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More on the Russian Situation
Russian Bio Programs
Recent testimony by Dr. Ken Alibeck, former first deputy chief of the Soviet biological weapons program has revealed that the Soviet Union even went on to equip some of its intercontinental ballistic missiles with biological agents targeted at individual American cities the Soviets wanted to capture intact.
Violation of US Air Space by Russian Bombers
On Sept 17, 1999 Russian bombers violated US air space probing air defenses in Alaska. US fighter planes repulsed the Russian bombers.
Russian Political Class = the Soviet Political Class
July 8, 1999 Andrei Piontkovsky, Moscow Times "The Russian political class to a man is made up of the same people that comprised the Soviet political class. Why did the communists so uncomplainingly hand over power in 1991?
"Because they did not give up power."
INF Aid Siphoned off by the Russian Leadership
Billions of dollars in US and INF aid to Russia (up to 60%) was siphoned off by the Russian leadership and hidden in secret accounts in New York and other Western banks. The money never went to help the starving Russian people, but will end up financing new weapon systems and intelligence operations.
Former World Bank Representative Scared to Hell
9/23/99 According to Charles Blitzer, a former World Bank representative in Moscow "When times were good, very few people asked pointed questions about Russia,". . . "But when things started going wrong, the answers suddenly scared the hell out of everyone." In other words the Russian leadership has been extorting money out of the west under the guise of humanitarian aid and using it to chrome plate the barrel of their war machine.
U.S. Provides Aid for Upgrading Russian Submarines
September 18, 1999 Defense Secretary Cohen visited the Russian Severodvinsk submarine yards, a Russian submarine scrapping facility, to watch as U.S.-provided equipment and aid was used to cut up old ballistic missile submarines. Cohen ignored an adjacent facility that is building new Severodvinsk-class attack subs and Borei-class SSBNs that will replace the ones being scrapped.
Russian and Chinese Violations
of the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty
Recently both Russia and China violated the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty by detonating small nuclear test blasts. Russia's detonated two blasts, one on Sept. 8, 1999 and another on Sept. 23, 1999, at its arctic test base in Novaya Zemlya. On June 12, 1999 China detonated a nuclear blast at its remote northwestern Lop Nur testing site in Xinjiang province. Intelligence analysts think that China's test was a part of its efforts to build smaller warheads for its short-range missiles, or multiple warheads for its intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Congressional Budget Office Proposes to
Help Re-build Russia's Early Warning System
Russia says it can't afford to launch several new satellites for monitoring U.S. nuclear missile sites, so the Congressional Budget Office is proposing to have the US pay for the launching of six of these Russian satellites into orbit. This would give Russia military 24-hour coverage of U.S. missile silos. According to the Congressional Budget Office, Russia has built seven new early warning satellites, but is unable or unwilling to devote the resources necessary to launch them.
Media and the Foreign Policy
Establishment Ignored Warnings
The CIA's former chief Russia analyst, Fritz W. Ermarth, testifies before the House Banking Committee that "mainstream media and the mainstream foreign policy establishment ignored warnings of widespread corruption and organized crime among the Russian political and economic elites. The fundamental misdemeanor of Western, including American, policy was that it bought into this phony-crony capitalism too uncritically and for too long. So did the mainstream media, and the mainstream foreign policy establishment. The protests of Russian and Western observers who knew what was going on went unheeded."
New Missiles Can Penetrate U.S. Defenses
September 11, 1999: Strategic Rocket Forces Commander Vladimir Yakovlev, commenting on Deputy Secretary of State Strobe Talbott's attempts to amend the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) treaty says that "Russia has worked out asymmetric measures, including the option of giving the intercontinental Topol-M [SS-27] missiles independently targetable warheads," the Guardian reports. Topol-M design team chief Yuri Solomonov says ìthe missile can foil U.S. anti-ballistic missile defense systems with "a number of technical options," including "making the missile maneuverable during the active part of its flight." Early in September 1999, the Russian military launched the worlds most advanced intercontinental ballistic missile the Topol M. It was launched from Russia's west Arctic cosmodrome and traveled 6,000 miles before slamming into a target range in Siberia. The missile scored a direct hit.
