US/NATO War on Russia

[Paul Rigby]

Ukraine: A revolving door of scoundrels

[video=youtube_share;U2uOsqnLLsc]http://youtu.be/U2uOsqnLLsc[/video]

[Lauren Johnson]

Paul, Great find!!

[David Guyatt]

Chuck Hagel fired as SecDef. Connected? He was supposedly not on message with the White House.

If Thierry Meyssan at VoltaireNet is correct, Obama was not on message with Obama? Which, if correct, presents an interesting and alarming dilemma: the Neocons rule supreme - private war is now official Washington war.

Does Obama still have a military policy?

by Thierry Meyssan

Thierry Meyssan, who was the first to predict Chuck Hagel's possible appointment as Defense Secretary, speculates over the reasons behind his dismissal. They are not to be found in Hagel's conduct, but in the President's policy changes. Moreover, he observes, Washington no longer has a specific policy and the Obama administration is carrying out dangerously contradictory actions.

VOLTAIRE NETWORK | DAMASCUS (SYRIA) | 1 DECEMBER 2014 FRANÇAIS ESPAÑOL TÜRKÇE عربي PORTUGUÊS DEUTSCH ITALIANO РУССКИЙ فارسى POLSKI

Chuck Hagel, who had been appointed to implement the policy of Barack Obama, refused to follow him when he veered off course, preffering to resign.It is undeniable that the Obama administration has lost its compass in terms of defining its national security policy. In May 2013, the White House scuttled the President's Intelligence Advisory Board without renewing it and, this week, it ditched its loyal Secretary of Defense, Chuck Hagel. Most importantly, it keeps on delaying the release of the new national security doctrine, which should have been submitted to Congress by law already 7 months ago.Whereas there are clear guidelines for long-term goals (thwarting the economic development of Russia and China) and the means to achieve them (shifting troops from Europe and the Gulf to the Far East), no one knows what the goals are in the face of the Arab world today.It would seem that in 2010 the "Arab Spring" - long time in the State Department pipeline to install the Muslim Brotherhood in power everywhere in the region took President Obama by surprise, at least partially. The same applies to the regime change orchestrated in Ukraine, in 2013.Today, one part of the US state apparatus is combating the Islamic State, while another part is supporting its efforts to fight the Syrian Arab Republic.Chuck Hagel, who had sought clarification in writing from the President's National Security Advisor, not only did not get a response, but was fired without being given an explanation.Indeed, the man failed to win over the staff in his department, but his judgment or the support he enjoyed from his senior officers were never in doubt. He opposed George W. Bush's war in Iraq and was bent on repositioning US forces around national goals instead of private ones.His two main potential successors, Senator Jack Reed and Michele Flournoy, immediately threw in the towel, realizing that Chuck Hagel was not removed from office for misconduct, but precisely for having applied the policy handed down to him by President Obama. Hence, all eyes are now on second fiddles Bob Work and Ash Carter. Moreover, it is not enough to be nominated; the candidate will also have to be confirmed by the Republican majority controlling the Senate, which is sure to lead to complications.The specialized press draws a strange portrait of the outgoing secretary. It acknowledges his honesty - a very rare quality in Washington only to accuse him of being an underachiever. Now his role, as defined at the time of his appointment, was precisely not spark new wars, but to reform the Pentagon, which he was in the process of doing. In the first place, he dismantled many bridges between US forces and those of the Israel, the IDF. Then he proceeded to implement colossal budget cuts, except in the nuclear field. During his tenure, he was incessantly attacked by pro-Israelis, neo-cons and gay organizations (funded by all the above).The confusion surrounding the entire US policy in the Arab world dates from mid-2012. At the time, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and CIA director David Petraeus had seized on the US presidential election campaign to promote a second war against Syria, this time via France and Qatar. After his re-election and the ousting of his two "associates", Obama nominated new cabinet members with the task of building peace in Syria. But after a few months, it became clear that the policy of the Clinton-Petraeus duo was continuing without the knowledge of the White House and against the Pentagon.Clearly, President Obama is no more his own master than was George W. Bush, and there is every reason to believe that he has gradually rallied behind the secret policies of his own administration. Thus, the man who had proclaimed the end of nuclear deterrence, the war in Afghanistan and Iraq, and pledged to abandon the war on terror, is in actual fact taking the opposite course: he is poised to modernize and expand nuclear weapons, to send soldiers back to Afghanistan and Iraq, and to rekindle the threadbare concept of the war on terrorism.Chuck Hagel's dismissal should not be understood as a sanction against his performance, but as the reflection of the change undergone by President Barack Obama.There is still a need to identify the forces propping up Mrs. Clinton and General Petraeus, who are now on top. The "deep state" or economic agents? Clearly, the US press is completely out of its depth, incapable of explaining or analyzing the situation, and even less in a position to provide an answer to the question.Ultimately, the embassies around the world are waiting for new information before arriving at any conclusions. Meanwhile, on the ground, the Pentagon has been bombing the Islamic State while other American agents provide weapons and funding.In the United States and France, presidents follow one another without having any influence on the outcome of events. It makes no difference whether it's Republican President Bush or the Democratic Obama, the UMP's Sarkozy or the Social Democratic Holland, the machine inexorably continues its course without anyone knowing who is behind the wheel.

