Tag: perpetual war

Trump Should End the Ukraine War Now

President Trump had a simple but profound message about the Ukraine war during his campaign: “I want everybody to stop dying. They’re dying, Russians and Ukrainians. I want them to stop dying.”

About two weeks into his second term in office, Russians and Ukrainians are still dying, and not just soldiers. On January 29, a Ukrainian drone killed a mother and her two-year-old child in Russia’s Belgorod Oblast. The following day, a Russian drone slammed into an apartment building in northeastern Ukraine, killing six people, who were described as three older married couples.

Trump has reportedly given his envoy to the conflict, Keith Kellogg, 100 days to end the war, and a purported leaked plan drawn up by the administration would call for a ceasefire by Easter to begin talks on a lasting peace deal.

But between now and then, many more Ukrainians and Russians will die. And for what? There’s nothing the US can do now to give Ukraine any real leverage over Russia. Time is on Russia’s side, and everybody knows it. Ukraine will have to make serious concessions to achieve peace, and that will be the situation now and in 100 days.

There are other reasons to stop the war besides the daily casualties. The risk of escalation is still very real as Ukrainian drones are flying into Russia on a daily basis and sometimes target very sensitive infrastructure, including nuclear power plants.

Contrary to what many believe, Ukraine did not build up its drone capabilities by itself. In its final days, the Biden administration decided to reveal a once-secret program that funded Ukrainian drone development to the tune of $1.5 billion. We also know that Ukrainian drone attacks on Russia are carried out using intelligence from the West.

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Heritage Foundation Project Wants To Weaponize Selective Service Registration Against Immigrants

According to an exclusive report by Fox News, the Oversight Project of the Heritage Foundation is filing Freedom Of Information Act (FOIA) requests with the Selective Service System and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) for records of how many “illegal immigrants” may have violated US law by failing to register with the SSS for a possible future military draft. Fox News quotes the FOIA request as alleging that, “there is widespread criminal non-compliance by such aliens”.

The Oversight Project appears to misunderstand both immigration and Selective Service law. With respect to “illegal immigrants”, seeking asylum isn’t illegal – it’s a human right. By international treaty, penalties cannot lawfully be imposed on refugees for “illegal entry or presence”. And failing to register with the Selective Service System is a crime only if it is “knowing and willful”, which it usually isn’t. Most immigrants are unaware, until the question comes up on an application for naturalization, that they are supposed to sign up for a possible U.S. draft even if they aren’t U.S. citizens.

But quotes in the Fox News article from Executive Director Mike Howell and Chief Counsel Kyle Brosnan of the Heritage Foundation’s Oversight Project suggest that the goal of their FOIA requests is to put pressure on the Department of Justice (DOJ) to embark on bound-to-fail attempts to prosecute immigrants for failing to register with Selective Service:

“Howell said the FOIA request’s results could go beyond the scope of just determining whether undocumented residents of the U.S. may have attempted to avoid the draft – but also potentially offer an additional avenue for… mass deportation plans.

“With failure to register with SSS being a felony and a deportable offense, Howell said that… it could provide simplified legal grounds for the mass deportation plans of the Trump administration.

“‘You can turn a class of individuals into potential criminals overnight. What it also means is you don’t need ICE necessarily to do it. [Alleged SSS violators] would be prosecuted by DOJ. That means they’re in other beds that aren’t ICE beds. So you’re looking at all of them being in federal prison potentially, as opposed to taking up space in ICE custody,’ Howell said.”

Immigrants shouldn’t be scared, however, by these threats of deportation or prosecution for not having signed up for the draft.

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After Ceasefire With Russia, Trump and Kellog Want Ukraine To Hold Presidential Elections – Zelensky’s Mandate Expired in Mid-2024

Amid what US President Donald J. Trump called ‘very serious’ – if still-secret – peace discussions with Russia, some aspects of the sought agreement have started to leak to the press.

One of the most relevant so far is that the US wants Ukraine to hold elections by the end of the year, especially if Kiev signs a ceasefire with Russia in the coming months, according to President Trump’s Ukraine envoy.

Reuters reported:

“Keith Kellogg, Trump’s special envoy for Ukraine and Russia, said in an interview that Ukrainian presidential and parliamentary elections, suspended during the war with Russia, ‘need to be done’.

‘Most democratic nations have elections in their time of war. I think it is important they do so’, Kellogg said. ‘I think it is good for democracy. That’s the beauty of a solid democracy, you have more than one person potentially running’.”

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U.S. Military Launched Airstrikes Against ISIS Operatives In Somalia

The U.S. military has conducted coordinated airstrikes that were ordered by President Donald Trump against ISIS operatives in Somalia, making it the first strikes carried out in the African nation under the new Trump administration. 

Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth said Saturday that the strikes by U.S. Africa Command was directed by Trump and coordinated with Somalia’s government.

