Tag: perpetual war

Mystery Car Bombing Near Moscow May Have Taken Out A Top General

In what appears the latest targeted killing in a string of high profile assassinations of top Russian military brass since the Ukraine war began, an unidentified man – possibly a high-ranking military officer, was reportedly blown up Tuesday morning after a bomb detonated in his car.

The incident happened very early in the morning Tuesday in a suburb called Balashikha, just outside the Russian capital. While Russian authorities have yet to release the identity of the deceased man, it happened very near an area known to host residences of military and government officials.

“The location of Tuesday’s explosion is not far from where Lieutenant General Yaroslav Moskalik — the deputy head of the General Staff’s main operational directorate — was killed in a car bombing last year,” the Amsterdam-based Moscow Times writes.

Investigators said an “explosive device was detonated while a BMW X3 car was driving near a residential apartment building.”  

In this newest case, the speculation on Telegram is that the fatality was a 62-year-old lieutenant general. A formal investigation is underway:

Security camera footage circulated by pro-Kremlin media showed the vehicle bursting into flames from the trunk and back seats before rolling into a parked vehicle. According to the Telegram channel Mash, bystanders rushed to pull the driver out of the burning wreckage, but he died shortly after.

Russia’s internal security service, the FSB, previously said it is making great efforts to tighten around high-ranking military officers of late.

This possibly adds, pending the details, to a growing list of high profile assassinations related to the Ukraine war. To review:

—Darya Dugina was killed in a car bombing in 2022 which was likely meant for her father, prominent political thinker and often dubbed “Putin ally” Aleksandr Dugin.

—Gen Igor Kirillov died in December 2024 outside of his residence when a bomb planted in a nearby scooter detonated.

—Gen Yaroslav Moskalik, who served as deputy head of the Main Operations Directorate of the General Staff of the Russian Armed Forces, was killed in a car bomb attack last April. A “homemade” explosive device detonated under his Volkswagen Golf in a residential neighborhood.

Throughout the course of the war there’s been a string of these high profile assassinations on Russian soil involving car and even cafe bombs.

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Kuwait Turns To Anduril For $2 Billion Counter-Drone Shield After Horrifying Airport Attack

The moment an Iranian Shahed-136 drone struck Kuwait International Airport last week appears to have been a major wake-up call for Kuwaiti officials. The incident likely crystallized a troubling reality: legacy air-defense systems are not enough to counter the Shahed drone threat spreading across the Gulf, and Kuwait needs to supercharge the deployment of layered counter-UAS systems with both electronic and kinetic defeat capabilities.

The State Department revealed shortly after the airport attack last week that it approved a potential $1.98 billion foreign military sale to Kuwait for Anduril-made counter-drone systems.

“The Government of Kuwait has requested to buy counter-unmanned aerial systems platforms,” the State Department wrote in a press release.

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Did Iran Establish a New Equation in the Middle East Through Its Attacks on Israel?

It remains unclear whether Iran’s effort to establish a new equation in the region has truly succeeded — an equation in which, for the first time, Iran would directly strike Israel if Israel attacks Lebanon.

What is clear is that recent events suggest the strategic landscape may be shifting. Israel chose to defy President Trump and carry out strikes against Iran. Yet according to both Iranian and American sources, those Israeli attacks appear to have been deliberately calibrated to inflict limited damage, perhaps reflecting U.S. pressure to avoid a broader escalation.

Iran, for its part, responded by striking Israel once more after the Israeli attacks. The full extent of the damage caused by Iran’s two rounds of attacks remains unknown, however, due to extensive Israeli military censorship. As a result, outside observers still lack a complete picture of the military and strategic consequences of these exchanges.

The real test of whether a new regional equation has emerged may not lie in what has already happened, but in what comes next. Specifically: Will Israel strike Beirut again?

Even if it does, Israeli decision-makers will now have to factor in a cost that did not previously exis t— the likelihood of a direct Iranian response against Israel. For decades, Israel enjoyed near-complete freedom of maneuver in much of the region. It could bomb targets in Lebanon at will without facing meaningful costs imposed by third parties. That assumption may no longer hold.

At the same time, the United States has signaled clearly that it no longer intends to be an active participant in Israel’s confrontation with Iran. The White House has, for instance, stated that it did not partake in Israel’s defense this time around. This would be a first and a very alarming development for Israel, if true. Washington’s desire to avoid direct involvement has become increasingly evident, even as it continues to support Israel in other ways.

