International Man: After spending over $350 billion—half of which is reportedly unaccounted for—the US government is finally pulling the plug on supporting the Ukraine in its war with Russia.
What do you make of this?
Doug Casey: It was criminally insane for the US to involve itself in a border war between two countries on the other side of the world. Not many Americans know that “Ukraine,” which was previously always known as “the Ukraine,” means borderland. It was just a region, like Kurdistan, with undefined shifting borders until Lenin created it in 1921.
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Why, you might ask, would the West take a chance on starting World War III over the most corrupt country in Europe?
Several reasons. For one, Ukraine has been a highly effective laundromat. Gigantic amounts of American tax dollars disappeared into a black hole to re-emerge in the pockets of NGOs, masquerading as aid. For another, connected scumbags like the Bidens got fat. Scores of billions were redistributed to weapons manufacturers, military contractors, and God knows who else. And, of course, a large coterie of Neocons in DC have made careers out of trying to destroy Russia at any cost.
I only hope that as Trump digs into where all the money has gone, it will result in massive clawbacks and long jail terms for lots of people, both in the US and Europe.
International Man: As the post below makes clear, President Trump is displeased with Zelensky. Without US backing, Zelensky’s days in power in Kiev seem to be numbered.
What are your thoughts on Zelensky’s future and that of Ukraine?
Doug Casey: How Zelensky, a second-rate nobody actor in a poor country, became immensely wealthy is a tale that should be widely disseminated. Years ago, the Panama Papers showed that Zelensky was already worth about $300 million and had two ultra-expensive houses in southern Florida. But to this day, nobody’s looked into the provenance of that fortune. I’m sure it’s grown to billions in the intervening years.
Here’s a rule of thumb: Dictators who are responsible for wholesale destruction, millions of casualties, and massive looting should wind up like Mussolini, who was hung by his heels from a lamppost.
If Zelensky were smart, he’d hightail to a country without extradition. Israel might work, although they declined to shelter Meyer Lansky, who also had Law of Return rights.
At a minimum, he should be indicted for criminally bad taste, prancing around in his faux military olive-green T-shirts and cargo pants for the last three years. Although he went to a nicely laundered black long-sleeve pullover for his formal meeting, last week.
It was hilarious watching Trump treat him with the respect he deserved in the White House before kicking him out (link).
International Man: What are the broader geopolitical consequences of a Russian victory in Ukraine?
How might this impact NATO, the EU, and Europe as a whole?
Doug Casey: Despite Putin having said that he misses the old Soviet Union’s borders, the chances of Russia attempting to conquer Europe are zero. In fact, the chances are that Russia itself—which is a multicultural domestic empire—will disintegrate into lots of smaller units over the next few decades.
People don’t understand that things are very different from the days of the Roman Empire or even before WW1. Back then, it could make sense if you conquered or colonized another country.
Life was cheap; if you won, you got to steal the gold, cattle, artwork, and slaves. Things are different today. If Russia were foolish enough to try to reincorporate the old USSR—forget about the rest of Europe—it will find little “stealable” wealth exists in today’s world. They’d wind up with an extraordinarily expensive war followed by an interminable guerrilla war, resulting in the total collapse of Russia. There’s absolutely nothing to be gained, and everything to be lost.
How do such insane memes even originate? There are psychological reasons, but now isn’t the moment for us to go down that rabbit hole. Russian invasion of Europe is a red herring floated by American and NATO warmongers. Only very stupid and unknowledgeable people even consider it. But that’s not to say great dangers haven’t been set in motion.
Russia has had to triple the size of its army, and that’s expensive. If the war ends, it will have to disband most of it, creating back-to-back distortions in their economy.
Another likelihood is that NATO—which should have been abolished after the Soviet Union disintegrated in the early ’90s, but has continued to grow like a cancer, even though it no longer serves any useful purpose—will finally fall apart. This is a good thing because NATO is nothing but a provocation to Russia and China.
There will be a wave of emigres from the Ukraine, joining the millions who’ve already left. Most Ukrainians are reasonably well-educated. Who wants to stay in a poverty-stricken, war-torn country with a predatory government? Millions more will move west.
As far as rebuilding the Ukraine is concerned, the idea of a Marshall Plan is counterproductive. If foreigners want to come in and carpetbag, that’s one thing. But bankrupt US or EU governments throwing money at the place will just make things worse. It will inevitably go into the pockets of well-placed rich guys, corrupting both the giver and the receiver.
