"Provoked: How Washington Started THE NEW COLD WAR WITH RUSSIA AND THE CATASTROPHE IN UKRAINE" By Scott Horton, Book Review

Much Deserved and Well Earned; A Geopolitical Analyst's Wet-Dream

“With each crisis our government incites, We the People lose more of our freedom.”

Scott Horton’s Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine, The Libertarian Institute.

First a bit about the Author, Scott Horton. By reading book reviews in various publications over the years I grasped that a writer of an esteemed publication such as my own, Declaration of Liberty, here on Substack, I would be behind if I waited for a book’s release to get a copy. Other publications get their hands on copies in advance, read them, and have their review already ready when a book is released. Too bad I hadn’t figured this out and got the nerve to send a message until a week after its release, so as my readers are privy to me being, I was late as usual. With that being said, as a fan of ALL things Scott Horton and Scott Horton adjacent, it was, how should I say, refreshing, to know that not only is Scott Horton a well-read, well-spoken genius of geopolitics, with over five thousand interviews stretching back to when I was in kindergarten, and the top intellectual of our times, he’s also generous! Even with me being two weeks late to email, and my, not just one, or two, but three messages totally fan-boying out like a high school schoolgirl, he simply said, and I quote, “hehe. gimme your mailing address.”

So, when the book came in the mail, I was revved up to get it read and get to writing but, boy I wasn’t ready for what was in that box. At 678 pages and over 6600 citations there’s no fucking reason that this isn’t a New York Times Best Seller and book of the year. Maybe a Pulitzer Prize Winner but, from the words of Chris Hedges, who is a Pulitzer Prize Winner, so he should know, those things are bought and paid-for like the Oscars. Only narrative fitting stories make that bill, Provoked, instead, is narrative shattering story, and we couldn’t have that. In fact, this book lays out quite efficiently, maybe more efficiently than anyone else, a rebuke of one of the more recent Pulitzer controversy's, the prize for the “Russia, Russia, Russia” Disclosures, by another name of course.

The book came in a medium-sized box, a box awful large for a book and it took up the entire box! I brought it inside, opened the box, pulled out this massive book, and started flipping through it. Let me just say, this book is a geopolitical analysts wet dream! It has everything! First off, it has every single moment that pertained to Russia’s relationship with the United States for the last 35 years, and you quickly realize that Russia has been scapegoated as evil doer of all things evil, since the fall of the Soviet Union. Since the Ukraine invasion, I have been trying to figure out when the rise of Russophobia happened in the United States, because there was never one thing that made me think that I should be against Russia, but many people in a bipartisan manor regard Russia as an evil empire. I had come to the belief that this was rooted in Russiagate, but this book proves that it went so much deeper than that. This was a systemic hatred that carried over from the fall of the USSR and ran parallel to the financial need to excise demons, militarily. Matt Taibbi commented once on his show America This Week w/ Walter Kirn that when he went to study abroad in Soviet Russia before the fall, there were entire studies, whole careers, dedicated to the Soviet culture, “Soviet Studies” and such. People whose entire careers and college major was going to be studying these people in the Soviet Union, so when the Soviet Union fell, where did these people go? Where indeed.

I finally made it through the book once, but this is not a book to just read and get the story. For me, this is something to keep at arm’s length any time you start to wonder, who’s the bad guy here? Well, we wouldn’t do that right? Or something in the news simply doesn’t make sense. Search through the book, there’s a chapter on it. Or something related to it. Even the most recent story about the United States Agency for International Development (USAID), there’s plenty of evils by them to refer back to in this book. From the Berlin Wall to Russiagate, this book gives you SO MUCH, it leaves no room for doubt! As soon as I finished typing this today, I clicked over to my YouTube feed, and what do I see? Scott vs. Eli Lake at the SoHo Forum, debating this book, and I had to add this in during the edit, because I must say, after reading this book, although Eli might’ve made a good argument, I couldn’t tell. It sounded like gibberish, anyone can read off what CNN says is true, but I’ve read this book, and dug through the footnotes, and no argument to the contrary of what this book says, well, we’re not even speaking the same language. Scott kills it, as usual.

To clear up the handwringing from the Michael Moynihan’s of the world who will strawman the entire book with a single dumbass line, “Er, we did? Why not Putin? What he did?!” (in best caveman dialect) Scott includes realistic options that Putin could had besides invading!

Anyone wanting to know why America’s foreign policy is such a disaster needs to look no farther. Scott’s last book Enough Already explained the terror wars of the last 20 year's fully, and Fool’s Errand is a damn masterpiece on the ‘war in Afghanistan’, they are both a result of our foreign policy. I haven’t read Hotter Than the Sun yet, but knowing it’s about nuclear war, it’s what we are heading toward if this continues, but Provoked tells the story of how it got this way and hangs them with their own words. It’s very much the inside story that played out just beyond the public eye. It wasn’t completely buried in classified documents and such, however, there is some of that, most of these stories were in the public’s eye, but we neither knew it was the story, nor had the ability to place it all in order and view it as one single story. Let’s be honest, how many people, on average, have analyzed 6,600 news stories or pieces of data on a subject. Scott was uniquely equipped for this because, fuck what Michael C. Moynihan and Iraq War “Stool Pigeon” Jonah Goldberg has to say, Scott’s been there, damn near since the beginning, following geopolitics, and interviewing the people there, in the know, during the time that this would have been fresh on their minds. Regardless of what those narrative-driven voices have to say about any of this, it means nothing. The evidence says different. And Scott give’s SO MUCH EVIDENCE for every single claim he makes. You can only come away with one position, what Scott’s saying is right, and the rest is just noise!

