October 14, 2008
Steven Collins
The world has noticed that a seismic shift in world geopolitics has taken place recently. Not only did Russia unleash its military into the Caucasus nation of Georgia, but, in doing so, it served notice that it can sever the energy pipelines flowing from the Caspian Sea region through Georgia to Europe whenever it wants to do so. The world has also noticed that the US military is badly overextended fighting two Asian wars even as America’s financial and banking system experiences the worst systemic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s.
The financial/banking crisis is truly a global one, but many nations blame reckless American bankers and lax regulators for selling mortgage-backed “securities” to the world which were structured more like junk bonds instead of the AAA-rated items which most nations thought they were buying from US financial houses. This “near death experience” in the global financial markets has greatly reduced the USA “soft power” and credibility throughout the globe.
More nations are tilting away from the USA and moving in Russia’s direction in light of resurgent Russian military power and declining American financial power. The Central Asian Republics which gained independence when the Soviet Union collapsed had been fairly favorable toward the USA. They hosted American military forces supporting the war in Afghanistan and welcomed US diplomats and energy companies eager to exploit energy resources. That has changed quickly. The first link below (from the Asia Times) documents what American media are not telling American citizens, that “US influence and prestige in Central Asia and the Caspian region has…plummeted.” Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan have tilted heavily toward Moscow since Russia demonstrated in Georgia that it will use military force outside its borders to implement Russian goals. Even Azerbaijan, which had been the most pro-Western nation in the Caspian region is backpedaling so quickly that its leaders “snubbed Vice President Dick Cheney during his visit to Baku.”
Even within NATO’s borders, a trend is moving in Russia’s direction. The second link, from the Financial Times, reports that Iceland has “lashed out at its allies in Europe” for not helping Iceland in Iceland’s fiscal melt-down. The article notes that Russia has stepped into the breach and strengthened “strategic ties” with Iceland via a pending multi-billion dollar loan to Iceland. In stating the obvious, the article notes that this would weaken Iceland’s “traditional ties to the West.” While the article claims that Russia will not be given access to a vacated NATO airbase, who knows what the future may hold? Russia sees this as a way to split NATO’s cohesion at the very least. Iceland sits in a militarily strategic location in the North Atlantic Ocean, almost straight north of the United Kingdom. Ezekiel 38 prophesies the nations of the modern ten tribes of Israel (found in NATO) will be attacked from the north by a Russian-led alliance in the latter days (Ezekiel 38:15-16). Even if Russia doesn’t formally take over the old USAF base on Iceland, Russians will surely come to Iceland if a Russian-Icelandic financial alliance is made. When the prophesied Russian-led attack vs. NATO occurs in the future, it would be easy for planted Russian Spetsnaz forces to secure the old USAF air base on Iceland and use it to support an attack vs. the UK and Europe “from the north.” Russia can already attack Europe from the north via the Kola Peninsula and its Kaliningrad enclave north of Poland. Seizing an Icelandic air base as hostilities begin would give Russia an even wider northern route into Europe (and also westward into North America).
The USA acts like it is playing a football game on the world geopolitical chessboard. However, the Russians are chess-masters and Putin knows how to mask his true intentions while he prepositions his pieces for his ultimate “checkmate” move. Thankfully, Ezekiel 38 reveals the end-game of Russia’s latter-day current geopolitical chess game, but few Americans know who their nation is in biblical prophecy so Americans are heedless of the Bible’s warnings.
The third link below mentions that Russia has test-fired an ICBM from a Russian nuclear submarine in the Arctic Ocean on a trajectory which had it land in the equatorial part of the Pacific Ocean. Other media stories report Russia has launched at least two other ICBMs in its on-going, global military exercises. In other words, this Russian ICBM overflew the Hawaiian Islands’ latitude–a provocative step that Russia didn’t take even during the previous Cold War era.
In his “Inside the Ring” column in the October 6, 2008 “hard-copy” issue of The Washington Times (Weekly Edition), Bill Gertz comments on the fact that “China and Russia are each modernizing their nuclear capabilities,” but that “The US has not designed a new nuclear warhead since the 1980s and has not built a new warhead since the early 1990s.” In other words, no US president since Ronald Regan has strengthened American nuclear forces. I tried to find this story at the Washington Times’ website so I could add it as a link with this blog. I couldn’t find it although it has not been difficult to find Bill Gertz’ columns in the past.
Mr. Gertz’s column (subtitled “Nuclear Problems”) makes a stark observation illustrating how badly US military capacities have gone downhill since President Regan’s time. He writes: “the United States does not have the ability to produce new nuclear weapons.” Read that last sentence again to let the full force of it sink into your consciousness. Now realize that Russia and China are producing new nuclear weaponry while the West has apparently lost the means to even build them. Now you know why nations around the world are paying more attention to cultivating relations with Russia and paying less attention to their relations with the overconfident and complacent USA. Ezekiel 38 tells you what will happen to finally shock the USA and the Western world out of its complacency.
http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Central_Asia/JJ11Ag01.html
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/ee3be044-94d3-11dd-953e-000077b07658.html
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20081011/wl_nm/us_russia_missile_pacific