This morning I ordered precision Military air strikes on the Senior ISIS Attack Planner and other terrorists he recruited and led in Somalia. These killers, who we found hiding in caves, threatened the United States and our Allies. The strikes destroyed the caves they live in,…— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) February 1, 2025

“These killers, who we found hiding in caves, threatened the United States and our Allies,” Trump posted on social media.

“The strikes destroyed the caves they live in, and killed many terrorists without, in any way, harming civilians.”

The president ended his post with: “The message to ISIS and all others who would attack Americans is that “WE WILL FIND YOU, AND WE WILL KILL YOU!”

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The Biodefense Oligarchy And Its Demographic Defeats

Some years back, in calmer times before the storm, we officers at sea held the wardroom mess in accordance with that classic naval tradition. It was modernized and conducted over secure video, so those of us in the Med studied with those in the Gulf and those in the BAM,1 but it was all the same. Our study was Thucydides. 

The Peloponnesian War is too large for a deployment’s worth of weekly studies to cover, so after each session, I filled my evening with further reading. As the Oak Hill2passed Sicily, I was drawn to the history of the Sicilian Expedition. History is studied to draw lessons for present times. Athens’ lessons are abundant for ours.

In the midst of the 30-year Peloponnesian War, factions of Athens deemed an invasion of Sicily critical to overall victory. Inherent to their argument was the reality that Sicily would be impossibly lucrative if victorious. So it was then, so it is now: potential profit often clouds sound judgment. 

The opposition lost and the attack proceeded. It took the entire fleet and all its citizen manpower and it was entirely defeated. During the multi-year effort, the factions that drove it fused into an oligarchy that perpetuated itself and its war until its incompetence and complete defeat undermined its despotism. It still took the Demos physically overthrowing the Oligarchy for democracy to be restored in Athens.3 

Athens could rebuild the ships. But it could not rebuild the men. Thirty thousand citizen sailors were lost in the expedition – the heart of Athens’ civilizational power. The demographic catastrophe is considered a cause of Athens’ eventual defeat in the war and its civilizational decline.4

Two decades ago, factions argued that biowarfare threats were so significant that biodefense responsibility needed to be removed from the purview of the uniformed military and placed within NIAID under NIH and under HHS. There were structural and efficiency reasons to do this but the intangible reason was that the uniformed military officer corps would not stain its honor with biowarfare. It had held the line with the bioweapons convention since Nixon axed the US bioweapons program, so it had to be removed from the picture for the factions to proceed.

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US Private Security Firm Now Manning Gaza Checkpoints

While Israeli hostages are being released, and the ink barely dry on the ceasefire agreements, American security company UG Solutions, staffed by U.S. Special Forces veterans, is now manning checkpoints in the Gaza Strip.

A small U.S. security firm is hiring nearly 100 U.S. special forces veterans to help run a checkpoint in Gaza during the Israel-Hamas truce, according to a company spokesperson and a recruitment email seen by Reuters, introducing armed American contractors into the heart of one of the world’s most violent conflict zones, reported Reuters.

UG Solutions’ role in the cease-fire deal has been reported, but the email disclosed previously unknown details, including the aim of recruiting 96 veterans exclusively with U.S. special operations forces backgrounds, as well as the pay and the types of weapons they will carry.

Reuters reported on January 7 that Emirati officials had suggested the use of private contractors as part of a post-war peacekeeping force in Gaza, and that the idea had caused concern among Western nations.

These are private companies, and not active-duty American soldiers; but, the risk of this deployment pulling the United States further into another Middle Eastern war remains.

These soldiers are essentially high-value targets for regional terrorists, and lightly defended at that.

“Of course there is a threat they will face,” said Avi Melamed, a former Israeli intelligence official, reported Reuters.

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Euro lackeys pandering to Trump will escalate NATO’s conflict with Russia

It’s a bad combination. A bruising U.S. president with territorial expansion on his mercurial mind and European politicians without any backbone – all too eager to pander to the American bully.

Mixed in with that noxious brew, we also have European elites who are so obsessively Russophobic that they would stab each other in the back just to keep the proxy war on Russia at full throttle.

Donald Trump, whose policymaking is more befitting a Mafia real estate business, wants to grab Greenland as well as Canada, the Panama Canal, and anywhere else that takes his fancy. He wants to “clean out” Gaza, no doubt to flog beachfront properties to millionaires.

Trump has doubled down on his intention to annex Greenland – by military force if needed. His comments have caused Danish leaders to freak out, fearing that the president may order a military invasion of the Arctic island territory, a centuries-old colonial possession of Copenhagen.

Repeating earlier threats, Trump said last weekend: “I don’t really know what claim Denmark has to it, but it would be a very unfriendly act if they didn’t allow that to happen because it’s for the protection of the free world.” (Not like America’s God-given right to Hawaii, Guam and Puerto Rico, for example.)

Notice how Trump glosses his imperialist real estate interests with the virtue of “protecting the free world.”

The dainty Danes are reportedly in “crisis mode” over Trump’s aggressive takeover. Danish Prime Minister Mette Frederiksen went on a whirlwind tour of European capitals on Tuesday to drum up EU solidarity. She held urgent meetings with German Chancellor Olaf Scholz in Berlin, French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris and NATO chief Mark Rutte in Brussels – all in one day.

