The State Department said it had confirmed “individual incidents of gross violations of human rights” against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank before the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October.
VT Condemns the ETHNIC CLEANSING OF PALESTINIANS by USA/Israel
$ 280 BILLION US TAXPAYER DOLLARS INVESTED since 1948 in US/Israeli Ethnic Cleansing and Occupation Operation; $ 150B direct “aid” and $ 130B in “Offense” contracts Source: Embassy of Israel, Washington, D.C. and US Department of State.
The US has found five Israeli units guilty of gross , the State Department said on Monday.
The State Department said it had confirmed “individual incidents of gross violations of human rights” against Palestinians in the occupied West Bank before the Hamas-led attack on southern Israel on 7 October.
“After a careful process, we found five Israeli units responsible for individual incidents of gross violations of human rights. All of these were incidents much before October 7th and none took place in Gaza,” State Department deputy spokesperson Vedant Patel said Monday.
“Four of these units have effectively remediated these violations, which is what we expect partners to do… For a remaining unit, we continue to be in consultations and engagements with the government of Israel.”
Patel said the findings would not impact arms transfers.
US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken had signalled that a review of Israeli military units was underway.
Blinken said last week the State Department was conducting investigations under the Leahy law, which prohibits sending military aid to foreign security forces that violate human rights, adding : “I think it’s fair to say that you’ll see results very soon. I’ve made determinations. You can expect to see them in the days ahead.”
ABC News reported on Friday that the Biden administration had found at least three military units guilty of human rights violations but decided not to withhold military aid to the units because it believed Israel was addressing the findings.
The US has been investigating Netzah Yehuda, an ultra-Orthodox Jewish military battalion in the Israeli army, over human rights violations in the occupied West Bank.
A US State Department panel recommended months ago that Blinken blacklist a number of Israeli military and police units following a review into rights abuses against Palestinians, according to a report last week in ProPublica.
US-sponsored Israel assassinated the commander of the IRGC – Al Quds Forces in a bombing that targeted an Iranian diplomatic building in the Syrian capital Damascus, the Israeli bombing led to the destruction of the building which also houses Syrian civilian business offices.
The Israeli bombing in the late afternoon follows a heinous Israeli war crime bombing of the Syrian Scientific Research Center in Jamraya in Damascus countryside the day earlier, and a widespread coordinated Israel and Al Qaeda aerial bombing of Aleppo two days ago.
A Syrian military spokesperson said in a statement conveyed by the Syrian news agency SANA:
“At approximately 5 pm today, the Israeli enemy launched an air aggression from the direction of the occupied Syrian Golan, targeting the Iranian consulate building in Damascus. Our air defense forces intercepted the aggression’s missiles and shot down some of them.
The aggression led to the destruction of the entire building and the martyrdom and injury of everyone inside. Work is underway to recover the bodies of the martyrs, treat the wounded, and remove the rubble.”
Local sources reported that ‘the commander of the Quds Force in Lebanon and Syria in the IRGC, Brigadier General Mohammad Reza Zahedi, was martyred in the Israeli aggression against Damascus.’
Yesterday Sunday 31st of March evening, at approximately 9:30 pm, the US-sponsored Israel bombed the Scientific Research Center in Jamraya in the western Damascus countryside. To make it understandable to our US readers, this is akin to bombing the Berkeley scientific centers of the University of California, the destruction of which is paid for by the US taxpayers with US-made bombs and fighter jets, facilitated by US spying satellites and capabilities, and protected diplomatically by the ‘democratically’-elected US officials.
it’s a war crime to bomb a diplomatic facility disregarding who is in it at the time of the bombing, diplomatic facilities across the world are protected by international law and the relevant Geneva Convention, Israel bombing the Iranian diplomatic facility gives Iran the right to retaliate in kind anywhere in the world bombing Israeli diplomatic facilities.
It’s a war crime to bomb scientific research centers, Israel’s repeated bombing of Syrian research centers including Syrian research centers for medical and other civilian purposes has given Syria the absolute right to bomb all of Israel’s research centers including those used for medical and civilian purposes at any given time and these Israeli war crimes do not have a statute of limitation.
If Western citizens do not approve of the war crimes sanctioned by their ‘elected’ officials and committed by their armies, their allies, and their proxy terrorist groups, they should immediately hold their ‘elected’ officials accountable before crying when retribution commences. There is absolutely no power that ever existed on the planet throughout the history of mankind that shields the people of evil countries from retribution, and it always comes when they are at their weakest stages.
When prioritizing the destruction of other countries over the welfare and well-being of their own, the US taxpayers need to keep in mind that Karma serves its plates cold and when they are in dire situations, and it never fails.
The people of the countries invaded by the US military to protect its Israel project hold the USA directly responsible for all the war crimes, crimes against humanity, and genocides committed by Israel.
The Russian role in Israel’s war crimes continues to puzzle the Syrian people, despite the overall support for the Russian people and their fight against neo-Nazism by the vast majority of the Syrians.
The Syrian people cannot help but wonder why Russia insists on supporting Israel directly and indirectly, Russia withheld the deliveries of weaponry including at the time modern Geneva Convention air defense systems to Syria in the year 2010 upon instructions from Israel’s current PM Netanyahu to the Russian President Putin paving the way for the US-led war of terror and later the US-led bombing campaigns of Syria, and Russia has an active military agreement with both Israel and the US to coordinate their aerial movements in Syria’s skies!
Russia, whose top officials including President Putin and his Foreign Minister Lavrov never failed to express their commitment to Isreal’s security at a time when Russia’s only proven real ally throughout its modern history, Syria, is being bombed by Israel, the top Russian officials never fail to remind the Syrian leadership that their help in Syria is limited to combating terrorism.
Israel’s bombing of Syria and the assassination of Iranian officials in Syria will not go unanswered, even if the current Israel genocide of Gaza stops and even if there is a peace treaty signed across the region, very highly unlikely, but even then, there’s a price that will be paid by Israel and its sponsors for the war crimes they have committed and continue to commit on behalf of the Anti-Christ.
Syria News is a collaborative effort by two authors only, we end up most of the months paying from our pockets to maintain the site’s presence online, if you like our work and want us to remain online you can help by chipping in a couple of Euros/ Dollars or any other currency so we can meet our site’s costs.You can also donate with Cryptocurrencies through our donate page.
There have been some interesting developments over the past few days relating to Israel’s demonstrated subjugation of the government at all levels in the United States as well as its domination of the entertainment and news media. Nearly everyone now accepts that the current situation is not due to ordinary Americans actually liking what Israel represents and is instead rather a consequence of the US Israel lobby’s deep pockets and the corruption that can be bought by being willing to spend billions of dollars to support a single highly focused cause. And there is also the tool used frequently to keep potentially troublesome politicians in line, which is the willingness to do whatever is necessary to discredit and marginalize any and all critics of the Jewish state, to include the liberal often bogus claims of the alleged crimes of antisemitism and holocaust-denial to demonize those who are targeted.
Both current and previous Israeli Prime Ministers have boasted that they control the United States and the evidence is there that they can in fact do so. Most dispiriting in the Zionist induced sturm und drang which is a covert war of sorts directed against the United States Constitution has been the impact on the actual rights of all Americans, including freedom of speech. Last week South Dakota governor and Republican vice-presidential candidate hopeful Kristi Noem boasted of new legislation in her state that would criminalize antisemitism. As criticizing Israel is considered to be ipso facto antisemitism and criminalized as a so-called “hate crime” it means, as some have observed, that Americans in South Dakota and also in Florida (thanks to Ron DeSantis) can criticize their own country, but not the self-declared Jewish state. Paul Craig Roberts puts it another way, observing that “I find it extraordinary that Jews alone among all ethnicities can control what can be said about them. The real threat is not anti-semitism. The real threat is the destruction of free speech and the rise of status based law that protects some chosen ethnicities and persecutes others. What is really needed is an alliance against those who are destroying the foundations of truth, freedom, and accountable government.”
Last week there was also an interesting vote in Congress, blocking or forcing the sale of the Chinese social media and networking site TikTok, which has become very popular among young people worldwide. What was not much discussed in the media in the lead-up to the vote, which claimed the site was a “national security threat,” was who was pushing for the bill. In reality, the story within the story was again all about Israel. “We have a major TikTok problem” complained the grotesque Anti-Defamation League chief executive Jonathan Greenblatt, apparently freaking out because global youth aren’t buying Israel’s propaganda anymore since the site has something like a “memory” that directs readers and viewers to new information or videos that they had previously expressed an interest in. Many users were, per Greenblatt, interested in what is going on in Gaza and were receiving information hostile to Israel. The passage of the bill overwhelmingly, which was rushed through Congress, demonstrates yet again the Israel Lobby power. The American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) was reportedly heavily engaged in lobbying up until the voting took place. It unfortunately demonstrates how Israel is able to decide how Americans choose to communicate and socialize with one another and the world. Summarizing the Israel Lobby’s view on the issue was the ever-delightful ex-presidential candidate Nikki Haley who responded to the legislation with “We really do need to ban TikTok once and for all and let me tell you why. For every 30 minutes that someone watches TikTok every day they become 17% more antisemitic, more pro-Hamas based on doing that.” And there’s even more to the damage done. The bill doesn’t just ban TikTok. It also creates a new unilateral authority for any president to ban any app or website he or she deems to be a “national security threat” if its owned or controlled by a “foreign adversary,” which includes not just China but also Russia, North Korea, and Iran. Goodbye free speech and association!
So, in return for considerable pain and nothing tangible to benefit the United States and its citizens, Israel is celebrated as America’s best friend and closest all” while also getting a free ride of billions of dollars from the US taxpayer and complete political protection bestowed by the clowns that run Washington no matter what it does and how much damage it actually inflicts on American people or interests. Along those lines, the biggest story recently has been Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer’s denunciation of the Israeli government of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a 40 minute speech delivered from the Senate floor followed up by an X tweet.
Schumer, who is the highest ranking elected Jew in the US government, accused Netanyahu of continuing the Gaza war and running it is such a fashion so as to demonstrate that he “has lost his way to allow his political survival to take precedence over the best interests of Israel.” Schumer observed that Israel’s government, whoever heads it, must make “course corrections” and that “[Netanyahu] has been too willing to tolerate the civilian toll in Gaza, which is pushing support for Israel worldwide to historic lows. Israel cannot survive if it becomes a pariah” among nations, which has already to a certain extent taken place. In light of that, Schumer recommended that “At this critical juncture, I believe a new election is the only way to allow for a healthy and open decision-making process about the future of Israel,” Schumer said in a speech, adding that it’s “a time when so many Israelis have lost their confidence in the vision and direction of their government.”
Schumer also criticized Netanyahu for rejecting the Biden administration’s proposal to discuss the establishment of a Palestinian immediately after the war ends. “As a lifelong supporter of Israel, it has become clear to me: The Netanyahu coalition no longer fits the needs of Israel after Oct. 7. The world has changed — radically — since then, and the Israeli people are being stifled right now by a governing vision that is stuck in the past.” He added that “As a democracy, Israel has the right to choose its own leaders, and we should let the chips fall where they may. But the important thing is that Israelis are given a choice. There needs to be a fresh debate about the future of Israel. In my opinion, that is best accomplished by holding an election.”
An election would not necessarily produce a change in Gaza policy, with most Israelis supporting the war by a large margin, according to opinion polls. But one survey released in January suggested that only 15% of voters wanted Netanyahu to remain in office after the conflict ends. War cabinet minister Benny Gantz, Netanyahu’s rival and most likely successor, basically supports the ongoing Gaza slaughter with only minor deviations from what the prime minister is currently doing.
Many congressional Democrats praised Schumer’s speech and a follow up X tweet but Republicans in the United States and leaders in Israel quickly responded negatively to his remarks. Israel’s Likud party saying Israel is not a “banana republic” while House Speaker Mike Johnson said in a statement “It is highly inappropriate and simply wrong for Senator Schumer to be calling for new elections in Israel.” Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell agreed with that judgment: “It is grotesque and hypocritical for Americans who hyperventilate about foreign interference in our own democracy to call for the removal of a democratically elected leader of Israel. This is unprecedented.” Opposing the Republican onslaught, some Democrats pushed back, including Senator Mark Warner of Virginia, who observed that “Netanyahu has certainly not been shy about trying to interfere in American politics.”
Schumer’s speech must be placed in context. Schumer, who has been in the US Senate for 25 years, has always been a strong and uncritical supporter of what Israel does and how it manages its security. He has described his own surname as derived from the Hebrew word “shomer” which means “protector” or “guardian” and has elaborated on that theme to declare openly that he is “Israel’s protector” in the Senate. That said, it is quite possible that Schumer does believe that Israel’s ongoing slaughter of Palestinians with no end in sight is doing grave damage to the long-term viability of the Jewish state. Many other prominent American Jews and friends of Israel like Tom Friedman of the New York Times, are likewise warning that the Jewish state is acting recklessly, not in its own self-interests. Polls suggest that Israel is the most despised nation in the world due to its torturing, starving and outright killing of Palestinian civilians. Number two in those polls is the United States, which is paying the price of being Netanyahu’s political, financial and weapons supplier, enabling the deaths and making it complicit in the conflict, much of it being done in secret by Biden and Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and covered by a series of lies.
The impact of Israeli actions with elections coming up in the US might well have motivated Schumer to speak up now while there is still time to correct course and reduce both the Palestinian death toll and the damage being done to the White House. President Joe Biden almost certainly would have approved of the Schumer speech, but he characteristically did not want to get too far in front on the issue. The trick will be making the Gaza conflict look like it is Netanyahu’s war while also establishing one’s “humanitarian” principles in a way that does not actually blame Israel. It will be difficult and there is no certainty of success, but Schumer and Biden might be smelling electoral defeat in November with the margin of difference being the Gaza war and how the Democratic Party base and independent voters have responded to it.
The White House has powerful allies, interestingly enough, in the Republican Party, which has been transformed into a hardline Israel loving propaganda machine, as well as in the mainstream media, which continues to slant its coverage of Gaza to favor Israel. Indeed, Schumer’s remarks came, not coincidentally, a day after Senate Republicans invited Netanyahu to speak as their special guest at an upcoming party retreat in Washington. Voters who are genuinely antiwar might well vote Democratic as the lesser of two evils, particularly given Donald Trump’s advice to the Israelis to “finish the job” in dealing with the Palestinians. In any event, it is likely that such possibilities are currently swirling through the heads of Biden and Schumer as well as those who are directing the Democratic Party campaign.
And make no mistake that the Administration is currently making sure that those who want to continue the struggle against what is being consistently labeled the international terrorist threat, which justifies ongoing wars, will have something to promote. Top US intelligence officials last Monday at an annual hearing on global security threats held at the Senate Intelligence Committee offices warned that the war in Gaza could embolden terrorist groups, which are aligned in their opposition to the United States for its support of Israel. “The crisis has galvanized violence by a range of actors around the world. And while it is too early to tell, it is likely that the Gaza conflict will have a generational impact on terrorism,” said Avril Haines, who is of course Jewish, the director of national intelligence. At the meeting Senator Tom Cotton a Republican from Arkansas and a stalwart backer of Israel, prodded CIA Director William Burns and Haines to refute critics’ allegations that Israel is ‘exterminating the Palestinian people’ with its military campaign.” Indeed, Zionist apologists like Cotton aside, no one in the room suggested that putting an end to the Israeli genocide might be the best way to put an end to the proliferating terrorism threat.
