Wondering how war in the Middle East impacts Russia? I highly recommend Charlie Ganske’s post “The Long War in the Middle East and Russian Oil” on Russia Blog for an answer. Here is the opening paragraph:
The Russian business newspaper Kommersant has an article up on their website today, candidly titled Thanks to the War Machine. The article provides some historic perspective on how the USSR profited from the oil shocks after the 1973 Arab-Israeli War and the 1979 Islamic revolution in Iran. The article also notes that Russia has been the single largest beneficiary of higher global oil prices fueled by Mideast turmoil. However, Kommersant contributor Sergey Minaev’s argument intersects with a view we have presented here at Russia Blog for some time: the West (not just the U.S.) has a strategic interest in developing Russian oil and gas, with the goal to expand global energy supplies from outside the Middle East.
I also suggest taking a look at Yuri Mamchur’s deconstruction of the new extremism law signed by Putin.
Yuri Mamchur’s comments about the extremism law are fundamentally inaccurate and totally ignore a huge deluge of reporting which exposes the extremism law as a Neo-Soviet attempt to destroy free speech in Russia. The unfairly slander the Wall Street Journal’s reporting. The extremism law has been condemned by journalists worldwide, but Mamchur supports it and totally ignores their condemnation, in outrageous and offensive fashion. His gross errors, distortions and bias are detailed here.
In the Ganske piece you cite, the author writes as follows:
“As for Russia’s role in the Middle East crisis, we have documented here at Russia Blog how Putin refused to meet with Hamas leaders after they vowed at the Moscow airport never to recognize Israel and condemned Hezbollah’s missile attacks on Israel. In fact, Russia has probably been more supportive of Israel in the current crisis than many EU countries. Part of this is quid pro quo: Israel is considering revoking passports issued to fugitive Russian oligarchs, while Gazprom wants to build a gas pipeline under the Mediterranean from Turkey to Israel and the Palestinian territories. While geographically speaking it would make more sense for Israelis and Palestinians to buy natural gas from Iraq and Saudi Arabia, due to the Iraq insurgency and decades of Arab-Israeli politics, this fuel is not available. So Russia is profiting in this case from the Mideast conflict, but this does not mean that Russia started the fire.”
This statement is outrageous! How dare Ganske give credit to Putin for not meeting with Hamas WHEN RUSSIA IS PROVIDING DIRECT ECONOMIC ASSISTANCE TO HAMAS? How dare Ganske write about this issue without even MENTIONING this direct aid? Russia is frustrating the entire international community on both Hamas AND Iran. It provided U.S. military secrets to Iraq. It is providing a massive military infusion to Venezuela despite a U.S. military blockade and Venezuela plans to exports arms to Bolivia.
If I did not know better (and I don’t), I would say that the Kremlin had planted this story about Russian oil and the West’s need to accommodate Russia because of it in Russia Blog.
The West doesn’t need Russian oil, which is doing NOTHING to halt the spiraling price of gas in the U.S., and even if it did the West doesn’t need to prop up a nascent totalitarian regime in Neo-Soviet Russia.
LR:
I am sure you are confused about “RUSSIA … PROVIDING DIRECT ECONOMIC ASSISTANCE TO HAMAS”. Russia is providing direct aid to a legitinately elected GOVERNMENT, _NOT_ organization/party or any other entity.
If _you_ don’t like the results of that election, it doesn’t mean that everybody else must have the same contempt for democracy.
BIG BLACK: By your logic, if Shamil Basayev won an election in Chechnya, the U.S. could freely provide financial support to his “government” and Russia could say nothing about it, right?
Gosh, you Russophile’s are the most breathtaking of hypocrites.
SEAN: I’ve got a question for you. Let’s say you were Vladimir Putin, Tsar of All the Russias (it’s a horrible thought to contemplate, I know, but be brave and humor me).
Now you have a choice to make:
(A) Western media will focus on your outrageous jailing of a major political rival, sending him to Siberia for years, stealing his company and kicking his wife out onto the street; the result might be that this rival gets empowered and takes your job, while the world is reminded of just how closely Neo-Soviet your behavior is, motivating them to galvanize against you on the international scene.
(B) Western media will focus on your outrageous failure to stop child poverty and child sex crimes; the result might be that people think of you as even more callous and indifferent than they did before, and grow even more nervous about what awful thing you might do next. You can label this coverage “russophobic” and use it to further polarize your xenophobic nation against the West. You can also use it as an excuse to increase totalitarian police measures, purportedly to stop child sex crimes but actually to clamp down on rivals.
