Behind incessant rhetorical invocations of a "democratic revolution," Ukraine's newly-installed government of former bankers, fascists and oligarchs is preparing draconian austerity measures.
The plans being drawn up are openly described as the "Greek model," i.e., the programme of savage cuts imposed on Greece by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and European Union (EU) that has caused Greece's economy to collapse by nearly 25 percent in five years and produced a massive growth in unemployment and poverty.
In the case of Ukraine, however, this social devastation is to be unleashed against a country that has already been subjected to the scorched earth economics of capitalist restoration. Even before the latest events, Ukraine was the 80th poorest country in the world based on gross domestic product per capita, behind Iraq, Tonga and Bosnia-Herzegovina.
More than one quarter of its population—11 million people—live below the official poverty line, which is set at a meagre 1,176 UAH ($127) per month. The situation is far worse than official figures indicate, however. With an average monthly wage of only 1,218 UAH ($131), or 79 US cents per hour, millions more survive barely above subsistence level.
The official unemployment rate of 7.5 percent masks large numbers of unregistered and underemployed workers. It is, moreover, held down by high emigration, with tens of thousands fleeing the country in search of jobs. The equivalent of 15 percent of Ukraine's population has left the country, giving it one of the largest diasporas in the world. Between 1991, when the Soviet Union was dissolved, and 2010, Ukraine's population shrank from 51.7 million to 45.9 million.
Besides migration, the population decline is a consequence of Ukraine's contracting birth rate, which is among the lowest in the world. Tragically, the country also has the highest maternal mortality rate in Europe, part of a health crisis that has seen incidences of HIV/AIDS grow to epidemic proportions, with 57 new cases a day identified in 2012.
Poverty has played a major role in the spread of HIV/AIDS—especially in parts of the formerly heavily industrialised regions of the east and south, where conditions are already depression-like.
In poverty's wake has come an explosion of all manner of social diseases—from drug abuse and alcoholism to prostitution, with every sixth prostitute reckoned to be a minor. This is an underestimation, as Ukraine is a major hub of human trafficking, for the purposes of both sexual exploitation and forced labour.
These conditions are a direct consequence of the counterrevolutionary role of the Stalinist bureaucracy and its betrayal of the October 1917 Revolution, which reached its climax in the destruction of the Soviet Union and the restoration of capitalism.

READ MORE: What the Western-backed regime is planning for Ukrainian workers

Upon the processing of 50% ballots cast Sunday in a referendum on Crimea's future, a total of 95.5% voters who had come to the polling stations said 'yes' to the reunification of their region with Russia, Mikhail Malyshev, a person in charge of the referendum commission at the Crimean legislature said.

Another 3.5% voters said 'yes' to Crimea's continued stay within Ukraine. Invalidated ballots made up 1% of the total. Malyshev said that the data did not feature the results of voting in Sevastopol.

The ballots in Sunday's referendum contained two questions: 1) Are you in favor of Crimea's reunification with Russia in the status of a constituent territory of the Russian Federation and 2) Are you in favor of restoring the 1992 Constitution of the Republic of Crimea and its status of an integral part of Ukraine.

As many as 1,534,815 people of Crimea and 309,774 people in the city of Sevastopol had the right to vote in the referendum. As many as 27 territorial election committees and 1,239 polling stations, including 192 polling stations in the city of Sevastopol were set up for the event.

The expenditures for the referendum were covered from the autonomy's budget. Referendum's organizational costs stood at 1.7 million U.S. dollars. Under the Constitution of the Russian Federation the initiative of joining the Russian Federation is the prerogative of the applicant state (or of its part). The Russian president notifies the parliament and government of the Russian Federation of such a request.

After the signing of an international treaty the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation examines it for legality and compliance with the Constitution. The document undergoes ratification. The name of the new territory of the Russian Federation, its borders and transitional period are determined.

The newly-admitted territory is granted the status of a republic, territory, autonomous area or autonomous district. Next, the rules are established of granting Russian citizenship, and the status of the property assets and liabilities of the entering state and the period of the new member's integration with the Russian system are determined.

READ MORE: More than 95% Crimeans voted for reunification with Russia, says official

The human race is on the brink of momentous and dire change. It is a change that potentially smashes our institutions and warps our society beyond recognition. It is also a change to which almost no one is paying attention. I'm talking about the coming obsolescence of the gun-wielding human infantryman as a weapon of war. Or to put it another way: the end of the Age of the Gun.