I listened to the critics of this book, disputing it with Scott like Noam Dworman, owner of the Comedy Cellar, just dying to come up with a reason this book can’t be true, and he couldn’t do it. He was left arguing that Scott had an exchange with Candace Owens that wasn’t a struggle session (meaning, they got along). Oh, and one of his sources thought it was kinda odd that Saudi’s had been involved in 9/11, or something to that effect. I’m sorry, if you feel 100% OK, about everything that went down with 9/11, maybe the DHS should have you on a list. While I’m talking about Dworman, one of his criticisms when he had Dave Smith on, was the ‘not one inch’ quote was mischaracterized and he’d “read a whole book about this” discrediting it, so I think, damn, I’ve got to get this book. The book is Not One Inch: America, Russia, and the Making of Post-Cold War Stalemate by M.E. Sarotte, and it maps out how “Not one inch towards the Russian border” was the agreement that was made in the “2+4 Meetings” and others alluded to it in subsequent talks. They said, “they would not move NATO one inch further towards Russia’s borders in unified Germany” after the fall of the Soviet Union if Gorbachev “let East and West Germany reunify”, his claim is they said this once during the meetings and he read this book proving this, hoping no one else does their homework. The entire premise of the book was “Yes, they did say this, and they meant it”, Scott uses Sarotte’s book as a source too. He explains that Baker made this claim to Gorbachev at the same time that Robert Gates was saying this to the head of the KGB. Then they started to turn it on its head, so that it fit their interest, saying “what we meant was we wouldn't not move NATO towards Russia”, that’s what we meant, and “who cares? Russia’s not a great power like we are.” They’re a second-rate power. What they mean by that, besides demeaning the people is in power politics there should always be a buffer zone between ‘great powers. in order to keep peace. Ukraine is that buffer zone. By the way, all of this is in Provoked, just one book. Sorry, Sarotte. Most importantly, was Gorbachev believed it and they lied to him.

Thinking of liars, Nile (sic) Ferguson debated Scott on his book also, and after hitting more roadblocks than a fire fighter in the Palisades, he decides, well Scott must be wrong because “he doesn’t speak Ukrainian” (!!!) These people with come with one claim and expect, as they always have, everyone to bow at their feet! Scott offers fifty pieces of concrete, unimpeachable evidence to destroy their unfounded claims, leaving them arguing about what languages he knows and who he hangs out with, it’s fucking pathetic!

Through this book I gained a perspective, that I already half believed, that the ‘War in Ukraine’ had happened after American meddling into other people's politics for decades, creating fear and instability, as they do with everything they touch, but I wasn’t sure of this next part. I didn’t want to be so cynical, but it’s here in black and white. They didn’t do this because it’s what they believe in. There’s lots of devastation and desecration caused at the hands of belief, but these people don’t believe in ANYTHING. They’re simply interested parties, and working to secure that interest no matter who gets in their way. In the chapter The Iron Triangle, Scott shows this exactly:

According to Secretary Albright, an informal poll of the members of the Council on Foreign Relations showed opposition to expansion by a margin of two to one. If so many leaders of America’s foreign policy establishment were opposed to NATO expansion due to concerns about provoking a negative reaction from Russia, then how did the hawks win?

Representing the establishment consensus, George Kennan ironically, and wrongly, thought that “[w]ere the Soviet Union to sink tomorrow under the waters of the ocean, the American military-industrial complex would have to remain, substantially unchanged, until some other adversary could be invented. Anything else would be an unacceptable shock to the American economy.” But Kennan was a diplomat and historian, not an economist.

Of course, Kennan was wrong about this, as Scott tells what will actually happen per economics, but this is the fucking establishment consensus! It’s what those demons put out there. Here’s what economists who were not on the board of Lockheed Martin say:

The end of American militarism would have been a shock to the arms manufacturers, to the benefit of everyone else whose money they had been confiscating and destroying. With a peace dividend, all that wealth, material, labor and talent could be reinvested in improving the production of actual goods and services to benefit the public’s quality of life. [167]

But their interests rested somewhere else, listen to where:

But the vested interests were not going to give up without a fight. As Richard Cummings explained in his 2007 article “Lockheed Stock and Two Smoking Barrels,” [168] the 1990s-era U.S. Committee to Expand NATO (later renamed The U.S. Committee on NATO) was a project of Lockheed Martin Vice President Bruce Jackson. The policy was in large part a racket for selling jets either directly to the Eastern European states, or failing that, to force the American taxpayer to pick up the tab for them. Cummings wrote, “The objective of the committee was to push for membership in the NATO military alliance for former Soviet bloc countries including Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic.” [169]

