Originally published at Notes from the bunker…. You can comment here or there.

Russian Military Analysts are reporting to Prime Minister Putin that US President Barack Obama has issued orders to his Northern Command’s (USNORTHCOM) top leader, US Air Force General Gene Renuart, to “begin immediately” increasing his military forces to 1 million troops by January 30, 2010, in what these reports warn is an expected outbreak of civil war within the United States before the end of winter.

(Note: original page linked to went 404. hmmm.)

Why, oh why, would anyone take anything the Russians say seriously? Yet this bit of ‘news’ is getting some serious play in the preparedness blogs.

By “the end of winter”, in my opinion, would be about, oh, March. You really think that in four months you can train, equip, stage and manage a million troops, domestically, in a country where every 12-year old has a cellphone and video camera and that this will somehow be a secret?

This article tries to sound reasonable but it plays every tinfoil hat card there is – UN, Peak Oil, gun control, etc, etc.

The notion that Obama will rotate troops back from Afghanistan to use for domestic operations against US citizens? C’mon, really? You genuinely think that some guy who has spent a year in Afghanistan, ducking mortars and roadside bombs, feeling like he’s stuck in a hopeless situation, is going to come back the US and be eager to roar around Main Street USA in his hummer intimidating the civilians because the guy who gave him an all-expense vacation in Afghanistan told him to? srsly?

Let me tell you the far more likely outcome of “the end of winter”: exactly like today except the unemployment, debt, homeless numbers are a little different…maybe up, maybe down. No civil war. No ‘peacekeeping’ troops rolling down US streets. No ‘Red Dawn’. No armband-wearing armed civillians waving their Gadsen flags atop the smoking rubble of Washington DC.

However….if you are the creative type, this sort of thing is wonderful fodder for some book idea.

Good grief, man….its the Russian ‘news’ for crying out loud. How familiar are you with Russian media anyway? For all you know this is their version of “The Onion”.