[Magda Hassan]

Too bad Michael Hastings is not around any more.

[Lauren Johnson]

Supposedly, Putin said negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon: It walks on the board knocking all the pieces over, then it craps all over them, and the struts around claiming victory.

[Lauren Johnson]

More evidence that Merkel is in serious trouble on her Russia policy.

Under the no-holds-barred headline of "Summit of Failure: How the EU Lost Russia over Ukraine" Der Spiegel has published a major article blasting her "historical failure" and pinning personal responsibility on her for a "standoff with Russia and war in the Donbass".

The mammoth 7,000 words long article came from under the pen of a 6-man team headed by the influential Christiane Hoffmann, one of Spiegel's most senior political writers, and a Russia specialist.

The appearance of an article like this in Germany is of much more significance than it would be in an anglo-saxon culture, which encourages spirited debate. German culture is much more consensual, and the media tends to move in lock-step on important policy matters.

That this article is appearing now is a very big deal, and hardly a coincidence.
The article gives a detailed chronicle of Germany's and EU's dealings with Ukraine president Viktor Yanukovich from his inauguration until shortly before his downfall.

Without any needless, high-pitched rhetoric it systematically exposes German officials and Merkel herself as naive bumblers who consistently fail to understand Yanukovich, the Ukrainian realities and, most importantly, the critical importance Ukraine holds for Russia.

The end impression is that the current mess could have been easily avoided, and the EU could have even had its Ukraine deal, if it had only listened to Kiev and talked to Russia.
Here are some of the key paragraphs:

---

Conclusions:

Everyone came to realize that efforts to deepen Ukraine's ties with the EU had failed.

But no one at the time was fully aware of the consequences the failure would have: that it would lead to one of the world's biggest crises since the end of the Cold War; that it would result in the redrawing of European borders; and that it would bring the Continent to the brink of war.

It was the moment Europe lost Russia.
For Ukraine, the failure in Vilnius resulted in disaster. Since its independence in 1991, Ukraine has strived to orient itself towards the EU while at the same time taking pains to ensure that those actions don't damage its relations with Moscow.

The choice between West and East, which both Brussels and Moscow have forced Kiev to make, has had devastating consequences for the fragile country. But the impact of that fateful evening in Vilnius goes far beyond Ukraine's borders.

Some 25 years after the fall of the Berlin Wall and almost 70 years after the end of World War II, Europe is once again divided.

The estrangement between the Russians and the Europeans is growing with Moscow and the West more inimical toward each other today than during the final phase of the Cold War. It's a reality that many in Europe have long sought to ignore.

...

When the German delegation, under Merkel's leadership, met with Yanukovych the next morning for one final meeting, everything had already been decided. They exchanged their well-known positions one last time, but the meeting was nothing more than a farce.

