"People tens of meters from the epicenter can suffer concussions"... I should think there'd be nothing left to concuss. I take that as a typo.
Strange how people rally around the flag when attacked by terrorism. Take 9 11 as an example. It got Bush reelected. So I don't agree with the thesis it will bring Putin down.
Tens of meters to me mean.... 10,20,30.... 90. I live in a metric country and have been a kilometer away from an explosion... just a natural gas leaking in a house. I was in my bedroom with windows closed and a hundred houses away. I actually felt an impact on my chest when it blew.
Looking at one of these missiles going off, I'd be comfortable... even smug in saying that someone 90 meters or less away from ground zero, as it was put, would be vaporized. A meter is only 3 inches longer than a yard. 90 meters is smaller than an average city block. A hand grenade will scatter shrapnel 200 meters "Typical guaranteed wounding range is much smaller, around 15–30 meters, and a lethal radius of 5-10 meters, but one still does well to throw them from cover, and throw them with all due enthusiasm" I was tempted to guess he meant tens of kilometers but that seems a bit extreme. Mind you, I'm told if you are within 10 kms of an American 'bunker buster' it will scare the living shit out of you.
"A meter is only 3 inches longer than a yard." That is precisely what he said. where do you fellas get the idea that he said a meter is less than a yard?
Victor ... you think the grammar and spelling cops are bad on the internet, now they got math and metrology undercover narcs all over the place. I fixed the error .
"90 meters is smaller than an average city block. " A historical note on the origin of the term "blockbuster": The original "blockbuster" was a bomb developed by the UK in WW2 that was loaded with 1,400 kg of high explosive. It was called that because it could destroy an entire block of buildings.
The movie industry started using the same term during WW2 to refer to a big hit movie.
A 3000 kg FAB is considerably bigger than even bigger WW2 blockbusters.
I don't think it's just concussions, these bombs can create overpressure-induced neurotrauma. Literal brain damage. And yeah, probably in the hundred-meter range.
Of course one does have to have a brain in the first place to get it damaged and these guys are going on suicide missions for Lindsey Graham's plan to strip their country of it's mineral wealth , so ....... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzLKdn0hqFY
Yes, but we don't know how he splits up units of measurement in his language, or at least I don't.
He could go, meters, tens of meters, hundreds of meters. So, he could be saying that anyone within 100 meters or less of that epicenter can be concussed. That's a much more reasonable statement.
Yet to be proven and an assault to my sense of reason at least, not firstly because of the towers. Imagine being a fly on the wall when the CIA explained to the Pentagon that they were going to crash a loaded passenger jet into their offices. The flight that crashed in Pa was headed to the White House an even harder sell to the President's family.
That may be but some things being wrong in a particular story does not make the whole story wrong or false. There were other buildings that collapsed exactly like WTC did - see for instance the collapse of the steel-supported upper part of the Windsor Tower in Madrid - here is description: https://www.designingbuildings.co.uk/wiki/Torre_Windsor_office_building_fire
The building in Madrid has a strengthened middle floor which prevented complete collapse. I guess WTC did not have that feature.
The real problem with the whole 9/11 is that these people were on the list by the alphabet soup agencies and they still managed not only to prepare but also to get on board of the plains. Some Biden critics have problems with the later.
In a wider context the US victory over the SU in Afganistan and the way we achieved that made the 9/11 and later rapid withdrawal action 2021. One may think that this somehow make the idiots in white house, state dep. and pentagon wiser but no - they still push for more war. I suppose if we ever see a "Victory" in Ukraine, the follow on costs of that will be so high that the may crash the Western society. Then again we are already on a path of destruction of the liberal societal order so maybe that makes no difference.
Anyways - bottom line is: not everything is a conspiracy even if part of the world events certainly are.
Very possible. There is an alternative suggestion based on the amazing lack of rubble left from the explosions.
Dr. Wood has videos on what it might be. The first video are slides from her presentations. I suggest you speed up the second video, she is not a polished presenter, but does know her subject.
Good for you! Never let facts and reality stand in the way of supporting your totally benign and loving US govt. They will never hurt us, look how they nurture and care for us
The towers were taken down by explosives, take a look at the crater inside building 6, one seldom mentioned, that is well out of the supposed impact area, yet totally hollowed out from the INSIDE.
The Pentagon was in on it, why? Because the place where the missile hit (there was no plane) was the area where the accountants had just begun an audit of what had become of the Pentagon's missing trillions. That area had recently been "reinforced" as well. All records, and all accountants were destroyed. The audit ended, never to resume again.
No plane crashed in Penn, there were no bodies according to the coroner, and what wreckage there was was minimal, plus the impact point was ridiculously small.
Oh I see. Well I can't wait to tell the mourning 300 families and many thousands of beloved friends and other relations that they are all still alive. Did you want to be the first one to tell them ?
9/11 was a well planned, well thought out operation. It accomplished a great many objectives for the Deep State. Research the bond transactions that took place on that day, the stock trades, the court documents on Enron, WorldCom that were destroyed. How the steel was immediately transported to China rather than held for forensics. The evidence of a crime is all there.
To chose to believe rather than to know is an unfortunate choice.
the Twin Towers were taken down by controlled demolition using thermite. That's why the steel of the buildings was still melting days later and they decided to send the wreckage to China to tie up loose ends. Mossad was part of the operation. Silverstein increased his insurance on the buildings a few months before the inside job. I saw the TV news report that Building 5 fell while still standing in the background. lol
Better that you say nothing, Charlie. You have no credibility.
Thanks for raising, although unintentionally, a really huge crisis in this country and that is mental health.. I find myself so often asking "Where did all the fucking crazies come from ?"
You're never going to get better if you don't take those pills though. You could also opt for a few milliseconds of serious electricity. Apparently they put you out for it so I don't think it's painful. As your new friend Dennis, how about it ? Are you ready to take the first step ?
I have no problem with you, Charlie. Keep on learning and you will find that the path to the truth means going through a minefield of lies and deceptions. And don't worry about George and his family. I assure you they were quite safe. lol
You are misinformed, this article is from 2006, at which point already 1/3 believed it was an inside job or allowed to happen.
"Third of Americans suspect 9-11 government conspiracy
By THOMAS HARGROVE
Scripps Howard News Service
Tue, 08/01/2006
More than a third of the American public suspects that federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks or took no action to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East, according to a new Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll.
The national survey of 1,010 adults also found that anger against the federal government is at record levels, with 54 percent saying they "personally are more angry" at the government than they used to be.
Widespread resentment and alienation toward the national government appears to be fueling a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories about the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Suspicions that the 9/11 attacks were "an inside job" -- the common phrase used by conspiracy theorists on the Internet -- quickly have become nearly as popular as decades-old conspiracy theories that the federal government was responsible for President John F. Kennedy's assassination and that it has covered up proof of space aliens.
Another study from 2016, believers were down to 36%.
"Asked if the Twin Towers could only have collapsed in on themselves at such speed if they were given some kind of ‘help’ to collapse (i.e., explosives), 39% of Americans believe that to be the case, while acceptance of the official narrative has dwindled to 36%."
Internally perhaps but externally the Iraq invasion was motivated publicly by accusations that Saddam had WMDs. You are preaching to the choir on that.
What does it have to do with these nutty absurd allegations that the USA decided to attack itself on 9 11 ? That is both stupid and nuts.
Give it a rest, Charlie. You've taken up enough of our time proving how dishonest a scum bag can be protecting the reputations and fake narratives of the most sordid creeps on the planet.
My second piece of advice to you? Seek professional help for your disturbing lack of empathy and reason. Unfortunately, there's no help for your unimpressive IQ.
Oh I'm nuts and stupid am I ? You guys are the ones that believe the USA attempted suicide on 9 11. You can't get more retarded than that. I think it's a scream but also worrisome that you are allowed to vote or be allowed to breed.
"The President approved a blood curdling slaughter of his White House staff. Pentagon Military Command, and banking and trade core behemoth" .... As they say on Saturday Night Live ... "Why sure, that's the ticket".
Exactly. Not sure why the same people who create external threat for their own citizens in their own country to consolidate power think it should work differently in another country and create that threat themselves. More looks like it's the only thing these maniacs can do - bomb and kill. If it didn't work, bomb and kill more.
Since the shrapnel radius of a FAB3000 is (I think I read) 3km, I would wager that the above quoted sentence was a misprint "tens of of kilometers". (ie. >10km)
Strategic bombing in WWII, Korea and Vietnam was also counterproductive. Terrorism is not going to break a people's resolve in the same way those modes of attack didn't. The only way to win against a unified people is to defeat them on the battlefield, incurring such serious losses that they will accept the painful terms to end the bloodshed.
Firebombing of North Korea is what won that war for the U.S. 2 million people, almost all civilians, were burned to death. 80% of the cities and towns of North Korea were obliterated. My source is U.S. General Curtis LeMay, who ran the bombing campaign when he was SAC commander, 1948-1957. LeMay was very proud of his"work" and was miffed that for some strange reason, the American MSM never managed to cover the firebombing campaigns. The 2 million people and 80% of cities and towns also comes from Curtis LeMay. He knew the exact score because his photo-recon planes flew over and took pictures of the damage, to see if the victims needed a second strike.
So in fact ... a bombing campaign can win a war if they aggressors are vicious enough. At least, that's the lesson the Pentagon learned in the Korean War. The firebombing and murder of 2 million people is the big reason why the North Koreans are not friendly, even today. After such a huge crime, the aggressor can't confess the truth and put an end to the crime.
Won the war? Do you remember what happened? It stalemated around the 38th parallel. If that's a win... It is true that the NK forces were trounced but that didn't end the war. It was a costly stalemate. So much for the power of bombing. No amount could dislodge the primarily Chinese forces from their positions.
I'd also suggest LeMay arrogated too much of the victory to himself. There was a ground war, the NKs lost. Then the Chinese took over and won for a while.
Okay, Washington didn't "win" the war, but it was able to settle for the southern half, and the northern half was a wasteland. The North Koreans had to put 50 years of abysmal to just plain poor living standards into fixing it.
So you're right, it wasn't exactly a "win" for the US, but it was the next best thing, and I'm pretty sure the main reason the US didn't finish off North Korea was about equal parts of (1) support from the USSR and PRC, and (2) North Korean Communist fanaticism which stiffened them in the hot war, and Washington must have considered that if occupation of North Korea had even been possible, the US would have been treated to the eventual loss of Korea in a long guerilla campaign.
My main point remains, and it's something almost nobody in the West knows about: the massive crime of 2 million barbecued Koreans (mostly civilians BTW), and the complete destruction of 80% of all cities and towns north of the 38th parallel. That's a history we need to remember and condemn. The relative success of the huge firebombing campaign certainly must have been an influence in Pentagon planning ever since.
The US did not win the Korean war. An armistice was signed, but no permanent peace agreement was ever reached. Whatever lessons the Pentagon learned from that conflict, it was not how to win.
The massive carpet bombing of Hanoi and other North Vietnamese cities (Nixon's Christmas bombings) was also what forced the Vietnamese to a reluctant truth with the USA.
The specs for a 2000 pound Mk84 bomb says it will kill everything within 360 meters and significantly injure through blast and concussive effect out to 800 meters. The FAB 1500 and FAB 3000 are significantly larger (in terms of explosives weight).
There is not much documentation on how those effects are mitigated by different sorts of shelter - such as being in a trench, dugout or concrete basement.
During the Viet Nam war, in some of the more famous sieges such as Khe Sanh, the NVA were well dug into tunnels and shelters significantly underground. B52 sorties were common, dropping hundreds of bombs in very tight groups. It was reported that many shelters were found containing dead NVA without a mark on them.
These weapons are very dangerous and lethal. War is not fun or sport. Lets hope the Russians can bring it to a successful end soon.
NATO was always about terrorist methods and targeting civilians, even when the military was at its most fabulous - like in the Vietnam era, aircraft and helicopters used like paper plates and napkins, by the thousands. Main strategic methods of the war? Bomb cities, towns, and villages.
Thanks – I guess you to say it is NATO who has this notion of their victory
And it's re assuring to see they still have no idea of what's happening - it's this and these delusions which keeps ensuring their defeat in Ukraine
It would realistic to consider NATO survival in anything like the current form to be victory - but they'll be the last to find this out
A typical example from today’s FT article about ever shrinking EU armies-
‘For Mölling at the German Council on Foreign Relations, the problem is solvable. “More and more people in Europe recognise the service of the armed forces,” he says. “We just have to work out how to make a career in the military work for people.”
“The difference between us and Putin is that for us it’s not just about headcount,” he says. “We are not just giving people a uniform and sending them to their death. We care about our soldiers. We have to communicate that better, but ultimately I think we have time on our side.”
It is my opinion with no evidence that the WEF is pushing the continuation. The WEF can afford to impoverish the Ukrainian people if the Russian Federation is broken apart to be properly looted.
Macron was a golden boy at Rothschild Paris. I suspect Rothschild bank is a major stakeholder of Vanguard, which is the largest stakeholder of BlackRock.
I don't know much about European culture regarding military service. I do know quite a bit about the American people and military service. In less than a generation, young people don't want to commit and who can blame them after decades of counterproductive wars?
It's easy for NATO to remain clueless when paychecks, careers and social status are on the line. And it's not too difficult for the US to get elected and appointed national and EU officials in line. Suitcases filled with cash and access to low risk, high return deals or a scandal to taint them.
Thanks for this link – the essay is a convincing picture of disorganised chaos in the US gvmt: faction constantly fighting faction, through the use of lies and propaganda, with temporary victory to the clique presenting the most distorted view of the outside world so as to allow the most extreme policy interventions, by presenting themselves as incorrigible and impossible of negotiation
This picture is confirmed by observation of the results- the chaotic nature of US foreign policy and military interventions, as disorganised unplanned and never more than of temporary validity, with no consistent priorities other than constantly to shift priorities, to inflict damage on both friend and foe, preferably civilian
Via the declaration of an evil madman as the eternal enemy, to excuse their own irrational plans and failure to comprehend the plan or purpose of the pretended foe
Above all to focus on obscurity and deniability of any responsibility, to insist of the availability of an immediate exit at the expense of defined purpose and commitment
Check out the date. BTW, I believe they fight so much because they are warring FAMILIES, some dynasties. They almost all went to the same schools. American version of British public school boys and girls. It's a is place that is Somewhere-over-the- rainbow-flavored democracy where serfdom = debt. Chaos and division are central.
I can't resist, immediately came to my mind...from the Master Himself: (Mark 3:24 -26)......."How can Satan cast out Satan?” he asked. “A kingdom divided by civil war will collapse. Similarly, a family splintered by feuding will fall apart. And if Satan is divided and fights against himself, how can he stand? He would never survive.
Thanks - I did see that the article dates from the time when many more MSM outlets were prepared to report on the state of the gvmt cliques
It could be said that the situation is now a lot worse, given the usefulness of Russo phobia to animate internal faction fighting, to generate cashflow
It can be seen that all US foreign policy is essentially internal, is conducted with a view to securing power internally, together with the cash benefits - the enemy is always within, the rest of the world is nothing more than an excuse: they all agree on this
To an extent this is a class war; the dominant class prime interest is to keep these gvmt underlings, often more recent immigrants, divided by conflict, scrabbling for rewards, and well away from the real money
Had considered US/NATO terrorism in Russia as an act of frustration in not being able to win a conventional war. But your post takes my thinking wider, thank you.
There is nothing the empire of lies will not do to maintain power. From the Bengal famines under the British to the Indonesian massacres of one million political opponents, from carpet bombing Cambodia to white phosphorus in Iraq, there is no action that is off the table. Plan your own lives accordingly.
The summer of the Apollo moonwalk, the summer NASA astronauts placed a bronze plaque on the lunar surface--"We come in peace for all mankind"--on that very day in July of 1969, B-52s were carpet-bombing Cambodia--part of Operation Menu, a covert campaign under Nixon--& had been doing so for months.
A thrust for American glory, which fueled the frenzy of the Space Race, released itself in unexpected ways, like a 2-stage Saturn V rocket that somehow went awry @ lift-off only to fizzle--a cataclysm of ash, a flame of hypocrisy.
Operation Freedom Deal followed hard on the heels of Operation Menu: 3800 Stratofortress sorties over Cambodia, some of them called Breakfast, another Snack & occasionally Supper, in keeping w/ the Menu theme.
In recounts of US wars, almost always left out perhaps the most heinous war crimes of USA, The 9(!) year bombing of Laos in secret. A planeload of bombs every 8 minutes from 580,000 sorties totaling more than 2 million tons of ordnance, mostly cluster bombs. To date only about 1% of the unexploded cluster ordnance has been eliminated and they had a much higher dud ratio back then.
