“Dead,” you say? I hardly think so.

But Donald Trump said so, and therefore it must be true . . . right?

Nah. What he said last week — after threatening the BRICS member nations with 150% tariffs if they attempted to promote an alternative currency to the U.S. dollar — was this:

“BRICS states were trying to destroy our dollar. They wanted to create a new currency. So when I came in, the first thing I said was any BRICS state that even mentions the destruction of the dollar will be charged a 150% tariff, and we don’t want your goods and the BRICS states just broke up. . . . I don’t know what the hell happened to them. We haven’t heard from the BRICS states lately.” [NDTV.com, February 21, 2022.]

It’s difficult to separate the truth from the imaginary in anything said by someone who can’t remember his own words. Because in January, Trump had threatened — not 150% — but a 100% tariff if the BRICS nations wanted to “play games.” [NDTV.com, February 14, 2022.] At a press briefing at that time, he was asked whether he wanted to dismantle BRICS or become a part of it, to which he responded:

“I don’t care, but BRICS was put there for a bad purpose and most of those people don’t want it. They don’t even want to talk about it now. They’re afraid to ask about it because I told them if they want to play games with the dollar, then they’re going to be hit with a 100 per cent tariff. The day they mention that they want to do it and they will come back and say we beg you, we beg you not to do this. BRICS is dead since I mentioned that. BRICS died the minute I mentioned that and know I remember when Obama and Biden, in particular, I guess he said that oh, they have us over a barrel.” [Id.] [Bold emphasis is mine.]

I just want to know one thing: What on earth has Donald Trump been smoking?!! Because there is not one phrase in all of that gobbledegook that makes an ounce of sense.

To begin with, BRICS is neither dead nor dying. If they were, would they have added five new members — Egypt, Ethiopia, Indonesia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates — since last year, doubling their size? And would they have added a new membership category — “Partner States” — in 2024 to accommodate the integration of prospective members?

Those Partner States are effectively observers, not yet officially part of the BRICS bloc, but guaranteed of support from the full members. Thus far, some 22 countries have been invited to become Partner States. Only three — Algeria, Turkiye and Vietnam — had not yet confirmed their status as of mid-January.

And if, as Trump would like to believe, BRICS were indeed finished, would they even now be busily planning their 2025 Summit in July, to be hosted in Brazil?

*. *. *

To be sure, Donald Trump is not wrong in considering BRICS a threat to U.S. supremacy — in fact, to the entire structure of the Western world. It was founded by Vladimir Putin in 2009 for the sole purpose of building an organization strong enough to run counter to NATO, the EU, the G7, and — who knows? — possibly even the United Nations.

But if Trump thinks throwing tariffs at the member states is going to cause them to put their chairs back on the table and slink home in defeat, he is living in an alternate reality.

Because, with Vladimir Putin at the helm, it isn’t going to be that easy.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/24/25

According to the History Channel’s “This Day In History,” February 23rd has often been a good day for a variety of reasons. These are my personal faves:

February 23, 1861: Abraham Lincoln arrives in Washington, D.C. And not a moment too soon. Southern states were seceding from the Union; civil war was imminent. Lincoln, about to be inaugurated as President on March 4th, was under threat of assassination and had to sneak into Washington protected by a cadre of Pinkerton security guards. The country needed a leader who could see them through the hard times ahead, and for once, Fate delivered the right person at the right moment.

A man of the people — born in poverty, self-educated, he studied history and the law before entering politics. He knew the value of hard work, he was scrupulously honest, and he loved his country. He didn’t live in a gilded palace, whining because he wasn’t universally loved. Instead, he visited nearby battlefields, gave hope and strength to his troops at Gettysburg, and freed a race of downtrodden people from the oppression of slavery.

The day that Abraham Lincoln arrived safely in Washington was a very good day indeed.

*. *. *

February 23, 1940: Woody Guthrie writes “This Land Is Your Land.” Born in Oklahoma in 1912, Guthrie was a troubadour who chose a life of traveling around the American West, where he chronicled the lives of ordinary, hard-working Americans. He left home at the age of 15, traveled by freight train, found employment as a migrant farm worker, and lived among other migrants and hobos. Eventually arriving in California, he began his musical career on local radio shows, but continued to perform among the homeless victims of the Great Depression.

