Category: Russia
The analysis published under this category are as follows.
Sunday, May 25, 2014
Putin is Grinning - The Deal of the Century / Politics / Russia
By: LewRockwell
Eric Margolis writes: GENEVA – Russia’s leader Vladimir Putin usually wears a perfect poker face. But last week in Shangahi, the icy-cold Russian president came awfully close to bursting into a big grin.
And why not? Putin had just stolen a march on his western rivals. The US-British attempt to wound Russia’s economy and punish Putin for disobedience had just blown up in their red faces.
Saturday, May 24, 2014
Crimea, Ukraine War, Czar Putin Tightening Grip Over Police State Russia for New Dynasty / News_Letter / Russia
By: NewsLetter
The Market Oracle NewsletterMarch 16th , 2014 Issue # 8 Vol. 8
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Thursday, May 22, 2014
Russian Oligarch - No Short-term Consequences from Sanctions Yet / Politics / Russia
By: Bloomberg
In a Bloomberg Television interview with Ryan Chilcote in St. Petersburg today, Russian oligarch and Severstal CEO Alexey Mordashov said he has 'no pressure' in U.S. or Russia to dispose of assets and has not seen any short-term consequences from sanctions yet. Mordashov told Bloomberg’s Chilcote he is 'quite optimistic' on interest shown for U.S. assets.
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
As The Cold War Returns, Russia Turns East / Politics / Russia
By: Money_Morning
Tonight I am a guest again on Chinese national TV. I’ll be appearing live via satellite from Ft. Lauderdale, Florida, and we’ll be discussing the crisis in Ukraine.
This time, however, we’ll be talking directly about energy.
With a new Cold War mentality returning to Europe, China is now about to take center stage in Moscow’s export strategy. The Kremlin has turned its attention to the East.
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Sunday, May 11, 2014
Czar Putin Mission Accomplished in Crimea Puts up Ukraine Smoke and Mirrors / Politics / Russia
By: Nadeem_Walayat
Czar Putin after overseeing his goostepping troops in Red Square flew to Sevastopol, Crimea to undertake his own Bush-esk 'Mission Accomplished' boat ride to inspect the newly annexed territory to the Russian Empire.
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Friday, May 02, 2014
Russia’s Counterstrike: Currency and Palladium / Politics / Russia
By: Submissions
Georgi Ivanov writes: The ongoing tensions between Russia and the West over Ukraine have already been expressed in mutual sanctions, the expulsion of diplomats and the suspension of cooperation in nearly all forums – from NATO to the Arctic Council. Yet further sanctions are possible on Russia if an understanding on Ukraine is not reached soon, but Moscow’s reaction can have equally reverberating effects.
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Monday, April 28, 2014
Putin’s Ukraine Dilemma / Politics / Russia
By: Mike_Whitney
“The last decade of the twentieth century has witnessed a tectonic shift in world affairs. For the first time ever, a non-Eurasian power has emerged not only as a key arbiter of Eurasian power relations but also as the world’s paramount power.” (p. xiii)
“Now a non-Eurasian power is preeminent in Eurasia — and America’s global primacy is directly dependent on how long and how effectively its preponderance on the Eurasian continent is sustained.” (p.30)
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Thursday, April 10, 2014
Economic Sanctions Not Key Cause of Russia’s Next Recession / Economics / Russia
By: Frank_Shostak
According to commentators, sanctions imposed by the US and the European Union are pushing Russia toward a recession. However, we hold that some key Russian economic data have been displaying a weakening prior to the annexation of the Crimea to Russia. This raises the likelihood that sanctions might not be the key factor for an emerging recession.
Tuesday, March 25, 2014
Russia Looks East as Relations with Europe Deteriorate / Politics / Russia
By: OilPrice_Com
The standoff between the U.S. and the EU on one hand, and Russia on the other, intensified pretty quickly late last week. The U.S. quickly slapped heavier sanctions on Russia after its annexation of Crimea, leading to a mutual escalation of retaliatory measures. However, it appears that the West gained a bit of leverage at the moment, as the Russian economy has shown some cracks amid uncertainty over how bad this is going to get.
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Friday, March 21, 2014
Cold War “Lite” - the Battle over the Russian Rouble / Currencies / Russia
By: Gary_Dorsch
The confrontation over Ukraine has the potential for spiraling out of control and could lead to "serious problems in the heart of Europe," warned former Secretary of State James Baker on March 9th. "It is clearly the most serious East-West confrontation since the end of the Cold War," Baker said on "Meet the Press." "For someone who was the last US-Secretary of State during the Cold War, it's very disappointing to me to see that we're moving now from cooperation with Russia to confrontation again. The risks are very substantial. I think we are pretty much in a "Cold War Lite," right now." Baker said he hopes a diplomatic solution can be reached because he thinks there's no good endgame for the Russian Federation.