I'm in Cambodia. 40-50 years later people are still dying from unexploded US ordnance. As well as from land mines and all the rest. My wife's village (Neak Luong) was obliterated by a US B52 unloading all their bombs on it, for some reason nobody seems to know. There used to be a Miss Landmine event, for girls who had limbs blown off, because it was so common. It's stopped now.
In 2060 children not even born when the by then all but forgotten War in Ukraine was raging, will still be blown to bits by unexploded cluster ammunition (or die from cancer since the ground has now been poisoned by radioactive ammunition which will not disappear for millions of years).
I wonder how long these cycles will continue, they seem so never-ending. I wonder how long it will the current power groups to utterly destroy the entire planet with their death and destruction? Really heartbreaking stuff, appreciate you sharing. Imagine how bad the Karma is going to get within this lifetime for these souls. If one considers a more eternal approach, Level 7 is reserved for them according to Dante's Inferno. And then there is coming back to the planet as a cockroach!
Personally, I judge not. I'm grateful for mercy because I need it!
I believe the only truly serious problem Vladimir Putin—who has embarked on a long-term project to create a new world as his glorious legacy—is facing is determining what level of shock he should inflict on the West to collectively sober us up. A direct hit to NATO, a tactical nuke, a sinking of an aircraft carrier?
My take, should you forgive me a self-promoting link:
I think what is sadly missing from everyone's analysis is what is going on in the world of oil and natural gas and I am convinced that this is at the heart of it all. In the 2 years prior to giving Ukraine the green light to join NATO, China and Russia swooped into the Middle East and locked up Iraq's oil and Iran's oil and made great strides with the Saudis to let them bid on theirs. Most importantly though, they now have effective fire control over the Persian Gulf.
One of my favorite stories was attending a presentation by Regan's Chief of Defense Staff , 3 months after the invasion, where his opening remark was "If we lost the flow of oil through the Persian Gulf, we would have Depression Era economic conditions across the west, in a matter of months".
I think that is one of the most important reasons for the Ukraine war and that is to bog the Russians down as much as possible and keep them out of the Middle East. Russia, I'm told, has already promised Syria a lot more help and support, as soon as the Ukraine War is over. Israel that controls the American government must be quaking in their boots to consider a revitalized Syria so they will demand more and more war.
Anyhow, my main point is, China and Russia have their hand on the oil taps, all the more so if they can get all of BRICS to commit and they haven't even played that hand yet.
It's a promotion alright. I followed a link and it's all paywalled. Very interesting. I haven't got it figured out at all - only just started thinking about it and I am a 'very' slow thinker - but it raises kind of deep questions.
A bit after the style of those sites we find that loudly proclaim they know the cure for cancer or something and then lead you down link after link after link to the inevitable 'pay for these pills'. We come back from that experience, I think, most of us, with the most obvious thing we should have seen and acted upon before we started like: 'If you have a cure for cancer then aren't you morally bound to freely disseminate it?'
That kind of thing.
But here, of course, we're not talking cures for cancer but simply 'enlightened' or especially acute analysis or observation but in context it has something of the same character doesn't it? For the 'sheeple', of which one may be one, could well be swayed by this acute analysis and eventually given enough people swayed a new direction be forced upon the govt and potentially even lives saved in the course of a war.
So these kind of authors have something of that character but not wholly.
They have perhaps a larger quotient of the traditional 'novelist' author who writes strictly for money.
Do they?
Ah. Not always. Not at all. But in the main we could say, perhaps.
We know for sure there is a significant number of them who fiercely believe they should be paid for their writings or at least supported while they write whether or not anyone reads their writings.
So that's one 'trend' or 'bent' or 'type' of author.
And there's another who just dearly wishes we'd read. They even self publish.
And so on.
As I said, I am a slow thinker. There's obviously much more to it than all that. More significances. I can't work it all out. Certainly not at this stage and possibly never.
But I do find it all a bit off-putting. Particularly this latest trend on Substack. Have you seen it? You start reading some author's piece and then mid stream it gets paywalled. BUT you are offered an 'out'. You can download the app and you'll be able to read this post and maybe some more I don't know, for free.
But when you follow the link to download the app it really is 'an app'. i.e. a smartphone thing. Apparently. My pc at least seems unable to get anything gainful from it.
I do not understand it at all. It seems a curious way of doing business. And an even more curious way of 'spreading your word'.
Farewell Petrodollar: America Next? should not be pay-walled; it was published on June 10th. I removed the other two paywalls.
BTW - I don't require paid subscriptions, but essays older than 4 weeks are placed behind a paywall by Substack, except for the one labeled "legendary" and "Joe Biden's Journey into Evil," which will remain freely accessible for as long as my Substack lives. I forget about that stuff because I don't "promote" "old" work.
As for the questions you raised and musings you offered - I can't speak for the others. But I do read analytics and know that even "big names" struggle with payments. As for myself, this article today, "World War III Countdown: Putin Dilemma" was just a fast reaction to ongoing madness. No real research or time invested. Just a personal take.
Alas, for so much stuff I wrote, which is now pay-walled and forever out of sight, I spent hours and hours, sometimes days to research and come up with some value. Nothing cheap in such work, no cancer cures. We all struggle in the dark, like Vogons, wanting to be loved. :)
Well, it looks like i need to give this a shot. Such guilt-wracked plugging merits the effort.
But on this subject, and while i have your ear...does anyone else experience the dissonance of desiring the comeuppance of the West because of the inherent justice in it, whilst simultaneously knowing it's going to destroy their lives too
I trust such dissonance is more prevalent than we would like to believe. What Biden's inherent evil has brought forth is a slow realization of how wicked, truly biblically devilish, those people running our lives are. When I researched for my book As America Crumbles...: A Grim Chronicle Exploring the Evil Source of America’s Catastrophic Decline (https://amzn.to/4cceTYN), I faced true horror.
Almost all of what I wrote in the book I knew beforehand, but placing it all in one huge pile of pillage, manipulation, and blood sobered me. It, in fact, broke my heart. I am an immigrant but America is my only home, the place where I have political asylum, but I feel betrayed. I can't even fathom how born Americans, once they open their eyes, must be feeling.
The majority of Americans never open their eyes nor do they have the capacity to comprehend what's really going on. A society consumed with reality TV, twerking females, LGBT++++++, silicone infusions for the perfect body, lousy education, crime, drugs,........Nah, they are 'eating their own young'.
Global elites will suffer more, because they have staked so much reputationally on a maximalist outcome--Russia Must Lose--not to mention materiel & fig-leaf billion$, plus out-sized Time & Attention. Ordinary citizens don't share the maximalist maxims of the elites & once OTAN loses to Russia will simply chive on.
The number of elites in the U.S. who have hardcore tied themselves in pretzel knots over this war--elected officials/unelected officials/members of Permanent Washington--tops out @ just shy of 5000, not enough even to fill a UFC arena on a Saturday night.
OTAN, led by the U.S., has self-euthanized on Project Ukraine
Comment of the year for me at least. That's it, isn't it ? I'm an ex Nato serviceman (Canadian Armed Forces) and i, with many other ex military men are "Rutin for Putin". I hate lies. That's my hang up. and I despise all that tell them. I have a family to protect and I find myself oddly having to explain to my young daughter that we are the bad guys now.
"There are very few that are gonna look in the mirror and say: The person I see is a savage monster. Instead, they make up some construction that justifies what they do. '" Noam Chomsky
Yes! The lies make things so much worse. If the Empire was brazen about their objectives it would be easier to handle. Instead we get false flags and inside jobs: people/entitities being scapegoated to exculpate themselves; and we get mealy mouthed platitudes about bringing democracy while they covertly subvert it.
There is an overt war on truth and the decent person recoils from lies and obfuscation. We are damaged when they are given in our name and denied the means to refute them by a compliant media.
" You know I hate, detest, and can't bear a lie, not because I am straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appalls me. There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies—which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world—what I want to forget." ~ The Heart of Darkness , Joseph Conrad
Excellent quotation! And a reminder too to revisit the excellent work it came from.
I never like to get too hyperbolic or diabolical, but there is a reason Satan is called ‘the father of lies’. So much evil can be perpetuated by its bad seed. The truth shall set you free…
Go pay a visit to oilprice dot com. Look up Simon Walkins articles from a few years back. Iraq, that the USA and UK thought they had all stitched up as the spoils of war, has now contracted their oil output to Gasprom. Iran has done the same with both China and Russia.
I'm told BRICS now control about 2/3 of the worlds oil and gas output. The USA nearly ran out of diesel about a year ago. Meditate on that !!! That alone, would kill most of us by starvation, but I guess we can stand to lose some weight.
It's a finite resource though and moving it around isn't a walk in the park. Look at oil rich Canada. They still import a lot of oil from the Middle East as they can get it to port in eastern provinces instead of vulnerable pipelines stretch thousands of miles.
True, but what happened after that ? Of course we're swimming in affordable oil. The USA is the number one producer and it's an election cycle. Wait until January. It's a finite resource and there has to be a good reason for the USA and Britain to flatten countries and murder millions while burning through a couple trillion dollars for a resource they are trying to claim we have lots of. The number one state secret of any nation is how much oil they have. It reveals to intimately a nation's vulnerabilities and real wealth. There's a great YT video about how much oil the world actually has and the conclusion is.......... it's a secret.. I went back and tried to find it but could not.
How far out ? Why would the US and UK spend trillions in brutal wars, trying to lock down more if the future was bright ? Are you confident that these countries are honestly reporting on their reserves ? I don't think so as it would be absolutely nuts to do that. None of them ever show their cards when negotiating oil trades.
What matters is not what governments report but what market participants believe and what their data implies or reveals.
The US and its puppets spend trillions on war. not for resources but for empire. To give an example, Saddam would have been delighted to be able to freely sell oil for dollars on world markets. The US did not allow him to do so, hence the "oil for food" program.
"What matters is not what governments report but what market participants believe and what their data implies or reveals."
Where does the 'market data' come from ? Government stats, no ? I used to work for a NATO government agency that measured Nat Gas moving through pipelines to make sure there was no cheating, in one form or the other.
People think oil and gas reserves are public info. Well I guess you could say they are but just like inflation, the government could and does manipulate that info. Unlike inflation, however, there is no way of doing any verification unless they infiltrate and hack into government and corporate accounts.
I could tell you how much natgas was travelling through a hub and what it's composition was but how much the seller or buyer has was none of my business, even though I had the government behind me.
"The US and its puppets spend trillions on war. not for resources but for empire." Not sure what you mean there but I almost certainly disagree with the premise that governments aren't like pirate ships and they most assuredly are after resource treasure. Lindsey Graham 0:40 >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzLKdn0hqFY&t=376s
Slow starvation of gas, oil, minerals, fertilisers and food. And organise the BRICS to do it. At the same time eliminate the NATO commanders one by one. Close us down.
Call it a mercy killing we're the hostages of maniacs.
Well, there is one war that the West appears to be winning, and that is the Media-Propaganda War which, (it could be argued), indirectly kills as many as real ones do.
The Media-Porpaganda War in the West disallows putting a 'W' in VVP's column. They're so protective of the West's ever-softening Soft Power that a Russian or Belarusian tennis player winning a championship can cause a melt-down, let alone allowing a Russian or Belarusian athlete to hear their national anthem or display their country's flag while raising a trophy in the winner's circle.
The intent of the Media-Propaganda War in the West was to isolate Russia in the eyes of the RoW, which failed miserably as the series of Capitulation Summits have shown. In an Own-Goal, which history may prove epic, the West has isolated itself from the RoW
And yet history teaches us that all empires fall. Always. No matter how they try to cling to power, sooner or later it all comes crashing to the ground. There are no exceptions to this rule.
So it will be with this empire, it is just a matter of time.
But it usually doesn't end with absolute agony. Look at France, Spain, Portugal , Rome, UK... The USA just needs to welcome it and try as best they can for a soft landing.
You talk about it as a remote possibility. It's in fact quite feasible. Remember Al Quaeda?
If the Eurocrats ever need a terrorist organisation to for example necessitate a federal EU level army and direct control of member state police forces, they'll probably find some of the Azov guys to "come back for one final job"
Is it Ukrainians though? Nominally I guess - it is a lawless, corrupt place - but its the $ rolling in that permit terror attacks, and the providers of the $ are aware of what they are facilitating, its just a little shimmy to move the spotlight from them. You’d have to look at it that funds (weapons) provided by US etc are used by US etc to attack US etc.
Way back in 2022, after the first sabotage and terrorist attacks started, and after the HIMARS first made an appearance, the Kremlin should have started to physically take out the economic and political elite in the West.
US sends HIMARS missiles that killed hundreds and thousands of Russian soldiers? The Lockheed Martin board of directors and all the main shareholders all die with days of each other. Assassinations, explosions, etc. But it would have been best done with an official missile strike on the HQ, with the Kremlin taking full credit for it, and then declaring that the matter is settled if there is no further violation from the US, the way the Iranians did. But then the Iranians had their president and FM die in a "crash". Which is why the Kremlin didn't follow that path -- the Iranians were ready to pay that price, in the Kremlin they are cowards and weaklings.
That is the only way to enforce deterrence.
Back to our usual reminder of the fundamentals of the situation: this is a war of Western elites against Russia using Ukrainian elites as middle men and regular Ukrainian people as the cannon fodder. What do you do in such a situation?
1) You can fight the cannon fodder endlessly, that will only deplete your strength, plus in this case it is actually your own people, which makes it doubly and triply f****d up for you.
2) You can take out the Ukrainian elites and thus cut off the middle men. But the Western elites don't really care about the Ukrainian elites either, they see them as Russian traitors, i.e. doubly despicable (nobody likes traitors, plus they are Russian), so if they find another way to mobilizie cannon fodder, war will continue
3) You go after the Western elites directly, who currently think they are untouchable, and make them seriously afraid for their personal safety. This is the only way to stop the war. The downside is that you risk some of your own elites being taken out in the process too.
So what does the Kremlin choose? Of course option #1, which has zero chances of ending the war and reestablishing deterrence, worse, it erodes deterence completely. Not even option #2, and definitely not option #3.
If it is indeed true, as recent Putin public appearances indicated, that the General Staff are actually grounded in reality, but it has been Putin personally who insisted on esssentially surrender terms back in March 2022, then he has to go. Now. Before it's too late, though in many ways it already is.
BTW, that also means that presumably it was him who sabotaged the SMO from the start, by refusing to mobilize the necessary resource before the war started (I am sure in the General Staff they knew very well you can't do much with 150,000 men), then imposed the absurdly pacificst self-defeating rules of engagement early on, then sabotaged the SMO again by refusing to mobilize in Spring 2022, and yet again by mobilizing only partially and only way, way too late, plus everything that has happened since then that has resulted in the current situation, in which Russia is a punching bag for the West.
Either Putin is completely detached from reality, or he is in fact compromised and not working in Russia's interest. Either way, time for someone else.
Another instance where it's sufficient to read the first sentence of the comment to be able to make an informed decision on how to best spend the time: reading the rest of the comment, or not.
Another Putin fluffing ignoramus who thinks criticism of his Dear Leader should be punishable by death. So much copium and projection of Dear Leader Puta to blow NATO out. Winning by dying is what Dear Leaders followers want.
"Today what appeared to be a large coordinated series of terror provocations was carried out by Ukraine and Western intel assets."
"Western intel assets."
Can we please just stop it. Just say it. It's the United States. Okay? It's my country. Shout if from the roof tops, for crying out loud.
Whose your Nazi now? Is that so hard? Whose your terrorist state? What is going on in the world makes me think 9/11 was as inside job. For sure. More than think. Just ask the 48-million illegal aliens that have flooded into my country.
"Western intel assets." Stop it with the euphemisms. Speak plainly. Speak clearly.
The Brits MI6 and predecessors have a lengthy history of associations with Ukrainian Nazis after WW2 extending to Neo Nazis and ultranationalists before and since the Western Maidan putsch. This accommodation of Nazis ideology speaks for itself and betrays the nascent fascist currents in the UK ruling class. No organisation is too evil for MI6 to patronise witness its involvement with Islamic terrorist movements for many years reaching its nadir with the Islamic state ISIS. This history and expertise gives certainty that British Intelligence is involved in these terror attacks fulfilling the brutal needs of the UK ruling class to damage and despoil Russia unity amongst its diverse population.
Good point. I would add that 1 very strong motivation driving the UK in this is its insane desire to destroy Russia, and that desire dates back to the 19th century, if not earlier.
Pft, I can easily track it back to the first British vessel arriving in Arkhangelsk during Ivan IV's reign. The crew's reports back home reek of shock, jealousy, hostility and insist on action against this powerful nation that will inevitably rival their own if left to its own devices.
