Ray Dalio — "Is Trade War Harbinger Of A Bigger Conflict?

Politics is playing a bigger role in influencing the markets than is typical, and I (and others) am still trying to figure out where Donald Trump is taking us, especially as it regards trade and other wars. Besides prompting me to think hard and dig deep into what’s now happening, it is leading me to delve deeper into past trade and military wars to see their effects on economies and markets.

I will pass along my findings when I complete the examination. In the meantime, I will share some of my ruminations for the little that they are worth....

The analogy with the late 1930s continues to echo in my head….

Zero Hedge
What Keeps Dalio Up At Night: "Is Trade War Harbinger Of A Bigger Conflict?"

Authored by Ray Dalio via LinkedIn

See also

Russia Vows Imminent Response To Diplomat Expulsion "The US Only Understands Force"

Tyler Durden

See also

The Unz Review
Neocons Are Back With a Big War Budget and Big War Plans
Ron Unz

See also

Stumbling or provoking?

The National Interest
Stumbling into a War with Russia
Dave Majumdar | Defense Editor

The Saker — A truly historical month for the future of our planet

Hence this month’s historical developments which have placed Russia and the West in a direct collision course. As I said above, the Empire can now either fold or double down. If it decides to fold, war will be averted and meaningful negotiations finally entered into. If it doubles down, something the Neocons always do, then this means war with Russia. This is a stark and very difficult choice (no, not for normal people, but for the psychopaths ruling the West). And there isn’t much Russia could, or should, do at this point. As is the case every time a serious crisis takes place, the apparently united elites running the West will now break-up into separate factions and each one of these factions will pursue and promote its own, narrow, interests. There will be an intense, mostly behind the scenes, struggle between those who will want to double down or even trigger a war against Russia and those who will be horrified by that notion (not necessarily for profound moral reasons, just out of basic self-interest and a healthy instinct for self-preservation).

As to who will prevail, your guess is as good a mine. But the fact that today Trump replaced McMaster with a warmongering psychopath like John Bolton is a clear sign that the Neocons are in charge in the USA and that the Axis of Kindness is about to get a heck of a lot “kinder”.

The Vineyard of the Saker
A truly historical month for the future of our planet
The Saker

Leonid — The low blow as a rule

It is a centuries-old practice of the maritime powers [thalassocracy] to "isolate" their enemies with a curtain made of economic sanctions, military encirclement, political and ideological condemnation: in the past, "isolation" or "strangulation" was usually the source of war. The latest developments in Europe are therefore to be looked at with concern: in the United Kingdom, the clumsy poisoning of former Russian spy Sergei Skripal was exploited to further exacerbate diplomatic relations with Russia and to push "the allies" in the same direction, while in Slovakia Prime Minister Robert Fico, opposed to a total flattening of NATO policies, was overthrown in a dirty operation. The Atlantic block has now "ostracized" Moscow and, denying its rights, its interests and its legitimate sphere of influence, is preparing the ground for war....

Good summary of the lead up to war to date. This is pretty clearly the way the Russian leadership views it. They are preparing for WWIII as the extension of WWI and WWII. They would be foolish not to do so.

The Chinese leadership is also well aware it next on the list after Russia and is sending warnings that Taiwan is a red line.

My assessment is that the Western military establishment realizes that the window of opportunity is closing and that they don't have much time left before Russia and China, which are being driven together by events, become too strong to confront, so that the US-led West loses global hegemony. This is unacceptable.

Parlous times. Looks like the US is stumbling into the Thucydides trap.

Geopolitica
The low blow as a rule

Leonid

See also

Paul Robinson dissects more propaganda.

Irrussianality
How not to write history
Paul Robinson | Professor, Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa

Also

Strategic Culture Foundation
The Russian Military Warns: a Major War in Syria Is ImminentArkady Savitsky, military analyst based in St Petersburg, Russia

Also

Reuters
Israel admits bombing suspected Syrian nuclear reactor in 2007, warns Iran

Stephen Farrell

Also

TASS
Britain pushes ahead with developing secret chemical warfare agents laboratory

Trump voices concerns to Putin over new Russian armaments - report

Paul Craig Roberts — War Is On The Horizon

Good analysis.

