Gilbert Doctorow — Letter from India: Local and global speculation about Henry Kissinger

While these two posts are not must-reads, they are important for understanding the subtext rather in order to avoid being taken in by flawed analysis and propaganda. Most Westerners don't understand the Russian world view, which is called Russkiy mir (Русский мир) in Russia. Failure to get this difference in understanding, based on cultural bias, results in the US foreign policy establishment, the US government, and US media in taking a confrontational attitude toward Russia that is based more on imagination than reality.

And this lack of understanding of other cultures doesn't apply only to Russia. Americans generally project themselves on the world and wonder why their analysis doesn't work out as planned, as in Iraqis greeting their liberators with flowers, instituting a Western-style democracy and everyone living happily ever after. Even the American cultural myth of falling in love, marrying a person of one's own choice and "living happily ever after" is fiction instead of reality, judging from divorce statistics and domestic violence.

The first post is a backgrounder on history, international relations, Henry Kissinger and the Realist School (Realpolitik) by an expert and scholar in foreign affairs. Detailed.

The second is a backgrounder on Russia and Russkiy mir (Русский мир) by the Saker, who is from a White Russian emigre family. Detailed.

Une parole franche
Letter from India: Local and global speculation about Henry Kissinger
Gilbert Doctorow | European Coordinator of The American Committee for East West Accord Ltd.

The Vineyard of the Saker
Could there be a grain of truth in the Ukrainian propaganda? (repost with new introduction)
The Saker