SMO as a measure of things

Alexey Osin (Radio Sputnik): The main thing for us this year was the SMO.

Alexander Dugin: The Special Military Operation (SMO) is now the main topic, which is the central theme for us, for our people, for our State. The philosopher Protagoras said that “man is the measure of things”. For us now, the SMO is the measure of things. This ending year of 2024 saw a decisive turning point in the SMO sphere. Despite the invasion of the Ukrainian Nazis into the Kursk region, the seizure of Suja, and a number of other territories from which we have not yet (unfortunately) been able to squeeze them out, in general, this year there was a turning point in our favour in the SMO. Russia began to slowly, but confidently and irreversibly advance. This is movement towards the West. It is clearly visible, first and foremost in the Donetsk People Republic (DPR), where it is most visible and tangible. This is practically the completion of the liberation of the Lugansk People Republic (LPR), with only a couple of per cent of territory left. Our advancement is in the Kharkiv region.

This year it has become clear that no one can question Russia’s determination to complete the SMO with victory and the realisation of the goals that were initially set. And no proposals that are not based on the complete and unconditional surrender of the Kiev Nazi regime will be accepted by us. This is absolutely clear. The will of our leadership, of our people, of our society, of our army, of our entire power, of all that Russia represents as a State-Civilisation is unambiguous.

This year there have been fundamental, but maybe not too bright, although very important infrastructural successes in this direction. Ukraine has finally stopped advancing and is not even able to adequately resist us. We began to move slowly but surely towards our goal, towards Kiev, towards the complete liberation of Ukraine from the Nazi regime.

This difficult, bloody, hard for all of us, but, nevertheless, victorious year ended with just such a result - in our favour, we are gradually starting to win the SMO. And this is the main result, because it is by the SMO that we should judge everything else that is happening in and around our country.

Reasons for the breakthrough: Overcoming liberalism

Alexei Osin: Why did this fracture happen? In what area was it most significant?

Alexander Dugin: Any victory has something rational and something social, as well as economic, psychological, organisational, purely military, political dimensions, but there is always something spiritual in a victory. The year 2024 marked a major turning point in our society as a whole. Perhaps until that moment many people thought that the SMO was just something technical, some bug in the system, some local phenomenon. Our conflict with the West was conceived as something supposedly situational, and that we are about to end it, one way or another, and everything will go back to normal. And so the army, the society, the economy, the political elites, and our ordinary citizens lived in the usual peaceful rhythm. To our great regret, periods without wars, eras of peace have proven to be very difficult for our society. We often win the war, but just as often we lose the peace. We cannot use peace for its intended purpose. Hence the decay, the rampant corruption, which we have begun to fight seriously just in recent years, in recent times.

In 2024, a breakthrough took place at all these levels. Most importantly, it took place in our spirit, in the consciousness of our society. We have finally realised that this is a war, that it is serious, that it will not be resolved by itself, that everyone must take part in it. I see these changes in higher schools, among students, among young people, among officials, among top government officials, among businessmen, in general at all levels. People, our people, have understood, finally, after three years of war, that it is going on, and that it is serious, that it is not a situational failure, but that we have entered into a deadly conflict with the civilisation of the West as such. And that means we are not part of it. We are something special, a separate civilisation, in many ways the opposite of Western civilisation.

Hence the complete collapse of the liberal worldview within Russia itself. To be a liberal turned out to be simply criminal. Now we see it. For some liberalism was a delusion, for others - a conscious sabotage or even betrayal. This question will be clarified for years to come. We have to deal with each individual liberal - how he/she found himself/herself in the liberal camp, how liberalism got to the top of the political system, how it led to such catastrophic consequences. This is something we will still be dealing with, but in any case the fracture has happened in general. Overcoming liberalism is a decisive step towards Victory, towards the ideology of Victory, towards the Russian Idea.

Mobilisation of society

Alexander Dugin: Of course, a breakthrough has occurred in technology, in the economy, and in the work of the government. The appointment of Andrei Belousov as Minister of Defence was a long-awaited, necessary, and life-saving step. It was obvious that something was wrong with the army, but patriots were not allowed to criticise the army, and we do not criticise it, we only glorify and support it. But anyone, any citizen of the country who takes part in the SMO, people from the front and people from the rear understand perfectly well that these personnel reshuffles are more than personnel reshuffles. It's about getting on the salvation track of the SMO. This change of course and strict intolerance to any corrupt practices in the army has largely improved the situation in our armed forces as a whole.

Similarly, the economy is mobilising, gradually, not quickly, but it is happening. We are making a technical breakthrough. We have seen an example of this in the story of the ‘Oreshnik’ and its spectacular use. There is a general social and psychological mobilisation taking place.

I don’t think we have numerical superiority on the line of contact. This is classified information, but we probably don't have a large numerical superiority. And in modern warfare it's not just about manpower.

Nevertheless, volunteers are joining the army en masse, as the President Putin himself and other officials have recently said. We are not carrying out a full forced mobilisation, but there is a mobilisation of spirit, a mobilisation of volunteers. The flow of people ready to defend the Motherland in this difficult situation is growing.

I think we have now reached the tipping point this year, when the process of SMO will change significantly. A cumulative effect will be achieved.

It seems to me that 2025 will be a decisive year, because many factors in international politics predispose us to this.

In particular, the victory of Trump and trumpists (which is especially important!) in the US presidential election. This cannot but have an impact on Ukraine.

Our cause is Russian, i.e. the right

Alexei Osin: We have people going into the army. In Ukraine, they have to catch them. People are running away from the army there. Why?

Alexander Dugin: There are differences between the cause for which we are fighting and the cause for which the Ukrainian society is fighting. The territorial, political, economic, and manpower losses that the Ukrainian side is suffering now are the result of the activities of the Nazi regime that was strengthened in Kiev back in 2014. In fact, they are the architects of the tragedy that has befallen Ukraine. They created a false criminal ideology based on racism and russophobia. And the result was not long in coming. Immediately after coming to power, after the coup d’état on the Maidan in 2014, they lost Crimea, lost part of Novorossiya, several regions - DPR and LPR, at least. And the further they persisted in their own, the more they lost.

And this the citizens of Ukraine cannot help but notice. The authorities that are now waging war and relying on terrorist, russophobic and neo-Nazi ideology are themselves responsible and guilty for the tragedies and the territorial and personal losses that Ukraine is suffering. We were recently told by our responsible leaders that Ukrainians have already lost about a million or more than a million people. And if you take refugees into account, these are huge numbers.

And whose fault is that? The leaders of the Nazi junta say Russia. But Ukrainians are realising more and more that it can't be our fault alone, no matter what they are told. They believed earlier in this russophobic myth, but now it is crumbling before their eyes.

We are fighting for the right cause, we are fighting for our historical existence, for our identity, for our Civilisation-State. And Ukraine is a part of our common Civilisation- State. That’s how it was from the beginning. And it is not the first time for us to fight to free Ukraine from Western influence. This is repeated with a certain regularity in our history. When Russia weakens, over these border areas, over this frontier, an alternative, opposite to us geopolitical entity, the Western civilisation tries to establish power. When we come into force, we regain control over these border territories, which were once the cradle of our statehood. For us, these are the original Russian lands -- the Old Lands, not the “new territories”. We are reclaiming what is ours, not for ourselves, but for all of us together.

We are fighting against the chimera of Ukrainian nationalism, against the neo-Nazi criminal ideology, we are fighting for a just cause. We are fighting for Ukrainians too. We are not fighting against Ukrainians. We are fighting for them. For the Russians, for the Orthodox, for the Malorossians, for the people who are part of our united, triune nation -- the Great Russians, the Malorossians, the Belarusians. But they are fighting against us and against themselves.

More and more the criminal and destructive, suicidal goals of the Ukrainian and Kiev junta are becoming obvious to the Ukrainians themselves. That is why they are trying in every possible way to evade mobilisation.

In fact, a totalitarian regime has been established in Ukraine. And in Russia, everything is voluntary, everything is sensible, everything is conscious. And, by the way, the further we go, the more and more. The further we go, the more the rightness of our power, the rightness of our army, our society, our people in SMO begins to be realised by wider and wider layers of the population.

