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Lukashenko just pointed out a pretty obvious problem with the SCO. China, Russia, India, Iran and much of Central Asia are all sitting at the same table. Together they have a huge population, enormous resources and serious economic power. But when one of them gets hit with sanctions, what... happens? Not much. When Iran is attacked, the SCO condemns it, but then what? Part of the problem is how the SCO works. It is not a military alliance, there is no central authority calling the shots, and decisions require consensus. So there is a huge gap between the power these countries have on paper and their ability to actually use it together. And that’s basically Lukashenko’s point: if the SCO wants to become a real center of power, at some point it has to move from statements to mechanisms.show more

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29,353 views • 1 day ago •via X (Twitter)

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Matthew McCracken 🇨🇮🇮🇪🇺🇸🇱🇷🇷🇺🇳🇱🇷🇴🇹🇩1 day ago

He raises some very good points but how do you find the perfect equilibrium where the SCO does not become a mirror image of the EU and the members lose their sovereignty to the monster they created?

Ridiculousness Inspector1 day ago

Future Eurasian power? It would be a nice contest to EU. SCO that is. It will be interesting to see how this develops in time.

Soran Ibrahim1 day ago

@araghchi yep…starting with a nuclear umbrella for non-nuclear powers…

Join Bri , Brics & the Multipolar World .1 day ago

whats he want ? war? the countries listed continue to trade

Merce Hanson1 day ago

#Lukashenko is right: #SCO has potential but no teeth. Condemning #Iran is weak. Time for real defense mechanisms. #Russia and #Belarus lead. #Moscow and #Minsk will take #SCO from words to action. The West trembles.

Left Out🐀 老大1 day ago

It is a financial instrument, not a military alliance.

My Name1 day ago

He is right. The fence-sitting has to end. Otherwise the small ones will be targeted one by one, and the big ones have a never ending stream of problems and provocations on their borders. That's why the Caucasus, the Stans, and Mongolia - and Belorus - need to be reintegrated.

leokhan3131 day ago

100% Agreed, Brics is useless until it's Members can't defends each other's...

Роман1 day ago

Ну,в общем то он прав!

M1 day ago

Didnt the SCO respond to the attempted cup in Kazakistan a few years earlier. Stabilised the situation and left, seems what the operating parameters/scenarios to be explicitly expresssed and continously reiterated so usage can be an option.

Raimund O'Brien1 day ago

His own man.

JESÚS1 day ago

Pepe Escobar se da cuenta o es demasiado optimista...

Antonio forestal1 day ago

Por ese motivo arabia saudi, se salio del mecanismo de pago chino, porque no ofrecen protección a sus socios, los que tienen imposición imperial mandan sobre el resto

Average Socialism enjoyer 🇰🇵🇨🇳1 day ago

Lukashenko is good but he l!cks b00ts of w0men too much. He is just another anti-male politician

SilverSpiritJack1 day ago

Statements to mechanisms is the whole story. But mechanisms mean binding obligations, and India and China would block anything with teeth. Lukashenko knows this, which is why he's complaining from the cheap seats.

Wilemo1 day ago

You seem to view the SCO as a sort of NATO (or a Warsaw Pact 2.0), but I believe it is more significant—and more complicated—to view it as the BRICS' version of UN peacekeepers.

