Streetwise Professor

The United States, and the other countries in the 5+1 group, have reached some sort of agreement with Iran which trades a relaxation in sanctions for some temporary limitations on Iran’s nuclear program.  Most of the discussion has focused on the specifics of this deal, but that is short sighted.  All parties admit that this is just an interim step along the path towards a more permanent settlement.  We need to look forward and try to anticipate where that path will lead.  It is unlikely to lead anywhere good, from an American perspective, and likely to be highly favorable to Iran.

The dynamic will favor Iran because it is easy for them to delay or evade any substantive cutbacks in their efforts to obtain nuclear weapons, and because it will be difficult for Obama to resist Iranian demands.  Look at the protracted and frustrating and largely futile attempt to stop the North Korean nuclear program: Obama’s personal investment in the Iran initiative will make the US even more likely to make concessions in order to keep the process alive.

Other news illustrates exactly how this process works.  The Russians have repeatedly violated the Intermediate Range Nuclear Forces Agreement but the administration has refused to make these violations public because . . . well, you have to read it to believe it:

Inside the meeting, Kerry expressed anger and frustration about the Russian cheating and warned that if the violations became widely known, future efforts to convince the Senate to ratify arms control treaties would be harmed.

In other words, we can’t possibly acknowledge treaty violations because that would impede our ratification of treaties  . . . that would be violated. Treaty-making becomes an end unto itself, rather than a means of securing American interests.  That mindset gives anyone we are negotiating with a tremendous advantage: they know they can play us for patsies because we are so obsessed with the process, rather than the results.

And Iran is pressing its advantage.  It claims that the agreement recognizes its right to enrich uranium, which the administration denies: in response Iran released a statement calling the administration a liar.  Moreover, it announced that it is commencing talks with international oil companies, thereby signaling its belief-expectation, actually, or demand, actually actually-that sanctions will be lifted.

And why not?  They know Obama has entered the bazaar, and can’t get out.  It would be a humiliating setback for Obama to admit that his initiative has failed, and knowing that, the Iranians will keep upping the price for a deal.  They further know that Obama’s domestic political weakness, courtesy of Obamacare, makes him all the more dependent on claiming a major foreign policy achievement.  Obama’s approval rating is around 40 percent.  This represents rock bottom for him: these 40 percent would support him even if he mandated adoption of Swift’s A Modest Proposal by executive order.  Admitting failure would help cement his loss of power and influence.

The costs of this are already large, and will only grow over time.  In the short run, the biggest cost will be endured by Syrians, who have been consigned to the tender mercies of Assad and the jihadis: Obama cannot simultaneously pursue an agreement with Iran and confront Iran’s major ally in the region.  This casts Obama’s decisions regarding Syria in August and September into a whole new light.  Following through on his threat to attack Iran’s client Assad would have seriously complicated, and likely derailed, a deal with the Iranians.  Although political considerations and his incautious off-teleprompter “red line” remark forced him to make noises about attacking, he was desperate to find a reason not to, which the Russians graciously offered.

And no doubt the Russians were aware of his predicament, and the Iranian angle to that.  The Saudis found out about the US-Iran talks, and tipped off the Israelis.  It is inconceivable that the Russians weren’t aware as well, given all the potential sources of information.  No wonder they found it so easy to give Obama a deal he couldn’t, and wouldn’t, refuse, even though it made him look craven and feckless.

Viewed in retrospect, the administrations actions during the weeks leading up to the CW deal with Syria look all the more bizarre and discreditable.

The longer run consequences will be even more malign.  Iran, already an aggressive power with dreams of hegemony in the Middle East will be emboldened, and will have more resources to fund their ambitions.  And again, they know that Obama will be reluctant to push back, lest he admit that his initiative was ill-conceived.  In response, other powers in the region, notably Saudi Arabia, will take a more independent and aggressive posture, knowing their interests are no longer aligned with those of the US at least as long as Obama is president: Saudi Arabia may well go nuclear by placing a carry-out order with Pakistan.  Feeling threatened and abandoned, the risk of an aggressive Israeli response is also greater.   Iran’s Lebanese client, Hezbollah, will be strengthened, raising the odds of conflict in Lebanon and between Hezbollah and Israel. The diversion of Israeli resources to counter a more powerful Hezbollah will encourage attacks by Hamas.