Yes, the Brits are actually the most russophobic of all westerners, and they are probably the original source of russophobia, which began about 200 years ago. All this Anglo-Saxon hatred of Russia and confrontation with it began approximately after the Russian Empire took Crimea from the Ottoman Empire and annexed some other territories. Around this time, sometime in the mid-19th century, the Russian Empire reached the peak of its power and influence. The peak of the British Empire's power occurred around the same time, so it saw Russia as its main competitor and a threat to its hegemony. At the same time, the decline of the Ottoman Empire began and Britain was afraid that Russia would spread its influence into the territories of the Ottoman Empire, that is, the Middle East and part of Central Asia. And it is precisely in these regions that Mi6 now mainly operates, and it is they who contributed to the creation of most terrorist organizations and radical Islamic movements in these territories. The CIA are just puppies compared to them. In the conflict in Ukraine, it was the Brits who caused the most damage to Russia, and they are behind the majority of Ukrainian terrorist attacks against Russia. The Ukrainian GUR is a local branch of Mi6, and its head Budanov is also a minion of Mi6. British intelligence and special forces are also behind most attacks on the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
Exactly how many ATCMS do the Brits possess? Ukraine's weapon of choice in this latest attack into Crimea. That's right: Zero. So, it was the United States "who done it." Say it.
While the Brits are obnoxious, and very much like the United States in that they are an empire that refuses to die, the Brits have been irrelevant a lot longer than the United States has. With the United States we should allow a few failings, like The Fall of Saigon and Afghanis failing from the wheel wells of C-5 Galaxies. [heavy sarcasm]
All the Brits have needed, since World War I, was a proper finishing off. For some reason the collapse of their economy, society, and government, the complete loss of all natural resources, and the fact that the Brits are truly just an island people does not change the whole "Rule Brittanica" thing, the greatest delusion in all of history. Except the delusion the United States has, about democracy, and saving the whole world for something that does not exist. A fiction. The Brits remain unfazed. James Bond will save them.
In that terrorist attacks "almost by definition these acts are conducted as obscurely as possible" the Brits and the United States (9/11 and the Nord Stream Pipeline terrorist acts) are great at playing cowards. The reason the culprit (about as obvious as obvious can be) has gotten away with terrorism has been the terror of naming the Devil -- the threat of instant death.
"And I am? Yes? Say my name."
At some point the United States is going to get back what they have been putting out there -- at least five-fold. All things being equal, I see five (5) 25-megaton nuclear warheads falling on Washington, DC, in the near future. First on Langley, then on the Pentagon, then the FBI, then on the US Capitol Building, then the White House (just too irrelevant for words at this point). We will never hear about it because the fully owned, fully controlled, fully manipulated, fully propagandized mainstream media will never allow it. Unless you live there (and died there) or visit there and are now not feeling very well (hair and teeth falling out, abscesses all over your body, can't keep anything down), you will never know.
You dial up the angerwanger just about as much as the brits, that's saying a'plenty - you could probably pass their induction requirements
You may observe, as does S and many, that the terrorist attacks presently dominating the military acts of the the NATO ites are conducted by the brits and the yankas, with some tea lady assistance from the French and Germans
The reason - they have not found anything else they can do, and sure the anglos like terrorism probably more than the euros do, and are the better suited by their dark perfidious souls, and also because they are ungrown up country cousins for the most part
Keep your nuclear fantaisies for them, maybe they'll let you do that too
Well the fact that there are/were 12 CIA bases in Ukraine kinda points to who was responsible. Further, the fact that Victoria Nuland has been directing all things Ukraine for over a decade should leave no doubt that the USSA is responsible... Chip
The RoW is increasingly less disposed to believe in/trust US claims, still less CIA
The US (gvmtPRMSMclass) always like to boast of how successful their terrorisms are, and claim in this, as in all things exceptional status
But....the US (gvmtclass) also likes to claim that everything anyone does of which they approve is also...down to the US
It would be prudent to discount US claims, especially at a time when the US does not seem, by any standards, to be winning in this war, and when their terrorist tactics have lost them everywar they have fought since...God know when
As for Vicky - the US also like their guinea pigs or is it their scapegoats, or both - whatever Vicky is a low lever porker : is is now was
It is very certain that although these fattened ups make a lot of noise they are not the dominant class who are in charge of the US
It is prudent to think that those CIA bases are basically stores, strictly commercial operations, why bother to fight a war when you can sucker the Ukies the euros etc to do it for you, and you can trade in guns, drugs, women, babies, bios, men, girls....the list goes on and on
That splashy nytimes piece on the 12 CIA labs, bylined by several journalists & boasting over 400 sources, reads like a boastful Infomercial on how cutting edge, indispensable & savvy the CIA is: the CIA built Ukrainian intel from the ground up! Ukraine came to John Brennan after Euromaidan & practically begged for help in spying on Russia! Sure, the Ukrainians were feistier than the principled & disciplined CIA personnel, more inclined to assassinations & car bombs--so of course the CIA gave the Ukrainians a good talking to about the rules-based-international-order & it was all good. Swaggering, puffed-up, vainglorious boastfulness.
The U.S. intel agencies have to be @ the epic center of every geopolitical event, directing traffic as it were--so of course the CIA had 12 labs in Ukraine many, many years before Russia commenced the SMO, because the U.S. leads the world in monitoring all the hot spots.
It's how they knew that ISIS-K carried out the Crocus City massacre, because the CIA has its finger on the pulse.
It's how they knew that Prigozhin was going to embark upon his March: finger on the pulse.
The nytimes article was a glamor piece, after the fact, designed to Big Up the earthshattteringly exceptional ways the CIA knows about stuff before anyone ever knows.
"The MSS functions as China's intelligence, security and secret police agency. A document from the U.S. Department of Justice described the agency as being like a combination of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)."
Want to include Russia's Kremlin in this terrorist attack. Spice it up with yet another false flag? Yeah, sure. That's the ticket. Russia bombed itself. Russia copied the ATACM and let loose "The Poodle of War."
Mossad, too.
So, that's five (5). Maybe more. Each addition taking us further afield from the real culprit (not culprits, not plural, not the several, not the many) responsible for this whole mess. For crying out loud, just say it. Europe doesn't count. They are nothing more than a vassal state, a lap dog of "the Republic," the Global Hegemon with a Napoleonic Complex.
While that's certainly true and you reignite my faith in Americans simply by existing, you shouldn't underestimate Perfidious Albion's skills in staging internal strife. While too. militarily miniscule to pull off something like Crimea, Dagestan is their signature move. Brits are sponsoring uncontrolled islamic migration into Russia via a UN fund (the irony!) and manipulate extremist prophets into positions of influence within that cadre. Americans lack the finesse to play this long game.
Just like they have at home. We in the UK are the test run. In fact we have our own active Hannibal Directive. The Arena Attack wouldn't have been possible without the RN picking up the Abedi brothers from Tripoli.
Those familiar with the "Looney Tunes" canon may recall the yappy little dog that follows Spike The Bulldog around, simping and getting the big dog into fights?
I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue. but maybe it was a scratch for credibility. Who knows ? I haven't heard much detail on the damages except the church was set ablaze. I'm more interested to hear what happened at the synagogue as that would be a reliable indicator of who was behind this,
Why wouldn't the U.S. attack a synagogue of it is to rouse anger where/when it is needed? After all, ZioNazistan itself does not hesitate to sacrifice its own citizens as convenient — see the Pfizer kill shot levels.
I just notice how Israel will spare no cost to bring a single captured soldier home or avenge the death of a single Jew. In short, Jews never kill Jews. They're considered immediate family.
G'day Charlie, what about the Hannibal directive kill all Isrealis who could possibly be taken hostage. It happen in October. Also the two hostages barechested shot in Gaza. Just two examples.
Did they know they were Jews ? It was my understanding that many of the Jewish fatalities were confused for Hamas. One of the drawbacks of denying nationhood to Palestine : No uniforms. Hamas should just top up their attire with a yarmulke when they go on missions.
G'day Charlie, in one of the kibutzim that Hamas had enter and the IOF followed and attacked some settlers were being held in a house by Hamas soldiers and the IOF destroyed the building and it's occupant with a tank round. Also I feel you need to research the Hannibal directive as it explicitly explains the need to kill Israeli settlers usually to avoid them becoming hostages.
well that's entirely wrong. they did it at the beginning of this whole thing. in fact they 'began' the whole thing inasmuch as Netanyahu knew it was coming. we must be talking at cross purposes. perhaps you were being facetious, tongue in cheek or something...
Zionists do kill Jews when it benefits Zionism. The terror bombings of Jews in Baghdad in the early 1950's were done by Zionists and blamed on the Arabs. Fake "Arab Terrorism" was the only way to get the Jews to leave the city they had lived in very comfortably for over 2000 years. And the Jews did leave in panic, trading the paved streets and prosperous economy of Iraq's capital for the mud streets, poor economy and dismal housing of Occupied Palestine. It's Israelis, not Arabs, who wrote it's Zionists who did the bombings. The Baghdadi Jews were shocked to find themselves the victims of hard-core Ashkenazi racism.
At university in the early 1970s we had a "Middle East Discussion Group" that got some interesting guest speakers. One was an Israeli who said he was part of that operation, though he claimed that he was on the propaganda side rather than the kinetic operations. Unfortunately I can't remember his name.
"I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue. " The US is unlikely to directly attack a synagogue, but the US isn't likely to use such proxies in such an explicit manner. That's not how the US used al Qaeda against the USSR or al Nusra against Syria, for example.
It pays them, trains them, arms them, and then sends them to "attack Russia" without specifying all the details. That's especially true when operating proxies through intermediaries. The objective is to cause attacks and turbulence and incent hatred between ethnic groups within Russia and the details of how that's done don't matter so much.
That is the way it works with proxies in general. However, in the case of the Ukraine it is clear who is paying, training and supplying who to do the job: the destruction of Russia.
I would not put it past the U.S. to carry out a false flag attack against a synagogue, after receiving the green light from its ZioNazi master, of course. Mind you, the master is also a master at carrying out false flags, such as 9/11 and 10/7.
The US-paid & trained “freedom fighters “ were carried away. Besides, Jews are only interested in “what is good for Jewish tribe” hence the Hannibal doctrine to smear the Palestinians. The US government and CIA are throughly judaized, and the supremacist lunacy, which justifies all and any kind of crimes and depravity, shines in the US/UK actions.
Whether the sadistic genocide of children and women in Gaza and bombing schools in Donbas or bombing civilians in Syria and Crimea, it shows the anti-human and supremacist character of Owners of the collective west - the private banking cartel which interests are protected by the criminal CIA / Mossad/ MI6 “security services “. Langley is dominated by Mossad.
The MIC is just a Comprador (a traitorous agency) working in cahoots with the private banking cartel. The supranational fascist mega corporations BlackRock, Cargill, at al. are tentacles of the private banking cartel. The judaization of the collective west governance is complete.
"I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue."
Well, the United States can only engage in only so much genocide before resorting to the false flag of piety. All before it resumes its genocide of whole peoples.
That's exactly what I thought. Some Mossad agent will be getting a Gilligan thrashing from the Skipper back in Tel Aviv for not giving them parameters. Have we heard any details on what went down at the synagogue ?
The attacks on the synagogues were basically fights between the terrorist attackers and the police and private guards guarding the synagogues. That's where most of the 15 police died who lost their lives fighting the terrorists.
The terrorists attacked out of the blue, hence the many casualties among police, and they managed to throw firebombs into at least one of the synagogues to completely burn out the interior. But there were no worshippers inside or other personnel, so apparently the only fatalities at the synagogues were police and guards.
Given the demographic makeup of Dagestan, it's almost certain that some of the policemen who died defending the synagogues were Muslim. I haven't seen the full list so I can't confirm that.
It's the job of ISIS to provoke, and lock the country into a conflict no sane person would agree to on a normal day. nothing special here. And US proxies in UA massacred Jews for as long as that was a thing, into the modern era when - yes - they burned down synagogues. Heck US proxies even attacked the US itself in 9/11. They know perfectly well who they fund.
Max Blumenthal & Kit Klarenberg did detailed investigative journalism just days after 7 October, debunking knee-jerk narratives about Hamas's attack & revealing the extent to which the IDF killed Jewish Israelis on that day.
Would Jews kill Jews to advance a war aim?
Would the U.S. sign off on its proxy attacking a synagogue if it were possible to weaken VVP in doing so?
This attack is clearly similar to the attacks on the Palestinians in Gaza — hardly surprising as the same modus operandi (killing innocents) is being used. As Netanyahu has stated so clearly and often, these are eschatological issues for Israelis, and Zelensky could say the same. As presaged by the Old Testament of Genesis, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Judges etc.
The Russians are far more patriotic than the current American population...Attacking schools will simply lead to a demand that Kiev should be leveled...Whereas in America, the hated Biden administration (hated by military families who have seen. wounded soldiers mistreated and kicked to the curb) has lost the support of many, and the number of qualified volunteers has dropped dramatically...This is leading to the enlistment of overweight, low IQ recruits, many of whom have had problems with the law...repeating "McNamara's folly" in the Vietnam War...Such recruits are often more dangerous to our side than the enemy....
And stop them from ruining the west? Not gonna happen.
Also, every Russian civilian who dies hardens the resolve of the population to finish off Ukraine and the entire west if it doesn’t stop, but this will be done in the most drawn-out way possible to bleed the west, for another decade if necessary. The balance of power is shifting as we speak, and the only possible brake is western leaders waking up and realizing that they have pushed a losing hand. If the west stops now we may retain some power globally. I think Trump realizes this with Ukraine and Gaza. One can only hope. If we go all in it’s truly over, and maybe that’s what the world needs.
At the begining of this war, a nun from Ukraine told me of the prophecy by a prominent Orthodox Christian prophet, that this war would continue for 3 years and 3 months, and there would be the Bloody Easter and the Famine Easter. At at the start of this war, it all seemed just surreal, but the longer it goes on, the more real this prophesy looks...
I think I've heard something about this, but could you give me a more direct source?
I'm not saying anything about you personally, but a rando on the internet who told me about someone who said something about a mystic prophecy is a bit thin, not much to go on.
The last thing I care about is to impress an irrelevant stranger (you) :-) - no offence. I was just reminiscing out loud on it. You don't really expect to goad me into telling you the name of the nun, the prophet or the convent, do you? Are you totally oblivious to what is happening to the Orthodox Christians in Ukraine?
The Orthodox Church is an important player in these events and one of the ways they operate is through mysticism and prophecy.
If such statements have been made it could be important to know them and people may want to hear them.
You yourself think it's important information otherwise you would not have mentioned it. How can it be important to mention a prophecy on a public forum but then also believe that it's important that the name of the prophet, when and where he spoke and exactly what he said must remain a secret?
Dangling out a little piece of information and then refusing to share the details that would confirm it is a classic technique of obfuscation and disinformation.
I might be snippy :-), but I wasn't "dangling" this information. My family member was a nun at a Ukrainian convent. The same convent I visited in the mid 1990s, and the nuns were talking about that "they are chipping people in the West." I thought they were lost in the "dark-ages" or plain loony, and I tried to "enlighten" them that in the West only the dogs and young kids (in case lost/kidnapped ) get chipped but nobody else. Given our current situation, it looks like the joke was on me. I wish I paid more attention and asked more questions, but it seemed so improbable. Both pieces of info - the war duration and chipping people in the West I heard first hand and I was told the name of the prophet and the location.
From the start date, what yet? The conversation took place in the early days of war, it just seemed improbable it would go even more than 1 year, never mind over 3.
It's hard to point to an incident when terrorism has achieved a political objective. It causes those harmed to hate those killing civilians. Do you really think Hamas planned Israel's assault which has taken the lives of thousands of their fighters and many of their top leaders? It is far better to get the enemy to kill your civilians - that will gain you support from the outside. And a terror campaign inside Russia would be very difficult to pull off. Assume that the SVR and the GRU have penetrated the Ukrainian government at every level. This is a civil war and retaliation is easily arranged when everyone looks the same and speaks the same language. If the SVR identifies a Ukrainian terrorist cell, I would not want to be a member of anyone's family. I spent ten years of my life doing a deep dive of our portion of the war in Vietnam, and vendetta drove much of the violence. But there's one difference. The red terror/white terror took place inside South Vietnam - not North Vietnam. I would not want to plan a sustained terror campaign inside Russia.
I've spent years of my life studying and writing about the Pacific War. The bombs were not terrorism - they were a device aimed to get the war over with before either the US Army invaded Kyushu or the US Navy blockaded Japan and starved them out. Get back to me when Ukraine starts igniting atomic bombs inside Russia.
