The Next Stage in Western Escalation

January 27, 2023

Source

by Batiushka

Introduction: The Story So Far

So far the US has carried out regime changes and created military conflicts in countries friendly to or important to Russia: Iraq, Serbia, Afghanistan, Iraq (again), Georgia, Syria, Libya. All this was to make Russia lose important interests or deploy its own forces. It has also staged PR events such as Litvinenko, Pussy Riot, MH17, Skripals, Navalny, Bucha, the destruction of Nordstream – in order to try and blame Russia and make it into a pariah state.

In particular, in 2014 in the Ukraine it carried out a $5 billion coup with the murder of and terror against Russian-speakers. It then installed a puppet government, promoted Nazism through racist indoctrination, besmirched the historic legacy through rewriting history and toppling memorials, terrorised and banned all opposition, set up US military biolabs, supplied and trained an army, made military threats against Russia, threatened the Crimea, and promised that the Ukraine could soon join the US-puppet NATO and install nuclear weapons.

A Message from Boris: Deaths and Sackings

When Boris Johnson turned up in Kiev a few days ago, you knew events would follow. He is after all the office boy for Biden. So last week came the resignation of Zelensky’s spinmaster, Alexey Arestovich, for telling the truth about the Ukrainian military – that it had killed civilians by destroying an apartment block in Dnepro in a military accident and could not win the war. The next day the interior minister Monastyrsky, a longtime aide of Zelensky, and his first deputy died in a helicopter crash in Kiev a week ago (‘caused by flying low in fog’). Strange, since the neo-Nazi militias operate through his ministry.

Then there was the murder of Denis Kireev, who was an important participant in the March peace talks with Russia. It is rumoured that he was too keen on peace – which the US and the UK are totally opposed to. He had to go, so the CIA/SBU (same thing) did the job. Next came a major purge on 24 January following corruption claims, involved a deputy prosecutor general, the deputy head of the president’s office, the deputy defence minister and five regional governors.

Interestingly, Poroshenko, last seen in a luxury hotel in London, living off his now very active cremation business in the Ukraine, promised peace with Russia in one week. Once in power he did not bring peace and lost the next election. He was replaced by Zelensky, who also promised a peace settlement with Russia in the Donbass, but instead prepared war and even sought nuclear weapons. The Ukrainian people are promised peace, but are not given it. Zelensky’s support base is small and there is a majority that wants peace. Is Zelensky the next to be purged?

Escalation: Germany Declares War on Russia Again

Germany is going to send Leopard tanks to the Kiev regime. For the third time since 1914 Germany is now, on paper at least, at war with Russia. The Russians have a choice: they can intervene in the Ukraine from the north-west (Belarus) and the south-west (the sea) and cut off the whole of the Ukraine from all its arms supplies, including several dozen German, American, British and other tanks – and it will take months for the promised tanks to arrive across the Polish border. Or else Russia can bomb anything that comes across the Polish border. It has already warned that anything coming across that border into the Ukraine will be destroyed. Thus, in any case, a barrier will be created. Western Europe must be cut off, for it has become the source of the evil, providing weapons to Neo-Nazis.

Otherwise, the Poles and their reservists too may intervene (in their Leopard tanks? Remember Tiger tanks?) to take over the west of the Ukraine. Is Russia really going to allow the division of the Ukraine into the Russian East and the Polish-led Western West, in other words, its Koreanisation or Vietnamisation? (And we know how those divisions ended). Otherwise, the Anti-Russia of the Ukraine will remain forever. Western Europe must be cut off. What began as a small operation to liberate the two Russian provinces of the Donbass, is now, as a result of Western (= US-led) escalation, an operation to liberate the whole of the Ukraine. Only total Russian victory can work. Only establishing a Russian-led Kiev Protectorate, like the situation in Belarus, can work. All those who disagree with that and have not yet fled for the West had better leave now.

Interestingly, we know that the Russian Black Sea Fleet with its landing craft left port last week. On 25 January Dmitry Medvedev wrote publicly that the Ukraine would have no need of submarines, as it would soon become landlocked. The day before, the President of Belarus, Lukashenko, rejected the offer of a Non-Aggression Pact from the Ukraine (= the US on behalf of Poland). Meanwhile, the somewhat senile Biden has blurted out that the US will support the Ukraine ‘for as long as it exists’. This is not what he used to say. Then it was ‘support to victory’. The only problem here is that the US never admits failure, it never admits that it backed the wrong horse at huge expense to the US taxpayer. How will it get out of this one?

The War

In the Ukraine the NATO war has killed and maimed hundreds of thousands in just the last eleven months is continuing with hundreds more victims today, the same as yesterday, and the same as tomorrow. The doomsaying pessimists with their conspiracy theories of nuclear Armageddon foretell that this war will continue for years, ‘perhaps even a decade’. Others, the optimists, are thinking that the Kiev regime may collapse within weeks, or in three or four months at most, or there will be a coup in Kiev with Kiev forces either surrendering en masse or else turning around and marching on their murderous US puppet-commanders in Kiev. It does sound like wishful thinking. With yet more NATO weaponry and tanks to be destroyed, I think it will all take longer. Not years, as those happy souls, the doomsaying pessimists with their conspiracy theories of nuclear Armageddon foretell, but another 15 months. But I really hope that I am wrong and that the wishful thinkers are right and that it will all be over very soon.

As the Saker in his penetrating analysis has pointed out, if the US cannot prevent a Ukronazi/NATO defeat, it can at least make the war as costly as possible for Russia. Find another attacker. Poland will do. Promise them the five provinces in the far west of the Ukraine, Volyn, Rivne, Lviv, Ternopil and Ivano-Frankivsk, and the Poles will do anything you tell them to. After all, there are Poles, and most of them seem to be part of its current incredibly stupid government, who still have a messianic complex, who still dream of glory, of ‘saving Europe from the barbarian Russian hordes’, of a ‘Poland stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea’, and of becoming the most powerful country in Europe, dwarfing those nasty Germans ‘who are going to give us back trillions’. Well, there have always been fantasists. Hitler was one of them. And the American Empire has always known how to manipulate them for its own ends, whether in Argentina, Iran, Iraq, Nicaragua, Afghanistan, Venezuela, the Baltics, the Ukraine or Poland.

The fact is that the American Empire knows that it cannot defeat Russia in a straightforward war, so it has always used proxies. In 2008, it took the absurd step of using Georgia. This was far too small, far too weak and irrationally nationalistic. As a Georgian told me quite seriously just a few years ago: ‘God only speaks Georgian and does not understand any other language’. I was surprised to learn that God has such limited linguistic abilities, however, there are plenty of Ukrainians who believe much the same today, not to mention Poles.

And both the Ukraine and Poland are a lot bigger than Georgia. Hence the American choice. Once they are both defeated, the US will be turning to Germany – as they almost did in Churchill’s Operation Unthinkable plan to attack the Red Army on 1 July 1945, using British, American, Polish and German forces to destroy Russia (1). Or why not use Sweden, Turkey, Japan? Why not China? Why not just overthrow Putin with the ‘masses’ of Russians who do not like him? Such today are also the fantasies of ‘the crazies in the basement’ at the Pentagon. No wonder they get on with the Polish government. And don’t forget the biggest crazy in the US basement was Polish: Zbigniew Brzezinski.

For Russians, 2022 was simply a repeat of 1812 and 1941. The Third Great Patriotic War. The West doing its barbaric thing, as usual. The fact is that, though some historians deny it, history does repeat itself, simply because human pride, arrogance and hubris repeat themselves. German tanks with their black crosses trying to destroy Russia on the Ukrainian steppes? We Russians shrug our shoulders. We have seen it all before. The Anti-Russia of the Ukraine will simply never happen. Zelensky is on drugs and so is the Ukraine, addicted to Western transfusions of blood, money, mercenaries and arms.

Afterword: Another Future

Famously, or rather infamously, the British Establishment figure who was the first NATO Secretary General boasted that the aim of NATO was ‘to keep the Soviet Union out, the Americans in, and the Germans down’ (2). As for us, we wish to see a renewal of Kennedy’s ‘Alliance for Progress’, a World Alliance of Sovereign Nations, a global version of the Gaullist spirit (though not the precise words) of ‘l’Europe des Patries’ (Europe of the Nations’). We wish to see a for now geriatric Europe reattached to its historic destiny with Russia and so with Eurasia, where it is all happening. Therefore, our aim is: ‘To keep Russia in, the Americans out and the Germans up’.

Some write that Russia can only win the war in the Ukraine as long as it can help the US to save face after its defeat and then the collapse of NATO and the EU. Remember Saigon? Remember Bush and his ‘Mission Accomplished’? (The world laughed at his farce, but plenty in the US were convinced by it). Remember Kabul? The US just left them and pretended to be in denial about them. Like the British at Dunkirk in 1940, who left their French allies in the lurch, they just ran away back to their island, declaring victory, though leaving lots of their equipment behind them. The Americans can also run away, saying: ‘Forget it. They are not worthy of us’.

Self-isolation would be such a good thing. Go back to the big island of Northern America. If you want, build Trump’s long-promised wall across the south to keep those nasty Latinos out. Lick your wounds and at last start trying to deal with the massive internal problems that you already have: great poverty, racial division, mass shootings, debt, social injustices, lack of healthcare, unemployment, exploitation, an education system that deliberately makes people stupid, drugs, crime and so mass imprisonment. Leave the Europeans to sort themselves out. No more Americans are going to die for or pay for those lazy Europeans. Just don’t tell the American people that this would make those same lazy Europeans only too happy. The only problem is that the US never admits failure, it never admits that it backed the wrong horse at huge expense to the US taxpayer. How will it get out of this one?

27 January 2023

Notes:

1. https://www.thehistorypress.co.uk/articles/operation-unthinkable-churchill-s-plans-to-invade-the-soviet-union/#:~:text=The%20plan%20called%20for%20a,his%20domination%20of%20East%20Europe

2. https://www.nato.int/cps/en/natohq/declassified_137930.htm

About Saving Face: Some Advice to Volodymyr Zelensky

November 28, 2022

Source

By Batiushka

It matters not how much you, gentlemen, bend down before them,
You will never gain Europe’s recognition:
You will always be for them,
Not servants, but serfs of their enlightened disposition.
F.I. Tyutchev, Russian diplomat and poet, May 1867

To be an enemy of America can be dangerous, but to be a friend is fatal.
Henry Kissinger

Ditching the Ukraine

It is now dawning on the US elite that they totally underestimated Russia in all respects. For instance, on 25 March 2014 the arrogant Obama contemptuously called Russia ‘a regional power, threatening others out of weakness’ (sic!). (Clearly, he was talking about the USA). As a result, blinded by hubris, some in the US are now admitting that the Ukraine, the most corrupt country in Europe, is a dead duck, the game is simply no longer worth the candle. Apart from being a black hole for Western money and military equipment, the Ukraine is no longer the problem. It is a sideshow, a distraction, a mere symptom of something far more important. The real problem is what is now happening worldwide under Russian leadership – the ending of the unipolar world, of US global hegemony, camouflaged beneath the more innocent-sounding term ‘globalism’.

Following Russia’s decision and ability to stand up to the world’s bully, the whole Non-Western world is now also standing up to him. For example, at the recent G20 meeting in Indonesia, the debate was not about the Ukraine, but about whether or not to continue to accept American Fascist rule (‘the rules-based international order’). All the Latin American and African and four Asian countries said no, it’s finished, the world is now multipolar. Taiwan will inevitably be Chinese and soon – and wait till Chinese troops appear in Mesopotamia to take control of Iraqi oil and gas and rebuild that tragic country. Freedom beckons. Long-deluded Western elitists must be shocked: other ‘regional powers’ are now also standing up to the bully. Perhaps also out of weakness? Zelensky must have suspected that his boss, until now the self-imagined master of the universe, is going to get rid of him. He is a loser and the Yanks cannot stand losers.

As the US realises that the free nations of the world are turning against it, it will not hesitate to blame the Kiev regime. The US must save face. Kiev has been warned: it will have to start negotiating with Russia again. Zelensky had better plan his escape now, because Ukrainians will not forgive him for stringing them along with a pack of lies. Regardless of Zelensky’s delusional assertions that there will be no negotiations with Russia and that it will re-occupy Russian territories, including the Crimea, there are three reasons for him to throw in the towel now, before it all gets much, much worse.

Three Reasons To Surrender Now

Firstly, Russia has now reluctantly moved closer to the US ‘shock and awe’ strategy of destroying infrastructure, as the US did in Germany and Japan (World War II) and then Serbia and Iraq. Power stations and power networks, bridges and ‘decision centres’, such as certain government buildings in Kiev are being targeted. Russia is one or two mass missile strikes away from the knock-out blow which will disable the Ukrainian electricity, water and rail systems. With 50% of Ukrainian electricity infrastructure knocked out by the first three strikes on the electricity grid, demonstrations are starting against the deteriorating situation, with Zelensky sending in the hated and dreaded Ukrainian Secret Police, the SBU, to break them up. He is also banning coverage of them in his heavily-censored media. The electricity system has entered a stage of ‘arbitrary and uncontrolled imbalance’. Ukrainians have been told to leave the country for the winter. Where to? Who wants them anyway? And does this include the military too?

Secondly, once the infrastructure has been incapacitated, Russia’s 380,000 regular and newly mobilised troops will be fully incorporated into the Allied forces in eastern Ukraine. Even without them, Russian forces are continuing to advance in the Donbass. A winter offensive by some half a million troops will make huge gains on the whole front, advancing hundreds of kilometres and multiplying Kiev’s – and NATO’s – staggering losses. After success here, President Putin’s generals have the option of moving a serious force into the western Ukraine from Belarus in order to cut off NATO supply routes from Poland. This could easily lead to the total collapse of the already ravaged Ukrainian forces and their mercenaries. Now Russia is going all the way to Lvov and the Polish border. It has been forced to. The Kiev regime has brought it on itself. All Russia wanted was security for the Crimea and the Donbass and a neutral, non-nuclear Ukraine. It could all have been so simple.

Thirdly, Western countries, including even the brainless Stoltenberg, is suffering from Ukraine fatigue. The Ukrainian flags have nearly all come down in Europe. Support has waned as reality has dawned. NATO countries’ arms stocks have been seriously depleted and strikes and ensuing social chaos have appeared in Europe, This the result of double-digit inflation and economic recession, brought on by suicidal Western sanctions, yes, those ‘against Russia’ (!). ‘We are cold and hungry in our own country because you gave everything to that bunch of losers in Kiev and the Ukrainian freeloaders you invaded our country with’. The foul-mouthed thug Nuland has achieved her aim in Europe. All this makes Russia the strategic winner and is forcing the US/UK/EU to call on Zelensky to talk again. The British financier PM Sunak (who cares little for and knows even less about politics) used a modest British aid package, announced during his recent visit to Kiev, to tell Zelensky that bankrupt London can no longer pay. Kiev must negotiate with Moscow. Following this, there has been a delay in the fourth round of missile strikes on Ukrainian infrastructure. President Putin is waiting to see if Zelensky will cave in and start realistic talks before Russia unleashes the last assault on Ukrainian infrastructure and the winter offensive.

Ditching Zelensky

At least some in the Biden regime are realising (though not Biden himself, he is in no fit state to realise anything – a clear case of elder abuse) that they are going to have to drop the Jewish billionaire as the fall-guy for the Ukraine’s defeat. Just as they have done to countless Latin American, Middle Eastern and Asian tinpot dictators and gangsters in past decades, the US will also do the same to him in his Monsanto/Cargill banana republic. Can Zelensky still entertain any illusions about it? Of course, the US will deny that the war in the Ukraine was ever between the US and Russia and declare it was only ever ‘an internal conflict’ between the Ukraine and Russia. (Ukraine only supplied the cannon fodder for its transatlantic masters, who have controlled the country since their coup in 2014).

Ukraine’s former CIA asset, the actor Zelensky, has now acted up. The Ukrainian missile strike on Poland and the Ukrainian President’s insistence that it was a Russian strike, despite the clear evidence to the contrary, has hit Zelensky’s credibility. The intentional Ukrainian false flag strike on Polish/NATO territory, designed to provoke NATO or at least pathetic Poland into entering the war, is a pathetic embarrassment. Even compared to all of Zelensky’s other ridiculous staged false flags, like Bucha, which venal Western journalists were paid to report, this one has gone too far. The West is getting fed up with Zelensky’s antics. A bullet in the head is much cheaper than continuing to subsidise this clown.

Some are waking up to Zelensky, who is willing to unleash nuclear war in order to avoid negotiating. Some may now even understand that his crazy claims that President Putin always wanted to occupy all the Ukraine and restore the USSR, if not conquer all of Europe, are fairy-stories. These stories are told by Kiev to Western infants only in order to get military and financial aid and above all to draw NATO into the war. (The half-American Churchill spent all of 1941 trying to get the US into Britain’s war against Germany; unlike Zelensky, Churchill succeeded by emphasising his racial compatibility and dangling the Pacific Ocean carrot in front of the Yankees. Zelensky cannot offer either of those). President Putin has clearly stated on more than one occasion that: ‘He who does not regret the USSR has no heart, but he who wants to restore it has no brain’. A desire to restore the failed Soviet Union is a Western propaganda myth used by arms merchants and lying politicians to justify their greed and ambition.

Three Reasons To Run Now

Since NATO has categorically refused to send troops into the Ukraine and since there is no such thing as a ‘coalition of the willing’, apart from a few Polish and Baltic fanatics who are currently being wiped out as mercenaries in the Ukraine, what can Zelensky do? He could urge the Ukrainian commander-in-chief, General Zaluzhny, to open a last (yes, last) offensive in Donetsk or Zaporozhie in order to reboot support from the West. However, General Zaluzhny is fed up with sending his troops to commit suicide. He is, after all, a professional military man. Zelensky, on the other hand, is a White House court jester, who cares only about his own survival. Zaluzhny has other considerations. Here there is potential for a coup d’etat, a palace revolt in Kiev.

On the one hand, the self-deluded and murderous Neo-Nazis in the Ukraine who surround Zelensky and were all given power by the US, will not tolerate surrender. On the other hand, ordinary cold and hungry Ukrainians will ask why was not all of this avoided in the first place by agreeing to Ukrainian neutrality and fulfilling the Minsk 2 promises with their Russian brothers? (A good question, which should be asked of all the Western leaders who also rejected it). So Zelensky is stuck between the Neo-Nazis and the moderate Ukrainian people, between a rock and a hard place. It is lose-lose for him. Russians do not hate Ukrainians, they are brothers. But they do hate Nazis. They are enemies. The Nazis can expect no quarter from the Russians and they know it. The USSR cleared out its part of Germany of Nazis, liberating their German brothers. It is the same now in the Ukraine. With the Russian liberation of the whole of the Ukraine (not originally intended by Russia, but now necessary), a new wave of Ukrainian ‘refugees’ is going to hit Western Europe, maybe even before Christmas. This could be the last straw for a Europe full of refugees from other equally stupid and unnecessary wars of the US Empire: Iraqis, Afghans, Syrians, Libyans, Albanians and now Ukrainians. Europe cannot take it any more. It is collapsing in waves of social unrest and even Britannia cannot rule those waves.

The clueless Stoltenberg (him again) has declared that the defeat of the Ukraine means (yet another) defeat for NATO. Actually, the superfluous NATO was long ago defeated, but Stoltenberg is too clueless to have seen the writing on the wall and join the long queues of now unemployed ex-slaves of the US, Afghan and Iraqi interpreters among them. The US and its NATO vassals must now backtrack. Some statement like: ‘We were let down by those vodka-drinking surrender-monkey Ukrainians (what can you expect from those Slav subhumans?), but we have won the greatest victory in our history because we have triumphed in stopping the brutal Russian beast at the Polish border. Mission accomplished’. That would do the job. The US and its vassals cannot save face, but, since they only care about PR, they can at least pretend to save face – by blaming Zelensky. They could, conveniently, have him assassinated, so he does not tell the truth about what has really been happening behind the scenes over the last few years (he knows far too much), blaming it on ‘extremists’ and making him into a new Jewish martyr. If I were Zelensky, I would leave for Tel Aviv today. Does the Ukraine have any planes left?

The persecution of Graham Phillips by the UK government

September 06, 2022

Dear friends

About a month ago I wrote about the truly Orwellian persecution of the journalist Graham Phillips by the UK government and I did a short Q&A with Graham himself.  Graham has sent me s number official document regarding his case, I concatenated them into one PDF which I will now share with you:

https://drive.google.com/file/d/1nf-QOTN1H4feYcekUeKVEMorPEF_7maI/preview

This is a scary, but very interesting read.  One thing is very very clear: Graham’s “crime” is that he dared to disagree with the official narrative: for pages and pages the UK officials denounce Graham for daring to call the Ukronazis “Nazis”.  He is also guilty of “obfuscating” the false flag massacre in Bucha.  All of which makes him a “involved person”.  Here is just one “great” example of how these folks think: (excerpt from the document)

Summary: Guardian article which offers a profile on Graham PHILLIPS. It notes that PHILLIPS has claimed that ‘Ukraine is run by Nazis and the massacre of Ukrainians in Bucha was staged’. The Guardian is a highly credible source.