Our society has been de-ideologised in recent decades. But now it is again entering the era of ideologisation. But now the ideology is natural, organic, it is born from within human souls, from human hearts. This is the Russian Idea, which, by and large, drives our history. We are beginning to realise it better and better. And our people are realising more and more clearly that there are values higher than life. Any idea acquires content and meaning when people are ready to give their lives for it. There is no higher price to pay. And then the Idea, washed in blood, illuminated by the deeds of our people, it becomes attractive. Now it is beginning to take hold of our society. Patriotism, realisation of the importance of the sovereignty of the Motherland, faith and loyalty to the President, our Supreme Ruler, a return to our religious Orthodox Byzantine roots, to our main spiritual treasury of Russian Orthodoxy - all this is happening now and is reaching ever wider masses.

This affects, among other things, the fact that people voluntarily go to save the Motherland, to save the nation at the moment of severe trials.

I believe in my people

Alexei Osin: Until 1955, the Banderites could not be completely eradicated. For 10 years after the end of WWII 30.000 people died. Where is the optimism that in the fourth year of the war we will cope with them?

Alexander Dugin: First of all I believe in our people, I believe in our State, I believe in Russian history. This war is not an accident. Maybe it is the most important and the most sacred war of our history, which we are now waging with the West on the territory of Ukraine.

The West has reached the critical point of its degeneration, its degeneration. Today it is a purely satanic civilisation. It threw us, as the Ark of Salvation, as the Katehon, the Keeper the deadly challenge in Ukraine. They wanted to destroy us, to deprive us of our independence, identity, sovereignty. Their goal was to inflict a strategic defeat on Russia. They made no secret of it. And that is why this is a holy war for us. And the more we realise it, the more the national power awakens, the spirit of our people soars. I believe that in 2025 this awakening will reach its culmination.

The second argument. Ukrainian society is beginning to gradually wake up and realise that it is not about ‘bad Russians’, that we are in fact brothers, and only have to counteract the Nazi top brass and its russophobic terrorist ideology and practice. We are not fighting against them, but for them. Ukrainian society is gradually coming to its senses. Some are running, some are hiding, some are joining the Resistance. I think that 2025 will show us the beginning of real anti-Nazi guerrilla actions on the territory of Ukraine itself.

And the third factor is the fundamental changes in the world and especially in the United States. A non-globalist, even anti-globalist group has come to power there. This will give a completely different style of foreign policy, and we will soon encounter it. Of course, it is not a gift, nothing will be brought to us on a platter, no one will facilitate our Victory, but the new power in America will reconsider the attitude towards Ukraine. That’s for sure.

Until Kiev’s unconditional surrender

Alexei Osin: So far there are no preconditions for the end of the conflict. Presidential spokesman Dmitry Peskov said so.

Alexander Dugin: The conditions on the ground, which we have now, categorically do not suit anyone. We are still quite far away from our Victory, from the unconditional surrender of the enemy. And these are the starting conditions from which we can begin to talk about peace. The current Nazi leadership in Kiev has not abandoned its goals of taking Novorossiya from us, taking Crimea, and attacking Russia. So they are not ready to recognise even the status quo, which does not suit us. It doesn't suit them either. In the West, the globalist leadership, which is responsible for unleashing this military conflict, the purpose of which, as they frankly said, was to destroy Russia, to inflict a strategic defeat on us, is still living out its last weeks in the White House. This goal was not even close to being achieved. On the contrary, the war had the opposite effect. Russia woke up, Russia rose up, Russia realised itself, Russia came into force and once again felt its historical role in the global context. The results of the Western globalists have been achieved; on the contrary, something directly opposite has happened.

Accordingly, it is quite clear that no one will negotiate with the current American administration. There is neither faith nor trust in it. They are the criminals. Is it possible to negotiate with terrorists? Therefore, there are no preconditions for peaceful negotiations. And by the way, there won't be for a long time.

And it won’t be for a long time under Trump. It is not that very long, but still Trump needs to strengthen himself in the presidential chair, to deal with his enemies, to drain the Swamp, to revise the US foreign policy. He will never make America great by continuing to deal with the current elites. He’ll have to annex Canada, Greenland and the Panama Canal. And fight China, and help the Israeli far right.

Therefore, if we believe that this conflict can be resolved or suspended or frozen quickly, it is a mistake. It is an absolutely naive position and a false goal.

This, by the way, is what Ukrainian Nazi propagandists have been talking about lately. They are like a copycat voice: believe us, in a day there will be a ceasefire, Trump will tell Putin, and Putin will stop everything. This is complete nonsense, it won’t happen. Nobody can order Putin to do anything. We are actually fighting for the sovereignty, for the freedom and independence of our country.

Until complete victory, until the goals of the SMO are fully realised (which is, I remind you, the total denazification and demilitarisation of Ukraine), we will not be serious about peace talks. And we will try to postpone them further and further. Yes, we are leaving the door open, but only if our basic and main conditions are met.

And if we retreat even one step from our conditions on the need to abolish the Nazi regime (especially now it is illegitimate in Ukraine) and from the demand of unconditional surrender of Kiev, from the absence of any aspiration to join NATO, from the complete dismantling of the military machine and the criminalisation of the neo-Nazi russophobic ideology, we will betray ourselves, we will nullify all the sacrifices, suffering and exploits. There can be no negotiations until the moment of our complete Victory.

Diplomatically we smile, we say our doors are open, but we mean one thing: surrender and we will spare you. If you don’t surrender, we will not spare you.

Alexei Osin: So we initially put forward unacceptable conditions?

Alexander Dugin: Well, I wouldn’t say that. We put forward conditions that are simply fabulous for them. We are actually offering them something that they could not count on in any way. It is to stop the conflict, to recognise the right of the four regions and Crimea to be in Russia forever, plus never to join NATO. But they are not ready to accept that either. Moreover, we offered it before, now the conditions have changed. But even then they would not even discuss these paradisiacal conditions. We will really be ready for negotiations and we will be really involved in them only after Kiev’s unconditional surrender.

The main event of the outgoing year: The election of Trump

Alexey Osin: AI (precisely GROK) reports the following about the main events of 2024:

- Russia held a presidential election where Vladimir Putin won a fifth term.

- In the US, Donald Trump won the presidential election, becoming the first president since Grover Cleveland to be elected to an uncontested second term.

- In December 2024, Bashar al-Assad fled Syria, leading to the fall of the Baath regime.

- Continued Russian invasion of Ukraine, with a marked turn in the fighting in Russia's favour.

- Escalation of the conflict between Israel and Hamas, leading to Israel’s invasion of Lebanon.

- The significant deterioration of the situation in Gaza due to Israel’s war with Hamas, resulting in massive civilian casualties.

Most important of all, perhaps, is the election of Trump in America.

Alexander Dugin: Yes, that is exactly right. Here we need to understand from the very beginning that there are two obviously wrong positions concerning Trump’s victory.

The first absolutely wrong position is that nothing will change, that Trump will be forced to continue the same line that was before him and that has remained unchanged for the last 30 years, except for his own presidency of 2016-2020. It is a focus on promoting leftist globalism, the LGBT agenda, the woke ideology, the continued destruction of traditional values, and the promotion of a unified, international, transnational world order with a World Government, with global liberal elites at the helm, based on the ideology of liberalism and individualism. Trump openly rejects this line and no longer intends to continue it. This is very serious. The first time Trump came to the White House, the globalists thought it was just a ‘short circuit,’ some kind of technical glitch. But his deliberate and decisive election to a second term means that no, this is not a glitch. It is the clear and unambiguous will of the majority of the American people. It cannot be dismissed so simply.

That is why today, seriously and increasingly in America itself, there is talk of the end of woke culture, the end of liberalism and globalism. It is Trump’s ideological victory over the globalists that the majority of American society now recognises. Europe refuses to face the truth, it goes into unconsciousness, but American society recognises it. Trump and trumpism is a new ideology. And what it rejects is clear - it is left-wing liberalism and globalism. But what it affirms is less clear.

So -- to assume that everything will continue to be the same is completely wrong, and all predictions and analyses based on such a simplistic scheme -- “nothing changes, it will be business as usual, we’ll regret our hopes” -- are primitive and unrealistic.

But there’s a second unrealistic position, as if Trump is representative of a worldview similar to our own. It may be similar, in terms of denying woke, LGBT, liberalism, wanting to return to traditional values, but the fact is that their values are quite different. American traditional values have a very indirect and distant relationship to ours. Yes, Trump will change his ideology, change his geopolitical priorities, but American -- even traditional -- values, as he understands them, have nothing to do with ours. So to hope that things will get better immediately with Trump is just as naive, as wrong.