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Russia Examines Its Options for Responding to Ukraine / Politics / Russia
By: STRATFOR
The fall of the Ukrainian government and its replacement with one that appears to be oriented toward the West represents a major defeat for the Russian Federation. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, Russia accepted the reality that the former Eastern European satellite states would be absorbed into the Western economic and political systems. Moscow claims to have been assured that former Soviet republics would be left as a neutral buffer zone and not absorbed. Washington and others have disputed that this was promised. In any case, it was rendered meaningless when the Baltic states were admitted to NATO and the European Union. The result was that NATO, which had been almost 1,600 kilometers (1,000 miles) from St. Petersburg, was now less than approximately 160 kilometers away.
Sunday, March 16, 2014
Crimea, Ukraine War, Czar Putin Tightening Grip Over Police State Russia for New Dynasty / Politics / Russia
By: Nadeem_Walayat
The Crimean referendum at the point of several thousand Russian guns is typical of what to expect from a totalitarian police state as those that oppose don't vote out of fear whilst those that do vote have no choice but to vote for Russian annexation also out of fear of being labeled as un-patriotic based on propaganda of a mythical 'great' past under the Soviet Union when the truth is that the Soviet Union was a police state of the worst kind that held 99.9% of its population in the grip of perpetual terror of what the state could do to them if they did not obey.
Tuesday, March 11, 2014
Putin Plays for Keeps in Crimea / Politics / Russia
By: Peter_Schiff
For those investors who have grown used to the relatively minor geo-political crises of the past few years, the developing situation in the Ukraine and the Crimea must come as an unexpected communiqué from the early 20th Century.There can be little doubt that the drama will impact financial markets.
Monday, March 10, 2014
Ron Paul - Can We Afford Ukraine? / Politics / Russia
By: Dr_Ron_Paul
Officially, US debt stands at more than $17 trillion. In reality, it is many times more. The cost of the US invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq may be more than six trillion dollars. President Obama's illegal invasion of Libya cost at least a billion dollars and left that country devastated. The costs of US regime change efforts in Syria are likely thus far enormous, both in dollars and lives. That's still a secret.
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Sunday, March 09, 2014
Russia and Crimea, Vlad the Bad Advances his Knight / Politics / Russia
By: LewRockwell
Eric Margolis writes: Soviet leader Josef Stalin used to shrug off critics by his favorite Central Asian saying: “The dogs bark; the caravan moves on.”
Russia’s hard-eyed president, Vladimir Putin, is following the same strategy over Ukraine and Crimea.
Saturday, March 08, 2014
EU And American War-Jaw Will Not Faze Putin / Politics / Russia
By: Andrew_McKillop
War-War or Jaw-Jaw?
The Ukrainian crisis, to date, throws up endless examples – and proof – of European and US political and economic, military and ideological weakness built on the shifting sands of longstanding fads, foibles and obsessions about “the world as we want it”. Each day brings more examples and proof that neither Europe nor the USA are capable of thinking and acting straight, while each part of the “Western camp” incites the other to greater idiocy.
Tuesday, March 04, 2014
Ukraine Crisis: RTS Russia Stock Market What's Next? / Stock-Markets / Russia
By: EWI
Social mood is another term for the shared inclination of a society. The conflict between Russia and Ukraine is a dramatic example of social mood in action.
Editor's note: You'll find a text version of this article below the video.
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Tuesday, March 04, 2014
Will Russia Go to War Over Ukraine? Don’t Bet on It / Politics / Russia
By: Vitaliy_Katsenelson
It is hard for me to see a full-blown war between Russia and Ukraine. There are so few cultural differences between these two countries. Ukraine has its own language, but almost everyone (outside of small villages) speaks flawless Russian. If there is a war between these two countries, it will be a civil war.
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Tuesday, March 04, 2014
Ukraine and the 'Little Cold War' / Politics / Russia
By: STRATFOR
We must consider the future of Eurasia after the fall of the Soviet Union. Since 1991, the region has fragmented and decayed. The successor state to the Soviet Union, Russia, is emerging from this period with renewed self-confidence. Yet Russia is also in an untenable geopolitical position. Unless Russia exerts itself to create a sphere of influence, the Russian Federation could itself fragment.
Saturday, March 01, 2014
Putin and the Central Asia Black Hole / Politics / Russia
By: Andrew_McKillop
From Black Hole to Nuclear Singularity
The former United States National Security Advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski in his 1997 book “The Grand Chessboard”, called the wide sweep of post-Soviet Eastern Europe and Central Asia the "Black Hole" and "Eurasian Balkans." The area is what geopoliticians as far back as the USA's Alfred Thayer Mahan, in 1900, called a Debated and Debatable region – meaning a disputed ethnic cauldron prone to instability and constant conflict, with only restricted, or even totally absent national identities, riven with religious, historical, political, ethnic and cultural influences, often organized into tribal or clan systems of power, nearly always poor - and always unpredictable. Despite or because of this, also due to resource and market search, and for self-defence, outside powers have continuously sought control or at least prime influence in this region. Past and present powers engaged in what the British called The Great Game, and the Soviets called The Struggle of the Shadows feature Russia, Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, China, Pakistan, India, the US and the EU.
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