Ain’t that just beautiful?  Graham says that the Nazis in Kiev are Nazis and Bucha was staged.  And The Guardian is a “highly credible source”.  This is the trick which all the western Gestapos have been running for a while now: “leak” to a 100% loyal and Gestapo controlled “highly credible source”, any modern version of the Völkischer Beobachter will do, then built a case against any person daring to challenge the official narrative by, you guessed it, referencing the “credible article” in the “highly credible” Völkischer Beobachter“, and then call it all “open source intelligence” (OSINT) and all the sheep reading the said Völkischer Beobachter will jointly bleat “crucify him! crucify him!” or whatever the lynching slogan of the day might be.

Just read the full thing, it is quite worth it.  Orwell would have been absolutely fascinated to see that the UK has fully adopted his 1984 model and is now openly persecuting people for their ideas and for daring to speak their minds.

If modern journos were not the presstitutes they all are (as the French philosopher Alain Soral likes to remind us: “there are only 2 types of journalists [in the West]: prostitutes and unemployed) they would have to all rise up in horror and demand that this kind of ideological persecution be immediately stopped.  Oh, wait!  I am talking about the same people who “forgot” the vicious persecution of Julian Assange’s by the self-same UK authorities, so why would anybody expect them to speak up on behalf of Graham Philips?  Besides, with all these urgent issues which need to be addressed (LGBTQ+ “rights”, the “Putin inflation”, taking short showers to “stick it to Putin”, the triumph of black actors in white roles, the immense danger presented by schoolgirls in hijabs, the immense danger of a resurgence of “Antisemitism” and how “heroically” the Ukronazis and their brilliant leader “Ze” stand as a thin Nazi line defending Europe and democracy from the evil Rooskie Asiatic hordes which are poised to invade the entire planet, etc.)  there is simply no time to deal with such “petty” issues as journalists persecuted for doing their jobs!

So Alain Soral was wrong: there are not two, but three types of journalists in the West: prostitutes, unemployed and the viciously persecuted ones (Soral, of course, knows this, as he has been crimincally persecuted nonstop for his views).

Truth be told, the UK is definitely the worst and most Orwellian state in the West (I am not even counting the 3B+PU clowns as part of the “West” here).  Things are marginally better in the other EU countries and even in the United States which, at least on paper, still have the Bill of Rights.  That being said, all you need to do to bypass and totally ignore the Bill of Rights in the USA use the expression “national security” and, voilà, you can kidnap, torture, disappear, and basically do anything to anybody, including US citizens.  So while the UK is the worst, it is also the model towards which all of the West follows (and I won’t even mention what the UK will be like with that absolute ignorant imbecile Liz Truss in charge!).

Thank God, Graham Philips is safe for as long as he stays in Russian controlled territories, just like Snowden.  But this does not change the fact that in the UK they want to make him a “unperson“.

Of course, I could conclude here by quoting Martin Niemöller’s famous “first they came…” but I prefer to conclude with another one of my absolutely favorite aphorisms, this one by Yehuda Bauer: “Thou shalt not be a victim. Thou shalt not be a perpetrator. And above all, Thou shalt not be a bystander.  So, please, if you can, especially if you are in the UK, speak up on defense of Graham Phillips and do not allow the British ruling class hide behind your silence when crushing those who dare to speak the truth!

Andrei

PS: also make sure to watch this latest video by Graham Phillips: http://thesaker.is/liz-truss-vs-graham-phillips-and-the-donbass-truth/

Who killed the POWs at Yelenovka? All signs on the ground point to a Ukrainian attack

August 2, 2022 

There is every reason to believe that the July 29 bombing of a detention center holding Ukrainian POWs was carried out on Kiev’s orders

Eva Bartlett

There is every reason to believe that the July 29 bombing of a detention center holding Ukrainian POWs was carried out on Kiev’s orders

https://twitter.com/EvaKBartlett/status/1553045892109934592

The next morning, I went around Donetsk to document the extremely dangerous “petal” mines Ukraine has dropped on the city. According to DPR Emergency Services, eight civilians had been killed by these mines just the day before. If you step on one of these tiny-but powerful-explosives, chances it will merely tear off a leg instead of outright killing you. And they are insidiously toy-like in appearance, likely to attract children’s attention.

Even with warning, these nefarious "petal"/"butterfly" mines dropped by Ukraine on Donetsk are hard to see & easy to miss.

Ukraine is committing war crimes against the civilians of the Donbass, and has been for 8+ years. pic.twitter.com/p5byG95GVG

— Eva Karene Bartlett (@EvaKBartlett) August 1, 2022

Who benefits from the war crime at Yelenovka? 

Ukraine and Western media, as would be expected, blame Russia for the bombing of Yelenovka detention center, which killed 53 people. Russia and the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), in turn, point the finger at Kiev.

In addition to those killed, the 2am bombing, which DPR officials say was carried out using American-supplied HIMARS, injured at least eight employees and over 70 POWs held there. The prisoners were captured Ukrainian combatants, mainly members of the Azov neo-Nazi militia who’d surrendered in Mariupol in May.

If HIMARS, or High-Mobility Artillery Rocket System, were indeed the source of the destruction and death, then it is almost certain it was Ukraine who bombed the prison, given that Kiev had the coordinates and is the only side in the conflict that possesses such weapons. Even the Pentagon admits it is possible, albeit characterizing the strike as “unintentional.”

From a logical perspective, Russia had no motivation to bomb the prison. For Ukraine, on the other hand, these POWs represented a liability, in that they could testify to the alleged war crimes they committed against Donbass civilians.

Ukraine has made a litany of claims meant to incriminate Russia throughout the current conflict –the Bucha massacre, the strike on the Mariupol maternity hospital, the Ghost of Kiev hoax, the supposed mass graves of civilians, the outlandish false allegations of Russian soldiers committing sexual crimes, which even saw the former Ukrainian Parliamentary Commissioner for Human Rights fired by Kiev’s own parliament.

Russia has invited the UN and the International Red Cross to investigate the Yelenovka prison bombing. Meanwhile, observers online have used the publicly available data to put together a picture of what occurred. Here’s an insightful analysis from the Rybar Telegram channel (with more than 627,000 followers), specializing in military analytics:

“The eastern part of the building suffered the most damage, where a powerful fire and explosion occurred, which blew out the windows.” Judging by the angle of impact, the analyst concludes that “the shooting was carried out from the trajectory of Marinka-Kurakhovo –the Sergeevka triangle– Pokrovsk-Udachnoe.” This is Ukrainian-controlled territory. The analysis could not conclude whether HIMARS was used, from the information at hand. 

Along the ‘who benefits?’ line of thinking, a number of circumstances also point to Kiev. These have also been pointed out by Russian observers and compiled into a chronology. The captured Azov Nazis were taken to the Yelenovka detention center in late May. While prisoner exchanges between Ukraine and Russia have included Azov fighters, there is a strong opposition to handing them back over to Kiev, meaning that there’s no guarantee that they would be exchanged in the future – potentially making them a liability to Kiev. By June 20 reports of Ukraine shelling the prison already appeared on Russian channels watching the conflict. On July 28 the confession of an Azov member emerged, claiming that neo-Nazis in Kharkov and Kiev had direct orders from Zelensky’s office to torture and murder Russian prisoners of war. Late that night/early next morning, Ukraine struck the very detention center holding the Azov member who confessed, as well as others who might have done so.

Elsewhere, other neo-Nazis in captivity have confessed to deliberately murdering civilians, a PR disaster for Ukraine, made worse were the prisoners in Yelenovka to follow suit.

Last but not least, just two days before the Yelenovka strike, the US Senate passed a resolution urging the State Department to recognize Russia as a “sponsor of terrorism.” By perpetrating an attack and blaming it on Moscow, Kiev could be aiming to push that decision through – even though the State Department is reportedly reluctant.

And here’s the reason behind today's Ukrainian missile attack: Yermak, head of the Office of the President of Ukraine, wrote that the “Russian terrorist attack in Yelenovka” should lead to the recognition of Russia as a sponsor of terrorism. pic.twitter.com/MYFqoJhBNt

— Maria Dubovikova (@politblogme) July 29, 2022

Given Ukraine’s multiple attempts to incriminate Russia, and eight years of bombing Donbass civilians, killing their own soldiers is not too far-fetched. In fact, surrendered Ukrainian soldiers have claimed their commanders threatened to shoot them if they attempted desertion, and indeed Ukrainian nationalists firing on them when they attempted to surrender, in one case killing or wounding dozens .

It is left to Russian and DPR doctors to preserve the lives of Ukrainian POWs – even those apparently injured by friendly fire. Outside a Donetsk hospital after the Yelenovka bombing, one of the doctors working on wounded Ukrainians said that five had already had successful surgery for their shrapnel wounds, and two more were to undergo operations.

“It doesn’t matter which side you’re on, we will help you,” he said. 

The ghastly scenes of charred flesh and shrapnel-studded bodies I saw at the prison will remain etched in my mind for a long time. Yes, war is ugly, but Ukraine is upping the ante when it comes to both war crimes and hypocrisy.

*Warning: below are extremely graphic images, which I’ve blurred slightly, but still, not for the weak of stomach.*

RELATED LINKS:

–Here’s what I found at the reported ‘mass grave’ near Mariupol

–Western media and politicians prefer to ignore the truth about civilians killed in Donetsk shelling

5 thoughts on “Who killed the POWs at Yelenovka? All signs on the ground point to a Ukrainian attack”

1. Tom WelshAugust 2, 2022 at 14:38‘Even the Pentagon admits it is possible, albeit characterizing the strike as “unintentional.”’One minute with Google Maps or equivalent will show that the prison compound stands in open fields, some way distant from the nearest houses. And even those are just a small hamlet. There is literally nothing else in the vicinity that could have been the target.
2. 5onic5ocialistAugust 3, 2022 at 09:23Eva I can’t imagine what kind of spirit you must have to be able to do what you do and have done. Looks like fucking Empire like rust will never sleep. They would only be too happy to put us all to sleep permanently. Admire your passion and adhesion to the truth and not bullshit propaganda. If only Empire had the qualities you possess. The world would turn unfettered by nascent greed. Peace Dear Sister. And much thanks.
3. EsmondAugust 3, 2022 at 12:21Thank you, Eva. It’s heartbreaking but it’s reality. I can’t help but be concerned over the effect these horrible events have on all our human psyches particularly you who has witnessed it firsthand. You and those around you are in our thoughts and meditations. Much love to you.
4. 10 to 1August 4, 2022 at 00:35Very tragic. How low has the US leadership sunk to support the Ukrainian government which does this to their own soldiers. When their own soldiers become liabilities of the Ukrainian government and are slaughter like cockroaches. Not to mention was the US leadership a party to the decision to attack the Ukrainian POW’s, to hide the US involvement and possibly being the ones making the decisions to commit them?As word of this gets out, my guess is the defense of Ukraine will collapse very rapidly and the US will have few friends. Now how far will the US leadership go to stop this story in its tracks and do all it can to bury it?Please stay safe Eva.
5. Mark ChapmanAugust 4, 2022 at 06:33Great work, Eva. This incident has gotten quite a lot of notice, and here’s a good piece from Awful Avalanche which affirms many of your details – although to the best of my knowledge, the motive of having Russia declared a state sponsor of terrorism is unique to your site.https://awfulavalanche.wordpress.com/2022/08/03/ukraine-war-day-161-yelenovka-erratum/

• Today is Remembrance Day for Child Victims of the Donbass War, 130 of Them.

Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with the BBC TV channel, St Petersburg, June 16, 2022

June 18, 2022

Ed Note:  This transcript is not complete and we will issue an update when it is completed.  We post it now because of the renewed DDoS attacks on Russian infrastructure.

In addition, Mr Lavrov had two more quite serious interviews.  They are available here:

• Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with the NTV network, St Petersburg, June 16, 2022
• Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov’s interview with TASS news agency, St Petersburg, June 16, 2022

---

https://www.mid.ru/en/foreign_policy/news/1818228/

Question: Did President Putin, before taking the decision and announcing the start of what he calls a special military operation, consult you on whether he should?

Sergey Lavrov: Every country has a decision-making mechanism. In that case, the mechanism existing in the Russian Federation was fully employed.

Question: Did he consult you?

Sergey Lavrov: Again, there are things we do not speak about publicly. There is a mechanism for taking decisions. It was followed in full.

Question: I am asking because you have been foreign minister for 18 years, and invading a sovereign neighbouring state is a foreign matter. The President surely assumed that there would be international repercussions. I thought he would consult you.

Sergey Lavrov: You are an experienced journalists well-aware of the realities in Russia, around Russia, and in the post-Soviet space. Your question seeks to cancel everything prior to February 24 of this year. For eight years, we had been promoting the necessity of implementing the Minsk agreements, unanimously endorsed by the UN Security Council, with the help of our intelligence agencies, Foreign Ministry, and Defence Ministry.

Throughout those eight years, we were insisting that Donetsk and Lugansk (which initially, as you may remember, in 2014, declared their independence in response to the neo-Nazi coup d’etat in Kiev) should sign the Minsk agreements, which guaranteed Ukraine’s territorial integrity and sovereignty. When nowadays Chancellor Olaf Scholz claims that Russia must be forced to reach agreements with Ukraine, agreements that would respect the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the Ukrainian state, I have a feeling that he is not of this world but someone from “outer space.” Because all those eight years we were trying to ensure the implementation of agreements which guaranteed the territorial integrity of the Ukrainian state.

Question: But the situation changed four months ago …

Sergey Lavrov: The situation has not changed. We are going back to what the Minsk agreements were coordinated for: protecting Russians in Donbass, who have been betrayed by the French and Germans. The British also played a leading role. All our Western colleagues kept saying they were unable to make Kiev honour the Minsk agreements.

Question: If the goal is to protect Russians in Donbass, why have more civilians been killed in the DPR and LPR in the four months since the start of the special military operation than in all of last year?

Sergey Lavrov: Did you also watch German ARD television and the main French TV channel, which declared recently that a maternity clinic and a marketplace had been shelled by the Russian army killing dozens of civilians? They declared without any qualms that this had been done by the Russian military. Just like they claimed some time ago that a railway station in Kramatorsk had been hit by Russia. Although the Western journalists proved that the missile had come from the territory controlled by the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

Question: Last year, eight civilians were killed in the LPR and DPR, and seven the year before. While every death is a tragedy, that did not constitute the genocide Russian officials often invoke. With these numbers in mind, can you say that invading Ukraine was a reasonable decision?

Sergey Lavrov: We did not invade Ukraine. We announced a special military operation after being left with no other means to make it clear to the West that it is engaging in criminal activity by dragging Ukraine into NATO, by coddling and doting on a neo-Nazi regime, whose president Vladimir Zelensky said in September 2021 (you didn’t tell your viewers about it, did you?) that, if someone in Ukraine feels Russian, they should leave for Russia. He said that publicly. When a CNN correspondent told him that the Azov Regiment was listed as an extremist and terrorist organisations by some Western countries, the US, and Japan, Vladimir Zelensky shrugged his shoulders and said they had many such battalions and regiments, and they were what they were.

Question: Let’s look at the consequences. Four months have passed. The result: thousands of civilians have been killed; over 14 million Ukrainians have fled their homes; Russian troops sustained considerable losses and a host of sanctions have been imposed on Russia. Do you still call it the right decision?

Sergey Lavrov: I will tell you again: we didn’t have any other choice. We have explained this many times, a thousand times. Today, the Ukrainian regime is attacking civilians with your Western weapons just like they did in 2014 when the putschists came to power, when the centre of Lugansk was bombed by aircraft and 50 people were burned alive in Odessa. Does anyone recall this now?

Question: If you didn’t attack, there wouldn’t have been any weapons from the West.

Sergey Lavrov: We didn’t attack anyone. Russians were attacked in Ukraine. Imagine you are English. English or Scottish?

Question: I mentioned the figures to you. Eight dead in the past year, seven…

Sergey Lavrov: I am telling you that the Ukrainian regime is bombing its own population and you are selling weapons to it so it can continue doing this. Now about genocide. Are you English? What if Ireland (not Northern Ireland but the Republic of Ireland) banned the English language? How would the English feel?

Question: They wouldn’t invade Ireland for certain.

Sergey Lavrov: Wouldn’t you feel humiliated? The Russian language is banned in Ukraine. Try to speak Russian in a street in Kiev when young people with a certain look are walking there.

Question:Why do you consider NATO a threat? Why do people in Russia often talk about five waves of NATO’s expansion?

Sergey Lavrov: I think that NATO is a threat because we have been close friends with Serbians for a long time. They told us what the North Atlantic Alliance is about. The Afghans with whom we maintain relations in Afghanistan (and that includes practically all ethnic groups) also told us about the alliance and how it bombed wedding ceremonies. Just because these pilots wondered why some people had got together. They must be bombed, just in case.

I will explain to you why NATO is a threat. Talk to citizens of Iraq and Libya. Their countries were razed to the ground. After this, NATO still claims to be a defensive alliance. We are told not to worry, that Ukraine’s accession to NATO wouldn’t pose a threat to the Russian Federation. This is what we were told. With all due respect for our colleagues from the North Atlantic Alliance, I must say that Russia has the right to decide for itself what threatens its security and what does not.

Question: There were no NATO troops in Eastern Europe before the annexation of Crimea in 2014…

Sergey Lavrov: Moreover, there was no annexation of Crimea, either.

Question: As a result of Crimea’s annexation, there appeared 4,500 troops in 2016, and 40,000 after February 24, 2022. This is the result of Russia’s actions.

Sergey Lavrov: You are a clever man. These are facts. I will cite different facts for you. Your entire analysis is based on “cancel culture.” You are changing everything that preceded the event that you call an invasion or annexation. What happened in Ukraine on February 21, 2014? What we call a coup d’etat. How do you call it?

Question: I was the first to ask you. How do you call it?

Sergey Lavrov: I’ve already said that this was a coup d’etat that took place the morning after France, Poland and Germany affixed their signatures under the agreement between the then president and the opposition leaders. In the morning, the opposition leaders spat in the faces of Germany, France and Poland which  swallowed it. We called this a coup d’etat. And how did you call it?

Question: Do events of eight years ago give you the right to do what you are doing?

Sergey Lavrov: This is not about the right. I want to hear your honest response. We called it a coup d’etat. How do you call it in Britain?

Question: I wanted to ask you about this.

Sergey Lavrov: I want to understand your logic because if you want me to give you clear answers you must clearly explain to me what you are talking about.

Question: I want to grasp your logic. You say that NATO is a threat. Now you are saying that there is too much NATO on Russian borders. And yet now “there is even more NATO” as a result of Russia’s actions. Finland and Sweden are joining the alliance.

Sergey Lavrov: Finland and Sweden have long been subordinate to the Anglo-Saxons as the EU and NATO have drawn closer together. The EU has lost its meaning.

Question: Is the fact that Finland and Sweden are becoming NATO members a failure of Russian diplomacy?

Sergey Lavrov: Sweden and Finland are exercising their sovereign right and they are acting according to their governments’ decisions. They also are not overly concerned with public opinion, just as they didn’t concern themselves with public opinion in different countries as they carried out the objectives set by NATO.

Question: Does that mean it is not a threat to Russia?

Sergey Lavrov: We shall see how it will end. When and if Sweden and Finland join NATO, we will see what will go into effect on the ground. Whether weapons are delivered there and new contingents deployed. That said, I assure you that nobody is going to listen to either Europeans, or Finland or Sweden. They are telling us now that they will have no foreign troops or military bases. Meanwhile, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin that the US intends to increase its military presence in Europe, they have not yet decided if it will be permanent, rotational or permanent-rotational. He never said the EU should be consulted. He does not want to hear from European allies. He just decided, and announced that decisions will be made in Washington.

Question: Russia says that Ukraine is fighting Nazis.

Sergey Lavrov: Ukraine is not fighting Nazis. Nazism is flourishing in Ukraine.

Question: Listen to what the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights says. She spoke in May following a monitoring mission and said that the Russian military kept 360 people including 74 children and 5 disabled persons for 28 days in a school basement in the village of Yagodnoye, Chernigov Region, without a toilet and water. Ten elderly people died. Is this fighting Nazism?

Sergey Lavrov: International bureaucrats, including the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights and, to my immense disappointment, the UN Secretary-General and many other UN representatives, are being put under pressure by the West and are often being used to amplify fake news spread by the West.

Question: So Russia is squeaky clean, isn’t it?

Sergey Lavrov: Russia is not squeaky clean. Russia is what it is. And we are not ashamed of showing who we are.

May I inquire with you to better understand your media outlet’s policy on the Bucha tragedy? Did you report on the frame-up job in Bucha? You definitely said it had been carried out by Russia, right? The Guardian newspaper published in London later got preliminary forensic results which showed that most people whose dead bodies were shown by all the world’s TV channels got their wounds from artillery shrapnel.

Question:  Why do you ask? We have little time.

Sergey Lavrov: We have little time but you do not want to tell me why you keep saying untruths, to put it mildly. I asked you a question about how the BBC had covered the events in Bucha.