This article is very compelling. Paraphrasing it :
the Japanese were not particularly concerned with atomic bombs since the US air force had already destroyed 68 Japanese cities, many of them were far more devastated than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. What they were concerned with is the Soviet Union. And on 9 August 1945 the Soviet Union invaded Manchuria and Sakhalin Island, and declared war on Japan. They easily overran Manchuria and were preparing to be in Japan proper (Hokkaido) in 10 days - months earlier than US forces were likely to be. Although the Japanese had already realised they had lost, they were hoping to inflict high casualties on US forces when they invaded, in order to get better surrender terms, ideally via the Soviet Union as a mediator. When the Russians invaded, that option evaporated, and Japan was now facing an impossible fight against two great powers from different directions. And that is why they surrendered, not because of the atomic bombs.
Relevant is the very interesting (and little known) is the battle of Nomonhan (known as Khalkhin Gol in Russia), which you can read about here:
Stuart D. Goldman
"Nomonhan 1939, The Red Army's victory that shaped World War II"
Indeed. Anyone who has spent years of their life studying and writing about the Pacific War should know this stuff. The fact that some don't shows how effective propaganda can be when it is in such volume that it crowds out what little objective information there is.
In the British election campaign, Farage has introduced a little bit of truth about how NATO provoked the Ukrainian war. He has been attacked from all sides by the fooled and by the conscious liars. In an extraordinary but hardly surprising political intervention, the British Ministry of Defence issued an official statement attacking him and repeating the lies he had criticised. I haven't seen anyone in the mainstream decry this blatant election interference.
Exactly. And the bombs were dropped to send the Russian a message. And it only hastened the invasion of Manchuria. Those GM and grr and whatever are ignorant to facts and live on provoking people in these discussions.
That's not particularly compelling given it doesn't go into detail about what was happening in Tokyo. Explaining the Japanese government's operation prior to the end of WWII is beyond the scope of a post here, except to indicate that Hirohito had only limited control over his own government and assassinating him or compelling his acquiescence to a military coup even at that late date was possible. He wanted to end the war, and the atomic bombings and fire bombings of cities were the main reasons why, other than not seeing any likelihood of victory. The Soviet invasion just multiplied his issues. There was actually a coup attempt at the end, intending to sabotage his radio message to the nation. The timing of the surrender was basically when the forces aligned in Tokyo. No one claims Hirohito was some kind of powerful ruler or focused enough on the ball. He was weak and easily led astray.
The part that is clearly not pointed out is that according to the Yalta terms, the invasion of Hokkaido would have entitled the Soviets to an occupation zone in Japan and a portion of Tokyo. The US was not interested in that outcome, so the bombs dropped to get the surrender done before Soviet influence was felt in Japan. As it happens, Stalin wasn't all that intent on carrying through with this - it wasn't a core interest of his, and he cancelled the invasion two days before it was to go off. But it was a big fear in the US that it would happen.
Toland's book will give you better information sourced from participants.
"Although the Japanese had already realised they had lost, they were hoping to inflict high casualties on US forces when they invaded, in order to get better surrender terms..."
Reminiscent of our current belligerent, prosecuting the war while losing, *hoping to get better surrender terms...*
I saw footage apparently showing General Sodol getting drunk in a bar in Odessa at the same time that Russians were making advances in the Toretsk region, so things are definitely starting to fall apart, domestically. Which makes me wonder why/how Maria Buzuglaya has become the new "Arestovich" or chief criticizer of the Zelensky gov't.
As for the rest, I find it utterly ridiculous that terrorist attacks will somehow sour the Russian people on Putin. If anything, it'll just unite them more. Certainly, everyone's focusing on that horrific attack in Sevastopol right now and I haven't heard a whisper of anyone blaming Putin for that at all.
PS - The World Bank did a comprehensive study on global grain shipments a couple of weeks ago. Long story short is numbers are UP. Literally no one starved because the grain deal collapsed. It was BS from the very beginning.
Not going to happen. Remember conflict between Dagestan and Chechnya? This would only play into hands of those who activated their terrorist cell - western intelligence.
He's got a point though, I have hard time thinking of Crimea as an active war zone. Not to mention that Sevastopol is a central naval base, it's literally sitting on top and between arsenals. It's been attacked so much that indeed it may qualify as one. But drive half an hour away, and it's still the same leisury Crimea. You're only in danger if some AA installation is nearby or you're between launch sites and possible targets so that shot down missiles may rain on you. Which is btw not what happened at the beach, today's videos prove that cluster munitions deployed correctly and so it was indeed aimed there, not accidentally shot down by AA.
My point was not to blame the victim but was to point out that Crimea has been constantly attacked and if people want to live their lives normally - which I support - they just need to understand the risk even if they’re willing to take it.
It’s possible that this was deliberate on civilians. The silence from the Americans and the gloating from the Ukrainians seems to point to it and it’s something that I wouldn’t put past them. They’ve been doing it in Donbass and Belgorod so why not Crimea?
You are so tiresome with your nit-picking, irritating provocations. The whole of Ukraine, Crimea and an good part of Russia is a war zone. And a big chunk of Black Sea.
There have been many strikes at night in the last month and a half.
And another one last night too, even more massive than the one during the day.
>Plus, why is anyone going to a beach in an active war zone?
How many warm water beaches does Russia have? Crimea's main economic activity is tourism.
And this is precisely why this strike was carried out -- to ruin the tourist season. They weren't targeting Balbek, look at the map -- the beach is out of the way of any trajectory from Odessa/Nikolaev to Balbek. They were aiming precisely at Sevastopol, and this is why it was done on Sunday, June 23, the official start of the tourist season, in the middle of the day, when there are as many people out in the open as possible. If Russian AD hadn't shot down most of the missiles, it would have been hundreds of dead.
I understand and we can go the route of “we’ll live our lives the terrorists won’t win”. I’m just saying that these people are criminals (Ukrainian leadership and the west) so I wouldn’t put it past them.
I recall they tried something similar last year (or was 2022) and have been shelling markets in Donetsk for the last 10 years. So it’s not new and to be expected. If someone wants to still go there then it’s a risk they should accept.
Donbasss shelling became much worse after the SMO started.
First, places outside artillery range were safe previously, now they are not.
Second, it was random shelling previously, now it is precisely targeted for maximum carnage.
The Kremlin, always in its usual mode of "if we ignore the problem sufficiently stubbornly, it will go away on its own", leading to the natural corollary of "information that will result in demands on us to do something should be suppressed" has mostly kept quiet about these, but once HIMARS appeared, the Americans (we know they do all the targeting) started hitting bus stops in the Donbass with anti-personnel HIMARS rounds. Absolutely gruesome scenes of babushkas lying on the street dead with their brains leaking onto the pavement, with their bodies and everything nearby turned into swiss cheese from the tungsten pellets.
The Kremlin could have broadcast this all over the world, but it didn't. Because had it done so, it would have had to strike the "dear partners". And the dear partners are more dear to the Kremlin that the Donbas babushkas.
Now the terror is expanding to Belgorod, Sevastopol, and soon many other cities. Because the Kremlin is a total mockery that nobody takes seriously.
well lots of us do take it seriously. but yourself and such as rurik skywalker make us worry a bit. And such as this which I can't actually listen to and understand. Because I can't do Russian. But the context makes it fairly clear that it is a strong condemnation of the Kremlin's management of the war. https://t.me/KvachkovV/1491
And, of course, Prigozhin is not 'swept under the rug' in our minds even though not mentioned anywhere any more.
Nor is Texas Bentley, come to that.
So show us some good links or sites and/or how we can translate those russian telegram vids. :)
It seems to tell us that there's something bad happening. Seems to. Fact is we don't know all the ins and outs of these things at all. I mean we see clearly that much is bad. But how much it is an indicator of a whole 'iceberg' of bad we simply don't know. So we should be slow to jump to conclusions.
Let me put it the other way around: Putin has made spectacular improvements in Russia's position vis a vis the whole world in the last two years. It would not be an exaggeration to say he is leading a global insurrection.
So following the logic most often used when seeing something 'bad' such as those things you mention we should jump to the conclusion that Putin is therefore the messiah?
Not so, is it?
We never seem to jump to conclusions that someone is wholly divinely right.
But we seem very liable to jump to conclusions that they are wholly satanically wrong.
And that's what, essentially Rurik etc ( I don't know what to call them overall: the 'Russian dissenters' ?) are calling him. They seriously maintain that everything he does is intended to destroy the Russian State in the interests of Western oligarchs and even more: literally destroy Slavs in the interests of the Jewish State !
There's much hysteria and exaggeration on all sides.
All built on perceiving some little thing as an iceberg tip. We then postulate the iceberg.
To return to your question: 'What does that tell us?' well that's it: what does it tell us? These things tell us only what we see. And even there we are often in doubt. We need to rein ourselves in and properly assess what things do tell us.
Can you hold two contrary opinions in your mind at one time?
I think it is the way to go.
The Russian govt is good and it is bad.
The Russian military machine is good and it is bad.
And so on.
We are better off looking at the preponderance, the balance, I think.
On balance the Russian State in the last three years has brought to light some very clear indisputable facts and has begun the construction of something the world has to have: because it is the nation state parallel to democracy: multipolarity.
Exposed by the pressure the USA and NATO and EU and Israel have shown themselves to be utterly antipathetic to the people, utterly without redeeming features. A filthy truth about the world has been revealed.
Like a mask ripped off.
Now we may suspect that they who ripped the mask off are less than perfect and we may be right. But first things first. What's been revealed here is core to world, is essential to 8 billion people, no localised backyard thing.
Keep our eyes on that and help with it.
While making sober assessments of other matters as facts and time permit.
These western elites are the same ones who are pushing the Great Reset, where only 500million in the world survive, where people are controlled by digital currency and can’t travel, holiday, move out their lane, buy with free will. This attack fulfils many of their objectives.
Denial and complacency ... 'it won't happen to us'. Happens all the time and the stats were in their favor. How many people have been killed on that beach from missiles ? I just read a story from a news outlet about those strikes and they showed a shuttle launch from 20 years ago. Mouse clicks are money.
Denied.
Fake news pal
No Pal!
Thats the TG channel with 100 subscribers..... such losers.
"People tens of meters from the epicenter can suffer concussions"... I should think there'd be nothing left to concuss. I take that as a typo.
Strange how people rally around the flag when attacked by terrorism. Take 9 11 as an example. It got Bush reelected. So I don't agree with the thesis it will bring Putin down.
Hundreds of metres would be more accurate I reckon.
well, thats 10 tens, or 20 tens, or probably even 30 or 40 tens, lol.
technically it works
Tens of meters to me mean.... 10,20,30.... 90. I live in a metric country and have been a kilometer away from an explosion... just a natural gas leaking in a house. I was in my bedroom with windows closed and a hundred houses away. I actually felt an impact on my chest when it blew.
Looking at one of these missiles going off, I'd be comfortable... even smug in saying that someone 90 meters or less away from ground zero, as it was put, would be vaporized. A meter is only 3 inches longer than a yard. 90 meters is smaller than an average city block. A hand grenade will scatter shrapnel 200 meters "Typical guaranteed wounding range is much smaller, around 15–30 meters, and a lethal radius of 5-10 meters, but one still does well to throw them from cover, and throw them with all due enthusiasm" I was tempted to guess he meant tens of kilometers but that seems a bit extreme. Mind you, I'm told if you are within 10 kms of an American 'bunker buster' it will scare the living shit out of you.
"A meter is smaller than a yard" - not true: 1 yard = 0.9144 meters.
Nit: a meter is longer than a yard; 3" longer.
But that doesn't change your conclusion.
"A meter is only 3 inches longer than a yard." That is precisely what he said. where do you fellas get the idea that he said a meter is less than a yard?
Note the "edited 26 minutes ago" in italics at the top of his post.
It originally said, "a yard is larger than a meter." That's where I "got the idea."
The poster corrected his mistake.
Victor ... you think the grammar and spelling cops are bad on the internet, now they got math and metrology undercover narcs all over the place. I fixed the error .
"90 meters is smaller than an average city block. " A historical note on the origin of the term "blockbuster": The original "blockbuster" was a bomb developed by the UK in WW2 that was loaded with 1,400 kg of high explosive. It was called that because it could destroy an entire block of buildings.
The movie industry started using the same term during WW2 to refer to a big hit movie.
A 3000 kg FAB is considerably bigger than even bigger WW2 blockbusters.
I don't think it's just concussions, these bombs can create overpressure-induced neurotrauma. Literal brain damage. And yeah, probably in the hundred-meter range.
Of course one does have to have a brain in the first place to get it damaged and these guys are going on suicide missions for Lindsey Graham's plan to strip their country of it's mineral wealth , so ....... https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzLKdn0hqFY
Yes, but we don't know how he splits up units of measurement in his language, or at least I don't.
He could go, meters, tens of meters, hundreds of meters. So, he could be saying that anyone within 100 meters or less of that epicenter can be concussed. That's a much more reasonable statement.
Anyone less than a hundred meters from the epicenter will be killed from either the direct blast or the shockwave causing organ failure.
Bush was elected 10 months prior to 911
I meant his second term obviously. I said re-elected.
Stranger, how people rally around the flag when attacked by acts of terrorism from their own government like 9/11.
Yet to be proven and an assault to my sense of reason at least, not firstly because of the towers. Imagine being a fly on the wall when the CIA explained to the Pentagon that they were going to crash a loaded passenger jet into their offices. The flight that crashed in Pa was headed to the White House an even harder sell to the President's family.
You forgot to mention it provides an opportunity for agencies to be created and to grow, with large, secret budgets.
and it suddenly allowed the govt. unlimited surveillance powers and the ability to search and detain anyone without any "probable cause" whatsoever
Section 702 of the FISA Warrant Law is particularly a gift that goes on giving
Yep, I would add the towers were taken down by explosives', not planes
Thermite. You could see it blasting off as the buildings fell.
That may be but some things being wrong in a particular story does not make the whole story wrong or false. There were other buildings that collapsed exactly like WTC did - see for instance the collapse of the steel-supported upper part of the Windsor Tower in Madrid - here is description: https://www.designingbuildings.co.uk/wiki/Torre_Windsor_office_building_fire
The building in Madrid has a strengthened middle floor which prevented complete collapse. I guess WTC did not have that feature.
The real problem with the whole 9/11 is that these people were on the list by the alphabet soup agencies and they still managed not only to prepare but also to get on board of the plains. Some Biden critics have problems with the later.
In a wider context the US victory over the SU in Afganistan and the way we achieved that made the 9/11 and later rapid withdrawal action 2021. One may think that this somehow make the idiots in white house, state dep. and pentagon wiser but no - they still push for more war. I suppose if we ever see a "Victory" in Ukraine, the follow on costs of that will be so high that the may crash the Western society. Then again we are already on a path of destruction of the liberal societal order so maybe that makes no difference.
Anyways - bottom line is: not everything is a conspiracy even if part of the world events certainly are.
If we were only to express opinions on subject on which we have absolute knowledge then we would be living in an absolute silence.
But you can chose to live in your own bubble too. and listen to own voice only.
As for the arguments I will not repeat or add any as the original comment was enough.
Very possible. There is an alternative suggestion based on the amazing lack of rubble left from the explosions.
Dr. Wood has videos on what it might be. The first video are slides from her presentations. I suggest you speed up the second video, she is not a polished presenter, but does know her subject.
http://www.drjudywood.com/wp/
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T1NbBxDGSkI&list=PL199DDA6A5746CDFB&index=1
> Yet to be proven
You need yet more proof 9/11 was an inside job? 🤣
Good for you! Never let facts and reality stand in the way of supporting your totally benign and loving US govt. They will never hurt us, look how they nurture and care for us
great irony! 🤣🤣🤣
You are sadly misinformed IMO.
The towers were taken down by explosives, take a look at the crater inside building 6, one seldom mentioned, that is well out of the supposed impact area, yet totally hollowed out from the INSIDE.
The Pentagon was in on it, why? Because the place where the missile hit (there was no plane) was the area where the accountants had just begun an audit of what had become of the Pentagon's missing trillions. That area had recently been "reinforced" as well. All records, and all accountants were destroyed. The audit ended, never to resume again.
No plane crashed in Penn, there were no bodies according to the coroner, and what wreckage there was was minimal, plus the impact point was ridiculously small.
Oh I see. Well I can't wait to tell the mourning 300 families and many thousands of beloved friends and other relations that they are all still alive. Did you want to be the first one to tell them ?
I am beginning to see how it is that you are so easily duped.
I never said they were still alive, in fact based on what I have read they are all dead. The plan was rerouted to a US base, they were removed from the plane. That is where they made some of the phone calls. That is the last they were ever heard from. https://themillenniumreport.com/2014/09/shanksville-pennsylvania-on-911-the-mysterious-plane-crash-site-without-a-plane/
9/11 was a well planned, well thought out operation. It accomplished a great many objectives for the Deep State. Research the bond transactions that took place on that day, the stock trades, the court documents on Enron, WorldCom that were destroyed. How the steel was immediately transported to China rather than held for forensics. The evidence of a crime is all there.