And so the beat goes on. How to do everything Israel wants without appearing to do so has plagued every White House since Harry Truman, only it has gotten harder to execute as Israel behavior has worsened and American politicians have become more corrupted and openly dependent on Jewish political contributions. It will be interesting to see if the Schumer speech will actually have some resonance or will only serve to trick the public into believing that the US government has actually regained its independence. Only time will tell but it might become an interesting run politically speaking between now and November.
Formidable US military assistance to Israel will always demand a regional reaction. In this case, it has driven the Resistance Axis to establish an irregular military counterbalance, an essential move to ensure West Asia’s stability.
Late last year, Israel’s Ministry of Finance unveiled the country’s anticipated budget for 2024, revealing a noteworthy development. The proposed budget called for a substantial $8.3 billion increase in defense spending, projecting a historic high of approximately $37 billion for the occupation state’s armed forces. This marks a significant surge in military expenditure, positioning Israel among the top-tier states globally in terms of military budget allocations.
Rank
Country
Value of military expenditure (billion $)
1
United States
877
2
China
292
3
Russia
86
4
India
81
5
Saudi Arabia
75
6
United Kingdom
68
7
Germany
56
8
France
54
9
South Korea
46
10
Japan
46
11
Ukraine
44
12
Italy
33
13
Australia
32
14
Canada
27
15
Israel
23
As of 2022, Israel already ranked among the top 15 countries with the highest military spending worldwide. When taking into consideration military spending as a percentage of GDP, Israel secured the ninth spot globally.
A key factor influencing Israel’s supposed military prowess is its status as the largest recipient of US military aid. Since 1946, Washington has provided an enormous $263 billion in support, with approximately $130 billion allocated for addressing evolving security threats and enhancing Israel’s capabilities. This aid, including joint exercises and cooperation, plays a crucial role in maintaining Tel Aviv’s qualitative military edge.
Arab Allies, Israeli Arms
In 2023, the US bolstered its commitment with a record-breaking $3.8 billion in military funding to Israel, part of a $38 billion deal spanning a decade. Additionally, the European Parent Command maintains war reserves within Israel, fortifying its defenses in times of significant military emergencies.
There are ten defense cooperation agreements between the US and Israel today, including the Mutual Defense Assistance Agreement (1952), the Public Information Security Agreement (1982), the Mutual Logistics Support Agreement (1991), the Status of Forces Agreement (1994), and the Memorandum of Understanding on Counterterrorism and Research and Development (2005).
Beyond receiving unparalleled military funding, Israel occupies the tenth position in the global arms export arena, contributing 2.3 percent of the world’s total arms exports from 2018-2022 to reach an unprecedented $12.5 billion in exports in 2022.
Arab states who normalized relations with Tel Aviv through the 2020 Abraham Accords, have emerged as substantial importers of Israeli arms, marking a paradigm shift in regional dynamics. The three Arab countries, the UAE, Bahrain, and Morocco, which signed the US-brokered normalization agreement, accounted for 24 percent of Israeli arms sales in 2022, up from 7 percent in 2021.
In terms of military reserves, Israel ranks 13th globally, boasting 465,000 soldiers in its reserve ranks. Around 5 percent of the Israeli population serves as army reserves, making it the third-highest percentage globally.
Global share of major arms exports by top 10 exporters, 2018-2022
Israel in the US defense budget for 2024
On 22 December, President Joe Biden signed the National Defense Authorization Act, allocating $886.3 billion to the 2024 defense budget, a $28 billion increase from the previous fiscal year.
Notably, the budget received praise from Israeli quarters for its generous provisions, including $500 million for missile defense cooperation, encompassing Israel’s Iron Dome systems, the David Slingshot, and research and testing programs. It also allocates $47.5 million to “new cooperation between the United States and Israel on emerging defense technologies,” including artificial intelligence and cybersecurity. The new budget increased funding to combat drones by almost 40 percent to $55 million from $40 million and also extended the US-Israel cooperation program to combat tunneling until 2026.
Country
Reserves
Population (in million)
Reserve percentage of the population
Finland
900000
5.541
16.24%
Taiwan
1500000
23.57
6.36%
Israel
465000
9.364
4.97%
Veitnam
2500000
97.47
2.56%
North Korea
600000
25.97
2.31%
Colombia
845000
51.52
1.64%
South Korea
500000
51.74
0.96%
Brazil
1340000
214.3
0.63%
Egypt
480000
109.3
0.44%
Pakistan
550000
231.4
0.23%
India
1155000
1408
0.08%
China
510000
1412
0.04%
The 2024 budget extends support for strategic initiatives, such as training Israeli pilots, enhancing maritime domain awareness, and continuing the US-Israel cooperation program to combat tunneling over the next two years. Furthermore, the appointment of a presidential envoy for the Abraham Accords and the Negev Forum initiative underscores Washington’s relentless pursuit of West Asian subjugation to its interests.
Other key items include:
Extension of the Defense Department’s (DoD) authority to transfer weapons systems to Israel under the Israel War Reserve Stockpile Authority (WRSA-I) until January 2027. Extending the authority of the DoD to transfer precision-guided munitions to Israel.
Training Israeli pilots to operate KC-46s.
Directing the DoD to develop a strategy to improve integrated maritime domain awareness and interception capabilities to counter maritime threats against Israel.
Deterrence balance
So how do neighboring countries respond to Israel’s formidable military arsenal, with its American uber-benefactor ever-ready to replenish its stocks and advance its qualitative edge? Clearly, regional states will seek to redress any imbalance by enhancing their own military capabilities in order to maintain both deterrence and stability.
But the disparity in US military aid to Israel and its neighbors is an ominous reminder that Washington seeks, above all, to ensure there is no such “balance.”
Between 2006 and 2018, Washington allocated a mere $1.28 billion in military assistance to the Lebanese army, averaging a meager $100 million annually. This clearly pales in comparison to the tens of billions directed towards Israel during the same period.
Moreover, Washington has actively impeded military cooperation between the Lebanese army and other international forces. A stark example occurred in 2008 when US pressure thwarted Beirut from accepting military support from Russia, including advanced weaponry like MIG-29s, tanks, and ammunition.
In response to this asymmetry, there emerges a crucial need for neighboring states to cultivate their own capabilities, establishing deterrence against the conventional military might of Israel. This approach aligns with the realist school of international relations, which perceives the global order as inherently chaotic, compelling states to prioritize their security and interests through the accumulation of power — often in the forms of military and economic strength.
Time to get real
Realism also contends that maintaining peace necessitates a balance of power. When power is distributed equitably among states, it deters any single state from attempting dominance, as the cost of aggression becomes prohibitively high.
However, this balance is delicate and requires constant maintenance. From a realist perspective, peace is not merely the absence of conflict but relies on a stable power structure preventing major wars or unilateral domination. Therefore, aside from the obvious exception of Iran, other members of the region’s Axis of Resistance (Lebanon, Yemen, Iraq, Syria) must persist in building a deterrent against the Israeli military to forestall major conflicts and ensure stability in West Asia.
The realist school also posits that powerful states are inclined to expand their interests and influence beyond their borders as part of their pursuit of national interests and security. As states grow in power, their national interests become increasingly entwined with international dynamics, prompting deeper engagement beyond their borders.
Thus, alongside historical evidence of Israel’s inherent expansionist tendencies, behavioral science points to the fact that possessing substantial power will further drive the state to extend its influence beyond its geographical boundaries. To counteract this, establishing a robust deterrent force becomes imperative.
Considering the size of Israel’s military arsenal and technology sector relative to the 22,000 square kilometers it occupies, the occupation state stands out as one of the leading spenders on defense globally, a major arms exporter, the largest recipient of US military support, and boasting one of the world’s largest military reserves.
Despite the formidable force at Tel Aviv’s disposal, the Resistance Axis has recently demonstrated, notably through Yemen’s Ansarallah-led forces, that there exist significant vulnerabilities within Israel’s extensive security apparatus. The Lebanese resistance movement, Hezbollah, has also consistently punctured the myth of Israeli military prowess through successful cross-border operations that establish new rules of engagement. And, while Iran’s indigenous missile arsenal has yet to come into play, it may potentially be the one-two punch that neutralizes Israel’s entire arsenal.
The views expressed in this article do not necessarily reflect those of The Cradle.
The US supplying cluster bombs and depleted uranium to Ukraine – and Ukraine using them – is an admission that the territories have now been permanently lost to Russia.
Ukraine is over one month into its long-awaited counteroffensive, with bleak results. Russia has held its defensive line, backed by only a partially mobilized army. On the other hand – Ukraine has seemingly been giving it their all – several rounds of mobilization backed by logistics, weaponry, and armor courtesy of NATO countries.
Throughout the course of the war, Ukraine – and the West – have obfuscated the actual losses of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. Ukraine also admits to making up heroic stories – like the “Ghost of Kiev” – to stir up public support. Through the fog of war, maintaining the narrative is important. It allows for public support, the proliferation of weapons, and financial support.
The fog is now clearing. Kiev is losing territory, weapons, tanks, and – most important of all now – the narrative. The counteroffensive is an absolute catastrophe and an objective failure – Kiev even admits losing 20% of its weapons and armor.
The United States, even before the start of the Russian invasion – was Kiev’s main supporter. Billions of taxpayer dollars given to Ukraine for aid primarily went to weapons and ammunition. The Russian invasion presented the United States with a unique situation where it could attempt to weaken Russia without sacrificing a single American or NATO soldier – they had the Ukrainians to do it for them.
US Senator Lindsey Graham even brazenly admits that “Russians dying” is the “best money the US has ever spent.” If the war is indeed an investment for the United States to weaken Russia, the gap to get the most bang for its buck is closing.
The United States, in order to make sure it can inflict as much damage as possible within this closing gap, is now resorting to sending horrific weapons that will at best temporarily hold off a Russian advance and at worst pollute and destroy the region for years to come.
Early on in the failed counteroffensive, the destruction of NATO weaponry such as the Leopard and Bradley tanks prompted the US to approve depleted uranium rounds for Ukraine. Depleted uranium shells are effective at destroying armor, but leave a devastating side effect – they completely pollute the air, leaving catastrophic effects for years to come. The United States used DU shells in Fallujah – now, over a decade later, the city is nearly permanently altered. Children are born with horrific birth defects that can be fatal, cancer and miscarriage rates are sky-high, and uranium is even detected in human tissue.
A few weeks after the approval and delivery of depleted uranium came the arrival of the cluster bombs – sparking worldwide outrage. Cluster munitions contain packs of submunition that can either detonate on impact or detonate years later. The usage of the bomb is banned by over 100 countries because of the likelihood of the weapon indiscriminately killing civilians.
The usage of both depleted uranium and cluster bombs admits a few things, and none of them spell out a victory for Ukraine.
First, Ukraine won’t gain back any strategic territory now held by Russians. The US supplying these weapons to Ukraine – and Ukraine using them – is an admission that this territory is now permanently lost, as the depleted uranium will permanently alter it and the cluster munitions will make it a death trap for civilians. Those problems will now be passed off to Russia, which will have to spend years dealing with the task of monitoring radiation levels and clearing out undetonated bombs.
It is also becoming clear that Ukraine is not only losing thousands of soldiers but its Western-delivered tanks are being rendered useless. The counteroffensive alone is estimated to cost the Armed Forces of Ukraine almost one thousand soldiers per day for a week at one point. The NATO tanks and artillery were supposed to deliver, but they didn’t – instead, images of dozens of these tanks burning and being captured spread like wildfire over Telegram. Russian President Vladimir Putin even commented that the tanks “burn nicely.” The DU rounds and cluster munitions will have to deliver what the former weaponry did not.
The incoming weapons also mean NATO is not really coming to help. The NATO summit this month was a massive disappointment for Kiev – there is no path or timeline for the war-ravaged country to join NATO, and NATO does not want to risk a direct war with Russia. US President Joe Biden said Ukraine can join when it “defeats Russia,” but this comment was made in the midst of the failing counteroffensive. As the summer days wind down, the chance for any significant breakthroughs diminishes. The delivery of these weapons – which could have happened at any point in this war – is a way to keep Ukrainian forces committed to the US goal of killing Russians.
Adding to this point is the fact that the United States completely gives up its moral high ground with the delivery of these weapons. A few “progressive” politicians in the US have spoken against the delivery of both of these types of weapons, and Joe Biden even says it was a “difficult decision” to send cluster bombs to Ukraine.
“Difficult decisions” come at desperate times – and desperate times call for desperate measures. However, these weapons won’t bring victory – or most importantly, peace – to Ukraine. For the United States, this has always been the perfect opportunity to weaken a longstanding global rival. Much to Washington’s dismay, things aren’t working out the way they intended.
As it stands, the Ukrainian military officials are restrategizing their efforts in the counteroffensive. Russian lines are strong, and the “gray zones” where clashes are occurring have not shifted in any side’s favor. If the Ukrainians are able to use their newly acquired weapons successfully, they would still have to cut through kilometers worth of Russian-mined areas while maneuvering around Russian artillery and air support.
As the region becomes permanently damaged by the use of these weapons, nations must come together to draft a permanent peace and encourage dialogue – otherwise, the United States will continue to escalate the carnage.
The opinions mentioned in this article do not necessarily reflect the opinion of Al mayadeen, but rather express the opinion of its writer exclusively.
HR. 3099 was Introduced in the House of Representatives on May 5, 2023. This bill, known as the “Special Envoy for the Abraham Accords Act,” is the latest act by the United States in the service of Israel.
This bill establishes the position of Special Envoy for the Abraham Accords within the Department of State. For anyone who does not remember, the Abraham Accords are agreements to normalize relations between Israel and Arab states that do not recognize Israel. It is an anti-Palestinian accord more than anything. It should be named “a bill to guarantee that governments who go against the wishes of their people and are willing to turn their backs to the plight of the Palestinian people will be rewarded.”
The first four members of the Arab League to sign this accord were the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Morocco, and Sudan. The initial signing took place in the White House during the Trump administration, and it should be noted that President Trump and Prime Minister Netanyahu were the only heads of state present. The other countries sent their foreign ministers, ostensibly so as not to be seen signing this disgraceful agreement. It is worth noting that there was extensive widespread opposition to normalizing relations with Israel in all countries that signed the accords.
A US AMBASSADOR IN THE SERVICE OF ISRAEL
According to the bill’s text, the Special Envoy, who shall have the rank and status of ambassador, shall serve as the primary advisor to the U.S. government for expanding and strengthening the Abraham Accords. The duties of the Special Envoy include:
• Encouraging countries without diplomatic relations with Israel to establish formal diplomatic, economic, security, and people-to-people ties; • Expanding and strengthening existing relationships between Israel and Muslim-majority countries; and • Coordinating efforts across the U.S. government and engaging diplomatically with foreign governments, nongovernmental organizations, and other stakeholders to expand and strengthen the Abraham Accords.
The language in the bill demands that we ask why in the world is the U.S. government engaged in serving the interests of Israel so blatantly. Indeed, the U.S. will be selling arms to these countries, but a larger picture here is not being discussed, at least not enough. You have to hand it to Israel and even more to the Israeli lobby here in the U.S.: They got a superpower to work as Israel’s sales agent and pay for it. American taxpayers will now be paying additional millions of dollars to solicit – or rather bully – countries who have not yet established relations with Israel to do so. Is this the best use of American taxpayer dollars? Does this serve Americans in any way? The answer to both questions is “No!”