Paul Craig Roberts

War Is On The Horizon

Also

Haaretz
Israeli Military Drill Simulates Multi-front War – With Russia Intervening Over Syria

Yaniv Kubovich

Also

Lies and shifting goal posts. The US leadership never intended to deliver.

National Security Archives
NATO Expansion: What Yeltsin Heard

Also

We’ve reached the point where the US will have to either confront Russia militarily or accept that their vicious project in Syria has failed. My gut feeling is that the foreign policy establishment is not ready to throw in the towel just yet. They are going do something very risky and very stupid. They’re going to roll the dice and hope they don’t come up snake-eyes.

Unz Review
Will Washington launch a “false flag” on Russia’s Election Day?
Ron Unz

Edward Curtin — Further Signs of More War: A Most Dangerous Game

Concur. The march to war has begun after the public has been prepared. Just a matter of time now.

Dissident Voice
Further Signs of More War: A Most Dangerous Game
Edward Curtin

See also

Russia is warning the United States firmly that it will not tolerate attacks on its military forces in Syria.

The Russian policy mirrors Washington’s own, but the Kremlin has never spoken so forcefully to reiterate that it will retaliate if its forces are attacked. However, the Russian policy only applies to the Kremlin’s official military forces rather than private military contractors (PMCs) that are also operating in Syria....

Gerasimov also noted that there are Russian military advisers, Russian Reconciliation Centre personnel and military policemen stationed with the Syrian defense department in Damascus.

If U.S. forces intervene in Syria and hit uniformed Russian military forces, the Kremlin is basically warning the United States that it will hit back and that there will be a war.

The National Interest

Russia Sends a Chilling Warning to America over Syria

Dave Majumdar | Defense Editor

Whether in Ukraine or another international engagement, if an honest analysis reveals that the United States has merely a secondary or tertiary interest—rather than a core national interest—yet commits itself to expending valuable political or military capital, the chances are high that such engagement would end up costing more than would be gained. Why should Washington spend money and risk the lives of our troops for a mission that would leave the country at a net loss?

In the current standoff in the Ukraine, Washington would certainly prefer to see a peaceful resolution to the violence. For Moscow and Kiev, however, the matter is existential, meaning each is willing to expend considerable capital and take significant risks to resolve the conflict in their favor.

Translation: Getting involved in Ukraine is a strategic blunder.

But so was Vietnam, Afghanistan, Iraq, Lybia, Syria, Yemen, etc.  The US has a history of blundering.

What Does America Gain by Arming Ukraine?

Lt. Col. Daniel L. Davis (US Army ret.) | senior fellow for Defense Priorities

Also

International Man — Casey Research
Trump’s Tariffs Could Start a Real War
Nick Giambruno, Senior Editor

Trump wants to privatize the war in Afghanistan because, you know, we're out of money.

This is ludicrous.

Check it out.

Trump Considering Plan to Privatize Much of War in Afghanistan

And this is for what reason? So he can give tax cuts to the wealthy?

The United States has become a buffoon nation with a buffoon for president. This would be laughable if it wasn't so pathetic.

We export war. That's all we do. It's sickening. War for profit now. A new industry is born with the blessings of the White House.

The U.S.A. is a for-profit,  mercenary nation. We are a laughing stock with nukes. Zero moral authority. ZERO.

Trump is getting more pathetic every day. I am ashamed that I voted for this asshole.

Sputnik International — Influential American Defense Think Tank Lobbies For Preemptive War With China

On Friday, the RAND Corporation, America’s single most influential military and defense strategy think tank issued a troubling new editorial in Newsweek magazine based on a July 28 report titled – War With China: Thinking Through the Unthinkable – in which the lead authors renewed the call for armed conflict with Beijing they made one month earlier.… 

Evermore disconcerting, the article is slated to appear in the same Newsweek publication in which the face of Russian President Vladimir Putin graces its cover in a hoody with a laptop in front of him with a similarly hawkish article calling for preemptive cyberwarfare against Russia.

The US deep state speaks. Where are the grown ups. or maybe better the mental ward keepers?

