US led NATO Escalates Against Russia

I have translated via [https://translate.yandex.ru/?source_lang=fr&target_lang=en&text=] an article from Philippe Grasset (french journalist, who live in Belgium) from the site https://www.dedefensa.org/. The original in french here: https://www.dedefensa.org/article/le-fuehrer-et-larticle-5

The Fuhrer and Article 5 *

Terrible prospect, isn’t it? * Germany firing a few missiles at Russia and receiving by return mail a salty response, if possible with the very precise and horribly destructive ‘Orechnik’ which would reduce to dust, at night to avoid workers, a factory manufacturing these same missiles. • What would happen next? A war in Europe? No, says Alastair Crooke. • We would rather say: the disorder and the total disunity– – – of Europe of course. • Europe would at least have felt “the burning and terrible breath of war”.

Since his official entry into office, Chancellor Friedrich Merz has been firing all four irons. He does not hide his intentions to attack Russia so that finally the Truth appears in all its nakedness, and Zelensky can walk around Red Square. His enthusiastic zeal even worries his own neighbors and allies a little and, in the spirit of the thing, some French people find memories that they thought they had fled forever thanks to the pacifying virtues of the EU as we talked about it in the 1950s-1990s.

The chancellor’s fever revolves in particular around the ‘Taurus’ missile, supposed to terrorize and pulverize Russia according to Merz’s plans. The Chancellor speaks of these plans as if they were an act of completely unexpected and unforeseen audacity, even if we have been talking about this missile for Ukraine for well over a year. As for its capabilities, which are what we know – good enough, no more, and in any case insufficient and a good prey for the S-400s – Merz speaks of it as Hitler spoke of his “secret weapons” in 1944-1945, to brutally straighten out the course of the war to his advantage.

But let’s leave the emphasis aside. Coming from Blackrock, Merz is a Führer with a short week and a big salary. The singular element is that he seems to believe himself in it. The Russians, on the other hand, do not want to leave anything to chance, and they are coldly examining the situation. The “Russian unanimity”, we should say, who, in order to follow Merz’s course and envisage the course of this war, believes that it must be led to its victorious end, they say, – including the Westernist liberals, now exacerbated patriots. (We leave aside for the moment the zig-zags of Trump, another circus act.)

See what Crooke says, following his very recent stay in St. Petersburg– – words from an interview with “Judge Napolitano”, as partly covered by Mark Wauck on ‘Meaning in History’ of May 27 :

“Crooke begins by describing the atmosphere he felt during his recent stay in St. Petersburg, Russia’s liberal window on the West. According to Crooke, the atmosphere has changed dramatically in just one year. Liberal Russians are now as angry with the West as more nationalist Russians. They are deeply offended by the Western demonization of Russia, Russians and their culture, which is called barbaric. The multiplication of sanctions and the constant lies about the alleged barbarism of the Russians had a cumulative effect on Russian psychology… »

This is an important factor and, unlike Merz’s vituperations and Trump’s zig-zags, a very serious factor. Shortly after taking up these considerations from Crooke, Wauck remarks: “And Putin is well aware of all this”. This means that the Russians, their president first, are indeed planning an attack– – or let’s say “a strike“, – of German origin on the territory of Holy Russia, – which would necessarily be followed by a ”brutal” Russian response on German territory. The thing is clearly said by a Russian expert whom we have known for a long time, also originally well known as a liberal and Westernist– – Dimitri Trenin :

“Russia has made it clear that a strike on our territory with long-range weapons, which German Chancellor Friedrich Merz authorized to be used by the armed forces without restriction, would involve Berlin in the conflict and legitimize German targets for retaliatory attacks by the Russian army. Dimitri Trenine, director of the Institute of Global Military Economics and Strategy of the Higher School of Economics and member of the FNI, said he was confident during the Tsargrad broadcast. The main thing is that the Kremlin is not bluffing: the reaction in case of aggression will be brutal. »

Hello, here it is again, Article 5!

As soon as such a hypothesis, latent for three years, acquires some credit, if not real credibility, the question arises: a war with Germany or a war with Europe and NATO? And for those who are well informed and who can play well-informed specialists, the argument of Article 5 is essential since it implies, it is still said here and there, the automatic commitment of the NATO countries to the aid of one of the members of the Organization. Trenine sweeps it away in a few sentences.

“Such a response against Europe will not lead to a war with NATO as a whole. According to the expert, the United States will accept it. Thus, the truth about Article 5 of the charter of the Atlantic Alliance, which presupposes mutual assistance in the event of an attack on one of the countries of the bloc, has been revealed, and [Trenine] stressed that this article is strongly mythologized.

“This provision of the charter does not imply the automatic entry into the war of the other members of the alliance, at least the United States. It provides for consultations and the implementation of certain measures on which NATO members will agree later. »

Lights on a vivid myth

Why didn’t we mention Article 5! For a group of countries that form the matrix of civilization, it is the only legalistic beam to which they cling to embark on the most absurd adventures believing that they have secured the support of their co-religionists. In a way, it seems that Article 5 is what gives their behavior as hackers and attackers a veneer of respectability under the guise of a legal guarantee.