Question:  I wasn’t in Bucha. I am in Russia and this is why I am asking you about Russia’s position. The purpose of the operation as it was stated by President Putin back then is regime change, isn’t it?

Sergey Lavrov: The purpose of the operation is to protect the rights of Russians which have been blatantly ignored not only by the Kiev regime but also by the entire West and the civilised community which refused to implement the Minsk Agreements.

If you did not want to secure the rights of the Russians in Donbass through Kiev’s adherence to a UNSC resolution, we will ensure the rights of Russians ourselves. That is what we are doing.

Question: On February 25 of this year, Vladimir Putin addressed Ukrainian soldiers and urged them to take power in their hands because it would be easier for Russia to come to terms with them than with this gang of drug addicts and neo-Nazis in Kiev. This sounds like a direct call for a military rebellion.

Sergey Lavrov: No, it sounds like a direct call for fulfilling their military duty instead of serving Nazis who are cancelling everything that their regime doesn’t like, including Russian education, culture and media. They didn’t cancel BBC because you haven’t told the truth about what was happening there for eight years. I asked you a question: Did you or any of your BBC colleagues go to Donbass during the eight years when Kiev soldiers were bombing civilians there?

Question: Over the course of six years, the BBC had many times contacted the leadership in the separatist-run areas asking for permission to go and see what was happening. We were refused entry every single time. I think if genocide had really taken place there, they would have been interested in letting us come and see but no. Why were we denied entry?

Sergey Lavrov: I don’t know why you were denied entry. Our journalists worked there 24/7 and showed the results of bombing by Kiev battalions. You should have gone to the Ukrainian side of the contact line. They do not have such destruction there.

Question: Recently, your President praised Peter the Great for reclaiming primordial Russian territories and even added that “to return and strengthen is also our lot.” How many more territories and what territories are you going to reclaim?

Sergey Lavrov: President Vladimir Putin said it all. I have nothing to add. I will tell you again: you want to forget everything that preceded this event. You deny, cancel and do not want to hear what happened before February 24 of this year, what happened before the voting in Crimea. You cannot accept that we are very patient. But when our patience runs out, we respond to rudeness and the humiliation of the Russian people, like the coup in February 2014 when power was taken by people who cancelled the regional status of the Russian language and were going to oust Russians from Crimea (they sent armed people there). What did BBC report about this? Nothing at all. You said this was a normal democratic process.

Question: Can you say categorically that Russia won’t launch another special operation and won’t invade neighbouring territories?

Sergey Lavrov: We believed words for a very long time. Your comrades-in-arms, your compatriots together with other members of the North Atlantic Alliance solemnly proclaimed a principle of indivisible security where nobody has the right to enhance their security at the expense of the security of others. When we said that NATO’s five expansions undermines our security, we were simply ignored. Now President of France Emmanuel Macron said they must talk to Russia and should not humiliate the Russians. Do you know who replied to him? Some Czech Foreign Minister Jan Lipavsky. He said Macron didn’t understand anything, implying that Russians must be humiliated. What is your attitude to this?

Question: I want to ask you about the Brits who recently got a death sentence …

Sergey Lavrov: You should do an interview in the Donetsk People’s Republic about it.

Question: Russia is the only country that recognises the DPR.

Sergey Lavrov: No, it is not the only one, several more countries have recognised them.

Question: I think the DPR has a lot of influence in Russia.

Sergey Lavrov: We are friends and allies.

Question: In the eyes of the West, Russia is responsible for these people. Do you think the death sentence …

Sergey Lavrov: I am not interested in the “eyes of the West” at all. I am only interested in international law, according to which mercenaries are not combatants. So nothing in your eyes matters.

Question: They are not mercenaries, they were serving in the Ukrainian Armed Forces.

Sergey Lavrov: This should be determined by the court.

Question: Do you think the court there is independent?

Sergey Lavrov: I am confident they have independent courts there. Do you think your courts are independent? After Alexander Litvinenko’s death your “independent” court announced “public process,” that is, had the case classified. You did the same with the Skripals. That’s your law.

Question: Did the UK government contact you about the fate of these boys?

Sergey Lavrov: I have no information about their contacting us. They are used to doing everything publicly. They began saying they are worried about the fate of their subjects. I do not know if they contacted us or not. They should contact the DPR.

Question: How would you characterise relations with the UK now? Saying they are bad would be putting it mildly.

Sergey Lavrov: I think there is no room for manoeuvre left in the relationship. Boris Johnson and Elizabeth Truss say publicly that they must defeat Russia and bring it to its knees. Come on, do it!

Question: How does Moscow view Great Britain now?

Sergey Lavrov: This is a country which is once again sacrificing the interests of its people for the sake of politicians’ ambitions, who only think about the next election and nothing else.

Question: You criticise the countries, which are supplying weapons to Kiev. Who is more to blame – the countries supplying weapons to a country, which is defending its lands, or the country that has attacked it?

Sergey Lavrov: How is it defending its lands, when it bombs its own citizens? Let me remind you once again: Vladimir Zelensky said in September 2021 that those who think in Russian and feel they are Russian should beat it back to Russia. Why don’t you talk about that? Why do you ignore past events? Now, when they are shelling their own cities, towns, markets, maternity homes, and hospitals – everything is all right [with you]. You ask me why Russia is waging a “war” – in response to what we are showing. If they do not show in Britain the aftermath of the [Ukrainian] shelling of Donetsk, Kramatorsk and other places, you can certainly watch it here. Do you report anything on that?

Question: You said that you are defending Donbass and the people in Donbass. I told you that since the start of the operation twenty times more people had died …

Sergey Lavrov: And I told you that those people are being killed by neo-Nazis. I ask you: Do you show the results of the AFU’s shelling of towns and villages? Or you don’t show them in your reports? You don’t show it, correct? That is why you want to squeeze some words of regret from me about the current developments so as to send a report to London and use my words to back up the false version of events in Ukraine, which you keep broadcasting.

Question: You are wrong about that.

Sergey Lavrov: Being in Moscow, you cannot fail to see what journalists in Donbass are showing, what is happening as a result of [Ukrainian] artillery attacks on  peaceful towns and civilians. Do you report on that or not?

Question: I want to ask you…

Sergey Lavrov: So that means you don’t.

Question: I have been in Russia for almost 30 years. I have toured the country. The phrase I heard most in the villages and cities I visited was “if only there is no war.” I understand that your country suffered terrible losses, that is why it beggars belief that your country has “unleashed a war” in Ukraine. I don’t understand why it was needed. To ruin Ukraine and the future of your own country?

Sergey Lavrov: I got your point. You have no problems with understanding the political course pursued by Kiev in the past ten years – to cancel anything Russian – do you? You think “if only there is no war” means a possibility to humiliate Russians and Russia (as the Czech foreign minister said replying to Emmanuel Macron who had spoken out against humiliating the Russians). For some reason, nobody is speaking about that. You grabbed what you needed for your line, for the narrative of your broadcasts.

The phrase “if only  there is no war” is deeply ingrained in the Russian people. But it also has pride ingrained, what we call self-respect, which they are trying to take away from all the Russians in Ukraine, with your support.

To be continued…

President Putin and UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres: Meeting

April 27, 2022

http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/68287

April 26, 2022

President of Russia Vladimir Putin:

Mr Secretary-General,

I am very happy to see you.

As one of the founders of the United Nations and a permanent member of the UN Security Council, Russia has always supported this universal organisation. We believe the UN is not simply universal but it is unique in a way – the international community does not have another organisation like it. We are doing all we can to support the principles on which it rests, and we intend to continue doing this in the future.

We find the expression of some of our colleagues about a world based on rules somewhat strange. We believe the main rule is the UN Charter and other documents adopted by this organisation rather than some papers written by their authors as they see fit or aimed at ensuring their own interests.

We are also surprised to hear statements by our colleagues that imply that some in the world have exceptional status or can claim exclusive rights because the Charter of the United Nations reads that all participants in international communication are equal regardless of their strength, size or geographical location. I think this is similar to what the Bible reads about all people being equal. I am sure we will find the same idea in both the Quran and the Torah. All people are equal before God. So, the idea that someone can claim a kind of exceptional status is very strange to us.

We are living in a complicated world, and, therefore, we proceed from reality and are willing to work with everyone.

No doubt, at one time the United Nations was established to resolve acute crises and went through different periods in its development. Quite recently, just several years ago, we heard it had become obsolete, and there was no need for it anymore. This happened whenever it prevented someone from reaching their goals in the international arena.

We have always said that there is no other universal organisation like the United Nations, and it is necessary to cherish the institutions that were created after WWII for the express purpose of settling disputes.

I know about your concern over Russia’s military operation in Donbass, in Ukraine. I think this will be the focus of our conversation today. I would just like to note in this context that the entire problem emerged after a coup d’état staged in Ukraine in 2014. This is an obvious fact. You can call it whatever name you like and have whatever bias in favour of those who did it, but this was really an anti-constitutional coup.

This was followed by the situation with the expression of their will by the residents of Crimea and Sevastopol. They acted in practically the same way as the people living in Kosovo – they made a decision on independence and then turned to us with a request to join the Russian Federation. The only difference between the two cases was that in Kosovo this decision on sovereignty was adopted by Parliament whereas Crimea and Sevastopol made it at a nationwide referendum.

A similar problem emerged in south-eastern Ukraine, where the residents of several territories, at least, two Ukrainian regions, did not accept the coup d’état and its results. But they were subjected to very strong pressure, in part, with the use of combat aviation and heavy military equipment. This is how the crisis in Donbass, in south-eastern Ukraine, emerged.

As you know, after another failed attempt by the Kiev authorities to resolve this problem by force, we arrived at the signing of agreements in the city of Minsk. This is what they were called – the Minsk Agreements. It was an attempt to settle the situation in Donbass peacefully.

To our regret, during the past eight years the people that lived there found themselves under a siege. The Kiev authorities announced in public that they were organising a siege of these territories. They were not embarrassed to call it a siege although initially they had renounced this idea and continued military pressure.

Under the circumstances, after the authorities in Kiev actually went on record as saying – I would like to emphasise that the top state officials announced this in public – that they did not intend to fulfil the Minsk Agreements, we were compelled to recognise these regions as independent and sovereign states to prevent the genocide of the people living there. I would like to reiterate: this was a forced measure to stop the suffering of the people living in those territories.

Unfortunately, our colleagues in the West preferred to ignore all this. After we recognised the independence of these states, they asked us to render them military aid because they were subjected to military actions, an armed aggression. In accordance with Article 51 of the UN Charter, Chapter VII, we were forced to do this by launching a special military operation.

I would like to inform you that although the military operation is underway, we are still hoping to reach an agreement on the diplomatic track. We are conducting talks. We have not abandoned them.

Moreover, at the talks in Istanbul, and I know that you have just been there since I spoke with President Erdogan today, we managed to make an impressive breakthrough. Our Ukrainian colleagues did not link the requirements for Ukraine’s international security with such a notion as Ukraine’s internationally recognised borders, leaving aside Crimea, Sevastopol and the newly Russia-recognised Donbass republics, albeit with certain reservations.

But, unfortunately, after reaching these agreements and after we had, in my opinion, clearly demonstrated our intentions to create the conditions for continuing the talks, we faced a provocation in the town of Bucha, which the Russian Army had nothing to do with. We know who was responsible, who prepared this provocation, using what means, and we know who the people involved were.

After this, the position of our negotiators from Ukraine on a further settlement underwent a drastic change. They simply renounced their previous intentions to leave aside issues of security guarantees for the territories of Crimea, Sevastopol and the Donbass republics. They simply renounced this. In the relevant draft agreement presented to us, they simply stated in two articles that these issues must be resolved at a meeting of the heads of state.

It is clear to us that if we take these issues to the heads of state level without even resolving them in a preliminary draft agreement, they will never be resolved. In this case, we simply cannot sign a document on security guarantees without settling the territorial issues of Crimea, Sevastopol and the Donbass republics.

Nevertheless, the talks are going on. They are now being conducted online. I am still hoping that this will lead us to some positive result.

This is all I wanted to say in the beginning. I am sure we will have many questions linked with this situation. Maybe there will be other questions as well. We will talk.

I am very happy to see you. Welcome to Moscow.

(In his remarks, the UN Secretary General expressed concern over the situation in Ukraine, while emphasising the need for a multilateral world order based on the UN Charter and international law. Antonio Guterres also presented the two proposals he had put forward the same day during his meeting with Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. These proposals concern humanitarian matters, including humanitarian corridors, in particular, for Mariupol residents, as well as setting up a humanitarian contact group in which the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs (UN OCHA), the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Russia, and Ukraine would work together to discuss the situation in order to make these corridors truly safe and effective.)

Vladimir Putin: Mr Secretary General,

Regarding the invasion, I am well-versed in the documents of the International Court on the situation in Kosovo. In fact, I have read them myself. I remember very well the decision by the International Court, which states that when fulfilling its right to self-determination a territory within any state does not have to seek permission from the country’s central government in order to proclaim its sovereignty. This was the ruling on Kosovo, and this is what the International Court decided, and everyone supported it. I personally read all the comments issued by the judicial, administrative and political bodies in the United States and Europe – everyone supported this decision.

If so, the Donbass republics, the Donetsk People’s Republic and the Lugansk People’s Republic, can enjoy the same right without seeking permission from Ukraine’s central government and declare their sovereignty, since the precedent has been created.

Is this so? Do you agree with this?

(Antonio Guterres noted that the United Nations did not recognise Kosovo).

Vladimir Putin: Yes, of course, but the court did. Let me finish what I was saying.

If there is a precedent, the Donbass republics can do the same. This is what they did, while we, in turn, had the right to recognise them as independent states.

Many countries around the world did this, including our Western opponents, with Kosovo. Many states recognised Kosovo. It is a fact that many Western countries recognised Kosovo as an independent state. We did the same with the Donbass republics. After that, they asked us to provide them with military assistance to deal with the state that launched military operations against them. We had the right to do so in full compliance with Chapter VII, Article 51 of the UN Charter.

Just a second, we will talk about this in a minute. But first I would like to address the second part of your question, Mariupol. The situation is difficult and possibly even tragic there. But in fact, it is very simple.

I had a conversation with President Erdogan today. He spoke about the ongoing fighting there. No, there is no fighting there; it is over. There is no fighting in Mariupol; it has stopped.

Part of the Ukrainian armed forces that were deployed in other industrial districts have surrendered. Nearly 1,300 of them have surrendered, but the actual figure is larger. Some of them were injured or wounded; they are being kept in absolutely normal conditions. The wounded have received medical assistance from our doctors, skilled and comprehensive assistance.

The Azovstal plant has been fully isolated. I have issued instructions, an order to stop the assault. There is no direct fighting there now. Yes, the Ukrainian authorities say that there are civilians at the plant. In this case, the Ukrainian military must release them, or otherwise they will be doing what terrorists in many countries have done, what ISIS did in Syria when they used civilians as human shields. The simplest thing they can do is release these people; it is as simple as that.

You say that Russia’s humanitarian corridors are ineffective. Mr Secretary-General, you have been misled: these corridors are effective. Over 100,000 people, 130,000–140,000, if I remember correctly, have left Mariupol with our assistance, and they are free to go where they want, to Russia or Ukraine. They can go anywhere they want; we are not detaining them, but we are providing assistance and support to them.

The civilians in Azovstal, if there are any, can do this as well. They can come out, just like that. This is an example of a civilised attitude to people, an obvious example. And anyone can see this; you only need to talk with the people who have left the city. The simplest thing for military personnel or members of the nationalist battalions is to release the civilians. It is a crime to keep civilians, if there are any there, as human shields.

We maintain contact with them, with those who are hiding underground at the Azovstal plant. They have an example they can follow: their comrades-in-arms have surrendered, over a thousand of them, 1,300. Nothing bad has happened to them. Moreover, Mr Secretary-General, if you wish, if representatives of the Red Cross and the UN want to inspect their detainment conditions and see for themselves where and how medical assistance is being provided to them, we are ready to organise this. It is the simplest solution to a seemingly complex issue.

Let us discuss this.

Day 49 of the Russian SMO – a few notes on the propaganda war (UPDATED!)

April 14, 2022

Source

Dear friends,

First, I want to point you to an excellent analysis by Bernhard at Moon of Alabama entitled “U.S. Military Intelligence Official Refutes ‘Russian Atrocities’ Claims“.

So we can now “officially consider” the Bucha false flag as an “official flop” 🙂

Next, I want to point you to Andrei Martyanov‘s commentary on what happened to the missile cruiser Moskva he simply titled “About RKR Moskva“.

Please read both of these articles as I won’t report it here and I will assume that you have read them.

Here I will just add what Pentagon spokesman John Kirby officially declared  about this incident:

“We know she suffered an explosion,” Kirby said in an interview on MSNBC. “It looks like — from the images that we have been able to look at — it looks like it was a pretty sizable explosion, too. We don’t know what caused that explosion.”

In an interview on CNN, Kirby said the explosion was “sizable enough.” According to him, US officials “picked up indications that other naval vessels around her tried to come to her assistance.” (emphasis added)

“Eventually, that wasn’t apparently needed, so she’s making her own way now across the Black Sea, and we’ll continue to try to monitor this as best we can. Certainly, it could have been damage from some external force, like a missile or an attack of some kind, a torpedo or something like that. But it could also be something that happens inside the skin of the ship — an engineering fire, a fuel fire. You just don’t know,” Kirby said.

It is a truly a very sad time when top US officials lie LESS than the “free and democratic” press!

Okay, I am not a naval person at all (being born in landlocked Switzerland did not help!) but I can make a few semi-educated guesses:

• The Ukronazis claim that they sunk the Moskva with two Neptune missiles.  Wikipedia gives us two important technical details about this missile: its warhead is 150kg and its speed is subsonic which brings this specialized article to add “This missile travels at subsonic speed. It is estimated that due to its subsonic speed that anti-ship missile can be intercepted rather easily, especially by advanced defense system“.  The Moskva displaces 12,490 tons, so I will assume that every person reading this will understand that 2x150kgb subsonic warheads are not enough to sink such a ship.  Thus the “sunk by Neptunes” is highly unlikely.
• The electromagnetic space over the Ukrainian coast and the Black Sea is chock-full with signals from all the parties to the conflict.  The launch of two Neptune ASM would have been instantly detected not only by the Russians (including the very powerful radars on the Moskva) but also by the USA/NATO yet Kirby said “We don’t know what caused that explosion”, did he not?  Yes, he could be lying, but why bother when the morale-boosting lie would be to claim that it was a Ukrainian ASM hit?  It seems that, like with Bucha, the US side is NOT endorsing the Ukronazi lies.  I wonder why…
• Why was the Moskva evacuated?  Simple, it was literally full of highly explosive munitions and fuel, so the crew was evacuated and the ship either towed back to Sevastopol or it had a skeleton crew which drove it back to port on its own power (I have heard both versions but Kirbys’ “she’s making her own way now” seems to point to the latter version ).
• The ship was clearly very seriously damaged which, according to Russian ex-navy posters on Telegram is probably due to two crucial factors: the ship is very old and it did not get a modern fire suppression system due to budgetary constrains and, possibly, mismanagement and fraud.
• Ships do burn, explode and sink.  Anybody thinking that this is the result of Russian incompetence, vodka or poor design better read this first: “Navy ship destroyed by fire to be dismantled at Port of Brownsville“.
• Still, this is yet another PR disaster because the timing could not have been worse: not only is the flagship of the Black Sea Fleet unable to participate to the SMO, the Ukies now have a silly, but much repeated and morale-boosting fairy tale to spin, and it was picked up by most of the western press (what else is new?).  Yes, I know, the Ukies always lie, even about sinking Russian ships, but the braindead folks in Zone A have had an entire life long exposure to constant lies from their own “press” and they STILL read/watch it.  Apparently they don’t mind being lied to.
• It is interesting that Kirby mentioned “torpedoes” since the (already non-existing) Ukie Navy does not have subs or surface ships to fire torpedoes.  Make of it what you want.  He did not mention a stay Ukie mine by name, but just say “something like that”.  We might want to keep that tidbit of info somewhere in the back of our minds.
• One more thing: the Moskva had very good, if rather old, air defenses.  They were more than enough to deal with a couple of Ukrainian subsonic missiles, but we don’t know what the Ukies or the Romanians might have deployed on their coast.  And air-launched missile is, in theory, also an option, but when we look at the kind of anti-shipping missiles and aircraft the Ukrainians, Romanians or even NATO or the US have, I did not find a combination which would make sense under these circumstances.

For these reasons I am inclined to believe the Russian version of a fire which put the entire ship at risk and which was eventually put out, but only after major damage to the Moskva.  It was a quite beautiful ship and I hope it can be salvaged, but it was also objectively very old so maybe the money would be better spent on modern Russian Navy ships.

The only major doubt left to me is whether there were any lives lost in this fire.  The Russians say that 500 sailors were safely evacuated, and if that is true, that means that if there were casualties they were not large numbers, but even a single loss of life is a tragedy and such a fire did represent a MAJOR risk for the Moskva and its crew and Russian sailors are known to be willing to sacrifice their lives to save their fellow sailors and their ship.  So there could be casualties, possibly more than just a few, but probably/hopefully less than a dozen.

