If ever you want to understand how and why the West seems to be losing on every front, all you have to do is to watch the leaders of the Western bloc’s geopolitical rivals, when they speak in public. We had one such opportunity this week, when the Neo-Tsar held forth, as he has done for the past 20 (!!!!!) years, at the Valdai International Discussion Club (Валдай Международный Дискуссионный Клуб) in Sochi.

The Neo-Tsar spoke expansively on a wide range of subjects, laying out and defining his vision of a multipolar world that we see unfolding before us:

Personally, I intensely dislike it when people speak over the Neo-Tsar, as I have always preferred to listen to Russians speaking in their native language, while I read along with subtitles or translations. For those (few) who feel the same way, here is the Russian version of his speech, though unfortunately it is without subtitltes:

The entire transcript of his speech, and the subsequent Q&A, is available here, from the Kremlin’s website. You will not be able to do so without a VPN – try this one.

Doubtless, if you try to access it, you will be accused of being a Russian propagandist- all I can say is, you should get used to it. I’ve been doing this for years, and plenty of people think I have lost my damn mind – but the difference between them and me is, of course, that I have actually been to Russia, many times, and kind-of-sort-of-on-a-good-day speak some Russian.

Strength and Honour

When we met for the first time at the club’s meeting nearly 20 years ago, our country was entering a new stage in its development. Russia was emerging from an extremely difficult period of convalescence after the Soviet Union’s dissolution. We launched the process of building a new and what we saw as a more just world order energetically and with good will. It is a boon that our country can make a huge contribution because we have things to offer to our friends, partners and the world as a whole.

Regrettably, our interest in constructive interaction was misunderstood, was seen as obedience, as an agreement that the new world order would be created by those who declared themselves the winners in the Cold War. It was seen as an admission that Russia was ready to follow in others’ wake and not to be guided by our own national interests but by somebody else’s interests.

Over these years, we warned more than once that this approach would not only lead to a dead-end but that it was fraught with the increasing threat of a military conflict. But nobody listened to us or wanted to listen to us. The arrogance of our so-called partners in the West went through the roof. This is the only way I can put it.

— Vladimir Putin, Valdai, Oct 5, 2023

Keep in mind, this video is nearly 4 hours long – and the man sitting in the big chair is very nearly 71. Yet, he speaks extemporaneously, without having prescreened the questions or the reporters in front of him.

Can you imagine the Fake President doing the same thing? Merely to ask the question is to laugh.

Nor is any other Western leader capable of doing the same thing – with the sole exception, these days, of Viktor Orban, the longtime Prime Minister of Hungary, and one of the VERY few Western leaders of any prominence who has his head screwed on right.

Go down the list of unworthies – Nipple-Height Rishi Sunak, Justine “Castro’s Bastard” Truvada, DD Melons in Italy, Salty Liverwurst Scholz in Germany, Fagboy Macaroni in France, etc. – and you will just see a list of incompetents, morons, malcontents, and fools.

You can say a lot of negative things about President Putin – plenty of people have. Most of them are patently false. But one thing you cannot accuse him of, is weakness. This man is far from weak.

The overriding impression I get of the President of Russia, at this moment in time, is of a man supremely confident in his position. He appears completely at ease with himself and his role as President of the world’s largest country. Even though his nation is at war, he seems unfussed about that fact – and indeed, he is confident of victory.

And why should he be otherwise? Russia is WINNING the war against the West, currently being fought in Ukraine under the guise of a “Special Military Operation”.

The Fair World Order

Everyone realises that in an international system where arbitrariness reigns, where all decision-making is up to those who think they are exceptional, sinless and right, any country can be attacked simply because it is disliked by a hegemon, who has lost any sense of proportion – and I would add, any sense of reality.

Unfortunately, we have to admit that our counterparties in the West have lost their sense of reality and have crossed every line. They really should not have done this.

The Ukraine crisis is not a territorial conflict, and I want to make that clear. Russia is the world’s largest country in terms of land area, and we have no interest in conquering additional territory. We still have much to do to properly develop Siberia, Eastern Siberia, and the Russian Far East. This is not a territorial conflict and not an attempt to establish regional geopolitical balance. The issue is much broader and more fundamental and is about the principles underlying the new international order.