But all this is just a blah-blah without consistency, although the communication system returns to it at every opportunity as if there was truth in it: that one of them embarks on an adventure and all the others, members of NATO or a state of mind of this kind, will comply with the legal obligation to be by his side without further questioning. All this, thanks to Article 5!

It is a singular adventure that that of Article 5, failing that this Article 5 can guarantee the various adventures of the various members. The question began to arise very seriously, for our period of time, almost 16 years ago, during the war between Russia and Georgia. There was talk at that time, to block the attempts of some to hack an anti-Russian intervention during this war– – of “reinterpretation” of Article 5. This “reinterpretation” consisted in denying those who affirmed that Article 5 required a full military commitment to an Alliance country that was engaged in hostilities (the Georgian case having led some European NATO countries to consider themselves, in pure theory moreover and on tiptoe, an intervention which should, in their “interpretation” of Article 5, involve the others).

dedefensa.org intervened, also at that time, several times about this Article 5, in particular wanting to show the complete disorganization that the various “interpretations” created, in particular on August 20, 2008 and September 19, 2008. In this last text, we showed in particular that the “ambiguity” that everyone was talking about (and continues to talk about) about Article 5, – on the contrary extremely clear as we can see in the excerpt below, – was found among those who spoke about it to cover themselves or to give themselves good arguments of solidarity, much more than in the article itself. This clarity of automatic non-commitment had been wanted by the US Senate in 1949, during the drafting and ratification of the treaty, to avoid an automatism aimed at necessarily linking the USA to a European war ; it was one of the last cartridges of the isolationists.

It was ourselves who highlighted in bold the essential expression of the article, followed by the remark that “the use of armed force” is mentioned there as a possible extreme measure (“including”) and in no way as the central measure envisaged. Finally, Article 5 specified that only “the North Atlantic Region” is concerned by its recommendation.

“In terms of “reinterpretation”, it is simply an obvious interpretation of Article 5, which we know that it does not impose any obligation on the form of assistance to be provided in this case since it leaves it to each member to assess what assistance he will want to provide. Until then, “until a year or two ago,” we were content to accept the ambiguity that made ourselves believe that Article 5 was binding. It is characteristic of this ambiguity that Shanker [NYT journalist], by quickly explaining what Article 5 is, suggests that the title of this article actually reflects an ambiguity. But no, the ambiguity is not in the statement of the text, it is in the official attitude that we maintained towards him; the attitude is (was?) ambiguous, not the text…

As a reminder, always, this famous article, with our own underlined in bold: “The parties agree that an armed attack on one or more of them occurring in Europe or North America will be considered an attack directed against all the parties, and consequently they agree that, if such an attack occurs, each of them, in the exercise of the right of self-defense, individual or collective, recognized by Article 51 of the Charter of the United Nations, will assist the party or parties thus attacked by taking immediate, individually and in agreement with the other parties, such action as it deems necessary, including the use of armed force, to restore and ensure security in the North Atlantic region”. »

Prospects for the European disorder

These clarifications on Article 5 are given to show the legal and psychological imbroglio in which NATO and European countries would be plunged in the event of a Russian response on German territory. It is interesting to note another remark by Alastair Crooke on this issue of a conflict directly affecting Ottoman Europe

“I don’t think it will lead to a larger war in Europe, because the Europeans are not capable of it. … But their goal is to push Trump to an increasing escalation against Russia. They want to weaken Trump and his program, because they hate him, and then they fear the consequences of his economic program. This economic program can destroy Europe, and they understand that, so they don’t want that to happen. »

The assertion about the possibility, quite negative according to Crooke, of a war in Europe is very well founded. As soon as the Westerners begin to understand in reality and firsthand the Russian capabilities, we will necessarily witness various divergences, loopholes, false-evaders and other escapades-cabrioles of each other. Indeed, much more than the extension of a war of which we will have felt the burning and terrible breath, it is rather conceivable that we will witness an explosion of pseudo-solidarities, according to the interests of each other, with internal turmoil that can take on revolutionary proportions. We leave aside the American and Americanist factor as he himself will be subjected to extreme tensions, less with his European “allies” than within himself, between his parties and his factions who hate each other… As Crooke says in his St. Petersburg lecture, and taking “cultural” in its most acute ideological sense :

“American conservatism therefore seems to be rebuilding itself in a more brutal, crueler and much less sentimental form. […] The culture war will then leave the public arena to take place on the battlefield of the street. »

This is sad if not horrible to say– – but where is the culprit if not in this human flaw of believing oneself to be the master of the world while we are destroying it without the need to ‘Taurus’? It is sad to say, then, but we need this ”burning and terrible breath” of the war to return to the merciless hardness but also without pretense of reality. We need some catastrophic situation-truths to think again about the Truth that must get us out of our satanic sham.

Posted online on May 30, 2025 at 19:30.