The Geopolitics Of South-East Europe And Importance Of The Regional Geostrategic Position (I)

South-East Europe

 

The geopolitical issue of South-East Europe became of very importance for the scholars, policymakers, and researchers with the question of the dismemberment of the Ottoman Empire as one of the most crucial features of the beginning of the 20^th century in European history. A graduate collapsing of the one-time great empire was accelerated and followed by competition and struggling by both, the European Great Powers and the Balkan national states, upon the territorial inheritance of it. While the European Great Powers have the aim to obtain the new spheres of political-economic influence in South-East Europe, followed by the task to establish a new balance of power in the continent, a total collapse of the Ottoman state was seen by small Balkan nations as the unique historical opportunity to enlarge the territories of their national-states by unification of all ethnolinguistic compatriots from the Ottoman Empire with the motherland. A creation of a single national state, composed by all ethnographic and historic “national” lands, was in the eyes of the leading Balkan politicians as a final stage of national awakening, revival and liberation of their nations which started at the turn of the 19^th century on the ideological basis of the German romanticist nationalism expressed in a formula: “One Language-One Nation-One State”.[i]

Russian South Stream 2.0 Comes Out of the Shadows

Source: Kommersant

 

Russia and Turkey have announced that the two countries have reached significant progress in reviving the November 2014-shut down South Stream gas pipeline intended to land Russian gas across the Black Sea. The project is the part of the already secured open tender contracts for purchases of gas signed between Gazprom, Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary, Slovakia and Austria.

The new Black Sea gas pipeline Turkish Stream will run under sea from Krasnodar to a landing hubv just west of Istanbul. On November 19, presidents Vladimir Putin and Recep Tayyip Erdogan met in Istanbul to announce the completion of pipeline’s off-shore section.

Cyprus and Greece to create EU spy academy

Athens: new academy to provide ‘training in intelligence disciplines’ (Photo: Barcex)

 

EU defence and foreign ministers have agreed to create a joint intelligence training school and to develop new hardware, including drones and electronic warfare technology, as part of plans for what could one day be an “EU army”.

The “Joint EU Intelligence School” will “provide education and training in intelligence disciplines and other specific fields to EU member states intelligence personnel”, the EU Council said in a press release after ministers met in Brussels on Monday (19 November).

The project is to be led by Cyprus and Greece – two traditionally Russia-friendly states – at a time of heightened tension over Russian espionage operations in Europe and the Western Balkans, including assassination attempts in the UK and in Montenegro.

The EU foreign service already has a joint intelligence capability called IntCen.

The EU’s ‘Internal Enemies’

BERLIN (Own report) – In view of the conflict between Brussels and Rome over Italy’s national budget, the German establishment is increasing its demands to resolutely fight the “internal enemies” of the EU. The Union must “now be vigorously defended,” wrote a leading German daily. The Italian government coalition is “not worth risking the country’s fate.” The Italian government is being put into question, because it refuses to continue to submit to German austerity dictates. Berlin’s dominance over the EU is also being met with mounting protests in other member countries. Poland and Hungary are not the only countries, where controversies are intensifying. Anger at Berlin is also growing in France. Jean-Luc Mélenchon, the founder of “La France insoumise,” who, with almost 20 percent, barely missed making the run-offs in the 2017 presidential elections, has now called for “France to withdraw from all EU treaties.” The German elite’s reaction is becoming more hostile.

State of the Union

A German-dominated United States of Europe with its respective European Army is on the rise — out in the open.

The Fourth Reich has landed.

 

BERLIN/BRUSSELS (Own report) – The EU must develop the capacity “to shape global affairs” and act as “architect of tomorrow’s world,” declared Jean-Claude Juncker, President of the European Commission during his “State of the Union” speech yesterday. The speech is modeled on the famous annual “State of the Union Address” presented by the US President to a joint session of Congress. Juncker particularly wants to accelerate the EU’s militarization and the fortification of its external borders. While the German-dominated Union is striving to become a global power, at all costs, tensions within the EU are growing significantly. The disciplinary action adopted yesterday by the European Parliament against Hungary, which has been undermining democratic rights for years, exacerbates the conflict between the West European centers of power and the EU’s eastern members. The blatant prosperity gap between the EU’s center and the impoverished periphery continues unabated. Serious violations of human rights, particularly against refugees, accompany the internally disunited Union’s striving for a global role.

Geopolitical crisis : A moribund NATO

 

As we have explained on other occasions, NATO is still there, of course, but only because there are no better options at hand. Everyone wants to be rid of it – the Europeans who want a common European defence[1] and Donald Trump who wants Europeans to participate more in their own defence. They are all contributing to a slow process in which NATO continues to get in the way whilst Europeans dither between several strategies:

• To increase their share[2] and thus acquire an equal say with that of the US within NATO (with the long-term aim of separating off to form a European NATO[3]). Problem: For this strategy to have a chance of success, much greater cohesion is needed in the European camp – something that is still a long way off at the moment.