It is more correct to think that Trump will change his policy by 90 degrees in relation to Biden. Exactly 90, not 180. This, on the one hand, is very good, because 90 degrees for the better, but on the other hand, it’s pretty bad, because only 90, not 180. And, of course, it will not lead us to peace immediately. It is going to be very difficult to build relations with the new administration.

And nevertheless, you have to understand that there has been a real ideological revolution in America, that the ideology that dominated until the last moment, based on hyperindividualism, on dehumanisation, on gender politics, on woke, on cancel culture, on hatred of one’s own roots, has been discarded. The internationalist liberal globalism Trump and the trumpists are resolutely abandoning. This means that a post-liberal ideology has come to the White House and the United States, and more broadly to the West. And now many things, ideas, slogans, movements, positions that before were actually forbidden will now be allowed. In fact, what left liberals mercilessly branded their ideological opponents as ‘fascists’, as ‘extreme rightists’, is now signed by J. D. Vance, Elon Musk, Pete Hegseth, Tucker Carlson, Kash Patel, Vivek Ramaswamy, Robert Kennedy, Tulsi Gabbard, Mat Gatz, Steve Bannon, that is, in fact, the entire inner circle of trumpism. The anti-liberal, post-liberal right came to power in the US. They are now called it the ‘woke right’, the ‘vigilant right’, who will be as intolerant of the liberal left as liberal left was intolerant of themselves while they remained in opposition and marginalised.

It is impossible not to take this into account. And, of course, it will affect relations with Europe, with us, Russians, with China, with the Middle East. And not in the way we would like to see a multipolar world, with the West occupying its niche and other civilisations theirs. No, Western hegemony will continue. But this hegemony will acquire other features, other ideological forms, use other tools and other priorities. For Trump and trumpists, the main internal enemies are liberals and globalists - the criminal and rotten top of the Democrat Party, Soros and his networks, Bill Gates, et Fauci, who leaked bioweapons and poisoned half of humanity with their vaccines, woke ideologues and globalist media, etc.

The external enemies are primarily China, and secondarily the Islamic world and especially Iran. Trump’s support for Netanyahu will be unconditional. There will be stiff resistance to the Chinese economy, up to the point that, as the trumpists are now proclaiming, Chinese entrepreneurs will be deprived of almost all property in the United States, where they own half of the economy. Trump has absolutely grandiose horizons of reform, wars, competition and purges. For the Chinese, these prospects are very troubling, for the Iranians even more troubling. But we are somewhere third or fourth on that list. It’s not that Trump treats Russia well, he treats Russia rather indifferently. But here’s the important thing: we are not a priority target for him. We are neither friend nor foe for him. And especially not the main enemy, as for the globalists. That, I think, is very important.

It is also vital for us to take into account the new ideology of trumpism, which is represented not only by traditional American paleo-conservatives and nationalists like Steve Bannon (trad right), but also by what is called today the ‘tech right,’ that is, Silicon Valley iconic figures like Elon Musk or Peter Thiel, who represent the will for a technocratic leap, for accelerationism.

Trumpism is a rattling mixture of technological development combined with a defence of conservative values up to and including monarchy. In this environment, new extravagant ideological ensembles are emerging. If the globalists do not start a new World War before 20 January 2025, i.e. before Trump is inaugurated and takes office, and do not arrange some other catastrophe on a global scale, we will have to know a completely new America, with a new ideology. Which means there will be a whole new balance of power in the world, because something unpredictable will reign supreme at the other end in Washington.

Already today we can see how Elon Musk, the second man on the Trump’s team, supports the AfD party, the ‘Alternative for Germany’, which the left-wing liberals still in power in Europe simply consider ‘extreme right-wing’ and are trying to ban, despite the huge and ever-growing support of voters. Various conservative populist forces in Europe, with the support of the new regime in America, could come to power. This already has precedents, Orban, Fico, partly Meloni, or “Georgian Dream” for example. Of course, they are just sovereigntists, and even fairly moderate conservatives based on traditional values. But the leftist globalists in their uncompromising and extremist woke-strategy against them have been adamant, demanding to overturn, overthrow, ban, destroy, including through colour revolutions.

Trump is definitely the new wave. It has already won in America, which means it will affect Europe as well.

All this should be considered very carefully analysed.

I observe our (Russian) expert community - some are enthusiastic about Trump, others say that nothing will change there. Both are wrong. A lot of things will change, but not necessarily to our advantage. If we are strong enough, smart enough, accurate enough, deep enough, and determined enough, this could be a chance for us, as well as for humanity. But if we sit back and wait for the weather, then naturally the results could be most deplorable for us and for all those who lead like this. Trump is a chance, but it is also a challenge, and even in a certain sense a threat.

In any case, Russia needs to do actively. The Americans are giving us an example. They want to swiftly remove the entire corrupt globalist bureaucracy in the US. They are doing what, in principle, we should have done long ago. Putin is doing it too, but much more slowly, stretched out and carefully. But they want to immediately, instantly, sharply rotate the elites, putting their opponents in the electric chair as soon as they get to the White House. This is very serious.

The Oath to the Supreme Ruler of Russia

Alexei Osin: It would not hurt us to adopt this experience...

Alexander Dugin: That’s right. We talked about one more event of the passing year - the election of the President of the Russian Federation. I think we should not forget about it either. It was the most important event. Not the fact of the election itself, but the fact that now the election is gradually turning into something else - into a ritual of nationwide worship of the monarch, the supreme ruler - Putin. The elections have proved that he is unchangeable. After all, Putin is more than a President. Putin is more than an ordinary ruler of Russia. As everyone knows, in his time there was such a great Roman commander, leader, supreme ruler Gaius Julius Caesar. By his name they began to call rulers ‘Caesars’. So “Putin” became the highest function, status. It is not a personal name, but this is the generic name (function) of a providential leader who saves Russia.

The one who is the national leader who saves the country, who asserts its sovereignty in a critical situation, is “Putin”.

This is a very subtle point. Putin is not just an elected temporary head of State, but a supreme historical ruler who has such a volume of popular support that he has eternity. At least all that time that is within a human lifetime. The maximum amount of power possible. It's not him we have, it’s us he has. So in this special year, in the midst of the SMO, our nation simply swore an oath to a supreme leader.

In fact, voting for Putin in 2024, it was a nationwide oath to our ruler. The people swore an oath to him and said: Rule us always; rule the same, rule better; do the same, do more; and don’t worry about political intrigue, about keeping power; you have all the power; you are free; focus on the interests of our people, our State; don't worry about anything else; you can do everything for the good of our country; nothing threatens you - not this stupid four-year cycle, because it’s just some symbolic procedure. We chose Putin once and for all, and we will not deviate from our decision.

But this is a peculiarity of our historical tradition. Unlike the Americans’ choice of Trump, which changed the course of American history for sure, and maybe even the world history. That’s where elections really matter. For now, at least. Though it may be that they too will pick the ruler they want to keep in power as long as possible. So trumpist Curtis Yarvin has already raised the issue of establishing a monarchy in the US. They are clearly learning.

Putinism and Katehon

Alexei Osin: The problem, however, is that in Russian history after a great leader often comes something directly opposite.

Alexander Dugin: This is true, this is the biggest risk. Now the deadline for solving this problem has already come. The red light is already on, it is an alarm signal. There is only one way out - it is necessary to turn the line of our President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin into an ideology, that is, to create a certain stable ideological construction that would embody his precepts, his strategy, his principles, his ideas, his beliefs. We need an ideology. At least as a symbol of faith for political elites, but it would be worth extending it to the masses as well. Although the word is often used in a negative or ironic way, we need to move from Putin to putinism. This is necessary precisely to hedge the risks associated with one man. Putin is more than a man; he is a country, he is a vector of development. We must try to transform his core, the essence of his patriotic reforms into an ideology. This is the challenge that faces our society, our intellectual elite first of all, but also the political elite.

We need an ideology that will ensure the continuity of not persons, not dynasties, but the spirit, mission, strategy, and goal. So that the next rulers would look at Putin and his ideas as a model and would be afraid to deviate from this line on strengthening sovereignty, on defending traditional values - the Civilization-State - as the supreme and main mission of their rule. They, whoever they are, should be like Putin, serving the people, history, and the State and following the Orthodox Christian tradition. They should fulfil the function of the Katehon, which is higher than any human being.

Georgia’s pro-Georgian dream

Alexei Osin: Maybe some post-Soviet states are starting Russiocentric processes. Are they following us in some way?