Russia Plans to Deploy a Second Batch of its New Topol-M Nuclear Missiles in the First Half of December 1999
WORLD TRIBUNE.COM, Monday, October 11, 1999, MOSCOW
"A second Strategic Rocket Forces regiment equipped with land-based Topol-M intercontinental ballistic missiles will assume full combat readiness in the first half of December this year," deputy Defense Minister Col.-Gen. Alexander Kosovan told a news conference. The RIA news agency quoted Kosovan, deputy defense minister in charge of military construction and housing, as saying that the first 10 Topol-M missiles were installed in their silos last December.
The Topol-M, known to the West as the SS-27, is slated to become the backbone of Russia's nuclear deterrent. Kosovan said two missile early warning systems were near completion and a number of air and naval bases had been repaired this year. But he added many bases were in poor shape because of limited government investment that stems from the nation's economic crisis.
Russia's new Topol M is the world's finest strategic rocket. It was designed to leave the earth's atmosphere, to glide through space and return to earth with deadly precision. It was even built to evade interception. But the most important fact about the Topol M has yet to be mentioned. The Topol M was built for one purpose -- to attack America.
The Dialectic Process in Action,
KGB Provocateurs Behind the Moscow Terrorism
According to a Moscow Times editorial, the Kremlin has destroyed evidence at sites where the terrorist bombings killed 300 Russians. Ten days after the terrorist attack a "controlled implosion" was used to destroy the remnants of the bomb shattered apartment block. This eliminated any possible clues that could lead to the real identity of the bombers. This is like a carbon copy of the Oklahoma City bombing case, in which only five weeks elapsed before the building evidence was "imploded".
Both Russian and American officials were in a hurry to get past the evidence and to wage a subtle propaganda war against a mysterious undeclared enemies. The effect of both tragedies was to effectively turn the public opinion against an opposition group and to get the public to agree to a reduction in civil liberties in the name of peace and safety. In spite of the fact that no real evidence has been unearthed linking the bombings to Islamic rebels, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin, former chief of Russia's secret police, stated that "there is no doubt" that the Moscow bombings are linked to the Islamic incursion in Dagestan.
It is argued by some Russian analysts this so called "war against terrorism" now masks a general Russian mobilization of military and secret police resources. According to J.R. Nyquist, we should not take today's turmoil in Russia at face value. Historical evidence strongly suggests that the possibility of real Chechen independence is a sham. Economic and geographical factors alone make real independence a virtual impossibility. The old KGB structures have held this region tightly for decades and all opposition has been systematically crushed. Realistically, the only opposition possible in this region would be an opposition created by the KGB for use in the future as "strategic camouflage."
Dark rumors from Russia
MONDAY OCTOBER 11, 1999, J.R. Nyquist , WorldNetDaily.com
An American businessman in Moscow, the managing director of Matrix Technologies, recently described conditions in the Russian capital. He said the city is heavily patrolled by police and army units. Vehicles are routinely searched, papers are inspected, civil rights are violated. But Moscow's police are not simply looking for terrorists. They are also looking for "military-aged individuals" and persons with medical experience. These are being taken for military training as part of a "general preparation for war."
We know that the Russian military began to expand its manpower base in April, during the crisis in Kosovo. At that time nearly 170,000 new recruits were called up in a special Russian military draft. There were also reports that between 80,000 and 100,000 volunteers were recruited to fight NATO in the Balkans. Throughout Russia, as well as other former Soviet republics, there have been rumors that hundreds of thousands of convicts have been offered amnesty in exchange for military service. If you examine the naval and marine exercises of the past six months (especially in the context of the mobilization of Russia's Black Sea Fleet), one cannot escape the suspicion that naval and marine reserves have also been mobilized.