Woody Guthrie was not a scholar or a politician; he never became president, and didn’t bring an end to war. But he created music that expressed his love of America and the American people — music that continues to inspires us some 85 years later.

We could use more Woody Guthries in our lives today.

*. *. *

February 23, 1945: U.S. flag raised on Iwo Jima. World War II was struggling toward its end, but the battle for the Pacific was still raging when U.S. Marines on Iwo Jima finally took the island’s most strategic position — Mount Suribachi — and raised the American flag on its crest. Associated Press photographer Joe Rosenthal was there to record the event, and one of the three pictures he took became the most reproduced photograph in history and the inspiration for the Iwo Jima Memorial that now stands in Arlington, Virginia, just across the Potomac River from the nation’s capital.

One cannot look at that statue without feeling the indomitable spirit of the fighting men and women who brought, not only the United States, but the entire free world through those hellish years of global war. It was love of country and unity that carried the troops up Mount Suribachi that day, and to ultimate victory over the tyranny of Adolph Hitler and Emperor Hirohito.

And on this February 23, 2025, we can only hope that the same spirit will carry us through the hard times ahead.

*. *. *

February 23, 1954: Children receive first polio vaccine. I remember the years of my childhood, when we kids weren’t allowed to go to the movies, to a swimming pool, or anywhere there might be crowds of people in the summertime, because it was “polio season.” And when the development of an anti-polio vaccine by Dr. Jonas Salk was announced to the world, our mother made sure we were first in line for our shots.

There were no anti-vaxxers in those days . . . no nay-sayers, no snake-oil salesmen promoting the ingestion of cleaning fluid to fight off a virus, no one saying medical research was a waste of government money. Instead, people cheered each and every advance in preventive medicine . . . and millions of lives were saved.

How fortunate that Dr. Salk was around in 1954. Would that he were still here in 2025.

*. *. *

Those were four great days from the dim, distant past — days worth reliving, if only in memory.

But today isn’t over yet, at least in my part of the world. Maybe this February 23rd will still bring us some good news.

Ya think?

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/23/25

Last week we were happy to report that American Marc Fogel and Belarusian journalist Andrey Kuznechyk had both been released by Vladimir Putin and returned home.

The not-so-good news is that this week has brought no further releases. On the other hand, there has been no word of new hostages having been taken, which is always a relief.

Now we need to continue working on bringing back those remaining in prison:

*. *. *

David Barnes
Ales Bialiatski (in Belarus)
Gordon Black
Andrei Chapiuk (in Belarus)
Robert Gilman
Stephen James Hubbard
Ksenia Karelina
Ihar Karney (in Belarus)
Vadim Kobzev
Uladzimir Labkovich (in Belarus)
Michael Travis Leake
Aleksei Liptser
Ihar Losik (in Belarus)
Daniel Martindale
Farid Mehralizada (in Azerbaijan)
Marfa Rabkova (in Belarus)
Igor Sergunin
Dmitry Shatresov
Robert Shonov
Eugene Spector
Valiantsin Stafanovic (in Belarus)
Siarhei Tsikhanouski (in Belarus)
Laurent Vinatier
Robert Romanov Woodland
Vladislav Yesypenko (in Crimea)
Yuras Zyankovich (in Belarus)

*. *. *

And again, in the hope that he may actually see it one day, I reiterate my message to Donald Trump:

“Amidst all of the hubbub of your new administration, it is imperative that these innocent men and women not be forgotten. Negotiations for their safe release have been underway for some time. President Joe Biden succeeded in bringing home 16 innocent people on August 1st of last year, and you have added two others to that list. But you should be trying to do even more. Whatever else you do, this should be high on your list of priorities. The people you promised to represent are counting on you.”

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/23/25

My grandmother used to say that. Of course, she was thinking in terms of the narrow confines of our town in 1940s Rhode Island . . . and usually about the kurva (use your imagination) who lived just down the street and had to pass our house on her way to church.