Alexander Dugin: Pay attention, not so much pro-Russian forces won in Georgia, but pro-Georgian ones. Both Bedzina Ivanishvili, the recently sworn-in new president Mikhail Kavelashvili, after the disgraceful flight of the globalist puppet Solomea Zurabishvili, who represented the failed Biden administration in Georgia, and the Georgian Dream party as a whole can become a friendly or at least neutral force towards Russia, and at least they are sovereignty-oriented like us. Besides, our traditional values are very close, both we and they are Orthodox countries, Orthodox peoples. But to come to this position, it is not necessary to imitate us or be inspired by our example. I don’t see any contradiction between the Georgian Dream and Trump. After all, for Trump such a conservative Georgia is quite acceptable and even desirable. It is not an alternative to the West. It is an alternative for globalists, but not for Trump. That is why now the most concerned about Georgia are both the outgoing US globalist administration and European globalists, who are still in the old days, still living in that liberal LGBT/woke phase, which in America itself is already overcoming.

I believe that figures like Ivanishvili, Kavelashvili, or Orban and Fico in Europe are the future. They are not pro-Russian leaders, they are leaders of the future world, including the European one.

Yes, Putin is not an enemy to them. He represents a sovereign country. As realists they will treat us based on their national interests. If it is or is not profitable for them to build, do, sell, buy, agree on something, they will do the same with us, with the West, and with the East. It is important to serve themselves, their own people and not the sect of globalist perverts from Washington or Brussels.

What is happening in Georgia is also happening in Hungary and Slovakia, but it is also happening in the United States.

Now the Georgian Dream is winning over the anti-Georgian, russophobic, neo-Nazi mob that tried to overthrow it during the colour revolution. And it does it not in the interests of Russia, but in the interests of Georgia. This way Georgia will be preserved and strengthen its positions. Georgia will preserve its traditional values, and these are the demands of the Georgian people. The Georgian people voted for the Georgian Dream, just as the Hungarian people did for Orban and the Slovak people did for Fico. Other peoples and societies in Europe or the post-Soviet space, alas, have fallen under the corrosive hypnosis of the outgoing liberal elites.

In my opinion, this is the goal we have in common with Trump - together with the new administration, with trumpists, to close the page of history of such characters as George Soros and his criminal son, to end the era of colour revolutions, to end globalist interference in the internal affairs of sovereign countries. We must move to realism, clearly understanding what is to our advantage and what is not. And this should be the main task of any State, and on this basis we should build a policy with both near and far, with our Georgians, who are close in faith, or not close, neither in faith nor in history, by the way, with Hungarians or with Americans, with whom we have geopolitical antagonism, but this antagonism can be solved more or less by universal agreement. It is not easy, but it is possible. If only because of the fact that they and we are oriented towards traditional values.

The fire of the big war in the Middle East

Alexander Dugin: Artificial Intelligence talked more about the sad events in the Middle East. This is also a crucial escalation zone. There is a tense clash of antagonistic forces there. Not only in Gaza, not only in Lebanon, not only in Yemen, not only in Syria itself, but basically the whole region is about to be engulfed in the flames of a major war. Avoiding this is very difficult.

The Zionist authorities are determined to build a Greater Israel ‘from sea to sea’. Hence the invasion of the Golan Heights and Lebanon, and the genocide of Gaza. Israeli conservatives are determined and radical in their intentions. They have already shown how much. From now on, especially with the support of Trump’s pro-Israel group, they can go further. And that’s the challenge. There are really very serious events unfolding in the Middle East right now. You have to keep an eye on the Middle East. Things are changing there.

And of course the fall of Bashar al-Assad’s regime is a blow to us. I think that the globalists deliberately timed the operation in Syria, involved the Turks and other forces, Qatar, for example, as well as other Islamic States, in order to supposedly ‘demonstrate our weakness’. It is not our weakness, they did not achieve their goal. But still, the fall of a regime friendly to us, in which we had a real investment, cannot be called either an “indifferent” or a “good” event. It is a sad event for us, a sad result of the passing year.

In the new year of 2025, I think the situation there will become even more acute. This is not the last, alas, sadness that the Middle East will bring us in the near future. I do not rule out the beginning of a war between Israel and Iran.

Alexei Osin: How will they fight, they do not border?

Alexander Dugin: Through Syria, through Iraq, through missile strikes. Israel and Iran have already exchanged missile strikes. I do not rule out the involvement of the American armed forces in this campaign. Strikes could be launched against Iran’s nuclear facilities. There could be a direct intervention in Yemen, because the Yemeni Houthis are tough against Israel, brave and well armed.

The region as a whole is very tense between Sunnis and Shiites. Many factors could be triggers for a major war. But, of course, the main factor is the Greater Israel. In 2025 it may happen that the right-wing Zionist forces in the Israeli government, Bezalel Smotrich, Ben Gvir and other ministers from Natanyahu’s entourage will get their way and blow up the Al-Aqsa Mosque in order to start building the Third Temple. They have threatened the Arabs with this many times before, and in fact, the Hamas terrorist operation in October 2023 was largely provoked by this. And it was called ‘Al-Aqsa Flood.’

Accordingly, a variety of conflicts will escalate in the Middle East. One should study the map of the Middle East diligently. Most likely, more than one country and more than one territory will be engulfed in a great war.

And Turkey, which is now celebrating its supposed success in Syria, I think could also suffer in the course of this. I mean, the overthrow of Assad was a trap for Erdogan. The Middle East is a world of traps.

But let us hope in God and His Providence.

Translated from the Russian by his interview on Radio Sputnik

His Highness Prince Mohammed bin Salman, Crown Prince of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia,

Your Excellencies,

Majesties and Highnesses,

I will not talk about the historical and established rights of the Palestinians and the inevitability of adhering to them, or about the steadfastness of the Lebanese and Palestinian peoples and our urgent and immediate duty to support them, nor about the legitimacy of the resistance in both countries, and what it embodied in terms of honor, dignity and progress, and what it presented in terms of icons with its honorable leaders and brave fighters. I will not talk about the Nazism of the Zionist occupiers, their crimes and their artificial entity, nor about the West’s transformation from a supporter of this entity and its crimes since its inception to a direct and declared partner in them, as this will not add anything to what the majority of Arabs and Muslims know and what many others in the world know today.

As for our summit, a year ago we met and expressed our views, condemned and denounced, and for a year now the crimes have been ongoing. Are we meeting today to replicate the past and its events, or to change the course of the coming future and its prospects? Last year we stressed the cessation of aggression and the protection of the Palestinians, and the result of the year was tens of thousands of martyrs and millions of displaced persons in Palestine and Lebanon. In 2002, the Arabs put forward a peace initiative, but the response was more massacres against the Palestinians.

In 1991, we decided as Arabs to enter the American game of goodwill by participating in the peace process in Madrid. Our peace was an incentive for their wars and a legalization for their settlement. This does not indicate a mistake in our orientations, but rather a deficiency in preparing the tools. Our tool is language and their tool is killing. We say and they do. We offer peace and we reap blood!

The remainder of the same results requires keeping the same tools used, but changing those results, which is what we all seek, requires replacing the existing methods and mechanisms that have been tried repeatedly and are repeatedly ineffective. If we agree on the principles proposed, how do we transform them into application on ground?

To define its goals and the results we seek, to define the tools available to achieve it, to define the target group that will transform it from intentions to actions, from a plan to an achievement, and from a statement to reality. The goals may seem elementary to any of us when mentioning the rights that are being violated for the Palestinian people, but what is the value of these rights as a whole when the Palestinians do not possess their basis, which is the right to life? What is the value of any right given anywhere in the world in any field, to the dead?

This means that while it is important to work to restore all legitimate rights, the priority now is to stop the massacres, to stop the genocide, to stop the ethnic cleansing. As for the tools, I believe that we have them, as a community, both popularly and officially, Arabs and Muslims, countries and peoples. What we need is the decision to use them if the entity refuses to respond to what was stated in our statement and agreed upon, which is expected, and to determine our options then... Do we get "angry" again? Do we condemn? Do we appeal to the international community? Or boycott? Is this the least we can do, or what? What is our executive plan?

Without that, we encourage the continuation of the genocide and become indirect partners in it. We are not dealing with a State in the legal sense, but rather with a colonial entity outside the law. We are not dealing with a people in the civilized sense, but rather with herds of settlers who are closer to barbarism than to humanity!

