The "no-duh" prize of the year goes to Nikolai Patrushev, director of the Russian Federal Security Service (FSB), who reported to President Vladimir Putin last week that the United States and Britain were using non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in the countries of the former Soviet Union to spy, to covertly influence internal politics, and to foment revolution.
Oh, the old KGB sure aint what it used to be! Presuming the FSB didn't have the time or training to simply peruse the internet for the "pro-democracy" NGOs in the former USSR, most of which have proudly displayed banner ads thanking the US government for support, they could have easily had it explained to them by the only Member of Congress who is on the ball when it comes to this unconstitutional and illegal activity of the US government.
The Ukraine "revolution" was exclusively financed in Western capitols, primarily US and UK and had been planned far in advance. As the Guardian reports:
But walking through the encampment (in Kiev) last December, it was hard to ignore the evidence of meticulous preparation - the soup kitchens and tents for the demonstrators, the slickness of the concert, the professionalism of the TV coverage, the proliferation of the sickly orange logo wherever you looked. It was surprising how few journalists commented on what was so obvious.In reality, the events in the square were the result of careful, secret planning by Yushchenko's inner circle over a period of years...
According to one of the main organisers of the revolution, Roman Bessmertny - Yushchenko's campaign manager and, currently, vice-prime minister - the aim was, effectively, to carry out a peaceful coup d'état: "We created a system parallel to the state...
Yes, planned in advance and in the Western capitols. I recall sitting in on a backroom Washington meeting in 2000 where the pre-diseased Yushchenko was making the case for the US to intervene to replace then-President Lenoid Kuchma with himself. I am certain as he made the rounds in other agencies that could "make it happen" he was greeted with the same warm response he received in the meeting I attended.
But no, it is not surprising, as the above journalist asserts, that so few journalists commented on the obvious pre-planning and organization of the Ukrainian coup. Journalists and commentators on both the Left and Right are identical in their enthusiastic support of the "people power" revolutions, whereby a few thousand Western-financed "protestors" in the street can trump the will of the millions who actually showed up to vote. All in the name of democracy, of course. It is pure Leninism writ large and everyone from the Left to the Right to the Beltway "libertarians" just cannot get enough of it.
However, some observers have consistently "gotten it," but the vast majority are just too excited by the mob in the street to notice the spoil-sports.
Patrushev also claimed that the next target for the NGO coup d'etat was Belarus. Again, this is hardly a revelation, as the Bush Administration never misses a chance to demand that the democratically-elected Aleksander Lukashenko be overthrown -- in the name of democracy, of course.
And the United States is clearly putting its money where its mouth is. Former National Security Council spook Bruce Jackson is cashing in on the 40 million dollars appropriated by Congress to foment "democracy" in Belarus by forming his own NGO -- talk about a revolving door! It is funny how these "non"-governmental organizations are always funded by government money. And rather telling that someone like Jackson will be putting his NSC training to use overthrowing the government of Belarus.
As one European official candidly admitted, in a startlingly schizophrenic article published this week on Belarus, "It's not Election Day; it's the day after that's important." Shades of Budapest 1947 and Czechoslovakia 1948. What is most astonishing about reporting on Belarus is, aside from the obligatory horror stories about all "the disappeared", the admission that the vast majority of the Belarusian people would like to keep Lukashenko as their president. The journalists use different wording, of course, such as the above article puts it, most Belarusians are "not ready" for democracy. After all, how dare they keep voting for the wrong guy? Clearly, millions are needed to convince them to vote differently, and if that does not work more millions are available for "the day after" as the European diplomat put it.
As the Spectator (UK) reported this week,
Minsk today is not a city teetering on an abyss — it is clean and well run. Rather than stopping you for bribes as they do in every other post-Soviet country, the Belarus police refuse back-handers because they’re terrified of the government finding out. You don’t see many bums in the street or oligarchs in shiny Humvees. Schools and hospitals are well funded and the streets are safe at night. Everyone gets paid on time and the pensioners say they love Lukashenko, that he takes care of them. Farmers say he’s a great lad, one of them.The state spends millions on grandiose projects for the people, like Minsk central station. It’s possibly the nicest station I’ve ever visited. A four-storey glass structure, it has two cafés, a cinema, a pool club, an internet café, a play area for children. Unlike every other station in Europe, it is free from drug dealers and prostitutes.
Sounds like a nightmare! How dare those Belarusians resist the "liberalization" that has made Russia such an economic miracle! The fact that they are satisfied with robust economic growth and wish to see it continue under the slow approach to liberalization signals a need for a US-funded push to give them "democracy" whether they like it or not.
As the US News article linked above breathlessly reports, "It may not be tyranny--opposition figures still distribute anti-Lukashenko literature, and a handful of independent papers criticize the president--but it does smell of dictatorship." Oooh that smell... And the author further claims that the appearance of Western multi-nationals such as McDonalds, sushi bars, and Benetton are mere "capitalist eye candy." Are these private companies really in Belarus to lose money so as to provide "eye candy" to mask a Stalinist regime?
Should libertarians be cheering for a government that clearly has a great deal of influence over the business and personal lives of its citizens? Certainly not. But enough about Sarbanes-Oxley and the REAL ID act... It is much easier to pick American pockets to force "democracy" in the rest of the world as tyranny advances unchecked onto our own shores. It's a lot more fun to boss other people around than face your own troubles.
Which brings us back to Patrushev. I don't know what is more astonishing: that he reports the USG/NGO "axis of revolution" as something his agency just uncovered or that the international press actually reports his findings as if they are something new. Of course, this assertion has been roundly denied in the USAID-funded "independent" media in the former Soviet Union, so there cannot possibly be any truth to it...