I, on the other hand, am referring to someone much more widely known . . . someone who holds complete power in his own country, and seems to have a terrifying influence over the current occupant of the White House. This guy:

So, while this missive should be addressed to the man in the Oval Office as a caution to beware of his Russian counterpart, I know he’ll never read it; and even if he did, it wouldn’t register, because it’s not what he wants to hear.

But some of the details, since they are intentionally not widely publicized by the Kremlin, might be of interest to the casual reader. So here are a few tidbits to add to what you already know.

*. *. *

There’s nothing secretive about what Vladimir Putin is: what he has done, and continues to do, in Ukraine; about the journalists and dissidents he has arrested and imprisoned in recent years; or about the deaths of the more well-known of his victims, including Alexei Navalny and Yevgeny Prigozhin. But did you know about . . .

The Early Years. Originally a young hoodlum from St. Petersburg (formerly Leningrad), Putin grew up to become a Lieutenant Colonel in the KGB. He was stationed in East Germany when, in 1991, the Soviet Union was suddenly declared kaput. Returning to his home town, he aligned himself with the then mayor of the city, Anatoly Sobchak, a popular liberal of the day. Putin became Sobchak’s fixer, his procurer of goods, services, and information . . . a latter-day Fagin, if you will.

When Yeltsin, then President of Russia, realized that Sobchak was somehow able to acquire things that were still scarce in Moscow and elsewhere, he asked Sobchak why. Learning that it was due to a wily fellow named Putin, Yeltsin snatched Putin away from St. Petersburg and brought him to Moscow. And the rest . . . well, you know . . . history.

Incidentally, Sobchak died in February of 2000 at the age of just 62 years . . . officially of a heart attack, though the opinions of two medical experts were contradictory.

*. *. *

Galina Starovoitova. A former Soviet dissident, she carried on her campaign against corruption in the Russian government and society after the breakup of the Soviet Union by becoming a member of Parliament. She lobbied for legislation to keep former secret intelligence (i.e., KGB) agents out of politics, which would have prevented Vladimir Putin — then an up-and-coming member of the Yeltsin administration — from eventually becoming president. It was, of course, Boris Yeltsin himself who had brought Putin to Moscow from St. Petersburg, and who — on the recommendation of oligarch (now deceased) Boris Berezovsky — had since appointed Putin head of the FSB, a successor agency to the KGB.

But Starovoitova’s campaign failed . . . and so did her heart, when she was shot to death in the hallway of her St. Petersburg apartment building in 1998.

The following year, at the end of 1999, Putin — by then having been elevated to the position of Prime Minister of Russia — was handed the interim presidency when Yeltsin resigned. He then stood for election in March of 2000 and won handily . . . as he has done in every election since then by simply amending the Russian Constitution to extend the term limitations provision as needed.

Had Starovoitova’s legislation been passed, that would not have been possible. Her death was a political necessity.

*. *. *

Moscow Apartment Bombings and Theater Hostage Crisis. In 1999, as Vladimir Putin was preparing to run for the presidency, a series of bombings — the largest being in Moscow — took place in three locations in Russia, killing some 300 people and injuring an estimated 1,000 others. The incidents were immediately labeled as terrorist acts, blamed on Chechen rebels, and were all the impetus needed by Putin to stage his second war on Chechnya. He stepped forward to declare his “war on terrorism,” at the moment when the people of Russia were frightened and needed a strong leader. Coincidence . . . right?

In 2002, more than 900 audience members were taken hostage in the Dubrovka Theater in Moscow . . . this time by actual Chechen rebels in retribution for Putin’s barbaric invasion of their region. In order to free the hostages without giving the terrorists the opportunity to activate the explosives they were carrying, the FSB (successor to the KGB) security troops filled the theater with an anesthetic gas 1,000 times more potent than ricin. When the anesthetized hostages were removed from the theater to be revived, between 130 and 174 of them were dead . . . along with every one of the Chechen rebels.