Taken together, these developments suggest that a new strategic reality may be in the making. The picture remains murky, and it is far too early to declare that a durable deterrence framework has been established. Much will depend on future Israeli actions, Iranian responses, and the degree to which both sides internalize the risks of escalation.

But if Israel now has to weigh the prospect of direct Iranian retaliation before striking Lebanon, then something important has changed. Whether that change proves temporary or enduring remains to be seen.

The next question is whether this emerging equation can be translated into renewed momentum for U.S.-Iran diplomacy.

The Iranians believe that their action demonstrated to the US that the value of the Memorandum is so low that Iran is willing to risk a complete collapse of diplomacy. The hope is that Trump yields on what appears to be the last sticking point in the talks, which is the release of $12 billion of Iranian frozen assets.

Trump, on the other hand, may calculate that the exchange of fire demonstrated both the cost to Iran if full-scale war were to break out again, as well as Trump’s ability to impose certain restraints on the Israelis. As a result, the Iranians should feel confident in Trump’s ability to deliver on his end of the bargain and not insist on the release of the assets at the outset of the MOU.

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Crime Doesn’t Pay, But US Government Grants Do

InSight Crime, a thinktank which claims to fuse “investigative journalism with academic rigor,” accuses Nicaragua’s government of “hiring assassins” to hunt down and kill opponents abroad. This bold accusation is based on no more than “circumstantial” evidence, strongly suggesting political motivation. This fact-impoverished rush to judgment reflects a more general bias of the US-aligned corporate press, which seeks to demonize Nicaragua and its Sandinista political leadership.

The focus of the thinktank’s article is the death of Roberto Samcam, a former Nicaraguan army officer, exiled in Costa Rica. He was assassinated by gunmen in his home in a gated community in the capital, San Jose, on June 19, 2025. InSight Crime says he was killed because he was “fomenting regime change” in Nicaragua. Supposedly linked to this crime are two failed attempts to murder a Nicaraguan associate, Joao Maldonado, also exiled in Costa Rica and – like Samcam – an opponent of Nicaragua’s Sandinista government.

So far, almost a year after Samcam’s murder, the authorities have made four arrests in the case. All the arrested are Costa Ricans and none have been brought to trial. Keny Navarrete, a Nicaraguan criminal incarcerated in Costa Rica, is said to have coordinated the assassination. Navarette, who has no known connection to Nicaragua’s government, has been serving multiple sentences in Costa Rican prisons since 2016: supposedly he was able to orchestrate the crime from his prison cell.

Samcam’s criminal record 

InSight Crime notes in passing that both Samcam and Maldonado were “charged with crimes” in Nicaragua, but nevertheless the author, Steven Dudley, asserts that “Samcam was not a criminal.” Curiously for a prize-winning crime investigator, Dudley completely ignores the real violent crimes carried out by Samcam, Maldonado and the groups they led in the Carazo region of Nicaragua in 2018, during a coup attempt against its Sandinista government. An email to InSight Crime asking why he omitted Samcam’s backstory received no reply.

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U.S. Secretly Deployed Paratroopers to Israel

When the Pentagon announced that the 82nd Airborne was deploying to the Middle East in March, it concealed a key detail: some of the paratroopers were headed to Israel, as revealed in an Army deployment order I obtained.

A military source involved in war planning tells me the deployment is tied to new U.S.-Israeli joint contingency plans, completed since February, for seizing Kharg Island and carving out coastal territory inside Iran.

The 82nd Airborne Division is the Army’s premier quick reaction force, trained to parachute into hostile territory.

By keeping the deployment quiet, the Pentagon headed off public debate over a joint U.S.-Israeli operation inside Iran — a prospect many considered plausible at the time, amid a fever pitch of mainstream reporting on a potential ground invasion. The secrecy also sidestepped what’s euphemistically called “host nation sensitivities.” A joint U.S.-Israeli operation raises thorny questions for America’s Gulf Arab “partners,” especially over logistical support — hence the 82nd, which could launch directly from Israel without any Gulf state’s consent to use its territory.

The Army deployment order, issued April 7, 2026, directs elements of the 2nd Battalion, 501st Infantry Regiment — the storied “Geronimo” battalion — to deploy to Israel on “temporary duty.” The Israel deployment has not been previously reported.

