The Duran Podcast - The Blinken Doctrine: A two front war with Russia and China

Episode Date: September 21, 2023

The Blinken Doctrine: A two front war with Russia and China

All right, Alexander, let's talk about U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinkin's speech at Johns Hopkins University. An interesting speech from Blinken. He actually tweeted out many of the points that he made during this speech because I think it was very proud of the foreign policy agenda that he laid out during this speech at Johns Hopkins University. What part of the speech do you want to start with? Of course, there's Russia, Ukraine, multipolar world. This is the speech where many people say, Blinken acknowledged that we have a multipolar world, even though he didn't say it like that. It was an acknowledgement that we have a multipolar world.

There was a lot of praise for Jake Sullivan. What else? What other parts of the speech? you find interesting? Well, let's start with the admission that the unipolar moment has ended, because of course that is there. I mean, he has, let's start with the best bit first. He admits that the unipolar moment has ended. He doesn't talk about it. In that way, he says that the post-Cold War era has ended. It's a wonderful period of history in the post-Cold War period, full of optimism and hope.

We were moving stodily forwards towards the sunny uplands of democracy and human rights and all of those things. Of course, there were a few, you know, small problems along the way. You know, there was Iraq, there was Afghanistan, there was 9-11,

there was the global financial crisis and all of those things. But everything was going so well until these horrible people in Moscow and Beijing came along and spoiled it. But we have to, accept that they are these horrible people, they are very powerful, especially the horrible people in China. And the result is we now have to accept that we are in the post post-Cold War period.

The period of unipolarity has ended. We are once more in a conflict situation. So that's the best part of his speech. He admits that the United States no longer is in a position of world dominance. It is no longer the unipolar world. Every other part of the speech, as far as I was concerned, was a total disaster. In fact, I'm going to say it straightforwardly, I thought it was the most disastrous speech that a US secretary estate has given. In terms of its catastrophic effects, it rivals Tony Blair's Chicago speech. of 1999, in which Tony Blair talked about, you know,

the Vesphalia period ending, which he doesn't understand, by the way, he's completely wrong about, but that's another story and says that, in effect, the West now has not only a right, but even a duty to intervene everywhere in everybody's internal affairs as it chooses. So I

put this latest speech on that level, and I was utterly dismayed reading it. And in order to give myself a little bit of comfort, to remember that things used to be better, I reread JFK's peace speech at another university, American University, also in the Washington, D.C. area, I understand.

That speech of extraordinary rationality and humanity, a speech which looked to reach out to America's adversary, specifically the Soviet Union, talked about the importance of understanding your opponent, trying to work with your opponent to achieve a sustainable, realistic peace, what perhaps the greatest speech an American president has given since the end of the Second World War, a speech which many people think was the reason why President Kennedy was, eventually killed. Well, I'm not going to go and discuss that, but a speech that was the diametric opposite in every respect to the one that Secretary Blinken has just delivered. And if you

want a discussion of the Kennedy speech, well, you know, we did a great program with Jeffrey Sacks about it. Anyway, Blinken's speech is completely different. He says that we're now in this conflict with these horrible people in Beijing and Moscow. The people who want to make the world safe for autocracy. They're these bad authoritarian. And we must take them on. And we must take them on at the same time. Because when you unpack it, that in effect is what he's saying.

He says that the United States is now involved in a confrontation with these two nuclear superpowers simultaneously. and must continue to be so. Obviously, you know, we can perhaps find things to talk about, not, of course, with the Russians, they're beyond redemption, but sometimes with the Chinese, but ultimately they are our enemy and we must treat them as such. It's, I have to say, I thought it was a disaster speech. Now, so many people have been saying,

ever since the 1960s and 1970s that the United States cannot afford to be in confrontation with both of these adversary superpowers at the same time. Nixon and Kissinger there might have been morally defective people in all sorts of ways but they understood that they worked to improve relations with both the Chinese

and the Russians simultaneously. They were incredibly successful. They opened up the China. They basically placed the United States in pivot position between these two other great powers. They put the United States in a very, very strong strategic position.

Indeed, we've had articles that appeared right at the start of the administration, the Biden administration, about, you know, we must allow ourselves to be drawn into a two-front wall against

both of these countries. simultaneously. We had proposals at the Atlantic Council that we reach out to the Russians make concessions to them. We had people like West Michels say, no, we've got to break the Russians

because we can't afford to be in a two front war with the Russians and the Chinese simultaneously. Well, Lincoln, he's embracing it. He actually embraces this situation where the United States is now in an anniversary situation with the Chinese and the Russians at one at the same time.

