Ah, Vikki Nuland! Did ever Woman unite so many qualities, whether physical or moral? Those noble features, as though sprung from an ancient frieze, the shimmering ringlets, the tiny rows of teeth, that, were they not so sharp and jagged, were veritable pearls, the graceful walk like a ship breaking the waves, the grave, musical tones. Not to forget her understated elegance (who, pray, is the happy, happy tailor who may approach the august bosom with his pins?) of her attire, of her every thought and word.
Were Paris to return and judge a contest of the fairest public figure, even Prof. Dr. Sahra Wagenknecht, or the polemicist Elsa Mittmansgruber, reputed to be amongst Europe’s most beautiful women, would cut a most sorry figure.
But let not beauty blind us to Miss Nuland’s intelligence and clear judgment!
So refreshing was Miss Nuland’s frankness in the Nord Stream tempest in a teapot that one might all too easily forget her masterful role in the little matter of the murder of Ambassador Stevens at Benghazi. In the old days, was it a century or so ago? the French press noted:
(Nuland’s) interlocutors reveal unmistakably their true concerns in the course of their e-mail exchanges; for example… that one must avoid all impression that the State Department had underestimated warnings from the CIA on terrorist threats in Eastern Libya.
An e-mail from Victoria Nuland states that [certain talking points] ‘could be abused by members (of Congress) to beat up the State Department for not paying attention to warnings, so why would we want to feed that either? Concerned.’“
As the correspondence moves on, the language is altered, to the point that a “Light” version acceptable to all emerges:
All reference to Al-Qaida is struck out.
All reference to eventual implication of the Islamist group Ansar Al-Charia disappears.
The text no longer refers to the quantity of arms and experienced fighters present in Libya.
The reference to the many warnings and reports drafted by the CIA prior to the attack and the risk of an incident owing to extremists being present at Benghazi and in the East, vanishes completely.
Now, THAT deserves promotion for a Vikki who knows where the monkey sleeps, and how to shovel under his droppings. It goes without saying that one would not dream of quoting from a nasty piece designed to dissuade Joe Biden from appointing her Under-Secretary of State, but then again, we might.
The muscle for Nuland’s $5 billion coup was Oleh Tyahnybok’s neo-Nazi Svoboda Party and the shadowy new Right Sector militia. During her leaked phone call, Nuland referred to Tyahnybok as one of the “big three” opposition leaders on the outside who could help the U.S.-backed Prime Minister Yatsenyuk on the inside. This is the same Tyanhnybok who once delivered a speech applauding Ukrainians for fighting Jews and “other scum” during World War II.” (Cf. Another little reminder from the Old Days in the French press).
Amongst Vikki’s many talents is of course her ability to choose a spouse, the Neo-Con Robert Kagan, an entourage, and thus to know how far back in modern history one need turn, for guidance in dealing with the ectoplasmic, eternal, ineffable enemy, Russia.
Alfred Rosenberg or Adolf Hitler? An Embarrassment of Riches?
Cutting it short, as we are all so terribly busy in these times of war, allow us to quote a few lines from Nicolas Werthe’s 1990, Histoire de l’URSS, starting at page 326. (One could tootle about fitting in You Know Who for “Germany” and replacing the term USSR by Russia but why deconstruct the obvious, as Seymour Hersh might say?):
As Hitler saw it, invading the USSR was not simply a military gambit. His aims were specific: liquidating Bolshevism, destroying the Soviet State, conquering vital areas to the East where Germany could move in as colonizer… Hitler considered Bolshevism to be a Great Russian and Jewish phenomenon, two equally-despicable epithets. He believed in an eternal struggle between the Teuton and the Slav, a struggle wherein Russia, no matter her political regime, was a threat to Germany. Furthermore, he considered the Slavic race to be inferior, for which reason all form of political organization was to be liquidated in Russia, forever. Slaves need no State.
As for Alfred Rosenberg, the Ostpolitik’s theoretician (A. Rosenberg), who headed the Ostministerium from 17th July 1941… his theses were more nuanced… His origins were in the Baltic States; he saw sharp racial and cultural differences between the USSR’s peoples… and suggested that the Russians be isolated, roped into their ‘historical territory” of Muscovy and walled-in by non-Russian nations (the Ukraine, the Baltic States, the Caucasus) whose State and Governmental structures were to be tightly run from Germany.
There was also a third tendency, in addition to Hitler who objected to any compromise with the USSR’ s peoples of any stripe, and to Rosenberg’s selective approach; this third tendency was for a time backed by General Jodl: the Soviet authorities had to be split from the people, whose discontent, especially amongst the peasantry, was to be leveraged…
In turn, and quite incoherently, the Nazis tried all three approached to the problem of the ‘East territories.
Germany’s Ostpolitik having shewn itself to be such a resounding triumph, Vikki and Friends have opted to deploy all three approaches at one and the same time. Where there’s a War, There’s a Way!
The kicker: although Vikki is notoriously contemptuous of Europe, she has nonetheless made Brussels, or perhaps its NATO HQ, her home, according to Wikipedia, alongside the Kagan. Would the magnet be the city’s famed restaurants? Jack Spratt could eat no fat, his wife could eat no lean?
Which begs the question: thanks to the bombing of Nord Stream and Vikki’s War, eating one’s fill in Europe costs an arm and a leg, whereas the Kagan bellies are reassuringly well-upholstered. Heigh-ho! What is the couple’s monthly revenue, and Who pays for What? As Private Eye would have said, in its glory days, We should be told.
Cf Michael Tracey’s remarkable piece, and Professor John Mearsheimer, very recently, on the USA’s “upcoming” war on China.
Post Scriptum: Michael Tracey, now attending the Munich Security Conference, has just looked up the US Government Manual from Vikki’s Early Days. The Vice-President was Dick Cheney. Vikki was his Principal Deputy Assistant for National Security Affairs: “There cannot be enough reminders given of who’s actually running US foreign policy. From the US Government Manual circa 2004.”
Mendelssohn Moses is a Paris-based writer.