mother russia is back. and how. what is the impact on IraqNam?

[ChairmanAgnostic]

the tsarist secret police came first. They were replaced by the NKVD. Then came the infamous KGB. All three groups had spies, assassins, torturers, and other experts. All three groups worked abroad and within their own country. All three groups were a threat to other countries.

They are back, relabeled, renamed, and modernized, but they are back. Recently, the SVR has poisoned the prime minister of Ukraine, they have poisoned an ex-KGB defector in London, and they are agitating elsewhere in the world, including Pakistan, Mexico, Greece, Somalia, Yemen, Georgia, and parts of Central and South America. The latest confirmation of their global efforts just took place in Canada. Funny, it takes Al Jazeera to report on it, Not important enough for US media, I guess.
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/D9628587-8A1F-4F3A-A911-0ECB339BCA3D.htm

a little history. Afghanistan was one of the most destructive and costly steps taken by the USSR. our CIA made it even more dangerous, with billions in investments, arms, and training. unfortunately, once the USSR left Kabul, tail between its legs, we left the muhajadeen alone, and many eventually joined something called the taliban. the rest is nasty history, and a black eye for our CIA and Congress. (Congress cut funding, over the objections of State and a few smart folks in CIA. But the leadership of CIA overruled the minority voices)

With russia stretching its claws all around the world, what would be the best way for Russia to pay back the US? How about funding and arming an insurgency just enough so the US would be stuck in its own nasty quagmire, along the lines of USSR's Afghan mistake?

How easy would it be for Russia to create high tech, but cheap devices to blow up IEDs? to determine which convoys are best suited for attack? To learn when oil pipelines are unguarded? to learn about major troop movements so insurgents can run and hide before the attacks? it would be damned easy.
It would weaken the US, costing us billions, and cause most of the muslim world to view us as more dangerous than Mother Russia (despite chechnya, Georgia, and other hot spots).
it would make Russia look great in comparison.
better yet, by using persian script on the devices, it could even maintain plausible deniability while pushing the blame on Iran.

Contrary to Bush, Cheney and Rice pronouncements and "warnings", Iran does NOT want another revolutionary or civil war-type of event on its border. It already fought a war in which millions died defending against Iraq (and the US). If Iraq descends further into chaos, it will spill over and threaten Iran. Or at least, its oil fields and pipelines. Iran's interests are best served by a peaceful, friendly, and cooperative Iraq, not a quagmire that might suck it in. Of course, the White House will never talk straight on this issue, not when there is a military to use, a navy to attack with and an opportunity for one last shot at muddle east dominance with Israel's help.

My guess is that Iran is NOT the country training and funding insurgents within IraqNam. I suspect Russia. It serves the short and long-term interests. It bleeds our economy. It provides them with plausible deniability. It keeps the muddle east from becoming a permanent southern base, ready to strike at the homeland. In fact, having the US in trouble in IraqNam serves every conceivable purpose of Russia. Far more than Iran. I suspect that we are being misled again, and that Russia is not the clean, warm, cuddly friend that Ms. Rice, that superb russki speaking expert suggests.

[acmavm]

1. Paybacks are a bitch. But revenge is a mother f**ker (or so the

old saying goes.

[Wednesdays]

2. Russia has good reason to be concerned

with what's happening just a few hundred miles from their borders. I mean, imagine how the U.S. would react if it were the other way around--let's say Russia invaded a Central American country to overthrow the government and install a puppet regime? The U.S. would invoke the Monroe Doctrine so fast you wouldn't know what happened (if I remember correctly, the Monroe Doctrine was that a foreign attack on any country in the Western Hemisphere would be considered an attack on the USA).

[ChairmanAgnostic]

3. precisely the point.

Russia has every reason to worry. Iran worries that the war - er, our invasion - will expand.

[Strelnikov_]

4. Russia Is Neck And Neck With Saudi Arabia As The Worlds Largest

petroleum producer and exporter. Considering natural gas, the F.S.U. is the worlds largest exporter of fossil fuels.

Turmoil in the Middle East works to their benefit. Don't look to them to dissuade the Chimp administration from bombing Iran.

They keep worrying about Ah-Jad, that Russian Bear is going to sneak up and bite them in the ass.

Kinda puts it all in perspective. Russia has their petroleum empire, and we are trying to carve out some petroleum from weak nations for GOP connected corporations.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

5. economics is war by any other name?

if so, we are fighting with one arm tied behind our backs. The application of Bush economic policies will bankrupt this nation if left unchecked.

[Why Syzygy]

6. K&R

Very good observation. Thanks for pointing.

[Selatius]

7. Today, we don't call it colonialism anymore. We call it globalization.

Instead of controlling land and resources directly, the big powers of the world struggle over control of markets instead, markets like the oil market.

[ChairmanAgnostic]

8. it is also partly a natural, predictable reaction to our White house

and their insane policies.

When you have a maniac and his criminal partners controlling the most powerful military in the world, it is natural to investigate possibilities about how to counter it.