It is also incorrect to say that the problem lies in the current extremist government that has "lost its mind" and a people terrified by what happened on October 7th of last year. They all work with one ideological mind, a mind sick with bloodshed, sick with the illusion of superiority, afflicted with a split personality between hating Nazism on the surface and loving it as an organic part of it in reality!

Those are the targets of our meeting today and those are the problems. The problem determines the means, and the means are the basis of success. Here lies the essence of our meeting today, which I hope will be successful, and that we will succeed in making the right decisions, so that we are not like those who speak to the thief in the language of the law, to the criminal in the language of morality, and to the butcher in the language of humanity, and so that good intentions will not once again be a starting point and incentive for more death against the Palestinian and Lebanese peoples who have paid the price of good intentions and absent mechanisms over the decades.

Peace be upon you!

When were you in Gaza?

End of April for the first couple of weeks of May.

So of all of the disaster zones you’ve seen, how does Gaza compare?

All of the disasters I’ve seen, combined – 40 mission trips, 30 years, Ground Zero, earthquakes, all of that combined – doesn’t equal the level of carnage that I saw against civilians in just my first week in Gaza.

And when you say civilians, is it mostly children?

Almost exclusively children. I’ve never seen that before. I’ve seen more incinerated children than I’ve ever seen in my entire life, combined. I’ve seen more shredded children in just the first week…missing body parts, being crushed by buildings, the greatest majority, or bomb explosions, the next greatest majority. We’ve taken shrapnel as big as my thumb out of eight-year-olds. And then there’s sniper bullets. I have children that were shot twice.

Wait you’re saying that children in Gaza are being shot by snipers?

Definitively, I have two children that I have photographs of that were shot so perfectly in the chest I couldn’t put my stethoscope over their heart more accurately, and directly on the side of the head in the same child. No toddler gets shot twice by mistake by the world’s best sniper. And they’re dead-centre shots.

Δημοκρατία χωρίς ανεξάρτητη δικαιοσύνη δεν νοείται.

Αυτό υπαγορεύεται, άλλωστε, από τη συνταγματικά κατοχυρωμένη, δικαιοκρατική αρχή της διάκρισης των εξουσιών.

Στο άρθρο 26 του ελληνικού Συντάγματος, το οποίο έχει γίνει προ πολλού κουρελού, προβλέπεται ότι:

1. H νομοθετική λειτουργία ασκείται από τη Bουλή και τον Πρόεδρο της Δημοκρατίας.

2. H εκτελεστική λειτουργία ασκείται από τον Πρόεδρο της Δημοκρατίας και την Kυβέρνηση.

3. H δικαστική λειτουργία ασκείται από τα δικαστήρια· οι αποφάσεις τους εκτελούνται στο όνομα του Eλληνικού Λαού.

Δυστυχώς, κατά τον τρόπο που (δεν) απονέμεται η δικαιοσύνη στην Ελλάδα, η οποία, με κάποιες λαμπρές εξαιρέσεις άξιων δικαστών και εισαγγελέων, λειτουργεί ως πλοκάμι της εξουσίας και εκδίδει αποφάσεις υποστηρικτικές της εκάστοτε κυβέρνησης, επαληθεύεται καθημερινά το απόφθεγμα του Ασημάκη Πανσέληνου:

«Η ανεξαρτησία της δικαστικής εξουσίας στην Ελλάδα ανοιγοκλείνει σα φυσαρμόνικα που την παίζει η Διοίκηση».

Ανέκαθεν οι παραδουλεύτρες της πολιτικής, δηλ. οι δημοσιογράφοι, προσπαθούσαν να μας φοβίζουν, χρησιμοποιώντας το «κύμα» ως λέξη κλειδί που είναι στενά συνυφασμένη με το αίσθημα του φόβου:

Κάθε λουόμενος, και ιδιαιτέρως τα παιδιά, φοβούνται τα κύματα. Όχι μόνο τα μεγάλα, αλλά και τα μικρά, αφού αυτά μπορεί ανά πάσα στιγμή να τα διαδεχθεί ένα μεγάλο κύμα. Ως εκ τούτου, το «κύμα» αποτελεί έναν τρομο-εκλυτικό κωδικό που παραλύει την σκέψη του βρεφοποιημένου πολίτη!

Είναι, κατά τούτο, προφανές για ποιον λόγο οι «ειδικοί» στη διαχείριση της πανδημίας του κορωνοϊού αρέσκονταν να κρούουν τον κώδωνα του κινδύνου, προαναγγέλλοντας την έλευση του εκάστοτε επόμενου κύματος (αν και μετά το «3ο κύμα», άρχισαν κι οι ίδιοι να χάνουν το λογαριασμό).

Η ίδια εκφοβιστική λογική υπαγορεύει και τη χρήση άλλων λέξεων, όπως: «Τσουνάμι», «μάστιγα», «κοκτέιλ».

Είναι πια η ώρα να συνειδητοποιήσουμε τα τεχνάσματα που εφαρμόζουν οι δαιμόνιοι βρεφοποιητές μας και να δραπετεύσουμε από τα κάγκελα της νηπιακής κούνιας μας.

Ενεργός πολίτης που κρατά στα χέρια του τα ηνία του βίου του και της πατρίδας του σημαίνει: Συνειδητοποιημένος, ελεύθερος και υπεύθυνος πολίτης, όχι παλίμπαις (kidult)!

Ας βάλουμε ένα τέλος στην εξευτελιστική βρεφοποίησή μας!

Όχι, άλλοι μπαμπούλες! Όχι, άλλος τρόμος!

The main issue in 2024 remains the same fundamental problem as before: The confrontation between two waves — the waning wave of a unipolar world order with US hegemony and the collective West, and the rising wave of a multipolar world, embodied in BRICS-10.

This problem did not arise now, but as the West, having gained at one historical moment the appearance of sole planetary domination (after the collapse of the USSR), proved incapable of implementing its leadership in practice, new sovereign poles began to assert themselves — Russia and China. Other poles are on the approach — India, the Islamic civilisation, Africa, and Latin America. In total, seven power centres, including the West. Six of them have united in BRICS, beginning to build a multipolar order.

The West continues to cling to its hegemony and attacks the most dangerous opponents to its domination — Russia, China, and the Islamic world. This did not start today but at the very beginning of the 2000s. But the current contrast of the political world map was finally acquired in recent years — especially after the beginning of the Special Military Operation in Ukraine. The operation became the first hot war of the multipolar world against the unipolar one. Until then — especially during President Trump’s first term and due to the rise of populism in Europe — it seemed that a direct clash could be avoided, that the West would peacefully accept multipolarity, trying to fight for a worthy place in the post-globalist world order. This is what Trump meant by calling to drain the globalist swamp in the US itself. But so far, the swamp managed to drain Trump himself and, during the most swampy administration under President Biden, to unleash a bloody conflict in Ukraine, throwing all the forces of the collective West against Russia, the most important pole of the multipolar world.

The main result of 2023 was Russia’s disruption of the Ukrainian counteroffensive, which for the globalists was a decisive moment in the conflict. They supplied Ukraine with comprehensive assistance, including extensive weaponry, significant financial aid, and substantial political, informational, and diplomatic resources. However, when Russia successfully resisted these efforts and started preparing for its own offensive, it became apparent that the extensive support given to the Kiev regime was ultimately futile. However, as long as globalists are in power in the US, they intend to continue the war. And, apparently, not just to the last Ukrainian but to the last globalist.

At the end of 2023, however, a second front opened in the war between the unipolar and multipolar worlds. This time, the West’s vanguard in the Middle East, the State of Israel, in response to the invasion by Hamas, began a systematic genocide of the Gaza population, completely disregarding anything. The USA and the collective West fully supported Tel Aviv’s actions, thus drawing a new line of fracture — the West against the Islamic civilization.

American neoconservatives had already entered this cycle in the early 2000s, resulting in the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq, and then supporting radical Islamists in Libya, Syria, and so on. Now, the West has again confronted the Islamic world, led by the Palestinians, Yemeni Houthis, Lebanese Hezbollah, and also Iran.

Furthermore, in West Africa, another platform for the anti-colonial struggle against unipolarity and for multipolarity, an alliance of the most resolute countries has emerged — Mali, Burkina Faso, the Central African Republic, Gabon, and Niger, where a series of anti-globalist coups took place. So here, too, a new front has emerged.

Ultimately, Venezuela, led by Nicolas Maduro — whom the USA attempted to replace with their puppet, Guaido, in a move that ended in complete failure — became embroiled in a territorial dispute over the contested Guyana-Essequibo region with British Guyana, which is perceived as a pro-Atlantic puppet state. And the President of Argentina, Javier Milei, although he refused to integrate into BRICS, called on England to reconsider the issue of the Malvinas (Falklands). Thus, another front of struggle is emerging in Latin America.