You may not even realize you have been, indeed, living in the Age of the Gun because it's been centuries since that age began. But imagine yourself back in 1400. In that century (and the 10 centuries before it), the battlefield was ruled not by the infantryman, but by the horse archer—a warrior-nobleman who had spent his whole life training in the ways of war. Imagine that guy's surprise when he was shot off his horse by a poor no-count farmer armed with a long metal tube and just two weeks' worth of training. Just a regular guy with a gun.

That day was the end of the Middle Ages and the beginning of modernity. For centuries after that fateful day, gun-toting infantry ruled the battlefield. Military success depended more and more on being able to motivate large groups of (gun-wielding) humans, instead of on winning the loyalty of the highly trained warrior-noblemen. But sometime in the near future, the autonomous, weaponized drone may replace the human infantryman as the dominant battlefield technology. And as always, that shift in military technology will cause huge social upheaval.

The advantage of people with guns is that they are cheap and easy to train. In the modern day, it's true that bombers, tanks, and artillery can lay waste to infantry—but those industrial tools of warfare are just so expensive that swarms of infantry can still deter industrialized nations from fighting protracted conflicts. Look at how much it cost the United States to fight the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, versus how much it cost our opponents. The hand-held firearm reached its apotheosis with the cheap, rugged, easy-to-use AK-47; with this ubiquitous weapon, guerrilla armies can still defy the mightiest nations on Earth.

The Age of the Gun is the age of People Power. The fact that guns don't take that long to master means that most people can learn to be decent gunmen in their spare time. That's probably why the gun is regarded as the ultimate guarantor of personal liberty in America—in the event that we need to overthrow a tyrannical government, we like to think that we can put down our laptops, pick up our guns, and become an invincible swarm.

Of course, it doesn't always work out that way. People Power has often been used not for freedom, but to establish nightmarish tyrannies, in the Soviet Union, Mao's China, and elsewhere. But Stalin, Mao, and their ilk still had to win hearts and minds to hold power; in the end, when people wised up, their nightmare regimes were reformed into something less horrible.

But another turning point in the history of humankind may be on the horizon. Continuing progress in automation, especially continued cost drops, may mean that someday soon, autonomous drone militaries become cheaper than infantry at any scale. 
Note that what we call drones right now are actually just remote-control weapons, operated by humans. But that may change. The United States Army is considering replacing thousands of soldiers with true autonomous robots. The proposal is for the robots to be used in supply roles only, but that will obviously change in the long term. Sometime in the next couple of decades, drones will be given the tools to take on human opponents all by themselves.

Meanwhile, technological advances and cost drops in robotics continue apace. It is not hard to imagine swarms of agile, heavily armed quadrotor drones flushing human gunmen out of buildings and jungles, while hardened bunkers are busted with smart munitions from cheap high-altitude robot blimps. (See this video if your imagination needs assistance.)

The day that robot armies become more cost-effective than human infantry is the day when People Power becomes obsolete. With robot armies, the few will be able to do whatever they want to the many. And unlike the tyrannies of Stalin and Mao, robot-enforced tyranny will be robust to shifts in popular opinion. The rabble may think whatever they please, but the Robot Lords will have the guns.
Forever.

READ MORE: Drones will cause an upheaval of society like we haven’t seen in 700 years

Earlier today we reported that according to weekly Fed data, a record amount - some $105 billion - in Treasurys had been sold or simply reallocated (which for political reasons is the same thing) from the Fed's custody accounts, bringing the total amount of US paper held at the Fed to a level not seen since December 2012. While China was one of the culprits suggested to have withdrawn the near USD-equivalent paper, a far likelier candidate was Russia, which as is well-known, has had a modest falling out with the West in general, and its financial system in particular. Turns out what Russian official institutions may have done with their Treasurys (and we won't know for sure until June), it was merely the beginning. In fact, as the FT reports, in silent and not so silent preparations for what will be near-certain financial sanctions (which would include account freezes and asset confiscations following this Sunday's Crimean referendum) the snealy Russians, read oligarchs, have already pulled billions from banks in the west thereby essentially making the biggest western gambit - that of going after the wealth of Russia's 0.0001% - moot.

Russian companies are pulling billions out of western banks, fearful that any US sanctions over the Crimean crisis could lead to an asset freeze, according to bankers in Moscow.

