Rimini

 Rimini d'estate Rimini di notte

vicino alla barca che galleggia illuminata

vedo il tuo corpo nudo il tuo corpo italiano

morbido come la seta che i tuoi antenati

attraverso i continenti hanno portato fino qua

Ti ho visto così triste così triste, così italiana così bella

che non ho resistito a invitarti per una nuotata notturna

al mio fianco

Il tuo silenzio sorridente era un'immensa affermazione

grande come il mare che ci rinfrescava

Poi mi hai chiesto di spegnere le luci della barca

e mi hai aspettato sdraiata sul ponte

Ti ho asciugato la schiena e i capelli

poi i tuoi baci i miei baci

le tue mani e le mie

si sono intrecciate intorno a noi

una rete che ci ha trattenuto

fino all'alba dell'estate

un'alba calda e umida di agosto

Rimini d'estate Rimini di notte

Ti ricorderò sempre anche se riderai quando lo dirò

So che è così e così sarà

fino a quando tornerò a Rimini e non ti troverò più

Voglio solo dirti

che l'unica cosa importante è la felicità

Sono felice di averti regalato

 un momento

intenso di essa

e di riceverla da te

costruendo sospiri e frasi che solo tu e io

ricorderemo

Raccogli questa esperienza, ragazza italiana

e non dissolverla in altra inutile tristezza

né angoscia né catene immaginarie

perché tu sei il mattino e la notte

tu respiri e la terra vive

e quando dormi le stelle respirano appena

mentre mi trascini in catene

ai tuoi dolci fianchi

Sei stata per qualche giorno e qualche notte il mio centro

la mia pace

oh lontana Rimini

igor parra

Pondering and wondering before the spring-summer campaign in Ukraine

 

MASKIROVKA

strategic masking is a complex art, articulated by multiple prior actions whose purpose is one and only one: to divert attention from the main objective in such a convincing way that even this or that aspect of what is producing the strategic masking is debated, discussed and pondered by its potential enemies while the operational bases of the main action are built with a very low profile.

If someone were to ask me what in my opinion is the best example at the present time of strategic masking, I would not hesitate to point to China's action in relation to the island of Taiwan. 

Besides, in the conflict generated by the Russian invasion of Ukraine, there was no such masking during the first phase of the conflict. It seems that during the second phase, which is ending now, in a very classical way, with a spring-summer campaign "ad portas", we have on the Russian side a very advanced strategic masking that is acting on the main vector of the Grand Strategy: time. 

If there is no internal coup in the Russian leadership, and the spring-summer campaign turns into the bogging down of the Ukrainian-western war effort, then we will be facing a clear example of successful strategic masking on the Russian side. 

If so, it will have done so by clouding Western reasoning with the spatial projection of its temporal feint, that is, by generating more discussion about space than about what really counts in any kind of war : time, king and master throughout history, redundant though it may seem.

Let time pass by some days  before the next modest piece of observation and thinking, always enlightened by our western and eastern classical masters many times here mentioned during the last 12 years.

to be continued sooner rather than later

Igor Parra 

Burgos

Ukraine, the second moment

 Ukraine, the second moment

Analysing, observing and thinking about a significant event requires a certain perspective. I have let a year of the war in Ukraine pass, as the situation obviously got complicated for Putin already in the initial phase of the game. 

But in Russian military history problems of this kind are recorded in the strategic memory of this people who proficiently cultivate the art of the use of time in space. They are good chess players. And as we all know, chess is a problem machine that relates spatial control...in terms of available time to solve complex game situations.  

So I refer back to my earlier observation and thoughts on the Ukrainian issue of 12 February 2022 and repeat myself: it is likely that the Russian objective is not the one we can imagine in the West. Both Putin and President Xi use strategic time scales that are not the ones we use. 

I am therefore surprised that British intelligence reports almost as a triumph that Russian troops are defensively entrenched in the territory of the Donbas. Perhaps that is a major objective of the Russian move south... not the only one, but a very significant one. 

At the present time we are waiting for a Ukrainian counter-offensive to develop. Perhaps we are on the verge of surprising things, perhaps the business of reconstruction of the Ukrainian territory has begun prematurely. The Russians have flattened cities and infrastructure, now a period of reconstruction should begin.

 Whoever benefits from this will be the winner of the ongoing war. In this way we continue to witness the dilution of nation states, at least in the West, and their consolidation in Eastern Eurasia. In the West, the relationship between war and corporate business is growing, but we cannot say that it has only recently been invented. The great failure of Athens in the Peloponnesian War was to gamble strategically in terms of business on the conquest of Sicily. That thunderous failure (we still hear it from those of us who study these matters) permanently blighted its performance in the war against Sparta. The strategic gambles being made by the West bring us closer to a dangerous zone where a possible scenario would be precisely a scenario analogous to the failure of the Athenian expedition to Sicily. The Athenians did not lose the war the day after the failure of the expedition, the consequences of that defeat caused them to lose the confidence of their allies, the operational capability of their fleet and they were finally defeated by the Spartans in the military field in which they, the Athenians, were strategically dominant. 

For now, these are the observations that, as an archaeologist and palynologist interested in the present and the future, I am making to the kind readers of this unpublicised and very modest blog.

Igor Parra

en Burgos a 240 metros de la tumba del Cid y doña Jimena