Thanks to @barneypiccolo@lemm.ee for the following summary and turning me on to the linked excellent summary of the book.
Foundations of Geopolitics was published in 1997 by Aleksandr Dugin. It outlines how Russia can become the world’s dominant superpower without warfare. It is taught in Russia’s military officers school, Putin keeps a copy in his office, and it is Russia’s geopolitical playbook. Dugin is still closely involved with Putin and Russian intelligence, and so was his daughter, who was murdered in a car bombing that was likely meant for him.
Under the section for the United States, it says:
Russia should use its special services within the borders of the United States and Canada to fuel instability and separatism against neoliberal globalist Western hegemony, such as, for instance, provoke “Afro-American racists” to create severe backlash against the rotten political state of affairs in the current present-day system of the United States and Canada. Russia should “introduce geopolitical disorder into internal American activity, encouraging all kinds of separatism and ethnic, social, and racial conflicts, actively supporting all dissident movements – extremist, racist, and sectarian groups, thus destabilizing internal political processes in the U.S. It would also make sense simultaneously to support isolationist tendencies in American politics”.
Does anyone have a link to the actual Russian text?
I saw the headline, and thought " Hey! I post about that book all the time," only to find that I was credited in the post for being the inspiration.
I’d like to say that one of the things that intrigues me about this book, is the mention of “special interests” in America, which seems to indicate undercover agents already planted in America. In 2010, a Russian undercover spy ring was discovered, and sent back to Russia. They were living among us like regular Americans. The incident inspired the TV show The Americans.
I can’t help but wonder if one of the “special interests,” was Trump himself, along with all of his Russian-compromised henchmen. I wonder if certain elected officials are, or were, included.
Like, e.g. Vance posting on bluesky trying to ‘provoke’ biased conversation
Is it a book about how Russia becomes the world’s hegemon, or how it beats the US/West/Atlanticists?
What does it say in relation to East Asia?
Most interestingly China, considering today’s context, but thinking about the time it was written Japan might’ve been more pertinent in their thinking.
Try the Wikipedia entry under Content. It breaks down the plans for each region.
Interestingly, it mentions Iran is a key ally, referring to the “Moscow-Tehran Axis.”
You might be right, since his supposed russian code name is Krasnov
You’re doing the Lord’s work! 😅 I tried telling people about that book on several occasions and the reaction is always something along the lines of “hm Idk seems accidental”. Like no it’s not and I’m not some tinfoil hat wearing nutcase, this is real 😄
You and that roundsparrow guy. If youre curious, theres plenty of info to confirm that the operations only increased in frequency and severity. The operation directly interfering in american politics via thought manipulation on the internet was launched in 2013 and continues to this day. Roundsparrow has a bunch of different communities but I think the one most concisely centered around this subject is that countersurkov comm, (I believe thats the correct spelling,) surkov being one of the architects of russian counterintelligence and the orchestrator of russias internal political theater that has allowed putin absolute power since his election. If you’ve found the dugin book I’m sure you’re not too far off from this stuff but I figured I should give it a shout just in case you needed something to ruin your week lol Edit: figured out the link to the surkov comm
That sounds like a wild conspiracy theory to me. We don’t need any more conspiracy theories as we get enough from the right.
You might actually want to read the link before you open your mouth and prove yourself stupid.
This is the book that drives Russian foreign policy, and is entirely responsible for the global rise of the far-right. Dismissing it as a “conspiracy theory” marks you as either a Russian-compromised stooge, or an idiot.
Funny thing is my conservative parents have been talking about this book since like the 80s or early 90s? Or perhaps a predecessor that basically was an instruction list of how to take out America (make schools dumber, sow racism, etc) through infiltration or something.
Now they are Fox News worshipers and very much in line with Trump and his policies. They are exactly the people that have fallen for this plan and it’s maddening because they fucking KNOW about it
It was published in 1997. Time flies when you’re resisting oppression.
He apparently didn’t read it he invaded Ukraine
I think he read it and executed the plan to the letter, including using the exact messaging prescribed by the book:
Ukraine (except Western Ukraine) should be annexed by Russia because “Ukraine as a state has no geopolitical meaning, no particular cultural import or universal significance, no geographic uniqueness, no ethnic exclusiveness, its certain territorial ambitions represents an enormous danger for all of Eurasia and, without resolving the Ukrainian problem, it is in general senseless to speak about continental politics”. Ukraine should not be allowed to remain independent, unless it is cordon sanitaire, which would be inadmissible according to Western political standards. As mentioned, Western Ukraine (comprising the regions of Volynia, Galicia, and Transcarpathia), considering its Catholic-majority population, are permitted to form an independent federation of Western Ukraine but should not be under Atlanticist control.[9]
Putin has always justified his invasion of Ukraine using similar language. I specifically remember him dismissing their history saying something very similar to "Ukraine as a state has no geopolitical meaning, no particular cultural import or universal significance, no geographic uniqueness, no ethnic exclusiveness, " and other nearly direct quotes.
Clear confirmation that Putin is using this publication as his playbook.
I’d add up a bit. The idea expressed there is also basically dismissing Ukrainian subjectivity, and that is exactly what Russians do all the time.
Their ideology locked them in such a position where either Russia exists or free independent Ukraine exists, because they treat Ukraine as “Russia’s missing piece”.
This is why I naively believe that if any ceasefire actually happens (even if slightly unfavorable for Ukraine) - Russia will simply subsequently self-destruct.
non mobile link https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foundations_of_Geopolitics#Content
Edited original post, thanks.
