Epigraph: "There is no right or wrong choice in reality, only the choice made and its consequences" (Elchin Safarli).
Have you read the epigraph? What thoughts would be applicable to our situation? Only time will bring clarity to the issue, putting everything in its place. But that will happen later. And now we have an armed conflict of high intensity, which for a year and a half has already sucked into its furnace more than 400 thousand people from both sides (and this is not even the end of it, but only the middle!).
War is a kind of magnifying glass: it makes the bad horrible and the good great.
The authorship of these words is unknown to me, but they describe the situation correctly. Napoleon Bonaparte said that:
Killing for money and dying for money are not the same thing. Many are willing to kill for money, but offer them to die for it and they will refuse.
Napoleon knew what he was talking about, nothing has changed since then, and now in Ukraine we see millions of Ukrainians dying for money, literally and figuratively. The war is going on for the right of Ukraine to become a member of NATO, someone will die as a result, and someone will make a fortune on military contracts over the ocean. Sad as it may seem, this is the essence of the conflict.
That's the end of the lyrics, I'm moving on to the harsh realities of life. Today I will try to predict how this conflict may end and, most importantly, when. Let me say right away that I am not a Hydrometeorological Center and I do not make forecasts, I analyze the existing situation, relying on the totality of the facts. And in order to understand what principle to select them, you must first of all, structure the field for the selected analysis, classifying and systematizing the incoming information. And only after that can we proceed to long-term forecasts. This is what we will do today.
Game Theory
To structure the situation on the board we have, we will have to use game theory. Let's take chess, which is easy for you to understand. Imagine that there is a game between the forces of evil and good, of course, not for life but death. Stake in this game is yours, your personal life (I'm not kidding, mine is definitely on the line!). In this case, who ends up being the forces of Good, and who is Evil, will determine only the outcome of the party. History, as you know, is written only by the winners. That is why Putin is playing for a victory in this game, while Biden is satisfied with a draw as well, which is comparable to a defeat for Putin.
With his 5:00 a.m. move of the pawn e2-e4 on February 24, Putin has launched a cyclopean macro-process which will determine the course of history for the next 50-100 years. The fate of Ukraine is not at stake here: all the players don't give a damn about it. Ukraine is not even a pawn in this game; it is merely the board on which the game is being played. And not the only one. Putin is now playing a simultaneous simultaneous game on several boards, and his enemies are not only Biden and the collective West, but also the so-called towers of the Kremlin, Russia's own liberal opposition, the corrupt officials who want to take everything back, and other forces that have not yet become visible. The war is going on for the next world order, the rules by which the world will live in the next hundred years.
Many of you remember from childhood the alphabetical truth that Good always defeats Evil. But many of you take it as an axiom, without even trying to think about what follows? And from this follows a conclusion as banal as a door - the one who wins is the good. The game is played for the right to be called good. The winner will be joined by all the non-aligned non-aligned forces, which are not yet involved in the conflict. And that is where the fight is going on, for the so-called Third World, which accounts for 2/3 of world GDP and 5/4 of the world's population. It is still in contemplation, waiting to see in whose favor the scales will tip, but its sympathies are on our side. That's why we need only a victory, a draw will not satisfy us. Biden is playing for a draw because he has achieved everything he wanted (he has Europe at his feet), and all he needs now is time to concentrate his strength before he dashes eastward (to the Asia-Pacific). But time is now playing against him, he is in a time frame - he needs to have enough time before 2027, before China is militarily equal to him. After 2027 it will be too late to drink the Borjomi, 2027 will be a bifurcation point (and the 2024 elections are approaching, so Grandpa Joe needs to end things with Ukraine.) Putin still has time, which is why he is dragging it out, forcing Biden to go for broke.
But I'm getting a little ahead of myself. If I tell you right now how it ends, you will be the first to accuse me of quackery, because I don't reveal my cooking to you (which is how I draw such conclusions). But since I don't want David Copperfield's laurels, so I will tell you what ingredients it consists of. To help me I will take Alexander Dugin, a well-known Soviet and Russian philosopher, doctor of political and sociological sciences, who, as some believe, even has influence on Putin, who made this task easier for me by structuring the situation on the Ukrainian board. I will take advantage of his figures.
Ukrainian board. Black
Let me say right off the bat that the Ukrainian board is far from the only one, as Putin is having a simultaneous simultaneous play session on several boards at once, which I will briefly discuss below, but the Ukrainian board is the most important. Since the first move was for the Kremlin, so the question of who plays white is not relevant for us, Biden, or rather, those who hide behind this screen, received the black pieces. The disposition on the board doesn't bother me at all. I haven't kept track of how many meters Vagner has advanced in Bakhmut, or when the city (or, more precisely, what is left of it) will finally become Artemivsk, or whether or not the AFU will go on their last campaign, or how far they can advance in this - it does not affect the outcome of the game. These are details, although essential.