IMPORTANT NEWS
Needless to say, this bill was reported by the Israel press as another step in advancing the good relations between Israel and the United States. The Times of Israel reported that “the US House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed legislation mandating the Biden administration to appoint a special envoy for the Abraham Accords. The special envoy will encourage additional countries to follow the lead of the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain and Morocco, which normalized relations with Israel in 2020.”
If there was any doubt regarding the role the Anti-Palestinian, pro-apartheid lobby, AIPAC, played in passing this bill, Representative Ritchie Tores ensured it was set aside. In a tweet, Congressman 703748 thanked AIPAC for its role in passing the bill. He further said that the future belongs to peace and love, not BDS. In other words, the anti-Palestinian bill pushed down the throat of Americans by the Apartheid defending genocide supporting AIPAC will lead to a future of love and roses.
In contrast, the Palestinian call for freedom and justice is equivalent to a hate-filled future. Once again, anti-peace anti-Palestinian legislation is poorly masked with good intentions.
According to the Times of Israel piece, during his announcement of the administration’s decision to establish the new position, Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said, “Israel’s further integration in the region contributes to a more stable, a more secure and more prosperous region. That’s why President Biden has made it a cornerstone of his Middle East policy.”
“We will soon create a new position to further our diplomacy and engagement with governments and private sector, nongovernmental organizations, all working toward a more peaceful and a more connected region,” he added.
THE SAUDI CARD
Those who had expectations that the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia would join the accords suffered a blow when instead of opening an embassy in Tel-Aviv, Riadh reopened its embassy in Tehran. For Israel and especially for Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, having Saudi Arabia capitulate and sign the Abraham Accords would be the greatest of rewards. According to a piece in the Jerusalem Post quoting one of the sponsors of the Bill, Representative Mike Lawler, Republican of New York, “The addition of a special envoy will be critical for bringing Saudi Arabia into the accords.”
The warming of the relations between Riyadh and Teheran was ostensibly a result of Chinese intervention. At the same time, the U.S. was busy with more important things, like passing anti-Palestinian legislation. Now Israel has got President Biden nominating and paying for a full-fledged ambassador to try to bring Saudi Arabia back to fold, as it were.
The question is, of course, what is in it for the Saudis? Apparently, they want nuclear power plants, which Israel and the U.S. will never allow, but Teheran might be able to help them develop. Israel is seriously undermining the Arab and Muslim custodianship of the Holy Basin, which includes the Al-Aqsa Mosque, in a manner so egregious that the Saudis can no longer ignore it.
Still, one must not lose hope because Congress passed a bill, and President Biden will nominate an envoy. So, for now, the legislative and the executive branches are following the marching order of every Palestinian-hating, apartheid-loving, warmongering, racist lobby working for Israel. The two branches of the United States government are in sync as they serve Israel.
US media is reporting that Ukraine has five months to show demonstrable and significant gains or Western allies fear financial and military support from the US may wane and pressure will mount on the country to enter into peace negotiations.
US media reported on the matter, citing several senior European officials who spoke on the condition of anonymity.
The United States is entering an election cycle and it is important, one European official says, that the American public can be sold on the idea that the more than $113 billion in taxpayer aid given to Ukraine has been effective and “to prove that all of those aid packages have been successful in terms of Ukrainian advances.”
US officials contend that the current $48 billion package which was authorized last year, is enough to sustain Ukraine for roughly five more months, but European allies are concerned future aid packages from the US will come close to matching that level.
Nevertheless, earlier this month Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky said his country needed more Western weapons before he could order the start of Ukraine’s much-hyped counter-offensive. He visited four NATO nations this week, Italy, Germany, France, and the UK, securing billions in more aid, but European support is still a fraction of what the US has been providing.
The US government has also hit its self-imposed debt ceiling, which has led to a debate on domestic spending. Some social programs may be cut in the negotiations, which would make selling aid packages to the American taxpayer even more difficult if Ukraine cannot be presented as a winning bet.
US President Joe Biden has, publicly at least, remained steadfast in his support for Ukraine. Before heading to the G7 Summit on Wednesday, a White House official said that “President Biden has been very clear about supporting Ukraine for as long as it takes.”
However, Biden’s likely opponent in 2024, former President Donald Trump, said last week he didn’t think of the war “in terms of winning and losing,” and is instead focused on “getting it settled so we stop killing all these people.” He also would not commit to sending more aid packages and promised to end the war “in 24 hours.”
And there have been hints from other Republicans that support for Ukraine is not unlimited. While House Speaker Kevin McCarthy [R-CA] said he will “continue to support” aid to Ukraine, he also said previously that it won’t come in the form of a “blank check.”
Support among the American public for Ukraine has also been slipping. Polls have shown support as low as 48% in January and while other polls have had that number over 50% in more recent months, it is still far from last summer when 73% of Americans supported military aid to Ukraine.
Without significant gains by the Ukrainian armed forces, it is unlikely that trend will reverse itself.
“If we get to September and Ukraine has not made significant gains, then the international pressure on [the West] to bring them to negotiations will be enormous,” one official said.
Both the UN General Assembly and G20 summit take place in September. Both events would represent an opportunity to get both sides to the negotiating table.
Several countries have offered to act as mediators, including China, Brazil and Turkey, but Zelensky has rejected mediation since the beginning of the conflict when Ukraine pulled out of negotiations mediated by Turkey. On Saturday, he rejected another offer from Pope Francis for mediation.
But much of Ukraine’s sustained capabilities depend on Western support, and another European official said they “can’t keep the same level of assistance forever,” though he felt another year or two may be possible.
America gives Ukraine 5 months before cutting support, disrupting its access to the F-16, and strikes targeting the Crimean railways
379 _ A radioactive cloud from the detonation of depleted uranium missile stores in Ukraine and the completion of control over Bakhmut
Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is in his third term, and he has yet to get an invitation to visit Washington. Despite the fact that there are numerous subjects for discussion. Consider, for example, how strongly everyone around the world, including Americans, condemned the far-right Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich’s call for the Palestinian town of Huwara to be “wiped out.” Smotrich, the head of Netanyahu’s hardline coalition’s pro-settler party, made harsh public comments amid a succession of deadly punitive operations against Palestinians and Israeli settler violence in the occupied West Bank. The White House and Joe Biden “got nervous” over other similarly harsh statements made by Israeli ministers in light of the complex situation that is currently playing out not only in Israel but also throughout the Middle East. And not at all in favor of the USA.
According to World Israel News, if Israeli officials had made the same claims in private, Netanyahu would already be meeting with Biden in the Oval Office. But Joe Biden doesn’t want to endanger his campaign for a second term as president as the presidential election draws near. Yet, this year, three to four billion dollars in military aid from American taxpayers will continue to go to Israel. This is the same military aid that Israel uses in its crimes against Palestinians.
While the White House declined to clarify whether Netanyahu would still be invited, a State Department official directed reporters to the Cabinet of Israel for information on the prime minister’s intentions for such a trip. David Makowski of the Washington Institute for Near East Policy believes that “the message the US clearly wants to send is: If you follow unwanted policies, you have no right to sit in the Oval Office.” A senior Israeli official, who wished to remain unnamed, was quoted in US media reports on the matter as stating that the US position was not unexpected given that the two sides had been at odds on a number of topics for decades. Nonetheless, the official stated that “the solid relationship between Israel and the United States has not and will not be damaged as a result of these disputes.”
Two major crises that Israel is currently experiencing are affecting Netanyahu’s cabinet. Since the beginning of the year, protesters have crowded the streets of major cities to voice their opposition to the government’s proposal to curtail the authority of the so-called Supreme Court, which detractors claim will force Israelis to live under a dictatorship. Footage from Tel Aviv, where police actively used tasers and fought with Israeli protesters, was widely circulated.
Former Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennet warned last month of a “civil war in Israel” and called for talks on Netanyahu’s amendments. “There may be a settlement on judicial amendments,” Bennett said. “There are things that need to be fixed and changed, but we shouldn’t go from one extreme to the other.” At the same time, Bennett added that “the majority wants adjustments, not system changes,” warning against a civil war “over nothing.”
Former Attorney General Avichai Mandelblit believes the current security crisis has only just begun, and he predicts “bloodshed.” According to Israeli media, Mandelblit said, “We are only at the beginning of the conflict. The situation will continue to worsen, and there will be bloodshed inside Israel.”
The Knesset (Israeli parliament) is trying to overthrow the so-called judicial system. On first reading, the law received 63 votes in favor, which is more than the quorum’s required threshold. The goal of the action is to make the Knesset stronger so that Netanyahu’s hardline alliance can maintain its majority and overturn Supreme Court rulings. Members of the Knesset will have more influence in the selection of judges as a result of Netanyahu’s actions.
Netanyahu is allegedly attempting to utilize the reforms to remove a lot of accusations against himself that are related to 2019 according to the protest organizers. Fraud, bribery, and breach of trust are among the charges and scandals. According to Israeli media, hundreds of thousands of settlers protested in Tel Aviv and other settlements in the occupied areas, including Jerusalem, as well as outside President Isaac Herzog’s residence. The president urged Netanyahu’s cabinet to halt reforms and speak with the opposition in order to reach a consensus. Despite not ruling out conversation, the ruling cabinet refused to defer or postpone the reform vote. The president of Israel warned that the situation was going to erupt.
Netanyahu’s political opponents slammed the moves as an attempt to “abolish the courts.” The suggested measures, according to Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid, are an attempt by the prime minister to avert continuous corruption cases. “Just because they have a majority in parliament does not mean… that they can demolish the Supreme Court simply because the prime minister has been indicted,” Lapid stated.
The so-called reforms open the path for additional issues that the regime will be concerned about. Analysts worry that Netanyahu’s policies will have a long-term negative impact on Israel’s economic growth and the living standards of Israeli settlers. Although the judicial reform has not yet taken effect, it has already had an impact on the Israeli shekel. The planned reforms, in the opinion of businesspeople and economists, would jeopardize Israel’s investment interests in the occupied territories. According to Israeli President Isaac Herzog, Netanyahu’s obsession with supposed reforms has brought the government to the “depths of a serious crisis,” with the threat of civil war looming.
The Supreme Court justified all crimes and atrocities committed against Palestinians, so this has nothing to do with them. This includes the ongoing expansion of settlements, which are illegal under international law yet are approved by the US.
According to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, who also expressed “grave concern” about the proposal, the US supposedly opposes allowing Israel to establish Jewish settlement outposts in the occupied West Bank. This action came less than two weeks after he expressed the opposition of the United States to such measures during his visit to the region. According to the Tehran Times, it is probable that the Secretary of State covertly supported this type of conduct, despite his words of “condemnation” by Washington. As usual, there is a game going on here that is costing the Palestinians dearly.
Simultaneously, the United States continues to utilize its veto power in the UN Security Council to allow illegal Israeli settlements to thrive. Other than public words to calm the international community, Blinken has exhibited no significant resistance to settlement expansion. The hypocrisy of the Secretary of State is astounding: “We strongly oppose such unilateral measures, which exacerbate tensions and undermine the prospects for a negotiated two-state solution.” Ned Price, the spokesman for the US State Department, went even further in his euphemisms, asserting that Blinken had made it clear during his visit to the occupied territories that he opposed the legalization of settlements.
The increase of violence in the occupied West Bank is Israel’s second crisis. Punitive actions have intensified since young Palestinians started using armed resistance earlier this year, including numerous Israeli crimes against humanity.
Speaking before the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva, UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Volker Türk condemned the current actions of the Israeli authorities as “an incomprehensible declaration of incitement to violence and hostility.” According to this international organization, at least 65 Palestinian adults and children have been killed by Israeli Security Forces since the beginning of the year. “Settlements in the occupied territories must be stopped soon; the situation in the Occupied Palestinian Territories is tragic. A catastrophe, first and foremost, for the Palestinian people,” both Türk and the entire world agree.
Upon his arrival at Ben Gurion Airport, which sits on the lands of the occupied Palestinian city of El-Lyd, President Joe Biden repeated his age-old mantra, “You don’t have to be a Jew to be a Zionist.” Indeed you do not. To be a Zionist, you only need to be a racist, a supporter of the hate-filled, violent, intolerant apartheid regime that has been occupying Palestine since 1948. You need to believe that people who are not Palestinians have a right to Palestine and to its resources. To be a Zionist, you don’t need to be Jewish, you just need to repeat the absurd claim that the Bible gives all Jewish people around the world the right to kill people because they are Palestinians who want to return to their homes and their land.
In a nauseating show of hypocrisy, President Biden, Israeli President Yitzhak Hertzog, and Prime Minister Lapid spoke of peace, justice, and human rights as the shared values of the United States and the State of Israel. This was less than twenty-four hours after John Bolton admitted to orchestrating coup d’états in countries around the world. This is also after Israeli military, and political figures openly talked about assassinating Iranian scientists and officials.
The values shared by Israel and the United States are clearly represented in the fact that President Biden is visiting a country that only recently assassinated the American-Palestinian journalist Shireen Abu-Akleh and is keeping silent about it. The president of the United States is in Israel, meeting with heads of the Israeli state, and yet rather than using the full force of his position – which is considerable – to demand accountability, he says and does nothing.
American journalist Jamal Khashoggi. The murders of Khashoggi and that of Shireen Abu Akleh are not the only crimes committed by the two regimes for which Biden is showing love, but these two were well publicized and involve U.S. nationals, so one would think he would act or at least speak out.
A BAD DEAL
U.S. support for Israel is a bad deal for the American taxpayers. $3.8 billion dollars of American taxpayers’ money gets sent to Israel at the beginning of each year. And with the exception of the military-industrial complex, Americans get little out of this.
American citizens who wish to travel to Palestine, particularly if they have an Arab name or family there, are subjected to harassment by the Israeli authorities. This harassment takes place at Tel-Aviv airport, where the authorities are notoriously racist, anti-Arab and anti-Muslim. The harassment can last for many hours and often results in refusal of entry into the country. U.S. citizens are not protected from the inhumane interrogation process that takes place at the airport on the way in, and they are not protected by their U.S. citizenship when they leave the country.
A U.S. passport does not even protect Americans from being shot and killed by Israeli forces. Rachel Corrie and Shireen Abu-Akleh, both citizens of the United States, were killed in broad daylight. They were wearing safety equipment, they were well identified as non-combatant civilians, and they were both butchered in plain sight. Washington made no effort to bring the criminals to justice.
Another U.S. citizen who died at the hand of IDF soldiers is Omar Abdalmajeed As’ad. He died on January 12 after he was arrested by IDF troops. According to a report in The Jerusalem Post, the seventy-eight-year-old As’ad “was arrested, handcuffed, blindfolded and gagged,” after which the soldiers left. Also, according to the Post report, “the soldiers did not call for medical assistance and left him there believing that he had fallen asleep.” Although several members of congress did issue statements, no real action was taken to hold Israel accountable.
Where was the U.S. government to protect him? Where was the demand to investigate and bring the culprits to justice? and where are the sanctions against the State of Israel, which shows no regard for the lives of Palestinians?
The Israeli human-rights organization B’Tselem commented that: “The army’s announcement regarding the death of Omar Assad is adorned with empty words about ‘moral failure’ – concluding, as expected, with the faintest of rebukes…In fact, the fundamental moral failure is that of Israel’s senior echelons, leading a regime of Jewish supremacy, one in which the human life of Palestinians has no value.”
