As if Things Weren't Bad Enough, Russian Professor Predicts End of U.S.

[freedomnorth]

Source: The Wall Street Journal

MOSCOW -- For a decade, Russian academic Igor Panarin has been predicting the U.S. will fall apart in 2010. For most of that time, he admits, few took his argument -- that an economic and moral collapse will trigger a civil war and the eventual breakup of the U.S. -- very seriously. Now he's found an eager audience: Russian state media.



Prof. Panarin, 50 years old, is not a fringe figure. A former KGB analyst, he is dean of the Russian Foreign Ministry's academy for future diplomats. He is invited to Kremlin receptions, lectures students, publishes books, and appears in the media as an expert on U.S.-Russia relations.

But it's his bleak forecast for the U.S. that is music to the ears of the Kremlin, which in recent years has blamed Washington for everything from instability in the Middle East to the global financial crisis. Mr. Panarin's views also fit neatly with the Kremlin's narrative that Russia is returning to its rightful place on the world stage after the weakness of the 1990s, when many feared that the country would go economically and politically bankrupt and break into separate territories.

(snip)

Americans hope President-elect Barack Obama "can work miracles," he wrote. "But when spring comes, it will be clear that there are no miracles."

Read more: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123051100709638419.html

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WWIII?

[Pavulon]

1. If so he will not be around to tell the tale(nt)

[freedomnorth]

6. So tell me what will happen to him?

Moscow has ABM shield you know. :nuke: :hide:

[Pavulon]

15. MAD. Means what it says

they do not have a B2 dropping b61 shield. That is one reason they quit last time.

This will never happen. Neither side is willing to undertake a nuclear war.

[freedomnorth]

2. a map

[Pavulon]

5. Hmm, Let me smoke this

eat these mushrooms and then draw a map...

[KamaAina]

8. Maybe Sarah was just a little ahead of her time

she really would be able to see Russia from her house!

Can we please go to Japan? I don't want to go to China and make cheap crap and destroy the environment and execute dissidents and eat cat!! :cry:

I'd be very surprised if Tenn. and S.C. ended up in a union with them there gol-danged Yankee states. Similarly, Arizona to China, not Mexico? :shrug: In fact, in this kind of scenario, such a split might not always occur along existing state lines: upstate NY, and possibly parts of northern New England, might fall to Canada.

For further reading, consult Joel Garreau's The Nine Nations of North America, Ernest Callenbach's Ecotopia, and Robert Heinlein's Friday.

[PM7nj]

9. ROFLMAO. Yes...

:rofl:

Of course Tennessee is going to join the EU and Utah will be a part of China! Why didn't I see it before!

[KamaAina]

3. "In Soviet Russia, end predicts you!"

[bananas]

4. "a civil war next fall"

Are the Florida keys going to secede again?

[Pale Blue Dot]

7. "But when spring comes, it will be clear that there are no miracles."

This statement I agree with.

[Taverner]

10. This will be the case for 10+ years

The US is set to break up

Probably in 10 years from now, but it will happen

Happens to every country that does stupid things like invade Afghanistan

[Sandrine for you]

11. Ok , so maybe, here in Canada, we should be prepare to send

our army in the US ?

[freedomnorth]

12. omg

[Amerigo Vespucci]

13. That armchair quarterback can blow it out of his scholarly ASS.

Americans hope President-elect Barack Obama "can work miracles," he wrote. "But when spring comes, it will be clear that there are no miracles."

Prof. Panarin, with all due respect, fuck you and the fine Russian steed you rode in on, b**tch.

[Baby Snooks]

18. Unfortunately he's right...

Unless you consider saddling your children and grandchildren with trillions of dollars of debt by continuing to bail out crooks which is all Pelosi and Company seem interested in doing for some reason a miracle, there are no miracles. Nancy of Lourdes is just another Republicrat oligarchist protecting her own. Her philosophy is if we save the corporations, it will somehow "trickle down" to the American people. Sounds vaguely familiar.

And Barack Obama is not the Savior King. At this point, given who he invited to "his" table, he is beginning to look more like a Prince Charming who fell off his horse and unfortunately suffered a concussion.