This makes the administration’s response to those criticizing the rapprochement all the more disgusting.  Carney and some Congressional Democrats (like Nelson of Florida) have claimed that refusing the deal and increasing sanctions on Iran would actually be a “march to war.”  This is truly a false choice: particularly outrageous coming from a president who always accuses his political opponents of advancing false choices.  An emboldened, richer Iran increases rather than reduces the odds of conflict in the region.

Doubts about the prudence-and even sanity-of Obama’s initiative are only deepened by one of the justifications given for it: namely that it is a response to the strengthening of moderate elements in Iran, and will bolster the moderates’ strength going forward.  Unbelievable.  We’ve heard about “Iranian moderates” since 1979, and numerous previous US attempts to deal with chimerical Iranian moderates have ended in American tears, for the Iranians play American delusions about moderates like a violin.  Just ask Robert McFarlane.  Many defenders of Obama on Twitter harken to Reagan’s Arms for Hostages debacle, claiming “at least Obama isn’t selling weapons to the mullahs.”  This is a defense?  Fool me once, shame on you.  Fool me twice, shame on me.  The Reagan experience should be a stern warning of how treacherous the Iranians can be.  They responded to payments for releasing hostages by taking more hostages.  That should make one all the more reluctant to deal with the mullahs today.

Obama is also disregarding Iran’s long running and relentless terrorist  campaign against the US.  The attacks on the US embassy and Marine barracks in Beirut and on the American Air Force personnel in Khobar Towers are only the most egregious examples.

Khobar Towers is of particular interest.  After an extended investigation, US intelligence concluded the Iranians were behind the attack.  This was extremely awkward for the Clinton administration, because at the time it was in the midst of an attempt to open relations with the . . . wait for it . . . “moderate” Iranian president Khatami.  Clinton sent a secret letter to the Khatami demanding that Iran punish those responsible, which the then reigning Mr. Moderate dismissed with the back of his hand. Either the moderates aren’t really moderates, or the moderates don’t call the shots.  Either way, same result: basing strategies on the influence of Iranian moderates is as delusional as making plans dependent on the intervention of magical unicorns.

In sum, Obama has entered into an agreement that will not be honored, will subject him and the US to increasing demands that he cannot refuse, will strengthen and embolden a sworn enemy of the United States, will destabilize the region and increase the risks of conflict, and betrays and confuses our allies.

Given that this endeavor is inimical to American interests, reputation, and prestige (both of which affect our ability to advance our interests) one wonders about the motivation.  Folly or blunder based on a desire to achieve a legacy or a fundamental misunderstanding of reality are actually the least frightening alternatives.  The more sinister possibility is that Obama is acting on a view of American interests and proper place in the world that is at odds with the mixed idealist-realist view that has shaped US policy since at least WWII.   I usually adhere to the maxim not to attribute something to malice which can be explained by stupidity, but it gets harder to do that every day.

The Wall Street Journal’s story about Syria’s 21 August chemical weapons attack details the regime’s ruthlessness and American fecklessness.  It also makes it plain that The Russians lied repeatedly on Assad’s behalf in the aftermath.  For the Russians (and the Iranians) were aware of it almost immediately, and called Assad on it*:

Calls came in to the presidential palace from Syrian allies Russia and Iran, as well as from Hezbollah, the Lebanese militant group whose fighters were inadvertently caught up in the gassing, according to previously undisclosed intelligence gathered by U.S., European and Middle Eastern spy agencies. The callers told the Syrians that the attack was a blunder that could have profound international repercussions, U.S. officials say.

But recall the weeks after this.  Lavrov and other officials repeatedly denied that the regime was behind the attacks.  They supported Assad’s claim that the attack was launched by the rebels.  They cynically and shamelessly denied what they knew to be true and asserted what they knew to be false in order to protect their client.

Further recall that the Russians played this situation flawlessly, and achieved their aim: no American attack on Assad, Assad is in place and the tide is turning in his favor, and if anything the US is now a de facto supporter of the regime as its continued existence is necessary to carry out the elimination of its CW.   All of this done with the assistance of Obama and Kerry, the only question being whether this assistance was witting, unwitting, or just dimwitted.