I mean, he thinks that he has said something brilliant, as you said, he's retweeting it all over the place. It's the big thing that you will find on the State Department's website. He has shown no understanding again of the limits of American power. He's shown no understanding again of the complexities of the world as it actually is. He accepts that the United States is no longer the unchallenged leader,

but instead of drawing the obvious conclusions from that, he wants to take on the Chinese and the Russians at one at the same time. Contrast that, as I said, when Kennedy was speaking, reaching out to the Russians. That was said at a time when the United States was in every,

material respect at the absolute height of its power. At that time, President Kennedy had the wisdom to understand that even from that position of enormous strength, the United States needed to reach out to its adversary. Today, Blinken, from a much weaker position, argues and pushes the opposite. Yeah, from a much weaker position, he argues that the US is not the the unipolar power anymore. We're now in a multipolar world, while at the same time, saying that the U.S. now, as it's in a weaker position, as it is no longer unipolar power, will take on the other two main competitors, Russia and China. I mean, it doesn't make any sense at all. How does Blinken envisioned this this war against China and Russia. I mean, what's, what's his plan here? What is your

plan, Anthony Blinken, for the United States at this moment and time to take on both Russia and China? And by the way, that seems to be where he's pushing the United States. I mean, obviously, they're at a proxy war with Russia, but every day we're seeing more and more articles antagonizing China, whether it's Ursula's State of the Union, which she antagonizes the auto industry, whether it's Sanolina Berbach, whether it was the other day, Ram Emmanuel, the ambassador to Japan, he took jabs at China. I mean, and they're very personal, too. Like, they go after Xi Jinping in a very personal way. So, I mean, how does Blinken see all of this unfold to the benefit of the United States? Well, I can't see. I mean, you know,

you read the article, he talks about strengthening the United States, strengthening friendships and alliances with various countries, even by the way, as he admits early in his speech, that more and more countries are actually hedging and are working with the Chinese and the Russians. But, you know, in spite of all of that, he wants more of the same. Now, to use a metaphor that somebody else used about a different speech, I can't remember who it was.

I mean, this speech was all cliches. If you go back to Kennedy's speech, Kennedy's speech, reasoned argument. There's no cliches there. There's just thoughtful, careful discussion and analysis. In this speech, to come back to that metaphor, it reminded the cliches were like a Macedonian phalanx marching across the page. It was full of them.

It was entirely exclusively littered with cliches. I mean, there really isn't any thinking behind it at all. that I could see, no strategizing whatsoever. I mean, I was incredulous because he has no plan. It's very typical of the neocons, actually, when you think about it. You know, they don't need a plan. They can just magically wish for it to happen. And it magically will happen.

You know, we're going to defeat Russia and China at the same time. What's the plan? We don't know. We don't care. We don't think in those terms. We're the power. we're going to defeat them. That's the way it's going to be.

Let's start a war with Russia and China. I mean, this is, Blinken is a neocon through. Sometimes I say he's a neoliberal. He's a neocon from top to bottom. Maybe it's masked underneath this neoliberal facade and this, this climate change, green, woke facade. But when you get deep, deep into the core of what makes Anthony

blinking tick, it's pure neocon. Absolutely. And, you know, the assumption also somehow is that, you know, sooner or later, somehow or other, because we're the good people than the other people are the bad people, it will always turn out right for us somehow in the end. I mean, that's the sort of underlying presumption that, you know, we can't possibly lose because we're on the side of good, which is, again, very much the kind of thinking that the sort of Blinken side of, you know, neocolonism tends to think that, and of course, the real world isn't like that.

That's not how things actually happen. I mean, that was something that President Kennedy understood way back in the early 60s. But of course, in the case of Blinken, he just can't, he can't fathom this. I mean, you know, he can't, he can't see the other side as anything else other than bad people. and he can't conceive of himself as anything other than good people. So, you know, good must win because, well, that's what good always does. And that is his plan, as far as I could tell, because he has no other. That's where the cliches all come from.