One more note: all night long Ukie-trolls were sending me emails and comments with stuff like “so how do you feel about our missiles sinking your flagship and drowning 500+ of your fellow Moskals?“.  I want to let them all know that am deeply grateful for kind their concern and I want to reassure them that I am doing quite well, thank you 😛

Apparently, the “Ze” signed a decree authorizing Ukrainian forces to attack targets in Russia and there were a few minor attacks overnight.  The Russian MoD has officially announced that if this continues Russian will attack the “decision making centers” including those in Kiev.

There is no doubt in my mind at all what this is all about.  It is NOT “the invincible Ukrainian military about to invade Russia up to Moscow and even the Urals”.  It is about “Ze” desperately wanting a high-visibility “Russian atrocity”, but this time in Kiev.  I am confident that the Russian General Staff is acutely aware of this risk and will chose its target(s) with utmost caution and will use all intelligence sources – very much including HUMINT – in the process.

That’s it from me for right now.

Andrei

PS: if you come across any RECENT (post fire!) photos of the Moskva, please post them in the comments and email them to me, thank you!

UPDATE1: here is what the MoD officially reported so far:

The source of ignition on the cruiser “Moskva” is localized. There is no open fire. Explosions of ammunition have been stopped. The cruiser “Moskva” remains buoyant. The main missile armament was not damaged. The crew was evacuated to the ships of the Black Sea Fleet in the area. Measures are being taken to tow the cruiser to the port. The cause of the fire is being established.

UPDATE2: according to the Telegram channel of RIA Novosti:

The Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation reports that during the towing of the cruiser “Moscow” to the port of destination, due to damage to the hull received during the fire from the detonation of ammunition, the ship lost stability.  In the conditions of stormy sea waves, the ship sank. 

Comment by Andrei: if true, this saddens me, she is/was quite a beautiful ship.  I also notice the “superb” performance of the Russian MoD information operations.  When will the Russian get serious about the information war????

Russian SMO: day 47 “crazies in the basement” and a poem

April 12, 2022

Today let’s begin with this news item today:

Seven-in-Ten Americans Now See Russia as an Enemy Attitudes toward NATO increasingly positive.

You got to love the “logic” of these folks!

Russia intervenes in a country which neighbors Russia, thousands of miles away, and the US Americans see that as a threat to the USA.  And nevermind that the USA is the country which forced Russia into this war which the Kremlin spent eight years trying to avoid.

How is such a result even possible?  Here are a few options:

1. A majority of US Americans are simply stupid and cannot think
2. A majority of US Americans are unbelievably ignorant
3. A majority of US Americans are brainwashed by their media and schools
4. A majority of US Americans have been trained/conditioned to fear and hate whomever their rulers designate for demonization
5. A majority of US Americans sincerely believe that the USA ought to be the planet’s cop and no matter where a conflict starts, even when that conflict started by the USA, they believe that it is Uncle Shmuel business to deal with it.  In their tiny minds, the USA has a God given right to intervene anywhere and attack anyone.
6. A majority of US Americans perceive any truly sovereign country as a direct threat to their way of life.
7. The PYSOP campaign to demonize Russia has been a resounding success.

A mix of all of the above is probably the most accurate cause for such a result.

Next, I bumped into a Foxnews propaganda piece featuring a clown which, apparently, in some very distant past was a US Lt. General in the USA military, his last name is Kellogg.  I decided to give it a try and I have to say that I sat absolutely *transfixed* listening to him: according to him, Russia has already suffered a huge defeat at the hands of the Ukronazis and with NATO’s help the Ukraine can, and probably will, win this war.

And both that “general” and the presstitute “interviewing” him delivered that crock of shit with great gravitas and appropriate facial expressions (angled eyebrows, the way the journos try to look very sincere).  I was expecting at least one of them to burst out laughing but, no, of course not.

These two simply lack both the brain and the humor to realize how terminally stupid and ridiculous they both sound.

As I have written many times in the past, US generals are much more “corporate CEO in combat fatigues” than real combat officers.  By Russian standards this guy would not even be allowed to clean latrines in a construction battalion.  A man who says with a straight face that delivering 20 Soviet era aircraft or S-300 to the Ukrainians will make a difference in this war is either a clueless civilian or a deliberate liar prostituting his (putative and now former) officer’s honor for a few bucks.

No wonder the Russians have stopped taking telephone calls from these clowns.

Does anybody still wonder why “Kabul” happened or why the USA cannot win a war against anybody except Grenada (and that one barely, they had to bring the 82nd to fix the usual SNAFU created by US “special” operation forces)?

As for the German Eurolemmings, they have truly lost any sense of decency or even basic common sense: they are now seriously thinking about sending old Leopard 1 tanks to the Ukraine!

Let me explain something really basic here:

• You cannot just send weapons to the Ukraine and have that make a difference.  I mean, yes, if you send AKs, bullet and clubs, they might get used.  But modern weapon systems require training.  They also require maintenance.  Then they need to be integrated into the rest of the armed forces.  Then your forces need to train and practice a lot to perfect their combat coordination.  Then you need a supply/maintenance/repairs network to maintain/repair your systems.  Advanced air defense systems require crews with sometimes many years of training.  Considering that the reinforcements sent by Kiev to the Donbass even include their Volkssturm, you can imagine how utterly useless the operators of the few weapons systems surviving the trip from Lvov to the Donbass will be.  And the interval between the moment this ancient S-300 goes live and the moment a Russian ARM hit it will be counted in minutes at most.
• Next, old weapons (ex-Soviet or ex-NATO) are just fat targets.  In almost all cases, Russian equivalents are one or even two generations ahead, so why are all the EU sending them?  Well, for a couple of reasons, the main one is to get rid of them, since storage or recycling of such systems is rather costly.  The next reason is that it makes NATO politicians look “tough” – after all, if Zelenskii wants old tanks, artillery or air defense systems (he ain’t exactly a military genius either!) then, by all means, we give it to him and look like we are doing *something*.  By the way, the four S-300 sent by the Slovaks were, apparently, already destroyed in a strike yesterday.  And the Slovak taxpayer did not spend a penny on this.  How is that not a good deal for Slovakia?  Oh sure, this is an act of war, a casus belli, as are ALL but UNSC approved “sanctions”, but the Euroemmings Master Race are so superior in every sense to the accursed Rooskies that, screw that!  The only thing which can bring the Eurolemmings back to reality is a Russian strike on such a weapons convoy INSIDE a NATO member country because, as I have already explained, when the Eurolemmings to hide behind Uncle Shmuel’s back, all he will offer them are statements of support, outrage, freshly printed fiat money and the usual mix of threats, fear and hate western politicians always spew about Russia.  But the US won’t allow NATO to go to war with Russia over one such strike, especially if the Russians clearly explain what they did and why (I actually expect that quite a few “old-time” western officers will get a good kick out of their newfound NATO “allies” hysterics once that happens).
• As I have mentioned in the past, weapons convoys in the western Ukraine (and, possibly, even inside Poland) make for easy and lucrative targets for the Russians.  Just mix in enough civilians and, voilà!, sooner or later you will have a “Russian atrocity”, something like “the Russians kill scores of innocent feeling Ukrainian civilians” or “the Russians attacked trucks clearly marked with red crosses” (FYI – the SBU and Azov uses red crosses on its vans and ammo/supply trucks!).  This is likely one of the reasons the Russians have, so far, chosen not to attack early on but to wait for solid intelligence and then strike the NATO forces/hardware when it is nicely concentrated somewhere.  Still, we know that Azov ALWAYS used civilians (especially those perceived as “not sufficiently patriotic”!) as human shields.  By the way, NATO taught them this technique.  Anyway, to expect NATO weapon convoys NOT to be protected by human shields would be simply stupid.  The Russians simply have to ASSUME that NATO/SBU/Azov will ALWAYS be surrounded by captive civilians.

Which brings us to the issue of false flags.  Here are a few headlines about this topic:

• CNN: ““All options are on the table” for the West’s response if Russia uses chemical weapons“
• Vesti: “French gendarmes arrived in Lvov” (to investigate Russian war crimes and atrocities)
• Sputnik: “US Cannot Confirm Use of Chemical Agents in Mariupol, Senior Defense Official Says“

Need I say anything more?

Even by British standards, this is the most pre-announced pre-publicized false flag in history, I am amazed I don’t see ads and previews for it on Amazon and Netflix…

I guess, I will just say that if the public opinion is being prepared for a Russian chemical attack (maybe even with the – apparently harmless –  “Novichok”) then we know for sure which side is winning and which side is not winning.

Medvechuk, one of the main leaders of the opposition at held in the SBU offices, according to Zelenskii who is very proud of that “capture”

There are also a few other reasons why the Empire of Hate and Lies badly and urgently needs a false flag:

• Mariupol has fallen and all the rescue or escape attempts have failed.  Yes, there are probably several hundred, possibly around 1000 Nazis still left in the deep and many underground facilities under the industrial complex, but they have become militarily irrelevant so the Russian National Guard forces are taking their sweet time to avoid any unnecessary losses on the Russian side.
• Reports of Nazi atrocities are literally all over the place, especially on Telegram.  A few of these have leaked into the legacy corporate ziomedia thereby creating the first, still tiny, cracks in the official narrative.
• Nobody knows what/who exactly is hidden deep in the bowels of Azovstal, but considering the immense efforts to get “it/him/them” out of there, the inevitable takeover of the underground floors by the Russians will result in some major embarrassment for the Empire, unless the Kremlin decides to show “goodwill” again and mistakenly believe that any such goodwill will be appreciated in the West.  IF there is a deal made, it will have to offer the Russians something really substantive and very quickly verifiable since just promises won’t do, not even with the Atlantic Integrationists (who are now busy rebranding themselves as “patriotic Russians”).
• There are also lots of reports of atrocities in the Nazi-controlled Ukraine, including public floggings and executions.  Again, Telegram is flooded with such reports and footage and the Bucha false flag petered out without providing the needed “distraction” and return to the “correct” narrative.  The Ukronazis even reportedly told the Brits that they have no intention of abiding by the Geneva Conventions (what a surprise!).

• On the photo above and on the closeup, check out the face and expression of Viktor Medvedchuk, the leader of the Ukrainian opposition.  If that is how the SBU OFFICIALLY – the photo is from ‘Ze’ himself – treats a top political figure, just imagine what they have done to the thousands of people they have “disappeared” over 8 years now!

Over the past week or so, the western PSYOPs have begun to lose control of the narrative, which means that they need to seize the initiative and regain control of the narrative.  Not exactly a difficult task when dealing with a terminally stupidified public in Zone A.

In the meantime, the Eurolemmings are continuing their acts of highway robbery.  European “values” at work, from the Crusades to the modern age 🙂

A few weeks back I wrote that while the immediate objective of the SMO in the Ukraine was to denazify and disarm the Nazi-occupied Ukraine, the real end goal was to chance the European collective security architecture which, itself, is the cornerstone of our entire, worldwide, international order.  I called that “denazify the planet” and I am pretty sure that many readers reading these words thought “what’s Andrei smoking?”.

Well, how about we now listen to both Sergei Lavrov and Sergei Karaganov?

The first one, Lavrov, called the “end of the course for US hegemony as the goal of the operation in Ukraine“.  As for Karaganov, he declared that “we are at war with the West. The European security order is illegitimate“.

Still, for the time being, the big event will be the initiation of the 2nd phase of the war: the elimination of the Ukrainian forces inside the Donbass cauldron.  Very few people know how long such an operation would last, it depends on so many things that it makes no sense to try to guess it, but the outcome itself is not in doubt.

Only God, and Satan, know what kind of demented scheme the likes of Nuland or Blinken will come up next.

All we can say is that a rabid dog is cornered, it makes it even more dangerous.

And we have to keep in mind that they REALLY and SINCERELY thought they would (finally!) break the will of the Russian people and that they know this long awaited and oh-so-sweet revenge-victory is slipping away from them – just imagine the rage they must feel.  After eight years of endless provocations, insults and “negotiations” the Neocons have FINALLY forced Russia to intervene openly, which was always the dream of the Neocons.  But what they did not expect (and neither did anybody else, myself included) was that instead of “just” liberating the LDNR from constant Ukronazi strikes, Putin chose to liberate the entire Ukraine and change the entire collective security architecture of Europe.  Even better, Putin has confirmed this openly in his ultimatum and many times since.

You could say that Putin’s message to NATO was short: “We are coming for you”.  I think of it as the modern equivalent of the ancient words “хочу на вы идти” (pronounced “khochu na vy idti”) spoken to his enemies by the famous commander of ancient Russia, the Grand Duke of Kiev Svyatoslav Igorevich (955-972) and which can be loosely translated as “my intention is to attack you”.

I don’t believe that NATO has fully understood this or, to the extent they did, they will dismiss it as “bluff” (as if Putin ever bluffed, which is really something Russians very rarely do).

But by the time the 2nd phase is over, this reality will have trickled into the delusional minds of the likes of Borrell or Stoltenberg and you can be sure they will run to their beloved Uncle Shmuel for protection.  At which point the Empire of Lies will have exactly two options left:

1. Admit a total political defeat of NATO in Europe or
2. Commit suicide and try to attack Russia.  And since the US/NATO/EU/etc do not have anywhere near the force levels to take on the Russian military a direct US military intervention, this would be utterly pointless and bring the leaders of the USA to the same choice (to nuke or not to nuke?), except that a really embarrassing military defeat will be added on top of an already really embarrassing political defeat

So, apparently, the Eurolemmings are totally willing to die for the Ukraine, as long as the fighting is done by the Ukrainians themselves.

The same Eurolemmings are also willing to eviscerate their own economies only for the privilege to brown-nose Uncle Shmuel and get a “certificate of democratic credentials” as a reward.

But will US soldiers be willing to die for either the Ukraine or the Eurolemmings?  Will the Neocons have enough influence and power to force the US military to execute a civilization-ending order?  Or will there appear some personality/group which would do, but this time REALLY DO, what Trump promised and “drain the swamp” and get rid of the likes of Bliken or Nuland?

I very much doubt it.  But I can still hope for it.

And then there is China which clearly supports Russia, and which is clearly preparing for a war against the USA.  Even their minister of defense said so quite openly.  And here are two things the Chinese know for sure:

• If the Empire defeats Russia, China will be next, thus China cannot afford a Russian defeat under ANY circumstances (and neither can Russia afford a hypothetical Chinese defeat at the hands of the Empire).
• If the US and Russia go at each other in earnest, this will be the perfect time to not only solve the Taiwan issue, but to boot the US out of the Far East just as Iran booted the USA out of the Middle-East.  From the Chinese point of view, “just” liberating Taiwan is not enough – the US must be removed from Taiwan, Japan and even the ROK.  So yes, China also wants to denazify the planet, they are less blunt about it than the Russians, but it is clear to me that this world denazification plan was agreed to by both Putin and Xi.

The folks at the Pentagon must realize that – at least a sufficient critical mass must do so.  Yes, I agree with Andrei Martyanov, the former US generals on TV sound like ignorant infantiles, but I will never believe that all US military commanders are that stupid.  I studied in Washington DC from 1986 to 1991 and most of my teachers were active-duty military, and none of them were stupid.  I also had a lot of fellow students who were from the US military, in the “lieutenant to major” range, and, again, these were smart men, very well educated and, I believe, honorable men.  By now some of them must hold very senior ranks and they could make the difference.

Again, I don’t expect that to happen, but I get to still hope that it will.

I did not study with either General Mattis or General Milley and I know very little about them except this: Mattis seems to be the person who deliberately botched the US missile strike on Syria to avoid a possible Russian reaction leading to war and General Milley called his Chinese counterpart to tell him that the US has no intention of striking at China thereby telling the Chinese that they are NOT in a “use them or lose them” situation, which would have put the entire USA in the very real danger of getting nuked by a desperate China.  In both of these cases, these generals appear to have contravened direct orders for the greater good of service to their country and protection of the US population of the imbecilic orders given by imbecilic US Presidents.  Mattis was “let go” pretty soon by The Donald while Milley was subjected to a vicious smear campaign.

So if “Biden” (meaning Nuland, Sullivan, Blinken or any other demented psychopath) gives the order to attack Russian forces I still want to believe that there will be a critical mass at the Pentagon to tell the “crazies in the basement” to finally shut up and get back to where they belong: the basement they crawled out of.

Is there enough true and real patriotism left in the USA?  Or is patriotism just waving (Chinese made!) US flags, vote for the “lesser evil” from either branch of the Uniparty, and remain an Israeli colony forever?

Click on the image above to appreciate the irony of HIAS aiding Nazis!

If it wasn’t for the US nuclear triad (old, but still formidable and capable!), I truly wouldn’t give a damn, but alas that is a luxury nobody can afford, at least until the USA is finally denazified and disarmed too.  But until all of Zone A is absorbed and re-civilized by Zone B, that danger will threaten every human being on the planet (and now even in the southern hemisphere courtesy of the comprador leaders of the US colony in Australia which have decided to paint a big Chinese nuclear crosshairs on their brainless heads!).

Okay, I will end with some major good news: the entire 36th Marine Infantry Brigade in Mariupol has surrendered!  That is over 1000 soldiers, including 300 wounded and 90 seriously injured.

Now, careful here, these are NOT the Azov forces hiding in the underground floors of Azovstal.  First, they are not Azov but regular Ukrainian military and, second, they were barricaded in the Illich industrial complex, near the Azovstal, but already cut off from Azovstal.

The Ukrainian 36th Naval Infantry Brigade has surrendered

It is important to note that unlike the Azov Nazis, the Naval Infantry forces are NOT considered as Nazis by the Russians and that they will all get full POW protection under the Geneva Convention.

The very best the Azov people can expect is to be identified and arrested on suspicion of war crimes, crimes against humanity and all kinds of atrocities.  If some of them are clearly clueless idiots who made some bad choices, they might return home one day after either being found innocent (a minority) or after serving their time in Russian jails.

Those found with tattooed swastikas or those who are already on the FSB wanted list will get harsh sentences in equally harsh high-security prisons.

As for Azov commanders, they have already been told by everybody that they will get no mercy.  Which means that they will get interrogated and executed.

[Sidebar: Russia has had a moratorium on the death penalty to appease the Eurolemmings.  Now that Russia has quit all EU institutions, you can expect the death penalty to be reinstated under popular pressure.  Besides, the LDRN republics DO have the death penalty.  As does every single Chechen subunit :-)]

The bottom line is this: while the surrender of the 36th Naval Infantry Brigade is absolutely wonderful news – just think of the saved lives – it is very unlikely to set a precedent to the Azov forces in Mariupol or elsewhere.  Worse, I strongly suspect that the two reasons why the 36th Naval Infantry Brigade could surrender were that:

• They were cut off (by the Russian National Guard units) from the Azov forces in Azovstal
• They were considered an elite unit that the Nazis of Azov could not simply and safely massacre

In the Donbass, the situation is, reportedly, much worse: the ratio of Nazi to normal soldier seems to be close to 1:10 which means that the Nazis can act as “barrage forces” and shoot anybody refusing to advance or trying to retreat – a technique which the West loves to blame on Stalin, but which was invented by the Nazis on the Eastern Front.  They can also act as “political commissars”, a category invented by Leon Trotsky himself to force former officers of the imperial Russian military to obey orders given by these commissars or face execution.  And those who will say that 1:10 is a great ratio for the Ukrainians to dispose of their “Nazi commissars” miss the point as any such conspiracy will be detected long before it materializes.

Yet again, I am not expecting this to happen, but I will keep hoping with all my heart that a huge massacre (because that is exactly what this is shaping up to be) can still be avoided.  I really hope that the Russian PSYOPs are doing all they can to reach out to the Ukrainian soldiers in the Donbass cauldron and that the RU+LDNR forces will do everything short of taking serious losses to spare the lives of the 60-70 thousand or so Ukrainians who are now waiting to be obliterated by heavy Russian strikes.

One of my favorite Russian poets, Maksimilian Voloshin, wrote a poem entitled “Civil War” which I love and which I will share with you, in Russian and in a somewhat corrected machine translation:

Одни восстали из подполий, Из ссылок, фабрик, рудников, Отравленные темной волей И горьким дымом городовДругие из рядов военных, Дворянских разоренных гнезд, Где проводили на погост Отцов и братьев убиенных.В одних доселе не потух Хмель незапамятных пожаров, И жив степной, разгульный дух И Разиных, и Кудеяров.В других – лишенных всех корней – Тлетворный дух столицы Невской: Толстой и Чехов, Достоевский – Надрыв и смута наших дней.Одни возносят на плакатах Свой бред о буржуазном зле, О светлых пролетариатах, Мещанском рае на земле…В других весь цвет, вся гниль империй, Все золото, весь тлен идей, Блеск всех великих фетишей И всех научных суеверий.Одни идут освобождать Москву и вновь сковать Россию, Другие, разнуздав стихию, Хотят весь мир пересоздать.В тех и в других война вдохнула Гнев, жадность, мрачный хмель разгула,А вслед героям и вождям Крадется хищник стаей жадной, Чтоб мощь России неоглядной Размыкать и продать врагам:Сгноить ее пшеницы груды, Ее бесчестить небеса, Пожрать богатства, сжечь леса И высосать моря и руды.И не смолкает грохот битв По всем просторам южной степи Средь золотых великолепий Конями вытоптанных жнитв.И там и здесь между рядами Звучит один и тот же глас: «Кто не за нас – тот против нас. Нет безразличных: правда с нами».А я стою один меж них В ревущем пламени и дыме И всеми силами своими Молюсь за тех и за других.