And the Russians know it.  Indeed, they are pinching themselves over how easy it all was:

President Bashar al-Assad has tightened his hold on power. His regime has denied using chemical weapons, blaming the attacks on the rebels. In exchange for giving up his chemical arsenal, he avoided an American military intervention and likely will get even more support from Russia and Iran. Mr. Assad has pressed ahead with his offensive using conventional arms. U.S. intercepts show a Russian official later boasting to a Syrian counterpart about how easy it had been to get the U.S. to back off strike plans, officials briefed on the intelligence say.

The story is based on accounts of US intelligence intercepts provided by government officials.  And that is interesting in itself.

Unlike many intelligence leaks (e.g., the Osama raid, Stuxnet, the junk bomber) these are not calculated to make Obama and the administration look good, to portray them as aggressively and cleverly attacking America’s enemies.  To the contrary, they are uniformly damning.  Not just the revelation that the Russians think that Obama was (and is) an easily played chump.  But the revelations that the US had observed previous CW attacks.  That they observed the build up to this one, but didn’t react because they thought it was just going to be another “minor” attack like the earlier ones: apparently none of these met the Obama “whole bunch” test.  The revelations that the US was slow in responding in part because the intercepts had not been translated.

Which raises the question: who is leaking this damning information, and why? Is this the Intelligence Community’s payback for Obama throwing them under the bus over Snowden (which I noted and predicted in the aftermath of the Merkel cellphone kerfuffle)?  Or the consequence of the internecine battles over foreign policy in this administration?

Regardless, it is a uniformly depressing story.   But it can teach some lessons.  The most obvious of these is that the Russians will say anything to advance their interests, even if that something is 180 degrees from the facts.  Keep that in mind in events involving Syria in the future.  And also keep it in mind when you read anything the Russians say about Iran.

And keep in mind this administrations fecklessness and cluelessness when evaluating any deal it reaches with Iran.  Combine this with the fact that the Russians will run interference for Iran, just as they did with Syria, and the overwhelming odds are that no deal is far better than any deal Obama is likely to strike.

*Which means, OMG, we’re spying on foreign leaders! Heaven forfend. What will the NSA do next?

There was a tragic plane crash in Kazan, Tatarstan over the weekend. Fifty people were killed.  No one on the plane survived.

The initial reports said that the plane attempted to land, but the pilot needed to come around again, and crashed on the second attempt. One theory was that the plane’s wing “grazed” the ground on the second landing attempt.  The authorities almost immediately ruled out terrorism.

I initially credited these reports, writing off the tragic accident as likely caused by bad piloting or bad fuel. All too believable, given the atrocious Russian civil aviation safety record.

Stupid, stupid professor.

A video of the crash has been released (h/t @libertylynx).

That is no “wing grazing” caused by a lack of power on the second landing attempt. That is a vertical, uncontrolled power dive. No Boeing 737 has suffered a similar incident.

Note the flame on the right wing, possibly on or near the engine, which flares up right before impact. This, plus the fact that the initial stories are so contrary to the video evidence, plus the fact that the Russians rushed to rule out terrorism, makes me believe that it most likely was terrorism.

Tatarstan is a Muslim province. There have been signs of an incipient Muslim insurgency in the province. Notorious Chechen Islamist leader Doku Umarov has called for an uprising in the province. Islamic terrorists are looking to launch high visibility attacks in the lead up to Sochi. The head of the FSB in the region was on the plane, as was the son of the region’s president.

All of these conditions make terrorism plausible.

There’s also the history. Terrorist brought down two Russian airliners in 2004. Those attacks were most likely due to the detonation of explosives from inside the passenger cabin when the planes were at altitude. In the Kazan crash, the fire on the wing, and the fact that the fuselage appears to be intact, is inconsistent with a similar detonation here. The wing fire is more plausibly due to a man portable air defense system (MANPAD) hit.