In one of the most important questions facing European foreign policy, Germany had failed.

...

More than anything, though, the Europeans underestimated Moscow and its determination to prevent a clear bond between Ukraine and the West.

They either failed to take Russian concerns and Ukrainian warnings seriously or they ignored them altogether because they didn't fit into their own worldview.

Berlin pursued a principles-driven foreign policy that made it a virtual taboo to speak with Russia about Ukraine. "Our ambitious and consensual policy of the eastern partnership has not been followed with ambitious and consensual policy on Russia," Füle says. "We were unable to find and agree on an appropriate engagement policy towards Russia."

Bumblers:

Yanukovych had just spoken.

In meandering sentences, he tried to explain why the European Union's Eastern Partnership Summit in Vilnius was more useful than it might have appeared at that moment, why it made sense to continue negotiating and how he would remain engaged in efforts towards a common future, just as he had previously been.

"We need several billion euros in aid very quickly," Yanukovych said. Then the chancellor wanted to have her say.

Merkel peered into the circle of the 28 leaders of EU member states who had gathered in Vilnius that evening. What followed was a sentence dripping with disapproval and cool sarcasm aimed directly at the Ukrainian president. "I feel like I'm at a wedding where the groom has suddenly issued new, last minute stipulations."

...

Haber in particular demonstrated little enthusiasm for a compromise. When the ambassador sought to explain the Ukrainian position, Haber interrupted him saying: "Your Excellency, we are familiar with all of your arguments,"

...

"Stefan, if we sign, will you help us?" Yanukovych asked.

Füle was speechless. "Sorry, we aren't the IMF.

Where do these numbers come from?" he finally demanded. "I am hearing them for the first time." They are secret numbers, Yanukovych replied.

"Can you imagine what would happen if our people were to learn of these numbers, were they to find out what convergence with the EU would cost our country?"

...

"It was an unavoidable decision. Please understand me. I simply can't sign it now," Yanukovych said.

"I had to urgently turn towards Moscow, but I want to keep the doors to Europe open.

Please don't see this as a rejection of Europe."

...

"Today, we are going to make a bold chess move," one of Füle's people said, refusing to elaborate.

Were the Europeans going to offer Ukraine financial assistance after all?

... And then came the "bold chess move" that had previously been hinted at. Barroso said that Brussels would be willing to abandon its demand that Tymoshenko be released.

Yanukovych was dumbfounded. Didn't Brussels understand that other issues had long since become more important?

Source: Russia Insider

[Magda Hassan]

Supposedly, Putin said negotiating with Obama is like playing chess with a pigeon: It walks on the board knocking all the pieces over, then it craps all over them, and the struts around claiming victory.

:: lol it looks just like that doesn't it?

[Magda Hassan]

How The Ukrainian Government Is Giving Away Citizenships So Foreigners Can Run The Country

Submitted by Tyler Durden on 12/04/2014 12:22 -0500








Submitted by Mike Krieger via Liberty Blitzkrieg blog,
I hadn't written a single piece on the U.S.-Ukraine-Russia quagmire for the entirety of 2014, until Monday when I published: Tensions Between the U.S. and Russia Are Worse Than You Realize Remarks by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Now I can hardly think of anything else.
The reason the geopolitical hot zone has so captured my attention is because I think we are much closer to a serious escalation than most people want to admit. I hope I'm wrong, but when I take a step back and look at what is being said and done under the surface, an incredibly dangerous tinderbox is now firmly in place and ready to be lit. We know from history that relatively minor catalysts can lead to unimaginable horrors. I fear the stage is set for some real nastiness, and hope cooler heads can prevail on both sides.
Claims that the new government in Ukraine is nothing more than a Western puppet Parliament have been swirling around consistently since February. Nevertheless, I think it's very significant that the takeover is now overt, undeniable and completely out in the open. Nothing proves this fact more clearly than the recent and sudden granting of citizenship to three foreigners so that they can take top posts in the government.
At the top of the list is American, Natalie Jaresko, who runs private equity fund Horizon Capital. She will now be Ukraine's Finance Minister, and I highly doubt she will be forced to pay the IRS Expatriation Tax (one set of laws for the rich and powerful, another set of laws for the peasants). For Economy Minister, a Lithuanian investment banker, Aivaras Abromavicius, will take the reigns. Health Minister will be Alexander Kvitashvili of Georgia.