Sputnik International
Influential American Defense Think Tank Lobbies For Preemptive War With China

Pepe Escobar — While Beijing and Manila Talk, Washington Spoiling for a Fight

Escobar sees the that of US-China conflict as being immanent rather than longer term. The window of opportunity for Washington is closing fast and will be gone by about 2025. China now apparently feels strong enough to cross redlines declared by the US — after the US crossed redlines declared by China.

Estimates like this one are difficult to make, however, since no one really knows how fast the Chinese military is ramping up and what is in the pipeline.

In addition, swarming is an integral aspect of Chinese strategy going back to the Korean War. The US is at a disadvantage logistically, with its battle and supply line extended far from US territory. The US has superior defense capacity on its ship, but what happens when the puppy runs out at sea during battle and the Chinese missiles keep coming in force? The Chinese don't necessarily need superior weapons but rely on dominating numerically with more staying power.

This also raises the nuclear question since the most effective weapon against a US carrier group is a tactical nuclear weapon. Should China decide to resort to that, and it is hardly out of the question if China perceived itself threatened existentially, warfare will be changed forever.

Counterpunch
While Beijing and Manila Talk, Washington Spoiling for a Fight

Pepe Escobar

5 Questions for Peter Lavelle: The intentional slide to war against Russia — Interview with Peter Lavelle

Not encouraging. The US elite is sliding down the slippery slope.

The Duran
5 Questions for Peter Lavelle: The intentional slide to war against Russia

Interview with Peter Lavelle

Gilbert Doctorow — War or Peace: the essential question before American voters on November 8th

In matters of substance as opposed to character assassination that both parties’ candidates have engaged in freely, what separates the candidates and makes it worthwhile to register and vote on November 8th is the domain of international relations. This, as a general rule, is the only area where a president has free hands anyway, whatever position his party holds in the Congress. Here the choice facing voters is stark, I would say existential: do we want War or Peace?

Do we want to pursue our path of global hegemony, which is bringing us into growing confrontation with Russia, meaning a high probability of war, (the policy of Hillary Clinton), or do we want a harmonious international order in which the U.S. plays its role at the board of governors, just like other major world powers (the policy of Donald Trump).

Let me go one step further and explain what “war” means, since it is not something that gets much attention in our media, whereas it is at the top of the news each day in Russia.
“War” does not mean Cold War-II, a kind of scab you can pick to indulge a pleasure in pain that is not life threatening. War means what our military like to call “kinetics” to mask the horror of it all. It means live ammunition, ranging from conventional to thermonuclear devices that can devastate large swathes of the United States if we play our hand badly, as would likely be the case for reasons I explain below should Hillary and her flock of Neocon armchair strategists take the reins of power in January 2017.…

Une parole franche
War or Peace: the essential question before American voters on November 8th

Gilbert Doctorow | European Coordinator of The American Committee for East West Accord

Branko Milanovic — Economic reflections on the Fall of Constantinople

For the economic history buffs.

Global Inequality
Economic reflections on the Fall of Constantinople
Branko Milanovic | Visiting Presidential Professor at City University of New York Graduate Center and senior scholar at the Luxembourg Income Study (LIS), and formerly lead economist in the World Bank's research department and senior associate at Carnegie Endowment for International Peace

Robert Parry — Neocons and Neolibs: How Dead Ideas Kill

Hillary Clinton wants the American voters to be very afraid of Donald Trump, but there is reason to fear as well what a neoconservative/neoliberal Clinton presidency would mean for the world, writes Robert Parry.

Clinton is by far the most dangerous candidate based on history. There's no question about her in this regard. She is trigger-happy.

The problem is that she reflects the dominant position of the US foreign policy establishment and the US military establishment. It's questionable whether another of the candidates, including the presumptive GOP nominee, could resist pressure that will be brought to bear by the "experts" in international relations and US national security. But with HRC, there is no question.

Consortium News
Neocons and Neolibs: How Dead Ideas Kill
Robert Parry

US active duty service people don't want to go to war, and they think that HRC is more likely to "do stupid shit" than Trump.