There have been numerous MANPAD attacks against civilian airliners. Most MANPADs are heat seekers, meaning that a hit is most likely to occur near the engine. Given that airliners have multiple engines, the loss of one engine is not necessarily fatal, especially for four engine aircraft hit at altitude. Moreover, the thrust of large engines is often sufficient to deflect the blast, and an explosion aft of the engine is much less destructive than something getting sucked in the front end. Nonetheless, 70 percent of airliners targeted by MANPADs have crashed with significant loss of life. The vulnerability is greatest for hits at low altitude on takeoff or landing–like in Kazan.

Given all these facts, I would put a 70 percent probability at this being a terrorist attack by a MANPAD.

Not that we’ll ever know for sure. The Russians have every incentive to cover this up, and that is in fact the way that Russian authorities respond to every embarrassing. Indeed, the initial response suggests that the Sovok reflex to make stuff up is still operative, even in this era of ubiquitous video cameras that give the lie to official stories. But don’t count on a rigorous investigation intended to find, and more importantly disclose, the reality. Putin is totally invested in the image of the man who has eliminated Islamic terror in Russia, and the imperative of maintaining that image is all the more intense in the lead up to Sochi.

Ironically, Russia’s well-deserved reputation for civil aviation dysfunction will make people-like me, admittedly, at least initially-quite willing to believe such a story. But I am betting on terrorism, especially given the Russian haste to deny it.

I would love to understand the State Department, but I am not a clinical psychologist.  All I know is they have some sort of collective complex that manifests itself in various delusions.

Case in point.  The Russians are asking to install 6 monitoring stations for their GPSski, know officially as GLONASS, in the US.  The CIA and the DoD are saying: “Are you freaking kidding me?  No freaking way!”  But not the gang that Truman used to refer to as the “striped pants boys at the State Department”.  (Yes, there are pretty of women there now.)

No.  The State Department is totally fine with this.  Indeed, they think it’s a great idea.  Why?  Because we need to fix our relationship with the Russians.

No.  I am not making that up. I am not that creative:

For the State Department, permitting Russia to build the stations would help mend the Obama administration’s relationship with the government of President Vladimir V. Putin, now at a nadir because of Moscow’s granting asylum to Mr. Snowden and its backing of President Bashar al-Assad of Syria.

Let me get this straight.  The Russians screw us sideways over Syria and Snowden, not to mention Putin’s routine anti-Americanism and aggressive attempts to undermine US interests around the world, and the US is the one that needs to do the mending?  By giving the surveillance-obsessed Russians potential listening posts throughout the US?

Really?

If the State Department is so clueless about the Russians and electronic intelligence, maybe they should ask the Finns.

But then again, the State Department is a serial offender.  In 1973, they granted permission the Soviets to build the embassy at the 3d highest point in DC, where it had direct line of sight to the White House, the Pentagon, Capitol Hill, and yes, the State Department.  The CIA and Pentagon (i.e., the NSA) objected.  There were well-grounded suspicions that the Soviets would use it for electronic intelligence.  The US prevented the Soviets from occupying the embassy until the US received a similarly favorably located facility.  Then it turned out that the Soviets had built over 100 listening devices right into the new US embassy in Moscow.  American security experts called the building “a giant microphone.” Some called it “the Bug House.”  As a result, it took years for the US to get a new embassy built.  The original building had to be torn down, and the whole project started from the ground up.

Note the big difference in US and Soviet (i.e., KGB/FSB/Russian) approaches:

“Unlike the Soviets … the United States did not employ a systematic, stringent security program to detect and prevent Soviet technical penetration efforts,” judged the report.

For instance, Soviet officials overseeing the Mount Alto construction site in Washington routinely changed their blueprints without warning during the architectural bidding process, according to the Senate study. Their design plans were vague, with rooms identified as nothing more specific than “office space.”

In contrast US blueprints identified office spaces by name, making the location of sensitive areas clear to the Soviet workers—and their overseers.

The Soviets would use only concrete poured on site. The US accepted precast concrete forms constructed off site with no American supervision.

The Soviets inspected all materials carefully and were willing to halt construction work if they had questions. The US inspection system was less stringent, and the construction schedule ruled.

Soviet officials used about 30 of their own personnel to oversee about 100 US workers in Washington, on average. The US used 20 to 30 Navy Seabees to watch upward of 800 Soviet workers in Moscow.