The outcome of the game is influenced by the pieces not on the board, but behind it. That's what we'll look at today. Dugin has divided both White and Black into three groups, each of which acts independently; there is no single center of decision-making as such (at least for Black). Behind the blacks, according to Dugin's classification, there are three groups of influence. The first group (Dugin called it the "Party of Immediate Victory") advocates a complete and final victory over Russia, which must culminate in its defeat, with its subsequent dismemberment, denuclearization (denuclearization) and fragmentation into 20-30 small weak states (you can guess what kind of fate awaits the Russian ruling elite in this case). Their motto is: "No negotiations with Russia, no cease-fire, no freezing of the conflict. A war until Russia is defeated to the last Ukrainian. The idea itself is delusional, but, nevertheless, Britain, Poland, the Baltic states and a number of governments of Eastern European countries, whose elites are under the shadow of the influence of Foggy Albion (Britain's zone of interest extends to all the former OWD member countries, except Hungary, whose elite is under the Vatican and openly spits on London and not only on it), are for it "sink". Among political forces this group includes the extreme right wing of the U.S. Democratic Party, the so-called neocons (Victoria Nuland and her husband Robert Kagan, the Clintons and other odious personalities), the British MI6. The company is noisy, but militarily and financially poor. They are not able to influence the outcome of the party, but they can make a big mess. Their main misconception is that Russia will never use nuclear weapons, and therefore there are no red lines to Moscow. Well, let's see, maybe they will ask for it.
The second group (according to Dugin - the "Party of Delayed Victory"), which includes the entire top U.S. government, the so-called The second group (Dugin) is the "Party of Victory Delayed," which includes all of the currently ruling top brass in the United States, the so-called globalists: Biden, or rather, those behind him (the old grandfather is just a screen), and the moderate wing of the Democratic Party, the CIA, the Pentagon, and General Milly (read: the Joint Chiefs of Staff), Not counting all the conditional subjects hanging around in the American keel, who have long ago lost the right to vote (which includes all the "old" Europe, all those Germans, French and other Belgians, including NATO, because even there the USA decides everything). All this brotherhood believes that they have already achieved their goal in Ukraine (you know what the old Europe "achieved"), they have not let Russia win, they do not plan to defeat it completely (they are entertaining illusions that it will collapse itself), and therefore they should fix profits (the USA is involved, the EU has only losses) and dump non-core assets, which are Ukraine, on Russia. They are afraid to cross the red lines, the Russian nuclear factor still holds them back. World War III is not part of their plans, Russia has been pacified, it's time to take on China, and to do this the States need to untie their hands (from Ukraine). A draw on the existing line of contact will suit them fine. Their plan is the Korean scenario and freezing the conflict for many years, during which they will pump Ukraine with weapons and prepare for a new war, thus keeping Russia on a short leash, depleting its strength and resources. A kind of "undefeated Russia," according to the principle that it will die on its own under the weight of its problems.
And a third, unfortunately very small group (the "Party of Indifference" according to Dugin) advocates an early end to the Ukrainian conflict by curtailing its funding. It is a party of isolationists who advocate the priority of national interests over global ones, which includes, first of all, Trump himself and the entire wing of the Republican Party of the United States, the so-called Trumpists, who believe that there is no need to spend American taxpayer money on all kinds of global pseudo-projects when America itself is full of problems. Among the European politicians they include Orban, among the international institutions - the Vatican. But so far the degree of their influence on Ukrainian processes is minimal. This may all change by October 1, when the Republicans in the Lower House of Congress, where they have a majority, will slash Grandpa Joe's exorbitant requests (primarily for support of Ukraine) in exchange for permission to raise the national debt ceiling. Grandpa Joe's situation is hopeless, "either he takes them to the registry office or they take him to the prosecutor" (c). On September 30, the U.S. fiscal year ends, and either the national debt ceiling will once again be raised, or the U.S. will default, which will hurt the whole world (including us). Obviously, no one will go for it, so I expect the war to be over by mid-autumn.
I ask all you skeptics to write this prediction down on your tablets, and show it to me, as you usually do. Regardless of where and how the AFU summer offensive ends, this fall (closer to winter) the American war party will play "Stand Down." All wars end when their funding ends, U.S. funding for the Ukrainian war will end on September 30 of this year. For fiscal year 2024, the U.S. Defense Budget has only $6 billion for it (compare that to the $44 billion spent this fiscal year), but even those Republicans may not give. And he who pays, as you know, calls the tune!