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Because really it goes back to: what is Saudi Arabia? Saudi has been imposing on Yemen really for all these years since the founding of Saudi Arabia, trying to change its style of Islam, which is an esoteric either Ismaili or Zaidi type of Islam, but it’s an esoteric type of Islam. I’m not talking sectarianism. I’m just talking about the nature of Islam in Yemen being much more esoteric. It’s much more inwardness rather than the literal extremist Puritan idea of the Wahhabi of the Najd form of Islam that was weaponized by Abdulaziz and by Ibn Saud in the 1930s. They were a Puritan sort of militia that ran amok through the Middle East. They attacked Mecca; they attacked Karbala; they killed thousands—tens of thousands in Karbala. And eventually Abdulaziz was forced to try to contain them and to stop this because, first of all, it was the beginnings of the petrol—the fuel oil bonanza taking place in Saudi Arabia and he wanted to convince the British and the Americans that it could become a state. But that movement was never entirely retired. It was just put on standby. But this was the sort of incompatibility, the contradiction that takes place in Saudi Arabia. It claims to represent all of Sunni Islam. But actually it is based on the very narrow pillar of this very violently Puritan component—desert Islam—that regarded any change from their tradition as bid‘a, as heresy by innovation. And that anyone who did not subscribe to their view of Islam deserved death. This was the progenitor of ISIS, just to make clear. What’s the difference between this Wahhabism from the desert and ISIS? Nothing. They were the same. It was just a different formulation of them. So what happened with this was that eventually he had to take on these people because they were threatening the whole of the project of building a Saudi power that would be acceptable to Britain and to the United States and the outside world. So the British machine-gunned them for him. And they killed most of them. But the point is they never represented the main tribes of Saudi Arabia, who also were attacked and destroyed. And then Ibn Saud then married all their wives—married a wife from each tribe that he had defeated. So he ended up with 22 wives. Because he thought this was a way of preventing them from attacking him further. But they’re still there. And they still remain resentful of the sort of one-family formula which guides Saudi Arabia, because that’s what it is. There were old sort of traditions that riches had to be spread in some sort of way that was fair between the tribes, that their territories and their perquisites were respected. Some of the tribes, like the Shammar, have more than a million members. They’re not just tiny little militias. These are big tribes. They extend beyond the boundaries of Saudi Arabia. All the finance, all the money, all the essence of the Saudis’ kingdom project was all focused in one family. And so the resentment still continues about that. So the idea that Saudi Arabia is a sort of a strong modern political state is, to a certain extent, a myth. Yes, it had money. It doesn’t today. But also, it either makes concessions to the Houthis and risks the revolution gaining more oxygen and becoming bigger and spreading to Iraq and to other parts, which is happening. There is a real sense, a feeling in the air of revolution in the Middle East at the moment. Because a small group of people have just taken over and shown the hollowness of Saudi power, much as Iran has shown the hollowness of US power during this period. And of course this is animating people. And don’t forget Iraq. We’ve had Iran; now the shoe has dropped in Yemen. And remember that when the last supreme leader was assassinated by Israel, the funeral that followed in Iraq, millions turned out there in Karbala, even in Najaf, which is more conservative. Millions turned out. Across Iran, people walked miles to pay their respects to this. So what we’re playing with is revolutionary fire. I’m emphasizing it because it all tends to be viewed from the Western perspective that this is all about Saudi relations and Gulf relations with the United States, and it’s all about oil, and are we going to have to pay so much for diesel. But actually, what is happening is there’s a big reversion taking place. The whole region is sort of on the cusp of reverting to the old power paradigm that used to exist until the fall of the Shah, in which the big civilizational powers historically have always been Mesopotamia and Persia/Iran, whatever you want to call it. But these were real powers in the real sense. I mean, functional, functioning powers with big populations and riches, and were the powers in the region really until, first of all, the Clean Break document, which was written by Richard Perle and David Wurmser in ’96, recommended this inversion. We’re going to change the whole power structure, and the new pillars of American energy dominance and power are going to be Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, and all of the allies of Iran are going to be eliminated, and this new power structure would then also be the basis for normalization with Israel, i.e. the beginnings of the Abraham Accords. And then in 2006, after the war of Israel against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Dick Cheney was complaining bitterly that the war was supposed to weaken Iran and instead it strengthened Iran. And he was talking with Prince Bandar, who was then the intelligence leader, and we have the details of this meeting exactly because John Hannah, who was the aide of Cheney wrote it and even published it. And what Bandar said was, listen, the king believes that the weak point of Iran is Syria. Syria is the pipeline, their emergency routes. We take out Syria, and Iran is weakened, if not lost. And Cheney, at that point, said, well, hold on. Hold on. How are you going to take out Syria? And Bandar replied to him with one word: Islamism, extreme Islamism. And that was the Wahhabis coming back in. And what Cheney was doing was legitimizing the use of this extreme current of Najdi Islam, Wahhabism, which then transformed into the various components of ISIS and Nusra and everything else as a sectarian tool to weaken Iran and to complete the power shift that now the Sunni Gulf states were the pillar of power and the pillar of Israeli substance in the region and Iran was kicked out. And that’s why this thing is so important, because what we’re seeing with Iran and now with the Houthis, and we may see more components to this happening, is a complete turnaround back to the old system. Iran has power and the Houthis have power.” The City and Washington built a garrison on a desert militia and called it a pillar of order. Ansar Allah is treating that construction as what it was: colonial. The exit is development and a settlement the dollar cannot switch off. More garrisons will not restore 1934.