We know from Russian press reports that troops of the Interior Ministry and Federal Security Service were secretly mobilized last month. Exact numbers have not been published, though the strength of MVD and FSS reserve forces is probably well over 200,000. What we have inklings of, and what we read about in the Russian press, suggests a large-scale military preparation. This preparation cannot be explained by the situation in Chechnya. After all, Chechnya is a small place, without a real army or air force. It should be pointed out that these Russian mobilizations are too large for the Chechen theater of operations.
It is remarkable, in this context that we are constantly reading of the weakness of Russia's conventional armed forces. To give one example, we read in an Oct. 7 Reuters article by Martin Nesirky that "Russia now finds itself short of conventional weapons to fight Chechen guerrillas in its own backyard." Nesirky writes of a contrast between Russia's "creaking kit in the field and shining missiles in silos. ..." But this is an incorrect characterization. While it is true that Russia has announced plans to deploy a second regiment of Topol-M ICBMs this year, and Russia's nuclear forces are wonderfully modernized, it is untrue that Russia's conventional forces lack equipment.
As it happens, we can deduce the minimum amount of military hardware the Russians are deploying by doing a little homework.
In November of 1990 the Kremlin signed the Conventional Forces in Europe treaty (CFE). This treaty limited the Russians to deploying 20,000 battle tanks, 20,000 artillery tubes, 6,800 combat aircraft, 30,000 other armored vehicles, and 2,000 attack helicopters west of the Urals. In this context, it has been widely acknowledged that Russia never conformed to the CFE Treaty. (Even the Encyclopedia Britannica has numerous articles acknowledging Russian noncompliance with CFE.) Ö.. In the last few days the Kremlin has announced that it is presently exceeding CFE force limits due to the crisis in the north Caucasus.
The number of 20,000 tanks is a gigantic figure. It is several times the number of tanks used by Hitler to invade Russia in 1941. The number of 6,800 combat aircraft is also huge. If Russia is exceeding CFE limits in any of these areas then we cannot -- we must not! -- say that Russia has an under-equipped army. The military mobilization in Russia is something real. The official reason for this mobilization is not to be trusted. As I have said before, far more power is being mobilized than would be needed to crush tiny Chechnya. So what is up? What are the Russian generals getting ready for?
Members of an American church, who recently returned from mission, work in one of Russia's largest cities, reported contacts with Russian soldiers. These soldiers were "very disturbed" because they believed the present Russian mobilization is aimed at the United States -- not Chechnya. In a related report, a recent American visitor to Russia was privately informed by a Russian military officer that Russia had been preparing for war against America for the last 17 months.
Are these reports credible?
We have to be careful about embracing stories that confirm our worst fears. But if we look at such reports in the context of other information -- which is absolutely undeniable -- then we have to say that there is nothing inconsistent or surprising in the idea that Russia is preparing for war with the United States.
Russia's new ally -- China -- is also mobilizing.
This is supposedly a coincidence. The Taiwan Straits crisis just happens to coincide with the Chechnya crisis. Therefore, the military mobilizations in both countries are supposedly justified. But, if we have any strategic sense at all, shouldn't we be questioning this coincidence? Shouldn't somebody in the Pentagon be whispering in the president's ear?
According to Eric Margolis of the Toronto Sun, President Clinton has ordered the Pentagon to send state-of-the-art night vision equipment to Russia for use in helicopter gunships. He is also having them send over military communications gear. It is odd, to say the least, for the United States to be sending military assistance to a country that has more tanks and combat aircraft than just about any country on earth.
Russia's filling up of tank and motorized rifle divisions is not something spontaneous and of the moment. Last summer Russia curtailed gasoline and diesel fuel exports, as well as exports of fuel oil. Almost a year ago Russia cut her oil exports by more than 25 percent, while increasing oil imports from Iraq. But Russia is supposedly broke! She desperately needs cash, and 45 percent of Russia's $80 billion in exports in 1997 came from fuel exports.