NO DEMOCRACY, NO STABILITY
Contrary to what is said about Israel, it is neither a democracy nor an island of stability. It has been several years since Israel has been able to function as a state. This is due to the fact that there has not been a government with a stable majority in place. Elections are held over and over again, and even though the results are predictably the same, no stable government is formed. The election results have been consistent, clearly showing what Israeli voters want, namely, they are in favor of a strong, ultra-right-wing government led by racists like Benjamin Netanyahu, who was indicted for corruption, and war criminal generals like Benny Gantz.
Neither the corruption nor the war crimes seem to have any impact on the voters, and these people are elected over and over again. The only thing that changes are the partnerships between the politicians who rarely last very long and the new generals that join the political arena. The one thing that remains constant in Israeli politics is Benjamin Netanyahu. He and his loyal Likud Party followers are the only stable, consistent element in Israeli politics.
WHO IS JOE BIDEN WORKING FOR?
Judging by his performance, Joe Biden is working for AIPAC and not for the American people. He hit every note, shook every hand and repeated his mantras, clearly trying to please his donors back home. According to reports, he even made sure to tell Benjamin Netanyahu that he likes him. His interview on Israeli television included a commitment to keep the Iranian Revolutionary Guard on the list of terrorist organizations and even to attack Iran if that was what it took to prevent it from developing nuclear weapons. That is not what his constituents in the U.S. want, but it is what Israel and AIPAC expect of him.
Have you noticed how every major foreign policy crisis since the U.S. and U.K.’s invasion of Iraq in 2003 has peeled off another layer of the left into joining the pro-NATO, pro-war camp?
It is now hard to remember that many millions marched in the U.S. and Europe against the attack on Iraq. It sometimes feels like there is no one left who is not cheerleading the next wave of profits for the West’s military-industrial complex (usually referred to as the “defense industry” by those very same profiteers).
Washington learned a hard lesson from the unpopularity of its 2003 attack on Iraq aimed at controlling more of the Middle East’s oil reserves. Ordinary people do not like seeing the public coffers ransacked or suffering years of austerity, simply to line the pockets of Blackwater, Halliburton, and Raytheon. And all the more so when such a war is sold to them on the basis of a huge deception.
So since then, the U.S. has been repackaging its neocolonialism via proxy wars that are a much easier sell. There have been a succession of them: Libya, Syria, Yemen, Iran, Venezuela and now Ukraine. Each time, a few more leftists are lured into the camp of the war hawks by the West’s selfless, humanitarian instincts – promoted, of course, through the barrel of a Western-supplied arsenal. That process has reached its nadir with Ukraine.
Greenwald on the interests of the west's military-industrial complex: 'Right at the moment when the market for these weapons disappeared, when the US finally got out of Iraq and Afghanistan, lo and behold there's this new market in Ukraine' https://t.co/s3wVNbkOJN
I recently wrote about the paranoid ravings of celebrity “left-wing” journalist Paul Mason, who now sees the Kremlin’s hand behind any dissension from a full-throttle charge towards a nuclear face-off with Russia.
Behind the scenes, he has been sounding out Western intelligence agencies in a bid to covertly deplatform and demonetize any independent journalists who still dare to wonder whether arming Ukraine to the hilt or recruiting it into NATO – even though it shares a border that Russia views as existentially important – might not be an entirely wise use of taxpayers’ money.
It is not hard to imagine that Mason is representative of the wider thinking of establishment journalists, even those who claim to be on the left.
But I want to take on here a more serious proponent of this kind of ideology than the increasingly preposterous Mason. Because swelling kneejerk support for U.S. imperial wars – as long, of course, as Washington’s role is thinly disguised – is becoming ever more common among leftwing academics too.
The latest cheerleader for the military-industrial complex is Slavoj Zizek, the famed Slovenian philosopher and public intellectual whose work has gained him international prominence. His latest piece – published where else but TheGuardian – is a morass of sloppy thinking, moral evasion and double speak. Which is why I think it is worth deconstructing. It encapsulates all the worst geostrategic misconceptions of Western intellectuals at the moment.
Zizek, who is supposedly an expert on ideology and propaganda, and has even written and starred in a couple of documentaries on the subject, seems now to be utterly blind to his own susceptibility to propaganda.
COD PSYCHOLOGY
He starts, naturally enough, with a straw man: that those opposed to the West’s focus on arming Ukraine rather than using its considerable muscle to force Kyiv and Moscow to the negotiating table are in the wrong. Opposition to dragging out the war for as long as possible, however many Ukrainians and Russians die, with the aim of “weakening Russia”, as US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin wants; and opposition to leaving millions of people in poorer parts of the world to be plunged deeper into poverty or to starve is equated by Zizek to “pacifism.”
Playing games with the lives of Ukrainians – and risking nuclear war – simply to 'weaken' Russia is, Chomsky notes, 'morally horrendous. And the people who are standing on a high horse about how we’re upholding principle are moral imbeciles when you think about what’s involved'
“Those who cling to pacifism in the face of the Russian attack on Ukraine remain caught in their own version of [John Lennon’s song] ‘Imagine’,” writes Zizek. But the only one dwelling in the world of the imaginary is Zizek and those who think like him.
The left’s mantra of “Stop the war!” can’t be reduced to kneejerk pacifism. It derives from a political and moral worldview. It opposes the militarism of competitive, resource-hungry nation-states. It opposes the war industries that not only destroy whole countries but risk global nuclear annihilation in advancing their interests. It opposes the profit motive for a war that has incentivised a global elite to continue investing in planet-wide rape and pillage rather than addressing a looming ecological catastrophe. All of that context is ignored in Zizek’s lengthy essay.
Instead, he prefers to take a detour into cod psychology, telling us that Russian president Vladimir Putin sees himself as Peter the Great. Putin will not be satisfied simply with regaining the parts of Ukraine that historically belonged to Russia and have always provided its navy with its only access to the Black Sea. No, the Russian president is hell-bent on global conquest. And Europe is next – or so Zizek argues.
Even if we naively take the rhetoric of embattled leaders at face value (remember those weapons of mass destruction Iraq’s Saddam Hussein supposedly had?), it is still a major stretch for Zizek to cite one speech by Putin as proof that the Russian leader wants his own version of the Third Reich.
Not least, we must address the glaring cognitive dissonance at the heart of the Western, NATO-inspired discourse on Ukraine, something Zizek refuses to do. How can Russia be so weak it has managed only to subdue small parts of Ukraine at great military cost, while it is at the same time a military superpower poised to take over the whole of Europe?
The US war lobby is so massively bloated that it would be simply astonishing if it didn't have a (usually covert) finger prised into every major conflict zone on the planet – and a strong vested interest in perpetuating those conflicts too pic.twitter.com/XOVCkqx78x
Zizek is horrified by Putin’s conceptual division of the world into those states that are sovereign and those that are colonized. Or as he quotes Putin observing: “Any country, any people, any ethnic group should ensure their sovereignty. Because there is no in-between, no intermediate state: either a country is sovereign, or it is a colony, no matter what the colonies are called.”
SOVEREIGN OR COLONIZED?
The famed philosopher reads this as proof that Russia wants as its colonies: “Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Finland, the Baltic states … and ultimately Europe itself”. But if he weren’t so blinded by NATO ideology, he might read Putin’s words in a quite different way. Isn’t Putin simply restating Washington realpolitik? The U.S., through NATO, is the real sovereign in Europe and is pushing its sovereignty ever closer to Russia’s borders.
Putin’s concern about Ukraine being colonized by the U.S. military-industrial complex is essentially the same as U.S. concerns in the 1960s about the Soviet Union filling Cuba with its nuclear missiles. Washington’s concern justified a confrontation that moved the world possibly the closest it has ever come to nuclear annihilation.
Both Russia and the U.S. are wedded to the idea of their own “spheres of influence”. It is just that the U.S. sphere now encircles the globe through many hundreds of overseas military bases. By contrast, the West cries to the heavens when Russia secures a single military base in Crimea.
We may not like the sentiments Putin is espousing, but they are not especially his. They are the reality of the framework of modern military power the West was intimately involved in creating. It was our centuries of colonialism – our greed and theft – that divided the world into the sovereign and the colonized. Putin is simply stating that Russia needs to act in ways that ensure it remains sovereign, rather than joining the colonized.
We may disagree with Putin’s perception of the threat posed by NATO, and the need to annex eastern Ukraine, but to pretend his speech means that he aims for world domination is nothing more than the regurgitation of a CIA talking point.
Zizek, of course, intersperses this silliness with more valid observations, like this one: “To insist on full sovereignty in the face of global warming is sheer madness since our very survival hinges on tight global cooperation.” Of course, it is madness. But why is this relevant to Putin and his supposed “imperial ambition”? Is there any major state on the planet – those in Europe, the United States, China, Brazil, Australia – that has avoided this madness, that is seeking genuine “tight global cooperation” to end the threat of climate breakdown.
No, our world is in the grip of terminal delusion, propelled ever closer to the precipice by capitalism’s requirement of endless economic growth on a finite planet. Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is causing great ecological damage, but so are lots of other things – including NATO’s rationalization of ever-expanding military budgets.
It's disturbing how many people are peddling the idea that Nato is a 'defensive alliance'. It *claims* to be defensive. Actually, Nato is a central pillar of the highly lucrative war industries. This may help clarify: https://t.co/SL2MA1ASMh
But Zizek has the bit between his teeth. He now singles out Russia because it is maneuvering to exploit the consequences of global warming, such as new trade routes opened up by a thawing Arctic.
“Russia’s strategic plan is to profit from global warming: control the world’s main transport route, plus develop Siberia and control Ukraine,” he writes. “In this way, Russia will dominate so much food production that it will be able to blackmail the whole world.”
But what does he imagine? As we transform the world’s climate and its trade routes, as new parts of the world turn into deserts, as whole populations are forced to make migrations to different regions, does he think only Putin and Russia are jostling to avoid sinking below the rising sea waters. Does he presume the policy hawks in Washington, or their satraps in Europe, have missed all this and are simply putting their feet up? In reality, maneuvering on the international stage – what I have called elsewhere a brutal nation-state version of the children’s party game musical chairs – has been going on for decades.
Ukraine is the latest front in a long-running war for resource control on a dying planet. It is another battleground in the renewed great power game that the U.S. revived by expanding NATO across Eastern Europe in one pincer movement and then bolstered it with its wars and proxy wars across the Middle East. Where was the urge for “tight global cooperation” then? To perceive Ukraine as simply the victim of Putin’s “imperialism” requires turning a blind eye to everything that has occurred since the fall of the Soviet Union three decades ago.
My latest: Western media and politicians want us focusing exclusively on Russia's role in Ukraine so we overlook our own responsibility for making sacrificial victims of the Ukrainian people https://t.co/V0ZpwFFB9A
Zizek gets to the heart of what should matter in his next, throw-away line:
Those who advocate less support for Ukraine and more pressure on it to negotiate, inclusive of accepting painful territorial renunciations, like to repeat that Ukraine simply cannot win the war against Russia. True, but I see exactly in this the greatness of Ukrainian resistance.”
Zizek briefly recognises the reality of Ukraine’s situation – that it cannot win, that Russia has a bigger, better-equipped army – but then deflects to the “greatness” of Ukraine’s defiance. Yes, it is glorious that Ukrainians are ready to die to defend their country’s sovereignty. But that is not the issue we in the West need to consider when Kyiv demands we arm its resistance.
The question of whether Ukrainians can win, or whether they will be slaughtered, is highly pertinent to deciding whether we in the West should help drag out the war, using Ukrainians as cannon fodder, to no purpose other than our being able to marvel as spectators at their heroism. Whether Ukrainians can win is also pertinent to the matter of how urgent it is to draw the war to a close so that millions don’t starve in Africa because of the loss of crops, the fall in exports and rocketing fuel prices. And arming a futile, if valiant, Ukrainian struggle against Russia to weaken Moscow must be judged in the context that we risk backing Russia into a geostrategic corner – as we have been doing for more than two decades – from which, we may surmise, Moscow could ultimately decide to extricate itself by resorting to nuclear weapons.
INTELLECTUAL CUL DE SAC
Having propelled himself into an intellectual cul de sac, Zizek switches tack. He suddenly changes the terms of the debate entirely. Having completely ignored the U.S. role in bringing us to this point, he now observes:
Not just Ukraine, Europe itself is becoming the place of the proxy war between [the] U.S. and Russia, which may well end up by a compromise between the two at Europe’s expense. There are only two ways for Europe to step out of this place: to play the game of neutrality – a short-cut to catastrophe – or to become an autonomous agent.”
So, we are in a U.S. proxy war – one played out under the bogus auspices of NATO and its “defensive” expansion – but the solution to this problem for Europe is to gain its “autonomy” by …
Well, from everything Zizek has previously asserted in the piece, it seems such autonomy must be expressed by silently agreeing to the U.S. pumping Ukraine full of weapons to fight Russia in a proxy war that is really about weakening Russia rather than saving Ukraine. Only a world-renowned philosopher could bring us to such an intellectually and morally barren place.
The biggest problem for Zizek, it seems, isn’t the U.S. proxy war or Russian “imperialism”, it is the left’s disillusionment with the military industrial complex: “Their true message to Ukraine is: OK, you are victims of a brutal aggression, but do not rely on our arms because in this way you play into the hands of the industrial-military complex,” he writes.
But the concern here is not that Ukraine is playing into the arms of the war industries. It is that Western populations are being played by their leaders – and intellectuals like Zizek – so that they can be delivered, once again, into the arms of the military-industrial complex. The West’s war industries have precisely no interest in negotiations, which is why they are not taking place. It is also the reason why events over three decades have led us to a Russian invasion of Ukraine that most of Washington’s policy makers warned would happen if the U.S. continued to encroach on Russia’s “sphere of influence”.
The left’s message is that we are being conned yet again and that it is long past the time to start a debate. Those debates should have taken place when the U.S. broke its promise not to expand “one inch” beyond Germany. Or when NATO flirted with offering Ukraine membership 14 years ago. Or when the U.S. meddled in the ousting of the elected government of Ukraine in 2014. Or when Kyiv integrated neo-Nazi groups into the Ukrainian army and engaged in a civil war against the Russian parts of its own populace. Or when the U.S. and NATO allowed Kyiv – on the best interpretation – to ignore its obligations under the Minsk agreements with Russia.
None of those debates happened. Which is why a debate in the West is still needed now, at this terribly late stage. Only then might there be a hope that genuine negotiations can take place – before Ukraine is obliterated.
CANNON FODDER
Having exhausted all his hollow preliminary arguments, we get to Zizek’s main beef. With the world polarizing around a sole military superpower, the U.S., and a sole economic superpower, China, Europe and Russia may be forced into each other’s arms in a “Eurasian” block that would swamp European values. For Zizek, that would lead to “fascism”. He writes: “At that point, the European legacy will be lost, and Europe will be de facto divided between an American and a Russian sphere of influence. In short, Europe itself will become the place of a war that seems to have no end.”
Let us set aside whether Europe – all of it, parts of it? – is really a bulwark against fascism, as Zizek assumes. How exactly is Europe to find its power, its sovereignty, in this battle between superpowers? What vehicle is Zizek proposing to guarantee Europe’s autonomy, and how does it differ from the NATO one that is – even Zizek now seems to be conceding – actually just a vassal of the U.S., there to enforce Washington’s global-spanning “sphere of influence” against Russia and China.
Faced with this problem, Zizek quickly retreats into mindless sloganeering: “One cannot be a leftist if one does not unequivocally stand behind Ukraine.” This Bushism – “You are either with us or with the terrorists” – really is as foolish as it sounds.