The Soviets used a badge identification system, maintained tight perimeter security, and installed multiple surveillance cameras. The US had perimeter sensors and closed circuit TV monitoring, but they were soon disabled due to various “mishaps,” according to the Senate intelligence committee.In sum, US counterintelligence was playing catch-up almost from the beginning of the Moscow embassy project.

That’s our State Department.  Talk about naivety:

In celebrating the occasion, then-Ambassador James F. Collins called the new building “one of the most challenging construction projects ever undertaken by the Department of State. It has been a task … beset by the unexpected.”

Only unexpected by those oblivious to the Russians and their ways. And State is still naive after all these years.

And if you say “that was the Soviets.  They’re gone.”  I say: have you looked at the resume of the current Russian president?  You know, the one who sings songs about the glories of the KGB?

Consider this assessment:

New construction began in September 1997. The embassy finally opened in May 2000, after more than two decades of delays and at a cost to the US of more than $370 million. Its tortured 31-year history remains a lesson in US diplomatic and technical hubris and a reminder of a spy-versus-spy world that may (or may not) be long past.

The spy-versus-spy world is not long past.  It is still with us: Snowden, and the Russians use of him, is just another battle in this war.

And the US diplomatic hubris is definitely not behind us.  You need to look no further than the State Department’s benign view of allowing GLONASS monitoring stations in the US to find evidence of that.

Every day I lose my faith in the maxim “never attribute to malice what can be explained by stupidity.” As dismissive as I am about the State Department’s understanding of the Russians, I find it hard to believe anyone could be this stupid, at this late date.

It gets better and better. And by better and better I mean worse and worse. And by “it”, I mean the rubbing of the American nose in the manure pile in the Middle East. The Saudis flip out on us.  Then Bibi flips out on us.  (Quite an accomplishment to get the Saudis and Israelis on the same page.)

And now the Egyptians host a Russian naval vessel for the first time since 1992. Moreover, the Egyptians, who can’t even afford a pot to pee in (as my grandfather used to say), are looking to buy $4 billion in arms from Putin.  Obviously the Egyptians are sending a message to Obama.

Yeah.  That hurried Kerry visit to Cairo sure worked magic, eh?

The US has always been the object of hatred in the Middle East, but the president who orated in Cairo promising to enhance American prestige in the region has made our nation even more widely hated, not that I would have thought that possible.  In Egypt-the location of his allegedly transformational Cairo speech-Obama has turned the amazing trick of making the US hated by Islamists, secularists, and militarists.  It’s the only thing all Egyptians agree on.  That’s our Obama.  Bringing people together.

What’s worse, he’s made the US an object of ridicule and derision.

Machiavelli famously asked whether it was better for a prince to be loved than feared.  He concluded that it would be best to be both, but that since that was unlikely, it was better to be feared than loved.

The Middle East is as Machiavellian a place as exists today.  Obama’s Quixotic foreign policy-faithfully represented by his Sancho Panza, aka John Kerry-has resulted in the worst of all outcomes in such a place: to be hated and not just not feared, but to be actually ridiculed and despised as an unreliable ally and craven and cowardly enemy.

Obama reveled in killing Osama.  But he has given life to one of Osama’s most notable observations: “When people see a strong horse and a weak horse, by nature they will like the strong horse.”

Everybody in the Middle East-and the Russians too-see the US as a weak horse.  Hell, not even a horse. A donkey-or an ass-is more like it.

This cannot end well.

The Washington Post’s (yes-the WaPo’s) Jackson Diehl does a brutal, brutal takedown of John Kerry’s serial delusions about America’s Middle East policy (if it possible to use that word to describe such a farrago of idiocy).  My only disagreement with the article is that Diehl lays the entire responsibility for the debacles in Egypt, Syria, Israel/Palestine, Iran, etc. at Kerry’s big feet.  Kerry is merely the (very long) public face of this policy.  The true author resides at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue.

I usually operate under the maxim that one should never attribute to malice which can be explained by incompetence (or stupidity), but the administration’s foreign policy, especially in the Middle East, is putting my trust in that credo to the test.