The Wall Street Journal reports:

Ukraine's parliament appointed a new, pro-Western government that includes a U.S.-born finance minister to take on the job of staving off financial collapse, overhauling the shrinking economy and ending the armed conflict in the country's east.

The new cabinet includes Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko, the chief executive of a private-equity fund and a former U.S. diplomat, as well as two other nonnatives: Economy Minister Aivaras Abromavicius, a former investment banker from Lithuania; and Health Minister Alexander Kvitashvili, who held a similar post in Georgia.

Ukraine is dependent on the International Monetary Fund for financing, and officials and analysts say it will need more than the current $17-billion program from the lender.

Two senior EU officials said Tuesday that the IMF has in recent days shared a rough estimate of $15 billion in financing needs for Ukraine through the first quarter of 2016, although that could be revised as fund officials negotiate with the new government.

Shortly before the voting in Kiev, President Poroshenko signed a decree granting Ukrainian citizenship to the three foreign-born candidates. He said the dire economic situation meant Ukraine had to look for people outside the country with experience of dealing with "systemic crises."

Valeriy Voshchevskiy, deputy prime minister for infrastructure and ecology, said he wanted to privatize state holdings such as the railway and road-building monopolies.

This is where American financial oligarchs will get paid. It's all about looting at the end of the day, as always.

Some analysts praised the inclusion of outsiders in the government as a way to tap foreign experience, insulate against corruption and help push through unpopular economic overhauls. But opposition lawmakers slammed the decision.

"We don't understand why from 300 coalition members and 40 million people [in the country], 10 minister candidates couldn't be found who'd be Ukrainian citizens or at least ethnic Ukrainians," said Yuriy Boiko, head of the Opposition Bloc and a former energy minister.

In a sign of early discontent, some lawmakers from the ruling coalition questioned the creation of a new Information Ministry, dubbed the "Ministry of Truth" by some journalists amid concerns that it could create another expensive layer of bureaucrats.

The newly appointed minister said earlier that it will be needed to counter Russian propaganda.

I don't know much, but I know that people don't like being ruled by foreigners. Ever.
Bearing that in mind, a bill known as H.Res.758 was recently introduced in the U.S. Congress. Here's the full title: H.Res.758 Strongly condemning the actions of the Russian Federation, under President Vladimir Putin, which has carried out a policy of aggression against neighboring countries aimed at political and economic domination.
Here's how a summary of the bill starts off (click on the image for the full summary):


This isn't well intentioned diplomacy, these are demands. The last bullet point is particularly laughable. The U.S. government admonishes Russia for interfering in Ukraine's internal affairs (a nation directly on its border), when Ukraine just granted an American private equity manager citizenship so that she can be Finance Minister. The hypocrisy will not be lost on Putin, or anyone else for that matter.
The danger of this bill was highlighted by former U.S. Rep. Dennis Kucinich. Here are some excerpts via TruthDig:

U.S.-Russia relations have deteriorated severely in the past decade and they are about to get worse, if the House passes H. Res. 758.

NATO encirclement, the U.S.-backed coup in Ukraine, an attempt to use an agreement with the European Union to bring NATO into Ukraine at the Russian border, a U.S. nuclear first-strike policy, are all policies which attempt to substitute force for diplomacy.

The Western press begins its narrative on the Crimea situation with the annexation, but completely ignores the provocations by the West and other causal factors which resulted in the annexation. This distortion of reality is artificially creating an hysteria about Russian aggressiveness, another distortion which could pose an exceptionally dangerous situation for the world, if acted upon by other nations. The U.S. Congress is responding to the distortions, not to the reality.