The New York Times reported in 1997, “[A]t night Bruce Jackson is president of the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO, giving intimate dinners for senators and foreign officials. By day, he is director of strategic planning for Lockheed Martin Corporation, the world’s biggest weapons maker.” [170]

—A committee called the U.S. Committee to Expand NATO, a military alliance that was only supposed to exist long enough for post-WW2 Europe to become strong enough to defend themselves against the Soviet Union, not only continues to exist long after Europe’s return to strength and the fall of the Soviet Union but has the Vice-President of one the largest weapons companies in the world campaigning for its expansion! Which happens to be a direct threat, and a way to continue conflict with the newly liberated Russia. Maybe the guy just really believed NATO was a net good for the world…..

Cummings explained the facts of life. The relationships between the neoconservatives’ think tanks, lobbying firms and defense industry amounted to an “iron triangle” that rules the capital city and virtually “always gets what it wants.” [171] Lockheed Martin and their contemporaries had a simple interest in mind: selling big-ticket weapons systems to the new allies to bring their militaries up to NATO standards. Poland got expensive new fighter jets [172] and missile systems. [173] It was a tax money goldmine. [174] Soon Jackson created the Committee for the Liberation of Iraq, [175] and worked hard behind the scenes with a lobbyist named Sally Painter [176] to publish the “Letter of 10,” signed by Eastern European states in support of launching Iraq War II in 2003. [177] Jackson got his way there as well, though the degree of the Iraqis’ liberation remains in dispute. [178]

In 1999, the epitome of corrupt American big business showered millions of dollars on NATO officials, foreign ministers and diplomats from across Central and Eastern Europe at a big party in Washington in celebration of NATO’s 50th anniversary. Boeing, Motorola, Nextel, TRW, Honeywell, United Technologies, Ford, GM, Kodak and Raytheon along with various high-power lobbying firms were in attendance. The Washington Post quoted Gerald Robbins of 3Com Corp boasting about their contracts supplying equipment for NATO’s AWACS surveillance and control planes flying missions over Kosovo. “NATO is a big customer,” Robbins said. [179] The Military-Industrial Complex that President Ike Eisenhower helped to build and then warned about on his last day in office [180] has captured our government, in alliance with foreign states in the Middle East, Europe and Asia, and their allied domestic lobbies. [181]

Horton, Scott. Provoked: How Washington Started the New Cold War with Russia and the Catastrophe in Ukraine (pp. 143-144). The Libertarian Institute. Kindle Edition.

Just to be clear, the “Capital city” he’s referring to is our nation's capital, Washington, DC, and to be even clearer, “The Committee for the Liberation of Iraq”, is a front for BUY MY WEAPONS PLEASE!

“Hey, I started up a couple committees, we’re trying to “expand” this NATO and “liberate” them Iraqi’s, we determined in our committee's that the best thing for that is fighter jets and bazookas, and I happen to know just the place to get a few…….”

Back to the book, let’s talk about the title, I’ve heard a few “Nobody” critics take issue with the title, they are nobodies! The title is perfect. It’s akin to Dr. Fauci’s biography being called “Safe and Effective”. It’s perfect, throughout the book Scott organically starts running into complaints and warnings, and sometimes musing menacing's about how NATO expansion, among other things is gonna “provoke” the Russians”, and like clockwork, or maybe guilt rising up from deep down inside of their guts. The immediate media narrative following the February invasion was “mention the attack/invasion/whatever you wanna call it but you must refer to it as Unprovoked”. They ran with that myth continuously, like many of the recent media myths, passed down from high. “Joe Rogan/Horse Dewormer”, “Donald Trump/Russian Asset”, etc. Also, looking at it through the lens of it being a Russian provocation, this book gives the most thorough, most complete, and most up-to-date walk through the Russiagate scandal from beginning to end, nothing left out and everything cited.

This book starts at the George H.W. Bush Administration and lists America’s provocations against the Russians through every administration including Trump 2.0.

This book is a must-read for a few groups of readers, those that would like to know what actually is going on between Russia and Ukraine, this books for you.

If you’d like to read a thoroughly unbelievable but factually accurate story of corruption, greed, malfeasance, and out and out disregard for human life at the top of our government, this books for you.

If you’d like to know where your hard-earned tax dollars go when they enter the hands of the government, this is a great start!

If you’d like to know how the freest country on earth, became hated by the whole damn world, this is your book.

If you’d like to know how foreign policy has worked in America for the last forty years, this books for you (by the way, the lead characters of this book are the American deep state).

And if you’d like to know why two neighboring countries are approaching three years at war, with so much blood lost on both sides, one side has run out of 20-year-olds to get slaughtered on the frontlines, and both sides are using slavery tactics to force people to fight to the death, and would like to know how we could’ve saved these people, this is the book for you! It’s all there.

Thank you for reading! Have a wonderful day.

Jordan Lee Canter Editor-in-Chief Declaration of Liberty