What does “unequivocal” mean here? Must we “unequivocally stand behind” all of Ukraine’s actions – even should, say, neo-Nazi elements of the Ukrainian military like the Azov Brigade carry out pogroms against the ethnic Russian communities living in Ukraine?
But even more seriously, what does it mean for Europeans to stand “unequivocally” behind Ukraine? Must we approve the supply of U.S. weapons, even though, as Zizek also concedes, Ukraine cannot win the war and is serving primarily as a proxy battleground?
Would “unequivocal support” not require us to pretend that Europe, rather than the U.S., is in charge of NATO policy? Would it not require too that we pretend NATO’s actions are defensive rather intimately tied to advancing the U.S. “sphere of influence” designed to weaken Russia?
And how can our participation in the U.S. ambition to weaken Russia not provoke greater fear in Russia for its future, greater militarism in Moscow, and ensure Europe becomes more of a battleground rather than less of one?
What does “unequivocal” support for Ukraine mean given that Zizek has agreed that the U.S. and Russia are fighting a proxy war, and that Europe is caught in the middle of it? Zizek’s answer is no answer at all. It is nothing more than evasion. It is the rationalization of unprincipled European inaction, of acting as a spectator while the U.S. continues to use Ukrainians as cannon fodder.
MUDDYING THE WATERS
After thoroughly muddying the waters on Ukraine, Zizek briefly seeks safer territory as he winds down his argument. He points out, two decades on, that George W. Bush was similarly a war criminal in invading Iraq, and notes the irony that Julian Assange is being extradited to the U.S. because Wikileaks helped expose those war crimes. To even things up, he makes a counter-demand on “those who oppose Russian invasion” that they fight for Assange’s release – and in doing so implicitly accuses the anti-war movement of supporting Russia’s invasion.
He then plunges straight back into sloganeering in his concluding paragraph: “Ukraine fights for global freedom, inclusive of the freedom of Russians themselves. That’s why the heart of every true Russian patriot beats for Ukraine.” Maybe he should try telling that to the thousands of ethnic Russian families mourning their loved ones killed by the civil war that began raging in eastern Ukraine long before Putin launched his invasion and supposedly initiated his campaign for world domination. Those kinds of Ukrainians may beg to differ, as may Russians worried about the safety and future of their ethnic kin in Ukraine.
As with most things in life, there are no easy answers for Ukraine. But Zizek’s warmongering dressed up as European enlightenment and humanitarianism is a particularly wretched example of the current climate of intellectual and moral vacuity. What we need from public thinkers like Zizek is a clear-sighted roadmap for how we move back from the precipice we are rushing, lemming-like, towards. Instead he is urging us on. A lemming leading the lemmings.
There was no surrender by Azov National Battalion militants, Kiev assures us. There was only an “evacuation” (not clear to where), and this bit of demagoguery was happily picked up by both Ukrainian and world mass media. The effort to conceal the embarrassing truth about the situation on the frontlines is consistent with how Kiev explains the catastrophic state of the economy.
“If I had the Pravda newspaper, the world would have never learned of Waterloo!”, Napoleon Bonaparte said in a famous Soviet anecdote. Pravda is no more, but the anecdote’s punchline holds true, since narratives need not depend on events.
Today the role of the collective Pravda is played by the talking heads on Ukrainian TV (president Zelensky, press secretaries of SBU, Ministry of Defense, political scientists, it doesn’t matter who).
This time Waterloo is the Azov Steel Works with the Azov Regiment militants who have been trapped there (for the most part). Together with soldiers from several AFU brigades, border guards and, as has been persistently claimed by the media, an uncertain number of either mercenaries or instructors. Who was and was not there, we’ll find out soon enough.
The myth of heroic 82 day defense is already actively promoted by Ukrainian media, even though since late March that defense consisted largely of Azovite efforts to break out of the trap. First on helicopters, then with the help of Macron and Erdogan. And recently they’ve tried to involve everyone who came to mind: Israel, UN, Doctors Without Borders, the Pope, and Elon Musk.
In the end, on May 16 and 17 we saw what we were fated to see. Some of the Azovites and AFU soldiers came out of Azov Steel underground, existed using the corridor specified by Russia’s military, were searched and sorted (the wounded to hospitals, the rest to filtration points) and…went into captivity.
Not an evacuation, not an exit, not an “extraction”, but captivity. A simple Russian word, though not a merry one. But that’s what we saw. The Ukrainian viewer saw and was told something entirely different.
The Ukrainian language also contains a word for captivity. But Ukrainian media try to avoid it at all costs.
Azov’s commander was actually the first. Already on the evening of May 16, as if anticipating questions, he said he’s implementing a decision by top military authorities. OK, but what decision? We know, but Ukrainians viewing his statement in a Telegram channel could not understand a thing and said as much.
Then came Zelensky. He mentioned the AFU, UN, ICRC, and at the end: “…soldiers were transported to occupied territory for future exchange.”
Who did the transporting? Not a word about that.
But instead we learned this is called an “operation to preserve the lives of Azov Steel defenders.” Russians think they took someone prisoner. But in reality there’s an ongoing military operation, so stop panicking. And it’s not just any operation. No, it’s an operation by Ukraine’s military intelligence (that’s how it was officially reported)! These announcements were picked up by not only Kiev-controlled media but also the most authoritative (well, until recently) world media platforms, including CNN. They also don’t use the word “captivity”, only “evacuation”!
But since it’s difficult to ignore videos of Azovites going into captivity, Zelensky’s office simultaneously launched several interpretations. Some talking heads tell Ukrainians it’s actually a victory, others that the prisoners should soon be exchanged for Russian soldiers in Ukrainian captivity. But the treacherous Putin cheated the naïve Zelensky. Yet we are dealing with Ukraine’s national embarrassment. People who swore to fight Russians until the last drop of blood surrendered. Kiev is now trying to whitewash that embarrassment.
We can, of course, laugh, and often with a good reason. But that chorus of “not a surrender but carrying out orders”, “not a surrender but an evacuation,” “not an surrender but an exchange” is that Pravda newspaper from the anecdote.
A citizen can focus on a topic for several days. Kiev hopes that by the end of the week everyone will happily forget Azov surrendered, if they are not reminded of it. And who is to remind them of it when Ukraine’s media have been purged and placed under government control?
It’s the same in the economy.
Azov’s surrender is not unique. In April we closely followed the worsening economic situation in Ukraine. At that time top leadership in the person of Finance Minister Sergey Marchenko and President Zelensky actively speculated on the topic of IMF infusions of cash in order to cover budget deficit. The spoke of 5-7 billion dollars a month.
And now Marchenko says that if conflict continues for three or four more months, government will have to cut budgets and raise taxes. Economists debate whether the minister’s assessment is correct or it’s an attempt to exert pressure on the United States and the IMF. There is no need for debates. One can see the same matrix with the budget deficit and the economy as with the situation at Azov Steel.
The matrix consists of a topic to be passed over in silence (captivity), and a whole range of signals mean to camouflage it. We can assume the matrix functions the same way in regard to Ukraine’s economy.
Here the topic to be passed over in silence is the actual state of Ukraine’s economy. Marchenko described it to the Economist, which is not read by most Ukrainians. The monthly sum of 5 billion dollars is presented by Ukrainian media as something the IMF will simply give Ukraine.
They managed to survive March and April due to the taxes collected earlier and war loans. Money is gone even today, and the period of 3-4 months which the minister mentioned is the time during which that fact can be successfully concealed.
Incidentally, one of Marchenko’s complaints concerned military salaries. He called them a heavy burden (they’ve been greatly increased, and the budget did not reflect it). But what then of Ukraine’s minister of defense’s plans to increase the size of the army to one million?
Ratings Wars
The “we have almost won, any minute now” approach might seem naïve. But Kiev has perfected it. It doesn’t matter whether it’s Azof or the economy. It all revolves around the effort to protect Zelensky’s ratings. The purpose of stubborn resistance is the same.
Could Zelensky have resolved the crisis peacefully, since he knew of Russian demands before the start of the operation? Yes, he could have. But then his only remaining course of action would be to resign.
The current situation is not easy, either. The country is in ruins, there are thousands killed, even the closest advisors predict an economic catastrophe. But some of these problems can be solved with money, which means they are not problems but expenditures. The remaining ones can be dealt with Pravda.
Andrei Martyanov talks about a very important issue almost buried in the other issues. That is the Global Conflict which he describes as the west against the global community coalescing around Russia and China now.
On the Saker Blog, Andrei Raevski called it Zone A and Zone B, we can simply call it the west against the rest.
Biden forces illegally occupying Syria’s largest Conoco Gas field in Deir Ezzor province carried out a military drill using live ammunition, yesterday Sunday 15 May 2022, local sources have reported.
The local sources added that helicopters from two illegal military bases run by the Syrian oil and gas thieves of the US Army took part in the drill with sounds of explosions heard dozens of miles away from the gas field, the sources added the loud sounds of explosions to the heavy artillery and mortars used during the drill.
Biden forces have been beefing up their illegal military bases in the northeastern Syrian province of Deir Ezzor, mainly in the oil and gas fields in the region, with advanced gears and armored vehicles like the Bradley Fighting Vehicle, in addition to logistical support material, assorted weaponry, and large caches of ammunition.
This latest drill comes a month after a military drill carried out by the US army oil and gas thieves with their proxy Kurdish SDF separatist terrorists, the 4th of April’s drill included surface to surface missiles, fighter jets, tanks, and artillery.
Though the Biden junta continues the policies of his predecessors in justifying the illegal presence of their forces in Syria by claiming they’re fighting ISIS (ISIL), the only thing they have not done yet is actually combat ISIS, all they did was empower ISIS by dropping weapons and ammunition, by mistake – for the record, multiple times, air-lifting ISIS commanders when endangered and moving them to other regions where soon terrorist attacks were carried out against the Syrian army and civilians in the Syrian desert.
Another thing that the Biden forces have excelled at in Syria is plundering Syria’s grains, including wheat and barley, oil, and gas, thus depriving the Syrian people of their food to eat and feed their children, and fuel to heat their homes, cook their food, and transport within their own country, this comes on top of the inhumane blockade the US regime imposes on Syria and the draconian sanctions it imposes on countries and companies, especially US companies willing to do any legitimate business with Syria.
The US armed forces illegally deployed and operating in Syria have earlier gone to further lengths in their support to ISIS, in particular, by carrying out a military drill with one of the ISIS-affiliated terrorist groups so-called Maghawir Thawra within the 50 kilometers kill zone they control in the Al Tanf region in Syria’s furthest southeastern desert at the border junction with Iraq and Jordan.
What remains a puzzle for the rest of the world, especially the victims of the US wars on humanity around the globe: don’t the US citizens, mainly the taxpayers, have other priorities in their lives than to kill and maim innocent people on the other side of the planet? How about securing food for their own children, at least, not talking about the healthcare issues, infrastructure, housing, pandemics, jobs, et al, instead of spending their hard-earned tax money on financing the Military-Industrial Complex?
I am not a technical-military man, but I have very strong military connections and a keen interest in military history, both Russian and Western, and also in geopolitics, having lectured on it. I lived in Soviet Russia in the 1970s, experienced its weaknesses, its strengths and also its hollowness, understanding that it would eventually fall, for even then nobody believed in Communism any more. All continued by inertia. Collapse was inevitable. I also know contemporary Russia, the Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltics and Moldova very well. In fact, I was in Kiev only last October, being shown the SBU/CIA Secret Police building in the centre and being told to hush my voice as we walked past. No-one wanted to visit the torture-chambers in the basement.
The special operation to free the Russian Donbass from Fascist oppression which began on 24 February 2022 meant a war between the Russian Federation and the Kiev regime, which under Western pressure would refuse to back down. This would inevitably mean a war between Russia and NATO, even if the actual battleground would still be limited to the Ukraine. I firmly believe that the Russian government knew all this and foresaw the consequences, that the West would intervene with all the economic, political, military and technological might of the US/NATO military complex. This knowledge was why the Donbass had had to wait for liberation for eight long and grim years. Russia had had to get ready for the inevitable very carefully.
The Preparation
Let us recall how Soviet Russia fell through treason, ending up dissolving itself on 25 December 1991. In October 1993, 4,000 US Marines (I know one of them) were flown to a base outside Moscow. This was just in case the popular rising against ‘democracy’ and the drunkard Western puppet and traitor Yeltsin went Russia’s way and against the neocons and their privatisers’ ‘shock therapy’. The repression of the October bid for freedom left 5,000 Russian dead. The US support had been there, though it did not have to be used, as there were enough Russian traitors to do the dirty deed themselves.
Russian weakness and internal treachery was why the Russian government betrayed Serbia in the 1990s and Libya in 2011 – it was far too weak to stand up to the West. After the Crimea democratically returned to Russia after 60 years (1954-2014) with the internationally-observed referendum in 2014, the West still applied illegal sanctions to Russia. Then Moscow knew that any action to free the Ukraine from the Western junta in Kiev would have to be prepared very carefully, for the sanctions would only be multiplied. What preparations had to be made?
Firstly, there was the diplomatic and trade front. Allies had to be brought onside, in Eurasia with China, Iran, India, Turkey (Russia rescuing Erdogan from the US assassination attempt at the last moment in July 2016), Hungary, then, from Venezuela to Brazil, Latin America and then, from Egypt to South Africa, Africa. As regards the Western world, especially the EU, there was a chance to present the Russian point of view through RT, as at that time Western censorship was not yet total.
Secondly, there was the modernisation of the Russian Armed Forces to be undertaken, with new, non-nuclear weapons, hypersonic missiles, drones, electronic technology, some of which would be tested out in Syria.
Thirdly, there was the policy of import substitution to be implemented in order to make Russia independent in case of further illegal Western sanctions.
Why Did It Start on 24 February 2022?
There were four triggers which sparked off the special operation on 24 February.
Firstly, the Zelensky regime wanted the Ukraine to become a NATO member. The weak post-Communist Russian Federation had already made that mistake many times, allowing Eastern Europe, notably the Baltics, Poland and Romania, to join that aggressive protection racket. In that way the post-War buffer states of Eastern Europe, providing a demilitarised zone for Russia, ended. After all, if you have been invaded from the West very regularly for 800 years, leaving 27 million of your citizens dead in the most recent invasion, would you not also want a demilitarised buffer zone to protect you? Post-War offensive NATO was the only reason why the defensive Warsaw Pact had to be set up.
Secondly, with missiles on American bases in Poland and Romania and NATO troops smugly parading at the Estonian border with Russia, the Ukraine then threatened to obtain nuclear arms. Did Zelensky, reading his American script as a true actor, really expect Russia not to react to this?
Thirdly, the US, not without the help of its local pronconsul, the cocaine-addled Hunter Biden, had set up some thirty biolabs in the Ukraine. Their target? To find genetically-concocted viruses to infect Russians. Would Russia not defend itself?
Fourthly, though possibly this may not have been discovered by Russia until a day or two after the special operation began, though possibly they knew perfectly well beforehand, the NATO-manipulated, instructed and armed Kiev Army had a plan to invade the Russian Donbass and genocide its people. Had they succeeded, it is doubtful they would have stopped at the Russian border. Truss, the supremely stupid British Foreign Secretary, let slip that NATO already had Russian Rostov and Voronezh in its sights.
After eight years of attempts to negotiate, which Russia used to buy time to prepare for the War in case of Western idiocy, it was only because there was no alternative that it sent in some troops in an initially limited military operation.