What is being pointed out here is that "might makes right" everywhere but the world economy. We have destroyed the world economy and our own in the process. That $50 billion that the investors lost with Bernie Madoff is just the tip of the iceberg. Much more has been lost on Wall Street. And there will be bankruptcies which will cause investors to lose even more. Much more than what everyone lost with Bernie Madoff.

[Amerigo Vespucci]

19. Agreed that Obama is not the Savior King...

...and I really feel sorry for anyone expecting him to step into that role.

But we have a few choices in front of us. We can roll over and play dead our fight our way out of 8 years of George W. Bush's failed "leadership."

I'm not totally blind to the situation. I just feel that some asshole sitting in Russia ruminating over our doom deserves to be called out as exactly what he is...an asshole. If I go down in flames, with my country, the professor can come to California and I will gladly spit right into his fucking Russian EYE.

[Baby Snooks]

21. Don't forget the last two years...

Don't forget the last two years. The last two years of Nancy Pelosi's failed leadership.

The Russians and the Chinese have done well with our oligarchy by the way - they regulated it and they taxed it. They will survive the collapse of the world economy. We won't.

Oligarchy works well with every form of government but our own but then our own was its own unique form of democracy. Until the Republicrats took over and tossed democracy out the window.

The only Democrats and Republicans in this country are the fools who believe there are Democrats and Republicans on the ballots.

[tavalon]

31. Mad at the messenger?

Feel free but he's probably right. I hate that he thinks China will get Washington State but otherwise, the scenario makes sense. We've been setting up for this for quite a while.

[Kokonoe]

14. What happened to Dumbfuckistan?

[Tunkamerica]

16. I saw his map yseterday showing that the US would be

split into 4 parts. Seems pretty silly to me that Kansas would be under Canadian control and Tennesee would be in with Vermont in the EU. California belongs to China. Oh, and Alaska goes back to the Russians says the Russian professor.

[The_Commonist]

17. This guy has no idea what he's talking about.

He's just blowing smoke out his ass...

[Deja Q]

29. He does come across like one big butthole, I'll agree

[Oak2004]

33. There is a fissure in the US, but not the one his map shows

The divisions of the Civil War have not healed, as is obvious when looking at a great deal of data when plotted across the map of the US. If there is to be a breakup, without a doubt the primary fault line would look a whole lot like the old fault line, with some adjustment for subsequent mass migrations.

There may well be secondary fault lines, but the big fissure would look a whole lot like 1861, not like someone was drawing lines to demarcate the divisions of a league sport..

[Wizard777]

20. We need to start prosecuting the Republicans that bend over backwards to help that collapse along

[pnwmom]

22. The Soviet Union fell apart because it was a bunch of separate countries

to begin with.

The continental U.S. is not in the same situation, except for Texas. But if Texas wants to go on its own, I won't mourn it.

[tavalon]

32. You know, we used to be called These United States

There's a very important semantic difference. When it's "These" it's obvious it's many different states (mini-countries) but "The" is used to signify that the states are actually federal.

[KoKo]

23. This might happen and here's why:

He might be onto something, here. We all think our "Think Tanks" are all important, but there are other countries with "enlightened minds" who just might have some insight the AEI,Heritage,CATO and AIPAQ Think Tanks are so insular they just might miss.

I really can see America "splitting up" given what we are going to go through in the coming years. The fissures are too great. Just look at the masses of CROWDS that turned out for Obama! This is a MOVEMENT that goes beyond OBAMA. The "Movement for CHANGE" will not stop with Obama, if he doesn't bring change...it will move on and just might cut up America into Quarters of folks with "Regional Interests" who want to find a NEW Economy for their own interests.

I can see this happening because I feel things are going to get so bad from the terrible things we've been through where there has been NO ACCOUNTABILITY! History has shown when the "PEOPLE" are fed up and have no place to go with their grievances then they will TAKE OVER...to bring back some BALANCE.

This could happen in a few decades if not sooner. It does depend a lot on Obama and what he does with his "old Administration." Maybe on the "second go round" his Redux can work ....if they learned from the mistakes of the past.

[NJCher]

24. I can see your point

I'm from one of the "rich" northeastern states that gives a lot out in federal tax dollars but doesn't get much back. We are at the breaking point here in terms of taxes on our homes, sales taxes, income taxes, etc. If the federal government tries to increase our taxes, there will be no place to go but to refuse.