Tensions between Russia and the U.S. are being fueled every day by players who would benefit financially from a resumption of the Cold War which, from 1948 to 1991 cost U.S. taxpayers $20 TRILLION dollars (in 2014 dollars), an amount exceeding our $18 trillion National Debt.

Based on all I have read and observed, I'd have to say I generally agree with the conclusions of Mr. Kucinich.
Finally, I want to end the post with some very important words from Eurasia Group President Ian Bremmer. They were published in the article, Crumbling Oil Makes Putin More Dangerous:

Russian President Vladimir Putin is being pushed "further into a corner" by falling oil prices, leaving him little option but to continue his aggression toward Ukraine and confrontation with the West, Eurasia Group President Ian Bremmer told CNBC on Tuesday. Putin has "gone all-in on an anti-U.S., must-keep-Ukraine nationalist engagement," Bremmer said on "Squawk Box ." He said it's "completely inconceivable" for Putin to back down. "This is what is behind all his approval ratings. It's behind who he now is as a leader," Bremmer said, adding that capitulation would "erode a lot of his power." Russia's currency and economy are crumbling along with oil prices, the country's main export and revenue source. On Monday, the ruble suffered its worst one-day decline since 1998, and it looks like Russia's economy will tip into recession next year. As the ruble tumbles, what will Putin do next? "I think that lower oil prices simply squeeze him harder, pushes him further into a corner. He feels he has to fight as a consequence.

This echoes sentiments I expressed in my piece Monday. I wrote:

Lavrov also describes the negative impact that this behavior has had on the Russian psyche generally. He expresses dismay that the U.S. status quo sees the world as unipolar, and attempts to tackle every problem from the perspective that might is right. In no uncertain terms, Lavrov makes it clear that Russia will not stand for this. I don't think the Russians are bluffing, so this is a very dangerous situation.

The U.S. establishment is used to bullying around anyone it wants and getting its way. This will not happen with Putin. It appears that the U.S. is attempting to put so much pressure on Putin that he does something reckless and loses all support on the world stage. I can't stress enough how important, and dangerous, the current situation is, as Putin is"
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-12-04...un-country

[Magda Hassan]

Ukraine's Made-in-USA Finance Minister

December 5, 2014

Exclusive: A top problem of Ukraine has been corruption and cronyism, so it may raise eyebrows that new Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko, an ex-U.S. diplomat and newly minted Ukrainian citizen, was involved in insider dealings while managing a $150 million U.S. AID-backed investment fund, writes Robert Parry.
By Robert Parry
Ukraine's new Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko, a former U.S. State Department officer who was granted Ukrainian citizenship only this week, headed a U.S. government-funded investment project for Ukraine that involved substantial insider dealings, including $1 million-plus fees to a management company that she also controlled.
Jaresco served as president and chief executive officer of Western NIS Enterprise Fund (WNISEF), which was created by the U.S. Agency for International Development (U.S. AID) with $150 million to spur business activity in Ukraine. She also was cofounder and managing partner of Horizon Capital which managed WNISEF's investments at a rate of 2 to 2.5 percent of committed capital, fees exceeding $1 million in recent years, according to WNISEF's 2012 annual report.
Ukraine's new Finance Minister Natalie Jaresko.