A Fight for Survival
This is now a war of attrition. Russia has to destroy all Western/NATO arms and troops that get into the Ukraine from Poland or elsewhere as soon as possible, quicker than they can be sent. And this must go on until the West caves in, because so much Western war material will have been destroyed at huge financial loss to itself.
Russia is also relying on the self-imposed economic problems that the West faces. The West, and not just the EU, is already suffering economically. There could easily be popular uprisings as a result of inflation and the incredible cost of energy. This will hit very hard next autumn and winter. And the embargos on Russian grain and fertilisers have not hit yet. Wait till food costs go up by 100% in Western countries, instead of just going up by 10% as now: then you will have rioting in the streets and looting of supermarkets. As for the Ukrainian currency, it is worthless, propped up by the IMF run by the US, which in 2014 stole the $15 billion of Ukrainian gold reserves in expectation. Otherwise, the Ukraine would long ago have defaulted.
The stakes are huge for all. China stands behind Russia because Russia is like a shield for it. If Russia falls, then China is next and it knows that, which is why it supports Russia. The White Peril will next head towards China, making the British-imposed mass suicide of the so-called ‘Opium Wars’ look like a picnic. There will be no taking back of Taiwan in the near future, instead there will be Harvard economists and merchant bankers taking power and grasping billions in Beijing, as in Russia after 1991. And then, amid civil wars, millions and millions of Chinese will take the path of suicide, exactly as happened in 1990s Russia. Make no mistake, this is a battle for survival of the world’s seven billion against the one billion.
This is why today Russia remains firm, with 80% of the population behind President Putin, unlike in the Western world where it is rare to find a leader who has more than 30% of support. Why? It is simple: President Putin loves his country, he is a patriot: Western leaders are not patriots, they are venal mercenaries, no more so than the US puppet governments in Eastern Europe. The only Russians against President Putin are the traitors, recruited by the CIA, and there are still quite a few in Moscow and elsewhere, but we will not here name names.
True, many of the fifth column of traitors in Moscow have already left or are leaving, Tel Aviv being a popular destination for them. For Russia this is not some localised conflict on its borders, as it still appears to most Western people, lulled into delusions by their Goebbels propaganda ministries (‘media’). For Russia this is just as much a fight for survival as World War Two. This is the Third Great Patriotic War. Let me explain.
For those who do not know, the 1812 invasion of Russia by Napoleon and his multinational barbarian hordes is known as the First Patriotic War. The 1941 invasion by Hitler and his multinational barbarian hordes is known as the Second Patriotic War. It is our view that just as the 1941-1945 defensive War was called the Second Patriotic War, the 2022- ? defensive War will be known as the Third Patriotic War. Warsaw and Bucharest, Berlin and Paris, pay attention.
When Did It All Begin?
When did it all begin? Actually, it was not on 24 February 2022. Some, grudgingly, will admit that it was the US-run regime change of 2014 with its $5 billion price-tag for the hapless US taxpayer. Grudgingly, some might admit that it goes back even further to November 1989, the Fall of the Wall. Some might suggest two generations before that, in September 1939, when Stalin took the poison-chalice of the western Ukraine, Galicia, from Poland and had to fight a CIA-supplied war there against Fascist partisans until 1958.
Some might suggest exactly 100 years ago in 1922, when the brain-syphilitic Lenin transferred from Russia the southern and eastern half of the present Ukraine to the Ukraine, as he wanted the pro-Communist industrial proletariat of the south and east to counterbalance the real Ukrainian agricultural north and west. But we could also go back to 1914, the invasion of the Russian Empire by Germany, Austria-Hungary and Turkey. This is exactly 100 years before the 2014 US-orchestrated colour-revolution in Kiev, with its Lithuanian snipers on the roof of the American Embassy in Kiev murdering Ukrainian policemen and then the US blaming ‘repression’ on the democratically-elected pro-Russian government.
Conclusion: A Fight to the End
Russia must win this War against NATO. However, the last thing Russia wants is a nuclear war, however much some fools in the West talk that up. And however tempting as targets the 1,000 or so US bases around the world may be, Russia certainly does not want the war to spread outside the current Ukrainian territory. If Russia does not win, the Russian Federation will be humiliated and dismantled and become just another group of colonies for Western asset-strippers and slavers. Then the British dream for its 1917 coup d’etat, turned into a nightmare because the stupid dream permitted Bolshevism to come to power, will become real.
After that, China will fall next and then the rest of the still free, if for the moment impoverished and exploited, world will fall just like dominos into neo-colonial Western hands. And that will be the end of the world under a US Global Dictatorship, euphemistically known as ‘the Unipolar World’. We are not ready for that. We prefer to fight. As President Putin has said, a world without Russia is not one we wish to live in. As we have said before, this is our ONLY chance to work towards a Union of Sovereign (NOT Soviet) Social (NOT Socialist) Republics and an Alliance of countries which favour Prosperity and Justice, not Poverty and Injustice.
It is clear that a new world will emerge from the current conflict in Ukraine, but this has been known since the Anglo-Saxon Bretton Woods system was declared bankrupt a good three years ago. So I don’t believe there will be any major concessions at this stage of the game from any side, neither from Russia nor from the Anglo-Saxons, who are fighting in Eastern Europe; neither from the Ukrainian pawns, nor the smaller EU pieces, nor even the French and German rooks have a voice in this; they will be used by the queen, committed to defending the king and ready to sacrifice everything for him.
America summons its allies
Convened by US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin, and at the behest of US Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley, representatives from 40 countries gathered last Tuesday at Ramstein Air Base, US territory in western Germany, to kick off the so-called Defense Reform Advisory Board of Ukraine, which is scheduled to meet monthly from now on. The aim is clear: to secure and extend its influence along Russia’s western borders at any cost.
Present were representatives of the 30 NATO countries, the Ukrainian Defence Minister, the Pacific partners (South Korea, Japan, Australia, and New Zealand), the Africans from Tunisia, Liberia, Morocco, and Kenya, plus Jordan, Qatar, and Israel on behalf of the Middle East. Why so many seemingly randomly chosen guests is in the realm of speculation.
Austin had just arrived from Kiev, where he had negotiated the delivery of new arms deliveries to Zelensky, among them certainly more than a handful of Javelin and Stinger missiles manufactured by Raytheon Technologies, of which he is on the board and has made himself a millionaire. Austin also made it known that time is of the essence to get even more military assistance to Ukraine, but that the stakes “extend beyond Ukraine – and even beyond Europe”. Do you see the whole picture?
Milley warned that “time is not on Ukraine’s side” and feared that the ongoing Russian operation would be “potentially decisive in the east”, predicting that the coming weeks would be “critical”.
Later, the commander told CNN that “if Russia gets away with it,” then “the so-called international order will also be lost.” So much for the ‘rules-based international order’ that is so much to Washington’s liking, leaving nothing more than a necessary redesign of the Defence architecture in accordance with the new balance of powers. A nuisance for the complex that sucks more than $800 B a year out of the American taxpayer, and for its soldiers, who will no longer be able to roam the world with impunity, as he himself did in Panama, Haiti, Yugoslavia, Iraq, and Afghanistan.
He also used the opportunity to distort the words of Sergei Lavrov: “the danger is serious, it is real, it cannot be underestimated” on the threat of a third world war, accusing the Russian minister of being “completely irresponsible” and of “making nuclear threats”. It is in this blatant fashion that the “truths” are created for the great incautious masses today.
On the other side of the Channel
For her part, the following day in London, Foreign Secretary Liz Truss assembled at the City Mansion House an exquisite representation of that network that so likes to read the tea leaves about the destinies of our continent. Among the pearls that she launched, we should retain and take seriously at least these:
– “Britain has always stood up to bullies. We have always been risk-takers.” The ice-breaking joke of protocol.
– ” We’ve got to double down on our support for Ukraine.”
– “We are already stepping up in Ukraine. The war in Ukraine is our war – it is everyone’s war because Ukraine’s victory is a strategic imperative for all of us.”
– “The UK sent weapons and trained Ukrainian troops long before the war started.”
– “We also reject the false choice between Euro-Atlantic security and Indo-Pacific security. In the modern world, we need both.”
– “All of this will require resources.” Nobody doubts that. After all the taxpayers know that they always end up paying for wars engineered by British elites, with either or both their blood, sweat, or tears.
And in a sudden pearl-clutching burst, Truss even accused China of “rapidly building an army capable of projecting power deep into areas of strategic European interest”, now reaching out to Brussels in what she described as a “Freedom Network” against the illiberal interests of Russia and China. They leave Europe and accuse those who invest in it… Why?
Thus, the head of the FCO called for a strengthening of all alliances, from NATO to the 5-Eyes, through AUKUS and the Joint Expeditionary Force, recognizing that “we need a global NATO” that is able to “prevent threats in the Indo-Pacific” and, among other things, to ensure “that democracies like Taiwan are able to defend themselves”.
For anyone who doubts what she was talking about, she concluded with a “Your Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen, geopolitics is back!”.
This is how a broken empire talks, and we know what that means. The only question that remains is: Who is the queen and who is the king?
Let’s start with the obvious, that all bells are sounding regarding the start of the much awaited ‘Phase 2’ of the SMO. However, I for one am not yet entirely convinced it has fully begun and take the side of caution in line with what the Pentagon and analysts like Colonel Cassad have stated:
“We have not yet observed offensive actions using large forces of infantry and tanks, only local centers of breakthroughs along the Izyum-Kremennaya and Popasnaya lines. In advance, to the east of Gulyai-Polye, where our forces have clearly become more active. Elsewhere, rocket and field artillery, aviation and high-precision missiles are intensified everywhere. But so far the lines of contact have not changed. It is worth noting, perhaps, the deterioration of the weather in the Donbass.”
“The Pentagon is being much more conservative in describing Russia’s military operations in Donbas than Zelensky. U.S. thinks this is a prelude to a bigger offensive, with still adding troops. is now up to 78 BTGs in Ukraine, up 13 from last week.”
I agree in the regard that we haven’t seen the full usage of built up troops yet, nor have all the new troops even fully completed deployment. With that said, certainly a new phase of activity appears to have begun BUT my distinction is simply that it now seems that Russia may ‘ramp’ it up increasingly, and that it won’t be a massive blitzkrieg from the onset as the action we’ve seen the past two days is still relatively limited. This may be a testing phase with some Recon-In-Force actions to probe enemy defenses before larger combined arms activity is observed.
With that said, some updates:
Firstly there was a large Kaliber missile strike on Lyvov and we are now seeing confirmations from several places of what was struck:
“A stockpile of American, German and British anti-tank missiles was destroyed at a military depot in Lvov. According to our source in the SBU, the attack on the logistics base in Lvov was a complete surprise. Several tens of tons of various anti-tank weapons were destroyed at the facility, including German PanzerFausts, British NLAWs and American Javelins. It was expected that these funds should be enough for a month of active hostilities against Russian troops. According to our source, the plant was carried out secretly on commercial and civilian vehicles. Therefore, an investigation is now underway as to why the Russians were able to figure out all three storage sites.”
(note, some of my links have not been working recently for some reason. If that becomes the case, simply highlight the link, right click it, then “copy” and “paste” it manually into your browser for the video to work)
While we’re on the topic of Western arms, here’s Scott Ritter confirming something we’ve written about many times, how ineffective the Javelin missile really is: https://www.bitchute.com/video/hEsyUPnRjZdt/
A lot of places were hit in Nikolayev and Kharkov as well, destroying storage facilities and AFU troop gathering points.
In Mariupol, the advances continue in various axes around Azovstal plant, but still only on the outskirts of it. Russian planes and artillery hammer Azovstal nonstop: https://www.bitchute.com/video/l2nFk74hqKVP/
If you notice on the eastern edge of the red outline on this map, there are still some blocks of suburb high-rises just outside the actual industrial grounds of Azovstal. There are still battles and clearings taking place in these northeast districts, but it is only a few blocks left.
A reported 20-30 new prisoners managed to surrender near Azovstal as well, in this video only a handful are pictured:
Reports are indicating that 80% of the remaining Azov battalion wants to surrender, but the 20% who don’t are basically holding them at gunpoint and refusing to allow them to surrender. More and more evidence comes to light as proof of this – for instance this video of an AFU soldier who was shot in the back by his comrades, and had leaflets with surrender directions in his hand (18+):
you can see what the leaflets look like that are being fired by artillery over Azovstal. They have specific instructions on how the prisoners are to surrender (for safety purposes, exactly how they should come out, what they should do, where their hands should be, which corridors they should use, etc). And you can see the same leaflet is under the body of the murdered AFU marine.
And then there’s this:
“According to the content of the radio intercepts, the commanders of the armed formations remaining at Azovstal, realizing the hopelessness of their situation, are ready to lay down their arms, but only on the appropriate order (command) from Kyiv. Without receiving such an order, the commanders of the Ukrainian armed formations cannot make a decision on their own, since a military tribunal with a sentence, up to and including execution, awaits them for these actions in Ukraine.”
There have been written orders from Kiev posted that appear to show a direct no-surrender order from high up. For obvious reasons the elites in Kiev don’t want these guys to surrender, the same ones they were sending upwards of 10 helicopters and boats to try and rescue. Clearly these guys know too much valuable information that they can’t risk to give up to the Russians and so Kiev prefers they are killed and their deeds lost to history.
Serhiy Volyna, commander of the entire 36th Marines Brigade that’s left in Azovstal (and one of the 2 last high ranking people there along with Prokopenko the leader of Azov Regiment) has issued this final desperate plea where he now says there may only be ‘days or hours’ left for them:
I’d say there’s still another good week or two left unless they happen to surrender because clearing this giant factory complex will be difficult. Photos have emerged showing how the subterranean system beneath the complex works, and it’s no easy job. The plant was evidently designed to withstand nuclear attack so one can imagine how deep and fortified some of the underground systems are. There’s still no indication of how they truly plan to clear it.
The above map shows some of the incursion areas where troops are entering the industrial grounds at the northeast corner.
In other regions, the largest gains by far of the 2nd phase have been along the Izyum and LPR axis. Russian forces are pushing in from the north downward towards the Donets river.
However we’re waiting on full confirmation as some sources say there still may be a piece of the city to the south not liberated.
Meanwhile heavy battles continue in Popasna, a key strategic city, and LPR/Chechen troops are said to have advanced past the midway mark of the city, and it is likely to fall in the near future. Reports that as much as 70-80 prisoners were taken here, though a video has only showed a dozen or so thus far:
Next to Rubizhnoe, the town of Kreminna was also fully taken. This creates a dangerous risk for a cauldron-within-a-cauldron for AFU forces because once Popasna falls, troops can link up with the ones in the north by Rubizhnoe/Kreminna, thus trapping the AFU forces in Severodonetsk and Lysychansk in the following manner:
So because of this threat, there is now increasing reports that AFU plans a ‘mass retreat’ along the Rubizhnoe-Lysychansk-Severodonetsk ‘triangle’, as it’s being called, in order to prevent this cauldron from being formed. One must remember there is a very large AFU grouping in this ‘triangle’ as it is the 2nd largest after the Slavyansk-Kramatorsk-Druzhkivka grouping. However other reports were quick to caution that there will not be any mass retreats, at least not yet, and that AFU continues to hang on. With that said, some captured prisoners in the area stated that higher command officers have already pulled back and fled, but there’s no 100% confirmation of this.
From the frontline:
Map of Popasna city control. Popasna in center. Red is LPR forces, blue is AFU. This is a key city that controls the gateway both west and north to the region.