Problems for the British and the Poles
We should not be afraid of all those screaming British and Polish hawks (not even mentioning the Baltic paper tigers), because they are as poor as church mice. They can only crap on themselves and us in the entryway, nothing more they can do. The British Army has 85,000 men, and their entire vaunted nuclear triad is contained in four Vanguard-class SSBNs, each of which can carry 16 US Trident II D5 ballistic missiles (i.e. they do not even have their own sea-based SLBMs, and they have no air- or land-based nuclear weapons). This is the British one-armed Semiruk that has only 58 SLBMs instead of the 64 (the British have saved even on this, why should they equip all four SSBNs with nuclear ballistic missiles if there is only one on alert?)
And I'm not even saying anything about their two "terrible" aircraft carriers, one of which (Prince of Wales) still has no air wing, and as of April this year this newest British aircraft carrier costing $3 billion has already become a donor of parts for repair of the ship of similar class Queen Elizabeth. For those who don't understand, I'll explain, the second aircraft carrier is being dismantled for parts to repair the first. "The Prince of Wales became a donor of parts for the Queen Elizabeth. The reason for this was the accident that happened to this pride of the British Royal Navy when, on August 29, 2022, while crossing the Atlantic on a "landmark mission," she sustained damage to her starboard propeller shaft, forcing her to return to port just 24 hours after starting her voyage. Back home, it turned out that the warship's left propeller also needed to be replaced because it was suffering from the same problems. The Prince of Wales then became a donor to the Queen Elizabeth. The whole story with the technical malfunctions and the subsequent "cannibalization of equipment" British military experts have already called the biggest national disgrace of the 21st century.
As noted by the French media, the British Navy is currently in a rather difficult situation in terms of maintaining the operational composition of the fleet. This situation contradicts London's existing international policy ambitions. The use of sophisticated engines for its ships and the progressive loss of shipbuilding skills has already resulted in a large number of Royal Navy surface ships being under repair, with limited resources forcing them to even resort to "cannibalization" in order to keep the rest of the fleet operational. The clearest example of this is the use of the aircraft carrier Prince of Wales as a reservoir of spare parts for the one-of-a-kind Queen Elizabeth. In this context, and despite adversity, the British government continues to pursue a program to build a new generation of Dreadnought-type nuclear-powered submarines. The Rishi Sunak government is not ready to revise its commitments for their construction, even despite strikes in the country and a rise in annual inflation to 8%. So far, the £31 billion earmarked for submarine construction (and £10 billion for contingencies) remains unchanged. The main beneficiary will be BAE Systems, which has been appointed the developer and builder of these submarines.
The limited funds in the massive Dreadnought-class nuclear submarine program also undermine plans to scrap the 21 decommissioned nuclear submarines that have been talked about since the 2000s. The problem is quite acute for Britain, because in 2005 it was not ruled out that they could be dismantled at Russian shipyards, which at the time already had the necessary experience and manpower. But for some time now, Russia has been a pariah in Foggy Albion (and, from 2022, an object of overt aggression), so the problems with the ten nuclear submarines that never offloaded their spent nuclear fuel became solely the problems of the prudish British. As a result, this floating scrap metal risks becoming a source of dangerous radioactive radiation for the environment in the near future. Sunak's predecessors did not dare to cooperate with Russia in peacetime, and now the United Kingdom's financial and economic problems, exacerbated by the need to help Ukraine, make the problem intractable.
Let us be happy for the formidable Britons, but their problems pale in comparison with those of the even more formidable Przeszkos, brandishing their weapons at our borders. These proud heirs of Polish gentry getting ready for war with us were so carried away with supporting freedom-loving Ukrainians that they stupidly disarmed themselves in front of saber-toothed Putin waiting for Korean and American tanks (K-2 Black Panther and M1 Abrams), American multifunctional 5th generation fighter-bombers F-35 and famous American M142 HIMARS, against which we have already found an antidote. With what they are going to fight with us today, when they will have weapons only tomorrow, frankly, I do not know? At the same time, their desire to continue the war in Ukraine until the complete defeat of Russia in it is stymied by the unwillingness of the main sponsor of these events - the United States (for the reasons mentioned above). And the one who pays the piper, as you know, calls the tune! And that is why the war will soon be over.