Lasting peace will only be possible when everyone feels safe and secure, understands that their opinions are respected, and that there is a balance in the world where no one can unilaterally force or compel others to live or behave as a hegemon pleases even when it contradicts the sovereignty, genuine interests, traditions, or customs of peoples and countries. In such an arrangement, the very concept of sovereignty is simply denied and, sorry, is thrown in the garbage.

— Vladimir Putin, Valdai, Oct 5, 2023

The world order which Putin and other leaders of what we still call the “Global South”, is one of negotiation, dialogue, and trade. That may well be overly idealistic. Yet that is precisely the kind of world the West was supposed to create after WWII.

It failed, utterly and totally – especially in the wake of the supposed “victory” over the USSR at the end of the Cold War. As I have stated many times by now – and I have had to revise my own opinion on this subject repeatedly – the West did not “win” the Cold War. That conflict ended with a negotiated settlement between the West and the USSR – and, in fact, it ended years before the final collapse of the Soviet Union.

The actual end of the Cold War occurred when Mikhail Gorbachyov gave a speech at the UN on December 7, 1988, in which he announced dramatic cuts to Soviet military presences in Europe and the de facto dissolution of the Warsaw Pact.

Ever since that time, the West has fooled itself into thinking it “won” the battle for historical narratives. It has embarked down a path of economic exploitation of the rest of the world, along with an insistence on so-called “neo-liberal values” that the rest of us violently reject.

These “values” supposedly support a Western vision of a “rules-based international order”. Yet, as President Putin and many others have pointed out repeatedly, no one seems to be able to explain exactly what these rules are. When confronted and forced to do so, all the proponents of this “order” can utter are some vague mumblings about “freedom” and “democracy” and “the rule of law”.

Yet, the most flagrant violators and rule-breakers on the planet, of their own rules, are the Western nations. It is they, not the Russians or Chinese, who routinely break treaties and invade other countries on a whim. It is they who insist on ramming nonsense like gay “marriage”, mental illness in the form of 500 genders, and widespread acceptance of paedophilia, down everyone else’s throats.

Everyone else is sick and tired of this shit. But, until Russia started its SMO, there was no national power or bloc really capable of resisting Western madness.

All of that has changed, forever.

The future world order is one in which Russia will provide the resources and military backbone, while China will provide the manufacturing base and financial power. This is not a world the West will like, because it completely strips the Western nations of their ability to wield the power of the almighty dollar to browbeat other nations into submission.

The future belongs to a world of sovereign nations, each competing and cooperating in their own national interests. Despite what Westerners might think, this is the path to reduced conflict – because the various nations of the world will have to sort out their differences on their own, without having to deal with a superpower sending its expeditionary forces to pick one side over another, and turn the cities of one of them into a parking lot.

This is a world in which aircraft carriers are effectively obsolete, and their battlegroups are basically big juicy targets for hypersonic missiles. It is a world in which the FUSA can no longer pretend to be the world’s policeman, and where SWIFT is but one of several competing global financial messaging systems.

In other words – a world of competition and cooperation, which is how things probably should be.

The Return of the Civilisation-State

On a related note, the Neo-Tsar made a big deal about the fact that Russia is, effectively, its own civilisation, contained within the borders of by far the biggest country on Earth. It is very important for Westerners to understand this, because there is a terrible misconception among far too many of them when it comes to figuring out what countries like Russia, China, and India are all about.

What do you suppose keeps the Neo-Tsar awake at night?

He rules over the largest country on Earth. It is, by any reasonable definition, IMPOSSIBLE for one man to govern. It spans quite literally ELEVEN time zones. Fully 85% of its population lives west of the Ural Mountains – getting to the Far East is more difficult and expensive for Russians living in the West, than going to New Zealand. (FACT. Or at least, it was, before MUH SANKSHUNS!!!!!)

Therefore, the core concern on the Neo-Tsar’s mind is simply preserving that which he already has.

Unlike the stupid and crude Western caricatures of the man, he is NOT interested in constant “savage wars of peace” to “liberate” other nations. He is an emperor, ruling over the world’s largest empire, and he wants to keep it together.

Similarly, what do you suppose keeps the New Huangdi, President Xi Jinping of China, awake at night?

He rules over 1.4 BILLION people, in a country with far less arable land than is sufficient to maintain the food for such a populace. His country lacks water, oil, coal, and resources necessary to sustain an advanced civilisation.

So, President Xi’s primary concern is therefore the preservation of peace and prosperity among a vast populace that is ageing rapidly, and which will grow old before it grows rich.