Northwest of there, Russian forces have made major advances in the Izyum region since the start of Phase 2.
The town of Torske was captured, pictured on this map circled in Red:
As well as several settlements around Lozove such as Yatskivka and Rubtsi were said to be captured by RF forces – slowly working towards Lyman. The forces south of Izyum continued to work towards Slavyansk as well with uncertain results as there is a heavily forested area there that is reportedly difficult to work through, with Ukrainian units deeply embedded all over it.
In short, there is heavy pressure bearing down now from the north onto the cauldron grouping, and we could eventually see the Severodonetsk “triangle” become a cauldron cut off from the rest then sieged.
In the south, Russian forces have made some moves towards Velyka Novosilka and captured a few settlements like Makarivka, Storozhevoe, Rovnopol, and Novoselka, but it’s nothing too big to speak on yet so we’ll wait till next time to update on this front. Either way, this front is still likely waiting for the fall of Mariupol to free up all the reinforcements before it can get into full swing.
In other news: “U.S. has BEGUN training about 50 Ukrainian military advisors on using American provided howitzer artillery systems at an undisclosed location in Europe: senior U.S. defense official Ukrainians should be able to learn to use systems within days, officials believe.”
And the UK is considering sending a “handful” of advanced Stormer armored vehicles with Starstreak missile launchers on them.
Personally I think this is good news because it will give Russian forces a rare opportunity to ‘practice’ and scrimmage in real time against the top NATO equipment, to learn its secrets and vulnerabilities. So even though it’s a threat, I believe it will only work towards chiseling Russian troops into more capable forces in preparation for future conflict vs. NATO.
And in light of all the vehicle repair shops, workshops, factories, etc, that Russia has been hitting, it appears Ukraine is running out of ways to repair its own vehicles.
“The actions of the Russian missile forces, which over the past few months have been regularly attacking the military industry facilities of the Kiev regime, have borne fruit. Now the repair of damaged equipment of the Kiev regime will be handled by Czech defense enterprises. Since Kyiv is no longer able to repair armored vehicles on its own.
Note that the transportation of damaged equipment to the Czech Republic, its repair and transportation back will take much more time and cost the enemy many times more. In fact, it’s easier to just buy a new one.”
And on that note, there’s reports like this one:
“❗️Poland is secretly preparing a “liberation campaign” against Ukraine. For this purpose, a set of measures is being carried out – the supply of weapons, equipment and mercenaries across the Polish-Ukrainian border. Several formations of the Polish Army – the 18th motorized rifle division and the 6th airborne brigade – are preparing for a “peacekeeping mission”
The Polish Army stepped up measures to the maximum extent possible to complete the units to wartime states. The recruitment of “volunteers” is carried out through the websites of the Ministry of Defense of Poland.”
Unconfirmed of course, and dubious but it’s something to think about, and something many of us have already expected for a long time.
On the topic of funding, it’s been announced total aid is nearing $3 billion from the U.S. alone.
“U.S. has sent $2.6 billion in military aid to Ukraine since Russia’s Feb. 24 invasion, with DoD weapons reaching the battlefield within 48 to 72 hours: senior U.S. defense official”
What’s interesting about that is, the U.S. spent 3 billion on funding the Taliban in the 80’s, over the course of an entire decade.
From wiki: “The thrust of U.S. policy for the duration of the war was determined by Carter in early 1980: Carter initiated a program to arm the mujahideen through Pakistan’s ISI and secured a pledge from Saudi Arabia to match U.S. funding for this purpose. U.S. support for the mujahideen accelerated under Carter’s successor, Ronald Reagan, at a final cost to U.S. taxpayers of some $3 billion.”
“Operation Cyclone was one of the longest and most expensive covert CIA operations ever undertaken.[2] Funding officially began with $695,000 in mid-1979,[3] was increased dramatically to $20–$30 million per year in 1980, and rose to $630 million per year in 1987,[1][4][5] described as the “biggest bequest to any Third World insurgency”.[6]”
So this was the “longest and most expensive” CIA operation in history, and ended up at $3 billion in 10 years. But the Ukraine has already gotten $3 billion in a single month. Imagine how much they’re going to pump into it by the end of this year? This goes to show what I’ve said before that this is likely now the single costliest program of this sort in history. And that’s only counting the U.S. aid, NATO/EU are pouring in billions more.
Lastly, like I said in the beginning, I don’t believe we’re seeing the full onset of Phase 2 yet. It appears to still be the opening probing stage as the full available forces have yet to be committed. But we’ll see if this week confirms this view or not.
I’ll leave a few videos from the past day or so:
Tribute to the legendary Red Backpack Man you might’ve all seen leading some units in Mariupol:
He’s a commander for a unit of the Russian Black Sea Fleet Naval Infantry (Marines) operating in Mariupol.
*Following is a lengthy overview of my recent re-visit to the Donbass, on a two day media delegation, with a brief critique of some of the media’s slanted reporting. It is also a follow up from my 2019 visit to hard hit areas of the Donetsk People’s Republic. It is now 8 years of Ukraine’s war on the people of the Donetsk & Lugansk Republics.
Point of impact of March 14 Ukrainian missile attack on Donetsk. Photo: Eva Bartlett, March 24, 2022.
In the last week of March, I stood on a central Donetsk main street next to two of the impact points of a Ukrainian missile attack that had killed 21 civilians and injured nearly 40 more on March 14. The Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) maintains that their military intercepted Ukraine’s Tochka-U ballistic missile, and that not all of the cluster munitions inside had exploded in the city streets, thereby lessening the already terrible bloodshed it caused. Indeed, if all of the munitions had exploded, it would have been a bloodbath more horrific than the 21 killed.
Photo: Eva Bartlett, March 24, 2022.
Near the ATM, there were flowers and candles laid in memory of the civilians murdered that day, with haunting photos nearby depicting the aftermath of the bombing, the grisly scenes of the dead and the maimed—scenes you will generally never see blasted across Western corporate media, just as the same media were silent when terrorism struck civilian areas in Syria.
I’m intimately familiar with war zones, and with Western corporate media’s white-washing of the perpetrators’ crimes (Israeli crimes against Palestinians; Western-backed terrorists’ crimes against Syrians; Ukrainian military and Nazi crimes against the civilians of the Donbass—and also against Ukrainians proper), so the lack of media coverage on this recent Ukrainian war crime doesn’t surprise me.
They don’t report on it, or the myriad Ukrainian war crimes prior, because it doesn’t suit their narrative, a narrative that erases the eight years of Ukraine’s war against the four million people of the Donbass republics, killing at least 14,000 people, to give a modest estimate.
War crimes investigator, Ivan Kopyl, spoke about Ukraine’s March 14 attack, noting, “The warhead of a Tochka-U missile contains 50 cassettes of cluster munitions. We managed to find 28 traces of cluster explosions on the soil…A Tochka-U missile changes its orientation just before landing, so after it flies on a trajectory it makes a turn and falls vertically down before detonating at a certain height. The fragments then shower the surface in a radius of approximately 150 meters.”
I have one of those cluster fragments, a twisted and jagged square-shaped piece of metal—seemingly harmless looking on its own, but deadly when flying through the air at high speed, in great numbers.
The attack occurred around noon, when this central city street—not a military area, but a civilian one—would have been busy. Photos show a gutted bus and gutted cars. Pensioners, Koply noted, would have been lined up at the ATM right where the blasts occurred. “There was also damage to a yard where there are two kindergartens – there were several craters there,” he noted.
The strike on the heart of the city is among the latest in Ukraine’s litany of war crimes.
Ukraine again bombed Donetsk following the March 14 attack. Donetsk News Agency reported on March 30 that the Ukrainian forces’ bombing had killed one person and seriously injured four others. One of the girls injured in that attack fell into a coma, the DPR Ombudsman noted.
And just now, there’s been news of another Ukrainian Tochka-U attack. According to RT, at least 50 people (including 5 children) were killed at a railway station in Kramatorsk, where thousands of people were waiting for evacuation trains. Eduard Basurin, a representative of the DPR People’s Militia, stated that the attack was a missile containing prohibited cluster munitions.
“This is a fragment of the missile that hit the Kramatorsk train station…The AFU has blamed the Russians, but this picture of the missile shows that it is indisputably a Tochka-U rocket — used exclusively by the Ukrainian side. It’s the same kind of missile that two weeks ago hit the center of Donetsk and killed 27 civilians.
What’s that saying? Once is an accident, twice is a coincidence, three times . . .”
As of March 31, the Ombudsman reported that there’s been 6,010 deaths, including 96 children, since Ukraine’s war began in 2014. And that’s only with regards to the DPR. In the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR), which has also been under Ukrainian fire since 2014, as of late February, 1,762 civilians had been killed, including 35 children.
During my 2019 visit to the DPR, I went to the northern city of Gorlovka, of which I wrote:
“Gorlovka was hardest hit in 2014, especially on July 27, when the center was rocked by Ukrainian-fired Grad and Uragan missiles from morning to evening. After the dust settled and the critically-injured had succumbed to their wounds, at least 30 were dead, including five children. The day came to be known as Bloody Sunday.
A monument commemorates the Gorlovka victims of Ukrainian bombings and sniping from 2014-2017. Near a sculpture of an angel, over 230 names fill the marble slabs, the first dedicated solely to children, 20 of them.”
Photo: Eva Bartlett, March 24, 2022.
At the site of the March 14 bombing, DPR head Denis Pushilin spoke, outlining the chronology the last 8 years, from the violent coup in Ukraine and subsequent increase in radical Ukrainian nationalism, to the two republics’ decision to push for autonomy, to Ukraine unleashing hell on the 4 million people and continual violations of the (2014 & 2015) Minsk Agreements and the massive amounts of weapons pumped from the West to Ukraine (see also). [*Note: I’ll be adding a subtitled clip of his words in the next day or two.]
School and Hospital shelled by Ukrainian forces
The town of Volnovakha—on the road between Donetsk and Mariupol further south—was secured by DPR forces nearly two weeks prior to our visit. Entering the town, we passed destroyed homes and buildings, which was expected, as there was heavy fighting to liberate the area held by the Ukrainian forces.
As they did in their copy-paste reporting on liberated areas of Syria, most Western media reports on Volnovakha focus on the destruction, without any context as to why it occurred—these residential areas were occupied by Ukrainian forces, and not all of the destruction was from DPR forces’ fighting against the Ukrainian forces: the Ukrainian forces themselves fired on homes, and according to hospital staff, on the hospital itself.
In addition to not giving this context, most Western media in general depict the liberating forces as deliberately and wantonly destroying everything in sight. Some media went as far as to claim that Putin himself had destroyed the town. This cartoonish narrative, so prevalent in Western reports whitewashing terrorism in Syria and now in whitewashing Ukrainian forces’ crimes, unfortunately does achieve its intended effect: duping Western viewers into believing the opposite of reality–that the liberators are the war criminals.
In a central area of Volnovakha, Russian soldiers handed out humanitarian aid to lines of residents, including: bags of canned goods, fresh bread, water.
According to Alexander Yurievich Kachalov, the interim mayor, Ukrainian forces used civilians as human shields. “They made sure to destroy as much infrastructure as possible. They bombed buildings in order to leave ruins after they left, to make it harder for us to restore.”
This was common in Syria. Terrorist factions destroyed buildings and vehicles when fleeing, while leaving mines and booby traps on streets and in houses, to kill still more civilians and soldiers.
A woman waiting in line for humanitarian aid said, “They say Russia did this. This wasn’t Russia, Ukraine did it, destroyed everything here! They shot at our hospital. I work there. The new children’s and infection units have been destroyed. The outpatient clinic was destroyed. And then they left. They took the medical staff’s car and went away.”
At the destroyed hospital, Chief Physician, Viktor Fedorovich Saranov, said:
“[The Ukrainian Army] were there. There were tanks on our territory. There were guns and Grads outside the territory. I asked them to act in accordance with the Hague and Geneva conventions. I asked them to leave the hospital. They said it was war.
Many people come to us from nearby houses under fire. About 500-600 people came to our basement. We gave everyone three meals a day.
The second and third floors were occupied here. We were preparing for a long siege, and then it turned out like this: they conducted an attack. They evacuated the soldiers. And they mined the entrance to the intensive care unit. On the last day, when they were leaving, they shot at the intensive care unit.” The ICU, he said, had already been evacuated.
A woman who said she had worked at the hospital as a nurse for nearly 58 years said:
“On the 28th I was home alone. They soon started shelling. How can they do it with their local hospital? With patients here. They were laying in corridors, as they had been evacuated. They said there was no one in the hospital, no staff, no patients. This is a lie.”
Later, researching, I came across this news (*warning, graphic video at the link):
“Foreign mercenaries who were wounded in the Volnovakha hospital were shot by their own before leaving the city so that they could not tell anything. All the wounded have a control shot in the temple or the back of the head.”
On the road back towards Donetsk, we stopped at a school that had been shelled in late February.
According to Victoria Terichenko, head of the Dokuchaevsk city administration’s Department of Education, the shelling was by Ukrainian forces.
“Of course, Ukraine. There were only Ukrainian troops there. We had no military here, we were only civilians here.”
Fortunately, children weren’t at school at the time of the shelling, but Terichenko said a nursery school in the area had been shelled, with children inside, but again, fortunately, not on the side of the building shelled.
Horrors of Ukraine’s War on the People of the Donbass Republics
Ukraine’s relentless bombing and sniping of the people of Donbass is bad enough, along with it being ignored by Western press and politicians.
But in its eight years of warring on a people who rejected the rule of ultra-nationalists and Nazis, who just wanted to live autonomously, speak their own language, remember their history (Ukraine has rewritten history to glorify Nazis and Nazi collaborators and to vilify those who defeated Nazism, namely the Soviets), Ukraine has committed war crimes as heinous as ISIS and their co-terrorists in Syria, with more and more testimonies coming out of mass graves, rapes, torture of civilians and Donbass soldiers, beheadings. None of this shocking given the crimes these extremists commit against even Ukrainian civilians and journalists.
Along a sidewalk flanking a central park, there is a row of photos containing incredibly disturbing images of murdered LPR civilians.
Elders slaughtered on benches and in wheelchairs, the corpse of an infant, mass graves, a room used to imprison and torture people, the insignia of the notorious rapists and murderers of the “Tornado” battalion.
One photo shows Nazi graffiti left on a wall.
These are similar to the graffiti I saw in January 2009 left by Israeli soldiers who occupied the home of a Palestinian family, half of which had been killed by Israeli-fired White Phosphorous. One of the slogans written in Hebrew was: “Next time it will hurt more.” This, to the family whose infant had burned alive due to the White Phosphorous bombing, and whose surviving family members were badly mutilated from the prohibited weapon. In another house in eastern Gaza, likewise occupied and desecrated by Israeli soldiers, more hate and death graffiti had been left for the traumatized inhabitants.
Different people and places–same violent hatred of the population being targeted.
In the same park area, there is a monument to two journalists killed in 2014 by Ukrainian forces. Had these journalists been killed by Russia or Syria, their names would have been on the front pages of news sites and TIME magazine covers. In Syria, dozens of journalists have been killed by terrorist forces, to the silence of not only Western media but also of the groups supposedly advocating for journalists’ rights and safety.
In Shchastia, north of Lugansk, more civilians received humanitarian aid in the liberated town.
Humanitarian aid being handed out in Shchastia, a town north of Lugansk, liberated in early March.