To chose to believe rather than to know is an unfortunate choice.
https://odysee.com/@roobsflyers:0/noplaneatpentagon:c
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=z9Zqsd6bxI4
Well said, Frances. 5 stars to you.
Thank you :)
the Twin Towers were taken down by controlled demolition using thermite. That's why the steel of the buildings was still melting days later and they decided to send the wreckage to China to tie up loose ends. Mossad was part of the operation. Silverstein increased his insurance on the buildings a few months before the inside job. I saw the TV news report that Building 5 fell while still standing in the background. lol
Better that you say nothing, Charlie. You have no credibility.
Thanks for raising, although unintentionally, a really huge crisis in this country and that is mental health.. I find myself so often asking "Where did all the fucking crazies come from ?"
You're never going to get better if you don't take those pills though. You could also opt for a few milliseconds of serious electricity. Apparently they put you out for it so I don't think it's painful. As your new friend Dennis, how about it ? Are you ready to take the first step ?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?app=desktop&v=tMMMbTM1vE0&t=1s&fbclid=IwAR0fopCJt_bVMQuhcOuayMAlu53oukM28H5HbY3izTAr6xUObLEnT3xWQMI
I have no problem with you, Charlie. Keep on learning and you will find that the path to the truth means going through a minefield of lies and deceptions. And don't worry about George and his family. I assure you they were quite safe. lol
Because at the time 9/11 was not belived to be an inside job. Not widely, anyway, and neither is it now considered to be an inside job, widely.
You are misinformed, this article is from 2006, at which point already 1/3 believed it was an inside job or allowed to happen.
"Third of Americans suspect 9-11 government conspiracy
By THOMAS HARGROVE
Scripps Howard News Service
Tue, 08/01/2006
More than a third of the American public suspects that federal officials assisted in the 9/11 terrorist attacks or took no action to stop them so the United States could go to war in the Middle East, according to a new Scripps Howard/Ohio University poll.
The national survey of 1,010 adults also found that anger against the federal government is at record levels, with 54 percent saying they "personally are more angry" at the government than they used to be.
Widespread resentment and alienation toward the national government appears to be fueling a growing acceptance of conspiracy theories about the 2001 attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon.
Suspicions that the 9/11 attacks were "an inside job" -- the common phrase used by conspiracy theorists on the Internet -- quickly have become nearly as popular as decades-old conspiracy theories that the federal government was responsible for President John F. Kennedy's assassination and that it has covered up proof of space aliens.
Another study from 2016, believers were down to 36%.
"Asked if the Twin Towers could only have collapsed in on themselves at such speed if they were given some kind of ‘help’ to collapse (i.e., explosives), 39% of Americans believe that to be the case, while acceptance of the official narrative has dwindled to 36%."
https://thepeoplesvoice.tv/study-911-inside-job/
Well if you read it on the internet, it must be true.
And if you trust your government's controlled media, you are being duped.
You are aware that 9/11 was used as a pretext to destroy the Middle East? Perhaps not.
Let me enlighten you, or more accurately let General Westley Clark enlighten you.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FNt7s_Wed_4
Internally perhaps but externally the Iraq invasion was motivated publicly by accusations that Saddam had WMDs. You are preaching to the choir on that.
What does it have to do with these nutty absurd allegations that the USA decided to attack itself on 9 11 ? That is both stupid and nuts.
"perhaps"?
Do you hear yourself? The govt you apparently trust laid out a plan to invade seven countries and you dismiss it?
Charlie, you are beyond reason, my words are wasted on you. I wish you well.
Give it a rest, Charlie. You've taken up enough of our time proving how dishonest a scum bag can be protecting the reputations and fake narratives of the most sordid creeps on the planet.
My second piece of advice to you? Seek professional help for your disturbing lack of empathy and reason. Unfortunately, there's no help for your unimpressive IQ.
Oh I'm nuts and stupid am I ? You guys are the ones that believe the USA attempted suicide on 9 11. You can't get more retarded than that. I think it's a scream but also worrisome that you are allowed to vote or be allowed to breed.
"The President approved a blood curdling slaughter of his White House staff. Pentagon Military Command, and banking and trade core behemoth" .... As they say on Saturday Night Live ... "Why sure, that's the ticket".
You're right, I might be mistaken about the time it took for people to start doubting the official narrative.
Very good. I get a sus-pici-on Chucky's a bot. (primitive at that) lol
I have that sense as well. Bots language is always just a bit off...
Two words Charlie. Operation Northwoods
You aren't merely stupid you are a dumbass
I hope you don't mean both at the same time cause I'm really shitty at multitasking.
Two words Forest : Common Sense and if you can't do that much, Get Help.
Exactly. Not sure why the same people who create external threat for their own citizens in their own country to consolidate power think it should work differently in another country and create that threat themselves. More looks like it's the only thing these maniacs can do - bomb and kill. If it didn't work, bomb and kill more.
> If it didn't work, bomb and kill more.
Same with sanctions — the EU is now on its 14th round of sanctions because the previous 13 rounds were so successful to destroy Russia 🤣
lol, like
I wondered about the same thing, a 1000 + kilo bomb should be effective against people out to hundreds of meters.
Unless it's burying itself into the ground before exploding.
Since the shrapnel radius of a FAB3000 is (I think I read) 3km, I would wager that the above quoted sentence was a misprint "tens of of kilometers". (ie. >10km)
Could be. That's what I thought also.
Strategic bombing in WWII, Korea and Vietnam was also counterproductive. Terrorism is not going to break a people's resolve in the same way those modes of attack didn't. The only way to win against a unified people is to defeat them on the battlefield, incurring such serious losses that they will accept the painful terms to end the bloodshed.
Firebombing of North Korea is what won that war for the U.S. 2 million people, almost all civilians, were burned to death. 80% of the cities and towns of North Korea were obliterated. My source is U.S. General Curtis LeMay, who ran the bombing campaign when he was SAC commander, 1948-1957. LeMay was very proud of his"work" and was miffed that for some strange reason, the American MSM never managed to cover the firebombing campaigns. The 2 million people and 80% of cities and towns also comes from Curtis LeMay. He knew the exact score because his photo-recon planes flew over and took pictures of the damage, to see if the victims needed a second strike.
So in fact ... a bombing campaign can win a war if they aggressors are vicious enough. At least, that's the lesson the Pentagon learned in the Korean War. The firebombing and murder of 2 million people is the big reason why the North Koreans are not friendly, even today. After such a huge crime, the aggressor can't confess the truth and put an end to the crime.
Won the war? Do you remember what happened? It stalemated around the 38th parallel. If that's a win... It is true that the NK forces were trounced but that didn't end the war. It was a costly stalemate. So much for the power of bombing. No amount could dislodge the primarily Chinese forces from their positions.
I'd also suggest LeMay arrogated too much of the victory to himself. There was a ground war, the NKs lost. Then the Chinese took over and won for a while.
Okay, Washington didn't "win" the war, but it was able to settle for the southern half, and the northern half was a wasteland. The North Koreans had to put 50 years of abysmal to just plain poor living standards into fixing it.
So you're right, it wasn't exactly a "win" for the US, but it was the next best thing, and I'm pretty sure the main reason the US didn't finish off North Korea was about equal parts of (1) support from the USSR and PRC, and (2) North Korean Communist fanaticism which stiffened them in the hot war, and Washington must have considered that if occupation of North Korea had even been possible, the US would have been treated to the eventual loss of Korea in a long guerilla campaign.
My main point remains, and it's something almost nobody in the West knows about: the massive crime of 2 million barbecued Koreans (mostly civilians BTW), and the complete destruction of 80% of all cities and towns north of the 38th parallel. That's a history we need to remember and condemn. The relative success of the huge firebombing campaign certainly must have been an influence in Pentagon planning ever since.
The US did not win the Korean war. An armistice was signed, but no permanent peace agreement was ever reached. Whatever lessons the Pentagon learned from that conflict, it was not how to win.
The massive carpet bombing of Hanoi and other North Vietnamese cities (Nixon's Christmas bombings) was also what forced the Vietnamese to a reluctant truth with the USA.
What are you smoking? The US lost that war jughead
The specs for a 2000 pound Mk84 bomb says it will kill everything within 360 meters and significantly injure through blast and concussive effect out to 800 meters. The FAB 1500 and FAB 3000 are significantly larger (in terms of explosives weight).
There is not much documentation on how those effects are mitigated by different sorts of shelter - such as being in a trench, dugout or concrete basement.
During the Viet Nam war, in some of the more famous sieges such as Khe Sanh, the NVA were well dug into tunnels and shelters significantly underground. B52 sorties were common, dropping hundreds of bombs in very tight groups. It was reported that many shelters were found containing dead NVA without a mark on them.
These weapons are very dangerous and lethal. War is not fun or sport. Lets hope the Russians can bring it to a successful end soon.
No one agrees with that propaganda statement, it's known that terror works in the opposite direction of what is intended.
A pivot to terrorism has been underway for a long time
Although this presents problems of it's own, it is a sign, another sign, that NATO can fund organise and manage nothing more
This is de escalation masquerading as the best way to dethrone Putin - but it has little to do with winning a war
agree
NATO was always about terrorist methods and targeting civilians, even when the military was at its most fabulous - like in the Vietnam era, aircraft and helicopters used like paper plates and napkins, by the thousands. Main strategic methods of the war? Bomb cities, towns, and villages.
Yes, even at scale, NATO is still terrorist - very well said -
Hence also no negotiations, no rational goals, no idea of victory or defeat
Settlers forever reliving the forever wars with the first settlers
A NATO victory is considered the breaking apart of the Russian Federation. Can't have a WEF Agenda 2030 with Russia and China hanging around.
Thanks – I guess you to say it is NATO who has this notion of their victory
And it's re assuring to see they still have no idea of what's happening - it's this and these delusions which keeps ensuring their defeat in Ukraine
It would realistic to consider NATO survival in anything like the current form to be victory - but they'll be the last to find this out
A typical example from today’s FT article about ever shrinking EU armies-
‘For Mölling at the German Council on Foreign Relations, the problem is solvable. “More and more people in Europe recognise the service of the armed forces,” he says. “We just have to work out how to make a career in the military work for people.”
“The difference between us and Putin is that for us it’s not just about headcount,” he says. “We are not just giving people a uniform and sending them to their death. We care about our soldiers. We have to communicate that better, but ultimately I think we have time on our side.”
https://www.ft.com/content/f9dc7922-8d5c-4f29-90f3-6a5d27311c1c
It is my opinion with no evidence that the WEF is pushing the continuation. The WEF can afford to impoverish the Ukrainian people if the Russian Federation is broken apart to be properly looted.
Macron was a golden boy at Rothschild Paris. I suspect Rothschild bank is a major stakeholder of Vanguard, which is the largest stakeholder of BlackRock.
I don't know much about European culture regarding military service. I do know quite a bit about the American people and military service. In less than a generation, young people don't want to commit and who can blame them after decades of counterproductive wars?
It's easy for NATO to remain clueless when paychecks, careers and social status are on the line. And it's not too difficult for the US to get elected and appointed national and EU officials in line. Suitcases filled with cash and access to low risk, high return deals or a scandal to taint them.
Same strategy in Korea...
Hmmmm...and the Soviets, now Russia, and the Chinese, have done....
OTAN has self-euthanized on Project Ukraine
Very neatly put....... thanks
Hybrid warfare, courtesy of Jezebel.
https://newcoldwar.org/victoria-nulands-mastery-of-ukraine-propaganda/
Thanks for this link – the essay is a convincing picture of disorganised chaos in the US gvmt: faction constantly fighting faction, through the use of lies and propaganda, with temporary victory to the clique presenting the most distorted view of the outside world so as to allow the most extreme policy interventions, by presenting themselves as incorrigible and impossible of negotiation
This picture is confirmed by observation of the results- the chaotic nature of US foreign policy and military interventions, as disorganised unplanned and never more than of temporary validity, with no consistent priorities other than constantly to shift priorities, to inflict damage on both friend and foe, preferably civilian
Via the declaration of an evil madman as the eternal enemy, to excuse their own irrational plans and failure to comprehend the plan or purpose of the pretended foe
Above all to focus on obscurity and deniability of any responsibility, to insist of the availability of an immediate exit at the expense of defined purpose and commitment
Check out the date. BTW, I believe they fight so much because they are warring FAMILIES, some dynasties. They almost all went to the same schools. American version of British public school boys and girls. It's a is place that is Somewhere-over-the- rainbow-flavored democracy where serfdom = debt. Chaos and division are central.
I can't resist, immediately came to my mind...from the Master Himself: (Mark 3:24 -26)......."How can Satan cast out Satan?” he asked. “A kingdom divided by civil war will collapse. Similarly, a family splintered by feuding will fall apart. And if Satan is divided and fights against himself, how can he stand? He would never survive.
Alas, kingdoms fall.
Thanks - I did see that the article dates from the time when many more MSM outlets were prepared to report on the state of the gvmt cliques
It could be said that the situation is now a lot worse, given the usefulness of Russo phobia to animate internal faction fighting, to generate cashflow
It can be seen that all US foreign policy is essentially internal, is conducted with a view to securing power internally, together with the cash benefits - the enemy is always within, the rest of the world is nothing more than an excuse: they all agree on this
To an extent this is a class war; the dominant class prime interest is to keep these gvmt underlings, often more recent immigrants, divided by conflict, scrabbling for rewards, and well away from the real money
Had considered US/NATO terrorism in Russia as an act of frustration in not being able to win a conventional war. But your post takes my thinking wider, thank you.
There is nothing the empire of lies will not do to maintain power. From the Bengal famines under the British to the Indonesian massacres of one million political opponents, from carpet bombing Cambodia to white phosphorus in Iraq, there is no action that is off the table. Plan your own lives accordingly.
The summer of the Apollo moonwalk, the summer NASA astronauts placed a bronze plaque on the lunar surface--"We come in peace for all mankind"--on that very day in July of 1969, B-52s were carpet-bombing Cambodia--part of Operation Menu, a covert campaign under Nixon--& had been doing so for months.
A thrust for American glory, which fueled the frenzy of the Space Race, released itself in unexpected ways, like a 2-stage Saturn V rocket that somehow went awry @ lift-off only to fizzle--a cataclysm of ash, a flame of hypocrisy.
Operation Freedom Deal followed hard on the heels of Operation Menu: 3800 Stratofortress sorties over Cambodia, some of them called Breakfast, another Snack & occasionally Supper, in keeping w/ the Menu theme.
Guess it's gonna be that kind of summer
Never mind that the moon walk never happened.
Micheal Jackson fans might disagree on that one.
Let them dream 😉
The shitposting is strong in this one.
Lol you think the moon exists?
Yes, the moonwalk happened. The people selling the lie we didn't go are trying yo make you look foolish.
In recounts of US wars, almost always left out perhaps the most heinous war crimes of USA, The 9(!) year bombing of Laos in secret. A planeload of bombs every 8 minutes from 580,000 sorties totaling more than 2 million tons of ordnance, mostly cluster bombs. To date only about 1% of the unexploded cluster ordnance has been eliminated and they had a much higher dud ratio back then.
China is helping Laos w/ the zapping & clearing of the unexploded ordnance in the Red Zone mess the U.S. left behind.
I saw an article some years ago that showed Cambodian and Laotian homes build out of exploded munitions. Another fellow kept them as lawn ornaments.
https://www.nydailynews.com/2020/06/13/cambodian-mans-yard-decorated-with-old-land-mines-dozens-of-unexploded-munitions/
I'm in Cambodia. 40-50 years later people are still dying from unexploded US ordnance. As well as from land mines and all the rest. My wife's village (Neak Luong) was obliterated by a US B52 unloading all their bombs on it, for some reason nobody seems to know. There used to be a Miss Landmine event, for girls who had limbs blown off, because it was so common. It's stopped now.
In 2060 children not even born when the by then all but forgotten War in Ukraine was raging, will still be blown to bits by unexploded cluster ammunition (or die from cancer since the ground has now been poisoned by radioactive ammunition which will not disappear for millions of years).
I wonder how long these cycles will continue, they seem so never-ending. I wonder how long it will the current power groups to utterly destroy the entire planet with their death and destruction? Really heartbreaking stuff, appreciate you sharing. Imagine how bad the Karma is going to get within this lifetime for these souls. If one considers a more eternal approach, Level 7 is reserved for them according to Dante's Inferno. And then there is coming back to the planet as a cockroach!
Personally, I judge not. I'm grateful for mercy because I need it!
I believe the only truly serious problem Vladimir Putin—who has embarked on a long-term project to create a new world as his glorious legacy—is facing is determining what level of shock he should inflict on the West to collectively sober us up. A direct hit to NATO, a tactical nuke, a sinking of an aircraft carrier?