It’s hilarious to hear European non-entity politicians talk bravely about “defending Denmark” from American threats to its sovereignty and extraterritorial borders. They will do nothing of the sort.

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Putin declares Zelensky illegitimate, stalls peace talks

Russian President Vladimir Putin has reiterated his stance that Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is “illegitimate” and lacks the authority to sign any peace agreements, according to an interview broadcast on Jan. 28 with state TV channel Rossiya 1. This declaration comes as the conflict between Russia and Ukraine continues to strain international relations and humanitarian conditions on the ground.

Putin’s assertion hinges on a decree issued by Zelensky on Sept. 30, 2022, which banned negotiations with Russia, specifically with Putin himself. This decree was a response to Russia’s illegal annexation of Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia and Kherson oblasts. Putin argues that because Zelensky’s presidential term officially ended in May 2024, he is no longer a legitimate leader and cannot revoke the ban.

“Negotiations can be held with anyone. But due to Zelensky’s illegitimacy, he has no right to sign anything,” Putin stated. “If Zelensky wants to take part in talks, I will delegate people who will conduct such talks. But the key issue is the ultimate signing of the documents.”

The legitimacy of Zelensky’s presidency under martial law has been a point of contention. Under martial law, which was imposed after Russia’s full-scale invasion on Feb. 24, 2022, presidential, parliamentary and local elections are banned. According to Putin, the decree can only be revoked by the speaker of Ukraine’s parliament, who should have become the acting president after Zelensky’s term expired.

However, leading constitutional lawyers and legal experts dispute Putin’s claims. They argue that the Ukrainian Constitution allows for the extension of Zelensky’s term under martial law and that his presidency remains legitimate. The constitution states that the president of Ukraine, even under martial law, cannot extend his term, but the representative branch, the Ukrainian parliament, can have its term extended.

“If there is a will, any issue of a legal nature can be resolved. But so far, we haven’t seen such willingness,” Putin said, suggesting that the Ukrainian leadership could find a way out of this situation by having the parliament circumvent the ban.

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Georgescu Believes Ukraine will Divide – Is He Correct?

Romania’s Calin Georgescu has made headlines once more for calling Ukraine a “fictitious state” and suggesting that the nation will inevitably be divided. This man would have been president of Romania if the establishment accepted the results of the first election. Although he remains the most popular candidate, these statements and views are precisely why those behind the curtain will never permit him to hold power.

“One hundred percent. This will happen one hundred percent. There is no other way. This path is inevitable. Ukraine is an invented state. The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic. It is an artificial state; there are no reference points,” Georgescu said in a recent interview. “The world is changing, and borders will change. We have Northern Bukovina, Budzhak (the southwestern part of the Odesa region), Northern Maramureș from former Transcarpathia, what remains with the Hungarians, Lviv, which will stay with the Poles, and Little Russia,” he added.

He also suggested that part of Ukraine will be absorbed by Romania. Honoring the Minsk Agreement could have prevented such a divide. Russia wanted specific regions that have always been historically Russian. The Minsk Agreement would have allowed the people, not the governments, to vote on whether they wanted to join Russia or remain in Ukraine.

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A Pathway To Avoid Nuclear Catastrophe

Will the world ever be free of the menace of nuclear annihilation?

There was a promising start along these lines during the late twentieth century, when – pressed by a popular upsurge against nuclear weapons – the nations of the world adopted a succession of nuclear arms control and disarmament agreements.  Starting with the Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963, these agreements helped curb the nuclear arms race and prevent nuclear war.

But the tide gradually turned during the final years of the twentieth century and the first decades of the twenty-first.  As international conflict heightened and the nuclear disarmament movement waned, additional nations became nuclear powers, the U.S. and Russian governments abandoned most of their nuclear disarmament agreements, and all nine nuclear powers (the United States, Russia, China, Britain, France, Israel, India, Pakistan, and North Korea) revived the nuclear arms race.  Some of their leaders – Donald Trump, Kim Jong Un, and Vladimir Putin – even issued public threats of nuclear war.  Recently, the hands of the famous “Doomsday Clock” of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists were moved forward to 90 seconds to midnight – the most dangerous setting in its history.

Deeply disturbed by the slide toward disaster, the International Campaign for the Abolition of Nuclear Weapons (ICAN), comprised of hundreds of organizations, teamed up with the governments of many of the world’s non-nuclear nations to foster a series of UN conferences focused on the catastrophic humanitarian consequences of nuclear war.  Eventually, a UN conference drawing representatives from some 130 governments and dozens of civil society organizations met in March 2017 and began negotiations for a treaty outlawing nuclear weapons.  In July, the delegates adopted a Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) by a vote of 122 in favor, 1 opposed, and 1 abstention.  The treaty banned the use, threatened use, development, manufacture, acquisition, possession, stockpiling, stationing, and installation of nuclear weapons.

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