The Pentagon has never acknowledged it; in public it has said only that the 82nd was bound for “CENTCOM,” the military’s term for U.S. Central Command, the combatant command responsible for the entire Middle East. The press echoed the vague terminology, suggesting the unit was headed to existing U.S. bases in Kuwait or Qatar.

Asked about the number of troops deployed to Israel and their mission, the Pentagon referred my request to CENTCOM, which at the time of publication had not yet responded.

In late March, the New York Times reported that senior military officials were “weighing a possible deployment of a combat brigade from the Army’s 82nd Airborne Division … to support U.S. military operations in Iran.” The forces would come from the division’s Immediate Response Force — a brigade of roughly 3,000 soldiers able to deploy anywhere in the world within 18 hours. Those forces, the Times noted, “could be used to seize Kharg Island, Iran’s main oil export hub.”

The groundwork had been laid weeks earlier. The Army abruptly pulled the division’s 300-member headquarters from a planned exercise at the Joint Readiness Training Center in Louisiana, officials told the Times, so the command element wouldn’t be “caught out of place if the balloon went up.” The Aviationist reported that the division’s commander, Maj. Gen. Brandon Tegtmeier, and his command element had been ordered to deploy, and tracked a string of flights leaving Pope Army Airfield, which serves Fort Bragg, for the Middle East.

When the Pentagon finally did talk about the 82nd publicly, it took pains to keep Israel out of it.

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Trump Says US ‘Must Respond’ After US Apache Helicopter Shot Down Near Iran

President Trump said in a post on Truth Social on Tuesday that the US “must respond” after the US military told him that a US Army Apache helicopter was shot down by Iranian forces in the Strait of Hormuz.

His post came after US Central Command said that its forces rescued two crew members from the helicopter, and media reports said that the US was probing whether Iran was responsible for the incident, which came a day after a US F/A-18 fighter jet bombed an oil tanker that was trying to reach Oman. So far, Iran hasn’t taken credit for shooting down the helicopter, but it has made clear it will respond to US attacks on ships.

“I have just been informed by our Great Military that last night the Iranians shot down one of our highly sophisticated Apache Helicopters while patrolling over the Strait of Hormuz,” Trump wrote on Truth Social.

“There were two pilots involved, both are safe and uninjured. Nevertheless, the United States must, of necessity, respond to this attack. Thank you for your attention to this matter!” the president added.

According to The Associated Press, the two crew members of the Apache spent about two hours in the water before being rescued by a 24-foot unmanned boat.

Tuesday’s incident comes after Iran struck Israel in response to Israeli strikes on the southern suburbs of Beirut. Israel then launched strikes on Iran, and President Trump called on the two sides to “stop shooting,” but shortly after his statement, CENTCOM announced the strike on an oil tanker.

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Pentagon Names Alibaba, Baidu, And BYD In Updated Chinese Military Companies List As DoD Contracting Bans Loom

The Department of Defense has filed a major update to its official list of “Chinese military companies” operating in the United States, formally naming or reaffirming high-profile firms including Alibaba, Baidu, BYD, BGI Group, and Autel as companies linked to Beijing’s military-civil fusion strategy.

The notice, filed on Monday and scheduled for Federal Register publication on June 10, comes just weeks before new restrictions on Department of Defense contracting with listed entities take effect on June 30. The companies are alleged to have ownership or ties to SASAC (State-owned Assets Supervision and Administration Commission), affiliations with MIIT (Ministry of Industry and Information Technology), PLA connections, support from China’s “Little Giant” industrial program, or a presence in military-civil fusion zones.

Section 1260H requires the Pentagon to identify Chinese companies that conduct commercial business while also supporting or being affiliated with the People’s Liberation Army or China’s defense-industrial base. The list has existed for years, but the consequences are now becoming more significant. Effective June 30, the DoD will be barred from entering into, renewing, or extending contracts directly with listed companies or entities they control. A broader indirect ban – covering goods or services that incorporate products from these firms – follows in June 2027. Additional rules restrict DoD contractors from working with entities that lobby on behalf of listed companies.

In short, the Pentagon is putting major Chinese companies on notice that it views them as potential extensions of China’s military and defense ecosystem, even if those companies are better known globally for consumer products, cloud services, electric vehicles, drones, or biotech.

