Last week, Moscow hosted the first ‘Dialog of Nations’ conference, which involved a disrespectful geopolitical gesture – shredding the U.S. flag.
The conference, held by the Anti-Globalization Movement of Russia, was aimed to represent “many small nations that have historical experience of political independence” and who “think about their revival.”
The conference included separatists from many Western states – Spain, Italy and Ireland – as well as Western Sahara nations. However, it’s interesting to note that the largest amount of representatives came from the U.S.
Russia has long been keeping warm ties with separatists in Texas – the ones who want to include the matter of secession on Texas’s GOP ballot.
But now it seems that the head of the conference, Alexander Ionov, who has ties to a fundamentalist Orthodox party Rodina, has managed to reach out to other American separatists.
However, no representative from Texas who scheduled their attendance did not arrive to the conference. And although Ionov held a meeting with a Native American representative this summer, no Native American representative showed up either.
But the conference still saw leaders of separatist movements from Hawaii, Puerto Rico and the Uhuru black nationalist movement in attendance.
Hawaiian and Puerto Rican separatists want Russia’s help
The Hawaiian ‘delegation’ was represented by Lanny Sinkin from the Independent and Sovereign Nation State of Hawaii, who called for the return to the erstwhile Hawaiian monarchy.
An unincorporated U.S. territory – Puerto Rico – was represented by Ramon Nenadich, who threatened to put responsibility on the U.S. for “crimes of war and genocide … in its occupation of Puerto Rico.”
The Uhuru black nationalist movement’s leader, Chairman Omali Yeshitela, called for Russia’s help to push the claim before the UN that the U.S. is responsible for genocide against African Americans.
However, it’s more important to look at those who were not invited to know that the conference was a complete sham. There were no Russian representatives from neither Tatarstan, Siberia, Crimean Tatar population nor from Chechnya. In other words: the conference did not welcome those who could threaten the territorial integrity of Russia.
Is Crimean scenario possible in Syria?
Meanwhile, Russia has been stepping up its military presence in Syria this month, which raises concerns that Russian President Vladimir Putin might have plans to follow the Crimean scenario in Syria.
For many years, Moscow was providing aid to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad to let him keep his regime on the remaining territories, not looking for any direct involvement in the conflict.
But now there are all signs that Russia is not interested in supporting the Syrian government, it is interested in controlling the entire Syria.
The Crimean scenario has been so far used against Russia’s neighboring countries, which at some point of their existence tried to escape the Kremlin’s influence and push Moscow away from strategic assets owned by Russia for decades.
Russia carries out a direct or indirect intervention in the country it is interested in, while the intervention always has to be backed by a certain part of local population. Russia calls itself the protector of ethnic, linguistic and religious minorities, who allegedly seek Russia’s military intervention to fight governments and ‘free’ those minorities.
The first country to experience this scenario was Georgia in 2008, when Russian tanks invaded the country to allegedly protect Ossetian and Abkhazian minorities from the ‘fascist’ Tbilisi regime.
Obama’s softness allowed Russia to invade Syria
It felt like Putin was initially afraid of a possible strict response from the U.S. and the EU, which could punish Russia for such actions. But there was no response Putin had been afraid of.
U.S. President Obama was still talking about the reset policy with Russia and created a joint committee to resolve the conflict, but then completely forgot about it.
Emboldened by the successful operation in Georgia, Putin decided to try his chances with Ukraine, where pro-Western leaders took a course on NATO. Russia invaded Crimea in March 2014 to allegedly ‘free’ Russian-speaking majority from the fascist Kyiv regime.
Not seeing any significant pushback from the West for annexing Crimea, Putin sent his troops into eastern Ukraine, where he has been helping the so-called local militia.
Having invaded Georgia, Putin gained control over routes to Chechnya and Caucasus as well as expanded Russian presence on the Black Sea. With the help of Crimea, Putin saved the largest base of Russia’s navy. And in eastern Ukraine Putin gained a leverage against the Kyiv regime.
If Putin is not stopped in Syria…
Russia has been sending its advanced military equipment to Syria in order to allegedly give it to the Syrian army to fight against ISIS. But in reality, those hardware units remain under Russia’s control. According to media reports, there are about 20,000 Russian advisers on the Syrian territory.
That means Putin has all he needs to go with the Crimean scenario in Syria. Russia will soon announce its efforts to protect minorities such as Turcomen, Orthodox Christians and Armenians who have fled from terroristic groups in Syria.
By controlling a part of Syrian territory that has become a safe place for minorities, Russia will likely try to persuade the Syrian government to decentralize power – the same thing Putin does in Georgia and Ukraine.
Thus, Syria will likely become a yet another Crimea: it will either experience occupation or annexation by Russia.
And if Putin is not stopped in Syria, there will be other states he will get interested in spreading his influence on.