Some have risen from the underground, From exiles, factories, mines, Poisoned by the dark will And the bitter smoke of cities.Others from the ranks of the military, Nobles from now ruined nests, Where they would accompany to the graveyard The fathers and brothers of those murdered.In some the flame of ancient fires has not been snuffed out yet And in the steppes, rebellious spirit of Razins and Kudeyars remains aliveIn others – devoid of all roots – The corrupting spirit of the capital on the Neva: Tolstoy and Chekhov, Dostoevsky – The anguish and turmoil of our days.Some are posting slogans about Their nonsense and bourgeois evil, About the bright proletarians, A petty-bourgeois paradise on earth…In others, all the color, all the rot of empires, All the gold, all the decay of ideas, The brilliance of all the great fetishes And all scientific superstitions.Some go to liberate Moscow and unite Russia again, Others, unleashing the elements, They want to recreate the whole world.In both, the war breathed in Anger, greed, the dark intoxication of rioting,And following the heroes and leaders A stalking a greedy pack of predators crawls near To betray and sell out Russia’s boundless power to her enemies:Rot her wheat piles, Her dishonor skies, Devour riches, burn forests And suck up dry her seas and springs.And the roar of battles does not cease Across all the expanses of the southern steppe Amidst the golden splendors Horses are trampling upon the harvests.And there and here between the rows The same voice sounds: “Whoever is not for us is against us. There are no indifferent ones: the truth is with us.”And I stand alone between them In the roaring flames and smoke And with all my strength I pray for both of them.

These verses were written in November of 1919 and they refer to the Russian Civil war.

Today, the situation is radically different in too many ways to list, but on a spiritual level, I think that this is again yet another Russian civil war.  I have exactly ZERO sympathy or, even less so, empathy for the Ukrainian Nazis, but when I see the young faces of Ukrainian POWs I can’t help it – I see *my* people.  Yes, confused, mistaken, misguided, possibly stupid and even deeply sinful.  And I would not hesitate for 1 second to fight them with more than a keyboard.  But as long as they don’t embrace the Ukronazi/Baderista/Azov/SBU/NATO/EU/US ideology I will always see them as my people and I will never rejoice in their suffering or demise.

Finally, when Voloshin wrote “I pray for both sides” it was not a political statement.  It was a recognition of our common humanity. Even if the core of the Ukronazi/Baderista/Azov/SBU/NATO/EU/US ideology and even IDENTITY is to deny us, Russians, that common humanity (other than in vapid words, of course).

To the demons in Washington DC we need to oppose our saints, both living and long dead.

Our most formidable weapon is not a nuke or any “Tsar-Bomba” but our modest prayer ropes.

Let’s use that most formidable weapon of ours which only we have (there is no real hesychasm in the West, and there has not been for many centuries now),

And strictly in that sense, I do the same, I also pray for our people on both sides.

Andrei

Does the West want war with Russia?

April 12, 2022

Source

By Michael Antony

The horrific series of mass atrocities being carried out by the Ukrainians to put the blame on Russia and get more weapons sent to them is escalating at an alarming rate. The Mariupol Maternity Hospital fake bombing, and the fake bombing of the Mariupol Drama Theatre (both of them exposed by refugees from Mariupol, including the pregnant young lady used as a fake victim by Azov who has gone home to Donetsk and told everything) have been followed by extremely serious war crimes. The massacre of pro-Russian “collaborators” by Nazi extremist members of the security police as they “cleansed” Bucha two days after the Russian troops left, and the Tochka-U rocket attack on Kramatorsk train station have brought the death toll to several hundred. Zelensky has announced there are more horrors to come, which means his thugs have already carried out more massacres. What do MI6 and the CIA hope to achieve by pushing their Nazi puppets into this campaign of false flag war crimes?

Boris Johnson’s appeal to the Russian people to find out about these atrocities from Western media and learn what their government is doing is an extraordinary display of self-deception, self-delusion or cynical Machiavellian lying. Does he really think the Russian people can be convinced (as his own sheeple have been) that the Russian army shoots civilians (who are wearing pro-Russian white armbands in a sign of support for the Russian soldiers) and then leaves their bodies lying in the middle of main roads so they can be used by the enemy for propaganda? (A combination of evil and stupidity which is MI6’s habitual, racist caricature of Russians.) Does he think the Russian people haven’t been thoroughly informed of Azov’s torture and mass-murder of “pro-Russian collaborators” every time they gained back territory in the Donbass war over the last eight years? And does he think the Russian people are not aware that the missile that hit Kramatorsk station, whose casing has been displayed as evidence, a Tochka-U rocket, has for years only been used by the Ukrainians, not the Russians? That it was used two weeks ago by the Ukrainians in a bloody attack on a street in Donetsk and has never been used by the Russians in the current fighting? Moreover, in whose interest would it be to kill civilians at a train station and scream about an enemy atrocity? If the Russians did it, would that bring them any more weapons, any more support, any more sanctions on their enemies? What about the Ukrainians? Is Johnson aware that his brazen lies and slanders, far from fomenting revolt in Moscow, are only enraging the Russian people further, till they will push their government to do everything necessary to win this struggle against the Nazi scum in Kiev, no matter what the cost?

The question is: what is the objective of MI6 and the CIA, who are driving these false flag war crimes, and their media stooges who suppress any questioning of their false narrative? Do they want to arouse such hysterical indignation among the brainwashed Western public that they will demand Russia’s removal from the UN Security Council? Do they understand that if they succeed this will mean the end of the UN and any form of international law and split the world in two blocs far more irreconcilable than during the Cold War? Or do they simply want more and bigger weapons sent to the Ukrainians? Do they understand that will mean much more bombing by Russia of roads and railways in Western Ukraine and the cutting off of all escape routes for civilians? Or do they want to justify the entry of NATO troops into Ukraine to take part in the war and prevent the coming annihilation of Ukraine’s army in the Donbass? Or simply impose this no-fly zone fantasy? Do they understand a no-fly zone will mean Russia striking not merely the planes that enter its air space but the bases they take off from in NATO countries? That this will mean full-scale, continent-wide war?

The trouble with hysterical atrocity propaganda is that it makes peace impossible. This was the problem in the First World War: the British media portrayal of the Germans as monsters made any negotiated settlement out of the question. But British propaganda today is even worse: not only are the Russian troops war criminals but they are incompetent, demoralized and are starving and dying in droves. This double falsification of reality will increase British and US pressure on Zelensky not to negotiate, not to make concessions, not to allow the Russians any form of win from their criminal aggression. Territorial concessions to Russia will be permanently unrecognized by NATO members. The pressure will constantly be on any future Ukrainian government to renew the war, to beat these incompetent, disorganized war criminals and take back Ukraine’s legitimate borders. The question is whether NATO governments are so intoxicated with their own propaganda about the Russian army’s failings that they will start to believe that NATO’s hundred thousand strong force in Germany and Poland is a match for it and can save the Ukrainian army from defeat. That would be a serious mistake, given Russia’s reserves. Russia cannot afford to lose this conflict. That would not merely be a regional setback to its “expansionist plans to restore the USSR” as the NATO fantasy has it. No, this would be an existential threat. If Ukraine comes out of this disaster still able to be rebuilt by NATO countries into a platform for a nuclear attack on Russia, five to ten minutes’ missile flight time from Moscow, that is a threat to the survival of Russia as a nation. And that would even be a legitimate reason for using tactical nuclear weapons in any direct war with NATO, which may be the easiest way to destroy its three hundred bases in Europe.

The West is painting itself into a corner by its demented propaganda campaign. The danger is that this impasse – the inability to negotiate with war criminals who are in any case incompetent losers who can be beaten with a little more effort – may morph into a Western death wish. Has the US decided that the destruction of Europe by a continent-wide war will subject it forever to its rule (as it did in 1945) and mean the permanent weakening of Russia? And of China too, since Europe has been a major market for both economies (and the straying of Europe’s wanton thoughts towards them has provoked this crisis.) Has the American Empire decided that the definitive way to subject Europe to its will is not to lovingly extend its protection once again against the wicked ogre to the east, but to actually cripple Europe, reduce her to a basket case, by a brutal war with the ogre which will teach her once and for all where her interest lies? In other words, protect her permanently from the rapist next door by letting the rapist have his wicked way with her for a week. That may underlie this insane, suicidal rush towards military intervention, fueled by the atrocity story scripts that MI6 is such a master at.

A fake massacre for the sake of real sanctions

April 11, 2022

Source

by Batko Milacic

Shortly after the Russian troops left the outskirts of Kiev, the pro-Ukrainian media fired a broadside of stories about alleged Russian war crimes against peaceful civilians, traces of which were found in the abandoned towns. Before very long the first video appeared, with corpses scattered along the street, some of which, upon closer inspection, turned out to be quite alive. However, this did not prevent a number of publications from coming up with colorful first-person stories about the “atrocities” committed by the Russian military. The bottom line idea was that Russian soldiers do not want to fight and are scared, while simultaneously all too happy to commit war crimes by shooting at civilians and throwing grenades into a basement full of townsfolk hiding there. Soon, the temperature of anti-Russian propaganda went so high that even true-blue pro-Ukrainian viewers and readers began to question the credibility of what was going on.

Let’s try to figure this all out. The Ukrainian army did not liberate Bucha, but quietly returned there following the pullout of Russian troops, which Moscow had announced a couple of days earlier. At the same time, for some strange reason the departing Russian units not only left behind dead bodies lying on the street, but artistically laid them out and evenly distributed over the territory of ​​​​the town. Well, Russian commanders are hardly capable of such an unnatural performance. Even if there were such a maniac in the Russian command, he would be quickly arrested by his own subordinates and brought before a military court.

Where did all these corpses come from then? Obviously, not all of them are real, because even in the clearly staged video hastily aired by Ukrainian pro-government channels, some of them are seen moving and even standing up. Others could have been shot by Ukrainian advance units because of the white ribbons that the local civilians wore on their sleeves when going out into the street. In addition, given the low level of discipline and the lack of a unified command in the Ukrainian troops and law enforcement agencies, some of the nationalists could have lynched suspected “collaborationists.” In any case, there were enough bodies available to provide a “good picture” for the Ukrainian authorities.

And Kiev needs a picture, and the sooner the better. There was no time to create “burials for the victims” of Russian repressions, to look for a city away from Kiev, or to build a concentration camp complete with furnaces and barracks. A number of European politicians, worried by rising public concerns about the break of energy ties with Russia, demanded that Ukraine come up with a new reason for last-chance anti-Russian sanctions as soon as possible.

Meanwhile, Brussels is proposing to completely block Russian energy supplies and close ports for Russian ships. This is already a last-ditch measure, after which it will be simply impossible to introduce anything else. However, you’ve got to have something to justify the fast-growing tariffs and prices, so the images and “evidence” from Bucha arrived right in time. The investigation of the events in the Bosnian Srebrenica once allowed ratcheting up anti-Serb sentiments in Europe. Now, Zelensky’s “personal Srebrenica” allows the Ukrainian president to drum up more European support, and ideally, to bring about absolutely unprecedented sanctions against Moscow.

The organizers of the “Bucha Scandal” are hardly bothered by the questions that any sane person would ask himself. Why didn’t the Russian troops, retreating in perfect order and without any pressure from the Kiev garrison (the Russians are not falling back, they are simply moving their forces to the Donbass region) remove the corpses from the streets? They have all the equipment they possibly need to pick up all the dead bodies and take them to the crematorium in Bryansk, thus hiding the traces of their “crimes” once and for all. Why did the Russians evenly distribute the corpses throughout the city and did not shoot Ukrainian activists all in one place? Finally, why didn’t the bloodthirsty Russians burn down and mine the city during their retreat? They had enough time to do that. However, despite all these unanswered questions, Russia will be condemned. London, Washington, Paris and Brussels have already decided everything. The emergency meeting by UN Security Council will end in nothing as both Russian and Western resolutions will be blocked and the parties will be left even more dissatisfied with each other.

Bucha is only the beginning though. The directors working with the good actor, Mr. Zelensky, have surely prepared the second and third acts of this drama for us to watch. They are quite banal, but effective nonetheless. It might be a mass grave and some “torture chambers.” This time round they will prepare better, without hiccups. The victims’ hands will be tied with the same ropes, and secret protocols of interrogations and coerced confessions will be properly signed without errors. What they will hardly be able to explain to a thinking audience, however, is why the Russians would want to commit such atrocities in the first place.

Special operation of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation and events in Ukraine April 10, day

 April 10, 2022

By  VT Editors

Source Self Explanatory

Fondsk.Ru: Briefing by the official representative of the RF Ministry of Defense Igor Konashenkov on April 10, 2022 on the progress of the special operation in Ukraine:

– The Armed Forces of the Russian Federation continue to conduct a special military operation in Ukraine.

– During the night in the village of ZVONETSKOYE, Dnepropetrovsk region, high-precision sea-based missiles destroyed the headquarters and base of the nationalist battalion “Dnepr”, where reinforcements from foreign mercenaries arrived the other day.

– High-precision air-launched missiles in the area of ​​​​the settlement of STAROBOGDANOVKA, Mykolaiv region and at the military airfield CHUGUEV, destroyed launchers of Ukrainian S-300 anti-aircraft missile systems identified by reconnaissance.

– Russian air defense systems shot down eight Ukrainian unmanned aerial vehicles in the air in the areas of the settlements of OLHOVATOVKA, NOVAYA ASTRAKHAN, AVDEEVKA, SHAKHTERSKOE, KURAKHOVO, NOVOSELOVKA VTORAYA, VESELOYE.

– Operational-tactical aviation of the Russian Aerospace Forces hit 86 military facilities of Ukraine. Among them: two command posts, two ammunition depots, three fuel depots, three installations of multiple launch rocket systems, as well as 49 strongholds and areas of concentration of Ukrainian military equipment.

– In total, since the beginning of the special military operation, the following have been destroyed:

• 127 planes and 98 helicopters,
• 234 anti-aircraft missile systems S-300, Buk-M1, Osa AKM;
• 436 unmanned aerial vehicles,
• 2052 tanks and other armored fighting vehicles,
• 232 installations of multiple launch rocket systems,
• 894 field artillery and mortar guns,
• 1975 units of special military vehicles.

* * *

“Prime Minister Viktor Orban, of course, condemns the massacre in Bucha. Hungary fully supports the international investigation, the purpose of which is to find out who committed the crime, ”said the press secretary of the Hungarian Prime Minister Bertalan Havasi .

It was not in vain that Zelensky boiled up with indignation that someone in Europe was demanding some kind of proof.

* * *

In the Dnieper (former and future Dnepropetrovsk) there is an unreal commotion. All patrol cars of the national police were pulled up to the monument to Pushkin, on which unknown people put the symbol of the special operation Z.

Several people have been detained. Details are being clarified, writes the telegram channel Operative reports .

https://vk.com/video-35660695_456314482

* * *

Again, the population of Ukraine, as Arestovich said, prevents the Armed Forces of Ukraine from protecting it. For example, he does not want the Ukrainian military to mine the private sector. The population is outraged. He does not understand that, first of all, there is a war, and civilians in this war are a human shield, and their deaths are necessary to blame the Russian army for this.

* * *

The Ukrainian military with joyful shouts destroyed a truck with a red cross with an anti-tank missile.

The video was proudly published by former Ukrainian Ambassador to Austria Oleksandr Shcherba . A red cross and a white awning means that the truck is carrying the wounded or humanitarian aid.

At the same time, the military saw and understood that they were hitting an ambulance, this is clear from their dialogue, Radio Stydoba writes .

* * *

“Ukraine is already ready for big battles. Ukraine must win these battles, including in the Donbass. And after that, Ukraine will get a more substantial negotiating position, from which it can dictate certain conditions. After that, the presidents will meet. It may take two weeks, it may take three,” Mykhailo Podolyak , an adviser to the head of President Zelensky’s Office, one of the negotiators , broadcasts .

Boris Johnson arrived, promised Ukrainushka something extraordinary, posed together with Zelensky for a camera with clay roosters (as if hinting), and now Kiev is in a militaristic hellhole. Ready for war.

* * *

“Ukraine is failing and therefore using the tactics of Syrian terrorists – attacking civilians and calling for external intervention,” Brian Berletic , a geopolitical analyst and former US Marine Corps soldier, said of the Kramatorsk incident.

“It is clear what is happening here. Ukraine is defeated. And this is exactly what we saw during the Syrian conflict. When the terrorists sponsored by the US, Britain and the EU were defeated, they did something similar.

They attacked the civilian population. And they said that the Syrian government did it. And then they called for intervention. They called for new sanctions.

So they did throughout the conflict, until they completely lost. And this is what we see here in Ukraine.”

* * *

Putin’s real weapon against Europe is not missiles, not gas for rubles, and not even Russia Today. The real weapon is the millions of Ukrainian refugees who, in a few weeks, have Ukrainianized the best European cities and turned them into real pigsties.

Take, for example, my beloved Vienna, where I lived a happy year. The Austrians are very pedantic and scrupulous about their way of life. Order and some incredible biblical calm reign in this country. People do not violate parking rules not because high fines are set, but because they consciously protect their comfort, the beauty of their hometown and the rules of coexistence.

With the influx of Ukrainian refugees, a full @@@@ has begun: all parking spaces are filled, refugees strive to take a public transport lane and interfere with the work of city services, every Sunday thousands of Maidanites gather on the Museum Quarter Square, leaving behind not only tons of garbage, but also acoustic noise. For the Austrians, this is worse than being hit by the Kinzhal complex.

And so it is in other capitals. In Riga, the maydanuts yell in zombie costumes, in Chisinau they paint monuments blue and yellow and demand to communicate with them in Ukrainian. In expensive Stockholm, Ukrainian refugees demand accommodation for free that most Swedes cannot afford.

Europe gets tired very quickly. Despite the propaganda, Europeans are beginning to see with their own eyes who the Ukrainians are and what is their fundamental difference from the Russians. Ukrainians are constantly whining and demanding something, without giving anything in return and without thinking that it’s time to wake up and start radically changing their own lives, and not forever Maidan and whining.

Europe is waking up very quickly, and the next electoral cycle will be difficult for the current elites, who, to please the United States, got involved in the sanctions war, incurring enormous economic losses. But they receive a more powerful blow from my compatriots – lazy, capricious, hysterical and complex. Ukrainians for eight years have forgotten how to live in a normal society and turn any nutrient medium into a pigsty. And such a scenario was not difficult to calculate, because this is Putin’s real secret weapon.

* * *

The first footage of the evacuation in the port of Mariupol of the crew of the vessel “Blue Star”, under the flag of Panama, is written by WELDERS .

Crew 14 people. One Russian and 13 citizens of Ukraine.

Эвакуация проходила ещё под огнем нацбатов и ВСУ. Рядом противник оказывал сопротивление. Благодаря самоотверженным действиям военнослужащих ВС РФ и НМ ДНР люди спасены. Сейчас все моряки находятся в полной безопасности.

С началом боевых действий и до освобождения гражданские моряки находились в заложниках украинских нацистов, и использовать нацбатами в качестве «живого щита».

* * *

В морском порту г. Мариуполь отступающие остатки подразделений украинских националистов захватили ДВА иностранных судна «Царевна» и «Леди Аугуста». Удерживая в заложниках экипажи этих судов, националисты «Азова» ведут огонь с палуб из 120-мм минометов, различных типов гранатомётов и стрелкового оружия. Судьбы членов экипажей данных судов и состояние их здоровья пока неизвестно. Народная милиция ДНР совместно с Вооруженными Силами Российской Федерации предпринимают все возможное для спасения жизней насильно удерживаемых украинскими националистами моряков, – Народная милиция ДНР.

Заглавное фото: обстрел Еленовки, фото квадрокоптера “Пчёль”, источник

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VT Editors

VT Editors is a General Posting account managed by Jim W. Dean and Gordon Duff.

All content herein is owned and copyrighted by Jim W. Dean and Gordon Duff

The Ukrainian Conflict Is a U.S./NATO Proxy War, but One Which Russia Is Poised to Win Decisively – Scott Ritter

April 9, 2022

Source

By Finian Cunningham

The West has sown the wind in sanctioning Russia; Russia will not reap the whirlwind, says Scott Ritter in an interview with the Strategic Culture Foundation.

Scott Ritter is a former U.S. Marine Corps intelligence officer who has gained international respect for his independence and integrity as a commentator on conflicts and foreign relations. This week, he was banned on the Twitter social media platform for challenging Western claims of a massacre in Bucha, Ukraine, allegedly carried out by Russian troops. Moscow denies the claims, as have other independent analysts who point to evidence that the incident was a false-flag provocation perpetrated by NATO-backed Ukrainian Nazi regiments to undermine Russia internationally and bolster Western objectives. It is a foreboding sign of the times that Ritter should be banned for daring to question dubious narratives. (He was later reinstated following a public outcry against censorship.)