So we approached the new year, 2024. And here all the trends continued at an accelerated pace. Tension for the USA in the Middle East is growing by the day. The war in Ukraine will undoubtedly continue, and now the initiative is on Russia’s side.

Also, one should expect an exacerbation of the conflict around Taiwan, where the US has pushed through the anti-Chinese candidate Lai Qingde in the elections, further escalation in the Middle East, continuation of anti-colonial revolutions in Africa, and escalation into a hot phase of contradictions in Latin America.

In the West itself, the crisis is intensifying at an accelerated pace. In the USA, there are elections this year, in which the globalists will face a powerful wave of Republicans.

The European Union is in decline, and there again rises an anti-elite, anti-liberal wave of populists — from the left and the right. There are leftists, like Sahra Wagenknecht and her new party. ‘Red Sahra’ is becoming a symbol of anti-liberal left-wing Europe.

Such leftists are primarily enemies of global capital — unlike pseudo-leftists, bought outright by Soros, who primarily advocate LGBT, Ukrainian Nazism, the genocide in Gaza, and uncontrolled migration, and also desperately fight against Russian influence, Putin, and Russia as a whole.

There is also a right-wing component — significantly battered, but in many European countries it represents the second most important political force. For example, Marine Le Pen in France. In Germany, the Alternative for Germany (AfD) is gaining strength. In Italy, despite the liberal weakness of Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, the right half of society has not disappeared. The entire right-wing populism remains as it was.

But there is the globalist West, which tries to present itself as the entire ‘West’, and there are right and left anti-globalists, as well as a huge layer of Western commoners, who make up the ‘silent majority’. This is most important: the European commoner generally does not understand anything about politics. Ordinary Europeans and Americans simply cannot keep up with the demands to change gender, forcibly castrate their little sons, marry goats, bring in and feed even more migrants, eat cockroaches, read prayers to Greta Thunberg at night, and curse the Russians. The Western commoner, the petit bourgeois, is the main support of the multipolar world. He is the core of the real West, not the sinister parody into which it has been transformed by the globalist liberal elites.

It is very possible that in 2024, all these lines of fracture — wars and revolutions, conflicts and uprisings, waves of terrorist attacks, and new territories of genocide — will escalate into something massive. The declining wave of the unipolar world is already giving way to the rising multipolar one. And this is inevitable.

The dragon of globalism is mortally wounded. But it is known how dangerous the agony of a wounded dragon is. The global elite of the West is insane. There are many reasons to believe that in 2024 there will be something terrible. We are at arm’s length from a world war. On all fronts. If it cannot be avoided, then there is nothing left but to win it.

We must slay the dragon to free humanity from its villainous enchantments, and even the West itself, which is its first victim.

Translated and annotated by Constantin von Hoffmeister

Authors

• Akis Siamantziouras

• Cornelius Castoriadis

• George Contogiorgis

• John Ioannidis

• Konstantinos Vathiotis

• Urfurshlag

Issues

• Abstention

• Direct Democracy

• Parliamentary Republic

Your Holiness, friends,

I would like to welcome all the participants in the World Russian People’s Council.

The Council was established in 1993. We remember that time as a very difficult turning point for the country. The Council managed to unite around a common set of goals representatives of the Russian Orthodox Church and other religious organisations, political parties and movements, cultural workers, scholars and scientists, entrepreneurs and people of different beliefs, views and ethnicities who were nonetheless united in one important respect, in their firmly rooted patriotism.

First of all, I want to thank you for your support and contribution to strengthening the Russian state, civil peace and accord, and consolidating society, and for the help you always offer to your compatriots and everybody who is part of the big Russian world.

I know that many representatives of the World Russian People’s Council are currently in Donbass and Novorossiya as volunteers and members of military units, protecting our brothers and sisters, millions of people in the Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics, the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions, alongside their brothers-in-arms. I sincerely value the help that the World Russian People’s Council provides to the front and the families of our fallen heroes. They fought for us and for our Motherland. They will rest in peace and remain in our memory for eternity. Let us observe a moment of silence.

Friends,

Our fight for sovereignty and justice is, without exaggeration, one of national liberation, because we are upholding the security and well-being of our people, and our supreme historical right to be Russia – a strong independent power, a civilization state. It is our country, it is the Russian world that has blocked the way of those who aspired to world domination and exceptionalism, as it has happened many times in history.

We are now fighting not just for Russia's freedom but for the freedom of the whole world. We can frankly say that the dictatorship of one hegemon is becoming decrepit. We see it, and everyone sees it now. It is getting out of control and is simply dangerous for others. This is now clear to the global majority. But again, it is our country that is now at the forefront of building a fairer world order. And I would like to stress this: without a sovereign and strong Russia, no lasting and stable international system is possible.

We know the threat we are opposing. Russophobia and other forms of racism and neo-Nazism have almost become the official ideology of Western ruling elites. They are directed not only against ethnic Russians, but against all groups living in Russia: Tatars, Chechens, Avars, Tuvinians, Bashkirs, Buryats, Yakuts, Ossetians, Jews, Ingush, Mari and Altai. There are many of us, I might not be able to name every group now, but again, the threat is directed against all the peoples of Russia.

The West has no need for such a large and multi-ethnic country as Russia as a matter of principle. Our diversity and unity of cultures, traditions, languages, and ethnicities simply do not fit into the logic of Western racists and colonisers, into their cruel plans for total depersonalisation, separation, suppression, and exploitation. That is why they have started their old rant again: they say that Russia is a “prison of nations” and that Russians are a “nation of slaves.” We have heard this many times throughout the centuries. Now we have also heard that Russia apparently needs to be “decolonised.” But what do they really want? They want to dismember and plunder Russia. If they cannot do it by force, they sow discord.

I would like to emphasise that we view any outside interference or provocations to incite ethnic or religious conflict as acts of aggression against our country, and an attempt to once again wield terrorism and extremism as a weapon against us, and we will respond accordingly.

We have a large and diverse country. This diversity of cultures, traditions and customs creates greater strength, a tremendous competitive advantage and potential. We must continuously strengthen it, treasure this diverse accord, which is our common asset. I would like all the regional governors to focus on this, and I count on the authority of the pastors in our traditional religions and the responsibility of all political forces and public organisations.

I believe we all remember, and must remember, the lessons of the 1917 revolution, the subsequent Civil War, and the disintegration of the USSR in 1991. It may seem like many years have passed since then, but people of all ethnicities living today, even those born in the 21^st century are still paying now, decades later, for the miscalculations made at that time – indulgences in separatist illusions, the weakness of the central authority, and a policy of artificial, forced division in this large Russian nation, a triune of Russians, Belarusians and Ukrainians. The bloody conflicts that emerged after the Russian Empire and the Soviet Union not only continue to smoulder but sometimes flare up with renewed energy. These wounds will not be healed for a long time.

We will never forget these mistakes and should not repeat them. I would like to emphasise once again – any attempt to sow ethnic or religious discord, to split our society is betrayal, a crime against all of Russia. We will never allow anyone to divide Russia – the only country we have. Our prayers are for this, our homeland, and they are expressed in different languages.

I would like to recall for this audience the words of St Gregory of Nazianzus: “Honouring your mother is a sacred thing. But everyone has their own mother, whereas the Motherland is our common mother.”

Your Holiness, colleagues. The theme of this Council session is “The Present and Future of the Russian World.” The Russian world embraces all generations of our predecessors and our descendants that will live after us. The Russian world means Ancient Rus, the Tsardom of Muscovy, the Russian Empire, the Soviet Union, and modern Russia that is reclaiming, consolidating, and augmenting its sovereignty as a global power. The Russian World unites all those who feel a spiritual affinity with our Motherland, who consider themselves Russian speakers, and carriers of Russian history and culture regardless of their ethnicity or religion.

But I would like to emphasise that the Russian world and Russia itself do not and cannot exist without Russians as an ethnicity, without the Russian people. This statement does not contain any claim to superiority, exclusivity or chosenness. This is simply a fact just like our Constitution’s clear definition of the status of the Russian language as the language of a state-forming nation.

