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January 17th, 2021 
Awake Goy 16 Jan, 2021 22:18Get short URL
Victoria Nuland is shown greeting Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko in 2015. © Reuters / Mikhail Palinchak
Follow RT onPresident-elect Joe Biden is getting the old interventionist-foreign-policy team back together, including Ukraine coup engineer Victoria Nuland, signaling a hardline Russia stance as he fills out top posts in the State Department.
“These leaders are trusted at home and respected around the world, and their nominations signal that America is back and ready to lead the world, not retreat from it,”Biden said on Saturday in a statement announcing his picks to fill top positions under his nominee for secretary of state, Anthony Blinken.
Comment: Just another lie from Political Prostitue Joe Biden. No one trusts America and no one respects America. It’s leaders are Hard Core Criminals. See R.I.P. Tory Smith
Like Blinken, the five latest State Department picks are veterans of the Obama-Biden administration. Nuland, a neoconservative who was named undersecretary for political affairs, goes all the way back to former President Ronald Reagan’s administration and was a foreign policy adviser to former Vice President Dick Cheney.
Other new re-hires include: Wendy Sherman, deputy secretary of state, who led the Obama-Biden administration’s negotiating team on peace talks with Iran; Brian McKeon, deputy secretary for management and resources, who was a national security adviser to then-Vice President Biden; Bonnie Jenkins, undersecretary for arms control and international security, who previously coordinated nonproliferation programs; and Uzra Zeha, undersecretary for civilian security, who formerly was charge d’affaires at the US Embassy in Paris.READ MORE
US foreign aid agencies paid for Kiev street violence – ex-US agent Scott Rickard
After four years of President Donald Trump’s ‘America First’ policy, including efforts to wind down foreign interventions and broker peace deals, Biden’s declaration of “America is back” portends a sharp contrast in foreign policy. He said his latest nominees will “use their diplomatic experience and skill to restore America’s global and moral leadership.”
Nuland, who studied Russian literature at Brown University, wrote last summer in Foreign Affairs of how “a confident America should deal with Russia” with a more “activist” policy, including “speaking directly to the Russian people about the benefits of working together and the price they have paid for (President Vladimir) Putin’s hard turn away from liberalism.” She added, “Washington and its allies have forgotten the statecraft that won the Cold War and continued to yield results for many years after.”
Nuland perhaps was using such “statecraft” when, as assistant secretary of state in December 2013, she handed out cookies to protesters at Kiev’s Maidan Nezalezhnosti square who were demanding the resignation of President Viktor Yanukovich. An audiotape leaked in February 2014 showed that her involvement in the uprising went well beyond cookies, as she spoke with US Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt about plotting to replace Yanukovich with Washington’s chosen opposition leader, Arseny Yatseniuk, and about involving the UN to “f**k the EU” by pushing through a US-preferred Ukraine policy.ALSO ON RT.COMNuland’s biscuits again: Maidan midwife’s plan for US policy on Russia is dumb, delusional and dangerous
Ironically, Nuland’s appointment comes just as politicians in Washington fret over this month’s storming of the US Capitol by pro-Trump protesters, which some called a coup attempt.
“I knew it wasn’t a real coup because Victoria Nuland wasn’t handing out cookies,” Cato Institute senior fellow Doug Bandow said of the Capitol assault. “She’ll be back overthrowing governments in the Biden administration, so it remains a valid standard.”
In light of Nuland’s hawkish history, 25 anti-war groups have jointly called for the Senate to reject confirmation of her nomination as undersecretary for political affairs.
“Victoria Nuland is returning to the State Department,” one commenter wrote on Twitter. “The United States is returning to the former Soviet republics with great strides. A fierce struggle with Russia begins.”
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Comment: The Arrogance of Exceptionalism; America Has Always Treated Russia Like Shit & Everyone Else Too
15 Jan, 2021 11:11 / Updated 1 day agoGet short URL
Russian Air Force Tupolev Tu-214ON which will be operated under the Open Skies treaty. © Wikipedia
Follow RT onRussia is making preparations for the country’s withdrawal from the ‘Open Skies’ Treaty, a key trust-building agreement of the late Cold War. It comes after the US unilaterally left the arrangement last November.
The country’s Foreign Ministry issued a statement on Friday in which it confirmed that “due to the lack of progress in negotiations around the continuation of the treaty under new circumstances, the Ministry is authorized to announce the start of preparations for withdrawal.” The main reason behind Moscow’s move is the failure to secure assurances that intelligence gathered by members of the American-led NATO military bloc will not be passed to the US.
In the statement, Russian diplomats added that “the US arrogantly ignored our proposals to resolve these problems… Realizing that Washington would need counter-steps to address Russian concerns in order to reach an agreement, they interrupted the consultations and accused our country of ‘violations’ of the Treaty. These far-fetched accusations were used by them as a pretext first to propose ‘countermeasures’ and then to withdraw from the Treaty.”
In May last year, President Donald Trump confirmed that the US would withdraw from the pact, which allows members to fly mutually beneficial reconnaissance flights in order to observe the buildup of troops and movement of nuclear weapons. First proposed in 1955 by American President Dwight D. Eisenhower, the agreement was finally penned in 2002. Its aim is to reduce the risk of suspicion and misunderstandings leading to military conflicts.
Formally completing its exit from the deal in November, Washington had accused Russia of failing to adhere to its terms, denying flights over sensitive areas and those observing military exercises. Moscow denies these claims, and instead has suggested the US intends to access intelligence taken from flights by NATO members that are still party to the deal, while preventing Russian spyplanes from collecting equivalent data over America.
Russian President Vladimir Putin has chided Washington for the decision to unilaterally pull out of Open Skies, saying that the country’s diplomats “still have difficulties understanding US grievances that became the reason for that decision.” However, his spokesman has since alluded to the possibility of Russia following suit, adding that “the president has made it clear that Russia will protect its interests.”
President-elect Joe Biden, due to take office after his inauguration next week, has previously slammed Trump’s decision to end the deal, saying that it was short-sighted and that he would look to re-join the pact. However, that may prove difficult, as the US would have to sign up to any amendments to the treaty made in its absence, without qualification. In addition, since Washington’s withdrawal, the State Department has indicated that it would decommission or sell the surveillance planes used for flights under the deal.
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