In the following interview for Strategic Culture Foundation, he makes the crucial point that Russia’s intervention in Ukraine is exposing the involvement of the U.S. and NATO in the training and weaponizing of that country’s dominant Nazi regiments. That is why Western media have been so vehement in trying to distort the conflict and blame Russia. The truth about Western dirty involvement in Ukraine would be too much to bear for the Western public.

When Ritter served as a UN weapons inspector in Iraq during the 1990s he later challenged Western media and government claims that Iraq was harboring WMDs. Those claims were used as a pretext for the U.S.-British war on Iraq launched in 1993 that cost over one million lives, destroyed a nation, created millions of displaced and millions of casualties, as well as spawned international terrorism. It later turned out that the WMD claims were based on deliberate lies for which no Western leader has been held accountable. Scott Ritter was vindicated in his warnings against that war and it is one reason why he is widely respected among international public opinion.

Ritter is a critical commentator on U.S. conflicts and foreign relations. He is a former Marine Corps intelligence officer who served in the Soviet Union implementing nuclear arms control treaties, in the Persian Gulf during Operation Desert Storm, and as a UN inspector in Iraq (1991-98) overseeing the disarmament of weapons of mass destruction. He is the author of Scorpion King: America’s Suicidal Embrace of Nuclear Weapons from FDR to Trump (Clarity Press, 2020).

Interview

Question: Do you think that Russia has a just cause in launching its “special military operation” in Ukraine on February 24?

Scott Ritter: I believe Russia has articulated a cognizable claim of preemptive collective self-defense under Article 51 of the UN Charter. The threat posed by NATO expansion, and Ukraine’s eight-year bombardment of the civilians of the Donbass fall under this umbrella.

Question: Do you think Russia has legitimate concerns about the Pentagon sponsoring biological weapons programs in laboratories in Ukraine?

Scott Ritter: The Pentagon denies any biological weapons program, but admits biological research programs on Ukrainian soil. Documents captured by Russia have allegedly uncovered the existence of programs the components of which could be construed as having offensive biological warfare applications. The U.S. should be required to explain the purpose of these programs.

Question: What do you make of allegations in Western media that Russian troops committed war crimes in Bucha and other Ukrainian cities? It is claimed that Russian forces summarily executed civilians.

Scott Ritter: All claims of war crimes must be thoroughly investigated, including Ukrainian allegations that Russia killed Ukrainian civilians in Bucha. However, the data available about the Bucha incident does not sustain the Ukrainian claims, and as such, the media should refrain from echoing these claims as fact until a proper investigation of the evidence is conducted, either by the media, or unbiased authorities.

Question: Do you think the alleged Russian bombing of a hospital and an art theater in Mariupol were false-flag provocations?

Scott Ritter: Both locations are available for detailed forensic examination that would either confirm or refute Ukrainian allegations that these locations were struck by Russian aerial bombs. Other data, such as the existence of any NATO radar data that would put Russian aircraft over these two locations at the time of the alleged attack, should be collected. A detailed forensic examination of each site would go a long way in proving or disproving the Ukrainian claims through the collection of weapons fragments and the evaluation of environmental samples which would show the chemical composition of any explosive used, thereby allowing a better idea of what weapon or explosive was used to destroy the sites.

Question: Western governments and mainstream media have denigrated Russian objectives to “demilitarize and deNazify” Ukraine. The West says Russia has invented or grossly exaggerated these problems as a pretext for invasion. Do you think this Western denialism is because it doesn’t want to acknowledge that Russia may indeed have legitimate concerns, and secondly that to acknowledge would mean admitting that the West is part of the problem in the current war?

Scott Ritter: The irony is that the West had thoroughly documented the extent of the Nazi ideology in Ukraine’s civil, political, and military structures during and after the 2014 Maidan coup. This documented reality was deliberately obscured by the same sources that had previously documented its existence once the Russian invasion occurred. To acknowledge the existence of this odious ideology by NATO would require NATO to acknowledge the role it played in training and equipping Azov regiment personnel since 2015. The Russian documentation of its ongoing de-Nazification effort in Ukraine is a source of continual embarrassment to NATO, as it exposes the scope and scale of NATO’s role in empowering the militarization of Nazi ideology in Ukraine.

Question: For about four months before the Russian intervention in Ukraine, the Biden administration was asserting non-stop that Moscow was planning an invasion. Do you think this is a case of great intelligence on the part of Washington or the culmination of provocation by Washington resulting in Russian military action in Ukraine?

Scott Ritter: We now know that the U.S. intelligence community under the Biden administration is committed to a policy of haphazardly “declassifying” intelligence for the purpose of shaping public opinion (so-called “getting ahead of the story”). There is no evidence that the intelligence regarding potential Russian military action was based upon anything other than politicized speculation derived from a crude analysis of Russian military dispositions void of any context. Any genuine intelligence assessment regarding the timing of any Russian military action would have incorporated the domestic political imperative of getting Duma [Russian parliamentary] approval for the deployment of Russian forces outside the borders of Russia, which carries with it the requirement of a cognizable justification for this military action under the UN Charter. This required political steps such as Donetsk and Lugansk declaring independence, and then petitioning the Russian parliament to recognize this independence, so that Russia could legitimately invoke Article 51. None of these factors was knowable when the Biden administration was issuing its warnings of imminent attack, thereby certifying the “intelligence” as being derived from fact-free speculation, and not intelligence at all.

Question: The Western media are reporting that the Russian military operation in Ukraine is floundering because it has not over-run Ukraine entirely. As a military expert, how do you see the Russian operation proceeding?

Scott Ritter: Russia is fighting a very difficult campaign hampered by its own constraint designed to limit civilian casualties and damage to infrastructure and the fact that Ukraine possesses a very well-trained military that is well led and equipped. Russia deployed some 200,000 troops in support of this operation. They are facing some 600,000 Ukrainian forces. The first phase of the Russian operation was designed to shape the battlefield to Russia’s advantage while diminishing the size and capacity of the Ukrainian ability to wage large-scale conflict. The second phase is focused on destroying the main Ukrainian force concentration in eastern Ukraine. Russia is well on its way to accomplishing this task.

Question: Do you see danger from Ukraine being turned into a proxy war by the United States and NATO partners against Russia in a way that attempts to repeat the West’s covert war in Syria or the Afghanistan war (1979-89) with the Soviet Union? There are reports of foreign legions being sent to Ukraine via NATO countries. Do you think there is a Western plan to embroil Russia in a proxy war that is aimed at sapping Russia politically, economically, and militarily?

Scott Ritter: The Ukrainian conflict is a proxy war, but one which Russia is poised to win decisively. While there appears to be a NATO/western plan to embroil Russia in a “new Afghanistan”, I don’t see any risk of this conflict dragging on for more than a few more weeks at the most before Russia accomplishes a strategic victory over Ukraine.

Question: There is an arrogant assumption among Western governments that they can impose crippling economic sanctions on Russia in a similar way to what they did on Iran, Venezuela, and North Korea among others. But would you agree that if Russia begins to impose its own counter-sanctions by restricting oil and gas exports then the Western states may end up reaping a whirlwind that is devastating to their societies?

Scott Ritter: Russia was warned well in advance about the scope and scale of U.S.-led sanctions that would be imposed if Russia were to invade Ukraine. Russia has prepared its own counter-sanction strategy which will not only defeat the Western sanctions but further strengthen Russia’s economy by decoupling it from the West and Western control/influence. We see evidence of the effectiveness of this counter-campaign as the Russian ruble is strengthened, the Russian stock market enjoys positive traction, and Europe and the U.S. flounder economically. The West has sown the wind in sanctioning Russia; Russia will not reap the whirlwind.

Fabricating Putin Quotes, Banning Paraplegic Athletes to Undermine Russia: How Low Can the West Go?

April 10, 2022

Source: Al Mayadeen

Rick Sterling 

There has been massive and widespread publicity about Ukraine. It is a simple Hollywood script:  Ukraine is the angel, Russia is the devil, Zelensky is the hero and all good people will wear blue and yellow ribbons. 

Fabricating Putin Quotes and Banning Paraplegic Athletes to Undermine Russia: How Low Can the West Go?

Mobilizing a population to vilify and hate a targeted enemy is a tactic that leaders have used since before the dawn of human history, and it is being used to demonize Russia and Vladimir Putin in the current conflict. If we want to join the march to war, we can join the hate fest.  But if we want a more objective and honest assessment of events, we must rely upon facts that our government and its cheer-leading mainstream media are not anxious for us to view. 

In the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, all things Russian are being punished. Russian athletes, including paraplegics, are barred from international sports competitions. Century-old Russian writers and musicians such as Tolstoy and Tchaikovsky are being removed from bookshelves and concerts. Even Russian bred cats are not exempt. 

If such actions are justified, why was there no such banning of US athletes, musicians, or writers after the US invasion of Iraq?  Moreover, why are so few people outraged by the bombing and killing of 370,000 Yemeni people?  Why are so few people outraged as thousands of Afghans starve because the United States is seizing Afghanistan’s national assets which were in western banks?   

Why Ukraine?

There has been massive and widespread publicity about Ukraine. It is a simple Hollywood script:  Ukraine is the angel, Russia is the devil, Zelensky is the hero and all good people will wear blue and yellow ribbons. 

Maintaining this image requires propaganda to promote it, and censorship to prevent challengers from debunking it. 

This has required trashing some long-held western traditions. By banning all Russian athletes from international competition, the International Olympic Committee and different athletic federations have violated the Olympic Charter which prohibits discrimination on the basis of nationality. 

Censorship

The West prides itself on free speech yet censorship of alternative viewpoints is now widespread in Europe and North America. Russia Today and other Russian media outlets are being blocked on the internet as well as cable TV. Ironically, numerous programs on RT were hosted by Americans, for example, journalist Chris Hedges and comedian Lee Camp. The US is silencing its own citizens.  

Censorship or shadow banning is widespread on social media. On April 6, one of the best informed military analysts, Scott Ritter @realScottRitter, was suspended from Twitter. Why?  Because he suggested that the victims of Bucha may have been murdered not by Russians, but rather by Ukrainian ultra-nationalists and the US and UK may also be culpable. 

The 2015 Netflix documentary titled “Winter on Fire: Ukraine’s Fight for Freedom” deals with the Maidan (Kiev central square) uprising of 2013-2014.  It ignores the most essential elements of the events: the management provided by the US and the muscle provided by ultra-nationalists of the Right Sector and Azov Battalion. The attacks and killing of Ukrainian police are whitewashed away.  

By contrast, the 2016 documentary “Ukraine on Fire” provides the background and essential elements of the conflict.  It is not available on Netflix and was banned from distribution on YouTube for some time. 

Most people in the West are unaware of the US involvement in the 2014 Kiev coup, subsequent US funding and training of ultra-nationalist and Neo Nazi battalions, and the eight-year war in eastern Ukraine resulting in fourteen thousand deaths. 

Sensational Accusations 

Backed by US and UK intelligence agencies, Ukraine knows the importance of the information war. They make sensational accusations that receive uncritical media coverage. When the truth eventually comes out, it is ignored or buried on the back pages. Here are a few examples: 

– In 2014, eleven civilians were killed in eastern Ukraine when an apartment was hit in rebel-held territory.  Ukraine tried to blame Russia even though no bombs were coming from Russia and the population is ethnically Russian. 

– At the beginning of the current conflict, Ukrainian President Zelensky claimed that soldiers on Snake Island died heroically rather than surrender. Actually, all the soldiers surrendered. 

– Ukraine and western media claim a maternity hospital in Mariupol was bombed by Russia. Evidence shows the hospital was taken over by Ukrainian military forces on March 7, two days before the bombing on March 9.  

– The latest sensational accusations are regarding dead civilians in Bucha, north of Kiev. Again, there is much contrary evidence. The Russian soldiers left Bucha on March 31, the mayor of Bucha announced the town liberated with no mention of atrocities on March 31, the Azov battalion entered Bucha on April 1, the Ukrainian Defense Ministry published a video of  “Russian” atrocities on April 3. 

In most cases, western media does not probe the accusations or use simple logic to ask if they make sense.  However in the case of Bucha story, the NY Times had to acknowledge they were “unable to independently verify the assertions by Ukraine’s Defense Ministry.” 

Self Censorship 

In addition to actual censorship, there is widespread self-censorship. Instead of reading what the Russians are saying, western political “analysts” engage in outlandish amateur psychology and speculation. With no factual basis, they speculate about what Putin wants and his mental state. 

This is convenient if one does not want to deal with real issues and arguments. 

Most western analysts and journalists are afraid or unwilling to read or listen to what the Russian leaders say. That is unfortunate because those speeches are more clear and direct than those from western politicians who rely on public relations, spin, and platitudes.   

Fabricating quotes 

Ignorance of Russian foreign policy is such that Truthout online magazine recently published an article that contains a sensational but completely invented quote from Putin. It says,

Putin here is clear enough: “Ukraine has no national rights that Russians are bound to respect. Prepare for reunification, reabsorption, or some other euphemism for subaltern status with Mother Russia.”

Putin said no such thing and any moderately knowledgeable person would recognize this to be fake. 

When I emailed the co-author, Carl Davidson, asking where the quotation came from, he admitted inventing it. This is significant because the statement goes to the core of what the conflict is about. Is Russia trying to absorb all of Ukraine? Do they intend to occupy Ukraine?  Anyone who reads the speeches of Putin and Lavrov, such as here and here and here, knows they do not. Davidson’s fabricated quote suggests he has not read the speeches himself.

Ukraine in the Global Context 

The article with the made-up quote contends that “Putin is part of a global right-wing authoritarian movement that seeks to ‘overthrow’ the 20th Century.”  This analysis is close to that of the US Democratic Party, which sees the major global division being between “authoritarianism” vs “democracy”.   

It is highly US-centered and partisan, with Putin somehow lumped with Trump. It is also self-serving, with US Democrats as the embodiment of “democracy”.  It is completely contrary to a class analysis. 

This faulty analysis has major contradictions. It is well known that Biden is unpopular. Biden’s latest approval rating is under 42%. It is less well known in the West that Putin is popular in Russia. Since the intervention in Ukraine his approval rating has increased to over 80%.  

Also largely unknown in the West, most of the world does NOT support the Western analysis of the Ukraine conflict.  Countries representing 59% of the global population abstained or voted against the condemnation of Russia at the UN General Assembly. These countries tend to see US exceptionalism and economic-military domination as a key problem. They do not think it helpful to demonize Russia and they urge negotiations and a quick resolution to the Ukraine war.  

Cuba said, “History will hold the United States accountable for the consequences of an increasingly offensive military doctrine beyond NATO’s borders which threatens international peace, security and stability…. Russia has the right to defend itself.” 

South African President Ramaphosa blamed NATO saying, “The war could have been avoided if NATO had heeded warnings from amongst its own leaders and officials over the years that its eastward expansion would lead to greater, not less, instability in the region.”

The Chinese representative said, “The final settlement of the Ukraine crisis requires abandoning the Cold War mentality, abandoning the logic of ensuring one’s own security at the expense of others’ security, and abandoning the approach of seeking regional security by expanding military blocs.” 

Many western anti-war movements are critical of Russia’s invasion. Others, such as the US Peace Council, see the US and NATO as largely responsible. However they all see the necessity of pressing to stop the war before it gets worse.  

In contrast, the western military-industrial-media complex is fueling the war with propaganda, censorship, banning, demonization and more weapons. It appears they do not want a resolution to the conflict. Just as they supported NATO pushing up against Russia, knowing that it risked provoking Russia to the point of retaliation, they seem to be pushing for a protracted bloody conflict in Ukraine, knowing that it risks global conflagration.  Yet they persist, while crying crocodile tears.  

The opinions mentioned in this article do not necessarily reflect the opinion of Al mayadeen, but rather express the opinion of its writer exclusively.

Gonzalo Lira: Russia AND the US Miscalculated In This War

April 08, 2022

The Total War to Cancel Russia

April 09, 2022

source

By Pepe Escobar,

Vast swathes of NATOstan have been corralled into behaving like a Russophobic lynch mob. No dissent is tolerated.

By now it’s abundantly clear that the neo-Orwellian “Two Minute Hate” Russophobic campaign launched by the Empire of Lies after the start of Operation Z is actually “24/7 Hate”.

Vast swathes of NATOstan have been corralled into behaving like a Russophobic lynch mob. No dissent is tolerated. The full psyops has de facto upgraded the Empire of Lies to the status of Empire of Hate in a Total War – hybrid and otherwise – to cancel Russia.

Hate, after all, packs way more punch than mere lies, which are now veering into abject ridiculousness, as in U.S. “intelligence” resorting to – what else – lies to fight the info war against Russia.

If the propaganda overdrive has been lethally effective amidst the zombified Western masses – call it a “win” in the P.R. war – in the front where it really matters, inside Russia, it’s a major fail.

Public opinion support for both Operation Z and President Putin is unprecedented. After videos of torture of Russian POWs that caused widespread revulsion, Russian civil society is even bracing for a “Long War” lasting months, not weeks, as long as the targets of the Russian High Command – actually a military secret – are met.

The stated aims are “demilitarization” and “denazification” of a future neutral Ukraine – but geopolitically reach way beyond: the aim is to turn the post-1945 European collective security arrangement upside down, forcing NATO to understand and come to terms with the concept of “indivisible security”. This is an extremely complex process that will reach the next decade.

The NATOstan sphere simply cannot admit in public a series of facts that a military analyst of the caliber of Andrei Martyanov has been explaining for years. And that adds to their collective pain.

Russia can take on NATO and smash it to bits in 48 hours. It may employ advanced strategic deterrence systems unmatched across the West. Its southern axis – from the Caucasus and West Asia to Central Asia – is fully stabilized. And if the going gets really tough, Mr. Zircon can deliver his hypersonic nuclear business card with the other side not even knowing what hit it.

“Europe has chosen its fate”

It may be enlightening to see how these complex processes are interpreted by Russians – whose points of view are now completely blocked across NATOstan.

Let’s take two examples. The first is Lieutenant General L.P. Reshetnikov, in an analytical note examining facts of the ground war.

Some key takeaways:

– “Over Romania and Poland there are airborne early warning aircraft of NATO with experienced crews, there are U.S. intelligence satellites in the sky all the time. I remind you that just in terms of budgets for our Roscosmos we allocated $2.5 billion a year, the civil budget of NASA is $25 billion, the civil budget of SpaceX alone is equal to Roscosmos – and that is not counting the tens of billions of dollars annually for the entire U.S. feverishly unfolding the control system of the entire planet.”

– The war is unfolding according to “NATO’s eyes and brains. The Ukronazis are nothing but free controlled zombies. And the Ukrainian army is a remotely controlled zombie organism.”

– “The tactics and strategy of this war will be the subject of textbooks for military academies around the world. Once again: the Russian army is smashing a Nazi zombie organism, fully integrated with the eyes and brain of NATO.”

Now let’s switch to Oleg Makarenko, who focuses on the Big Picture.

– “The West considers itself ‘the whole world’ only because it has not yet received a sufficiently sensitive punch on the nose. It just so happened that Russia is now giving him this click: with the rear support of Asia, Africa and Latin America. And the West can do absolutely nothing with us, since it also lags behind us in terms of the number of nuclear warheads.”

– “Europe has chosen its fate. And chose fate for Russia. What you are seeing now is the death of Europe. Even if it does not come to nuclear strikes on industrial centers, Europe is doomed. In a situation where European industry is left without cheap Russian energy sources and raw materials – and China will begin to receive these same energy carriers and raw materials at a discount, there can be no talk of any real competition with China from Europe. As a result, literally everything will collapse there – after industry, agriculture will collapse, welfare and social security will collapse, hunger, banditry and chaos will begin.”

It’s fair to consider Reshetnikov and Makarenko as faithfully representing the overall Russian sentiment, which interprets the crude Bucha false flag as a cover to obscure the Ukrainian army torture of Russian POWs.

And, deeper still, Bucha allowed the disappearance of Pentagon bioweapon labs from the Western mediasphere, complete with its ramifications: evidence of a concerted American drive to ultimately deploy real weapons of mass destruction against Russia.

The multi-level Bucha hoax had to include the Brit presidency of the UN Security Council actually blocking a serious discussion, a day before the Russian Ministry of Defense struggled to present to the UN – predictably minus the U.S. and the UK – all the bioweapon facts they have unearthed in Ukraine. The Chinese were horrified by the findings.

The Russian Investigative Committee at least persists in its work, with 100 researchers unearthing evidence of war crimes across Donbass to be presented at a tribunal in the near future, most probably set up in Donetsk.

And that brings us back to the facts on the ground. There’s a lot of analytical discussion on the possible endgame of Operation Z. A fair assessment would include the liberation of all of Novorossiya and total control of the Black Sea coastline that currently is part of Ukraine.

“Ukraine” in fact was never a state; it was always an annex to another state or empire such as Poland, Austria-Hungary, Turkey, and crucially Russia.

The landmark Russian state was Kievan Rus. “Ukraine”, in old Russian, means “border region”. In the past, it referred to the westernmost regions of the Russian Empire. When the Empire started expanding south, the new regions annexed mostly from Turkish rule were called Novorossiya (“New Russia”) and the northeastern regions, Malorossiya (“Little Russia”).