Europe Cannot Cope With Any Further Armed Conflict On The Continent

 

European leaders are not only unable to counteract the demographic crisis on the Old Continent, but are also losing ground in terms of defense. President Trump’s skepticism and reservation about the military ideas of European bureaucrats, Ankara’s increasingly aggressive actions towards Cyprus and Greece, and the rapprochement between Turkey and Russia highlight NATO’s weakness on the eve of its summit in Brussels.

Europe stands no chance if forced to face conflict on three fronts. Two of them are of conventional character: on the eastern flank, where there are continuous tensions with Russia, and in the Balkans near the border with Turkey. The third concerns the Mediterranean area, where young and strong men from Africa and Central Asia cross European borders with the support of a thousand people from the continent’s heartland. Europeans are also militarily involved in Afghanistan, Syria and take part in the growing conflict in Mali.

Poland’s US Military Base Is More About China Than Russia

Illustration Only

 

Poland is proposing to host a permanent US military base on its territory.

Poland wants to replace Germany as the US’ preferred partner in Europe, taking advantage of American distrust with Berlin over Nord Stream II and trade disagreements while capitalizing on the Pentagon’s desire to “contain” Russia, thus satisfying multiple strategic objectives at once. The Polish leadership believes that the region-wide “Three Seas Initiative” of 11 other Central and Eastern European states that it wants to lead is ideologically compatible with the Trump Administration’s anti-liberal populism and represents another strategic convergence with the US. Paradoxically, however, while Poland is striving to advance its national sovereignty, it’s nevertheless sacrificing it by wanting to host an American military base, which is why a deeper explanation of this proposal is necessary.

Russia Just Won Big In The European Gas War

 

There’s been a lot of talk on both sides of the Atlantic about the U.S. pivot and efforts at locking in natural as market share in Europe. Much of this comes amid President Donald Trump’s so-called American energy independence push as well as both U.S. and several EU members thrust to wean Europe off of geopolitically charged Russian gas.

In fact, Trump has pushed for U.S.-sourced LNG to become so much of the EU’s energy security that several European states, particularly Germany, have accused the president of playing energy geopolitics, cloaking American concern for European energy security under the guise and to the benefit of U.S. LNG producers.

Now, however, Trump and U.S. LNG exporters will have an even harder time convincing key EU members to offset overreliance on Russian piped gas with U.S. LNG.

Soros’ Open Society Foundation Closes Operations In Hungary Under Pressure From Orban

 

After closing its Budapest office last month, Open Society, the purportedly philanthropic organization created to push a liberal, globalist political agenda espoused by billionaire investor George Soros, said Tuesday that it has officially pulled out of Hungary after accusing Prime Minister Viktor Orban of “repressing civil society,” according to the WSJ.

“Faced with an increasingly repressive political and legal environment in Hungary, the Open Society Foundations are moving their Budapest-based international operations and staff to the German capital, Berlin,” the group confirmed on Tuesday.

EU holding nations to ransom, ‘do as we say or lose funding’

(Shutterstock)

 

Brussels has issued some thinly veiled threats to countries that essentially asks them to forego their national, legal sovereignty if they want to keep receiving EU funds…it sounds a bit like a ransom note.

Hungary’s Orban in sweeping victory, boosting EU populists

The victory will embolden Hungary’s Orban to continue cracking down on critics (Photo: Viktor Orban’s Facebook page)

 

Hungary’s nationalist prime minister Viktor Orban secured a third term with a sweeping majority in a boost to Europe’s populist forces.

Orban’s Fidesz has likely won a two-third majority in parliament in Sunday’s (8 April) general election, paving the way for amending the constitution, the electoral law, rules on local governments and the courts.

Hungarians voted in record numbers, but contrary to expectations, the large turnout favoured Orban’s Fidesz, not the opposition.

Russia and Europe moving closer to WAR warns shock new report

Russia’s foreign policy has sparked concern across Europe [Getty]

 

RUSSIA and Europe are moving closer to all-out war, a shocking new report has warned.

The report said the erosion of arms control agreements, deployment of additional weapons and tensions over military exercises have increased the risk of an inadvertent armed clash.

The annual Munich Security Report, this year entitled ‘To The Brink – And Back?’ also cited growing pressure on nuclear disarmament treaties and ongoing security concerns in eastern and central Europe as cause for concern. 

Europe’s Era of Harmony Is Over

No one else I know can muster as much deep experience and insight into the sprawling, incendiary world of geopolitics as my good friend George Friedman, founder and chairman of Geopolitical Futures; and in today’s Outside the Box – part 2 of my 8-part SIC Speaker Series – George brings all his powers to bear to issue quite a declamatory statement on the present and future of the European Union.

Soros’ Global Influence

 

Just some examples of George Soros’ network of influence.

Unlike the mad ‘Russian collusion’ conspiracies being peddled by the tinfoil hat wearers, there is real and documented evidence of billionaire George Soros’ global influence which gets virtually no coverage outside of the new media (funny that!).

Did you know that Soros met with Juncker and other top EU officials several times over the summer?