This morning Secretary of State Antony Blinken appeared in video interviews at 9 am on both the ABC and CNN Sunday talk shows, reiterating his litany of accusations against Russia, false history, and threats. On the eve of the U.S.-Russia talks in Geneva beginning tomorrow, he offered up the formalism of “two pathways ahead:” Either “dialogue and diplomacy,” or “confrontation and consequences.”
From this, he gave three points to back up his assertion that, “we will not see any breakthroughs in the coming weeks.” First, because “any progress has to be reciprocal,” from which we can infer that the U.S. and NATO will be making demands they know are unacceptable. Secondly, there can be “nothing about Europe, without Europe,” from which we can infer that he means that the U.S. will use this as an excuse for obstruction. Thirdly, “It is hard to see progress when Russia is holding a gun to Ukraine’s head.” This is the Big Lie, going back to denying the Anglo-American Maidan coup in 2014.
Blinken’s explanation for “how we got here,” was a repetition of his false history. He charges that Russia has been practicing aggression for years, against Georgia, Moldova, Belarus and Ukraine, adding in a mention of Kazakhstan too. “Fundamentally, one country can’t change the borders of other countries,” Blinken said, stressing, “One country can’t have a sphere of influence.”
MICIMATT is in hyper-deployment on all these points this weekend. For example, today’s Washington Post runs an infographic showing a map of the “pushback against Russian sphere of influence,’” from the nations of Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan.