Yeah. Let me amend what I said previously, Alexander, get your thoughts. Maybe Blinken is a new type of neocon. You know, maybe he is. I'm thinking about what you just said right now. Then I was thinking about a video that we previously did about Ukraine and how the Blinkin side of things wants to freeze to the conflict so that they can rebuild Ukraine and then go after Russia maybe 10 years down the line while the old school neocons like Newland and Kagan. They're like no negotiations, no talking with the Russians, just keep on fighting and we'll figure things out. Maybe Blinken is a new type of neocon where we're actually our CEO.

the merging of neoliberal ideology with neocon coming to one life force in Anthony Blinkett. So maybe he's not so much like these old school hardcore neocons like Kagan, Newland, Crystal, I remember Rumsfeld or McCain or all of these guys, Lindsay Graham. Maybe he's like a new type of neocon. Yes, I think he is. I think what basically happened was that during the Trump period

when the neocons basically broke with the Republican Party at that time, or at least with the Trump working of the Republican Party, essentially the neocons and the neoliberals of that period just merged with each other, they united with each other. And I think what's happened is that there's been a kind of cross-fertilization and to the extent that there were ever differences, there were differences of nuance. I mean, the neoliberal always talked about human rights and democracy,

the neocons much the old classical you know cheney rumsfeld type neocons didn't really worry about that so much but now they've merged and all of the neocons now increasingly talking that way even kegan co talk to a great extent like that now so they all talk in the same there are tactical differences um blinkin wants to freeze i think he does want to freeze of the conflict in ukraine I think he understands at some level that this is now unsustainable. I don't think the Newland Kagan group do. But these are tactical differences. We're talking about the underlying ideology.

There's only one. All of them together have come together now. They did this during the Trump era, and they merged with each other, and they all meet and they all talk and they all exchange ideas, and they all talk the same talk, and they all think ultimately the same way. They might have differences in tactics, but that's all there is to it nowadays.

Yeah, right. I mean, Blinkets freeze and say Newlands approach to the conflict in Ukraine, they may be different today, but 10 years from now, they still have the same end goal, which is to destroy Russia to lead to regime change and to Balkanize the Russia Federation. I mean, they both want to get to the same place as far as Russia is concerned, and I'm sure China as well, but they have different approaches as to how to get there. I guess you could say that Blinkin's a little bit more sneaky in his approach where someone like Newland or Kagan or the Rumsfeld Cheney types are just more.

You know, just let's go and break it. Absolutely. I mean, it's not as sneaky as say the blinkets of the world. Absolutely. It's a change of tactics. but the strategy that is essentially identical. And by the way, you mentioned all the talk about breaking up Russia. One of the interesting things about Blankton's speech is that, of course,

the very first person he invoked was Brzynski, you know, who was in some ways the person who started off this thing about, you know, fragmenting Russia in his book, The Grand Chairsport. So, you know, Brzezinski is the very first person that Blinken talks and praises and speaks about and says, you know, how we're all his students in effect. So, which is interesting. Of course, that doesn't do full justice to Brzhenzinski because towards the end of his life, at the very end of his life, Jujinsky actually started to rethink some of his own ideas and started to have doubts about them. But of course you'll never see any of the today's neocons, you know, catch up with that or understand that.

So, you know, there it was. He also, by the way, quoted Kenan at one point, George Kennan. But of course he quotes the early Kennan, the Kenan who is supposed to be the great advocate of facing down the Soviet Union and containment. He doesn't mean the late Kennan who was all about detente. and opposed NATO's Eastwood expansion. So it's an interesting choice of people that he selected. Of course, to some extent, his own choice, but also I suspect he script writers.

Yeah, I was going to ask you real quick who you think actually wrote the script for Blinken. Oh, I think Blinken has played a big... Blinken wrote most of it. Well, I don't think he wrote it, but I mean, it certainly reflects, I think, he's actual ideas. If you listen to him,

if you listen to the kind of things that Blinken says in interviews and, you know, discussions. And, I mean, it is fully consistent with his underlying positions and beliefs. And, you know, I said that most of it was cliches. Well, that's how Blinken is. He talks in cliches. I mean, I invite people, you know, to read Kennedy's speech in 1963 and then read Blinkins, and they will see exactly what I mean.

Kennedy, no cliches at all. straight, clear, lucid reasoning, spoken at the height of American power. This speech, one cliche, after another, rolling across the page. Reminds me of Obama, the way Obama speaks. Oh, yeah, yes. Absolutely.

Well, that too. All right, the durand. Dot locals.com. We are on Rumble odyssey, bitchchew, telegram. Rockfin and X. and go to the Dradshop, 10% off, use the code. Good day. Take care.