policeman received 638 votes, winning the second place as “deputy representative of women”!!!
She now has at least a week to accept the election and take up her new role and will be appointed if the first deputy cannot attend.
Judy S. is the first transvestite to run for the position within the Berlin force, but her colleagues are now concerned that she did not disclose her gender identity change during the election.
“It would have been fair if he had spoken openly about it. How should I, as a woman, talk to a female born male about my period or menopausal issues? He can’t understand this at all ,” said the policeman.
Police raided Judy S.’s home in Berlin on Nov. 11 after the two men, anonymously, reported the incident to police and filed a lawsuit. They claimed they were drugged and sexually assaulted in the apartment, police reported Nov. 12.
Police later reported finding cocaine in the apartment of transvestite Judy S.
A Berlin police spokesman said no further details could be released, citing privacy concerns. ‘
She is not a real woman,
but she is a Deputy…
Brendan says
Pray that Putin’s patience holds…
* Paul Craig Roberts: The Utter and Total Insanity of Western “Leadership” *
https://www.lewrockwell.com/2024/11/paul-craig-roberts/the-utter-and-total-insanity-of-western-leadership/
‘ Since my strong warning of the stupidity and insanity of Western leaders who are without any doubt driving the world to nuclear Armageddon, the hyper dangerous situation has further deteriorated. While we all look forward to Thanksgiving holiday, the leadership of the Western world is setting us up for death.
The insanity of the West is so extreme as to be incomprehensible. Not satisfied by taking the US and Europe to war with Russia by firing missiles into Russia, the NATO military committee is openly discussing preemptive missile strikes on Russia. This is extraordinary. At the present moment it is only Putin’s patience that stands between life and death on planet Earth. Putin is willing to tolerate the West’s provocations in the face of his clear warning until Trump assumes the presidency and indicates whether a mutual security agreement between the US and Russia is possible.
With life on earth dependent on Putin’s patience with the West, what does the West do? The NATO Military Committee openly discusses a preemptive attack on Russia. To be effective, the attack would have to be nuclear.
Admiral Rob Bauer, the insane fool who is head of the NATO military committee, said publicly that NATO has changed its attitude and is no longer the defense organization that its charter defines it to be. It has become a first strike force. Here are his words: “It is more competent not to wait, but to hit launchers in Russia in case Russia attacks us. A combination of precision strikes is needed that will disable the systems that are used to attack us, and we must strike first.”
If not insanity, it is the triumph of evil that the West tells Putin, whose patience is the only guarantor of avoidance of nuclear war, that NATO is considering preemptive strikes on Russia. … ‘