Around the time of World War II, Marshal of the Soviet Union Y. N. Shaposhnikov explained, "Mobilization is war, in our minds there is no other meaning for it." Having recalled many of its people from Russia and China, it appears that some kind of mobilization has been underway in North Korea. Small moves, like placing artillery units in north-facing caves and increasing the number of divisions on the border with South Korea, indicates something more than the usual bluster. On the American side, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs, Admiral Mullen, says that North Korea is being irresponsible and "reckless." He talks as though an avoidable war may erupt in Korea, and appears exasperated by the behavior of China, which is not applying the needed diplomatic pressure on the North Koreans. At the same time, the Russian Far East Military District is increasing its war readiness.
Russia's actions are not difficult to read. On every front the Russians give aid and comfort to the Communist side, or the anti-American side. Take South America as an example. The government of Venezuela supports a Communist insurgency in neighboring Colombia. So what does Russia do? Moscow exports weapons to Venezuela that are, in turn, given to the Colombian Communist insurgency. According to the Washington Post, last year Russia exported 1,800 SA-24 shoulder-fired surface-to-air missiles to Venezuela. The Russian Federation also supports Communist Angola, the Communist-staffed ANC leadership in South Africa, and sells advanced weapons to Communist China (which is no longer regarded by Washington as Communist since it began selling cheap consumer items to the United States). Russia's support for rogue states is not a matter of conjecture. It is a matter of record. The Russians have supported terrorism worldwide for decades. They have armed the Iranians, who now threaten to kill American generals (see the FOX NEWS report). In other words, the Russian government supports America's enemies while pretending to be America's friend. The same may be said of China.
To understand Russia's motives, and to understand those of China, it is useful to read the a text prepared almost 30 years ago by a KGB defector named Anatoliy Golitsyn. His book was titled New Lies for Old, and he predicted the fall of the Soviet Union; only he said the collapse would be engineered by Moscow as part of a long-term deception operation. "The overall aim will be to bring about a major and irreversible shift in the balance of world power in favor of the [socialist] bloc as a preliminary to the final ideological objective of establishing a worldwide federation of communist states," wrote Golitsyn, who warned that the Sino-Soviet split was faked. This, in turn, set up the possibility of a far-reaching "scissor's strategy," in which Russia and China took opposite sides in various conflicts around the world, infiltrating and influencing various states (like India and Pakistan, or Zimbabwe and Angola). "Before long, the communist strategists might be persuaded that the balance had swung irreversibly in their favor," Golitsyn continued. "In that event they might well decide on a Sino-Soviet' reconciliation.' The scissor's strategy would give way to the strategy of 'one clenched fist.' At that point the shift in the political and military balance would be plain for all to see."
As the North Korean government sinks allied ships, bombards allied civilians and threatens Northeast Asia with a regional nuclear war, the Russians and Chinese prepare their forces, making threats of their own. Already the Chinese have openly warned against military exercises in the Western Pacific. In recent days the Russian Far East Military District has been preparing for a conflict. According to the Chief of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, Nikolai Yegorovich Makarov, "Without a doubt, we have taken measures to increase the combat readiness of our forces." (See Reuters story.) What reason does Makarov offer? He merely says that an "inappropriate situation" is developing in Korea. By this he does not mean that Russia is going to take South Korea's side, or support the American alliance. The Russians are preparing, if need be, to support their Chinese and North Korean allies. Make no mistake, the Chinese and the Russians will support North Korea against South Korea. They are not on the side of peace and stability; rather, they are on the side of war and destabilization. This, in fact, has always been the Russian and Chinese position. The ruling powers in Russia and China consider themselves already at war with America. This is a secret they keep to themselves. Meanwhile, the Americans believe the Russian and Chinese lies, imagining that Russian and Chinese power has made peace with capitalism, and will play nice from now on. Therefore America plans for a peaceful future, talking of nuclear arms reductions, while the Russians and Chinese have been building weapons of all kinds, sending those arms to rogue states like North Korea and Iran expressly for the purpose of igniting regional conflicts that will demoralize and economically ruin the United States.
You might ask, why would China participate in such a scheme when America is China's main customer? One might as well ask why China has broken agreements about missile technology transfers to countries like North Korea and Iran. Yet, the technology is transferred. As Constantine Menges pointed out in his book, China: The Gathering Threat, "Although China may have kept one or two of its many pledges and formal commitments, in fact, the phrase that best characterizes its policy is 'promise and forget.'" According to Menges, the CIA has described China as the "most significant supplier of weapons of mass destruction, related goods, and technology to foreign countries." At the top of the list of countries, you will find North Korea and Iran. Is this policy to make money? No, because there is much more money in selling consumer goods to the United States than selling missile technology to North Korea, and once the United States is attacked by WMDs your selling days are at an end. So how can we make sense of this?
Remember the words of Golitsyn. Remember the term "one clenched fist." The golden circle of American capitalism doesn't want to accept this analysis. Their obligatory economic optimism about China has caught them out, and they are no longer rational where these issues are concerned. American politicians cannot lead on this issue because they are the creatures of the financial and industrial elite, and the general public is too ignorant of foreign affairs to exert any pressure in the direction of realism. Those few voices of reason and alarm, like that of Constantine Menges, are drowned out by the daily media circus which concentrates on the politics of personality and scandal. The Russians can literally prepare their troops in the Far East for the advent of war, and there is no sense of alarm here in the United States. And it is useful to point out that the Russian Far East Military District has twice as many combat divisions as the entire United States Army. Imagine the number of Chinese troops in the Shenyang Military Region, where the Chinese deploy four armies, including 39th Mechanized Group Army.
Regionally, in Northeast Asia, the threat of war is being taken seriously by South Korean and American military officials. However, they appear to operate under the mistaken assumption that China's strategic interest lies with restraining North Korea. Apparently they have not considered the possibility that instability in Korea serves Chinese as well as Russian national interests, and a catastrophe on the Korean peninsula might strengthen the overall position of the Chinese as it weakens the position of America. In response to public warnings issued by top American and South Korean commanders, the North Korean Communists have alluded to the "dark clouds of a nuclear war" in which South Korea, Japan and the United States are turned into a "sea of flames." It is old North Korean rhetoric. But it is a type of rhetoric carried forward by a thoroughly militarized people, who have endured unimaginable hardships to sustain their military readiness at all costs. A Westerner can hardly imagine the sacrifices they have already made in peace-time.