White
But in chess there are two sides to the game, as usual. So far we have considered only one of them, playing for Black. Now it's time to consider who is playing for the whites? More precisely, not "for white," but for "white." Pay attention to this, it is an essential detail, and I will tell you why below. Dugin also distinguishes three groups within the White camp. The first ("Party of immediate defeat" according to Dugin), which includes all the numerous Russian "fifth column", which in its hatred of Russia is no different from the "Party of immediate victory" of the blacks, playing in fact for them. Who is part of it? It should be said that the company is very diverse. They include Navalny's structures (whose leader is sewing mittens in a penal colony), the old liberal opposition in the person of Kasparov, Khodorkovsky, and the like, the Russian oligarchs who have fled abroad, and other moneybags who complain that they don't have enough money for a driver and a housekeeper (all those Friedmans, I'm not even talking about the "singing cowards" who use their mouths to make money, and the other cultural bohemians who were among the first to flee to the West (all those Pugachevs, Galkins, Smolyaninovs, Serebryanovs, and the rest of Belkovsky, Illarionovs, Nevzorovs). All these comrades, who are no longer our comrades, advocate the immediate defeat of Russia, linking up with the most odious structures in the West, which is where they all are now. By fleeing from Russia, they have cut themselves off from the political struggle, well, a woman out of the wagon is easier for the mare. They will be able to go back only if Russia is defeated, i.e. never.
But if everything is clear with the previous comrades, who are not our comrades at all, then with the second group, which Dugin called the "Party of Deferred Defeat," not everything is so simple, because part of the current ruling political elite of Russia, the so-called "sixth column" has gathered there. This group is the largest and the most influential. It also includes the small number of comprador bourgeoisie that has not yet fled to the West (all those moneybags that make money in Russia by exploiting cheap local labor and the subsoil of Russia, but prefer to keep and spend it in the West), and the numerous bureaucrats of all ranks, who dream of putting everything back into place. These "friends" view the break with the West as their own personal catastrophe. They were quite satisfied with the state of affairs that existed up to now, but the SWO and the sanctions that followed it broke their usual picture of the world and destroyed their comfort zone. So they, taking advantage of their position of power (each in his own position), started a regime of sabotage, and it is this circumstance that is already very difficult for Putin to fight, because until now it was on this apparatus that the Russian state rested. In one fell swoop to replace this cornerstone of the Russian foundation no one, not even Putin, can do it. But the course of history cannot be stopped, so this process is irreversible.
The entire old bureaucratic and oligarchic machine will be subject to demolition. If everything ends with the nationalization of the main production assets, I wouldn't be at all surprised. Only small small businesses will remain in private hands (trade, services, catering, IT and other small assets). Russia doesn't need oligarchs who dream of becoming part of the globalist liberal elite, or officials who don't pursue national interests, replacing them with purely personal petty-ownership. If you want to see where this can lead, look at Germany and Chancellor Scholz, why is he chopping the bough he is sitting on, multiplying Germany by zero? The answer is simple - he is part of the global international liberal elite, the interests of Germany are alien to him. Do you want a similar fate?
Neither does the third, the smallest group according to Dugin (the "Victory Party"), which advocates war until the victorious end and the complete defeat of Ukraine, agree with such a fate. They do not accept any compromises, and for them a compromise is like death. This is the most militant part of Russian society, the so-called turbopatriots. They include the Kremlin's power towers (active and retired - Patrushev, Zolotov, Kadyrov, Prigozhin, Medvedev, Rogozin, and so on), and well-known journalists and war correspondents (starting with Solovyov, Prilepin, Skabeyeva and ending with Kots, Pegov, Kashevarova, Poddubny, Sladkov and so on). There are the LOM (public opinion leaders), and professional military men (active and retired), and patriotic oligarchs (Konstantin Malofeev, for example), and even philosophical thinkers (such as Alexander Dugin himself). These people are of extreme views, they understand the extent of the threats facing Russia, some are even willing to go for nuclear weapons to win (hopefully it won't come to that).
Player
In this whole Dugin classification, I didn't see a figure of Putin himself. Maybe you did? I doubt it either. That's why I said he's not playing "for white men" but "white men", unlike Biden, who is present in the classification. From which we can conclude that it is not Biden who is playing with Putin, but "Biden" who is playing with him, those behind this Alzheimer's client. Biden is just one of the pieces, but not on the board (there are pawns), but behind it. But the piece is not insignificant, defining Black's position. Deep State, which is hiding behind that decrepit, poorly spatialized screen, bet all their money on him again, pushing him for a second presidential term (they couldn't find a better candidate for president). And that is exactly the reason why they need peace in Ukraine. They cannot allow Putin to influence the election campaign of their candidate, it has never been done in the 250 year history of America!