I highly recommend any and all videos by Vlad Vexler. Here’s one on Dugin and the Putin regime: https://youtu.be/y-Zk7K9Un2U
To what extent is this different than what the US currently does?
This just reads like a guy that was frustrated by the fall of the Soviet Union and Americas following hegemony, and said: what if we did all that.
Especially the tactic of destabilizing rivals. For example: how sincere can Americas concern for a Muslim minority in China be, when they have directly caused the death of millions in all their illegal Middle-East adventures of the past decades.
The tools are roughly the same, however the key difference is the position. With the fall of the Soviet Union Russia became nearly a regional power, which is trying to become a great power and hopes to be a super power again. The US ended up being the remaining super power and mostly controlled the world. So the US does not have a massive plan for world domination, because it already is pretty much in that position.
You can see that with China. The US was very interested of integrating China in its global economic system. However now it is starting to take over, so we see trade wars and things like the Muslims.
Similar situation in the Middle East. The US used to import a lot of oil, so low oil prices were important. At the same time oil is traded in dollars, which as everybody needs oil, creates a lot of demand for the dollar. The US can just print more, which is pretty much free money. However the Middle East is the clear main source of oil, so to make sure those countries do not sell in another currency, the US has to show strength. Hence taking out Iraq. Nowadays the US is an oil exporter. So it is much happier to take out the competition. That happened in Venezuela, Russia and now Iran. Keeps up the oil price, which helps the US economy.
However those are all reactions to events, rather then some grand strategy. The US just wants to keep its position in the world.
It’s working is the difference. Mostly because they took a plan and stuck to it.
Plus, you know, it’s explicitly a plan from fascists to promote fascism with no pretensions about caring about human rights, democracy, or equality.
I‘m sorry but saying that the US cares about human rights is simply not credible. They literally have a bomb-The-Hague act in case one of their many war criminals ever faces justice.
Or explain to me why the US are allies with Saudi Arabia, but Iran is their biggest enemy. In what world is Saudi Arabia a country that cares about human rights, democracy or equality.
All actions by the US show that they only care about power and that human rights and democracy are pure rhetoric to be used when convenient.
pretensions
Good point pal.
The US has done many of these things, it’s true. A few differences IMO are:
- The US of the last century has had no ambitions to conquer countries militarily for the purpose of ursurping their land. These kinds of wars are the ones that cause the most death and destruction as we see in Ukraine.
- The US doesn’t require nearly as many “puppet regimes” as Russia does. The US has had some in the past, but generally in most cases are happy as long as there are democracies in place. Russia requires near complete control of their puppet states like Belarus and Ukraine when they controlled it.
- The US doesn’t directly commit genocide as we see happening in Ukraine or in almost every terriory Russia has ever brought under it’s rule.
- Countries allied with the US generally become more prosperous and free, whereas those under the Russian umbrella tend to experience the opposite.
So, given the choice between being under US hegemony or Russian imperialism, I personally would choose to ally myself with the US. Though, as a resident of the EU, in a country formerly a Soviet sattelite state, I would prefer to be beholden to neither. In a small country as this one, I would prefer to have a strong united EU with it’s own strong military.
Honestly a strong democratic EU would help keep everyone in check. The only problem really is that powerful countries tend to abuse that power overseas.
I would prefer to be under US hegemony than under Russian or Chinese hegemony (for the time being) but mostly because the US is richer.
But morally speaking the only difference is scale:
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20231108-gaza-deaths-compared-to-ukraine/
While the US isn’t doing what it should be in Gaza, I don’t think it’s fair to lay the blame entirely on the USA. The USA is not Israel and Israel certainly isn’t a US puppet state.
On Iraq, it’s true. But at least they didn’t ethnically cleanse or attempt to annex the lands to make them permanent vassals like Russia does. Not good but still better than what happens when Russia gets involved.
Saying Israel is not the US is like saying the Ukrainian separatists between 2014 and 2022 where not Russia. Israel gets its weapons, money and international support directly from the US. Without the US Israel would not exist in its current state, and definitely would not be doing what it’s doing right now in Gaza. The US fought the Houthis to defend Israel, and without the US many many more Iranian rockets would have hit. And even if all of this was not the case and Israel was just a normal ally, the difference in response to Russias invasion of Ukraine vs Israels genocide against Palestinians still proves the point.
The Ukrainian separatists (little green men) were literally Russian soldiers, complete with marching papers, so that’s not an apt comparison. There are no US troops involved on the ground in this conflict.
The US sells arms to a lot of countries, as does Russia. A better comparison would be China, who Russia sells arms to, but has little control over policy-wise due to being another well armed rich nuclear power.
What little green men do you think man the aircraft carriers, shoot down the missiles, or build the pier that was then used to kill civilians?
The US army is actively involved on every front of this war/genocide. Not to speak of the intelligence that they are probably providing.
And yes if you micro optimize the goal posts long enough there is bound to be a difference between Russian involvement in Ukraine before 2022 and Israel. But that is besides the point, the question is: would the Palestinian genocide be happening without direct US support? And the answer is irrefutably no.
American soldiers have not been used in any combat in Gaza, nor have the US carriers. So again, not a valid comparison to Ukraine.
You could draw the parallel with Russian weapons being used by India against Pakistan, but you could hardly argue that Russia was directly fighting a war with Pakistan there.