Dead men don’t talk. In order to silence the hostage-takers, all 900 of the hostages’ lives had been placed in danger . . . at the direct orders of Vladimir Putin. Of the six people who attempted to investigate the incident, three died in strange circumstances. One was Anna Politkovskaya. A fearlessly outspoken journalist who dared to oppose the Putin regime, she continued to report on the horrific situation in Chechnya. She too was shot to death . . . ironically, on Vladimir Putin’s birthday in 2006.

*. *. *

And the list goes on and on: Boris Nemtsov, Alexei Navalny, Aleksandr Litvinenko, Boris Berezovsky . . . all dead, as well as the attempted murders of Sergei Skripal and his daughter, the exile of Mikhail Khodorkovsky, and countless others. All on the orders of the man in the Kremlin.

The man whom Donald Trump has chosen to rehabilitate at the expense of America’s European allies.

The same Donald Trump who once bragged:

“I could stand in the middle of Fifth Avenue and shoot somebody, and I wouldn’t lose any voters, OK?”

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/23/25

Yes, I’ve been digging back through the history files again, and I see that it was on this date in 1980 that the U.S. Olympic hockey team — comprised of college players and considered the obvious underdogs in the match against the four-time gold-medalist Soviet team — performed the now-famous “Miracle On Ice” at Lake Placid, New York.

Against all odds, the Americans beat the pants off the Russians in a nail-biting game that ended 4-3 for the Yanks. And the world went nuts.

In the interest of full disclosure, as always, I admit that I am not a hockey fan. In fact, I’m not much of a sports fan at all, though I do enjoy watching some of the individual sports — particularly gymnastics, skating, swimming and diving. But all in all, I’d rather see a good play or musical.

So why does this event bring back such a clear memory? Actually, it’s because of what happened the following Monday, February 25th, when I was back at work in the law offices of Surrey, Karasik & Morse in Washington.

For those of you who haven’t been following me regularly, allow me to explain, as briefly as possible, that I was working as assistant to the senior partner of the firm, Walter Sterling Surrey, a man of exceptional accomplishments, incredible mental acuity, an unpredictable temper, unflagging loyalty . . . and a sense of humor that knew no bounds and gave no quarter to anyone.

The firm’s practice consisted in large part of the representation of major corporations in connection with international commercial transactions throughout the world’s six inhabited continents. (For some reason, the penguins on Antarctica never saw the need to retain our services.) And a number of Walter’s clients had business dealings in both China and the Soviet Union, which necessitated maintaining contacts with the commercial attaches in both of their embassies.

On the day in question — Monday, February 25th — it happened that “our man” in the Soviet Embassy, Valentin, was scheduled to meet with Walter in our offices to discuss a possible transaction between one of the firm’s clients and the relevant Soviet Ministry (all business was conducted with the Soviet government in those days).

Valentin was the first “real” Russian I had ever met, and he was nothing like the blustering, threatening image I had previously had of Soviet officials. Instead, he was quiet, well-spoken, obviously intelligent, pleasant, and always helpful to Walter in navigating the Soviet bureaucracy. We knew we couldn’t trust him; but we liked him.

That Monday, the chatter in the office — as in much of the rest of the country — was all about the big hockey win the previous Friday. And when Valentin arrived, and I went to escort him from the reception area to Walter’s office, Beelzebub suddenly took control of my brain and my tongue, as he so often did.

As we shook hands and said good morning, I asked Valentin — as I did with all visitors:

“May I offer you something: Coffee? Tea? Hockey puck?”

Holy Mother of God! What had I done?!!

One would think that, at the very least, I had just lost the best job I’d ever had . . . or, at worst, started World War III. But, though the devil may have been in charge of my tongue that day, an angel was obviously sitting on my shoulder. Because Valentin laughed. And I laughed. And we kept laughing, all the way down the hall to Walter’s office.

Later, when the meeting was over and Valentin had left the office, Walter of course had to know what had been so funny. And when I told him, he too roared with laughter. It was just the sort of thing he would have said . . . which is what saved my skin, and my job, that day.

*. *. *

Recalling this small incident today has brought on a sudden wave of nostalgia for what I call my “Walter years.” The ten years that we worked together were, for me, years of learning, of growing, and of being an integral part of the excitement of the ‘80s. Walter was my boss, my mentor, my friend . . . and a father figure, not only to me, but to all of “his people.”

