Is Obama driving the world to Nuclear war?

> Is Obama driving the world to Nuclear war? This article appears in the March 6, 2015 issue of Executive Intelligence Review.      Mike Billington
> Hear These Russian Warnings: They Might Save Your Life
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> by Rachel Douglas and Nancy Spannaus
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> [PDF version of this article]
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> March 3—On March 1, Gen. Maj. Andrei Burbin, chief of the Central Command Post of Russia’s Strategic Missile Forces (SMF), gave an unusual on-air briefing on Russia’s readiness to use its strategic nuclear weapons under conditions of attack on the country, including the much-ballyhooed U.S. Prompt Global Strike scheme for a non-nuclear attempt to destroy the Russian retaliatory capability. The message from this Russian officer is that “utopian” military schemes for “limited nuclear war” or a “counterforce” destruction of Russia’s nuclear weapons are illusory: They will fail, and the result will be retaliation against the United States using the intercontinental ballistic missiles of Russia’s SMF.
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> Burbin’s RSN Radio interview by military analyst Igor Korotchenko, editor of the journal Natsionalnaya Oborona (National Defense), was a high-profile message, which was intended not to be missed. It was cited by major Russian wire services and newspapers, including the government daily Rossiyskaya Gazeta. Highlights were showcased in English by Sputnik News, RT, and other outlets, indicating a high-level decision to get out this statement of Russia’s military posture worldwide.
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> Within the days before and after Burbin’s radio statement, his message was amplified in additional speeches and comments by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, and Russian Ambassador to NATO Alexander Grushko. The Russians are reiterating a policy which leading Western powers have been determined to ignore.
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> The absorption of this message is essential to saving your life, that of your posterity, and of all mankind.
> LaRouche’s Warning
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> Burbin’s statement came a few days after Lyndon LaRouche issued his own sharp warning on the threat of nuclear war. What we’re looking at, LaRouche said, is a “Zeusian” threat—the intent of a faction of the British elite which believes they can “cull the herd” of humanity, by launching some sort of limited nuclear war against the nations of Eurasia. The underlying assumption among these utopians, who think they can carry off a limited nuclear war confined to Eurasia, is that a government, such as that of Russian President Putin, would be willing to respond in a limited fashion to a “limited” nuclear strike.
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> This is a fallacy and a fantasy, LaRouche said. These Zeusian forces must be told: “There is no way that you can survive the effects of your own genocide.”
> Burbin’s Message
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> The first half of General Burbin’s interview concerned the scientific and psychological training of SMF officers, who man the “most combat-ready and capable component of the strategic nuclear triad,” namely land-based ICBMs. These forces “are capable of performing their mission within minutes.” Also explored was the command-and-control function, including multi-channel communications between President Putin, as the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, and the SMF.
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> Korotchenko then asked about the just-ended, month-long SMF training cycle. Burbin said that their main practice mission had been “to move our mobile missile units away from an attack,” so that the ability to launch a retaliatory strike would be preserved:
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>     “We worked on changing and extending the positioning areas, maneuvering the units, and thus increasing the survivability of these units and making the task of our probable adversary more difficult.”
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> Korotchenko:
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>     “So, the retaliatory strike potential will be ensured under all circumstances? It is no secret that the Prompt Global Strike concept now exists, meaning large-scale use of high-precision non-nuclear weapons, in order to make a disarming first strike in a critical situation, and thus knock out capabilities such as our strategic nuclear forces.”
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> Burbin:
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>     “This issue has been addressed. Within the developing or changing situation, we have already worked through this challenge and can meet it. The point is that, under any circumstances, the SMF can carry out their mission. In particular, in peacetime, our strategic mission is deterrence. But if it is necessary to perform the mission of launching a nuclear missile strike, this will be done in the prescribed time frame, with absolute certainty. Our units are geographically deployed in such a way, that no global strike is capable of disabling the entire SMF.”
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> To a follow-up question, Burbin replied that this “absolutely” applies to a nuclear attack on Russia, as well. The discussion also touched on the ability of the SMF to function “under real war conditions, with attempted interference and the deployment of sabotage teams.” The SMF officer said that this also involved countering new technologies, an allusion to stepped-up electronic or cyber warfare. Reviewing the Topol-M and Yars land-based strategic missile-building programs, Burbin noted that by 2020, 98% of the SMF will consist of new missiles.
