Can Swedish Russophobia have an explanation?

Why is Russophobia more widespread in Sweden than in the other Nordic countries?

Our ‘neutral’ Swedish country has not been neutral for a long time. Neutral Sweden is a beautiful concept that is held up for the Swedish people as a Saint Mary image, especially when they worry about NATO and nuclear weapons. Neutrality was very shaky even during World War II, but since Carl Bildt was given the leadership of the government and propaganda machine, the entire Swedish neutrality has died a painful death. But the Swedish people must not know this.

It can probably be impossible to get concrete evidence of Bildt’s role as propaganda minister. Much has changed in Sweden since Bildt’s time as prime minister, and the injury was aggravated when he became foreign minister and Fredrik Reinfeldt’s right hand in his center-right government some years later. That was when Sweden got its previously very good reputation—both politically and economically—thoroughly tarnished by the Julian Assange scandal. [1]

The Swedish government seems to have totally surrendered to Washington’s orders and accepts their guidance in matters of Assange’s fate and a pro-NATO policy. Center-right or social democratic government apparently makes no difference. Carl Bildt is out of the government, but his spirit still hovers over Swedish politics. The current Social Democratic government has openly stated that Assange is still in danger of being extradited to the U.S., although the UN deemed that:

“the UN Working Group on Arbitrary Detention (WGAD) announced its decision finding that the detention of Julian Assange is unlawful. The United Nations Working Group has ordered that he be released immediately and compensated by Sweden and the United Kingdom.” (February 2016)

At the same time as this scandal is going on, Swedish cooperation with NATO gets ever closer—and also more secret. We now have U.S. military bases on Swedish soil, probably with nuclear weapons, although Defense Minister Peter Hultqvist more or less denies this. “There is nothing in the agreement that compels us to accept this [nuclear weapons by NATO],” says Prime Minister Stefan Löfvén unconvincingly.

The unraveling of the thread that leads to the solution of the incredibly dangerous Swedish Russophobia begins by taking a close look at Carl Bildt and his close friendship with Karl Rove. Rove was Bush’s senior advisor and deputy chief of staff until August 2007, when he resigned from his post in George Bush’s administration.

Why is Russophobia dangerous for Sweden and for the world—if it cannot be stopped? It leads to a totally distorted picture of the political situation in the world today. Obviously it has its origins in Washington propaganda. NATO is, of course, like the obedient vassal, one of the main cogs in the wheel in this plot.

Here is where Karl Rove comes in. Rove is considered as George Bush’s ablest ‘spin doctor’. Karl Rove believes that propaganda is the very foundation of politics. World politics has definitely, especially since 9/11, been centered on propaganda. Washington leads the propaganda chorus, NATO chimes in and all the EU countries, as long as it suits them—Frau Merkel leads the European Choir. Mass murder becomes the specialty of the day and destruction of sovereign countries becomes a banality.

So what about all these submarines that have appeared in the Baltic Sea? On closer examination, they have proven to be quite different from Russian submarines about to violate Sweden’s national borders. We are now talking about Russia, not the Soviet Union. I do not see why an embarrassing situation in 1981, when a Soviet boat of some kind ran aground in the Blekinge Archipelago, should have any relevance today since the Soviet Union dissolved in 1991.

As for the submarine hysteria in October 2014, it was declared finally that there was no Russian submarine.[2] Period. Incidentally, it is useful to realize that “All submarines are allowed to operate in the Baltic Sea”.[3] What more can we add as a comment to the submarine hysteria? However, the Swedish press carried boldfaced headlines about war with Russia before the Swedish people regained part of their reason.

I have heard from my most leftist friend in Sweden that Russia has no great importance. Of course, Russia is enormously important. It is thanks to Putin’s quiet dignity and factual presentation of the explosive political situation today that we can have any hope at all that the world might be able to survive this monumental crisis.

But perhaps above all other arguments is the fact that the world needs an equilibrium, a fact that Washington totally ignores. It cannot survive with one unilateral superpower. Russia is clearly the other superpower and Washington no longer has a choice. U.S. leaders are trying by all means to strangle Russia economically, challenge Russia to go bankrupt by spending huge sums on an army that they no longer need.[4] Modern wars are fought not with armies, but with far more sophisticated means. Russia has a superb modern air force and nuclear weapons that have been deemed superior to the U.S. weapons.[5]

The nationalist and patriotic populist groups that have emerged throughout Europe and also in the U.S. make for less freedom to exert their power for organizations like the EU and even the U.S.—a power that despite all the setbacks they still think they have. The United States seems to believe that they can still today run the world as they please, but their days of glory are already gone. The EU clearly thought the same until Brexit, or so I hope, made them realize that the time of their dictatorial way of running Europe is now over.