Being Russian is more than a nationality. By the way, this has always been the case throughout our country’s history. Among other things, it includes cultural, spiritual, and historical identity. Being Russian is, above all, a responsibility. To reiterate, it is about the enormous responsibility to safeguard Russia, and this is what true patriotism is all about. As a Russian, I am here to say that only a united, strong, and sovereign Russia can guarantee the future and independent development of the Russian people and all other peoples who have lived within the borders of our country for centuries and are united by a common historical destiny.

What does sovereignty mean for our state, for each family, and for each person? What is its value and true essence? Primarily, it is freedom. Freedom for Russia and our people and, therefore, for each one of us, because in our tradition, a person cannot feel free unless his loved ones, his children and his Fatherland are free. Our soldiers and officers, men and women of our country, are defending this genuine freedom.

A free nation that understands its responsibility before current and future generations is the only source of power, sovereign power, which is called upon to serve all people, rather than someone’s private, corporate, class, or even foreign interests.

A truly free person is a creator. We will support everyone's aspiration to be useful to the country, society, and people. This is what sovereign development in the national interests is made of.

We are faced with the daunting task of developing vast areas from the Pacific to the Baltic Sea and the Black Sea. Our economy, industry, agriculture, innovative industries, creative industries, and national businesses must increase their capacity multiple times over.

I am now reaching out to entrepreneurs who I know are many in this audience. I would like to thank you, friends, for your coordinated efforts. We have thwarted the unprecedented economic aggression of the West by uniting the efforts of the state and business. Its sanctions Blitzkrieg has failed.

Russia will step up support for sovereign national entrepreneurship. We have fundamentally new tools being developed for that right now. Invest in Russia, create new jobs, expand production, and participate in personnel training. If you do that, the national economy will grow, creating more success and opportunities for your companies. By focusing on strengthening sovereignty, national businesses are growing stronger and more sovereign themselves as they shed dependence on the components of the current world order.

The sovereign development of the country, its economy, business, the social sector should bring well-being to all people, all Russian families, and, thus, be fair. This is not about a primitive one-size-fits-all approach. Justice means primarily decent living conditions, modern facilities for culture, healthcare and sports in all regions of the country. This means a qualified and well-paid job and high public prestige for workers, engineers, teachers, doctors, artists, cultural figures, entrepreneurs, every responsible specialist and master. Justice means equal, broad opportunities for study, for a start in life and self-fulfilment for youth.

The West is now pursuing a “cancel culture” policy, but this is, in fact, a renunciation of humanitarian education. As a result, both culture and education are becoming primitive. Many traditional subjects are simply being thrown out of Western academic programmes and replaced by some gender or other similar sciences – pseudo sciences, of course. In the meantime, we need a real breakthrough in cultural life. And we have a lot to learn in this respect from our predecessors that set the tone for the entire world in both traditional and, by the way, avant-garde art. I am convinced that the country’s sovereignty and strengthening its role in the world are impossible without a flourishing, distinctive culture in all of its manifestations.

And, of course, we should take all the best achievements made by the domestic and global systems of traditional education. Importantly, our schools and universities must be modern and open to all advanced ideas.

We need an integral holistic approach to education with family, education, national culture, children’s, youth, sports and military-patriotic organisations, large-scale mentoring movements; and let me add, the wise word of our spiritual clergy harmoniously supplement each other. The latter is simply essential.

Yes, the Church is separate from the state and the Patriarch [Kirill] has told me more than once that despite this fact we have developed unique relations between the Church and the state. I would like to note in this context that the Church cannot be separated from society or from people. I fully agree with this. And this is why I would like to emphasise again the importance of the participation of representatives of all traditional Russian religions in the education and upbringing of our youth, and of course, in the consolidation of spiritual, moral, and family values. The involvement of the clergy from all traditional religions is an enduring value.

Your Holiness, friends,

You know that the Executive Order declaring next year – 2024 – the Year of the Family in Russia has already been signed. And I would like to say that this decision is indeed based on the position of the absolute majority of our society. I am sure the World Russian People’s Council unanimously supports it as well.

Here is what I would like to say and make clear. We will not overcome the daunting demographic challenges facing us solely with money, social benefits, allowances, privileges, or dedicated programmes. True, the amount of the budget’s demographic spending is extremely important, but that is not all there is to it. A person’s points of reference in life matter more. Love, trust, and a solid moral foundation are what the family and the birth of a child are built on. We must never forget this.

Thankfully, many of our ethnic groups have preserved the tradition of having strong multigenerational families with four, five, or even more children. Let us remember that Russian families, many of our grandmothers and great-grandmothers had seven, eight, or even more children.

Let us preserve and revive these excellent traditions. Large families must become the norm, a way of life for all Russia’s peoples. The family is not just the foundation of the state and society, it is a spiritual phenomenon, a source of morality.

All levels of government, our economic, social and infrastructure policies, education and awareness-raising, and healthcare should be engaged without exception in the work of supporting families, mothers and children. All public organisations and our traditional religions should focus on strengthening families as well. Preserving and increasing the population of Russia is our goal for the coming decades and even generations ahead. This is the future of the Russian world, the millennium-old, eternal Russia.

Your Holiness, friends, we have many ambitious goals before us, and fulfilling them requires a truly concerted effort, which we are ready for. We have become stronger. Our historical regions have returned to Russia. Society is rejecting everything superficial and turning to true and genuine values.

Pyotr Stolypin emphasised that law based on national power takes precedence. Together, we have shown such national strength and national will, the determination to uphold our fundamental interests, the fundamental interests of the people of Russia, to be guided not by someone else's borrowed views, but by our own sovereign worldviews, our understanding of how the family and the entire country should live, and to build Russia for ourselves and our children.

I would like to thank you again for your support and patriotism and, of course, to congratulate you on the occasion of the 30^th anniversary of the World Russian People's Council.

I would like to address special words of thanks to its head, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia.

I am aware of your tireless work, Your Holiness, to bring about the spiritual revival of Russia and of the importance and influence of your position. I want to emphasise this. Under your leadership, the Russian Orthodox Church, clergy, and laity do much to implement social, charitable, and volunteer projects. I am also aware of the support provided to our servicemen and their families and how eagerly our soldiers and officers on the frontlines seek out the Patriarch's words.

I am pleased today, at the World Russian People's Council, to congratulate you on being awarded the 2023 Presidential Prize for your contribution to strengthening the unity of the Russian nation. You have my deepest respect. I wish the Council every success in its work.

Thank you.

Your Holiness, friends.

If I may, just two or three words about what has just been said.

Firstly, I agree that we still need to do a lot to improve the living conditions of large families and families with children in general. As you can probably see, the government is constantly focusing on this. It is no coincidence that we are declaring next year the Year of the Family: to look for the most effective, relevant, important and feasible measures for the state to support families with children in today’s conditions, at events like this and during discussions with deputies and representatives of various factions in the State Duma and public organisations.

This also includes, of course, preferential mortgages and more; but also unifying or focusing on the most effective ways of support in the form of various benefits, or combining various things. But I will not repeat this now; we have an entire big programme built, which probably has no precedent in the history of Russia. Of course, there is always something to work on; I understand perfectly what my colleague meant.

Of course, a large family with a large number of members needs separate housing, and housing construction needs to be improved. That is what we are doing. The point is that all this, everything that is being done, must be more accessible than today. This is obvious. This also applies to various options for supporting families.

But, let me say this again, I am very thankful to His Holiness the Patriarch for organising events like this one, because this provides us with the opportunity to talk, discuss, and hear each other. We will certainly work on this.

Now, concerning the fact that, 12 years after the Great Patriotic War, the entire world learned the Russian word “sputnik,” it signifies the progress that the country was able to achieve even during the most difficult times. I want to emphasise that it became possible because, even during the most critical moments of the Great Patriotic War, our nuclear physicists and missile developers continued to work on those technologies, on what was strategically important and necessary, even though at that time, there was nothing more important than, say, guarding the front or achieving another victory on the battlefield. However, the country always thought about the future.

Of course, we must do the same. We must always, regardless of circumstances, think about the future of our people and our state. We do so and we will in the future.

(Applause)

Thank you for your applause.

Finally, I would like to draw your attention to certain things that the Holy Patriarch mentioned. He quoted a Soviet song, “We will destroy the old world…” and so on. As His Holiness said, we will create a new building on the debris. That was what the Soviet government planned after the 1917 Socialist revolution. Everything seemed to be debris. But I believe that it was not debris but seeds from which a new Russian and Soviet statehood grew. Because only 24 years later, despite all the attempts to root out both the religious mindset and our cultural roots… Still, 24 years later… Let me just remind you, the Great Patriotic War started – and what happened? Remember how Molotov addressed the Soviet people with news about the war breaking out? How did he address them? “Citizens.” And, a few days later, Stalin addressed them as “brothers and sisters.” They immediately remembered about God, church and our eternal traditions.