Western Delivered Weapons on Display
In the two republics, we saw some of the vehicles and weapons captured from Ukrainian forces. Telesur journalist Alejandro Kirk spoke to me about these captured weapons and vehicles, noting the many foreign made weapons sold to Ukraine. Western countries continue to sell weapons to Ukraine.
On March 20, journalist Alexander Rubinstein wrote of the West’s exorbitant shipping of billions of dollars in weapons to Ukraine over the years. He noted:
“At least 32 countries have announced their intention to ship billions of dollars in weapons into Ukraine for use against Russian forces in Ukraine. Photographic evidence shows that these weapons have already ended up in the hands of neo-Nazi paramilitaries – units which have already received training and arms the US and its NATO allies.
All of this builds on $3.8 billion in military aid from the United States to Ukraine, the training of 55,000 Ukrainian soldiers by Canada and the United Kingdom, and a longstanding CIA program aimed at cultivating an anti-Russian insurgency.
…weapons furnished by NATO allies have been placed in the hands of the Azov Battalion, a neo-Nazi former paramilitary organization incorporated into the Ukrainian National Guard.
The governments of Canada, the United States and the United Kingdom have presided over a massive program to train and equip Ukrainian soldiers for a full-scale war with Russia. Trainees have included top commanders of the Azov Battalion.
In late February, the European Union opened the floodgates of weapon shipments to Ukraine, approving financing through the aptly-named “European Peace Facility” to reimburse countries sending weapons to the country to the tune of $500 million USD. Another $55 million USD is earmarked for non-lethal military aid.
This February, the State Department announced $350 million in additional military aid to Ukraine, bringing “the total security assistance the United States has committed to Ukraine over the past year to more than $1 billion.”
Another $200 million was sent in early March, and following Zelensky’s March 16 appeal to Congress for more weapons, Biden is reportedly set to dole out another $800 in military aid including 800 Stinger anti-aircraft systems, 9,000 anti-tank systems, 5,000 rifles, 1,000 pistols, 400 machine guns, 400 shotguns, 400 grenade launchers, 20 million rounds of ammunition, 100 tactical drones, 25,000 sets of body armor and 25,000 helmets. But that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
These figures add to the $2.5 billion in military aid the US delivered between 2014 and the summer of 2021, bringing the total to $3.8 billion.”
A shipment of NLAW grenade launchers and instructors from #NATO countries arrived in #Kharkiv. The Azov regiment was the first to learn about new weaponry pic.twitter.com/CCzjN40rW7
Missing Context: What the Donbass People Have Endured In 8 Years of Ukraine’s War
After my September 2019 visit to the DPR, I wrote about the mostly elderly civilians I met who were living in battered homes damaged by Ukrainian shelling and heavy machine gun fire just 500 meters and 600 meters from Ukrainian forces. They remained there, they told me, mostly because they had nowhere else to go. Some spoke to me on camera, others were afraid of Ukrainian retaliation were they to be interviewed.
But their stories were all pretty much the same: at night, when the observers of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) left, the Ukrainian terrorizing began, with shelling throughout the night.
I also met a couple who had been living for 6 years in the stinking, dank, basement of a battered school, after Ukrainian bombing destroyed their home.
The DPR press officer who accompanied me and provided translations, spoke of how Ukrainian forces used weapons prohibited under the Minsk Agreements.
Dmitri, press officer of the DPR People's Militia, explaining the Ukrainian-fired shell found at home Zeitsevo resident. According to him, Ukrainian forces ~600m from this point.
Irina Dikun, head of the administration of Zaitsevo, another frontline village, spoke at length on the Ukrainian bombing that erupted nearly every night.
“They are destroying street by street in the town. They take one street and destroy it house by house. Then they turn to another street. There was a school, and a nursery school, before, but they were both destroyed by Ukrainian artillery.”
As in Syria, when schools and hospitals are actually destroyed (in Syria by terrorist factions), the same media that howls over militarized hospitals being targeted, the same media that also manufactures stories that never even occurred, is silent when the destroying is actually done, by Ukrainian forces.
In Zaitsevo, Irina explained fire trucks and medics couldn’t reach targeted homes, because the ambulances themselves became targets for Ukrainian forces (as happens in Gaza, where medics are targeted by Israeli forces, as I myself witnessed).
During that 2019 visit, I also interviewed some of the defenders of the DPR, painted by Western media as “separatists”, “pro-Russian forces” and other such descriptions meant to dehumanize. The same Western media so quick to humanize terrorists, including one who chewed the organ of a dead Syrian soldier.
One more relevant note from that visit: Dmitri asked what people in the West think about the fact there is a Nazi state in Europe. I replied that most people don’t know, because of the media whitewashing.
Which brings me to my recent return to the Donbass: I was curious to see whether the journalists on the same delegation as me would report truthfully, partial truths, or fabricated lies. As it turned out, my skepticism was warranted.
Distortions and Omissions of Some Western Media on the Ground in the Donbass
Telesur’s report gave the historical context needed to understand the present, including the coup in Ukraine, the active neo-Nazis in Ukraine (many of whom re entrenched in the Ukrainian army), the past eight years of Ukraine’s war on the Donbass, the 14,000 killed during these years, and the media blackout on the suffering of the Donbass people.
Sky News’ report was good, mentioning the civilians killed in Donbass by Ukraine’s war, including the March 14 attack and the school shelling, while also giving air time to the DPR’s Pushilin.
Neither of the two French channels’ (FranceInfo and TF1Info) reports on the delegation’s visit mentioned the March 14 Tochka-U attack, even though we visited the site & Pushilin spoke of it at length, much less the roughly 8,000 civilians killed in the two republics alone. I couldn’t find mention of the Azov or other Nazi battalions participating in the atrocities against the Donbass people, even though we heard about them and saw the graphic photo display in Lugansk. Their reports were framed as, “this is what Russia wants us to see,” regarding the humanitarian aid and reclaimed towns.
🔴 Le Kremlin a organisé ces dernières heures le premier voyage de presse dans le #Donbass, région d'#Ukraine où l'armée russe a réalisé ses plus fortes percées. @JeromeGarro était présent : notre envoyé spécial vous explique l'un des objectifs de cette opération, regardez ⤵. pic.twitter.com/3NN4cj6tRA
And of course, they focused greatly on the destruction, but not on the reasons for it, the implication being that the Russians and the “pro-Russian separatists” were responsible.
The chief physician of the hospital in Volnokava spoke at length and did specifically state the Ukrainian army had occupied the hospital, as did the nurse I cited, both of whom addressed the group of journalists.
FranceInfo’s mention of the hospital was framed as, “The Russians accuse the Ukrainians of having bombed it.” They included a few seconds of the chief physician saying he didn’t know who had done it, there were soldiers in the area, he didn’t know who.
But actually, the physician spoke to us for about several minutes, during which—as I wrote earlier—he did specifically talk about the presence of the Ukrainian army in the hospital.
One journalist asked: “Why did such destruction happen?” To which the chief physician replied, “I don’t know. They were military. And who they were: military, national battalions, army? I don’t know.”
That’s the bit France TV cherry picked, omitting his previous words about the Ukrainian army occupying the hospital, as well as omitting what he said afterwards: “There was Ukrainian territory on that side and the rockets were from that side. They mined the entrance to the intensive care unit. On the last day when they were leaving, they shot at the intensive care unit.”
Likewise, TF1Info included just a few seconds of the physician’s words on the Ukrainian cannons and machine guns at the hospital, but then followed up with the presenter’s caveat: it is one of the arguments often presented by the Kremlin—in spite of the fact that not only he, but the nurse and many people I encountered in the town specifically blamed the Ukrainian army for occupying the hospital and attacking it themselves when leaving.
If there were any further TF1Info reports from their journalist’s visit which might have included mention of Donbass’ dead, I couldn’t find them. Likewise, of FranceInfo.
This tactic of cherry picking quotes and omitting information is a standard corporate media war propaganda tactic and, unfortunately one seen over and over in Syria and elsewhere.
Journalist Vanessa Beeley wrote of one particularly horrific and sadistic terrorist massacre of 200 Syrian civilians, including 116 children, in April 2017, killed by an explosion as they were being evacuated from their terrorist besieged villages. She wrote of one traumatized woman who lost 20 family members (10 dead, 10 missing) having witnessed the attack.
“Then, after the filming session (by various agencies, including Dubai based Orient News & Qatari Al Jazeera) which lasted approximately ten minutes, she and the other parents were forced back onto the buses, at gunpoint, and locked inside. They had to watch, while the armed militia collected the dead, dying and mutilated bodies of their community’s children and flung them in the back of trucks and Turkish ambulances, before driving them away from their families in Rashideen.
Not one western media outlet questioned why these injured, dying and disoriented children were being piled on top of one another in the back of a truck that obviously belonged to Nusra Front.”
In fact, as they did routinely in their Syria coverage, media essentially relegated these dead civilians as unimportant, because their deaths didn’t fit the corporate narrative, even when civilians were repeatedly targeted by horrific terrorist bombings, mortars and missiles.
Global Media Abusing the Suffering of the Donbass to Further Anti-Russia War Propaganda, Just as They Did in Syria…
It is already bad enough that Western media generally don’t report on Ukraine’s relentless shelling of the Donbass, but all the more disgusting when it depicts a scene from the March 14 bombing of Donetsk as if it was a bombing of Lvov by Russia.
“The aftermath of the bombing of Donetsk by Ukrainian “Tochka-U” missile, used by Italian newspaper “La Stampa” as an image from Lvov“ *Propaganda noted in this article: The Hard Facts about Ukraine and DonbassAt the site of the Tochka-U missile attack in Donetsk, photos of the moments after the bombing, including the scene depicted in Western media as in Lvov. Photo: Eva Bartlett, March 24, 2022.
This isn’t the only instance. More recently, various Western media have used footage showing a multi-story apartment building in Donetsk that was bombed by Ukraine on March 30 to infer that the scene depicted was actually of Ukrainian areas that had been bombed by Russia. If you followed the war propaganda around Syria, you would be aware that this practice is common, not accidental.
New York post using Donetsk bombing photo to infer the scene was Kiev or elsewhere, under Russian bombing. The article has since been updated, photo removed. They would say it was a mistake. With corporate media, it never is. Luckily, at the time, some observers caught the lie.
And as with war propaganda on Syria, some media will use footage not even from Ukraine:
I could add paragraphs of examples of how Western media did this in Syria, but for the sake of brevity will state simply that this is one of many deceitful and deliberate propaganda tactics used to both downplay the hell civilians are suffering under Ukraine’s bombing, and instead to pretend Ukraine is the victim. How the journalists that propagate such lies live with themselves, I’ll never understand.
Finally, a word to some in independent media who feel the need to denigrate Russia’s denazification operation in Ukraine by snidely putting “special operation” in quotation marks, or others who took to social media to tell the world they don’t like war, and denounced Russia for its military operation (to stop a war): The people of the Donbass don’t like war, they didn’t ask for Ukraine to unleash hell upon them. Such posturing disrespects the at least 14,000 killed by Ukraine’s war.
As journalist Roman Kosarev, who has covered the war eightyears, said: “Russia isn’t starting a war, Russia is ending one.“
Israel bombed Damascus from Beirut, and from the Syrian Golan which it occupies, in the early hours of 9 February. Lieutenant Zulfiqar Fayez Mansour was martyred while defending his homeland within its internationally recognized borders. Five others were injured. This triad of war criminal bombings by Israel also resulted in the destruction of housing, businesses, and automobiles.An undisclosed number of incoming missiles were intercepted and downed by Syrian air defense systems.
We ask our western readers to consider their concerns were a foreign military to bomb their countries, and on a regular basis. We also point out to our US American compatriots that during our time of food insecurity, housing insecurity, and a runaway inflation beginning to imitate Weimar, our taxes continue to pay Israel to murder Syrians in their country, in the amounts of tens of billions of dollars ($146 billion, according to a 31 May 2021 report by USA Today).
The Israeli aerial bombs were dropped just before 0100, Damascene time; Israel again breached Lebanon’s airspace, flying over Beirut. The breaching of another country’s airspace is a war crime, as is the aggressive bombing of a country. The second round of bombing were surface-to-surface, fired from the Syrian Golan occupied by Israel since 1967.
We also note that UNSCR 497 (1981) states that the occupation of the Syrian Golan is in breach of International Law, and called for an urgent withdrawal by no later than 5 January 1982, “in accordance with the Charter of the United Nations.” We further note, that unlike the colonialist UNSCR 2254 (2015), the bastion of peace and security has been steadfast in its NATO klansmenship: While the junta holds monthly anti-Syria hoax meetings on the implementation of 2254, it has not forced UNGA member Israel to withdrawal from the Syrian Golan.
NATO stenographer reporters engaged in pimping for the Military Industrial Complex, have chosen to ignore the most recent of Israel’s criminal and deadly aggressions; among the pimps ‘current’ reports are the claims that the Israel’s December bombings of the seaport of Lattakia were “rare.”
Syria reported on the Israel war criminal bombings around 0200, Damascene time.
NATO stenographers still ignoring Israel deadly bombing, 8 hrs later.
Apartment house bombed by Israel.
israel bombs damascus3
israel bombs damascus5
israel bombs damascus4
This is Lieutenant Zulfiqar Fayez Mansour. He was martyred by another war crime committed by Israel, while defending his country within its internationally recognized borders.
Brother, can you spare a $17.00 donation to support us?
Syria News is a collaborative effort by two authors only, we end up most of the months paying from our pockets to maintain the site’s presence online, if you like our work and want us to remain online you can help by chipping in a couple of Euros/ Dollars or any other currency so we can meet our site’s costs on time; you can also donate with Cryptocurrencies through our donate page. Thank you in advance.
A group of 25 Republican senators have written a letter to US War Secretary Austin Lloyd, demanding that the Biden Administration account for taxpayer-funded American military equipment that has now been seized by the Taliban.
“As we watched the images coming out of Afghanistan as the Taliban retook the country, we were horrified to see US equipment – including UH-60 Black Hawks – in the hands of the Taliban,” the group of Republican senators wrote.
Reports have poured in from the war torn country on how the group has captured not just arms and ammunition stocked by the US troops but also helicopters and heavy armored vehicles.
“It is unconscionable that high-tech military equipment paid for by US taxpayers has fallen into the hands of the Taliban and their terrorist allies. Securing US assets should have been among the top priorities for the US Department of Defense prior to announcing the withdrawal from Afghanistan,” the senators wrote.
The letter, which has been signed by Senators Bill Cassidy, Marco Rubio and 23 other Republicans, has sought a full account of military equipment provided to the Afghan armed forces last year.
The senators have also raised concerns over the possibility of the Taliban working with countries hostile to the US to use the highly advanced equipment.
The Taliban is believed to have taken hold of more than 2,000 armored vehicles, including US Humvees, and about 40 aircraft including UH-60 Black Hawks, ScanEagle Military Drones and attack helicopters.
The letter has come days after a damning report by the Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction [SIGAR], the leading US government audit authority, on how wasteful expenses were incurred by the US in Afghanistan.
On 16 August, SIGAR John Sopko released a bombshell 140-page report titled “What We Need to Learn: Lessons from Twenty Years of Afghanistan Reconstruction,” concluding that the US government consistently underestimated the time needed to rebuild the country.
“If the goal was to rebuild and leave behind a country that can sustain itself and pose little threat to US national security interests, the overall picture is bleak,” the report’s conclusion reads.
UPROOTED PALESTINIANS: SALAM ALQUDS ALAYKUM 