Alastair Crooke (Alastair Crooke): What happened in Yemen is a revolution, not a tit-for-tat over a blockade. Ansar Allah spent seven to nine years preparing it. The fight is with the Saudi state the British and Americans built on a narrow Wahhabi pillar. “What happened in Yemen is not just a sort of tit-for-tat against Saudi Arabia or about a certain blockade. It is a revolution. I think it should be understood as a revolution. It has been planned for at least 7 years, more like 9 years. They have been working on this. It is thought through by Ansar Allah, who are always deprecated in the West because they’re barefooted tribesmen and things, but it has been well planned. And so Saudi Arabia, if it goes down the path of conceding to Ansar Allah, it means they’ll have to return the three provinces that they stole in the 1930s. In 1934, they stole three provinces of the Yemenis. And the Houthis have strong tribal connections with those provinces, which are now generally sort of assumed to be within Saudi Arabia, but they will want them back. They will want an end to the blockade, and they will also want payments which were due to them on certain transactions. And they will demand the end of the UAE and the Saudi forces in the south. In fact, they are being destroyed anyway. They’ve been literally driven out because they’re mercenaries. They’re not Saudi forces; they’re mercenary forces. And the mercenary forces have all been fleeing as the Houthis have used ballistic missiles against them. And you can see they’ve just fled from the area. There’s a slight interaction: actually, the UAE mercenaries are not letting the Saudi mercenaries pass at the moment until they pay them. But I mean, they’re both mercenaries, and the Houthis will drop a few ballistic missiles on them just to make up their mind more quickly. So why do I say it’s a revolution? Because really it goes back to: what is Saudi Arabia? Saudi has been imposing on Yemen really for all these years since the founding of Saudi Arabia, trying to change its style of Islam, which is an esoteric either Ismaili or Zaidi type of Islam, but it’s an esoteric type of Islam. I’m not talking sectarianism. I’m just talking about the nature of Islam in Yemen being much more esoteric. It’s much more inwardness rather than the literal extremist Puritan idea of the Wahhabi of the Najd form of Islam that was weaponized by Abdulaziz and by Ibn Saud in the 1930s. They were a Puritan sort of militia that ran amok through the Middle East. They attacked Mecca; they attacked Karbala; they killed thousands—tens of thousands in Karbala. And eventually Abdulaziz was forced to try to contain them and to stop this because, first of all, it was the beginnings of the petrol—the fuel oil bonanza taking place in Saudi Arabia and he wanted to convince the British and the Americans that it could become a state. But that movement was never entirely retired. It was just put on standby. But this was the sort of incompatibility, the contradiction that takes place in Saudi Arabia. It claims to represent all of Sunni Islam. But actually it is based on the very narrow pillar of this very violently Puritan component—desert Islam—that regarded any change from their tradition as bid‘a, as heresy by innovation. And that anyone who did not subscribe to their view of Islam deserved death. This was the progenitor of ISIS, just to make clear. What’s the difference between this Wahhabism from the desert and ISIS? Nothing. They were the same. It was just a different formulation of them. So what happened with this was that eventually he had to take on these people because they were threatening the whole of the project of building a Saudi power that would be acceptable to Britain and to the United States and the outside world. So the British machine-gunned them for him. And they killed most of them. But the point is they never represented the main tribes of Saudi Arabia, who also were attacked and destroyed. And then Ibn Saud then married all their wives—married a wife from each tribe that he had defeated. So he ended up with 22 wives. Because he thought this was a way of preventing them from attacking him further. But they’re still there. And they still remain resentful of the sort of one-family formula which guides Saudi Arabia, because that’s what it is. There were old sort of traditions that riches had to