My take, should you forgive me a self-promoting link:
https://trygvewighdal.substack.com/p/world-war-iii-countdown-putin-dilemma
I think what is sadly missing from everyone's analysis is what is going on in the world of oil and natural gas and I am convinced that this is at the heart of it all. In the 2 years prior to giving Ukraine the green light to join NATO, China and Russia swooped into the Middle East and locked up Iraq's oil and Iran's oil and made great strides with the Saudis to let them bid on theirs. Most importantly though, they now have effective fire control over the Persian Gulf.
One of my favorite stories was attending a presentation by Regan's Chief of Defense Staff , 3 months after the invasion, where his opening remark was "If we lost the flow of oil through the Persian Gulf, we would have Depression Era economic conditions across the west, in a matter of months".
I think that is one of the most important reasons for the Ukraine war and that is to bog the Russians down as much as possible and keep them out of the Middle East. Russia, I'm told, has already promised Syria a lot more help and support, as soon as the Ukraine War is over. Israel that controls the American government must be quaking in their boots to consider a revitalized Syria so they will demand more and more war.
Anyhow, my main point is, China and Russia have their hand on the oil taps, all the more so if they can get all of BRICS to commit and they haven't even played that hand yet.
Many are writing about it. Given my shameless plug I can tell you I wrote about it many times.
Russia's $75 Trillion Dollar Treasure Trove as the ultimate loot:
https://trygvewighdal.substack.com/p/us-russia-war-adolf-hitlers-victory
Ukraine: A Trillion Dollar Goldmine of Death
https://trygvewighdal.substack.com/p/ukraine-a-trillion-dollar-goldmine
Farewell Petrodollar: America Next?
https://trygvewighdal.substack.com/p/farewell-petrodollar-america-next
Now I'll crawl back to my cave, ashamed of this promotion.
It's a promotion alright. I followed a link and it's all paywalled. Very interesting. I haven't got it figured out at all - only just started thinking about it and I am a 'very' slow thinker - but it raises kind of deep questions.
A bit after the style of those sites we find that loudly proclaim they know the cure for cancer or something and then lead you down link after link after link to the inevitable 'pay for these pills'. We come back from that experience, I think, most of us, with the most obvious thing we should have seen and acted upon before we started like: 'If you have a cure for cancer then aren't you morally bound to freely disseminate it?'
That kind of thing.
But here, of course, we're not talking cures for cancer but simply 'enlightened' or especially acute analysis or observation but in context it has something of the same character doesn't it? For the 'sheeple', of which one may be one, could well be swayed by this acute analysis and eventually given enough people swayed a new direction be forced upon the govt and potentially even lives saved in the course of a war.
So these kind of authors have something of that character but not wholly.
They have perhaps a larger quotient of the traditional 'novelist' author who writes strictly for money.
Do they?
Ah. Not always. Not at all. But in the main we could say, perhaps.
We know for sure there is a significant number of them who fiercely believe they should be paid for their writings or at least supported while they write whether or not anyone reads their writings.
So that's one 'trend' or 'bent' or 'type' of author.
And there's another who just dearly wishes we'd read. They even self publish.
And so on.
As I said, I am a slow thinker. There's obviously much more to it than all that. More significances. I can't work it all out. Certainly not at this stage and possibly never.
But I do find it all a bit off-putting. Particularly this latest trend on Substack. Have you seen it? You start reading some author's piece and then mid stream it gets paywalled. BUT you are offered an 'out'. You can download the app and you'll be able to read this post and maybe some more I don't know, for free.
But when you follow the link to download the app it really is 'an app'. i.e. a smartphone thing. Apparently. My pc at least seems unable to get anything gainful from it.
I do not understand it at all. It seems a curious way of doing business. And an even more curious way of 'spreading your word'.
But they know better than I, I'm sure.
Farewell Petrodollar: America Next? should not be pay-walled; it was published on June 10th. I removed the other two paywalls.
BTW - I don't require paid subscriptions, but essays older than 4 weeks are placed behind a paywall by Substack, except for the one labeled "legendary" and "Joe Biden's Journey into Evil," which will remain freely accessible for as long as my Substack lives. I forget about that stuff because I don't "promote" "old" work.
As for the questions you raised and musings you offered - I can't speak for the others. But I do read analytics and know that even "big names" struggle with payments. As for myself, this article today, "World War III Countdown: Putin Dilemma" was just a fast reaction to ongoing madness. No real research or time invested. Just a personal take.
Alas, for so much stuff I wrote, which is now pay-walled and forever out of sight, I spent hours and hours, sometimes days to research and come up with some value. Nothing cheap in such work, no cancer cures. We all struggle in the dark, like Vogons, wanting to be loved. :)
You are one of the best, Trygve! I love the insight and depth of what you write.
You'd like it more if I didn't blush like an unmanly tomato at your compliment. I'm not worthy of it. Wink-wink, nudge nudge. :)))
Well, it looks like i need to give this a shot. Such guilt-wracked plugging merits the effort.
But on this subject, and while i have your ear...does anyone else experience the dissonance of desiring the comeuppance of the West because of the inherent justice in it, whilst simultaneously knowing it's going to destroy their lives too
I trust such dissonance is more prevalent than we would like to believe. What Biden's inherent evil has brought forth is a slow realization of how wicked, truly biblically devilish, those people running our lives are. When I researched for my book As America Crumbles...: A Grim Chronicle Exploring the Evil Source of America’s Catastrophic Decline (https://amzn.to/4cceTYN), I faced true horror.
Almost all of what I wrote in the book I knew beforehand, but placing it all in one huge pile of pillage, manipulation, and blood sobered me. It, in fact, broke my heart. I am an immigrant but America is my only home, the place where I have political asylum, but I feel betrayed. I can't even fathom how born Americans, once they open their eyes, must be feeling.
The majority of Americans never open their eyes nor do they have the capacity to comprehend what's really going on. A society consumed with reality TV, twerking females, LGBT++++++, silicone infusions for the perfect body, lousy education, crime, drugs,........Nah, they are 'eating their own young'.
Global elites will suffer more, because they have staked so much reputationally on a maximalist outcome--Russia Must Lose--not to mention materiel & fig-leaf billion$, plus out-sized Time & Attention. Ordinary citizens don't share the maximalist maxims of the elites & once OTAN loses to Russia will simply chive on.
The number of elites in the U.S. who have hardcore tied themselves in pretzel knots over this war--elected officials/unelected officials/members of Permanent Washington--tops out @ just shy of 5000, not enough even to fill a UFC arena on a Saturday night.
OTAN, led by the U.S., has self-euthanized on Project Ukraine
Comment of the year for me at least. That's it, isn't it ? I'm an ex Nato serviceman (Canadian Armed Forces) and i, with many other ex military men are "Rutin for Putin". I hate lies. That's my hang up. and I despise all that tell them. I have a family to protect and I find myself oddly having to explain to my young daughter that we are the bad guys now.
"There are very few that are gonna look in the mirror and say: The person I see is a savage monster. Instead, they make up some construction that justifies what they do. '" Noam Chomsky
Yes! The lies make things so much worse. If the Empire was brazen about their objectives it would be easier to handle. Instead we get false flags and inside jobs: people/entitities being scapegoated to exculpate themselves; and we get mealy mouthed platitudes about bringing democracy while they covertly subvert it.
There is an overt war on truth and the decent person recoils from lies and obfuscation. We are damaged when they are given in our name and denied the means to refute them by a compliant media.
" You know I hate, detest, and can't bear a lie, not because I am straighter than the rest of us, but simply because it appalls me. There is a taint of death, a flavour of mortality in lies—which is exactly what I hate and detest in the world—what I want to forget." ~ The Heart of Darkness , Joseph Conrad
Excellent quotation! And a reminder too to revisit the excellent work it came from.
I never like to get too hyperbolic or diabolical, but there is a reason Satan is called ‘the father of lies’. So much evil can be perpetuated by its bad seed. The truth shall set you free…
Thanks for your replies Charlie.
Thanks for the good links , Trygve. 😊
n.b. Iraqi oil revenues are held in the Federal Reserve Bank of New York and Iraq must ask permission to draw on these.
See, for example: https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/iraq-asked-for-1-billion-in-cash-this-time-washington-said-no-ab79b0e2
Go pay a visit to oilprice dot com. Look up Simon Walkins articles from a few years back. Iraq, that the USA and UK thought they had all stitched up as the spoils of war, has now contracted their oil output to Gasprom. Iran has done the same with both China and Russia.
It started with the Kurds and as I understand it, after the US demanded that Baghdad rescind their autonomy, Baghdad liked the deal the Kurds got so much, they asked if it could be expanded to include all of Iraq and got it. https://oilprice.com/Energy/Crude-Oil/The-Oil-Deal-That-Could-Break-Up-Iraq.html.
I'm told BRICS now control about 2/3 of the worlds oil and gas output. The USA nearly ran out of diesel about a year ago. Meditate on that !!! That alone, would kill most of us by starvation, but I guess we can stand to lose some weight.
Look at UST prices or oil futures. Neither are showing signs of distress.
For that matter, I wouldn't rely in 2024 on an article from 2021 predicting the imminent breakup of Iraq.
Fortunately US can still become energy independent again.
It's a finite resource though and moving it around isn't a walk in the park. Look at oil rich Canada. They still import a lot of oil from the Middle East as they can get it to port in eastern provinces instead of vulnerable pipelines stretch thousands of miles.
True...but then there is that pesky, fascist Prime Moron in office that hates oil, pipelines, and the Western Provinces.
... and his mother, mostly.
True, but what happened after that ? Of course we're swimming in affordable oil. The USA is the number one producer and it's an election cycle. Wait until January. It's a finite resource and there has to be a good reason for the USA and Britain to flatten countries and murder millions while burning through a couple trillion dollars for a resource they are trying to claim we have lots of. The number one state secret of any nation is how much oil they have. It reveals to intimately a nation's vulnerabilities and real wealth. There's a great YT video about how much oil the world actually has and the conclusion is.......... it's a secret.. I went back and tried to find it but could not.
There is a reason I specifically mentioned *futures* and not spot prices.
How far out ? Why would the US and UK spend trillions in brutal wars, trying to lock down more if the future was bright ? Are you confident that these countries are honestly reporting on their reserves ? I don't think so as it would be absolutely nuts to do that. None of them ever show their cards when negotiating oil trades.
What matters is not what governments report but what market participants believe and what their data implies or reveals.
The US and its puppets spend trillions on war. not for resources but for empire. To give an example, Saddam would have been delighted to be able to freely sell oil for dollars on world markets. The US did not allow him to do so, hence the "oil for food" program.
"What matters is not what governments report but what market participants believe and what their data implies or reveals."
Where does the 'market data' come from ? Government stats, no ? I used to work for a NATO government agency that measured Nat Gas moving through pipelines to make sure there was no cheating, in one form or the other.
People think oil and gas reserves are public info. Well I guess you could say they are but just like inflation, the government could and does manipulate that info. Unlike inflation, however, there is no way of doing any verification unless they infiltrate and hack into government and corporate accounts.
I could tell you how much natgas was travelling through a hub and what it's composition was but how much the seller or buyer has was none of my business, even though I had the government behind me.
"The US and its puppets spend trillions on war. not for resources but for empire." Not sure what you mean there but I almost certainly disagree with the premise that governments aren't like pirate ships and they most assuredly are after resource treasure. Lindsey Graham 0:40 >> https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TzLKdn0hqFY&t=376s
Slow starvation of gas, oil, minerals, fertilisers and food. And organise the BRICS to do it. At the same time eliminate the NATO commanders one by one. Close us down.
Call it a mercy killing we're the hostages of maniacs.
Well, there is one war that the West appears to be winning, and that is the Media-Propaganda War which, (it could be argued), indirectly kills as many as real ones do.
The West is only winning the propaganda war in the West itself, as the rest of humanity does not buy the bull***
I did point out, the 'WEST' and not the World.
The Media-Porpaganda War in the West disallows putting a 'W' in VVP's column. They're so protective of the West's ever-softening Soft Power that a Russian or Belarusian tennis player winning a championship can cause a melt-down, let alone allowing a Russian or Belarusian athlete to hear their national anthem or display their country's flag while raising a trophy in the winner's circle.
The intent of the Media-Propaganda War in the West was to isolate Russia in the eyes of the RoW, which failed miserably as the series of Capitulation Summits have shown. In an Own-Goal, which history may prove epic, the West has isolated itself from the RoW
And yet history teaches us that all empires fall. Always. No matter how they try to cling to power, sooner or later it all comes crashing to the ground. There are no exceptions to this rule.
So it will be with this empire, it is just a matter of time.
But it usually doesn't end with absolute agony. Look at France, Spain, Portugal , Rome, UK... The USA just needs to welcome it and try as best they can for a soft landing.
Soft landings are for sissies.
Yep. Well I say we begin to take control.
It is clear we are not even considered never mind consulted. And what's worse the clerisy do not speak up on our behalf and suggest we should be.
Here's my idea of a step in the right direction:
https://abrogard.com/blog/2023/12/25/dont-write-to-congress/
open source voting apps
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Open-source_voting_system
Yes, and I think the coming US elections may be way up there on the "...nothing the empire of lies will not do to maintain power" list.
What goes around, comes around.
We should be ready for similar things to happen here
Would be funny if the Ukrainians, maddened by the West writing them off, decide to go launch terror attacks against them as well.
You talk about it as a remote possibility. It's in fact quite feasible. Remember Al Quaeda?
If the Eurocrats ever need a terrorist organisation to for example necessitate a federal EU level army and direct control of member state police forces, they'll probably find some of the Azov guys to "come back for one final job"
In fact it's quite likely. We have a lot of Ukrainian people here already. A few of them when pissed off,could do a lot of damage.
Is it Ukrainians though? Nominally I guess - it is a lawless, corrupt place - but its the $ rolling in that permit terror attacks, and the providers of the $ are aware of what they are facilitating, its just a little shimmy to move the spotlight from them. You’d have to look at it that funds (weapons) provided by US etc are used by US etc to attack US etc.
A dead certainty.
Way back in 2022, after the first sabotage and terrorist attacks started, and after the HIMARS first made an appearance, the Kremlin should have started to physically take out the economic and political elite in the West.
US sends HIMARS missiles that killed hundreds and thousands of Russian soldiers? The Lockheed Martin board of directors and all the main shareholders all die with days of each other. Assassinations, explosions, etc. But it would have been best done with an official missile strike on the HQ, with the Kremlin taking full credit for it, and then declaring that the matter is settled if there is no further violation from the US, the way the Iranians did. But then the Iranians had their president and FM die in a "crash". Which is why the Kremlin didn't follow that path -- the Iranians were ready to pay that price, in the Kremlin they are cowards and weaklings.
That is the only way to enforce deterrence.
Back to our usual reminder of the fundamentals of the situation: this is a war of Western elites against Russia using Ukrainian elites as middle men and regular Ukrainian people as the cannon fodder. What do you do in such a situation?
1) You can fight the cannon fodder endlessly, that will only deplete your strength, plus in this case it is actually your own people, which makes it doubly and triply f****d up for you.
2) You can take out the Ukrainian elites and thus cut off the middle men. But the Western elites don't really care about the Ukrainian elites either, they see them as Russian traitors, i.e. doubly despicable (nobody likes traitors, plus they are Russian), so if they find another way to mobilizie cannon fodder, war will continue
3) You go after the Western elites directly, who currently think they are untouchable, and make them seriously afraid for their personal safety. This is the only way to stop the war. The downside is that you risk some of your own elites being taken out in the process too.
So what does the Kremlin choose? Of course option #1, which has zero chances of ending the war and reestablishing deterrence, worse, it erodes deterence completely. Not even option #2, and definitely not option #3.
If it is indeed true, as recent Putin public appearances indicated, that the General Staff are actually grounded in reality, but it has been Putin personally who insisted on esssentially surrender terms back in March 2022, then he has to go. Now. Before it's too late, though in many ways it already is.
BTW, that also means that presumably it was him who sabotaged the SMO from the start, by refusing to mobilize the necessary resource before the war started (I am sure in the General Staff they knew very well you can't do much with 150,000 men), then imposed the absurdly pacificst self-defeating rules of engagement early on, then sabotaged the SMO again by refusing to mobilize in Spring 2022, and yet again by mobilizing only partially and only way, way too late, plus everything that has happened since then that has resulted in the current situation, in which Russia is a punching bag for the West.
Either Putin is completely detached from reality, or he is in fact compromised and not working in Russia's interest. Either way, time for someone else.
This cannot continue.
Russia is rapidly going down the Syria path....
Another instance where it's sufficient to read the first sentence of the comment to be able to make an informed decision on how to best spend the time: reading the rest of the comment, or not.
