Radio War Nerd EP #389 — Kyrgyzstan, or Death By A Thousand NGOs
Recorded: July 25, 2023
The War Nerd & Ames look at how the US broke Kyrgyzstan, which never recovered from the US-engineered "Tulip Revolution" of 2005.
*Maps & Images
*North-South divide
*Reading: Restless Valley: Revolution, Murder and Intrigue in the Heart of Central Asia, by Philip Shishkin
*RWN episodes cited:
-EP #181: Gene Sharp, Color Revolutions & American Empire
-EP #260: Yeltsin's 1993 Coup, Part 1: Background
-EP #274: National Endowment for Democracy, Part 1
-EP #312: Kazakhstan Uprising
-EP #369: Georgia Protests & NGO Colonialism, feat. Sopo Japaridze
Total time: 1:47:34
Direct link to this episode's mp3 here
Sound production by Telescope Audio Studios
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*Buy John Dolan's comic memoir "Pleasant Hell" now available in both audio and ebookformat.
Comments (28)
unrelated, but i would love RWN's take on the recent developments in Africa re: Wagner/ France
Excellent episode, if certainly not uplifting in the slightest. “Color revolution” has become a label that is thrown around quite casually, generally in concert with “let’s find 20 degrees of separation between this foreign upheaval and someone who received some NED bucks,” and this simplistic thinking can take people into some dark places, as I have noticed over the past few years (I have been guilty of this as well). This makes it all the more important to remember when a country is torn apart by the most brazen and smug of outside interference, and the Kyrgyz case must remain a lesson to all. And on that wretched note: outstanding work!
This was great!
A fantastic story. Great narration by Mark.
Great episode. Not too much detail at all. It is episodes like this that make you guys legends.
Thank you for linking the Gene Sharp episode. It is absolutely magnificent!
You're doing such a service by educating people on all these events that are obscured or ignored by western corporate media.
Change the term NGO to COGO = cut out government organization
One more RWN show you referenced: EP 312, Kazakhstan Uprising
The people who work for these NGOs are sick. It really seems like the State Department has more integrity than any of these "do-gooder" CIA cat's-paws, which isn't exactly saying much.
Was there a 2nd episode with Marcie Smith? Or another in regards to Gene Sharp? Mark mentions two episodes but Gene/Marcie only come up with the one interview with her. or is the 2nd episode referencing one of the NED, Georgia, etc podcasts above?
My mistake just 1, was thinking of the NED series
Great episode, one that I’ll have to listen to again in order to notice new things.
Some burn after reading shit
Chevron is an arm of the US. The US is an arm of chevron. Chevron is an arm of the US. The US is an arm of chevron.
wait a sec did you say they wanted to IPO AsiaUniversalBank? why tf would you do that lol. You want the international money markets looking over your balance sheets to figure out if you're a good deal? and you have all your crimes in there?
They might’ve just been thinking of the payout- or it could’ve been a conduit for money laundering, not that they didn’t clearly have that already. Point is, I think you’re taking it too much at face value and not thinking stupid, or smart, enough
Hey, just got a cancer diagnosis but I insist on live through interesting times.
Sorry to hear that.
I kinda get Israel's resentment towards NGOs now: it's a close US ally, but NGOs roost there. It's almost like the NGOs have picked a US ally that is indeed involved in very sordid deeds for the sole purpose of saying, "See! We've got one on the US payroll to complain about, so we're not biased in favor of the US! Really!" It's not like they do anything substantive about the occupation, but they point out that the Israelis look bad. Oh, and Putin should have done a color revolution in Kiev instead of invading. Just sayin'.
Really great episode
Mark: how much of Russiagate follows the color revolution playbook?
Ive thought about that too, given the role “ex” intel played and a lot of very familiar tactics, the relentless psychic driving etc. One big difference is weak poor new country easy prey to imperialism vs US
One thing I always wonder is what criteria the Soviets used to make an area an SSR versus just a state of Russia.
The TENE pod boys mentioned this sort of thing... It sounds as if there was some pretty stupid thinking behind it.
Kyrgyz self-deprecation
for what it's worth I think you deserve to live longer than kissinger john (or maybe not as long if you don't want to stick around for that long)
I was in St. Petersburg at the time of the 2005 coup. Colleagues in the programme who came through from Bishkek reported that everyone there was in a state of shock - not the impression the global media gave at the time.