Sputnik
US Military Supports Trump, and Probably Not Why You Think

Nikolay Shevchenko — How rival economic blocs replaced the Cold War's military blocs

This is a good article but it limits its scope to Russia and the EU. The problem is that the US is fixed on taking down a resurgent Russia and has mounted a strong economic, foreign policy and military stance if needed to do so. The US is also mounting a propaganda campaign domestically to prepare American for war with Russia. 

This situation is growing more dangerous daily and the Russians are well aware of US intentions. So is China and the Chinese leadership realizes that if Russia falls, they are next on the list for regime change and neoliberal takeover.

Complicating the matter are similar US designs on China in order to prevent an axis forming that would pit Eurasianists with Atlanticists. A Chinese, Russian and Iranian alliance is Washington's worst nightmare. This is also taking a geopolitical, geostrategic and global economic turn of pitting East and South represented by BRICS and the emerging world in general against the North and West (NATO and Japan).

If history is any guide, the present course is  a collision course and the world is again heading toward war. War has either a territorial or economic basis. Territorial disputes remain unsettled since WWII, and recent developments suggest that economic blocs are again confronting each other in a game that Washington perceives as zero-sum, based on unipolarity and hegemony, even though Russia and China have been emphasizing win-win based on multipolarity and a balance of power.

Add to this a Thucydides Trap, and the future is concerning. 

Most significant, however, is that this is now unfolding in Europe, which has been the scene of so much war for centuries, even millennia.

Russia Direct
How rival economic blocs replaced the Cold War's military blocs
Nikolay Shevchenko

See also

Demonising Russia won’t give us security

Letter to the Guardian by Anna Matveeva, King’s College London, and Richard SakwaKent University

The Daily Sheeple — Wake the Flock Up
WW3 Ahead? Pentagon To Quadruple Military Budget For European Theater

Joshua Krause

The Vineyard of the Saker
Coming to a head in Syria
Ghassan Kadi

Tony Cartalucci — Why the West Won’t Hit ISIS Where it Hurts

Those familiar with the Syrian conflict would recognize this section of the Syrian-Turkish border as precisely the boundaries of the long-sought after “safe zone” the US, NATO, and the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) have attempted to establish since as early as 2012. The Paris attacks and several minor border incidents recently reported, seem to be only the latest in a long line of cited provocations this axis has attempted to use to implement its preconceived plans.

This region between Jarabulus and Afrin constitutes the primary corridor through which the summation of Al Qaeda’s Al Nusra Front and the so-called “Islamic State” or ISIS, receive weapons, supplies, and fresh fighters. Through coordinated efforts between Syria’s Kurds and the Syrian government itself, the rest of Syria’s northern border with Turkey has been sealed. As this process has progressed, the desperation of the Western-led axis seeking regime change in Damascus has increased proportionally.

In reality, regardless of the West’s repetitive platitudes regarding its determination to “fight ISIS,” its actions and the actions of its regional allies have fully illustrated a desire to preserve the terrorist group. Its feigned “war on ISIS” helped open the door to the recent Russian military intervention. With Russia’s entry into the war, the West can no longer afford to drag out its nonexistent operations against ISIS, hoping for an opportunity to finally divide and destroy the country.

Russia and the Syrian Arab Army for whom it is providing air support, have nearly closed the Jarabulus-Afrin corridor themselves. In fact, the week before the Paris attacks, Syrian troops had established a corridor to the besieged Kweires airbase, just 40 kilometers from the Euphrates. Since then, the Syrian military has expanded its control around the surrounding area. Should it reach the Euphrates, along with taking Aleppo and moving northeast from Latakia in the west, Syria will fill the void NATO has long sought to establish its “safe zone” in.

In other words, there is a race between NATO to implement a partial occupation of Syria, and Syria and its allies racing to fill the void before this happens – and the race is nearly over.

The race is on to partition Syria against Russia and Iran who are determined to prevent it.

But that is just the initial objective.

ISIS is not only destined to divide and destroy Syria and Iraq. If the West has its way, the terrorist organization is destined to move into Iran, the Caucasus region of southern Russia, and Central Asia next. It is a proxy army built atop of what the United States and Saudi Arabia accomplished with Al Qaeda starting in the 1980’s, which itself was merely a continuation of the British Empire’s use of Wahabbi fanatics to overthrow its Ottoman rivals over a century ago.