Sberbank and VTB, Russia's giant partly state-owned banks, as well as industrial companies, such as energy group Lukoil, are among those repatriating cash from western lenders with operations in the US. VTB has also cancelled a planned US investor summit next month, according to bankers.

The flight comes as last-ditch diplomatic talks between Russia's foreign minister and the US secretary of state to resolve the tensions in Ukraine ended without an agreement.

Markets were nervous before Sunday's Crimea referendum on secession from Ukraine. Traders and businesspeople fear this could spark western sanctions against Russia as early as Monday.

So the bottom line is that Russia, thinking a few steps ahead, already has withdrawn the bulk of its assets from the West, and why not. Recall that a year ago it was revealed that the same Russians who were supposed to be punished in Cyprus had mostly withdrawn their funds in advance of the bail in: they tend to know what is coming. It was the ordinary Cypriot citizens, who had done nothing wrong, who were most impaired.

And so while the Russian response is already known, we wonder just how true is the inverse: just how prepared is the west, and especially Europe, to exist in a world in which a third of Germany's gas is suddenly cut off? We can't wait to find out early next week.

READ MORE: The Russians Have Already Quietly Pulled Their Money From The West

Russian energy company, Soyuzneftegaz, says construction of a pipeline from major oil producer Iraq to Syria could start once the conflict in Syria is over.

"The project could be carried out with the participation of Russian and Italian companies," Yuri Shafranik, head of the energy company said in an interview on Friday.

The former Russian energy minister added that the project has been discussed with the officials of the two countries and they had agreed it should go ahead once peace returns to Syria.

Shafranik also expressed hope that a deal signed with Damascus on the joint exploration of Block 2 of Syria's territorial waters can be concluded to develop oil and gas in peaceful regions of Syria.
"If there is no possibility of normalizing the situation throughout the country at once, the situation should be stabilized gradually in regions where it is possible to conclude an agreement," he noted.

The "Amrit" contract, which was signed by the Syrian Ministry of Petroleum and Mineral Resources and the Russian firm on December 25, 2013, spans 25 years and covers oil exploration in the area between the Mediterranean port city of Tartus and Banyas city at a depth of 70 kilometers.

Shafranik said exploration in the agreed region would take at least five years before any commercial production.

Syria has been gripped by deadly violence since 2011. Some sources say around 130,000 people have been killed and millions displaced due to the violence fueled by Western-backed militants.

According to reports, Western powers and their regional allies -- especially Qatar, Saudi Arabia and Turkey -- are supporting the militants operating inside Syria.

READ MORE: Russian firm plans Iraq-Syria oil pipeline after peace

Many phenomena, real and imagined, have been attributed to global warming. From rising ocean levels to increased agricultural yields to tornadoes to polar vortices to droughts to rapes to car thefts, global warming now stands as the cause of just about anything. And because of current political dogma, man is ultimately blamed for all these evils (and occasional goods).

Now a recent study in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences argues that there is a correlation between increasing global temperatures and the rise of the Mongolian empire. According to "Pluvials, droughts, the Mongol Empire, and modern Mongolia," the "dramatic increase in temperature and precipitation in the 13th century" increased grassland production, favoring the formation of Mongolian power, which was predominantly reliant on horses.
For global-warming alarmists, there's one problem: The Mongolian empire, fueled by a "dramatic increase in temperatures," grew to power in the early 1200s, over 500 years before the first Industrial Revolution, when man began pumping large amounts of carbon into the atmosphere.

The scientific facts of the study are clear, even if the researcher's sociopolitical conclusions are debatable. Annual tree-ring records show a warming period through the 12th and 13th centuries, which yielded "persistent moisture unprecedented in the last 1,000 years" correlating with the rise of the Mongolian empire. Much like the Medieval Warm Period of the 10th to 13th centuries, which warmed the North Atlantic region, this hot spell contradicts those few who contend that global warming is purely man-made. Furthermore, according to the study, this pre-industrial global warming was significant enough to cause the rise of the largest land empire in the history of mankind.

This alone does not prove whether anthropogenic global warming (AGW) exists, or to what degree, but it does cast doubt on the multiplicity of evils alarmists claim AGW causes. After all, this study asserts that a major climatic change happened, resulting in one of the grandest accomplishments in human history, long before man traded his horse in for an SUV, or his hand loom for a mechanical one.

READ MORE: Global Warming & the Mongolian Empire’s Rise

Mild weather may have propelled rise of Genghis Khan