It’s a quick (though depressing) read, so do take the time to read the whole thing.  I will just call out one, truly staggering paragraph:

On Tuesday, Kerry offered the following explanation of why the Syrian peace conference he’s pushing will succeed: “The Assad regime knows full well that the purpose of” the conference is “the installation of a provisional government.” And “the Syrian government has accepted to come to Geneva.” It apparently follows that Assad will show up and placidly agree to hand over power. If not, Kerry ventured, “the Russians and the Iranians . . . will make certain that the Syrian regime will live up to its obligation.”

The only possible flattering interpretation of that quote is that Obama and Kerry are trying to incapacitate the Russians and Iranians in convulsions of uncontrollable laughing. Sort of like the old Monty Python Funniest Joke in the World bit:

There are few things more dangerous than a president in search of a legacy.  Especially those who are in political straits.

A besieged Obama is in search of a legacy in foreign policy by achieving a rapprochement with Iran.  No doubt he is being egged on in this by his Rasputin, Valerie Jarrett, who, you know, is an expert about Iran because she lived there until she was four.

Never mind that even the French think this is insane.  (This being the second time in the past 3 months that the French have made Obama look like the surrender monkey.  Quite an accomplishment.)

Never mind that this is disconcerting-no, infuriating-every traditional American ally in the Middle East, notably Israel and Saudi Arabia.  Quite an accomplishment to get those two singing from they same, um, hymnal.

Never mind that this could actually provoke the increased nuclearization of the Gulf, with the Saudis ordering nukes Prêt-à-Porter from Pakistan.

Never mind that the Iranians have taken president after president to the cleaners.  (And lest you think I am being partisan, the president who was dry cleaned most thoroughly was Reagan.  In attempting to bargain with the Iranians for the release of hostages, Reagan gave the Iranians incentives to take even more hostages, which they did.)

I just read the memoir of former CIA operative Bob Baer (“See No Evil.”)  Baer compellingly ties Iran to numerous major terror operations launched against the US for the last 30 years, including the bombing of the US embassy in Lebanon, the bombing of the Marine barracks in that city, and the Khobar Towers bombing in Saudi Arabia. He also plausibly argues that Osama and the Iranians worked together.

Note: the same people-notably the mullahs (especially Khamenei) and the pesdaren (i.e., the Revolutionary Guards)-who approved and/or carried out all of these operations are still the true powers in Iran today.  (Anyone gulled by the new, and supposedly moderate, Iranian president are truly fools.)

The only hope is that the true realists-like the French! (yes-SWP just wrote that)-will derail this insane train before it gets to the station.

And maybe the Russians will derail it (yes-SWP just wrote that too!)  The Russians are utterly cynical, and utterly self-interested. The Russian economic situation-by the admission of the Economics Ministry and the Russian Central Bank, not to mention the IMF and World Bank-is increasingly fraught.  A substantial decline in oil prices would put substantial stress on the Russian economy, the Russian budget-and the lifestyle of the rent seekers that rule the country.  A deal with Iran that relaxed sanctions would add approximately 1mm bbl of oil to world markets-around 1.1 percent of world liquids output.  Using a short run elasticity of 10, that translates into an 11 percent decline in world prices.  That would put Brent in the mid-90s. Russia needs a Brent price of approximately $117/bbl to balance its budget.  It is already on the edge with a current price of $105: $95 would be a major problem.  Major problem.

The Russians, in other words, want turmoil in the Middle East.  An American rapprochement with Iran that would reduce tensions in the Gulf-at least in the short run-and bring Iranian oil back onto market is the last thing that Russia needs right now.  Which could well lead the Russians to throw a spanner in any deal.

So this is what we’ve been reduced to.  To relying on French realism and stalwartness and Russian cynicism and cupidity to prevent Obama from making a blunder of historical proportions in his narcissistic search for a legacy.

If it works out this way I will never doubt Bismarck again.

Sarah Harrison has left Snowden’s side in Russia, and joined the Berlin cabal (Poitras, Appelbaum, Holger Stark, et al.)  I won’t bore you with her tedious announcement: Google it in case you need a sick laugh.

The fact that she stayed so long in defiance of typical Russian visa regulations already suggested that she was essentially acting as an agent of the Russians all along, shepherding Snowden from Hong Kong to Moscow.   The Russians bent and broke the rules to permit her to stay.  Presumably because she was working with them, or for them.  This would be consistent with Assange’s pro-Russian tilt.

