The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

[londontsi]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Russian general who promised to protect Armenia resigns


July 05, 2011 | 14:40

... Tretyak also made clear that Russia will carry out its promises to Armenia,...

http://news.am/eng/news/66838.html

Do those statements/promises stay or go with him?

[Federate]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Russian general who promised to protect Armenia resigns


July 05, 2011 | 14:40

Several Russian MOD employees have handed in their resignations. Among the resigned is the Chief of the Main Operations Directorate of Russian MOD, General Andrei Tretyak. There is no information about the reasons of resignation, Russian media reported.

This June Eurasianet.org website published an article presenting Tretyak’s viewpoint on Karabakh conflict and Russia’s role in the region. The general stated that Russia’s refusal to intervene in Kyrgyzstan cannot serve as a precedent for Karabakh, as that was a very different situation. Tretyak also made clear that Russia will carry out its promises to Armenia, the website wrote.

http://news.am/eng/news/66838.html

[Federate]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Propaganda from a foreign agent/personal vendetta or ugly truth that Russia has not yet recovered from the demise of the mighty USSR?
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Whistleblower says Russian troops fed dog food

By Thomas Grove – 1 hr 37 mins ago

MOSCOW (Reuters) – Russian Interior Ministry troops were fed dog food earlier this year to save money, a former officer in the ministry said Thursday.

A rare whistleblower in Russia's expansive security forces, ex-Major Igor Matveyev said officers tried to cover up the scandal and other alleged wrongdoing at the Interior Ministry troops base where he served in the far east city of Vladivostok.

Matveyev, who served in Russia's wars against Chechen separatists in the 1990s, said he was ordered dismissed after posting a video on the Internet this month alleging widespread corruption in the Interior Ministry forces.

No one at the ministry's troop unit was immediately available to comment on his allegations.

"It's embarrassing to say but soldiers here were fed dog food. It was fed to them as stew," Matveyev said in an interview with Reuters, adding that dog food labels were covered up with labels reading 'premium quality beef'.

He said he would contest a dismissal order issued by a superior after he posted the nearly 10-minute video, in which he asked President Dmitry Medvedev and Prime Minister Vladimir Putin to intervene.

"It took me a month to determine through various reports exactly what was happening," he said by phone from Vladivostok, some 6,400 km (4,000 miles) east of Moscow.

The Interior Ministry troops command was cited by Russian agencies as saying that a number of the incidents Matveyev described had occurred, but that they had long ago been dealt with and that an investigation had been started.

President Dmitry Medvedev has said rampant corruption in the ranks is one of the biggest problems facing Russia's security forces.

The Interior Ministry maintains units of troops across Russia responsible for domestic security. They are separate from the army, which comes under the Defense Ministry.

Russia's security services are at odds with themselves as they undergo unpopular reforms that are aimed at restructuring the military's officer and troop structure, which critics such as Matveyev say is ridden with corruption.

"This doesn't happen by accident, it is a system. Reforms are ongoing and we have to come out and say these things, we have to pay attention to these issues," he said.

He added that 18 illegal migrant laborers were housed at the Vladivostok base for a month and a half and were used for clean-up and construction jobs.

"They were Koreans or Chinese, I don't know because they did not have any documents," he said.

He also said that property on the base had been sold off without permission to make money for the officers, but did not specify what had been sold or to whom.

The authorities have not said whether they are investigating that specific allegation.

(Editing by Jon Boyle)

http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20110519/wl_nm/us_russia_troops_dogfood;_ylt=AlvspAno0ULDNbIz_I07qib9xg8F;_ylu=X3oDMTM2b2l2bDhoBGFzc2V0A25tLzIwMTEwNTE5L3VzX3J1c3NpYV90cm9vcHNfZG9nZm9vZARjY29kZQNnbXBlBGNwb3MDNgRwb3MDNgRzZWMDeW5fdG9wX3N0b3JpZXMEc2xrA3doaXN0bGVibG93ZQ--

[arakeretzig]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Vladimir making a return?

I'd be surprised if he DOESN'T return. Like him or hate him, he's the kind of guy russia(and armenia) needs.

[KanadaHye]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Vladimir making a return?