Another Putin fluffing ignoramus who thinks criticism of his Dear Leader should be punishable by death. So much copium and projection of Dear Leader Puta to blow NATO out. Winning by dying is what Dear Leaders followers want.
Liked
LLM breakdowns and summaries of this post by Simplicius The Thinker:
https://open.substack.com/pub/complexiathesinker/p/llm-over-sitrep-62324-coordinated
"Today what appeared to be a large coordinated series of terror provocations was carried out by Ukraine and Western intel assets."
"Western intel assets."
Can we please just stop it. Just say it. It's the United States. Okay? It's my country. Shout if from the roof tops, for crying out loud.
Whose your Nazi now? Is that so hard? Whose your terrorist state? What is going on in the world makes me think 9/11 was as inside job. For sure. More than think. Just ask the 48-million illegal aliens that have flooded into my country.
"Western intel assets." Stop it with the euphemisms. Speak plainly. Speak clearly.
It's certainly not a given that the terrorist actions are uniquely planned and actioned by the USniks
The brits are long standing devotees and practitioners of terrorisms of all sorts, some say they are the very 'best'
Plus - almost by definition these acts are conducted as obscurely as possible, so's who is responsible is not easy to establish -
The Brits MI6 and predecessors have a lengthy history of associations with Ukrainian Nazis after WW2 extending to Neo Nazis and ultranationalists before and since the Western Maidan putsch. This accommodation of Nazis ideology speaks for itself and betrays the nascent fascist currents in the UK ruling class. No organisation is too evil for MI6 to patronise witness its involvement with Islamic terrorist movements for many years reaching its nadir with the Islamic state ISIS. This history and expertise gives certainty that British Intelligence is involved in these terror attacks fulfilling the brutal needs of the UK ruling class to damage and despoil Russia unity amongst its diverse population.
! Exactly
Good point. I would add that 1 very strong motivation driving the UK in this is its insane desire to destroy Russia, and that desire dates back to the 19th century, if not earlier.
Pft, I can easily track it back to the first British vessel arriving in Arkhangelsk during Ivan IV's reign. The crew's reports back home reek of shock, jealousy, hostility and insist on action against this powerful nation that will inevitably rival their own if left to its own devices.
Yes, the Brits are actually the most russophobic of all westerners, and they are probably the original source of russophobia, which began about 200 years ago. All this Anglo-Saxon hatred of Russia and confrontation with it began approximately after the Russian Empire took Crimea from the Ottoman Empire and annexed some other territories. Around this time, sometime in the mid-19th century, the Russian Empire reached the peak of its power and influence. The peak of the British Empire's power occurred around the same time, so it saw Russia as its main competitor and a threat to its hegemony. At the same time, the decline of the Ottoman Empire began and Britain was afraid that Russia would spread its influence into the territories of the Ottoman Empire, that is, the Middle East and part of Central Asia. And it is precisely in these regions that Mi6 now mainly operates, and it is they who contributed to the creation of most terrorist organizations and radical Islamic movements in these territories. The CIA are just puppies compared to them. In the conflict in Ukraine, it was the Brits who caused the most damage to Russia, and they are behind the majority of Ukrainian terrorist attacks against Russia. The Ukrainian GUR is a local branch of Mi6, and its head Budanov is also a minion of Mi6. British intelligence and special forces are also behind most attacks on the Russian Black Sea Fleet.
Exactly how many ATCMS do the Brits possess? Ukraine's weapon of choice in this latest attack into Crimea. That's right: Zero. So, it was the United States "who done it." Say it.
While the Brits are obnoxious, and very much like the United States in that they are an empire that refuses to die, the Brits have been irrelevant a lot longer than the United States has. With the United States we should allow a few failings, like The Fall of Saigon and Afghanis failing from the wheel wells of C-5 Galaxies. [heavy sarcasm]
All the Brits have needed, since World War I, was a proper finishing off. For some reason the collapse of their economy, society, and government, the complete loss of all natural resources, and the fact that the Brits are truly just an island people does not change the whole "Rule Brittanica" thing, the greatest delusion in all of history. Except the delusion the United States has, about democracy, and saving the whole world for something that does not exist. A fiction. The Brits remain unfazed. James Bond will save them.
In that terrorist attacks "almost by definition these acts are conducted as obscurely as possible" the Brits and the United States (9/11 and the Nord Stream Pipeline terrorist acts) are great at playing cowards. The reason the culprit (about as obvious as obvious can be) has gotten away with terrorism has been the terror of naming the Devil -- the threat of instant death.
"And I am? Yes? Say my name."
At some point the United States is going to get back what they have been putting out there -- at least five-fold. All things being equal, I see five (5) 25-megaton nuclear warheads falling on Washington, DC, in the near future. First on Langley, then on the Pentagon, then the FBI, then on the US Capitol Building, then the White House (just too irrelevant for words at this point). We will never hear about it because the fully owned, fully controlled, fully manipulated, fully propagandized mainstream media will never allow it. Unless you live there (and died there) or visit there and are now not feeling very well (hair and teeth falling out, abscesses all over your body, can't keep anything down), you will never know.
You dial up the angerwanger just about as much as the brits, that's saying a'plenty - you could probably pass their induction requirements
You may observe, as does S and many, that the terrorist attacks presently dominating the military acts of the the NATO ites are conducted by the brits and the yankas, with some tea lady assistance from the French and Germans
The reason - they have not found anything else they can do, and sure the anglos like terrorism probably more than the euros do, and are the better suited by their dark perfidious souls, and also because they are ungrown up country cousins for the most part
Keep your nuclear fantaisies for them, maybe they'll let you do that too
Well the fact that there are/were 12 CIA bases in Ukraine kinda points to who was responsible. Further, the fact that Victoria Nuland has been directing all things Ukraine for over a decade should leave no doubt that the USSA is responsible... Chip
The RoW is increasingly less disposed to believe in/trust US claims, still less CIA
The US (gvmtPRMSMclass) always like to boast of how successful their terrorisms are, and claim in this, as in all things exceptional status
But....the US (gvmtclass) also likes to claim that everything anyone does of which they approve is also...down to the US
It would be prudent to discount US claims, especially at a time when the US does not seem, by any standards, to be winning in this war, and when their terrorist tactics have lost them everywar they have fought since...God know when
As for Vicky - the US also like their guinea pigs or is it their scapegoats, or both - whatever Vicky is a low lever porker : is is now was
It is very certain that although these fattened ups make a lot of noise they are not the dominant class who are in charge of the US
It is prudent to think that those CIA bases are basically stores, strictly commercial operations, why bother to fight a war when you can sucker the Ukies the euros etc to do it for you, and you can trade in guns, drugs, women, babies, bios, men, girls....the list goes on and on
Organs for transplant
That splashy nytimes piece on the 12 CIA labs, bylined by several journalists & boasting over 400 sources, reads like a boastful Infomercial on how cutting edge, indispensable & savvy the CIA is: the CIA built Ukrainian intel from the ground up! Ukraine came to John Brennan after Euromaidan & practically begged for help in spying on Russia! Sure, the Ukrainians were feistier than the principled & disciplined CIA personnel, more inclined to assassinations & car bombs--so of course the CIA gave the Ukrainians a good talking to about the rules-based-international-order & it was all good. Swaggering, puffed-up, vainglorious boastfulness.
The U.S. intel agencies have to be @ the epic center of every geopolitical event, directing traffic as it were--so of course the CIA had 12 labs in Ukraine many, many years before Russia commenced the SMO, because the U.S. leads the world in monitoring all the hot spots.
It's how they knew that ISIS-K carried out the Crocus City massacre, because the CIA has its finger on the pulse.
It's how they knew that Prigozhin was going to embark upon his March: finger on the pulse.
The nytimes article was a glamor piece, after the fact, designed to Big Up the earthshattteringly exceptional ways the CIA knows about stuff before anyone ever knows.
Well, realistically speaking I really meant the plurality of 2: the CIA and MI6 for the most part.
You missed Mossad. They are the 3 headed Cerberus waiting for Heracles.
You forgot China.
"The MSS functions as China's intelligence, security and secret police agency. A document from the U.S. Department of Justice described the agency as being like a combination of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) and Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)."
Want to include Russia's Kremlin in this terrorist attack. Spice it up with yet another false flag? Yeah, sure. That's the ticket. Russia bombed itself. Russia copied the ATACM and let loose "The Poodle of War."
Mossad, too.
So, that's five (5). Maybe more. Each addition taking us further afield from the real culprit (not culprits, not plural, not the several, not the many) responsible for this whole mess. For crying out loud, just say it. Europe doesn't count. They are nothing more than a vassal state, a lap dog of "the Republic," the Global Hegemon with a Napoleonic Complex.
While that's certainly true and you reignite my faith in Americans simply by existing, you shouldn't underestimate Perfidious Albion's skills in staging internal strife. While too. militarily miniscule to pull off something like Crimea, Dagestan is their signature move. Brits are sponsoring uncontrolled islamic migration into Russia via a UN fund (the irony!) and manipulate extremist prophets into positions of influence within that cadre. Americans lack the finesse to play this long game.
Just like they have at home. We in the UK are the test run. In fact we have our own active Hannibal Directive. The Arena Attack wouldn't have been possible without the RN picking up the Abedi brothers from Tripoli.
Precisely so.
US State Department and White House. Please. UK are fluffy pets with no real independence, their job is to distract.
Those familiar with the "Looney Tunes" canon may recall the yappy little dog that follows Spike The Bulldog around, simping and getting the big dog into fights?
The uk is that yappy little dog.
except this US dog doesn't get into fights - dumbo gringo- it gets others into fights
Someone, please slap that dog down for good.
Its the UK too. 😔
I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue. but maybe it was a scratch for credibility. Who knows ? I haven't heard much detail on the damages except the church was set ablaze. I'm more interested to hear what happened at the synagogue as that would be a reliable indicator of who was behind this,
Why wouldn't the U.S. attack a synagogue of it is to rouse anger where/when it is needed? After all, ZioNazistan itself does not hesitate to sacrifice its own citizens as convenient — see the Pfizer kill shot levels.
I just notice how Israel will spare no cost to bring a single captured soldier home or avenge the death of a single Jew. In short, Jews never kill Jews. They're considered immediate family.
G'day Charlie, what about the Hannibal directive kill all Isrealis who could possibly be taken hostage. It happen in October. Also the two hostages barechested shot in Gaza. Just two examples.
Did they know they were Jews ? It was my understanding that many of the Jewish fatalities were confused for Hamas. One of the drawbacks of denying nationhood to Palestine : No uniforms. Hamas should just top up their attire with a yarmulke when they go on missions.
G'day Charlie, in one of the kibutzim that Hamas had enter and the IOF followed and attacked some settlers were being held in a house by Hamas soldiers and the IOF destroyed the building and it's occupant with a tank round. Also I feel you need to research the Hannibal directive as it explicitly explains the need to kill Israeli settlers usually to avoid them becoming hostages.
well that's entirely wrong. they did it at the beginning of this whole thing. in fact they 'began' the whole thing inasmuch as Netanyahu knew it was coming. we must be talking at cross purposes. perhaps you were being facetious, tongue in cheek or something...
That's what I used to think, but as each goes by I find out ever more about what the Jews are about.
Zionists do kill Jews when it benefits Zionism. The terror bombings of Jews in Baghdad in the early 1950's were done by Zionists and blamed on the Arabs. Fake "Arab Terrorism" was the only way to get the Jews to leave the city they had lived in very comfortably for over 2000 years. And the Jews did leave in panic, trading the paved streets and prosperous economy of Iraq's capital for the mud streets, poor economy and dismal housing of Occupied Palestine. It's Israelis, not Arabs, who wrote it's Zionists who did the bombings. The Baghdadi Jews were shocked to find themselves the victims of hard-core Ashkenazi racism.
At university in the early 1970s we had a "Middle East Discussion Group" that got some interesting guest speakers. One was an Israeli who said he was part of that operation, though he claimed that he was on the propaganda side rather than the kinetic operations. Unfortunately I can't remember his name.
"I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue. " The US is unlikely to directly attack a synagogue, but the US isn't likely to use such proxies in such an explicit manner. That's not how the US used al Qaeda against the USSR or al Nusra against Syria, for example.
It pays them, trains them, arms them, and then sends them to "attack Russia" without specifying all the details. That's especially true when operating proxies through intermediaries. The objective is to cause attacks and turbulence and incent hatred between ethnic groups within Russia and the details of how that's done don't matter so much.
agree
That is the way it works with proxies in general. However, in the case of the Ukraine it is clear who is paying, training and supplying who to do the job: the destruction of Russia.
I would not put it past the U.S. to carry out a false flag attack against a synagogue, after receiving the green light from its ZioNazi master, of course. Mind you, the master is also a master at carrying out false flags, such as 9/11 and 10/7.
The US-paid & trained “freedom fighters “ were carried away. Besides, Jews are only interested in “what is good for Jewish tribe” hence the Hannibal doctrine to smear the Palestinians. The US government and CIA are throughly judaized, and the supremacist lunacy, which justifies all and any kind of crimes and depravity, shines in the US/UK actions.
Whether the sadistic genocide of children and women in Gaza and bombing schools in Donbas or bombing civilians in Syria and Crimea, it shows the anti-human and supremacist character of Owners of the collective west - the private banking cartel which interests are protected by the criminal CIA / Mossad/ MI6 “security services “. Langley is dominated by Mossad.
The MIC is just a Comprador (a traitorous agency) working in cahoots with the private banking cartel. The supranational fascist mega corporations BlackRock, Cargill, at al. are tentacles of the private banking cartel. The judaization of the collective west governance is complete.
"I find it incredible that the USA would attack a synagogue."
Well, the United States can only engage in only so much genocide before resorting to the false flag of piety. All before it resumes its genocide of whole peoples.
That's exactly what I thought. Some Mossad agent will be getting a Gilligan thrashing from the Skipper back in Tel Aviv for not giving them parameters. Have we heard any details on what went down at the synagogue ?
The attacks on the synagogues were basically fights between the terrorist attackers and the police and private guards guarding the synagogues. That's where most of the 15 police died who lost their lives fighting the terrorists.
The terrorists attacked out of the blue, hence the many casualties among police, and they managed to throw firebombs into at least one of the synagogues to completely burn out the interior. But there were no worshippers inside or other personnel, so apparently the only fatalities at the synagogues were police and guards.
Given the demographic makeup of Dagestan, it's almost certain that some of the policemen who died defending the synagogues were Muslim. I haven't seen the full list so I can't confirm that.
If there’s an attack on a synagogue, the western political/media class can always point at that as Putin 'failing to protect Russian Jews'
It's the job of ISIS to provoke, and lock the country into a conflict no sane person would agree to on a normal day. nothing special here. And US proxies in UA massacred Jews for as long as that was a thing, into the modern era when - yes - they burned down synagogues. Heck US proxies even attacked the US itself in 9/11. They know perfectly well who they fund.
My newsfeed was blaming Russia for the attack on the synagogue.
Shameless, but the imperial propaganda machine is nothing if not shameless.
the imperial propaganda machine is owned by zionists, which means that it is lying and shameless
the imperial propaganda machine is owned by zionists, which means that it is lying and shameless
Max Blumenthal & Kit Klarenberg did detailed investigative journalism just days after 7 October, debunking knee-jerk narratives about Hamas's attack & revealing the extent to which the IDF killed Jewish Israelis on that day.
Would Jews kill Jews to advance a war aim?
Would the U.S. sign off on its proxy attacking a synagogue if it were possible to weaken VVP in doing so?
This attack is clearly similar to the attacks on the Palestinians in Gaza — hardly surprising as the same modus operandi (killing innocents) is being used. As Netanyahu has stated so clearly and often, these are eschatological issues for Israelis, and Zelensky could say the same. As presaged by the Old Testament of Genesis, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Judges etc.
The Russians are far more patriotic than the current American population...Attacking schools will simply lead to a demand that Kiev should be leveled...Whereas in America, the hated Biden administration (hated by military families who have seen. wounded soldiers mistreated and kicked to the curb) has lost the support of many, and the number of qualified volunteers has dropped dramatically...This is leading to the enlistment of overweight, low IQ recruits, many of whom have had problems with the law...repeating "McNamara's folly" in the Vietnam War...Such recruits are often more dangerous to our side than the enemy....
I loved a quote from one ex serviceman who was being asked to return to the USAF: "Give me a country worth dying for and I'll re-enlist".
Let him join Russian force then :D
It's past time for Russia to make it personal. Hit the decision makers.
You'd need a Sarmat to reach Biden and Langley.
Bidet isn't a decision maker.
He is but decisions he makes are low profile. Should I go with double chocolate and mint ice cream or vanilla today?
And then he shits his nappy. But that's not a decision, it's involuntary.
Hope he can hold it for 90 minutes.
