Seraphim Hanisch
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
Germany’s news media joined the chorus of fake news regarding Russia as “threat” as the 70th anniversary of NATO was being marked by the alliance’s member nations. On the news program “Heute” (English: “Today”) hosted by Claus Kleber, the anchor announced that Russian Armed Forces carried out an invasion of Estonia.
From Sputnik News, this translation:
“The US Army along with German and European allies are heading for Estonia in order to boot out units of the Russian military forces that intruded there just like they did several years ago in Crimea”, RIA Novosti cited Kleber as claiming.
Shortly after inciting an understandably strong reaction from his viewers, Mr. Kleber then simply announced that this was not true, but that it was a description of realistic events.
Ostensibly this act was played out to justify the continued existence of NATO, even as questions rise about the purpose of the alliance now that the Soviet Union (which it was intended to ward off) is no more.
The Russian news media and political spokesmen were not happy about this. Apparently, neither was NATO itself, as General Petr Pavel, the chairman of the NATO Military Committee went on record specifically saying that the alliance does not see any open aggression from Russia regarding the Baltic states.
Vesti News made their own set of comments about this stunt:
According to the website www.tellerreport.com, the Chairman of the Russian Federation’s Council’s committee on Information Policy, Alexei Pushkov, had some things to say about this event:
The Russian senator in his Twitter noted that “Russia has not invaded and will not invade Estonia.”
In his opinion, the statement of the German TV channel is an “information provocation” in order to “play along” with the North Atlantic Alliance.
“And since Russia has no aggressive plans, they need to be invented. In this and only this is the meaning of information provocation on the ZDF channel. Play up NATO, demonize Russia.The attack on the brain is in the spirit of the current information war, ”he wrote.
It would appear that this assessment is correct. Russia has repeatedly noted it has no intentions or desires to exceed its borders for any reason. However, the country has developed an array of extremely powerful weapons, from tsunami-causing nuclear torpedos to hypersonic missiles that cannot be stopped.
While the Western angle on this weapons development has not quite established a footing on the claim that these weapons developments are aggressive in nature, the media seems eager to push as close as they can to making such a claim. This “report” by the German anchorman is a good example of when this desire for sensationalism and perhaps some further scapegoating exceeds its bounds.
Relations between Russia and the West began to sour at least as early as 2014, when Russia’s President Vladimir Putin forbade homosexuals to be anywhere near children at the Sochi Winter Olympic Games. (The common narrative blames the Maidan Revolution and the rejoining of Crimea to Russia as the cause of pressure, but these are likely only to be the “acceptable” excuses for the increasing pressure not only on Russia, but on its Orthodox Church, and all Orthodoxy Christianity in general.)
A very nasty ideological war is simmering right now between Russia and the West, and military action would actually be a distraction from that war. Still, agitprop is the weapon of choice by the West to isolate Russia for not going the way of the world.
The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of this site. This site does not give financial, investment or medical advice.
If russia made any move, Estonia, Latvia, Lituania and Finland wouldn’t be long in letting us know, suffice to say the Powers that be would be ruthlessly quick to react instead of an EU gobshite mouthing off in a country some hundreds of miles from the relevant border. Actions speak louder than words people and I hear nothing….yet!
Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania: Europe’s dwarves are suffering from “lack of attention deficit”. They need to be in the press regularly, in order to feel alive. Even German fake news will do the job, just so those three eastern poorhouses of the EU can read something daily about themselves, bolstering their shaky ego.
Meh! I wouldn’t be that cruel to the three. Ego’s aside they’re actually pretty nice countries and their economies are better than they were. They are convenient political pawns however and I suspect larger European propagandists need very little encouragement to use them for their own ego.
Nobody will pawn them if they do not want to be pawned. I have traveled through all three of them and find them awful. To use President Trump’s elegant diction: Latvia, Lithuania, Estonia are the “shithole” countries of the EU. And Poland could be added in that list as well.
All their employables have high-tailed it off to western Europe, so they need that NATO moollah just to keep afloat.
The 21st century in one word: shitty.
Mostly “shitty”, but not for all countries: The Russian Federation and China are surging, up, up, up …
While most of the rest of the world goes down, down, down ….
Interestingly, two countries with a Communist past (and in China, Communism still present), are doing best now. How come? Maybe that Communist fundament, with a strong capitalistic topping, is not all that bad, after all?
As a non-military man, I’m a bit confused. What possible advantage would Russia gain in holding little Estonia and a hostile population, that it couldn’t effect from a few hundred miles away and its own territory? Sounds like just another hoax to me.