Putin hints at return to Russian presidency

Prime Minister Vladimir Putin insisted Wednesday that Russia must be strong to fend off foreign threats and lauded a long list of his own achievements, a show of muscle seen as a signal that the powerful leader intends to reclaim the country's presidency next year.

Putin laid out an ambitious program of weapons modernization in an annual address to parliament that sounded much like a campaign speech, promising to spend the equivalent of $700 billion by 2020.

The speech's broad scope — ranging from long-term economic goals to national security and defence — underlined Putin's role as the nation's No. 1 leader, though his successor as president, Dmitry Medvedev, technically has far broader powers.

"The nation needs decades of stable and calm development without any sharp movements and ill-conceived experiments" based on liberal policy, the 58-year-old leader said in a speech that lasted more than two hours.

Putin, who was Russia's president from 2000 to 2008, groomed his longtime aide and protege, Medvedev, to succeed him. Both men have said they would decide later who would run for president in March 2012, but Putin is widely expected to take the top job back.

His speech to the State Duma included a litany of self-praise and ambitious goals for the future. He claimed credit for quickly taking Russia out of the global financial crisis and promised that it would become one of the world's top five economies by 2020. Russia is currently ranked as the world's sixth biggest economy.

Putin said that a key lesson from the financial crisis was that the nation must be "self-reliant, independent and strong" to resist outside pressure.

"The weakness of economy and the state, a lack of immunity to outside shocks inevitably become a threat for national sovereignty," Putin said. "In the modern world, those who are weak will get unambiguous advice from foreign visitors which way to go and what policy course to pursue."

Putin said that the national economy rose by 4 per cent last year and said that the growth rate will accelerate this year allowing to fully compensate for losses from the crisis by 2012.

Putin vowed to modernize national industries and develop new technologies to reduce Russia's dependence on oil, gas and other raw materials, venturing into Medvedev's favourite turf. He also made pledges to combat corruption similar to those Medvedev has made since taking the country's helm — though he hasn't made much progress.

Winning frequent applause from a parliament dominated by his United Russia party, Putin boasted of hikes in pensions and other social payments as well as increases of government spending on education and science. He promised to stem Russia's population decline by supporting young families and improving health care, and pledged support to industries and agriculture.

Putin put a particular emphasis on boosting defence and laid out ambitious plans to procure new weapons for the military. He said that production of missiles will double starting from 2013 compared to the current level and that a massive navy modernization program will be launched.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/story/2...residency.html

[Haykakan]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

RUSSIAN GOVERNMENT APPROVES PROTOCOL PROLONGING RUSSIAN MILITARY PRESENCE ARMENIA

news.am
March 29 2011
Armenia

The Russian Government approved and submitted for ratification the
protocol on extending Russia's use of a military base in Armenia to
the Russian President RIA Novosti reports.

As Armenian News-NEWS.am reported earlier, during his state visit
to Armenia, Russian President Dmitry Medvedev signed amendments to
a 1995 bilateral treaty extending Russia's use of a military base
near Armenia's border with Turkey through 2044. The term of the 1995
deal on the base in Gyumri, Armenia's second largest city, had been
extended from 25 to 49 years. According to the amendments, besides
defending Russia's interests, the Russian military base in Armenia
will also ensure Armenia's security jointly with the Armenian armed
forces. With this end in view, Russia is to assist Armenia in getting
modern arms and military equipment.

[Armanen]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Gayane is an idoit and of course she happens to write articles for rfe/rl and armenianow. Don't pay attention to what she or anyone else from that camp have to say. They are trying to make a quick buck and sadly doing at the expense, indirectly, of Armenia's national security.

[Mos]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

I really didn't understand this article - the writer keeps complaining about our strategic relations with Russia, but fails to mention a better alternative - BECAUSE THERE IS NONE! It's either we chose Russia (CSTO) or Turkey (NATO), hmm, hard choice....

Armenia-Russia: 0-0 in Both Soccer and Strategic Partnership, Critics Say
March 28, 2011 - 3:16pm, by Gayane Abrahamyan
Armenia Russia Geopolitics
On the field, a recent qualifying match between the Armenian and Russian national teams ended in a scoreless draw. Outside the stadium, the football contest kicked up an emotional debate among Armenians about the two countries’ strategic partnership.