The growth of that insider dealing at the U.S.-taxpayer-funded WNISEF is further underscored by the number of paragraphs committed to listing the "related party transactions," i.e., potential conflicts of interest, between an early annual report from 2003 and the one a decade later.
In the 2003 report, the "related party transactions" were summed up in two paragraphs, with the major item a $189,700 payment to a struggling computer management company where WNISEF had an investment.
In the 2012 report, the section on "related party transactions" covered some two pages and included not only the management fees to Jaresko's Horizon Capital ($1,037,603 in 2011 and $1,023,689 in 2012) but also WNISEF's co-investments in projects with the Emerging Europe Growth Fund [EEGF], where Jaresko was founding partner and chief executive officer. Jaresko's Horizon Capital also managed EEGF.
From 2007 to 2011, WNISEF co-invested $4.25 million with EEGF in Kerameya LLC, a Ukrainian brick manufacturer, and WNISEF sold EEGF 15.63 percent of Moldova's Fincombank for $5 million, the report said. It also listed extensive exchanges of personnel and equipment between WNISEF and Horizon Capital.
Though it's difficult for an outsider to ascertain the relative merits of these insider deals, they could reflect negatively on Jaresko's role as Ukraine's new finance minister given the country's reputation for corruption and cronyism, a principal argument for the U.S.-backed "regime change" that ousted elected President Viktor Yanukovych last February.
Declining Investments
Based on the data from WNISEF's 2012 annual report, it also appeared that the U.S. taxpayers had lost about one-third of their investment in WNISEF, with the fund's balance at $98,074,030, compared to the initial U.S. government grant of $150 million.
Given the collapsing Ukrainian economy since the Feb. 22 coup, the value of the fund is likely to have slipped even further. (Efforts to get more recent data from WNISEF's and Horizon Capital's Web sites were impossible Friday because the sites were down.)
Beyond the long list of "related party transactions" in the annual report, there also have been vague allegations of improprieties involving Jaresko from one company insider, her ex-husband, Ihor Figlus. But his whistle-blowing was shut down by a court order issued at Jaresko's insistence.
John Helmer, a longtime foreign correspondent in Russia, disclosed the outlines of this dispute in an article examining Jaresko's history as a recipient of U.S. AID's largesse and how it enabled her to become an investment banker via WNISEF, Horizon Capital and Emerging Europe Growth Fund.
Helmer wrote: "Exactly what happened when Jaresko left the State Department to go into her government-paid business in Ukraine has been spelled out by her ex-husband in papers filed in the Chancery Court of Delaware in 2012 and 2013. …
"Without Figlus and without the US Government, Jaresko would not have had an investment business in Ukraine. The money to finance the business, and their partnership stakes, turns out to have been loaned to Figlus and Jaresko from Washington."
According to Helmer's article, Figlus had reviewed company records in 2011 and concluded that some loans were "improper," but he lacked the money to investigate so he turned to Mark Rachkevych, a reporter for the Kyiv Post, and gave him information to investigate the propriety of the loans.
"When Jaresko realized the beans were spilling, she sent Figlus a reminder that he had signed a non-disclosure agreement" and secured a temporary injunction in Delaware on behalf of Horizon Capital and EEGF to prevent Figlus from further revealing company secrets, Helmer wrote.
"It hasn't been rare for American spouses to go into the asset management business in the former Soviet Union, and make profits underwritten by the US Government with information supplied from their US Government positions or contacts," Helmer continued. "It is exceptional for them to fall out over the loot."
Jaresco, who served in the U.S. Embassy in Kiev after the collapse of the Soviet Union, has said that Western NIS Enterprise Fund was "funded by the U.S. government to invest in small and medium-sized businesses in Ukraine and Moldova in essence, to kick-start' the private equity industry in the region."
While the ultimate success of that U.S.-funded endeavor may still be unknown, it is clear that the U.S. AID money did "kick-start" Jaresco's career in equity investments and put her on the path that has now taken her to the job of Ukraine's new finance minister. Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko cited her experience in these investment fields to explain his unusual decision to bring in an American to run Ukraine's finances and grant her citizenship.
A Big Investment
The substantial U.S. government sum invested in Jaresco's WNISEF-based equity fund also sheds new light on how it was possible for Assistant Secretary of State for European Affairs Victoria Nuland to tally up U.S. spending on Ukraine since it became independent in 1991 and reach the astounding figure of "more than $5 billion," which she announced to a meeting of U.S.-Ukrainian business leaders last December as she was pushing for "regime change" in Kiev.
The figure was so high that it surprised some of Nuland's State Department colleagues. Several months later after a U.S.-backed coup had overthrown Yanukovych and pitched Ukraine into a nasty civil war Under Secretary of State for Public Affairs Richard Stengel cited the $5 billion figure as "ludicrous" Russian disinformation after hearing the number on Russia's RT network.
Stengel, a former Time magazine editor, didn't seem to know that the figure had come from a fellow senior State Department official.
Nuland's "more than $5 billion" figure did seem high, even if one counted the many millions of dollars spent over the past couple of decades by U.S. AID (which puts its contributions to Ukraine at $1.8 billion) and the U.S.-funded National Endowment for Democracy, which has financed hundreds of projects for supporting Ukrainian political activists, media operatives and non-governmental organizations.
But if one looks at the $150 million largesse bestowed on Natalie Jaresco, you can begin to understand the old adage that a hundred million dollars here and a hundred million dollars there soon adds up to real money.
Those payments over more than two decades to various people and entities in Ukraine also constitute a major investment in Ukrainian operatives who are now inclined to do the U.S. government's bidding.