He was, in his earlier years at the State Department, the chief legal draftsman of both the Marshall Plan and the NATO Treaty. He worked, mostly behind the scenes, with Richard Nixon and Henry Kissinger to reopen commercial relations with China in the ‘70s. And he never met anyone he couldn’t converse with, from heads of state to taxi drivers. But he never bragged of his accomplishments. He didn’t need to; you just knew, when you met him, that he was someone special.

I could write a book about those ten years. And who knows? . . . maybe I will.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/22/25

Today marks the 293rd anniversary of the birth of George Washington, born this date in 1732, who ultimately became known as the “Father of our Country.” That is, by any standard, quite an honor.

So . . . what do you think, sir? As your nation approaches its 250th birthday, are you proud of what your descendants have done with your legacy?

I’m sure you were, for about the first 200 years or so. You and your contemporaries got it right, and so did the next six or eight generations. But somewhere along the way, the train went off the tracks.

Oh, sorry . . . you don’t know about railroads trains, do you?

Let’s just say, the principles your generation set forth in the Declaration of Independence and the U.S. Constitution have somehow been shunted aside in the wake of individual political interests. And it sucks. (That’s a modern expression, meaning it’s really, really bad.)

All I can say, President Washington, is that I’m sorry. We’re all sorry . . . those of us who didn’t create the problems but who are most adversely affected by them. If we could go back and start over, we would.

And by the way, we’ve grown. This is how many states we have now (50), with nearly 350 million people from all over the world — people who (or whose forebears) came here seeking opportunity and freedom from oppression, and who built this former wilderness into the shining example it has become for the rest of the world.

We just need to be reminded now and then of our history, of how truly fortunate we are to live here, and of how we need to keep working tirelessly to protect our great nation from tyrants who would destroy us.

*. *. *

I hope you enjoy your birthday, wherever you are, and that you somehow know you are still remembered on this day every year.

And thank you, sir, for being our first President.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/22/25

The short answer is: Yes, they are. But in the midst of all of the recent hullabaloo emanating from the Washington White House, both internally and internationally, as well as the ongoing negotiations over the Ukraine and Gaza situations, China seems to have been relegated to Page Two for the moment.

But not for long.

We must never turn our backs on, or in any way underestimate, the Chinese. Over the past 50-plus years, their relations with Russia have waxed and waned, as have their relations with the United States. And through it all, they’ve grown stronger — economically, diplomatically, and militarily. Make no mistake: they are a force to be reckoned with.

But right now, Chinese President Xi Jinping is faced with a conundrum. He has not criticized Vladimir Putin’s war against Ukraine, even filling many of the gaps in Russia’s economy created by the West’s sanctions since the onset of the war in 2022 — to the advantage of both countries, of course. And Russia has become dependent upon that relationship.

At the same time, Xi has depicted himself as a peacemaker, desirous of assisting as needed in the negotiation process . . . thus placing himself squarely on the fence between Russia and the West, but so far managing not to fall off.

Then along comes Donald Trump, back into the White House, and one of the first things he does is signal his intent to improve relations with Russia by anointing himself the only person in the world who can bring about a peaceful end to the Ukraine conflict. So — completely ignoring the opposition of virtually the entire Western world, the sanctions imposed on Russia by most of America’s allies, and the criminal warrant issued against Putin by the International Criminal Court — he picks up the phone and calls his Russian counterpart, effectively bringing Putin out of purgatory and back into a place of power.

And, if all goes according to plan, before long Russia will no longer be reliant upon China’s increased trade . . . which, needless to say, President Xi finds more than a little distressing. Not to mention the question of whose side Russia would take in the event of a military conflict between China and and its next intended acquisition: Taiwan.

In fact, at the recent Munich Security Conference, U.S. special envoy for Ukraine and Russia Keith Kellogg bluntly stated that the United States aims “to force” Putin into actions he would be “uncomfortable with,” including disrupting Moscow’s ties with China, Iran and North Korea. [Reid Standish, RFE/RL, February 21, 2025.]