Thanks largely to the Russian team’s failure to crack Armenia’s defense, neither team managed to score in the March 26 game, played in Yerevan; Armenia now holds second place in the same qualifying group as Russia, 10 points behind its strategic partner in the standings. The two teams will play again on June 4 in Moscow. Poland and Ukraine will co-host the Euro Cup final round in June-July 2012.

While huge billboards in Yerevan promoted the soccer match as a “game of friendship,” there were limits to the bonhomie. In a bid to contain disturbances by rowdy Russian soccer fans and ticket scalping, the Armenian Football Federation limited sales of three-plus tickets to Armenian passport holders.

The satirical ArmComedy News Network underlined those misgivings with an article that described how make-believe, drunken Russian soccer fans confuse Yerevan with a Russian town and try to run “individuals of Caucasian ethnicity” out of town.

Many pro-opposition Armenians saw the event as symbolic of larger foreign policy “games” being played between Armenia and Russia. The resentment largely focuses on security matters. One key target for those who decry what they term Armenia’s “Russification” is the 49-year lease granted last year to Russia for a military base in the northern Armenian town of Gyumri.

The government asserts that the base and the Russian soldiers who guard Armenia’s borders with Turkey are a necessity, “one of the guarantees of national security.” The opposition, however, counters that Russia only pays attention to Armenia’s security concerns when it advances its own strategic interests in the region.

A March 16 meeting in Moscow between Russian President Dmitry Medvedev and Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan only added insult to that perceived injury. The date marked the 90th anniversary of the 1921 agreement by which Armenia lost to Turkey its national landmark of Mount Ararat, and other territory.

To protest Medvedev’s choice of a meeting date with Erdogan, Armenian youth groups of various political loyalties marked the day by demonstrating outside the Russian Embassy in Yerevan.

“That meeting with the Turkish prime minister clearly shows that Armenia’s strategic partner, Russia, does not respect either the sentiments of the Armenian people, or Armenian authorities; celebrating with no worries the 90th anniversary together with Turkey,” fumed Vahan Hovhannissian, head of the nationalist Armenian Revolutionary Federation-Dashnaktsutiun parliamentary faction.

But if opposition members and some analysts criticize Russia for allegedly taking Armenia for granted, many Armenians still view Russia as the economic buoy that keeps them afloat. During the month of January of this year, for example, individual remittances from Russia topped $49 million. Overall last year, about $1.1 billion was sent from both individual and commercial sources from Russia to Armenia. In addition, roughly 200,000 Armenians migrate each year to Russia – an outflow that has recently provoked criticism of one Moscow program that pays for migrant workers to move to Russia.

Nonetheless, for the government, such close economic and security ties are a critical safety net. As tensions with Azerbaijan over breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh have increased, so have the meetings between President Serzh Sargsyan and President Medvedev; the pair met nine times during 2010. So far, in 2011 they have met twice.

Even some of those who see Russia as a necessary, though bossy senior partner, can be skeptical of Moscow’s intentions. Armenians now often ironically repeat 19th century Armenian writer Khachatur Abovian’s line: “May the moment be blessed when Russians set foot on Armenian soil.”

“We all know that the Russians have always exploited us and sold us out whenever it was in their interests, but it is also a fact that the majority of people in our country live off the money earned in and sent from Russia,” elaborated 68-year-old historian Petros Ghazinian, whose two sons work in Moscow. “That means we have to be grateful to them, no matter what.”

A former Central Bank head maintains that gratitude should have its limits. “We should always keep in mind that ‘you shouldn’t put all your eggs in one basket,’” argued Bagrat Asatrian, a pro-opposition economist who headed Armenia’s Central Bank from 1994 until 1998. “Right now, our status is not even that of a Russian province.”

The sell-off of Armenian energy and telecommunications assets is a source of bitterness. Over the past decade, some 80 percent of Armenia’s energy network has been sold to Russia, including responsibility for management of the Metsamor nuclear power station. Russian-owned companies control most of Armenia’s telecommunications network and its railway line. Under a 2002 debt agreement, the Hrazdan thermo-electric power station and the MARS electronics and robotics plant also now operate under Russian ownership.