It was up to the USSR in the early 1920s to jumble it all together and name it “Ukraine” – adding Galicia in the west, which was historically non-Russian.

Yet the key development is when the USSR broke up in 1991. As the Empire of Lies de facto controlled post-Soviet Russia, they could never have possibly allowed the real Russian regions of the USSR – that is, Novorossiya and Malorossiya – to be again incorporated to the Russian Federation.

Russia is now re-incorporating them – in an “I Did It, My Way” manner.

Vamos a bailar in European Puerto Rico

By now it’s also quite clear to any serious geopolitical analysis that Operation Z opened a Pandora’s box. And the supreme historical victim of all the toxicity finally let loose is bound to be Europe.

The indispensable Michael Hudson, in a new essay on the U.S. dollar devouring the euro, argues half in jest that Europe might as well surrender its currency, and go on like “a somewhat larger version of Puerto Rico.”

After all, Europe “has pretty much ceased to be a politically independent state, it is beginning to look more like Panama and Liberia – ‘flag of convenience’ offshore banking centers that are not real ‘states’ because they don’t issue their own currency, but use the U.S. dollar.”

In synch with quite a few Russian, Chinese and Iranian analysts, Hudson advances that the war in Ukraine – actually in its “full-blown version as the New Cold War” – is likely to last “at least a decade, perhaps two as the U.S. extends the fight between neoliberalism and socialism [meaning the Chinese system] to encompass a worldwide conflict.”

What may be seriously in dispute is whether the U.S., after “the economic conquest of Europe”, will be able to “lock in African, South American and Asian countries”. The Eurasia integration process, rolling in earnest for 10 years now, conducted by the Russia-China strategic partnership and expanding to most of the Global South, will go no holds barred to prevent it.

There’s no question, as Hudson states, that “the world economy is being enflamed” – with the U.S. weaponizing trade. Yet on the Right Side of History we have the Rublegas, the petroyuan, the new monetary/financial system being designed in a partnership between the Eurasia Economic Union (EAEU) and China.

And that’s something no puny Cancel Culture War can erase.

The Biggest Bang.

China is starting to pay for Russian oil and coal in yuan.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 8, 2022

It don't mean a thing if it ain't got the Martyanov swing. https://t.co/ySWLBOcy1K

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 8, 2022

"Julian Assange is a victim of torture and inhuman treatment. This is a threat not just to Assange himself but to freedom of speech everywhere in the world. Nils Melzer’s book is the essential, utterly forensic analysis of this case" @VersoBooks https://t.co/oKvEq3hwAb pic.twitter.com/XSJIRn6xXQ

— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) April 8, 2022

Here you have:

– Zoltan Poszar's analysis.

– a Valdai discussion on the REAL gas issues for Europe.

– an old school Deep State pro telling it like it is.

Yep, I take NO prisoners.

Sit back and watch Europe commit suicide https://t.co/cejE6L9aNc

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

'Sit back and watch Europe commit suicide,' suggests @RealPepeEscobar. If the US goal is to crush Russia's economy with sanctions and isolation, why is Europe in an economic free fall instead?https://t.co/LM9dDENWGN via @TheCradleMedia

— Sharmine Narwani (@snarwani) April 7, 2022

If the #US goal is to crush Russia's economy with sanctions and isolation, why is Europe in an economic free fall instead while Moscow enjoys a record budget surplus?https://t.co/dAoL9zMbsK

— The Eurasianist ☦️ (@Russ_Warrior) April 7, 2022

And here's the Wall of Shame.

The Empire of Resentful Cowards and Liars, who's starving millions of Afghans to death and weaponizing the genocide in Yemen, got the UN General Assembly to suspend Russia from the Human Rights Council. pic.twitter.com/Db20bdC25g

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

Neither Russia nor China ever subscribed to the concept of “rules-based world order”. Unlike the West, they are not allergic to international law (as opposed to vague or even unknown “rules”) as the sound basis of international relations. https://t.co/42flmGWof2

— Mikhail Ulyanov (@Amb_Ulyanov) April 7, 2022

Pentagon honcho Lloyd "Raytheon" Austin has been calling Shoigu non-stop since mid-February.

No one picks up the phone.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

The Russian Investigative Committee has 100 researchers working full-time, amassing evidence of UkroNazi war crimes across the Donetsk People's Republic.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

The ruble continues its reverse search and destroy mission. https://t.co/a2eoyzO6fi

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

Kerch Strait has reopened to shipping.

Russian wheat exports will soon restart.

Kerch was previously closed to prevent 404 attacks on the bridge.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

NEVER underestimate Stupidistan's stupidity. Especially when they deploy imperial "intel".

h/t MoA pic.twitter.com/m1776Y0kej

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 7, 2022

Draghi: "dovete decidere tra la pace o i caloriferi caldi, tra la pace e i condizionatori accesi".

Bel tentativo, ma no grazie.

La scelta che ci imponete è tra nutrire la guerra in Ucraina o nutrire l'economia in Europa.

E solo uno psicopatico avrebbe dubbi.

— Andrea Zhok (@AndreaZhok) April 6, 2022

Looks like someone gave a copy of Eurasia For Dummies to Generalito Milley:

"We are now facing two global powers: China and Russia, each with significant military capabilities both who intend to fundamentally change the rules-based current global order."

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 6, 2022

Sellers of satellite images refuse to do business with Russian buyers.

And across NATOstan they only sell to the big news agencies.

That's how a Total Information Blockade works.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 6, 2022

https://twitter.com/RealPepeEscobar?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Eembeddedtimeline%7Ctwterm%5Eprofile%3ARealPepeEscobar%7Ctwgr%5EeyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH0sInRmd19zZW5zaXRpdmVfbWVkaWFfaW50ZXJzdGl0aWFsXzEzOTYzIjp7ImJ1Y2tldCI6ImludGVyc3RpdGlhbCIsInZlcnNpb24iOjR9fQ%3D%3D&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fthesaker.is%2Fthe-total-war-to-cancel-russia%2F

https://twitter.com/RealPepeEscobar?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Eembeddedtimeline%7Ctwterm%5Eprofile%3ARealPepeEscobar%7Ctwgr%5EeyJ0ZndfZXhwZXJpbWVudHNfY29va2llX2V4cGlyYXRpb24iOnsiYnVja2V0IjoxMjA5NjAwLCJ2ZXJzaW9uIjpudWxsfSwidGZ3X3NwYWNlX2NhcmQiOnsiYnVja2V0Ijoib2ZmIiwidmVyc2lvbiI6bnVsbH0sInRmd19zZW5zaXRpdmVfbWVkaWFfaW50ZXJzdGl0aWFsXzEzOTYzIjp7ImJ1Y2tldCI6ImludGVyc3RpdGlhbCIsInZlcnNpb24iOjR9fQ%3D%3D&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fthesaker.is%2Fthe-total-war-to-cancel-russia%2F

pic.twitter.com/jvtEc3J3qg

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 6, 2022

Russia, China, Iran and Turkey expressed their solidarity with Pakistan PM Imran Khan against a "foreign conspiracy" engineered by you know who.

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 6, 2022

Dear @TwitterSupport I am not “Russian State Affiliated media”. I work for NO #Russian media. I have 400,000 followers. I’m the leader of a British political party and spent nearly 30 years in the British parliament. If you do not remove this designation I will take legal action.

— George Galloway (@georgegalloway) April 6, 2022

According to the State Stupidity Department, sanctioning Putin's daughters and Lavrov's daughter is "in our national interest."

— Pepe Escobar (@RealPepeEscobar) April 6, 2022

“The Russians” commit yet another “atrocity”

April 08, 2022

The big news today is that those evil Russkies have fired a Tochka-U missile with a cluster warhead at the city of Kramatorsk, killing scores of innocent civilians.  The “entire civilized world” is disgusted and immediately announced even MORE sanctions, MORE condemnation and MORE anti-Russian virtue signalling.

Minor problem: Russia does not have Tochka-U missiles, which are 30 year old Soviet missiles which have been far surpassed by modern Russian missiles (of which Russia has plenty enough).  How do we know that it was  Tochka-U which was used?

Because of the tail section which separates from the warhеard during the flight.  Here it is:

No Russian tactical missile in service with such a tail section, and only the Ukrainian Tochka-U have.

Tochka-U tail and control surfaces

How much of a problem is that for the Empire of Hate and Lies?

Very minor, really.  Remember that their PSYOPS are directed at two kind of people:

• Those with low intelligence
• Those who don’t care about the truth

Russia did not have the old-model Buk which allegedly shot down MH-17 either, which did not stop the Empire of Hate and Lies to instantly blame the shooting down on Russia.  And Russia has long liquidated her chemical weapons stores, unlike the US or the UK, by the way.

But who cares about that when hating Russia and Russians is all which really matters?

In fact, this is straight out of the western PSYOPs book:

1. Execute a false flag, then
2. INSTANTLY blame Russia and lean on all your colonies to do the same in the name of western “solidarity”
3. Thereby make absolutely certain that no real investigation can take place or, if it does, it will be so far down the road that nobody will care.

So we have a major false flag in Bucha, and now we have that Tochka-U in Kramatorsk.  What will come next?

God only knows, but the goal is to associate “Russians” with “atrocities” in what is left of the mind of the eagerly scatophaging serfs in Zone A.

In the meantime, inside Russia a scandal is brewing with the latest statements of Dmitry Peskov who said a lot of very dumb things in his latest interviews.  Frankly, the day Putin fires Peskov I will personally feel an immense sense of relief.  During peacetimes having folks like Medinski and Peskov is painful enough, but during war times folks with their mindset are a real DANGER for Russia as they are directly injecting fear, uncertainty and doubt in the mind the the Russian public.  The only good news, but it is very good, is that more and more Russians are getting really upset with these characters: they support Putin and the military operation, and they are really getting fed up with the Atlantic Integrationists and their way to patronize 5th columnists (which is what Peskov did).

I very much hope for the day when the likes of Peskov and Medinski are given their retirement package and are replaced by a completely different kind of person.

[Sidebar: I wonder if those who emphatically denied even the existence of Atlantic Integrationists will how have the honestly to admit that they were wrong.  Probably not :-)]

Now let’s take a look at the recent vote to suspend Russian from the UN Human Rights Council:

First, notice that neither Hungary nor Serbia had the courage and decency to abstain (nevermind oppose).

Second, while this map does not accurately reflect how the actual people in these countries feel about this war, this map does a superb job showing us the list of pure comprador colonial ruling classes.  So here is the score for our planet: the Empire, while already dead, still rules, by momentum, over 151 governments and only 24 countries have what it takes to openly oppose the voting directives from the Empire of Hate and Lies.  The 58 countries which, like Pilate, have washed their hands from this vote are particularly pathetic, just like those who did not have the courage to even show up for the vote.

As for those who “voted green”, I wish I could send them each a small bag with 30 silvers coins inside.

Radovka posted an interesting map showing how the world is split:

Legend: from L to R: pro Ukraine, sympathetic to the Ukraine, neutral, sympathetic to Russia, pro Russian

And here is a sanctions map I came across recently:

Of course, this is just a still-shot of an evolving situation.  But the real value of these maps is that it shows three different groups:

• The real modern Nazis (CA+US+EU+AUS+NZ+JP).
• The comprador regimes who vote “correctly” but many of which do not want to put their money where their mouth is and who also want to get good and services from Russia (I think of them has countries which huge stomachs but tiny balls).
• The 25 countries which dared to defy the Empire of Hate and Lies and openly voted “no”.

Since the beginning of this war, the Russians have suffered many casualties trying hard NOT to harm civilians or the civilian infrastructure.  The Ukronazis did the polar opposite: not only have they kidnapped thousands of people who have been “disappeared”, they have openly attacked civilians in the LDNR and since the SMO they have unleashed their hatred against almost every town they had to evacuate (to make the local “separs” pay and to blame it all on “Russian atrocities”.

And the West noticed absolutely *nothing*.

At least officially.  In reality, of course, this is directly the result of the kind of “instruction” the Ukronazis have received from their Anglo masters.

Here is the ugly truth nobody wants to openly admit: the West wants to genocide Russia and the West is ALREADY genociding the people of the Ukraine.  If the Empire of Hate and Lies has its way, this war will last as long as possible, include as many horrible atrocities as possible and a total destruction of the civilian infrastructure of the Ukraine.

As for Russia and the Russian people, there is only one thing I have not heard from our wonderful western neighbors yet: the screams “crucify them!  crucify them! crucify them!”.  Of course, that is not how the modern Crusaders express their feelings, they just want to “cancel Russia” – different words, same meaning.

If all this sounds demonic, it is because it is.  Literally.  And Russia history is filled with such genocidal invasions, and today, in conclusion, rather that use words I want to use a few paintings by the Russian artist Il’ia Glazunov.  I don’t want to “explain” them, just look at them and you will maybe understand the Russian people and their history a little better than before, at least that is my hope.

Andrei

Sitrep: Operation Z

April 08, 2022

The biggest news of today’s cycle is the wild admission by the Pentagon, U.S. media, etc., that the U.S. has in fact employed a “strategy” of outright lying and making up fake intelligence to ‘combat Russia’.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/us-using-declassified-intel-fight-info-war-russia-even-intel-isnt-rock-rcna23014

Astounding quote from article: “President Joe Biden later said it publicly. But three U.S. officials told NBC News this week there is no evidence Russia has brought any chemical weapons near Ukraine. They said the U.S. released the information to deter Russia from using the banned munitions.”

They also admitted that most of the intelligence surrounding the conflict, such as the infamous ‘China is providing Russia with equipment’ was complete ‘malarky’, as the demented zombie-in-chief would say. How any reasonable and self-respecting country or people could trust the U.S.’s ongoing claims from this point on are beyond me. How could you possibly take in this announcement, and yet still believe the U.S. side of the story about the ‘Bucha massacre’ amongst other things?

This amazing feat of neuro-linguistic-programming must be seen to be believed: 

The reporters here celebrate the ‘novelty’ of this method of utilizing intelligence (as if the amazing technique of ‘lying’ has only just been discovered by them). They dance around the real description of the concept as basically being “lying”, by continually describing it in fancy ways to frill it up and legitimize the “technique” as something other than what it is on its bare-faced surface: outright lies and propaganda meant to control the narrative of the conflict favorably.

And by the way, the reporter in the video is this guy:

And was actually fired by the LA Times for how deeply in bed he was with the CIA

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/la-times-disowns-reporter_b_5770388

After these admissions how can ANYTHING from the U.S. be believed? Russian “casualties” of 30,000+? Bucha massacre? Chemical weapons usage? Russia’s “failed objectives” and “failing campaign”? These are all individual claims that fall under the purview of this ‘new’ and ‘amazing’ technique called complete b.s. from the CIA.

Obviously this has been U.S.’s chief tactic for decades. But the full admission brings up a starker reality. That behind the curtains, the CIA has in recent times shifted to conducting its Ops “in the open”, but presenting them in a way that makes them seem acceptable. For instance we know during the last election, a remarkable series of articles came out in the MSM detailing the entire deep-state covert ops, how various apparatuses of the democratic party came together with corporate assets, Facebook, NGOs, etc., to take control of the 2020 election. They even fully admit to it being a secretive “shadow campaign”, but rebranded as a ‘good cause’.

https://time.com/5936036/secret-2020-election-campaign/

In previous times this would have been an unprecedented scandal but now, rebranded and ‘in the open’, it’s given the cachet of legitimacy. The reason for the method shift is obvious: in today’s integrated online/social media environment, it’s pretty much impossible for the western intel agencies to operate in pure secrecy anymore. That era is over with. And so they’ve shifted to a strategy of conducting their Ops in full view but utilizing their media arm to repackage them to look justified in a certain light.

It’s akin to this – Hannity proudly and openly wearing a CIA pin (the Mockingbird is no longer caged, as you can see, it can fly freely and proudly in the open now) while decrying that, “Vladimir Putin has forfeited his right to live.”

Why does @seanhannity wear a CIA flag pin every night? https://t.co/iUW4hjwGJ1 pic.twitter.com/psPm4V1Dii

— Anya Parampil (@anyaparampil) April 7, 2022

Onto other things:

The U.S. has admitted to training Ukrainian saboteur groups to operate the new Switchblade kamikaze drones. Reportedly they are being trained on U.S. soil, in secret. https://thehill.com/policy/defense/3260827-u-s-training-small-number-of-ukrainian-troops-on-switchblade-drones/amp/

“The “very small number” of Ukrainian soldiers, who have been in the U.S. since last fall for military training, were taught to use the drone with the expectation that they would soon return to their country to train others on the equipment, press secretary John Kirby told reporters.

“We took the opportunity — having them still in the country — to give them a couple of days’ worth of training on the Switchblade so that they can go back — and they will be going back soon, back home — to train others in the Ukrainian military,” Kirby said.”

More confirmation of how deeply invested and entrenched the U.S. is in this war. But no different than the billions spent on training Syrian rebels and ‘moderate terrorists’ to fight against Russians and Assad in Syria.

The U.S. has even reactivated the Lend Lease program for the first time since WW2 to massively arm Ukraine: https://www.politico.com/news/2022/04/06/senate-unanimously-approves-lend-lease-00023668

And also:

“U.S. For 1st Time Publicly Announces Transfer Of Intelligence To Ukraine’s Armed Forces For Donbas Operations”

https://nationalinterest.org/blog/buzz/pentagon-reveals-it-giving-ukraine-intelligence-donbas-operations-201709

Here’s today’s print-up from the Pentagon itself. I can’t stress enough how massive the scale of this operation by the west to fund/supply Ukraine is. It dwarfs anything in history. When you consider that less than ~2000 Stingers were provided to the Taliban in the 80’s war, and that was considered an unprecedented scale operation at the time, then look at the above list and realize we’re only at the very earliest stages of what the West will be supplying to Ukraine (tanks, jets, etc likely all incoming eventually). There are some unconfirmed reports that even British Harpoons are already delivered and placed in Odessa. This is orders of magnitude more powerful/dangerous than the ‘Sea Skuas’ they were talking about, but this rumor may be fake propaganda from the Ukrop side.

More and more each day the scale of this operation is revealed and how deeply invested the west is, and it is breathtaking. New videos appear daily of large groups of foreign fighters, Georgian, etc., being heavily equipped and sent into the Ukraine.

And this list above is only from the U.S., there is much more from the other western ‘allies’ as well. Planes from North Macedonia landed in Reznow airfield in Poland today, likely bringing goodies as every other European country has. And add that to the billions already allotted recently in general aid and the billions spent on achieving Euromaidan, as admitted by Nuland when she said over $5 billion had been spent by the U.S.

The entire project has been in development for a very long time and it is the culmination of the western empire’s attempts to destroy Russia. Just listen here how Soros himself explains his involvement in the events of Ukraine dating back to the late 80’s and early 90’s. And how Adam Schiff admits that “the U.S. is fighting Russia over there so it doesn’t have to do it over here.”

On frontline news: As the big showdown in Donbass looms, a lot of forces are pouring in on both sides. Russia has shifted strategies and is now striking railway stations and reinforcement hubs / corridors, as many have hoped it would do. Overnight there were several reports of important railway hubs being hit by missiles. One near Zhytomir, which is possibly the single most important reinforcement hub to the frontlines in all of western Ukraine. Reinforcements being sent to frontlines were reportedly destroyed in the strike, though there’s no visual confirmation. And another in Kharkov region – just south, in Lozovaya – which evoked a video message plea from the Kharkov mayor who said railways were hit, oil has run out, but pleaded for people not to flee (presumably because the militants who control him need citizens to use as hostages / human shields just like in Mariupol).

“#KHARKOV Region—#Lozovaya—#Russia|n forces conduct precision missile strikes at a major supply/logistics centre of #Ukraine|ian forces in Lozovaya, which boast a key intersection of rail tracks enabling the supply and reinforcement of the #Donbass grouping of #UA military.”

As can be seen on this map, the Lozovaya junction is a critical resupply / reinforcement route for the Ukrop Donbass cauldron and specifically their stronghold of Kramatorsk, which had been the central headquarters of the entire JFO for some time. And other reports said a railway bridge was hit leading to that junction as well.

Just north of there, Russia continues to progress around Izyum. Our forces are now fighting at Sulihyvka/Suligovka on the way to Dovhen’ke in the direction towards Slavyansk.

Not only does this photo below show the progress downward from Izyum, but you can start seeing how this salient is now beginning to create the opening pincer that will enclose the ‘Great Cauldron’.

The battle for Kam’yanka, directly south of Izyum was quite destructive for the UAF, they suffered many losses and there are fields littered with their dead, as well as many trophies taken. https://www.bitchute.com/video/2qjB8t89mK2a/

Reports indicate that UAF forces are now amassing a huge force in the Kramatorsk / Druzhkovka region in preparation for RF’s advances. But they continue putting up stiff resistance along the road towards Slavyansk as well. The highways from Horlivka towards Kramatorsk are said to be filled with UAF troops. This appears to be their single largest agglomeration of the cauldron.