How about India? What do you suppose keeps Narendra Modi up at night?

He presides over the world’s most populous country, with a huge surfeit of young people, all of them hungry and looking for jobs. His country is colourful, noisy, ridiculously overcrowded, severely underdeveloped, with awful sanitation, lousy public infrastructure, a sclerotic and stupid bureaucracy that actively hinders business and makes life very difficult, and serious corruption at every level.

Not only that, but thanks to the “wonders” of Hinduism and its innumerable sects, plus the baleful influence of the Fake Religion of Pieces, he has to face constant demands from this or that ethnic group for representation and equity.

Therefore, his primary concern is simply preserving the peace and stability of this nearly ungovernable collection of races and languages, smashed together in the messy agglomeration that is the one and only truly Hindu nation on Earth.

All of these concerns are practically alien to Westerners – or at least, to Western elites – who fail to understand any of this.

That is a big part of the reason why the West hates and fears Russia, China, and India – because it simply does not understand them. All of these countries are unique civilisation-states, which seek to engage others on the same basis.

The sooner the West understands and embraces the realities of nation-states, and the vital need for people to live with and be governed by those who are most like them, the better.

Conclusion – Not a Clash of Civilisations

The civilisational approach confronts these trends because it is based on the fundamental, long-term interests of states and peoples, interests that are dictated not by the current ideological situation, but by the entire historical experience and legacy of the past, on which the idea of a harmonious future rests.

If everyone were guided by this, there would be far fewer conflicts in the world, I believe, and the approaches to resolving them would become much more rational, because all civilisations would respect each other, as I said, and would not try to change anyone based on their own notions.

Friends, I read with interest the report prepared by the Valdai Club for today’s meeting. It says that everyone is currently striving to understand and imagine a vision of the future. This is natural and understandable, especially for intellectual circles. In an era of radical change, when the world we’re used to is crumbling, it is very important to understand where we are heading and where we want to be. And, of course, the future is being created now, not only before our eyes, but by our own hands.

Naturally, when such massive, extremely complex processes are underway, it is hard or even impossible to predict the result. Regardless of what we do, life will make adjustments. But, at any rate, we need to realise what we are striving for, what we want to achieve. In Russia, there is such an understanding.

— Vladimir Putin, Valdai, Oct 5, 2023

The speech the Neo-Tsar gave at Valdai touched on a great many concepts and ideas. The Q&A session he did afterward – at great length, without notes – was even more revealing. He had a lot to say about the sheer stupidity and lack of education among Western elites, as he should have. And he spoke in detail about the ways in which Russia will continue to develop itself, partner with what it considers to be friendly nations, and build toward a future of shared prosperity.

Is this going to be a perfect future? No. Not at all. There will always be conflict and war. There will always be inter-ethnic strife and disagreement. Even today, Russia has to deal with conflicts between its historic ally, Armenia, and its neighbour, Azerbaijan – an ally and close friend of Russia’s great historical geopolitical rival and enemy, Turkey. Great Power games have not disappeared – they never will.

But, when nations engage with each other for mutual self-interest, on the basis of equals, with a genuinely neutral third party to help things along… you would be surprised at what can happen.

That is precisely what we saw over the past year in the Middle East, for example. For the past 20 years, the FUSA engaged in endless damned fool Syracuse Expeditions to bring… well, no one quite knows what, beyond perhaps some ridiculous notions of “freedumb” and “dumbocracy” to a part of the world which still has not figured out that firing bullets into the air during weddings is likely to result in some very unpleasant consequences. Yet, the Chinese were able to sit down with mortal enemies – the Iranians and the Saudi Arabians, split by 1,400 years of sectarian conflict – and get them to shake hands and part on friendly terms.

That is a remarkable achievement – an astonishing one, in fact. It has led to peace breaking out throughout the Middle East, as once-mortal enemies put their differences aside and consolidate to confront real threats to their own existence. It has fundamentally shifted the political calculus of the entire region – Israel, which could once act with impunity against Iran, now must tread EXTREMELY carefully, lest it upset the newfound balance which aligns against it.

This is what can happen when nations work with each other in their own interests – rather than doing the bidding, at gunpoint, of a bloated, failing, corrupt, and increasingly broken hegemon.

The Russians showed us the way. The world will never be the same. We will speak in coming years of the world “Before Banderastan” and “After Banderastan” – and we will likely be far better off for it.