The US Congress is intent on encouraging and increasing the level of confrontation with Russia and has formulated the «Stability and Democracy for Ukraine Act» or «STAND for Ukraine Act», which it intends «to further assist the Government of Ukraine in restoring its sovereignty and territorial integrity to contain, reverse, and deter Russian aggression in Ukraine». The Act is going through the legislative process and is the prime indicator of American strategy as regards Russia, which it wishes to destroy.

It could not be clearer that the Congress of the United States has decided to continue challenging Russia, economically, politically and especially militarily, as have the current president and his likely successor, Hillary Clinton who likes to overthrow foreign presidents who don’t agree with her and giggles, after their murder, that «We came. We saw. He died».

Anti-Russian policy is gathering weight, speed and vast amounts of corporate money in Washington, and the gates on the road to war have been opened wide. At the moment it appears that in no sector of the American government – the military-industrial-Congressional complex – is there any intention to attempt to understand that the citizens of Crimea are the most important factor in the dispute between Ukraine and Russia. Ordinary people don’t matter to the self-anointed «one indispensable nation in world affairs» – what matters to that nation’s political, military, financial and industry leaders is being able to meddle aggressively all round the world with the intent of creating pro-US regimes that will fall in economically to the advantage of commercial enterprises in the United States. They’ve had a major setback in the freedom-seeking Philippines, but they’re still trying hard elsewhere. (President Duterte of the Philippines commented about the widely-seen photograph of a desperate child in Syria by asking «why is it that United States is not doing anything? I do not read you. Anybody in that stupid body complaining about the stench there of death?» He had better be careful, because he’s an obvious candidate for more «We came. We saw. He died» hilarity when Hillary gets in to the White House.)

The anti-Russia Ukraine Act of Congress specifies in Section 301 that «the Secretary of State, after consultation with the Government of Ukraine, shall seek to establish an international consortium to support increased private investment in Ukraine and to provide for participation by the Government of the United States in such consortium». The military-industrial-Congressional complex is rubbing its collective hands with glee.

The xenophobic anti-Russia stance of the US Congress is based on the fact that «between the years of 1940 and 1991, the United States did not recognize the forcible incorporation and annexation of the three Baltic States of Lithuania, Latvia, and Estonia into the Soviet Union» and, therefore, that «no Federal department or agency should take any action or extend any assistance that recognizes or implies any recognition of the de jure or de facto sovereignty of the Russian Federation over Crimea, its airspace, or its territorial waters».

For Congress, the Pentagon and the US media, it’s right back to the happy days of the Cold War when the USSR was the essential bogeyman to justify vast expenditure on military expansion. Crimea is the new lynchpin of lucrative confrontation.

What the US Congress and its media outlets such as the Washington Post are determined to disguise and even deny is the fact that following the US-supported coup in Ukraine the citizens of Crimea, who are predominantly Russian-speaking, Russian-cultured, Russia-supporting people, voted decisively in a referendum to re-join Russia. Yes – re-join.

The anti-Russia propagandists ignore the fact that Crimea was transferred to the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic only in 1954, having been part of Russia for two hundred years. The majority of its people are Russian-oriented and know they would suffer grievously under an anti-Russia Ukrainian regime, such as the one that is enjoying and profiting from massive US support and described by Der Spiegel as ruling over «the most corrupt country in Europe», which is a damning indictment.

Beginning in 1999, the US-NATO military alliance has increased its menacing presence all round Russia’s borders and it is intriguing to note how this threatening deployment is regarded in the West – what is referred to as «the Free World», just like in the happy Cold War Days. The Washington Post, for example, reported with breathless excitement that Russia was conducting military exercises in its own territory in June. But even the WP had to record that «Russia’s drills come as dozens of NATO countries are participating in the largest military exercise in Poland since the end of the Cold War».

It was not Russia that began this enormous expansion of military force. It was the US-NATO military alliance that established military bases and deployed troops, warships and combat aircraft closer and closer to Russia’s borders – many years before the Crimea referendum to re-join Russia.

As the analyst Robert Borosage observed: «the United States and its North Atlantic Treaty Organization allies spend more on their militaries than the rest of the world combined. Washington maintains more than 1,000 bases across the globe, plus 11 aircraft-carrier task forces that are essentially moveable bases». The «Indispensable Nation» has to prove its indispensability by flaunting its massive military power and threatening any nation that dares to behave contrary to the US Playbook. It is not content with having reduced Iraq and Libya to chaos by subjecting them to its martial fandangos: it seeks to impose regime change in other countries that refuse to bow obediently to the Indispensable Nation.

The US-NATO military deployments and manoeuvres around Russia’s borders continue with growing intensity and media hype. Their purpose is clear: to intimidate Russia and force it to react militarily, whereupon Moscow will be subjected to even more insults and pressure. And so the macabre cycle of confrontation continues. But there has to be a limit. The surge of insult and provocation on the part of the US and some of its NATO subordinates can be tolerated for only so long. They want war, but they had better be careful what they wish for, because they might get it.