be spread in some sort of way that was fair between the tribes, that their territories and their perquisites were respected. Some of the tribes, like the Shammar, have more than a million members. They’re not just tiny little militias. These are big tribes. They extend beyond the boundaries of Saudi Arabia. All the finance, all the money, all the essence of the Saudis’ kingdom project was all focused in one family. And so the resentment still continues about that. So the idea that Saudi Arabia is a sort of a strong modern political state is, to a certain extent, a myth. Yes, it had money. It doesn’t today. But also, it either makes concessions to the Houthis and risks the revolution gaining more oxygen and becoming bigger and spreading to Iraq and to other parts, which is happening. There is a real sense, a feeling in the air of revolution in the Middle East at the moment. Because a small group of people have just taken over and shown the hollowness of Saudi power, much as Iran has shown the hollowness of US power during this period. And of course this is animating people. And don’t forget Iraq. We’ve had Iran; now the shoe has dropped in Yemen. And remember that when the last supreme leader was assassinated by Israel, the funeral that followed in Iraq, millions turned out there in Karbala, even in Najaf, which is more conservative. Millions turned out. Across Iran, people walked miles to pay their respects to this. So what we’re playing with is revolutionary fire. I’m emphasizing it because it all tends to be viewed from the Western perspective that this is all about Saudi relations and Gulf relations with the United States, and it’s all about oil, and are we going to have to pay so much for diesel. But actually, what is happening is there’s a big reversion taking place. The whole region is sort of on the cusp of reverting to the old power paradigm that used to exist until the fall of the Shah, in which the big civilizational powers historically have always been Mesopotamia and Persia/Iran, whatever you want to call it. But these were real powers in the real sense. I mean, functional, functioning powers with big populations and riches, and were the powers in the region really until, first of all, the Clean Break document, which was written by Richard Perle and David Wurmser in ’96, recommended this inversion. We’re going to change the whole power structure, and the new pillars of American energy dominance and power are going to be Saudi Arabia and the Gulf states, and all of the allies of Iran are going to be eliminated, and this new power structure would then also be the basis for normalization with Israel, i.e. the beginnings of the Abraham Accords. And then in 2006, after the war of Israel against Hezbollah in Lebanon, Dick Cheney was complaining bitterly that the war was supposed to weaken Iran and instead it strengthened Iran. And he was talking with Prince Bandar, who was then the intelligence leader, and we have the details of this meeting exactly because John Hannah, who was the aide of Cheney wrote it and even published it. And what Bandar said was, listen, the king believes that the weak point of Iran is Syria. Syria is the pipeline, their emergency routes. We take out Syria, and Iran is weakened, if not lost. And Cheney, at that point, said, well, hold on. Hold on. How are you going to take out Syria? And Bandar replied to him with one word: Islamism, extreme Islamism. And that was the Wahhabis coming back in. And what Cheney was doing was legitimizing the use of this extreme current of Najdi Islam, Wahhabism, which then transformed into the various components of ISIS and Nusra and everything else as a sectarian tool to weaken Iran and to complete the power shift that now the Sunni Gulf states were the pillar of power and the pillar of Israeli substance in the region and Iran was kicked out. And that’s why this thing is so important, because what we’re seeing with Iran and now with the Houthis, and we may see more components to this happening, is a complete turnaround back to the old system. Iran has power and the Houthis have power.” The City and Washington built a garrison on a desert militia and called it a pillar of order. Ansar Allah is treating that construction as what it was: colonial. The exit is development and a settlement the dollar cannot switch off. More garrisons will not restore 1934.

