Mass speculation has emerged after the sudden announcement this week that influential US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland would be resigning from her position in the Biden White House.
The surprising development came Tuesday amidst a difficult moment for US President Joe Biden. Former President Donald Trump has maintained a steady lead over Biden in opinion polling as questions remain about the octogenarian head of state’s ability to serve a second term. Cracks have also begun to show in Biden’s political coalition as pro-Palestine activists urge a show of defiance against the president’s foreign policy in state primary contests.
The problems extend to the personnel of Biden’s Cabinet as a scandal has arisen over Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin’s lack of transparency over health issues. With the president facing challenges on multiple fronts, why would the White House choose this moment for a staff shakeup? Former US Central Intelligence Agency analyst Ray McGovern speculated the answer may lie in disagreements between Biden administration officials and the notoriously strong-willed Nuland during a discussion on Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program Wednesday.
“The CIA would have, the NSA would have those conversations as well,” said McGovern, referring to leaked recordings of discussions between Nuland and German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius that appeared to reveal plans for an imminent attack on Russian soil. The leaks generated significant embarrassment for German officials as attention was drawn to Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s support for the Ukraine proxy conflict.
Nuland’s bellicose rhetoric may suggest she was going rouge, according to McGovern, attempting to contrive a highly escalatory attack on a nuclear power without approval from her superiors in the State Department.
“My best guess here is that the CIA and the Defense Department and the NSA got this message around saying, 'look, Victoria's got her own agenda here,’” said the analyst. “‘The president doesn't really want to strike these ammo depots in Russia or knock down the [Crimean] Bridge. So we got to rein her in, I guess it's time for her to go to early retirement.’”
Nuland has enjoyed a decades-long tenure in multiple US presidential administrations. Journalist Glenn Greenwald recently documented the controversial legacy of the arch neoconservative, criticizing her “catastrophic career fomenting bipartisan wars.”
The discussion then turned towards French-Russian relations, which took a nosedive last week after French President Emmanuel Macron mused about the possibility of sending European troops to assist the Ukrainian regime in the Donbass. Russian State Duma chairman Vyacheslav Volodin responded forcefully to Macron’s suggestion, recalling the history of military engagement between the two countries.
“To maintain his personal power, Macron could not think of anything better than to ignite a third world war,” said Volodin in comments posted on social media. “His initiatives are becoming dangerous for the citizens of France. Before making such statements, it would be right for Macron to remember how it ended for Napoleon and his soldiers, more than 600,000 of whom were left lying in the damp earth.”
“The Russians remember that with particular pride,” said McGovern of France’s crushing defeat, which serves to prove the adage that it’s never wise to attack Russia during the winter. A certain mustachioed German chancellor would learn the same lesson more than a century later as millions of Russians made the ultimate sacrifice to save the world from Nazism.