Eduard Sharmazanov, a spokesman for the governing Republican Party of Armenia, considers criticism of Armenia’s economic ties with Russia as groundless. “We have always been partners with Russia, and, in any case, our business deals are mutually beneficial,” he asserted. Russia ranked as Armenia’s main trade partner in 2010, with $700 million worth of turnover. Official data cites Russian investment for 2010 at about $300 million.

The end justifies the means, added Deputy Parliamentary Speaker Samvel Nikoian, also a Republican Party of Armenia member. “[Y]es, sometimes we need to put up with some losses, but we gain a strong partner, both militarily and economically,” Nikoian said.

Editor's note: Gayane Abrahamyan is a reporter for ArmeniaNow.com in Yerevan.

Eurasianet

[KarotheGreat]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Russia Rises Amid Geopolitical Events

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_fe9pTS-u-rA/SMKjVlvGt9I/AAAAAAAAAFc/mVTbpSO0-Gc/s400/bear-pipeline.jpg

The first three months of 2011 have had a steady flow of geopolitically relevant events. A youth named Mohamed Bouazizi, protesting corruption and government harassment in Tunisia, set more than himself alight on Dec. 17: He set an entire region on fire. Soon after, Tunisia and Egypt saw their long-time rulers fall. Libya essentially descended into civil war, and exit is uncertain. On Monday, almost exactly three months after Bouazizi’s self-immolation, the Saudi-led Gulf Cooperation Council’s forces entered the tiny island nation of Bahrain to prevent Iran from exploiting the anti-government protests there. The region’s unrest continues with almost daily action in North Africa and the Middle East. Around the globe, the March 11 Japan Tohoku earthquake rocked the world’s third largest economy and has caused the most serious nuclear accident since the 1986 Chernobyl disaster.

Among all this global consternation, Russia is the one power that has the luxury to take stock of it all in relative comfort. Russia has no reason to fear Middle East-style revolutionary activity. Its leadership is genuinely popular at home and safe from populist uprisings, at least for the time being. Russia is not embroiled in any war in the Middle East — unlike the United States, which is involved in two wars and trying hard to avoid a third one in Libya. Russia fears no migration exodus of North African refugees on its borders, as do the Europeans. Even the nuclear accident in Japan seems to be without negative effect for Russia, as the prevailing winds are blowing the radiation toward the Pacific Ocean and away from Russia’s eastern city of Vladivostok.

“Among all this global consternation, Russia is the one power that has the luxury to take stock of it all in relative comfort.”

In fact, Russia may be the one country that stands to gain from the various calamities in 2011. First, the general unrest in the Middle East has increased the price of oil by 18.5 percent. As the second largest oil exporter — and one not bound by OPEC production quotas — the increase in price goes directly into the Kremlin’s swelling coffers and is a welcome addition after the severe economic recession in 2009. Second, the Libyan unrest has cut off the 11 billion cubic-meter natural gas (bcm) Greenstream pipeline to Italy, causing Europe’s third largest consumer of natural gas to turn to Russia to make up the difference. Similarly, Japan’s nuclear imbroglio has forced Tokyo to turn to Russian emergency shipments of liquefied natural gas (LNG) to fuel its natural gas-burning power plants.

But the most beneficial of all events for Russia may be the psychological effect that the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant crisis is having on Western Europe. Germany’s government announced on Tuesday that it would close seven nuclear reactors during a three-month period, reassessing the future of Germany’s nuclear power industry. A looming Italian referendum on the government’s decision to unfreeze nuclear reactor construction now seems all but guaranteed to fail. Criticism of nuclear power has swept throughout the Continent with the European Union energy ministers deciding on Tuesday to subject the bloc’s nuclear reactors to a number of stress tests.

Europe’s hydropower capabilities are at capacity, while coal-burning power plants are perceived as incompatible with the bloc’s drive to reduce greenhouse emissions. The only alternatives left are renewable energy, which is slowly inching up in terms of overall electricity generation; nuclear power; and natural gas, which is seen as the much cleaner fossil fuel option to coal and oil. With fears about nuclear power returning to the Continent, it seems natural gas will be favored to fill the gap until renewable energy can become a larger part of the electricity generating mix.