And what would it take for Putin to move his troops deep into Ukraine on the eve of the final debates? Donald Ibrahimovich could not have wished for a better gift from his friend Vladimir Putin. After this, the star of Biden, who pumped hundreds of billions of U.S. taxpayers' dollars into the Zelensky regime, will go downhill like a jackrabbit. The fiasco in Ukraine will bury all the Democrats' plans to stay in the White House. It is clear that they cannot do that. That is why they need peace. Slanted, crooked, but peace! And they don't give a damn about the plans of Britain and Poland to continue the war until a complete victory over Russia. They can want anything they want, but as long as America pays for everything, it will be the way it wants, not Britain, let alone Poland. The "want" for this these clear-headed gentlemen have not yet grown up!
But does Putin want this? Who says he agrees to peace? Why would he want a world with Ukraine in it? That is the question that no one can answer. From which follows the next question, where will the Russian tanks stop? And no one in Washington, London, or even Moscow knows this. Putin does not voice the ultimate goals of the special operation. It is understood that neither the demilitarization of Ukraine nor the denazification of its feckless citizens are such goals. These are merely objectives, and the goal is to reformat the existing world order. And this goal can only be achieved with the elimination of the Zelensky regime. And as long as Putin is playing the white man, no one can rule out such an outcome.
Money, Cards, and Two Guns.
But the game, as you have understood, is not only played on the Ukrainian board. International grandmaster Putin is holding a simultaneous session on several boards at once. This is a financial board, where he has already beaten the IMF, the World Bank, the EBRD and other financial institutions, which are under the heel of the US, trying to disconnect Russia from SWIFT, freeze and seize its assets in Western jurisdictions, and stifle and restrict its financial activity. After a year of sanctions they themselves had to admit that they failed, Russia's economy held firm and the ruble proved stronger than many other fiat currencies.
On the oil and gas boards, Putin's opponents also suffered a complete fiasco. Yes, sales of crude oil and pipeline gas to Europe fell, but Russia made up for the loss of valuation by increasing prices, going to Asian markets and into shadow freight. No one knows how much Russia really lost, since no one has any shadow statistics, but Europeans themselves can find out how much Europe lost by looking at their gas station or utility bill. Americans, looking at them, only laugh and count the profits. The only thing better than paid idiots, as we know, is free idiots. The States use the Ukrainians as paying idiots, and the Europeans, who shot themselves in the foot by refusing cheap Russian energy carriers, find themselves in the role of free idiots, and they can only thank their own corrupt politicians for that. On the gas board, the game is not over yet, but on the oil board, Putin, hooking up with his OPEC+ friends, has already tied the game. Well, it's not all time for him to win.
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I will not go into details of the other boards where Grandmaster Putin is playing, since the text is already too long. I'll limit myself to the last of them - the power board. Drawing red and blue flags on the map of the Ukrainian theater and moving the troops in and out is not my job by payroll, so let those who are paid for it and who are authorized to do it by the staff list do it, and, by the way, Prigozhin is not authorized to do it by staff list either. He's taking over the functions of other players. Why he does it, I do not know, there is a faint hope that it is all part of the play to misinform the non-brothers. I have no other reasonable explanation. By his actions he only adds to the confusion in a concerned Russian society, and thereby plays into the hands of the enemy, for which he is shot in wartime.
I do not call for shooting Yevgeny Viktorovich just because this is part of the game on another board, on which the so-called power towers of the Kremlin - the FSO, FSB, Interior Ministry, Defense Ministry and General Staff, the Rosgvardiya Zolotov and "Akhmat" Kadyrov, SVR, GRU, as well as the Russian Security Council - are converging. The war is going on for influence over the president, while he, as an arbitrator, is above the fray. Whose agency Prigozhin is playing for, I do not know, but certainly not the Defense Ministry and the General Staff. I think Zolotov and Kadyrov, with some of the governor-generals (like Aksenov and Dyumin) and some of the generals and senior officers of the Defense Ministry joining them. I don't dare to predict who will win, because I am not at all aware of this closed kitchen. I simply suggest that we take it easy and understand who are the pieces on the board, and who is behind the board, moving these pieces. I can't assume that the tail is spinning the dog, too clever a dog I got. If Biden couldn't get along with her, then to think that she would fall victim to palace intrigue is no respect at all for herself or her (or rather, him). I hope you all understand.
At this point I'll call it a day and bid you farewell. Sorry if I bore you. You can tell me in the comments one more time that I don't know anything about sausage scraps. Your Mr. Z.
Photo by: kremlin.ru