Why is this being done?
The truth is, a force exceeding 20,000 tanks and 30,000 armored personnel carriers can suck a lot of fuel. Let me suggest that Russia has planned the current mobilization for many months. Let me also suggest that the Kremlin wants to be assured of its military supplies. What we are seeing is not a panicked reaction to a few Chechen rebels and terrorists. It is a carefully prepared and well-organized war mobilization, involving countrywide civil defense drills and a massive roundup of military-aged men and medical personnel.
U.S. Pays $2.3 Million to Maintain Illegally-Acquired Supercomputers at Russian Weapons Lab
(Material drawn from J. Michael Waller and the Russian Reform Monitor 10/7/99)
"The United States and Russia have quietly resolved a long-simmering dispute over the illegal sale of sophisticated IBM supercomputers to Russia's leading nuclear weapons lab," the New York Times reports from Sarov, Russia.
"The 16 computers, now fully licensed and operational, will be on display as part of the 'open computing center' that the American Energy Secretary, Bill Richardson, is to inaugurate at the lab that developed Russia's hydrogen bomb. The center is a joint project of the Energy Department and Minatom, the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy, to which Washington contributed $2.3 million. It is intended to help find jobs outside the weapons industry for thousands of scientists, engineers and technicians at this remote, still largely closed nuclear city and its premier lab." The center is one of five planned projects in Sarov under Richardson's "Nuclear Cities Initiative."
The Sarov facility, formerly known as Arzamas-16, "is the Russian equivalent of Los Alamos National Laboratory. . . . in addition to designing [nuclear] bombs, this complex, roughly the size of Washington, D.C., still engineers, fabricates and assembles nuclear weapons warheads and components." According to the New York Times, "Russia had evaded American export laws by buying the IBM computers in 1996 through Moscow-based middlemen. IBM installed them here. Though a federal grand jury investigated the transfer, no charges were brought against IBM," according to the New York Times.
Sarov/Arzamas-16 is the same lab that is producing the nuclear warheads for the next-generation Topol-M (SS-27) ICBMs. The Clinton administration tried to sell the IBM supercomputers to the Russian nuclear weapons lab but was thwarted by Congress in 1997.
Some Russian analysts suggest that the Clinton administration promise the supercomputers to the Russian nuclear weapons lab in exchange for Kremlin backing of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Russian Prime Minister Putin Says the Military is the Top Spending Priority.
"We have to react and establish order (in Chechnya) and we need more resources. But this will come from extra income," Putin said on Russian state television.î He went on to say that "National defense is a priority, it is number one in the budget." There are funds to be redistributed." Putin also said "new funds would be found for the military" in view of needs exposed by conflict in Chechnya.
According to a report from the Moscow Times a parliamentary-governmental commission is working on a budget compromise to allot an additional $1 billion (26 billion rubles) to finance the war in Chechnya for FY2000. Russia's entire federal budget for FY2000 is set at $23 billion, apart from debt servicing. The government is ready to spend about twice that -- between 40 billion and 60 billion rubles -- to fight in Chechnya just for the remainder of FY1999. According to Moscow Times correspondent Yevgenia Borisova, "Where Russia will get this cash remains a mystery. . . . [Prime Minister] Putin met with Defense Minister Igor Sergeyev and Central Bank Chief Viktor Gerashchenko to discuss funding for the war."
IMF Funding Chechnya War for the Second Time?
According to Moscow Times correspondent Yevgenia Borisova "Another possible source of revenue is the International Monetary Fund, which is debating sending another $640 million loan transfer to Russia.," Chechen President Aslan Maskhadov has appealed to the IMF not to lend now. Reuters quoted unidentified IMF officials who were worrying privately about sending more money to Russia during a war. The last war in Chechnya, between 1994 and 1996, saw the IMF come under heavy criticism for lending to Russia. Some economists, including Harvard University's Jeffrey Sachs and Marshall Goldman, charged the Fund with indirectly subsidizing the war.