The same continues today. It is not possible to root it out. It is the very essence of Russia and our nation. We will always look forward and move forward while relying on our centuries-long traditions and spiritual roots.

Thank you for doing this. Thank you and all the best.

Gaza isn’t just a concentration camp, it’s a death camp. Since 2006 or earlier, it was technically accurate to describe Gaza as a concentration camp. As early as 2003, Gaza has been described as the largest concentration camp, ever. As of now, it has become a death camp.

Last Saturday, we listened to allegations of war crimes. I condemn them unreservedly. I have a Palestinian friend, Lama Al-Arian. She lives in Beirut. She texted me in the middle of the night to tell me that eleven members of her family including a two-year-old cousin were killed by an Israeli bomb as they sat in the dark in Gaza on Sunday night.

We are very happy with our visit today and we know that we are very late in visiting you. Since the opening of the house the Director of Endowments has been telling us the students want to meet you, and we want to meet you too.

We care about you for several reasons, but the first reason is that the families of the martyrs are a priority for us, not only because the martyr is a brave person who went to battle, fought, defended his country and was martyred, but because your fathers hold values and they defended them. The first value we must think about is the value of faith. If they did not believe in their Lord, their country, and their people, and did not believe in their cause, and did not believe in many things, it would have been impossible for them to go and defend their country and give their lives. There are many people today for whom the country is not a faith, but rather a place of residence that they inhabit like any other place, and there are other people for whom the country represents the amount of money they receive. The martyrs defended the value of honesty in exchange for the many lies that we see in this stage in which we live. They were honest and possessed important values that they defended. They defended the truth in exchange for the fact that the whole world today lives a life of falsehood. It is the falsehood that wins outwardly.

In many places of the world, they rejected this thing and loved to defend the truth. They defended the value of knowledge and science in the face of the ignorant people who were fighting us, and this here concerns you because excellence is the value that you will carry in exchange for ignorance. We cannot fight ignorance with ignorance, we fight ignorance with knowledge and excellence, but what I want to say is that when your people painted this beautiful picture of the country, they would not have been able to draw it if they had not carried all these values, and if we want it to continue and remain in people’s memories, you, as sons and daughters, must carry these same values. Therefore, when you graduate after a few years and finish high school and enter university, and the years pass quickly and you go to work, you must think about what great, great goals you will have, because when your fathers were martyred, they carried great values. If they had not carried them and had not set great goals in front of them, it would not have been possible to give their lives.

Your parents carried the value of passion, and all the goals they were trying to reach were based on the idea of passion. You must think in the same way, and carry the idea of development. How do you want to develop as students? From now on, you must start thinking, when we grow up, what will we do for our country? Each one of you represents his/her father, of course, in addition to the role of the mother, which we all also sanctify. Therefore, we hope that within a few years, you will enter practical life and we will come back and meet you, and at that time you will have set the big and great goals that you want, and you will become the ones who represent the image of your heroic fathers for us as Syrians, because there are generations that will not know your parents, but they will know them through you. They will say: Look at how they act and how they present good ideas, how they love their country? Ηow they think of others before they think of themselves, they think of the public interest before they think of their own interest. When we do these things when we grow up, we will engrave a place for our fathers in the nation’s memory, and the last thing I would like to conclude is that what makes your fathers happiest is that you are outstanding. This is number one as a value and the rest comes after that.

We wish you all the best and thank the staff. Find greetings to your mothers. Of course, we do not forget the role of grandmother and grandfather in education, because they raised your fathers and made them heroes. Greetings to them as well.

Where did the war come from? From my country. From the CIA. […]

So, the idea that the only policy is to debate “should we accept refugees or not” is not right. The real policy is: Stop the wars that are producing them!

[…] The president of Ukraine, in my view, was an actor and he acted as a president. And many times when I listen to him, he still thinks he’s acting, which is tragic because he is now acting but real people are dying - real people are dying.

Ukraine has become a theater, in my view, where NATO is testing its weapons and immunizing him from listening to people who would guide him to stop that war. If he stopped listening to NATO and the Joe Bidens of this world, let me tell you, that war would end in a month. But they are encouraging, they are telling “go on, we are going to supply with F16s and drones” and all these thinks.

So, it is incumbent upon any person in a position of leadership to determine what kind of advice you recieve and what kind of advice you implement. […]

Power, it is said, corrupts and absolute power corrupts absolutely.

THEE ALFA HOUSE is a new African media venue where you will find everything from politics and news to popular comedy shows and dances.

On June 1, students of the Faculty of Journalism of Lomonosov Moscow State University visited the foresight forum “What kind of Ukraine do we need?” on the Russia Today’s press centre base. 

The panel discussion “Crisis of the World Order and Ukraine” was attended by the editor-in-chief of the multimedia “Ukraina.ru” Iskander Khisamov, philosopher, Doctor of Political Sciences Alexander Dugin, Acting Head of the Donetsk People’s Republic Denis Pushilin, Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Deputy Prime Minister of Ukraine (2002-2007), Minister of Education and Science of Ukraine (2010-2014) Dmitry Tabachnik, political scientist, publicist, writer Semyon Uralov.

The foresight forum was organized to discuss the development of modern relations between Russia and Ukraine, the modern world order and issues of language policy.

Dmitry Kiselyov, General Director of the Russia Today agency, outlined the topic of the discussion in the opening speech:

«Of course, we are talking about both Ukraine and Russia. Recently, we have been carried away by the geopolitical confrontation between Russia and the West. And it all started with Ukraine. We are probably the only ones to whom Ukraine is really important. Important with its embroidered shirts and with its language. This is our common culture.»

Continuing the topic of the two countries’ future, the speaker of the discussion Alexander Dugin spoke about his vision of the multipolarity of the world and the West’s part in it:

«We are very slightly proactive, we predict little. We need to imagine the future of Ukraine, Russia, the world order and the victory of Russia. I cannot imagine the defeat of the West. I can imagine how it can achieve its goals. It created almost irreducible paths of split. If we allowed this, then the West has already won.»

Speaking of the West’s strategy, Dugin added:

«They, of course, are leading the way to our complete annihilation, extermination. We fight to be, they fight to have. If we win, they won’t lose. This, as our Chinese colleagues say, is a win-win situation.»

Dmitry Kiselyov, specifying the future of Ukraine, emphasized:

«Ukraine must always be, I must say, so that we cannot be caught by the tongue. Ukraine forever. The only question is in what form.»

The foresight forum, organized by the multimedia “Ukraina.ru”, have been hosting journalists from CIS countries, China, Japan, Iran, Slovakia and a number of Arab countries. It was dedicated to the ninth anniversary of the “Ukraina.ru” muiltimedia’s creation.

Αsma al-Assad joins locals of al-Marah village in harvesting the Damascene Rose

Society has a memory which carries its customs, traditions and remains with the human being throughout their lives… the memory is represented in rituals that parents pass on to their children, a generation after generation, this memory embaded deeply in their identity, spirit of its society and its culture.

In al-Marah village, located in Qalamoun Mountains, in Damascus Countryside, there is a village named the “Village of Damascene Rose”, where with the first moments of the sunrise, at this time of each year, farmers begin the season of harvesting the Damascene rose. This rose has been associated with their lands hundreds of years ago in a way that its name has linked to them, and its fragrance spreads to the whole world, carrying its Syrian identity and heritage.

Reviving heritage in all its forms constitutes a continuation of life and preserving it is a cling to identity. First Lady, Mrs. Asma al-Assad, continues to sponsor and support those who hold strongly to their heritage and passes it on to their children.

On Thursday, the First Lady joined the local people of al-Marah village in harvesting their Damascene rose, the jewel of their life and icon of their continued livelihood.. the rituals of harvesting the rose each year demonstrate the rose’s social and cultural importance in protecting and preserving this heritage.

Ladies of the Diplomatic Club in Syria and other dignitaries’, artists’ figures and personalities who are concerned with preserving and protecting the Syrian heritage joined them.

The cultivation of the Damascene rose, which were inscribed on the UNESCO Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage in 2019, is expanded to include other areas and town. A year after a year, from al-Marah to Hama, Aleppo and other provinces, this rose remains an image from Syria and a source of its productivity and cultivation.