Or, their new nuclear-powered cruise missile (name escapes me) that's in testing phase. Can stay aloft indefinitely.
And stop them from ruining the west? Not gonna happen.
Also, every Russian civilian who dies hardens the resolve of the population to finish off Ukraine and the entire west if it doesn’t stop, but this will be done in the most drawn-out way possible to bleed the west, for another decade if necessary. The balance of power is shifting as we speak, and the only possible brake is western leaders waking up and realizing that they have pushed a losing hand. If the west stops now we may retain some power globally. I think Trump realizes this with Ukraine and Gaza. One can only hope. If we go all in it’s truly over, and maybe that’s what the world needs.
Trump realizes this with Ukraine, but I've seen no evidence of Gaza.
I have seen vid of Jared drooling over waterfront real estate potential once Gaza is razed
Even if Trump wanted to leave Ukraine, he won't be allowed to. Trump is weak, stupid and easily manipulated.
Recall how Trump twice cucked out of leaving Syria after being called "Putin puppet!".
Yup.
Sad but true. Weak men like him are dangerous since they want to prove they are tough. Easily manipulated,
For that matter, Trump also twice attacked Syria in an attempt to prove he was a tough guy.
It didn't work. His enemies weren't pacified and they saw right through the pathetic little cuck.
And did what Fauci and Gates told him to do over the vax and warpspeed. Despite RFK's warnings.
At the begining of this war, a nun from Ukraine told me of the prophecy by a prominent Orthodox Christian prophet, that this war would continue for 3 years and 3 months, and there would be the Bloody Easter and the Famine Easter. At at the start of this war, it all seemed just surreal, but the longer it goes on, the more real this prophesy looks...
I think I've heard something about this, but could you give me a more direct source?
I'm not saying anything about you personally, but a rando on the internet who told me about someone who said something about a mystic prophecy is a bit thin, not much to go on.
The last thing I care about is to impress an irrelevant stranger (you) :-) - no offence. I was just reminiscing out loud on it. You don't really expect to goad me into telling you the name of the nun, the prophet or the convent, do you? Are you totally oblivious to what is happening to the Orthodox Christians in Ukraine?
No need to get snippy.
The Orthodox Church is an important player in these events and one of the ways they operate is through mysticism and prophecy.
If such statements have been made it could be important to know them and people may want to hear them.
You yourself think it's important information otherwise you would not have mentioned it. How can it be important to mention a prophecy on a public forum but then also believe that it's important that the name of the prophet, when and where he spoke and exactly what he said must remain a secret?
Dangling out a little piece of information and then refusing to share the details that would confirm it is a classic technique of obfuscation and disinformation.
So don't do that.
I might be snippy :-), but I wasn't "dangling" this information. My family member was a nun at a Ukrainian convent. The same convent I visited in the mid 1990s, and the nuns were talking about that "they are chipping people in the West." I thought they were lost in the "dark-ages" or plain loony, and I tried to "enlighten" them that in the West only the dogs and young kids (in case lost/kidnapped ) get chipped but nobody else. Given our current situation, it looks like the joke was on me. I wish I paid more attention and asked more questions, but it seemed so improbable. Both pieces of info - the war duration and chipping people in the West I heard first hand and I was told the name of the prophet and the location.
Where are we on that timeline how, ie when what date would be considered the start date?
From the start date, what yet? The conversation took place in the early days of war, it just seemed improbable it would go even more than 1 year, never mind over 3.
Kosmas the Aetolian?
It's hard to point to an incident when terrorism has achieved a political objective. It causes those harmed to hate those killing civilians. Do you really think Hamas planned Israel's assault which has taken the lives of thousands of their fighters and many of their top leaders? It is far better to get the enemy to kill your civilians - that will gain you support from the outside. And a terror campaign inside Russia would be very difficult to pull off. Assume that the SVR and the GRU have penetrated the Ukrainian government at every level. This is a civil war and retaliation is easily arranged when everyone looks the same and speaks the same language. If the SVR identifies a Ukrainian terrorist cell, I would not want to be a member of anyone's family. I spent ten years of my life doing a deep dive of our portion of the war in Vietnam, and vendetta drove much of the violence. But there's one difference. The red terror/white terror took place inside South Vietnam - not North Vietnam. I would not want to plan a sustained terror campaign inside Russia.
These are wise words. And it is worth remembering the Russian experience in. Chechnya, and the outcome.
>It's hard to point to an incident when terrorism has achieved a political objective
I will give just two "minor" examples: August 6th and August 9th 1945
I've spent years of my life studying and writing about the Pacific War. The bombs were not terrorism - they were a device aimed to get the war over with before either the US Army invaded Kyushu or the US Navy blockaded Japan and starved them out. Get back to me when Ukraine starts igniting atomic bombs inside Russia.
https://foreignpolicy.com/2013/05/30/the-bomb-didnt-beat-japan-stalin-did/
This article is very compelling. Paraphrasing it :
the Japanese were not particularly concerned with atomic bombs since the US air force had already destroyed 68 Japanese cities, many of them were far more devastated than Hiroshima or Nagasaki. What they were concerned with is the Soviet Union. And on 9 August 1945 the Soviet Union invaded Manchuria and Sakhalin Island, and declared war on Japan. They easily overran Manchuria and were preparing to be in Japan proper (Hokkaido) in 10 days - months earlier than US forces were likely to be. Although the Japanese had already realised they had lost, they were hoping to inflict high casualties on US forces when they invaded, in order to get better surrender terms, ideally via the Soviet Union as a mediator. When the Russians invaded, that option evaporated, and Japan was now facing an impossible fight against two great powers from different directions. And that is why they surrendered, not because of the atomic bombs.
Relevant is the very interesting (and little known) is the battle of Nomonhan (known as Khalkhin Gol in Russia), which you can read about here:
Stuart D. Goldman
"Nomonhan 1939, The Red Army's victory that shaped World War II"
Naval Institute Press , Annapolis, Maryland 2012
ISBN 978-1-59114-339-0
and here:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Battles_of_Khalkhin_Gol
Indeed. Anyone who has spent years of their life studying and writing about the Pacific War should know this stuff. The fact that some don't shows how effective propaganda can be when it is in such volume that it crowds out what little objective information there is.
In the British election campaign, Farage has introduced a little bit of truth about how NATO provoked the Ukrainian war. He has been attacked from all sides by the fooled and by the conscious liars. In an extraordinary but hardly surprising political intervention, the British Ministry of Defence issued an official statement attacking him and repeating the lies he had criticised. I haven't seen anyone in the mainstream decry this blatant election interference.
Well, it's an existential election for the other parties this go 'round.
Have you ploughed your way through Coox's book?
I'm just a dilettante, so I don't know all the writers in the field.
Which book do you mean ?
Nomonhan: Japan Against Russia, 1939 (1985) by Alvin D. Coox 978-0804711609
Exactly. And the bombs were dropped to send the Russian a message. And it only hastened the invasion of Manchuria. Those GM and grr and whatever are ignorant to facts and live on provoking people in these discussions.
That's not particularly compelling given it doesn't go into detail about what was happening in Tokyo. Explaining the Japanese government's operation prior to the end of WWII is beyond the scope of a post here, except to indicate that Hirohito had only limited control over his own government and assassinating him or compelling his acquiescence to a military coup even at that late date was possible. He wanted to end the war, and the atomic bombings and fire bombings of cities were the main reasons why, other than not seeing any likelihood of victory. The Soviet invasion just multiplied his issues. There was actually a coup attempt at the end, intending to sabotage his radio message to the nation. The timing of the surrender was basically when the forces aligned in Tokyo. No one claims Hirohito was some kind of powerful ruler or focused enough on the ball. He was weak and easily led astray.
The part that is clearly not pointed out is that according to the Yalta terms, the invasion of Hokkaido would have entitled the Soviets to an occupation zone in Japan and a portion of Tokyo. The US was not interested in that outcome, so the bombs dropped to get the surrender done before Soviet influence was felt in Japan. As it happens, Stalin wasn't all that intent on carrying through with this - it wasn't a core interest of his, and he cancelled the invasion two days before it was to go off. But it was a big fear in the US that it would happen.
Toland's book will give you better information sourced from participants.
https://www.amazon.com/Rising-Sun-Decline-Japanese-1936-1945/dp/0812968581
"Hirohito had only limited control over his own government and assassinating him or compelling his acquiescence to a military coup"
Reminiscent of the Usurper of Kiev
The history book on the shelf is always repeating itself
It always rhymes.
Wife will be thrilled that you used an ABBA lyric, lol.
"Although the Japanese had already realised they had lost, they were hoping to inflict high casualties on US forces when they invaded, in order to get better surrender terms..."
Reminiscent of our current belligerent, prosecuting the war while losing, *hoping to get better surrender terms...*
Weren't they also battling the Chinese, and losing, by that time? Yes, the nukes were totally unnecessary.
Outstanding analysis 🫡
Thank you for yet another comprehensive analysis.
I saw footage apparently showing General Sodol getting drunk in a bar in Odessa at the same time that Russians were making advances in the Toretsk region, so things are definitely starting to fall apart, domestically. Which makes me wonder why/how Maria Buzuglaya has become the new "Arestovich" or chief criticizer of the Zelensky gov't.
As for the rest, I find it utterly ridiculous that terrorist attacks will somehow sour the Russian people on Putin. If anything, it'll just unite them more. Certainly, everyone's focusing on that horrific attack in Sevastopol right now and I haven't heard a whisper of anyone blaming Putin for that at all.
PS - The World Bank did a comprehensive study on global grain shipments a couple of weeks ago. Long story short is numbers are UP. Literally no one starved because the grain deal collapsed. It was BS from the very beginning.
Mariana giving herself a Tymoshenko glow-up
Maria B. imho should have her picture in a Russian dictionary by the word сука.
I think some Chechnyan forces need to take a field trip to Dagestan.
Not going to happen. Remember conflict between Dagestan and Chechnya? This would only play into hands of those who activated their terrorist cell - western intelligence.
The video of the launches is at night. Can’t be the ones targeting the beach in Sevastopol.
Plus, why is anyone going to a beach in an active war zone?
to swim
lol, like
Crimea is not an active war zone. Grab an atlas and study it.
Really? So all these drones and missiles attacking it over the last 2 years are just my imagination?
That is not the definition of a war zone. Dictionaries help.
He's got a point though, I have hard time thinking of Crimea as an active war zone. Not to mention that Sevastopol is a central naval base, it's literally sitting on top and between arsenals. It's been attacked so much that indeed it may qualify as one. But drive half an hour away, and it's still the same leisury Crimea. You're only in danger if some AA installation is nearby or you're between launch sites and possible targets so that shot down missiles may rain on you. Which is btw not what happened at the beach, today's videos prove that cluster munitions deployed correctly and so it was indeed aimed there, not accidentally shot down by AA.
I answered on another thread.
My point was not to blame the victim but was to point out that Crimea has been constantly attacked and if people want to live their lives normally - which I support - they just need to understand the risk even if they’re willing to take it.
It’s possible that this was deliberate on civilians. The silence from the Americans and the gloating from the Ukrainians seems to point to it and it’s something that I wouldn’t put past them. They’ve been doing it in Donbass and Belgorod so why not Crimea?
That’s all.
You are so tiresome with your nit-picking, irritating provocations. The whole of Ukraine, Crimea and an good part of Russia is a war zone. And a big chunk of Black Sea.
There have been many strikes at night in the last month and a half.
And another one last night too, even more massive than the one during the day.
>Plus, why is anyone going to a beach in an active war zone?
How many warm water beaches does Russia have? Crimea's main economic activity is tourism.
And this is precisely why this strike was carried out -- to ruin the tourist season. They weren't targeting Balbek, look at the map -- the beach is out of the way of any trajectory from Odessa/Nikolaev to Balbek. They were aiming precisely at Sevastopol, and this is why it was done on Sunday, June 23, the official start of the tourist season, in the middle of the day, when there are as many people out in the open as possible. If Russian AD hadn't shot down most of the missiles, it would have been hundreds of dead.
I understand and we can go the route of “we’ll live our lives the terrorists won’t win”. I’m just saying that these people are criminals (Ukrainian leadership and the west) so I wouldn’t put it past them.
I recall they tried something similar last year (or was 2022) and have been shelling markets in Donetsk for the last 10 years. So it’s not new and to be expected. If someone wants to still go there then it’s a risk they should accept.
That’s all.
Donbasss shelling became much worse after the SMO started.
First, places outside artillery range were safe previously, now they are not.
Second, it was random shelling previously, now it is precisely targeted for maximum carnage.
The Kremlin, always in its usual mode of "if we ignore the problem sufficiently stubbornly, it will go away on its own", leading to the natural corollary of "information that will result in demands on us to do something should be suppressed" has mostly kept quiet about these, but once HIMARS appeared, the Americans (we know they do all the targeting) started hitting bus stops in the Donbass with anti-personnel HIMARS rounds. Absolutely gruesome scenes of babushkas lying on the street dead with their brains leaking onto the pavement, with their bodies and everything nearby turned into swiss cheese from the tungsten pellets.
The Kremlin could have broadcast this all over the world, but it didn't. Because had it done so, it would have had to strike the "dear partners". And the dear partners are more dear to the Kremlin that the Donbas babushkas.
Now the terror is expanding to Belgorod, Sevastopol, and soon many other cities. Because the Kremlin is a total mockery that nobody takes seriously.
well lots of us do take it seriously. but yourself and such as rurik skywalker make us worry a bit. And such as this which I can't actually listen to and understand. Because I can't do Russian. But the context makes it fairly clear that it is a strong condemnation of the Kremlin's management of the war. https://t.me/KvachkovV/1491
And, of course, Prigozhin is not 'swept under the rug' in our minds even though not mentioned anywhere any more.
Nor is Texas Bentley, come to that.
So show us some good links or sites and/or how we can translate those russian telegram vids. :)
Think about who the Kremlin has directly gone after personally.
Strelkov is in jail, Kvachkov was arrested too at one point, Prigozhin was destroyed, etc. etc. So Russian patriots are silenced.
Meanwhile how many top Banderites got a missile on their heads? Zero.
What does that tell us?
It seems to tell us that there's something bad happening. Seems to. Fact is we don't know all the ins and outs of these things at all. I mean we see clearly that much is bad. But how much it is an indicator of a whole 'iceberg' of bad we simply don't know. So we should be slow to jump to conclusions.
Let me put it the other way around: Putin has made spectacular improvements in Russia's position vis a vis the whole world in the last two years. It would not be an exaggeration to say he is leading a global insurrection.
So following the logic most often used when seeing something 'bad' such as those things you mention we should jump to the conclusion that Putin is therefore the messiah?
Not so, is it?
We never seem to jump to conclusions that someone is wholly divinely right.
But we seem very liable to jump to conclusions that they are wholly satanically wrong.
And that's what, essentially Rurik etc ( I don't know what to call them overall: the 'Russian dissenters' ?) are calling him. They seriously maintain that everything he does is intended to destroy the Russian State in the interests of Western oligarchs and even more: literally destroy Slavs in the interests of the Jewish State !
There's much hysteria and exaggeration on all sides.
All built on perceiving some little thing as an iceberg tip. We then postulate the iceberg.
To return to your question: 'What does that tell us?' well that's it: what does it tell us? These things tell us only what we see. And even there we are often in doubt. We need to rein ourselves in and properly assess what things do tell us.
Can you hold two contrary opinions in your mind at one time?
I think it is the way to go.
The Russian govt is good and it is bad.
The Russian military machine is good and it is bad.
And so on.
We are better off looking at the preponderance, the balance, I think.
On balance the Russian State in the last three years has brought to light some very clear indisputable facts and has begun the construction of something the world has to have: because it is the nation state parallel to democracy: multipolarity.
Exposed by the pressure the USA and NATO and EU and Israel have shown themselves to be utterly antipathetic to the people, utterly without redeeming features. A filthy truth about the world has been revealed.
Like a mask ripped off.
Now we may suspect that they who ripped the mask off are less than perfect and we may be right. But first things first. What's been revealed here is core to world, is essential to 8 billion people, no localised backyard thing.
Keep our eyes on that and help with it.
While making sober assessments of other matters as facts and time permit.
Axtually, the Kremlin has stated that the United States is responsible for the terror attack on Crimea. Duh, of course it is.
Western MSM has proceeded to dutifully ignore or mock this statement of the obvious.
These western elites are the same ones who are pushing the Great Reset, where only 500million in the world survive, where people are controlled by digital currency and can’t travel, holiday, move out their lane, buy with free will. This attack fulfils many of their objectives.
Denial and complacency ... 'it won't happen to us'. Happens all the time and the stats were in their favor. How many people have been killed on that beach from missiles ? I just read a story from a news outlet about those strikes and they showed a shuttle launch from 20 years ago. Mouse clicks are money.