NATO Continues Its Advance: Top Russian Experts Agree That Post-Soviet Space is Under Threat

— It's open secret that the West is trying to deceive Russia. NATO's inability to counter Russia's mythical aggression generates hysteria. It becomes the pretext to fund the Alliance and move its forces to our borders. NATO cannot come up with any other ways to fight Russia, but OPCW can. The UK has developed a plan, which is not only used by the OPCW to investigate incidents similar to those in Syria and Salisbury but which the UK itself will use to determine who's guilty. Basically, they want to turn a technical organization into a political struggle tool.

Semyon Arkadyevich, you have a wise opinion about our enemies' actions. I suppose you know what they're driving at.

 

Semyon Bagdasarov, Director of the Central Asian and Middle Eastern Affairs Center: We've said many times that NATO is a serious military and political structure, which we sometimes underestimate and mock at, saying Europe supposedly has road issues, since it took them 3 days to transport something from Georgia to Germany. Anyway, it's a serious establishment, and their main task is to pressure Russia and to achieve its disintegration and destruction in conjunction with other measures. We saw the same thing with the USSR. I remember that euphoria when we had to work with high-profile officials. They were certain nothing would happen since we had great Army and secret services. Underestimating anyone is dangerous, so now we need several measures to neutralize this phenomenon.

We already see NATO gaining ground in the former Soviet Union. I'm not talking about the Baltic countries, I'm talking about South Caucasus, Middle East, Ukraine, Moldova, and others. We must get a grip on reality and call a spade a spade. For some reason, we're often embarrassed to say certain things. Last time I spoke about a certain country on the Caspian Sea, which offers its harbors for the US logistics needs. Just think about it, our CSTO ally offers the US its harbors for logistics, so that the US could ship some supplies to its soldiers in Afghanistan, and there are only about 12,000-13,000 of them, 10,000 Americans, the rest are from other countries. Through Turkey and South Caucasus via the Caspian Sea, to Uzbekistan, Central Asia, and so on. Alright, when contingent was big, we were stupid enough to provide them with logistics. But, the current contingent is much smaller, and it can get supplies through the territory of the US traditional ally, basically. Sure, Pakistan has its own issues, but going through the Khyber Pass isn't that hard. But no, such gimmicks, pardon the expression, exist for a reason. They do it deliberately to gain a foothold in the strategically crucial Caspian region, where the oil-and-gas stream originates towards the Middle East, South Caucasus, and Turkey, and they want to control this process. Meanwhile, we concluded many agreements with our allies regarding the Caspian Sea, and none of them allows the presence of non-member countries. But, we remain silent.

— It is directly prohibited.

— Where's a statement by our MFA? We're afraid to insult a well-respected man. And this well-respected man has been leaning to the US, frankly. Either we play hardball to protect our interests, or we'll get bent over like idiots. I meant we'd be bullied.

Viktor Murakhovsky, Editor-In-Chief of Arsenal Otechestva (Domestic Arsenal): As for the Russian threat, it's never militarized in the strategic North-West. The forces that are currently there are modernized with new-generation equipment and weapons. However, their size has remained the same for many years. Thus, this bane of the Russian threat is carried to the extreme by the Western media to justify their own expenses.

— Wait for your turn.

Semyon Bagdasarov: Alright.

— Are you both Colonels?

— Yes, we are. That's why I paused. Now, about the Baltic having 3 teams.

— Perhaps, even 4 Colonels.

— I remind you of 1991 when Americans deployed their troops in Kuwait for an operation against Iraq. They only needed 2-3 months to deliver enough armored vehicles and equipment to Kuwait.

Viktor Murakhovsky: They took 2 divisions from Europe.