When the West calls this a “long war,” they mean it. And it will be longer still until the people of the West realize their governments aren’t waging a “War on Terror,” they are waging a “War of Terror.”

Russia knows this. Iran knows this. And China knows this.

NEO

Why the West Won’t Hit ISIS Where it Hurts

Tony Cartalucci

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard — France swats aside EU budget rules in rearmament blitz

France has invoked emergency powers to sweep aside EU deficit rules and retake control over its economy after the terrorist atrocities in Paris, pledging a massive in increase and security and defence spending whatever the cost.
President Francois Hollande said vital interests of the French nation are at stake and there can be no further justification for narrowly-legalistic deficit rules imposed by Brussels. “The security pact takes precedence over the stability pact. France is at war,” he told the French parliament.
Defence cuts have been cancelled as far out as 2019 as the country prepares to step up its campaign to “eradicate” ISIS, from the Sahel in West Africa, across the Maghreb, to Syria and Iraq.…

The Telegraph
France swats aside EU budget rules in rearmament blitz
Ambrose Evans-Pritchard

Tom Winter — Polybius on war: Cause, Pretext, and Beginning

The title says it all, but it's an interesting post in its entirety. Short.

Fort Russ
Polybius on war: Cause, Pretext, and Beginning
Tom Winter

Novorossia.su — Source: Poroshenko is planning an operation to destroy DPR and LPR with NATO support

This is a bold move if there is anything to it.

Fort Russ
Source: Poroshenko is planning an operation to destroy DPR and LPR with NATO support

Novorossia.su
Translated for Fort Russ by J. Arnoldski

A different take.

Indian Punchline
Kissinger: Obama is prudent but more ideological than strategic
M K Bhadrakumar, retired Indian ambassador and foreign service officer

Patrick L. Smith — The U.S.-Russia “phony war”: How Washington warmongers could bring us from stalemate to catastrophe

Lots of background info.

“Kerry is now sidelined on Ukraine, it seems, since his four hours with Putin last May,” a prominent Russianist wrote in a personal note 10 days ago. “Another escalation by the war party—headed, I think, by [Vice President] Biden, [Senator] McCain, et al.”

There are actually three war parties in the US or three factions of the same war party, depending on how one looks at it — the Straussian neocons like Robert Kagan, the Scoop Jackson war hawks like John McCain, and in the background but perhaps most influential, the deep state including the clandestine services, some of the military general staff, and the military-industrial complex that profits from hostilities and has an interest in keeping them going.

Salon
The U.S.-Russia “phony war”: How Washington warmongers could bring us from stalemate to catastrophe

Patrick L. Smith, Salon’s foreign affairs columnist

Damn! Did You Ever Imagine It Would Come To This?

   (Commentary posted by Roger Erickson)

"In other words, this is a bullshit report written by neocons in order to foment war with Russia."

What did Marriner Eccles say?

Marriner Eccles gloomy last speech, 1977:

"... the wrong road was taken every time we had a chance to alter course ... "

That's from a lifelong Republican, mind you, who was for the New Deal, for normalizing relations with China in 1950, and against the Vietnam war.

Didn't Khrushchev say something very similar to Marriner's words, as soon as Stalin died? "We could have been a great country."

Institutional momentum = tangents to evolution .... over-adapting to transient context (aka, playing with death).

In a country this big & talented ... we have much better things to do than waste time conquering other countries & looting their natural resources. Our best return comes from investing in all of our own talents (not just in weapons to use on others).

NeoCons:  If they can't find it (reality), they must be hiding it from themselves. 

Former top Russian general: Russia will defend eastern Ukraine, even if it means taking Kiev — Max Fisher interviews Russian Lt. Gen. Evgeny Buzhinsky

Insight into the top Russian military.

Vox
Former top Russian general: Russia will defend eastern Ukraine, even if it means taking Kiev
Max Fisher interviews Russian Lt. Gen. Evgeny Buzhinsky (ret.), Chairman of the Executive Board, PIR Center