As the world’s number one exporter of natural gas — and with the world’s largest reserves — this is very welcome news for the Kremlin. But for Russia, natural gas exports are about a lot more than just added revenue. For Russia, the natural gas exports are about control and political influence. Luring Western Europe toward greater energy dependency on Russia is ultimately about wrestling the region away from its post-WWII alliance with the United States. As the Middle East and North Africa continue to wrestle with unrest — again reminding Europe of the region’s political uncertainty and fallibility as an energy exporter — and as Europe’s populations are reminded of their fears of nuclear power, Moscow is taking stock of it all.

But Moscow is also interested in how the crises around the world are politically beneficial outside of the energy realm. First, the devastation in Japan has allowed Moscow and Tokyo to have a rare conversation about cooperation after years (if not more) of declining relations over an island dispute. Russia is magnanimously trying to show that it isn’t such a bad neighbor to have, and is sending some of the larger amounts of aid, energy and rescue assistance.

The crises could also give Russia something it holds very precious — time. One of the reasons Russia grew so strong over the past decade is that its rival, the United States, was focused elsewhere. Moscow has been growing nervous in the past year knowing that Washington is starting to wrap up its commitments in the Middle East and South Asia. There is a discussion now rumbling through the Kremlin whether the events in the Middle East may keep the United States focused there a while longer, giving Russia even more time to cement its nearly dominant position in Eurasia. Thus far, the Kremlin must be satisfied with what the first three months of 2011 have brought in terms of its own strategic interests.

Source of article: http://www.stratfor.com/memberships/...litical-events
How Russia Is About to Dramatically Change the World

http://www.prospectmagazine.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/01/Russian-oil.jpg

Over the next few days, Russia will change the world. It has completed a new oil pipeline and port complex that sets Russia up to become a more powerful oil exporter than Saudi Arabia. The ramifications for Europe and Asia are profound: The shape of the global economy—and the global balance of power—will be altered forever.

December 28 was a big day of ceremony in Russia. Prime Minister Vladimir Putin pushed a button that transformed global oil dynamics—especially for Asia and Europe. The button released thousands of barrels of Siberian crude into a waiting Russian supertanker and heralded the opening of Russia’s first modern Pacific-based oil export facilities. The multibillion-dollar, state-of-the-art oil terminal was a “great New Year present for Russia,” Putin said during the inauguration. The strategic terminal, located in the city of Kozmino on the coast of the Sea of Japan, is one of the “biggest projects in contemporary Russia” he said, not only in “modern Russia,” but “the former Soviet Union too.”

Putin has every right to be enthusiastic about his new port. Kozmino will unlock a two-way gate through which Russia’s vast Siberian oilfields will gush into Asia’s energy-hungry economies—and Chinese, Korean and Japanese currency will flow into Russia. If just the seven ships currently waiting to berth are all filled during January, the port of Kozmino will instantly become Russia’s third-most important oil outlet. According to Reuters, the first oil transport loads on January 15. In a symbolic move highlighting Russia’s warming relationship with China, Hong Kong will receive the first shipment.

After that, Kozmino’s importance will exponentially grow over the next year. Currently, all Siberian oil shipments into Kozmino are delivered by train—but that will soon change. Phase one of the East Siberian-Pacific Ocean Pipeline (espo) was also completed during December. Phase two will soon connect the Siberian fields directly to the new port. When phase two is finished in 2014, total exports could jump from the current rate of 250,000 barrels per day to over 1 million. Kozmino will transform into one of the largest oil centers in the world—capable of handling 14 percent of total Russian oil exports. It will be one of the most strategic geopolitical assets in Russia’s arsenal.

Russia pumped more than 10 million barrels of oil per day during November. With Saudi Arabian production falling, Russia is now the world’s largest oil exporter. Toss in Russia’s natural gas exports, and Russia is the biggest energy superpower in the world, by far. That does not even count Russia’s massive uranium resources and nuclear expertise.