🅰pocalypsis 🅰pocalypseos 🇷🇺 🇨🇳 🅉

111,837 views • 5 days ago

#WATCH | Taipei, Taiwan: On Quad Foreign Ministers’ meeting, Fellow of Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation, Sana Hashmi says, “… What we are seeing right now is something that is much more evolved and transformed and much more aligned with the interests of the four countries. In fact, the US Secretary of State was in Delhi, and one of the major reasons for his being in Delhi is to participate in the Quad Foreign Minister meeting…we need to pay more attention to the foreign ministers meeting, to the working groups…the reality is much more nuanced than the simplistic understanding of Trump going to China and meeting Xi. We have to understand that the Indo-Pacific is very much there, and the four countries have real concerns, and there is a common thread, and that is the China threat…the main point of discussion is China…there are several strategic factors that are driving the Quad, and that is driving the interest and willingness of the four countries to cooperate. Focusing on the maritime dimension is so very important, specifically when countries such as China are looking at developing blue water capabilities and the PLA becoming a blue water navy. We need to really focus on the maritime capabilities of the four countries and come together forming a coalition, cooperative arrangement where the four countries could actually secure the waters…India is the only country that is injecting the maritime component within the quadrilateral dialogue. India hosts the Malabar exercise, which is more or less now a de facto quad maritime exercise…we have seen during Covid how the four countries came together and became an important stakeholder in the health security as well…but it goes beyond the traditional security issues…we have to look at the timing (of the New Delhi Quad meeting). We also have to look at the location. It is just happening after the visit of the US President to China. This is also an indication from the US that it is willing to repair ties with India, and Indo-Pacific remains an important area for them…this is one of the reasons why tomorrow's meeting is crucial. It's not a new development that India is seen as a formidable power in the Indo-Pacific…when Trump came to power again, there were some hiccups in India-US relationships, but from Australia’s and Japan's perspective, India has been very important. And with that, Quad is also very important…Quad and Indo-Pacific cannot exist without India…from Taiwan's perspective, Quad is the only arrangement within the Indo-Pacific region that is indirectly dealing with the China threat…for Taiwan, China is an existential threat. There is an alignment of interest between Quad and Taiwan…”

#WATCH | Taipei, Taiwan: On Quad Foreign Ministers’ meeting, Fellow of Taiwan-Asia Exchange Foundation, Sana Hashmi says, “… What we are seeing right now is something that is much more evolved and transformed and much more aligned with the interests of the four countries. In fact, the US Secretary of State was in Delhi, and one of the major reasons for his being in Delhi is to participate in the Quad Foreign Minister meeting…we need to pay more attention to the foreign ministers meeting, to the working groups…the reality is much more nuanced than the simplistic understanding of Trump going to China and meeting Xi. We have to understand that the Indo-Pacific is very much there, and the four countries have real concerns, and there is a common thread, and that is the China threat…the main point of discussion is China…there are several strategic factors that are driving the Quad, and that is driving the interest and willingness of the four countries to cooperate. Focusing on the maritime dimension is so very important, specifically when countries such as China are looking at developing blue water capabilities and the PLA becoming a blue water navy. We need to really focus on the maritime capabilities of the four countries and come together forming a coalition, cooperative arrangement where the four countries could actually secure the waters…India is the only country that is injecting the maritime component within the quadrilateral dialogue. India hosts the Malabar exercise, which is more or less now a de facto quad maritime exercise…we have seen during Covid how the four countries came together and became an important stakeholder in the health security as well…but it goes beyond the traditional security issues…we have to look at the timing (of the New Delhi Quad meeting). We also have to look at the location. It is just happening after the visit of the US President to China. This is also an indication from the US that it is willing to repair ties with India, and Indo-Pacific remains an important area for them…this is one of the reasons why tomorrow's meeting is crucial. It's not a new development that India is seen as a formidable power in the Indo-Pacific…when Trump came to power again, there were some hiccups in India-US relationships, but from Australia’s and Japan's perspective, India has been very important. And with that, Quad is also very important…Quad and Indo-Pacific cannot exist without India…from Taiwan's perspective, Quad is the only arrangement within the Indo-Pacific region that is indirectly dealing with the China threat…for Taiwan, China is an existential threat. There is an alignment of interest between Quad and Taiwan…”

ANI

11,468 views • 4 months ago