And U.S. Vice President JD Vance said in a February 14th interview with The Wall Street Journal that Washington is prepared to reset its relationship with Russia as a move to end Russia’s isolation and its growing dependence on China. [Id.]

*. *. *

To look at it as the most simplistic of analogies, what we seem to have here is a classic case of two high school boys who have been best friends for years, who suddenly find they’re both madly in love with the same girl. And what happens to this trio will depend entirely on the young lady in question. If she is decent and honorable, she will decide which of the young men she likes better, and tell the unfortunate one, as gently as possible, how she feels. With any luck, and hopefully a mature attitude on the part of both boys, they can remain friends.

But if the girl is a slut, and decides she wants to date both of her admirers and play them off against each other, well . . . “trouble” doesn’t adequately describe what they’re in for.

So I suggest you stay tuned for the next chapters of this high-stakes soap opera in your daily news reports, folks . . . it’s bound to be interesting.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/22/25

I was going to take the day off from writing today, when I suddenly realized why the date sounded familiar.

Unless it was your birthday, wedding anniversary, or the birth date of your first-born child, you probably wouldn’t have the slightest idea where you were on February 21, 1994. But I remember it clearly.

I was in Moscow — the one in Russia, not Idaho USA — staying in the apartment/office where I had lived and worked the previous summer. Back from a full day of meetings and a bit of shopping, I was settling down for the evening, and tuned in to the news on the apartment’s satellite TV.

Only half listening, I suddenly heard a news flash about an American who had been arrested in a Washington, D.C. suburb on charges of spying for Russia. That man was Aldrich Ames, and he was said to work for the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA). This was not good news.

But, I thought, it wasn’t all that surprising. The spy games of the Cold War had never really ceased. And who was this Ames guy, anyway? Probably just some low-level pencil-pusher . . . right? Nothing to do with me.

How wrong can you be?!!

It’s true that I had never met Ames . . . didn’t even know he existed before that news broadcast. But life is funny, for many reasons, one of them being this phenomenon known as the domino effect. Also sometimes referred to as “shit flows downstream.”

There is also a theory called “degrees of separation,” which posits that any one of us can trace our relationship to any other human being on Earth through no more than six degrees of separation. For example, if I have a friend whose nanny is the cousin of one of the British royal family’s nannies, then I’m only four or five degrees away from being connected to King Charles III.

Do you see where I’m going here? And in Washington, D.C., where everyone is somehow related to everyone else anyway . . . well, it’s easy to find yourself in the midst of a major shitstorm without having done anything wrong.

*. *. *

I have written at length, in this very blog, about my experiences in 1993-95 with the FBI, the CIA, the KGB, and a couple of high-level Russian defectors; there’s no need to go into the whole long, convoluted story again. Suffice it to say, that TV news flash — which didn’t seem to mean much to me at the time — eventually wove its way into my life.

It turned out that I was the person sitting way downstream when the shit began to flow.

*. *. *

Aldrich Ames was convicted of espionage and sentenced to life in prison without possibility of parole. Now 83 years old, he still sits in the Federal Correctional Institution at Terre Haute, Indiana, presumably just waiting to die. It’s where he belongs, having been responsible for the betrayal and deaths — executions, really — of an estimated 30 CIA assets between 1985 and 1994.

As for me . . . well, I’m still here, free as a bird, savoring my memories of those years of travel and adventure. I may have been at the bottom of the poop pile 31 years ago; but in the long run, I believe I got the better end of the deal.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/21/25

When the world gets to be a bit too much . . . or it’s too cold to go outside . . . or you’re just feeling flat-out lazy . . . you have the option of doing this:

And today, it’s all three. So that’s it for me, for the rest of the day. See you tomorrow.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/21/25

CNN’s Frederik Pleitgen recently asked the man on the street — a street in Moscow, that is — what he thought of Donald Trump.

Without further comment from me, here is what this fine gentleman had to say:

What he didn’t say was whether he thought that was a good or a bad thing.

Just sayin’ . . .

Brendochka
2/21/25