But here is why the new port in Kozmino could radically affect the future of both Asia and Europe. For over a century, Russia’s entire energy infrastructure has focused mainly on supplying Europe. That has now changed forever! The first and now-complete phase of the espo pipeline, which connects Russia’s Siberian oil fields to within just a few kilometers of China, is already destabilizing global oil dynamics and shifting them in Russia’s direction. “espo is what political strategists might call a ‘game-changer,’” writes the Telegraph. “It means that Russia will be able to send its oil either east or west—so it can drive a harder bargain when selling crude to Europe” (emphasis mine throughout).

Previously, when Russia has had pricing disputes with Europe, Moscow had to play the embargo card with an obvious bluff. It had no other alternative outlet for its oil. Without the Europeans, its oil would sit in Samotlor and Tyanskoye, costing money instead of making it. But now Moscow can turn off the tap to Europe and still pump in the profits by opening the pipe wide to its energy-hungry Asian partners.

But Russia’s stranglehold on Europe is about to get even tighter—much tighter. By 2012, the espo pipeline will be twinned with a pipeline for natural gas exports so Russian gas supplies can also flow east instead of west if necessary. This development is truly scary to Europeans. Moscow has already demonstrated that it isn’t afraid to turn off Europe’s energy supplies when it feels it needs to. In the middle of winter 2006, Russia shut off gas supplies to Germany, and several other countries, in order to punish Ukraine. Since then, it has repeatedly used the same method to strong-arm its former Eastern European satellites back into accepting Russian dominance.

The message is clear: Russian oil and gas supplies are a weapon to be used—or not used—to freeze opponents into submission. Europe, in a tenuous relationship with Russia to begin with, desperately needs to secure another source of energy. Only one other region in the world can supply the energy to warm and lubricate modern Europe’s homes and industries: the Middle East. Countries like Germany, which imports 90 percent of its oil, are now much more dependent on one of the most volatile regions of the world for power supplies.

It is inevitable that Berlin will seek to expand its ties with oil-rich Gulf Cooperation Council members: the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and especially Saudi Arabia, the world’s second-largest petroleum producer. Europe has no choice but to become much more intimately involved with the affairs of the Middle East—a region from which 40 percent of its oil is currently derived.

It is therefore no surprise that Germany, the most dominant nation in Europe, has made sure it has troops on the ground surrounding this Middle Eastern “golden triangle” of energy production (Gulf Cooperation Council members plus Iran and Iraq). On the seas, the European Union’s naval presence is growing too. The European anti-piracy task force operates in both the Gulf of Oman and the Gulf of Aden. Forty percent of the world’s ocean-borne oil is shipped through the Gulf of Oman.

Europe is critically dependent on imported oil. And Germany knows it must have a strong presence in the world’s most oil-rich region if it is to secure its flow and the country’s future. The Bible predicts that a major military clash will soon occur in the Middle East—specifically between a European power, led by Germany, and radical Islam, led by Iran.

Daniel 11:40-45 indicate that Iran will continue to push at this European power until it finally responds in “whirlwind,” blitzkrieg-type fashion. As we have explained for almost 20 years—and has been borne out repeatedly in real-world events—the “king of the south” spoken of in these verses is radical Islam under the leadership of Iran. And as Trumpet editor in chief Gerald Flurry has written, a big part of Iran’s push against Europe will involve oil.

The Middle East is a powder keg that could explode at any time. Syria dominates Lebanon and is stirring up trouble there. Iran is about to create a nuclear weapon and has said it wants to wipe Israel off the map. It is test firing missiles that can strike European capitals. Israel knows that the window to prevent Iran from getting the bomb is closing. Hamas is preparing to violently take East Jerusalem as a Palestinian capital. Israel is about to release 1,000 terrorists back onto the streets in return for one captured Israeli soldier.

And to top it off, the world is in the midst of its worst depression since the 1930s. Oil prices remain above $70 per barrel, and the International Energy Agency has indicated that world oil production will now peak in 2020—10 years sooner than prior estimates. Some analysts think the world has already reached peak oil production.