In the south, RF have blockaded Ugledar and Novomikhailovka, and begun storming the latter. Also, Basurin has estimated 3,000 to 3,500 enemy fighters remain in Mariupol. And the map there looks something like this:

With that said, most of the ‘weak’ ones have surrendered and only the most hardened Azov fanatics remain, so there is some possibility that the fighting can still go on for a decently long time. With that said, the more they retreat towards the ports, the more they are running out of residential areas with civilians to use as human shields, which allows allied forces to use increasingly heavy-handed tactics and strikes against them. I reported last time how for the first time heavy duty artillery units like 2S3 and 2S4s were brought in, such as those you can see in the latest Wargonzo video 

So it’s difficult to guess – the fight could take another two weeks, or it can suddenly collapse in the next day or two if the remaining Azov abruptly surrender. Unfortunately cities take a long time to siege, many of us remember following the events of Aleppo or Sarajevo, and the years it took. Even in the final stages of Aleppo when rebel forces were already collapsing and SAA had the upper hand, it was weeks for every neighborhood, and months to clear districts.

But right now things are advancing according to plan. Large Russian reinforcements have poured into the Kharkov area to head to the Izyum front, and meanwhile Ukrop reinforcements/resupplies are finally being hit in their train stations and railyards by the RuAF, so the stage is being favorably set for our forces.

And for those that continue to doubt that the RF has vastly destroyed the Ukrainian military in terms of armor and capabilities. New videos continue to show the total lack of Ukrainian armor or vehicles. Here is one showing a large Ukrainian force, all on foot, not a vehicle among them – forced to use a civilian truck to evacuate their wounded – whom, by the way, have obvious swastikas on their person.

A force this large should always be supported with mechanized units and some sort of infantry fighting vehicle at the minimum, yet here they are taking lots of casualties in the video, no armor in sight.

And here, we see Ukrainian soldiers forced to ride bicycles to get to where they’re going. https://www.bitchute.com/video/ULjN5yH3IcJn/

A week or so ago, the American mercenary James Vasquez bragged on twitter how him and his squad “commandeered” (read: stole) a Lexus in Kiev so they can get to the frontline, such is their lack of military transport vehicles or APCs.

The U.S. by the way says that Russia has not responded to any calls from the Pentagon since February: https://www.rt.com/news/553500-pentagon-russia-phone-silent/

General Milley keeps calling, and Russia is not answering.

A quick note on the topic of Russian ‘traitors’ and 5^th columnists, it’s interesting how many of them are fleeing to Israel specifically.

https://www.rt.com/business/553285-russian-billionaire-prokhorov-israel-citizenship/

Prokhorov was once a Russian presidential candidate and one of Russia’s richest and most powerful oligarchs.

And now the CEO of Yandex https://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/tech-news/yandex-ceo-relocates-to-israel-cannot-work-for-a-country-at-war-1.10722163

Lastly, the Ruble is now in the mid 70’s to the USD.

 To the utter bewilderment of the West, it just keeps gaining in strength against the dollar.

I’ll leave you with this last video: to those that still question the Russian air power, or say Russia is not utilizing it, or doesn’t have air supremacy, etc. Here’s what a Ukrainian soldier said when asked what he fears most in this war: https://www.bitchute.com/video/xbWbfp7v5nJH/

US Sanctions on Banks ‘Direct Attack’ on Ordinary People: Russia

 April 7, 2022

Russia has condemned the United States’ fresh sanctions on two of its largest banks, saying they are a direct blow to the Russian population and ordinary citizens.

Russian Ambassador to the United States Anatoly Antonov made the remarks on Wednesday, after Washington announced a new round of sanctions against Sberbank and Alfa-Bank over Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine.

“The administration’s non-stop sanctions attacks show true aspirations of the United States. An example is the restrictions against Sberbank and Alfa-Bank, where most Russians keep their savings. This is a direct attack on the Russian population, ordinary citizens,” Tass news agency quoted him as saying.

“By imposing new sanctions, Washington continues to damage the global economy. It undermines the possibilities of foreign partners for mutually beneficial cooperation with us. It leaves foreign business without the income necessary in the current period of economic turbulence,” the ambassador added.

Antonov said the US’s attempts to make it difficult for Russia to service its public debt were “puzzling,” adding that Moscow saw in these efforts “a desire to tarnish the reputation of Russia, which, despite the economic barriers built by Washington, continues to fulfill its debt obligations in good faith and on time.”

The US announced the new round of sanctions targeting Russian state-owned financial institutions and other enterprises on Wednesday. Restrictions also targeted Kremlin officials and their family members.

The move came after Ukraine and its Western allies, including the US, accused Moscow of committing war crimes in Bucha, a suburb of the Ukrainian capital.

In a video message on Saturday, the mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, claimed that 300 people had been killed by the Russian army, with some appearing to have been executed summarily. He displayed videos and photographs, claiming that 280 bodies had been buried in mass graves while nearly 10 others had been either not buried or only partially covered by earth.

Kiev has urged major Western powers, including the United States, to impose new crippling sanctions on Moscow over the “massacre” in Bucha.

Russia has denied the allegations, terming it a “monstrous forgery” staged by the West to discredit it.

Moscow has twice requested an urgent session of the United Nations Security Council over the Bucha situation, but the United Kingdom has refused to hold the meeting both times.

Russian President Vladimir Putin announced a military offensive against Ukraine on February 24. The conflict has provoked a unanimous response from Western countries, which have imposed a long list of sanctions on Moscow. Russia says it will halt the operation instantly if Kiev meets Moscow’s list of demands, including never applying to join NATO.

Delegations from Kiev and Moscow have been negotiating for peace and a ceasefire in recent weeks, but a breakthrough has been elusive.

Source: Agencies (edited by Al-Manar English Website)

More On This Topic

• Zakharova: West Uses Expulsion of Russian Diplomats as Information, Political Attack
• The true importance of the Bucha false flag: a change of narrative
• Massacre in Bucha. Was it a False Flag?
• Youtube Censors Truth on Bucha
• Gonzalo Lira: “YouTube bans any open discussion about the Bucha false flag”
• Press Briefing by Permanent Representative Vassily Nebenzia on the situation in the town of Bucha (Kiev Region) and related matters
• And now, a word from our wannabe Masters about the Bucha false flag

The true importance of the Bucha false flag: a change of narrative

April 06, 2022

So, as predicted by pretty much everybody, the long announced false flag has happened.  Yes, it was very poorly executed, botched really, but in a way this makes it even MORE effective?  Why?  It conditions the public of Zone A to uncritically accept any fairy tale, no matter how stupid, illogical and otherwise going against both basic common sense and basic logic.  In a way, Bucha is really MH-17 reloaded.  Yes, they appear different, but in reality they are built exactly according to the same model.  It goes something like this:

• Russia was/is winning while the cannon fodder of the Empire of Hate and Lies was/is clearly being defeated.
• The leaders of the Empire of Hate and Lies want to make Russia pay as high a price for daring to defy the leaders of the Empire of Hate and Lies, and so an atrocity was quickly arranged for and propagandized urbi et orbi.  And it worked.  Each time.
• In order to prevent any real investigation, the Empire of Hate and Lies IMMEDIATELY proclaims that “those evil Snow Niggers” did it and then declares that to be “self-evident, indisputable common knowledge” and anybody asking questions is, therefore, a “Putin agent”.  I guess the West’s infatuation with “diversity”, no matter how obscenely grotesque, does not apply to ideas, opinions or views…

Those simple acts have proven that they are extremely effective in turning most of Zone A into a Russophobic lynch mob.

Check out this list of article titles I just saw a few minutes on RT: (no need to read them, I just list them to “set the mood”, so to speak)

• EU explains why it continues to arm Ukraine
• Major Russian banks hit by sanctions
• US reveals more military aid for Ukraine
• Major conflict between great powers more likely – General Milley
• More EU members kick out Russian diplomats
• France announces mass expulsion of Russian diplomats
• Finland reveals timeline of possible NATO accession
• US sells more fighter jets in Europe

That is only the already usual nonsense, but now there is even more truly crazy stuff, check those out:

• US warns of Chinese nuclear breakthrough
• NATO to target China – Stoltenberg
• Japan discloses revised military plans
• Australia makes major move on missiles
• Europe’s plan to ban Russian coal sends prices higher
• Hungary at risk of losing billions in EU funding
• US sanctions Putin’s family

I could continue the list, but you get it, the leaders of the Empire of Hate and Lies have fully opened the “Hate and Lies” valve and it appears that they are seriously “losing it”.

Remember how in the Skripal and MH-17 cases EU countries joined in the sanctions out of “solidarity”?

I personally would call that cowardice and submissiveness, but “solidarity” works too.  Well, the Eurolemmings have solidarized themselves into their own grave and now there is no undoing what they did to themselves.

From the Russian point of view, it is rather straightforward: Russia tried to encourage EU countries to use their own judgment and act in their own interests.  It is now quite clear that as long as they get to brown-nose Uncle Shmuel the Eurolemmings are quite content with their fate.  Russia needs to flush the EU down her “mental toilet” and only deal with sovereign countries which have retained enough agency to defend their own interests.  In the EU that means Hungary and, to a much lesser degree, Serbia (not the people, of course, but the government which remains subservient to the Eurolemmings).

The Bucha massacre itself will go down Zone A’s collective memory hole, that’s where all the previous false flags of the Empire of Hate and Lies have gone.  Once a demonization operation has served its use, it can be forgotten.

So what are the purposes of the Bucha false flag:

• Change the narrative from the (non-existing) Ukronazi “victories” to “stop the Russian atrocities”
• Obfuscate the DELUGE of evidence (witnesses and forensic) showing that it was the Ukronazis who engaged in mass atrocities in Mariupol.  Remember – Ukrainian victims are sacred, Russian victims are simply irrelevant.  In fact, a Russian CAN NOT be a victim unless he is anti-Putin, then it’s okay.
• To condition (I mean that in the psychological sense) the TV watching serfs of the Empire of Lies and Hate to hate anything Russian with a searing, explosive, hated.  Declare that Putin is now the “New Hitler” (though Putin has been Hitler pretty much since 2000, it’s just that now he is even MORE Hitler than before) and Russia some kind of broken, poor, and otherwise horrible Mordor.
• Use this pretext to try to eject Russia and Russians from as many locations and organizations on the planet as possible.  That means all of Zone A for sure, but also plenty of locations and organizations in Zone B where the comprador ruling set the tone and don’t give a damn about their own people and country.
• Try to scare Putin with the same fate as Gaddafi, Milosevic, and Hussein who were all demonized and later murdered.

If you think about it, I think that it is fair to say that these are all clear signs that the Empire of Hate and Lies has now declared total war on Russia, just short of overtly actually attacking Russian forces or Russia, of course.  In fact, Russia and the Empire of Hate and Lies have been at war since at least 2013, and Russia had to make many concessions to the Empire simply because from 2013-2021 Russia did not have:

1. A military that could take on NATO and win.  She does now.
2. The kind of advanced strategic deterrence systems (nuclear and conventional) she now has.
3. A stabilized southern axis (Middle-East, Caucasus, Central Asia) from which no threat can realistically come.
4. A legal case to justify the decision to openly intervene in the Ukraine
5. A society that would not crumble under the tremendous pressure of US PSYOPS
6. A society in which the 5th columnists, the 6th columnists, and the Atlantic Integrationist have been pretty much totally discredited.
7. An economy that could survive the kind of total economic war unleashed nowadays
8. A system of alliances Russia could count on (remember Lukashenko’s and Nazarbayev’s “multipolarity” of the mid-20s?)
9. Large enough stores of advanced weapons for a long campaign
10. The real and full support of China

Interestingly, while the idiots in the West saw each Russian compromise and retreat as a sign of Russian weakness (including supposed well-wishers of Russia, who acted like typical 6th columnists), none of these wannabe armchair strategists had the intelligence to see that with each concession Russia APPEARED to be weaker and weaker while IN REALITY she was getting stronger and stronger right under the Empire of Hate and Lie’s collective nose 🙂

Now that all which has been previously hidden or misunderstood is becoming clear for all to see, and in this context, Bucha is the Empire of Lies’ declaration of TOTAL war against Russia.

The leaders of the Empire of Hate and Lies know the real score, not only in Mariupol or the Donbass, but about this entire war whose scope and purpose have caught the West totally by surprise (and me too!), and now they are scrambling to retain a semblance of control.  And, let me tell you, they are not.

The collective West has now fully adopted a strategy first invented by the Israelis: if you cannot win a real war, win an imaginary one.  And just as the IDF bombing some border post between Syria and Iraq makes no military sense or even any difference whatsoever, it is great for the morale of the Israelis who, just like the folks in the West, feel a strong sense of racial superiority over their Arab neighbors so they *need* “victories” to boost their own egos and conceal the fact that Israel’s neighbors have lost any fear they might have had in the past.  What has to remain the biggest secret of them all is that, in reality, it is Israel which fears its neighbors (and it should!).  Hence all the Israeli hysterics about BDS, or the term “Apartheid”, and all the crap about anti-Semitism: they are all designed to hide the truth, and first and foremost from the Israelis themselves who all suffer from what Gilad Atzmon very accurately calls “the pre-traumatic stress disorder”.

Bombing a Russian border post, however, is not an option for the Empire of Hate and Lies – that would be waaaaaaaaay too dangerous.  So, instead, the Empire scores political “victories”, stuff like sending old weapons to Lvov, threaten to take Putin to the ICC, or make noises about super-dooper hypersonic weapons the US is about to develop and deploy.

Sooner or later, the delusional and ignorant psychopaths which run the Empire of Hate and Lies will come to realize that far from breaking Russia, they committed collective economic, political, social, moral, spiritual, and, of course, military suicide and they will be left with *nothing* else to do that try a desperate military provocation.  I hope that I am wrong, but I don’t see how the united West could de-escalate from the corner it painted itself into.

Both the USA and the EU are run not by individuals, but by a class (in the Marxist sense of the word) which we can conceptually call the “1%ers”.  One percent seems small, but in the USA 1% is over 3 MILLION people, and in the EU this is almost 4,5 MILLION people.  Throw in colonies like Japan, Australia, Taiwan, and others and we can see that it is reasonable to assume that there are about 10’000’000 very rich and very powerful people out there who want to see Russia dead and gone forever.

These people will NEVER be voted out of power.  Oh sure, here and there, for a while, some will lose an election and an outsider might be voted in, but that is what economic sanctions are for: to punish those nations which vote for the “wrong” candidate (like Hungary just did).

Consider this: the leaders of the West have always preferred actual warfare to any risk of social warfare (inability, protests, riots, shortages, etc.).  So the “wait, we just shot our economies, let’s send more weapons to the Ukraine” is the only kind of “logic” these folks are capable of.  And just to make sure that the TV watching serfs “get it” “correctly”, they will either do a false flag at the UN (Powell), in their own country (9/11), or outside (Srebrenica, Gouta, etc.).

In other words, it is all going according to the script.  Not because that is “the plan” but simply because that is what the Empire of Hate and Lies does.  It is the ONLY thing that Empire knows to do very well: hate and lie.

It is not just Banderastan that needs to be denazified – it is the entire Empire of Hate and Lies.  And I have no clue whatsoever how to denazify 10 MILLION Nazis from our entire planet without a major war.

The false flag in Bucha is not only a declaration of total war on Russia, it is also a rallying call for those 10 million who run Zone A and a good part of Zone B.  The fact that it was botched really makes no difference.  If you have a brain, you know who did it and why, and if you don’t, you know it was Russia, on Putin’s personal order, no less.

And I predicted exactly that when I wrote (many times) that as soon as the “the Ukies are kicking the Russkies’ ass” narrative becomes unsustainable, which it now has, it will be changed to “Russian atrocities”.

Next, I fully expect NATO weapon convoys to be camouflaged as civilian and when the Russians begin striking them, there will be even MORE cries about “atrocities”.  To be clear, I do NOT believe that NATO is sending weapons to the Ukraine to make a military difference, and I believe that the NATO leaders know that.

My fear is that the 3B+PU will try to make the Russians attack those convoys: if the Russians do not, western armchair generals will resume their cries to high heaven about “Russia is letting NATO arm the Ukie, Putin is about to sell out!!!” and if Russia does strike these weapon convoys, then they will instantly become “trains of refugees” and “humanitarian safe zones” or whatever crap the Anglo PSYOPS will come up with.

Damned if you do and damned if you don’t.  Which might sound like an unsolvable dilemma, but that is simply not true.  If you are going to get hated in either case – then, by all means, do “it”.  And that seems to be the conclusion to which not only the Kremlin (and it’s Eurasian Sovereignists) have come to, but also the general public whose approval rating for both Putin and the Special Military Operation (SMO) has gone up.  Even better, there are signs that the Russian society is bracing for a “long war”, lasting months for sure, maybe even into next year.

We are 41 days into this horror and the end is nowhere near in sight, and remember that the real objective of Russia and China is not “just” to disarm and denazify the Nazi-occupied Ukraine, it is to completely change the European collective security architecture which, in turn, is the cornerstone of the Empire of Lies worldwide.   This will most probably take several years unless the coming economic crisis is even much worse than I expect it to be (in my total ignorance of economic topics).

Conclusion:

The Empire of Lies already understands that it lost Banderastan, so it executed the Bucha massacre to change the narrative and trigger a TOTAL “Cancel Russia” war.  The WWII  Nazis used the term “final solution” and that is what the Bucha false flag signals: the decision by Uncle Shmuel to achieve a “final solution” to the “Russian problem”.

This is the West’s way to signal that it too is now entering into its own 2nd phase of the war.

Signal received, loud and clear.

Andrei

Massacre in Bucha. Was it a False Flag?

April 05, 2022

By Jens Bernert

Global Research,

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According to CNN: 

“Lviv, Ukraine (CNN) The lifeless bodies of at least 20 civilian men line a single street in the town of Bucha near the Ukrainian capital. Some lie face down on the pavement while others are collapsed on their backs, mouths open in a tragic testament to the horrors of Russian occupation.

The hands of one man are tied behind his back with a piece of white cloth. Another man lies alone, tangled up in a bicycle by a grassy bank. A third man lies in the middle of the road, near the charred remains of a burned-out car.

The shocking images of the carnage in Bucha were captured by Agence France-Presse on Saturday, the same day Ukraine declared the town liberated from Russian troops. Accounts of alleged Russian atrocities are emerging as its forces retreat from areas near Kyiv following a failed bid to encircle the capital.

The town of Bucha has endured five weeks of near-constant firefights. Now officials and human rights groups are blaming the civilian deaths on the departed Russian forces.

Falsification of Images, Incoherent Information??: Russia Willing to Investigate Bucha’s Tragedy

“Corpses of executed people still line the Yabluska street in Bucha. Their hands are tied behind their backs with white ‘civilian’ rags, they were shot in the back of their heads. So you can imagine what kind of lawlessness they perpetrated here,” Bucha mayor Anatoliy Fedoruk told Reuters on Saturday.”

***

In contrast, the following report points to a false flag, which is yet to be verified.

At this stage the matter requires  further investigation as to what actually happened.

***

Civilians were shot in Bucha, Ukraine, as reported by the Kiev government on April 3, 2022. The Russian army had withdrawn from the village on March 30. On March 31, the mayor of Bucha had reported joyfully and good-humoredly about the Russians‘ withdrawal in a video. There was no talk of deaths yet. They came later.

Video, Youtube (Upload 1. April 2022): „The mayor of Bucha, Anatoliy Fedoruk, confirmed the city’s liberation from Russian troops on March 31.“

Many of those killed wore white armbands, like those apparently worn by the Russian soldiers who occupied the site as a distinguishing mark.

It is speculated that many of those killed were people who had put on a white armband in solidarity with these Russian soldiers. Some of the people may also have been specifically branded as “traitors“ with an armband during the massacre, which was apparently perpetrated by Ukrainian units.

The murdered people were then abused on April 3 as part of a false flag operation by attributing their deaths to the Russians who had previously occupied this place. That the massacre was carried out only after the Russians had left, by Kiev-Ukrainian units, is shown by the already mentioned video with the mayor, who was in a good mood one day after the Russian withdrawal and had no dead to mourn in his place.

The fact that “traitors“ in Ukraine are going down the tubes, unfortunately, was already known a month ago by the BILD journalist Julian Röpcke, a great supporter of the Kiev government as well as a friend of the Azov battalion, from Ukraine. The propaganda with the dead themselves is reminiscent of the approach in the Syrian war.

Translation of Bild’s Journalist’s Statement:

“Phew … what can I say … Ukrainians do gruesome things with captured Russian soldiers & traitors. But I won’t post that here. It’s fundamentally wrong, but it happens and anyone who criticizes it should ask themselves what they would do in such a situation.“

Addendum:

A video released by the Ukrainian National Police (April 2, 6:52 p.m.) purported to show the “cleansing of the city from the occupiers.“

Russian troops had already left by that time (compare also the March 31 video of the mayor mentioned above).

There are no civilian corpses in this video.

One would expect the (alleged) Russian atrocities announced on April 3 to be shown or addressed there.

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This article was originally published on Blauer Bote Magazin.

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The original source of this article is Global Research

Copyright © Jens Bernert, Global Research, 2022