10 Steps to the Edge of the Abyss

At this moment, the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists Doomsday Clock now stands at only 90 seconds before midnight. Thus, as we move closer and closer to a nuclear World War 3, why not identify the major steps that took us to this dangerously slippery road? Who knows, perhaps this exercise could help to bring some perspective to those who are pushing us into oblivion. They have families and children too. Sometimes even the greatest villains have the moment of repentance.

Here is my take of the ten such major events in the chronological order and those responsible for them: 

1. 1998 – Beginning of NATO expansion – Bill Clinton

Many prominent former US government officials, members of Congress, diplomats, and foreign policy experts have objected to this expansion. "We’ll be back on a hair-trigger,” said Sen. Daniel Patrick Moynihan, a New York Democrat, during the debates in the Senate. Moynihan continued: "We’re talking about nuclear war. It is a curiously ironic outcome that at the end of the Cold War we might face a nuclear Armageddon.”

Senator Joseph Biden (D-Delaware), while calling Moynihan "the single most erudite and informed person in the Senate,” said he disagreed with him, and pushed for NATO’s expansion.

2.  2004 – Abrogation of ABM treaty – George W. Bush

This is what Bush said in November 2001 following Putin’s support for the Afghan operation a month earlier:

"A lot of people never really dreamt that an American President and a Russian President could have established the friendship …. to establish a new spirit of cooperation and trust so that we can work together to make the world more peaceful….I brought him to my ranch because, as the good people in this part of the world know, that you only usually invite your friends into your house…. a new style of leader, a reformer, a man who loves his country as much as I love mine…. a man who is going to make a huge difference in making the world more peaceful, by working closely with the United States.”

What a spirit of sanity from a man who would oversee a disastrous two terms in office which included the war in Iraq and an abrogation of one of the most strategic anti-nuclear war treaties.

3.  2008 – Push to bring Ukraine and Georgia into NATO – George W. Bush again

As Professor John Mearshimer stated in New Yorker "I think all the trouble in this case really started in April, 2008, at the NATO Summit in Bucharest, where afterward NATO issued a statement that said Ukraine and Georgia would become part of NATO. The Russians made it unequivocally clear at the time that they viewed this as an existential threat, and they drew a line in the sand.”

4.  2014 – Western backed and US coordinated Coup in Ukraine sets up the cornerstone of the current crisis – overseen by the duo of Joe Biden and Victoria Nuland

After two decades of eastward NATO expansion, this crisis was triggered by the West’s attempt to replace the democratically-elected President Yanukovich and his administration who were against Ukraine joining NATO with the new anti-Russia team that will be for it.

5.  2015 – Minsk Peace Accords are supported by the UN Security Council but sabotaged by the US, EU, and Ukraine – Barack Obama, Joe Biden, and the EU leadership.

As was discovered years later, the premise of the accords was designed as a dishonest fraud to buy time to arm Ukraine and prepare for the future war with Russia.

6. 2016 – Russia is accused of hacking DNC files – Hillary Clinton and the Deep State

According to former chief NSA security official William Binney, and many other intelligence professionals, substantial evidence has come to light indicating that the DNC hack was probably an inside job that was perpetrated by Democrats within the committee.

7. 2017 – Russiagate scandal is unleashed to derail Trump’s Presidency – Hillary Clinton and the Deep State.

All Russiagate traces lead to Clintonites, who paid Perkins Coie to hire the Beltway smear-specialists of Fusion GPS to draw up and promote the British spy Christopher Steele’s fake allegations.

8. 2018 – Russia is accused of executing operation Hunter’s "Laptop from Hell” – Joe Biden and Deep State

Former Director of National Intelligence John Ratcliffe said Hunter Biden’s laptop was not Russian disinformation but a "domestic disinformation campaign for political reasons” which in Ratcliffe’s words "is a disgrace.” Joe Biden, his administration,  media, and 51 ex-national security officials,  lied about this. They included former Obama CIA Director John Brennan, former Obama DNI James Clapper, and former CIA director, then-Defense Secretary Leon Panetta, among others.

9.  2021 – Rejection of Russia’s proposals for the mutual security guarantees – Joe Biden

President Biden didn’t accept Vladimir Putin’s proposals that included a provision denying Ukraine’s entrance into the NATO.  There were additional items for negotiation which could lead to the exit from crisis but Biden decided otherwise.

10. 2022 – Destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines – Joe Biden

According to many experts, and the famous Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh who got firsthand information from an insider whistle blower, this destruction was done on the direct order from Biden. He denies it but if you had to choose between constantly lying Joe and most respected American journalist with the high professional reputation who would you believe?  2023 – Here we are – On the Edge of the Abyss.

Edward Lozansky is president of the American University in Moscow

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