The fact that they let her go only reinforces that conclusion.  She knows a great deal.  About where Snowden is.  About his experiences in Russia.  And most notably, about the relationship between Snowden and the security services.

If the Russians, and notably FSB/GRU/SVR, believed that she was at all unreliable, they would not have let her go and risk having this information come out.  The fact that they did let her leave makes it beyond plain that she is a reliable tool of the Russian security services, and that by extension Assange and Wikileaks are too.

Her current location also strongly suggests that the rest of the Berlin cabal is also considered highly reliable by the Russians.  And why wouldn’t they?  The entire agenda, the entire body of “reporting” is damaging to the US and highly beneficial to the Russians and Putin.

Not that those who pass for journalists in the US and Europe will connect these huge dots.

For years-probably going on 7-I have argued that Russia was in for a long period of economic stagnation.  I referred to Putin’s Hamster Wheel From Hell, on which Russia would just continue spinning.

This prediction was based on my belief that Russia’s “natural state” politico-economic system was inimical to sustained growth.  Yes, the country could experience Cocaine Blues spurts of growth (“took another shot of cocaine and away I run”)-with the Russian economic cocaine being black and gooey instead of white and powdery-but the fundamental institutional deficits would continue to hold it back.  Indeed, the rent seeking and redistributionist policies that resource wealth sustain were-and are-a detriment to the country’s long term prospects.

I stopped writing about Russian stagnation so much, well, because I didn’t want the blog to stagnate along with them 😉  What new was there to say?

Today the Russian Economics Ministry released a forecast that echoes what I’ve been on about all these years:

Russia acknowledged for the first time on Thursday that its economy would lag global growth over the next two decades, setting the stage for an era of stagnation that could threaten President Vladimir Putin’s grip on power.

Economy Minister Alexei Ulyukayev forecast that Russia’s economy would grow at an average rate of 2.5 percent during that period – down from an earlier 4 percent and half the rate Putin targeted before his return to the Kremlin last year.

The downward revision casts Russia as the poor relation in the BRICS group of large emerging markets that includes Brazil, China, India and South Africa. The ministry expects the BRICS to grow at a 5.2 percent clip during that time.

With the ministry expecting global economic growth to average 3.4-3.5 percent, the outlook threatens to make a mockery of Putin’s oft-repeated pledge to lift Russia into the world’s top-five economies by the end of this decade.

And it is still based on an oil price forecast many analysts view as over-optimistic, showing just how much Putin’s Russia, the world’s largest oil producer, relies on not only high, but rising, oil prices to prosper.

Over-optimistic.  Too funny.

Note this isn’t a forecast about a year to two.  This is a forecast that extends to beyond Putin’s departure (likely, anyways, but not absolutely certain-which is symptomatic of the problems).  It is a damning verdict on Russia’s fundamental structural and institutional flaws.  From their own mouths.

One bank analyst sarcastically remarks: “Stagnation is starting to look like a policy goal in Russia.”  Actually, there is much truth in this remark, as I also noted in my writing on this subject going back to ’06-’07.  Autocratic systems like Russia’s that exist to redistribute rents in order to maintain political control and stability hate economic dynamism.  It creates new sources of wealth that can be used to challenge existing power structures.  It creates new groups of individuals, of middling means, who aspire for greater liberties and a political voice.

Meaning that given the choice between stagnation and control on the one hand, and dynamism and a lack of control on the other, Putin and the siloviki will choose stagnation in a heart beat.  Stagnation is a policy goal.  Stagnation means that those are on top stay on top, profiting wildly from their parasitism.  And that, ultimately, is the point.

Until it all falls apart.  Which it will.   The system is strong, in its way (note the utter demoralization of the opposition), but it is brittle.  Dynamic societies can adapt to big shocks.  Stagnant ones not so much.  They tend to shatter into little pieces instead of bending and adapting in response to big shocks.

I’ll sit here patiently waiting for all those soi-disant “Russophiles” who criticized, and at times ridiculed, my earlier prognostications as the product of a Russophobe mind to explain to me how the Economic Minister is similarly Russophobic.  Because he’s just saying what I’ve said for years. Some people are slow learners.  And some are no learners.  Which means I’ll probably be waiting a long time.