Also, many resent the rural red states who voted the disastrous bush in.

On the other hand, there is one big flaw in the professor's theory and that is that the world has no place else to go for a consumer country comparable to the U.S. No other nation is as large and no other nation has that 24/7 media machine that convinces people to buy buy buy.

What do Asian consumers do when they get money? Well, some consumer buying, yes, but largely a higher degree of savings.

An enlightened, revised consumer impetus, with the U.S. going "green" would be in everyone's best interest.



Cher

[KoKo]

25. Yes...I understand what you say...

but given that old Soviet Union lived under PRAVDA, Military and other control that the US Citizens under the Bushies now live under...maybe he understands what it means when the "People have had ENOUGH." Might be he sees us breaking up like the Soviet Union did into former countries...and maybe he sees similar circumstances for us compared to the oppression he lived under.

I lived in NJ and understand what you mean. How much more can NJ tax it's people and expect them not to buckle under the burden. Many will have to move and they will probably move to the Southeast or wherever they can find lower taxes. In the meantime those of us who moved from NJ to the Southeast are starting to see our State Budgets have deficits and our schools are shit (parents don't want to pay...would rather live in McMansions and buy season tickets for the Sports Teams and eat out at fast food places.) There's going to be a lot of upheaval all over US as jobs to do anything and getting rid of high taxes folks can't afford to pay causes another migration. Our Repugs in the South are salivating over this. I don't think they have any idea about the kind of politics they are going to be importing when they open up their migrants to low taxes and yet folks find they kids will go to schools where they don't learn because there's no money for education, or that there's a "Right to Work" law that means you can't make more than minimum wage...but for folks fleeing a bad situation it will seem good for awhile as a trade-off in hard times.

I welcome our Northeast folks here to the Southeast...because WE NEED THEM for a REVOLUTION. That would be a positive!

[kemamusa]

26. The End

I'd be willing to believe him somewhat, had he predicted the fall of Soviet Union, but I bet he hadn't.

The division of the United States is not that hard to predict if the US were to go bankrupt. Civil war is a very likely scenario for any multi-ethnic/regional country that suffers a catastrophic economic failure.
It happened before and it will happen again.

But in any case, this guy's prediction map is absolutely ridiculous.

First of all, if the US were to fall apart, China will implode with its very own civil war. Unlike Russia, China has not yet faced fall of the Communist regime. If anything, it will be the failure of free capitalism that will be the demise of their communist government ,ironically enough. When the communist government falls, all hell will break loose in China. In every moment in Chinese history, whenever central government falls, it always gets resolved with civil war. Even if the break up of US doesn't trigger Chinese civil war, China is still thoroughly land-based continental power, so its first instinct will be to exert power over its immediate neighbours such as Korea, Japan and South East Asia rather than over-extending to North America and risk potential conflict with Russia and EU.

Second, Canada will very likely be divided up as well in the case of economic disaster spreading from its most important economic partner. Quebec and Alberta will be the first ones to declare independence and the rest will form some kind of loose regional federation with newly independent American states.

I think most likely scenario will involve Russia and European Union extending helping hands to various independent factions and eventually stepping in as the "Peace Keepers" This will almost certainly warrant the use of nuclear weapons... BOOM ---> THE END.

[sofa king]

27. America is too stupid to fall apart.

Seriously. Ask most Americans to draw a picture of the United States and they'll draw it as an island, with oceans where Mexico and Canada are supposed to be (where those people think illegal immigrants are coming from is probably a mystery to both them and me).

They'll fight their asses off to keep Merka a single island nation, if only so their kids can pass geography.

[northernlights]

28. Maine is more Canadian than European

unless all of Mass migrates here. Even then, downeast Maine is more Canadian. They may join with part of Canada, tho, to form Acadia. There is a little secessionist movement for an Acadian, up there in downeast...

[Alcibiades]

30. the carolinas are lumped in with the northeast

and join the EU?

If he's ever been to the Carolinas, I'll cut off my own balls, fry them, and eat them. We'd go with all the other crackers into what he calls the Republic of Texas.

[treestar]

34. Never gonna happen

But I am amused at the idea of Alaska going to Russia. Wonder if they'll let Palinova keep her seat? :rofl: