US commander warns NATO couldn’t repel Russian Baltic invasion

NATO would currently be unable to protect the Baltics against a Russian attack, the commander of US ground forces in Europe, General Ben Hodges, said in a news report Wednesday.

“Russia could take over the Baltic states faster than we would be able to defend them,” Hodges was quoted as saying in a German-language article by news weekly Die Zeit.

The general said he agreed with an assessment by military analysts who claimed that Russian forces could conquer the capitals of Baltic states Latvia, Lithuania and Estonia within 36 to 60 hours.

Russia is building network of ties with disgruntled US allies in Asia

As predicted in 2012, and as shown in the previous two posts, the U.S. is slowly being kicked out of Asia (See also HERE and HERE). A new Asian bloc will form under the umbrella protectorate of China and likely, as the article indicates here, Russia will be involved too. Japan will drift to the new Asian bloc and abandon the alliance with America which is backing down from China and allowing it to capture the Asian Pacific. It’s better to join the team you can’t beat instead of getting decimated in war, especially when your team has defectors.

The world is changing rapidly with events that happen only once every 1000 years. Get ready for a world dominated by Europe and Asia. The SCO will be a major player and likely be the military arm, with the largest military the world has ever seen.

 

Imperceptibly though, Russia is certainly on course to building a chain of positive relations, if not strategic alliances, in the region surrounding it.

While the West and its strong allies in the region see the move as part of Russia’s “expansionism”, others view it as the Russian way of counterbalancing the U.S. position in the region.

Moscow is providing a number of erstwhile U.S. allies the much needed alternative to diversify their foreign policies. This diversification is visible across the region.

For instance, countries including India and Afghanistan have started supporting China’s stance on South China Sea.

Russia Deployed Over 150 New Warheads in Past Year

U.S. cut warheads by 57 in same period

Russia deployed 153 strategic nuclear warheads over the past year under the New START arms treaty while the U.S. military pared its nuclear forces by 57 warheads, according to State Department figures released last week.

The increase in warheads by Moscow appears to be part of Moscow’s large-scale strategic nuclear forces buildup.

Defense officials disclosed last week that Russia is doubling the number of strategic nuclear warheads and remains over the 1,550 warhead limit set by the 2010 New START arms treaty.

Former CIA Agent Warns the World is at its most Dangerous Point in History

A former CIA agent and top U.S. defence expert has warned that the world is more dangerous than it has ever been due to the rise of heavily armed and well funded terrorist groups.

Although the 21st century has not yet been subjected to the mass carnage and industrial scale slaughter caused by the global conflicts between superpowers in the 20th century, the increased threat of worldwide terrorism ensures that no nation can consider itself truly safe.

Russia Says It Can Deploy Nuclear Arms to Crimea

Moscow to bolster military in occupied Ukrainian peninsula

Russia’s envoy to the NATO alliance said on Friday that Moscow will bolster military forces in occupied Ukraine, and is not banned from deploying nuclear arms in Crimea.

“Everything that we do in Crimea fully complies with all obligations of the Russian Federation under international treaties. We do not violate anything, there are no prohibitions on us deploying certain weapons systems,” said Alexander Grushko, the envoy, when asked if nuclear arms would be placed in Crimea.

Grushko also declined to say whether nuclear arms currently are deployed inside the Ukrainian territory forcibly annexed by Russia in March 2014. He made the remarks in a video press conference from Moscow with reporters in Brussels, where NATO headquarters is located.