The most recent Snowden revelation published by Der Spiegel (no doubt Putin’s favorite western publication) claims that (a) Merkel’s cellphone has been monitored by the NSA since 2002, and (b) the US has an electronic monitoring facility in Berlin, and numerous other cities around the world.

With regards to (b).  Good!

And especially in Berlin.  Especially.  Come on.  The place has been a viper’s nest of espionage since, oh I dunno, 7 May, 1945.  Please.  The German government has been thoroughly penetrated by first Soviet, and subsequently Russian, intelligence.  And the divided nature of Berlin made it a vortex of espionage.  And if you think that all fell down when the wall fell down, all I can say is: how was the ride on the cabbage truck? I mean other than the part where it hit the big pothole and threw you out like that.  Pity you landed smack on your head.

I only hope that NSA is vacuuming up every comm from Berlin residents Poitras and @ioerror (i.e., Jake Appelbaum).

With regards to (a).  So many things:

• This is typical Poitras/Holger Stark bait-and-switch.  A lot of breathless suggesting that NSA was hanging on Merkel’s every word, but buried in the piece is this:

Thus, the NSA would have targeted Merkel’s cell phone for more than a decade, first when she was just party chair, as well as later when she’d become chancellor. The record does not indicate what form of surveillance has taken place. Were all of her conversations recorded or just connection data? Were her movements also being recorded?

In other words, Der Spiegel is just guessing.  It doesn’t know the specifics of what information NSA collected: it suggests it was listening to everything, but in fact has no fricking clue. The rhetorical questioning is just so much bullshit.

• Given the equivocal nature of the Der Spiegel reporting, Merkel has not taken the honorable course, which would be to defer comment until she and the BND had the opportunity to confer with the US.  Presumably this reflects the fact that she is currently engaged in negotiations over the formation of a government, and hence needs to appease the left in Germany, and to indulge German anti-American neuroses.  Given the tight relationship between the German left (notably, the SDP) and Russia (can you say Gerhard Schroeder? I knew you could), all the more reason to keep close tabs on what is going on in Germany, and to suspect everyone. Everyone.
• Poitras et al control what is released. It is very easy to lie by selective disclosure. That’s why in the US, in court one is required to swear to “tell the whole truth.”  We know what the agenda of Poitras, Holger Stark, Appelbaum, Snowden, etc., is.  Given this knowledge, it is highly likely that they are cherry picking (or pit picking, more accurately) what to disclose so as to advance that agenda.  What in the vast trove of documents that Snowden stole might provide evidence that would validate American suspicions about some German politicians? And if there is evidence of perfidy by some German politicians, why should the US have believed ex ante that Merkel would be beyond suspicion? Especially given her East German upbringing?  The idea that any politician should somehow beyond suspicion is far beyond naive-and stupid.

Face it.  For deep historical reasons the US is rightly more suspicious about Germany than, say, the UK or Australia or Canada.  Which is why the US puts Germany in a different category, and treats it differently.  And for other deep historical reasons, Germany resents this deeply.

Objectively, based on history and basic logic, US intelligence collection in Germany-including on Merkel-is eminently reasonable.

And another point cannot be emphasized enough.  Snowden attempts to justify his theft and disclosure of classified documents as a way of protecting the civil liberties of Americans.  But the information he revealed about the collection of information on Americans was (a) widely known before anyone had heard of the grandiose Millennial Edward Snowden, and (b) in no way identifies any individual whose rights were violated.  Moreover, and more importantly, none of the Snowden revelations since June have been about “spying” on Americans (except for the stupid “loveint” inanity).  Instead, every revelation has been calculated to damage US interests and poison its relationships with historical allies.

I ask again: cui bono? I answer again: Putin bono. Meaning that every (selective) revelation that damages the US and boosts Russia/Putin raises the odds that this was a Russian operation from the beginning. Because I live by Bayes’ Law.

Addendum: This post from Volokh Conspiracy offers some complementary  arguments as to why surveillance of foreign leaders, especially German leaders, is a very prudent thing to do.  In brief: we don’t know what we don’t know; what you don’t know can hurt you; and you won’t know unless you try to find out.