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Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov Says the Fate of War in Ukraine Will Be Decided by Soldiers, Not Peace Talks

Moscow will rely on its ‘missile diplomacy’.

We reported here on TGP about how Kiev regime leader Volodymyr Zelensky sent a public letter to Russian President Vladimir Putin, ostensibly to ask for direct peace talks.

But upon closer examination, the letter was a puerile provocation, offending and trying to ridicule Putin, and was destined to try to claim the higher moral ground in terms of peace efforts.

Putin chose to respond not to Zelensky, but to the Russian soldiers: ‘rabotayte, brat’ya!’ (Work, brothers!)

Today (8), Russia’s Foreign Minister also criticized Zelensky’s PR move, labeling it rude.

Lavrov rejected the possibility of direct talks with Kiev, saying ‘guns will do the talking’.

Euronews reported:

“Sergey Lavrov specifically pointed out on Monday that Moscow is unhappy that the letter was ‘circulated around the world’, claiming that ‘polite people do not behave this way’.

Lavrov also claimed that for the Kremlin it ‘indicates that Ukraine has no interest in negotiation’.

[…] Russia’s foreign minister echoed Putin’s earlier statement that ‘it is not negotiations but the actions of those involved’ on the front lines of Russia’s war ‘that are crucial to the outcome’ of [the war].”

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Germany Says It’s Ready To Take the Lead in Russia-Ukraine Peace Negotiations

This readiness does not mean much, since Russia won’t accept the Europeans as mediators.

Yesterday (7), once again the E3 group of Euro-Globalists (UK’s Keir Starmer, France’s Emmanuel Macron and Germany’s Friedrich Merz) met with Kiev regime leader Volodymyr Zelensky to discuss the war and the peace process in the Russia-Ukraine war.

These meetings have happened countless times, and never yield anything practical, only tired speeches from four deeply unpopular leaders.

This time around, the E3 leaders published a list of 5 demands to achieve peace in Ukraine – a list that will surely be ignored by both the Russians and the US.

Today, a spokesman for German Chancellor Friedrich Merz stated that the European leaders are ‘ready to assume the leading role in negotiations’ to end the war.

Politico reported:

“’What is new, I believe, is that this process is now gaining new momentum in Europe’, Stefan Kornelius, Merz’s spokesperson, said following a meeting between the leaders of Ukraine, France, Germany and the U.K in London late Sunday. ‘Another new development is that we are taking up and continuing the negotiation process that the U.S. has largely led. We are doing this in close coordination with the U.S’.

U.S. President Donald Trump’s envoys, Steve Witkoff and Jared Kushner, have led efforts to broker negotiations between Russia and Ukraine, since early 2025 with few tangible results. The European initiative to assume a leading role in peace talks comes as Washington focuses increasingly on ending the U.S.-Israeli war with Iran.”

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Higher Education Must Not Become a Research Arm of Militarized Power

hat happens to higher education when institutions dedicated to critical thought increasingly align themselves with the logics of war, surveillance, and national security? Unless we mount an organized resistance, we may viscerally experience the answer to this question all too soon.

We are already watching this transformation play out in both the U.S. and Canada as universities face growing pressure to align their missions, research agendas, and pedagogical practices with the values, priorities, and imperatives of a society increasingly organized around the logic of war.

Militarized policies, values, identities, and modes of governance no longer merely creep into U.S. society. Under the Trump administration, they increasingly define it. Militarization now extends far beyond the battlefield, reshaping everyday life, public institutions, and the very meaning of citizenship. War is celebrated as a moral imperative, often wrapped in the language of religious righteousness and white Christian nationalism. Due process gives way to abductions and arbitrary detention, dissent is met with threats and repression, soldiers occupy U.S. cities, and political violence is normalized through a steady stream of incendiary rhetoric and state-sponsored spectacles that glorify force, exclusion, and domination. Democratic ideals are displaced by a culture of fear, manufactured insecurity, and the belief that the nation is besieged by enemies both within and beyond its borders — largely immigrants and people of color.

In this militarized landscape, critical thought is derided, informed judgment is replaced by ideological conformity, and institutions charged with nurturing democratic agency increasingly come under attack. This fusion of militarism, toxic masculinity, religious fundamentalism, and white nationalist politics functions as a powerful form of public pedagogy, producing the authoritarian values, identities, and modes of agency that have historically provided the cultural foundations for fascist politics.

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