Former CIA Chief Criticizes Spy Policy
Speaking at a two-day Trinity University intelligence symposium in San Antonio Former CIA Director R. James Woolsey said that the Clinton administration has allowed U.S. espionage to deteriorate and that the nation's spy skills are presently at the same ineffective level that existed back in the 1920s and 1930. Woolsey also warned that the international situation is more volatile now, than anytime since World War II. Woolsey inferred that prior to World War II there was a general apathy and lack of concern in this nation about the potential threat of Nazi Germany and Japan and that it "bears an interesting resemblance to what we're doing today in the comfortable, relaxed 1990s."
Conclusion
So how does the Communist threat apply to you? Regardless to whether it is Y2K, earth changes, or war, any one of these can potentially disrupt the delicate food, transportation, power, communication and fuel infrastructures. These interrelated infrastructures form the foundations of our stable society. If they fail, so will social order and our culture.
Several months before the attack on Pearl Harbor Walter Lippmann gave the following unheeded warning
"Millions will listen to, and prefer to believe, those who tell them that they need not rouse themselves, and that all will be well if only they continue to do all the pleasant and profitable and comfortable things they would like to do best."
Is Prosperity a Pacifying Drug?
Col. Stanislav Lunev, GRU defector posed the question: "Why aren't Americans more patriotic?" And then Lunev proceeded to answer his own question: "Because Americans are too busy shopping and having fun," [and making money].
So how are you going to turn your concern into action?
What first or additional steps are you going to take?
Suggestions:
Put a piece of paper up on the refrigerator. Keep track of everything you use over the next week. This will enable you to determine what and how much you use in a week. You might be surprised. Now, use the data you have collected and come up with a list of what you need to get by without the local supermarket for a thirty-day period.
Start accumulating the items you need for a thirty-day buffer every time you go to the store as your budget allows. If you are on a fixed budget skip the ice cream this week and buy and extra can of spaghetti sauce and an extra jar of apple sauce.
What about water?
Do you have a dependable source of clean drinkable water if the power goes out or if the municipal water system fails? If you have a creek, pond, swimming pool or river near by it is not that hard or expensive to fix this problem. Do you have a means to filter water?
There is only about a three-day food supply in every city around the US.
If there is any disruption in transportation, power or thee grocery chain computerized inventory systems, shortages will occur. Stock up on some long-term food storage. The advantage to long-term food storage in #10 cans and five and six gallon buckets is the mice and moisture will not destroy it. If you put up your own food make sure it is in containers that are mouse and moisture proof containers, or you might well be wasting your money.
What about lights?
If you decide to go with candles or kerosene make sure you have a fire extinguisher also. Hand crank flashlights and high-tech kerosene lamps are another option.
What about communication?
The unknown can be a great source of anxiety during a disaster. Look into a good battery powered, hand crank or hand cranksolar powered AM/FM radio.
If you can afford back up power visit our power generation page. The cheapest option is a gasoline generator. Buy one locally. 5,000 watt costs about $600. Make sure you store gasoline safely and use PRI fuel preserver. If your budget can accommodate a diesel generator all the better. They cost more but get twice the fuel economy and five times the life.
Today's society is a dominant media culture.
Most people's attitudes, beliefs and opinions are a product of mainstream media programming. If you want to find the information that the mainstream media is suppressing, the following are two news related web addresses that you might want to bookmark.
http://www.afpc.org/ (American Foreign Policy Council)
http://www.worldnetdaily.com/ (one of the best news sites on the net today)
One Last Note
For you Art Bell listeners who heard either my first or second interview with Art Bell. I suspect that Art puts a certain amount of weight on e-mails from listeners when he decides to re-run a show or when he is filling his available interview slots. If you enjoyed either or both of these interviews, take a few moments and send Art a short email message at. Artbell@mindspring.com Tell him how much you liked the show and ask him when he is going to schedule me back on his show.
Thanks again,
Philip L. Hoag |
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