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> Summing up, Burbin said,
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>     “The missile forces, which are in permanent combat-readiness, perform the task of strategic deterrence in peacetime. Thanks to the SMF, we are living without war today.” Korotchenko rejoined, “The conclusion for all of us, for our country and for the world, is that Russia’s nuclear shield is reliable, and that military orders will be carried out in any situation that develops.”
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> In the call-in portion of the program, after the general had left the studio, Korotchenko continued this discussion with listeners, noting the turnaround of the Russian military during the past two years since General Shoigu became minister of defense, and the emergence of a new, highly competent generation of Russian officers. He commented,
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>     “This is very important, when Obama is threatening us with sanctions and divine retribution, and hands are itching to press the button. So the Americans know that if you press, then the button will be pressed in response. And this makes for strategic equilibrium, and puts us on an equal footing with the Americans. Maybe we’re weak in some areas, or the liberals say things are bad here, and that sanctions will suffocate us, but a great country that has a nuclear shield cannot be suffocated by any sanctions.”
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> Long-Standing Policy
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> General Burbin’s policy statement is a reiteration of a Russian policy repeatedly stated by President Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister Dmitri Medvedev, and the top military brass. EIR highlighted this policy in its special report on “The British Empire’s Global Showdown, And How to Overcome It” in Spring 2012, and subsequently reported the detailed Russian warnings about the threat which the NATO/U.S. European Ballistic Missile Defense deployment and the increasingly eastward deployment of NATO represent for upsetting the strategic balance. (Helga Zepp-LaRouche reviews these insane utopian schemes in this week’s Feature.) Numerous of those warnings explicitly referenced that this “Western” deployment could potentially trigger nuclear war.
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> In a public address Feb. 29, 2012, President Putin emphasized his determination that Russia be prepared to deal with attacks. Referring to the lack of preparedness of the Soviet Union at the time of Hitler’s attack in July 1941, Putin said,
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>     “We cannot afford a replay of the tragedy of 1941, when unreadiness of the state and army for war was paid for by enormous losses.”
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> An article by two Russian military experts in Military Thought, the English-language edition of the Russian Defense Ministry journal Voennaya mysl (No. 4, 2012), elaborated the thinking of the Russian military establishment about Western military strategy against Russia, including assumptions that the West could use new generation weapons that would “achieve the war goals without much loss of life or property for their user.”
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> How would Russia deal with this? We quote:
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>     “In these conditions, Russia is going to resolve its problems in inter-state relations by using every kind of deterrence—by force or peacefully, or by nonmilitary and indirect (asymmetrical) actions.
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>     “Any forms and methods will do to deter the aggressor by force, such as, in the face of direct threat of attack, demonstrative deployment of a powerful defensive task force in the area where the aggressor is expected to strike; an ultimatum with a caution that Russia would (in the event of war) use nuclear weapons immediately and exercise no restraint in employing high-precision weapons to destroy strategically vital objectives on the aggressor’s territory; and planning and conduct of an information campaign to mislead the adversary about Russia’s readiness to beat off aggression.”
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> A Two-Pronged Policy
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> The Russians’ military warnings have been more than outpaced by the government’s offers of cooperation with the European Union and the United States on common objectives such as fighting terrorism, combatting drugs, building infrastructure like the Bering Strait tunnel, and even collaborating on space research which could defend the planet against asteroids (the Strategic Defense of Earth proposal of October 2011). But these offers have been ignored, in favor of increasingly blatant efforts toward degrading Russia’s sovereignty, if not dismembering it as a potential rival altogether. (See EIR, Dec. 19, 2014, “Who Is Behind the Drive To Dismember Russia?”)
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> Foreign Minister Lavrov’s address to the Diplomatic Academy of the Foreign Ministry Feb. 27 provides a guide to how the Russian leadership is thinking, and thus the context for the military warnings.
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> Lavrov lamented the “systematic violations” of principles of the UN Charter by the U.S.A. and others. He especially emphasized the lack of security and stability in the Euro-Atlantic region, attributed it to the West’s “line towards seizing geopolitical space and moving eastward: both through NATO expansion and the implementation of the EU Eastern Partnership initiative.” Said Lavrov,
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>     “Russian interests were not taken into account, and our numerous initiatives, including the elaboration of the European Security Treaty, were either dragged