Which do you choose? One of these stories must appear in the media, overshadowing and obfuscating the other. Which one will it be?
Let’s see. That is a tough one. If I was truely Vladimir Putin, Tsar of all Russians. I would certainly pick B. And while B is running in the press, I would take that “political rival”, which I choose to call a tax evading criminal, and leave him languishing in Siberia for much longer.
As for his wife, who lives a fine life because of the wealth her husband stole from the people, I would kick her out on the street, stick her on a horse drawn sled and have her carted off to sit with her husband.
I would then visit the Patriarch and ask God for forgiveness because being Tsar requires me to make harsh descisions to secure the welfare of the nation.
Next I would sign a bunch of decrees brought to me by my minions without reading them.
In the evening I would attend a lavish dinner well suited for my tsardom.
Before bed I would write in my diary that “nothing important happened today”, say my prayers to God and thank Him for annointing me his representartive on earth, and then drift off to sleep knowing that my empire is secure.
Yes this is what I would do if I were truely Tsar.
SEAN: Would it be fair to say then, that, transforming back to your democracy-loving self, you would advise viewing with a healthy dose of cynicism a claim made by a commentator that (a) is meaningless and the western world should focus entirely on (b) instead? I mean, on the off-chance that such a commentator might be working for the Tsar of All the Russians and trying to plant disinformation?
Feel free to ignore “La Russophobe’s” provocative comments. She’s just looking for attention. (Ask Yuri about the trouble he’s had from her at Russia Blog.) Of course, Ms. Russophobe, you are entirely welcome to join in a civilized debate that doesn’t involve SHOUTING IN ALL CAPS AND EXCLAMATION POINTS!!
JOSH: Have you always had the idea that you can decide for everybody else what constitutes “civilized” discourse, and that you can give permission to others to ignore a certain discussion, and tell others when/if they can use upper-case lettering (BIG BLACK should also be condemned, right, Mr. Josh Fairman?)? If so, you might be a good candidate for the next president of Russia.
Meanwhile, thanks for bringing up Yuri. As you can see, Sean agrees that Yuri’s attempt to have us focus on child pornography rather than anti-democracy is just what a Russia’s dicator would want us to do, indicating that Yuri is serving the Kremlin’s interests.
Given that I have exposed that, it’s not suprising that you would want to change the topic into a personal attack on me, that is the same tactic the USSR tried. You’ll fail in your pathetic attempt just as miserably as they did.
LR: You assume too much, there is no hypocricy in what I was implying.
Yes, by my logic irrespective who wins legitimate election in independent country called Russia (Basaev although a citizen of Russia would be ineligible to run as he was a wanted man on charges of mass murder — russian election law doesn’t allow criminals on a ballot) or, in a fictitious scenario, irrespective of who wins legitimate election in a (non-existent) independent country called Chechya — the US goverment should be free to provide financial support to that “government” and Russia better say nothing about it.
The Russian government would even have welcomed the aid to the elected goverment of the terrorist Mashadov and his premier — terrorist Basaev — when there was a glimpse of hope they would switch from killing to governing (in 1996).
This aid never came. So, if you can’t put your money where you mouth is – shut TF up.
As for the caps, I was quoting you.
PS. I was refering to your post not the US goverment position, you seemed somehow equated yourself with the US government in your post.
“La Russophobe”, a.k.a. Kim Betty, a.k.a. Kim Zigfield, posts her insanely hateful diatribes on just about ANY public internet forum concerning Russia.
All her posts are roughly the same in tone, a mixture of egotism, petty hatred, and virulent xenophobia. She often completely misrepresents other commentor’s arguments, and not necessarily to prove her own points but rather to belittle her adversaries. Nearly anything regarding Russia, no matter how inane, can be twisted to show “what a pathetic country” it is, or “what an ignorant people” Russians are. She occasionally tries to claim that she cares about Russia’s future, or bemoans Russia’s lack of stature in the world, when at most other times she very publicly wishes for Russia’s demise. Furthermore, she is CONSTANTLY posting her diatribes, to such an extent that some bloggers have suspected “her” of actually being a Putin-hired plant, to drive up positive commentary on Russia as a reaction to her ridicule (How could anyone have that much spare time? Is this ALL she does?). Arguing wth her is about as intellectually stimulating as playing solitaire: entertaining at first, but ultimately pointless.
A dominatrix couldn’t be more spiteful, a schizophrenic couldn’t be more illogical, and a robot couldn’t be more unceasing; she has already been banned from several other blogs, and I imagine several more bans will be forthcoming.