In this climate of global instability, Russia’s recent moves on the world’s oil stage will be amplified in dramatic fashion. By unlocking Siberia’s energy reserves, Russia is simultaneously binding Asia together and lighting a fire under Europe. Watch for the development of an Asian alliance between Russia, China and Japan. And watch for Europe’s next moves toward the Middle East.
Source: http://www.thetrumpet.com/?q=6872.5382.0.

[KarotheGreat]

Re: The Rise of the Russian Empire: Russo-Armenian Relations

Russia Rises Amid Geopolitical Events - March, 2011

Having already reversed much of the West's advances throughout Eurasia during the past several years and having more-or-less monopolized the distribution of Central Asian energy, the on-going political turmoils in the Middle East and North Africa and the historic catastrophe that just took place in Japan could not have come at a better time for the Russian Federation. Already controlling by-far the largest known energy reserves on earth, Moscow today is poised to dominate the global economy via its energy sector.

In the big geopolitical picture, at least indirectly, most (if not all) of the political violence we are seeing take place in the world today (including the situation in Nagorno Karabakh) has to do with the control of energy production and/or energy distribution. Oil production in the north Atlantic is dwindling fast and the Middle East is not too far behind. Energy reserves in north and south Americas simply cannot meet global demand and its production is not centrally controlled. Central Asian energy is currently being contested. Unknown to many in all this is the fact that the Russian Federation today is actually the largest energy producer in the world and its untapped energy reserves are thought to immense as well. Moreover, Russia has also taken a strong initiative in the energy rich Arctic region.

If the Kremlin is able to continue managing itself as well as it has been in recent years, within the next few decades the economy of the world, the developed world in particular, will be seriously dependent on Russia's natural wealth. Kremlin officials realize their nation's power potential all too well. Moscow realizes that they have in their position a weapon more powerful than any other in their vast military arsenal. How efficiently they will be able to use it, however, remains to be seen.

Addressing the last article posted on this page: I don't know if "World War III" is knocking on the door just yet, but I do know that the global community is currently preparing itself for a major international confrontation. In various places around the world we are seeing battle-lines being drawn. We are also seeing geopolitical realignments. Not if but when this inevitable war commences, the Russian Federation and/or its allies will essentially be battling the Western alliance and/or its allies for the control of Eurasian energy and strategic trade routes. What role will China play in all this is not yet clear. Although Beijing has very warm relations with Moscow, it nevertheless is also very heavily invested in the West. Nevertheless, the 21th century holds many promises for the Russian nation and if it plays its political cards correctly, Moscow will no doubt be in the drivers seat. And with Russia in the driver seat this century, at the very least I'd like to see Armenia in its passenger seat. The following are some articles on this topic that have caught my attention.

Several articles posted at the bottom of this page concerns with Moscow's recently announced arms spending program. The 20 trillion Rubles (approximately $650 billion) is part of a long-term plan to modernize Russia's aging military arsenal. Unconfirmed reports also suggested that some of weapons systems currently in Russian service may end up in Armenia free of charge as a result of Moscow's new purchases. The article pertaining to a Wikileaks document (see bottom of page) reveals that Western military officials are "unimpressed" by Russia's military. Needless to say, this is either the pinnacle of Western hubris - or simply an attempt to alleviate fears amongst regional US allies that Russia's military is again on the rise. Although a relatively small force of about ten thousand Russian troops armed with Soviet era military hardware, bad air cover and even worst communications brought all of Georgia's Western trained and armed military to its knees within two or three days - the noble masters of combat in the West are apparently not impressed!

The fact of the matter is, even being unprepared and armed with relatively ancient military technology, Russian troops utterly/comprehensively defeated their well-prepared and well-armed enemy in the full-scale combat. This begs the question: What has the mighty military of the West done besides long-distance bombing of small and/or vulnerable nations into submission? Hundreds of thousands of NATO/American troops armed with the very latest in military technology and a virtually unlimited supply of supplies have not been able to comprehensively defeat a bunch of sandal wearing peasants armed with Kalashnikovs in Iraq and Afghanistan. Therefore, the real question that should be asked is: what is the actual combat value of Western troops without their high-tech bombs and aircraft?

Arevordi
March, 2011