Ukraine should be totally free-marketized. Entrepreneurs will quickly move in, not to create an altruistic sham, a latter-day Potemkin village, but to make a profit. But who knows? Maybe the UN and EU will jury-rig some kind of solution, and the place will resemble a perpetual Gaza or post-war East Germany.
International Man: After pouring so much blood, treasure, and political capital into the Ukrainian quagmire, defeat will be a bitter pill for the Deep State and advocates of this war. The anti-Russia hysteria remains deeply ingrained in large segments of American and European society.
After years of being promised victory, how will these people cope with such a reality check?
Do you think the Deep State will attempt to block any US rapprochement with Russia?
Doug Casey: Russia and the Soviet Union have been the bête noire—the national enemy—of the US ever since I was a little kid. We all practiced duck and cover under our desks for fear of an obviously unprovoked attack by the evil Russkies.
Americans should realize that the enemy was never the Russian people, it was a Soviet state steeped in Marxist-Leninist dogma. And the almost equally pathological US Deep State, populated by our own group of warmongers, opportunists, and sociopaths.
For the last 30 years, there have been more communists in American universities alone than there are in all of Russia. The real danger is the socialists, fascists, communists, and Woke Europeans who have captured most European governments.
In the US, the Deep State complex (with its military, corporate, academic, financial, and entertainment tentacles) shouldn’t be underrated. It needs enemies for the war machine to make essentially useless and obsolescent junk. And for its infotainment arm to keep the hoi polloi in fear, happy to support a government claiming to “defend” them.
The real danger, as JD Vance intimated in his speech in Munich, is within.
Do I think the Deep State will attempt to block any rapprochement with Russia?
Absolutely. They don’t want the chaos to end because it would expose deep layers of crime and corruption, which are as bad throughout the US government as they are in the Ukraine itself. Ending wartime chaos would expose the US government as full of arrogant and entitled grifters.
It would be very inconvenient for them if the Ukraine war, perhaps the most effective money laundromat in all of history, disappeared. Followed by a thorough investigation to determine where the money went. Of course, they’ll want to block any rapprochement with Russia.
If the “Defense” Department and the 15 agencies in the so-called “Intelligence Community” are thoroughly investigated, however, the lives of investigators will be at serious risk. It’s risky business to break the rice bowls of these dudes.
International Man: The previous US administration froze all Russian stock and bond trading in Western financial markets.
If the war ends, these assets will presumably be unfrozen and accessible to Western investors.
What are your thoughts on Russian stocks?
Given the far-reaching consequences of Ukraine losing its war with Russia, what other investment implications do you foresee?
Doug Casey: It’ll be great when it’s possible to buy Russian stocks and bonds again.
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There may be some tremendous bargains on offer at that point. Let me re-emphasize what I said earlier: Russia itself will eventually break up into a lot of smaller countries, as did the Soviet Union 30 years ago. Russia isn’t the most stable country in the world, but it’s several standard deviations better than any place in Africa, for instance.
I don’t see Russia as an investment, but rather a high-potential speculation after their markets open again. The country has no debt and could easily go to a gold-backed ruble. The secession of non-Russian possessions could be a very good thing.
Meanwhile in the West, it’s not unlikely that we’ll see a financial and economic collapse as Trump unwinds numerous distortions at the same time he cranks in new ones. The Greater Depression will likely usher the Democrats back into power, which is bad news.
Given that Kiev loses its war with Moscow, it’s pretty certain that now is the time to sell military/industrial stocks, and war stocks. If Trump succeeds in cutting back military spending, as he says, a lot of money will stop flowing to the likes of Lockheed, Raytheon, and Boeing. The “defense” business is absolutely rife with fraud, stupidity and corruption.
They’ve done extremely well over the last 30 years, but based on changes in the macroeconomic situation, I think the party’s over. Not only that, but military technology is changing radically. The type of hi-tech junk that they’re producing—e.g., F-35s, B21s, carriers, and $100,000 artillery rounds—makes about as much sense as producing battleships at the end of World War II. Cheap drones make more sense. As do $20,000 Terminators.
The nature of the whole world is reorienting in every way. Radically.
Reprinted with permission from International Man.