I have no particular love for the extreme populist parties that have emerged as a reaction to the huge miscalculations from those in power who in a most arrogant way rule as they please without the slightest regard for the people’s need for a feeling of being taken into account—having a right to education, health care, a free press and human rights. They are completely blind to the fact that such demands must be satisfied in order for society to function. But when it comes to opening the eyes of those in power, it is after all to the society’s benefit that the patriotic movements have now arisen in the most varied countries and for the most varied reasons, from the extreme right to the extreme left. Brexit can be seen as an intensified popular attack against the self-assured European Commission. The people have spoken.

The propaganda is non-stop. The United States feels the earth shake menacingly under the stately palaces of the ‘elite’. They try in their desperation to convince the world that Russia is the bigger danger for world peace, that the West is just defensive. Russian aggression, Russian expansionism, has been and is the constant theme of the propaganda chorus from the west. Washington wants at any price to get a war started in Europe, a war that will be taking place on European soil. When Europe is greatly harmed by this war, though not completely destroyed, the US will shine as the only civilized power in the world, which they already think they are. And Russia will of course be eliminated as a rival superpower. That is obviously the gospel of the megalomaniac neocon monsters.

Russia’s military is entirely defensive. Washington knows this very well, but it is something that they will never admit. Now it so happens, however, that the European countries are waking up from their century-old slumber and they are beginning to realize that this supposed threat from the east is a pure propaganda ploy.

The sanctions against Russia, which were installed on Washington’s orders have hurt Europe as much as Russia. Only the United States has escaped the damage from this economic chess move. Washington commands and Europe obeys. Or so they think. But now see what happens—the European countries have awakened and they realize that Washington is the worst liar the world has ever seen. When it comes to lies and propaganda Washington is in the lead.

The EU was created to become a handy instrument for the United States, but the European countries, one after another, are beginning to see clearly that they need to get their national freedom back. And they realize, in particular, that they have had enough of being held on a leash by Washington

Russia is not a threat to Europe, and Putin is doing everything possible to get Washington to accept diplomacy as the only way to something like peace.[6] But Washington does not want to listen.

The greatest danger for Washington is a possible peace.[7] With the Big Corporations leading the world today, Washington has long since capitulated to what President Eisenhower believed to be the greatest risk of non-stop war—’the military-industrial complex’.[8]

In other words, it seems to be very difficult to find a solution to the incredibly tense situation in the world today. Putin wants a diplomatic solution—Washington, however, is only interested in continued armed confrontation, whether total war or, more likely, continued armed threat to Russia with aggressive war games in countries neighboring on Russia. How long can Washington manage to go on convincing the world, and especially Europe, that Russia and Putin are the major threats today?

Notes

1. ”Prosecutor Marianne Ny is just embarrassing the Swedish legal system”

2. Russia: There was no submarine—”Not one of the journalists of the “epoch-making” press conference asked why Stockholm cannot specify which country the intruder is coming from. If it had been a Russian submarine [Supreme Commander Sverker] Göranson would clearly not have kept silent, the newspaper writes. ” . . .” Not one of the journalists of the “epoch-making” press conference asked why Stockholm cannot specify which country the intruder came from. ” . . .”—So it is thus one of our own—NATO. But to say that means recognizing that the Russians are not the culprits. Such a manly step, the Swedish military is obviously not able to take. ”

3. ‘All submarines are allowed to operate in the Baltic‘—The Baltic Sea is Russia’s most important trade route—and an obvious place for submarine activity.

4. US Think Tanks Dream Up Russian Collapse, Aggression Despite the Facts

5. A Russian Warning—The Club Orlov, Axis of Logic, Jun 4, 2016

6. NATO General Admits Russia Is Not A Threat To The Region

7. Peace, Not Russia, Is Real Threat to US Power, by Finian Cunningham

8. President Dwight D. Eisenhower used the term in his Farewell Address to the Nation on January 17, 1961

Siv O’Neall is an Axis of Logic columnist, based in France. Her insightful essays are republished and read worldwide. She can be reached at siv@axisoflogic.com.