http://consortiumnews.com/2014/12/05/ukr...-minister/

[David Guyatt]

US House Resolution passed 411-10.

From International Business Times:

21st Century Cold War Has Began; US House Of Reps Passes Resolution 758 Even As US Tells Russia To Stop Self-isolation

By Esther Tanquintic-Misa | December 5, 2014 12:46 PM EST
The United States has effectively pushed the button of the 21st century Cold War era. On Thursday, its House of Representatives passed Resolution 758, a decree telling the U.S., Europe and its' allies to "aggressively keep the pressure" on Russia and its President Vladimir Putin until such measures "change his behaviour."



View Full Image
REUTERS/Gary Cameron
The U.S. Capitol dome is seen through skylights in the Vistor's Center in Washington January 2, 2013. The new 113th U.S. Congress convenes tomorrow on January 3, set to take a fresh crack at a number of issues, such as gun control, immigration, tax reform and the record U.S. debt. REUTERS/Gary Cameron



On Wednesday, U.S. President Barack Obama claimed Mr Putin is "isolating Russia completely internationally" and knows the Russian leader is not going to "suddenly change his mind-set ... which is part of the reason why we're going to continue to maintain that pressure." As U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry urged Russia not to isolate itself during a meeting of the 57 members of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe in the northern Swiss city of Basel, Resolution 758 had called for the reinforcement of NATO and the sale of U.S. natural gas to Europe, alluding away from Russian energy exports.

The resolution has likewise effectively given the government of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko the go signal to launch military actions against the "separatists" in Eastern Ukraine. Resolution 758 has called on the U.S. President to "provide the Government of Ukraine with defense articles, services and training required to effectively defend its territory and sovereignty."
"It is not only a declaration of a U.S. Cold War against Russia but it is a declaration of war for Kiev against Donetsk and Lugansk," Daniel McAdams, executive director at the Ron Paul Institute, told RT News. Resolution 758, described as a decree that strongly condemns Moscow's aggressive actions against its neighbours, was a document that had opened Pandora's box of global military conflicts.
McAdams said he finds the resolution comical in the sense that as it accused Russia of holding fraudulent elections in Ukraine, it greenlighted an all-out war urging the U.S. and NATO forces when, it fact, Ukraine is not a member of NATO. He added the bill mentions chapter five of the NATO Treaty several times, but he is unsure if Congress understands what it means. Under the guise of Resolution 758, the House of Representatives urged Mr Obama to check and review the readiness of the U.S. and NATO armed forces under the Conventional Armed Forces in Europe Treaty.
On Thursday, Mr Putin said Resolution 758, which he described as a "deterrence policy" against Russia by other states, was just formally instituted. But he believes the deterrence policy has always been in place towards Russia "for decades, if not centuries," and would be turned on immediately if other states feel Russia is becoming too powerful and independent.
He blasted the U.S. for manipulating the relations of Russia's neighbours. "Sometimes you don't even know to whom it is better to talk to: the governments of certain countries or directly with their American patrons." U.S. House Resolution 758 was passed with an overwhelming 411-10 votes by the 113th Congress.