Semyon Bagdasarov: Where are Europe, America, and Kuwait? They can easily deliver all the necessities to the Baltic region using European logistics. There's no need to make a fool out of anyone. That was my first point. Americans work rather cynically. They say there are no Americans or NATO in Iraq, Syria, or Afghanistan. But they have the temporary Coalition embracing NATO countries and a few other idiots — some former Soviet states. That's it, it's not NATO, it's the Coalition. They're tricking us. These are all the same countries with the same agreements. At some point, they said that it was the UN planning the operations in Afghanistan under NATO auspices, as if NATO was a global structure that undertook this operation. At the same time, we should learn cynicism from them. For instance, there's the TAPI project, which is the Turkmenistan–Afghanistan–Pakistan–India Pipeline. They said it'd never work because of the war in Afghanistan. They agreed with the Taliban that it would guard a certain part of this pipeline. Cohen is often here, asking whom they are supporting. And you, who are you cutting deals with? You're paying a Taliban fraction to guard your pipeline. This shows an incredible level of cynicism, we must learn how to do that. I've always wondered why we're somewhat afraid to work with Taliban, for example. Americans accuse us of supplying weapons to Taliban. Show us a single weapon system, you have great intelligence, but you have nothing on us. I think we should invite all Taliban fraction leaders to Moscow for negotiations. We'll say, "Guys, we don't care about Afghanistan's internal affairs. You must destroy all the Central Asian terrorist groups and the Islamic State, and we'll repay you by helping you. We'll help you fight terrorism!" Why don't we do that?

— Semyon Arkadyevich.

— It's clear that Syria is the main ground where they can stage the so-called chemical attacks. Currently, we can also see the new stage of active combat in Syria. It looks like there's some arrangement with Israel because the Syrian Government Forces are attacking backed by our Air Force, the so-called Southern Front of the Free Syrian Army. Everything is going well there so far. However, there's another division in the North-East controlled by the US. Tomorrow, it might provoke something to begin active combat against Assad. Assad has already said twice that they must free North Syria. He means the North-East and the part of the North-West occupied by Turkey. Well, we must act as well. How many times have we heard that the CSTO will send their divisions there to take measures? This is where we may learn something from the US, they use everyone, including our allies. Why aren't they there? Should we confront them, demanding to at least pretend to be there? Let Belarus participate with a couple of planes, let Armenia or Tajikistan go there with squadrons. We have a unique opportunity to push the US aside there. There's great disruption among the Syrian Kurds, the self-defense formations of the DUP specifically. They're ready to negotiate with Assad on his terms because Americans want to give them up to the Turks. Then let's pursue this further, tell them they will be given up to the Turks, this is the time, they will be given up today. Perhaps, we can use this disruption to take control over part of the North-East.

Viktor Murakhovsky: Semyon Arkadyevich has moved on to planning an actual operation.

— Yes, Semyon Arkadyevich will teach them to do it.

— I will disagree that we should learn cynicism as you should never learn anything bad. Although, we should be way more pragmatic in our actions. If the OPCW is being turned into a political tool, perhaps we should suspend our participation until it resumes normal operation process, until certain changes are made as mentioned by my colleague. I remind you that we were rather practical when we stopped participating in the CFE, or the Treaty on Conventional Armed Forces in Europe. The West, represented mainly by NATO, refused to make concessions. However, I believe its time for us to either stop completely or exit the Vienna Document which significantly limits the deployment of our Europe-based forces and the scale of our exercises, forcing us to inform our "partners" about any movements of our troops that exceed the said restrictions. We can suspend The Treaty on Open Skies. Why do we need NATO planes with their intelligence equipment over our heads?

— Who needs The Treaty on Open Skies when we have satellites constellation?

— There were times when it was necessary.

— At this point, it's ridiculous.

— Well, air reconnaissance has equipment that allows making more detailed shots. Satellite can't do it yet.

— There are millions of other ways to do that. They are even more effective.

— This agreement is controversial. Vladimir, this agreement is very symbolic.

— I understand that.

— That's why we stick to it.

— We now all have camera phones. Intelligence has great tools at their disposal, there's no need for the planes anymore.

— The next is the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty. In a military sense, it's absolutely useless, even harmful for Russia right now, thus we must quit it.

— We need to revisit our agreements with the West.

— Exactly. We need to be pragmatic, ensuring that our partners comply with these agreements.

— Do you have a napkin by any chance?

— Not on me.

— We could map out Europe on a napkin, just like Stalin and his allies. We could do that.—We'd be, like, “this is for you, for you, and for me. This is all for me.”

— Right. We must revisit the agreements and treaties that, first of all, jeopardize our military security and our national defense. We need to decide whether to quit them or to suspend our participation until our partners are willing to make concessions and alter the said agreements to comply with reality.

Jakub Korejba, Polish political expert: You talk so much about cynicism, but it's not like you're never pragmatic. So, when you do Geschäft with anyone, it's tzimmes, but you frown upon us doing the same. You can't do that, that's double standards.

— Which of us is a Jew and which one is a Pole? You're using my signature phrases.