Dear CCI Friends,
I don’t know whether you get as much information on these topics as I get, but I can’t avoid choosing to spend 2020 doing everything I can do to reject war-making and war continuation. We comfortable people here in America MUST come to grips with what is going on in our name and with our tax dollars. Please help with educating the American public in 2020 — so many are blithely unaware of these facts below.
Dear CCI Friends and Readers,
CCI’s September 2019 trip to Russia is covered below by America’s respected think tank and magazine, The National Interest. The article was co-authored by two CCI travelers, Krishen Mehta and Dennis Ortblad. They traveled to Moscow and St.Petersburg in addition to three Crimean cities, during which time fellow CCI delegates were visiting 17 other Russian cities from Kazan to Yakutia in Eastern Russia. Mehta and Ortblad dove into writing to explain their impressions of the “inscrutable Russia” and what they think we Americans should know and do relative to Russia, the other nuclear superpower.
After scanning the article, let us know if you are interested in traveling on CCI’s June 2020 trip which will explore multiple Russian cities and peoples, their histories, points of view, political leanings, hopes and their sense of the state of the world in 2020. We will send you a “no obligation” application.
Dear CCI Friends and Colleagues,
A Russian whom we Americans love and respect, President Mikhail Gorbachev, spoke out yesterday. His health is in a precarious place and has been for some time, but speaking out on the state of our world seems to give him the impetus to stay alive till now.
In September just passed we had an appointment with President Gorbachev which he was unable to keep due to his condition that day. His devoted interpreter and friend for over 40 years, Pavel Palazhchenko, met with us for two hours shortly thereafter. Our ageing hero is rarely able to keep appointments these days, but even so, still sends out strong messages. His insistence is that we Americans and Russians MUST resurrect our former good relations; or else humanity may cease to exist.
Below is his latest message and following it are several other URL’s delivered in the past few days. Study them and think seriously with us what we can do to get Gorbachev’s messages out to our American friends who don’t take seriously the imminent danger in which we now find ourselves.
Riva Enteen reports on CCI’s recent delegation to Russia and the chance to consider the country and its recent turbulent history from the vantage point of people living there.
Consortium News
October 23rd, 2019
By Riva Enteen
I just came home to California from a 50-person citizen diplomacy delegation to Russia to ponder my neighbor’s bumper sticker that says “Just pretend it’s all OK.” That’s the American state of mind, but it doesn’t extend to Russians, who are painfully aware of war and its death and destruction. The still pervasive images of wheat in the cities and towns reflect the necessity of feeding the people. The US unapologetically operates on the principle that war is good for business. Russians know war too deeply to accept that premise.
Russians call WWII the Great Patriotic War because of all the allies, they lost the most people (27 million) by a wide margin and fought the longest to defeat the Nazis. The siege of Leningrad lasted an almost incomprehensible 900 days. There is a visceral understanding of war in Russia, while in the US war is so sanitized that the corporate media is forbidden to show coffins draped in American flags.
Dear CCI Readers,
Enjoy Natylie Baldwin’s latest piece. It’s very timely and has a different perspective than our U.S. mainstream media.
Rather than continuing these dangerous wars throughout the Middle East, doesn’t it make sense to stop them and create solutions that allow all sides a reasonable outcome? It just takes honorable diplomacy, common sense and goodwill. No one gets everything they want, but the outcome is far better than endless killing fields and refugees. Removing our troops from Syria is one thing on which I can agree with Trump.
