Tag: perpetual war

Some Questions to Ask on Thanksgiving

What if the government’s true goal is to perpetuate its own power? What if the real levers of governmental power are pulled by agents, diplomats, bureaucrats, donors, central bankers and arms manufacturers? What if they have power no matter who is elected president or which political party controls either house of Congress?

What if the frequent public displays of adversity between Republicans and Democrats are just a facade? What if both major political parties agree on the fundamental issues of our day?

What if the leadership of both political parties believes that our rights are not natural to our humanity but instead are gifts from the government? What if those leaders believe the government that gives gifts to the people can take those gifts away?

What if the leadership of both parties gives only lip service to Thomas Jefferson’s assertions in the Declaration of Independence that all persons “are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness” and that when the government assaults our natural rights, we can “alter or abolish” it?

What if the leadership of both parties quietly dismisses those ideas as Jefferson’s outdated musings? What if Jefferson’s words are core American values that all in government have sworn to uphold?

What if the leadership of both political parties believes that the constitutional requirement of due process somehow permits mothers to hire doctors to kill babies in their wombs, out of fear or convenience? What if the leadership of both political parties believes that the president may lawfully kill any foreigner out of fear, because due process is an inconvenience?

What if the last four presidents — two from each political party — have used high-tech drones to kill innocent people in foreign lands with which America was not at war and claimed that they did so legally, relying not on a declaration of war from Congress but on erroneous and secret legal arguments that claim American presidents can kill with impunity?

What if the Constitution requires a congressional declaration of war or due process whenever the government wants anyone’s life, liberty or property, whether convenient or not, and whether the person is American or not? What if due process means a fair jury trial, not a secretly ordered killing?

What if most members of Congress from both political parties believe in perpetual war and perpetual debt? What if the political class believes that war is the health of the state? What if the leadership of that class wants war so as to induce the loyalty of its base, open the pocketbooks of the taxpayers, gain the compliance of the voters and enrich its benefactors? What if the government has been paying for war by increasing its debt?

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Trump’s Team Discusses Halting All Weapons Shipments to Ukraine If It Refuses to Enter Peace Talks

According to BRICS News President Trump’s team is proposing halting all weapons shipments to Ukraine if the country does not enter peace talks with Russia.

Trump has been pushing to deescalate the tensions in the region.

Earlier this week Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters Trump had been trying to negotiate peace between Ukraine and Russia but Joe Biden continues to escalate the war between the two nations before he leaves office.

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Putin’s game is hypersonic: Is that why we can’t see it?

On Nov. 21, Vladimir Putin presented a huge escalation challenge to the West: are you ready for Russia to strike NATO facilities anywhere in Europe with hypersonic munitions that you don’t possess?

Until Monday, Nov. 18, media outlets brimmed with pro-war activists urging Biden and other Western leaders to free Zelensky’s hand to use longer-range weapons deep inside Russia. Since the summer, bombastic British ex-military saber rattlers have been talking up the decisive impact that Storm Shadow missiles — and by implication, US ATACMS — could make on the battlefield in Kursk, with a range of 300 kilometers or around 185 miles.

They got their wish on Nov. 19, when the first salvo of ATACMS was lobbed at a military facility in Bryansk — outside the area in which Ukrainian forces are battling in Kursk. The following day, British Storm Shadow missiles were fired into Kursk, with the jubilant approval of Prime Minister Keir Starmer, no less. These strikes elicited widespread attaboy jingoism from the Western media, with hardly a word of caution.

However, those who call for the use of deeper strikes into Russian territory fundamentally misunderstand Russian strategy.

I have seen at critical points over the past decade that Russia seeks escalation dominance, a Cold War concept holding that a state can best contain conflicts and avoid escalation if it is dominant at each successive rung up the “ladder of escalation,” all the way to the nuclear rung.

Since the onset of the Ukraine crisis in 2014, Russia has sought to dominate each step up the escalation ladder. The annexation of Crimea in 2014 and the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 were major escalations that NATO didn’t meet head-on. This strategy is also seen in the diplomatic sphere, for example, Russia escalated a dispute with the U.S. in 2017 when it kicked 755 American diplomatic staff out of Russia. When Moscow over-escalates, it makes a gamble that its adversary will not be willing to step another rung higher on the escalation ladder.

There is a hard-wired view in Moscow, bolstered no doubt by Biden’s incrementalism, that Russia will always overmatch a divided and morally weak Western alliance when push comes to shove. Russia has something that the West does not have — the sovereign power and the political will to act unilaterally. Putin had been subject to criticism from hardliners in Russia that he hasn’t responded to the slow ratcheting up of military support to Ukraine from the West.

As indicated previously, Ukraine receiving permission to use ATACMS deep into Russia would leave Putin with no choice but to respond, having said in September that he would.

So, on Nov. 21, Russia launched a hypersonic Oreshnik missile at a well-fortified Ukrainian weapons facility in Dnipropetrovsk. This is the first time an Intermediate Range Ballistic Missile has been used in combat.

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Ceasefire Violations Rage In Southern Lebanon

Ceasefire violations are raging across southern Lebanon as Iranian proxy army Hezbollah attempts to regain positions lost to the IDF in recent months.

The IDF is warning residents of the region to not return to their homes or they could be fired upon.

The IDF does not intend to shoot at you,” the IDF spokesman said in his announcement, “and therefore, at this stage, you should not return to your homes south of this line. Anyone who moves south will expose themselves to danger.”

*Prime Minister’s Office Statement*

Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Israel Katz have directed the IDF to not allow the entry of the population to the area of the villages adjacent to the border with southern Lebanon, as per the first stage of implementing the framework of the ceasefire.

The IDF has arrested four Hezbollah militants, including a local commander, who entered the prohibited area, and will continue to take strong action against any violation.

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Syrian Opposition Moves On Aleppo, Kills Russian SF Team-Assad Declares ‘New Zionist Plot’

Reports are emanating from the Middle East of new clashes involving the Assad regime, as ceasefire violations in southern Lebanon rage.

Rebel forces against the Assad regime, long accused of being associated with terrorists, have gained ground in a bid to rush towards Aleppo, capturing the strategic town of Saraqeb, southeast of Idlib, between Aleppo and Homs.

The anti Assad rebels in northern Syria, probably emboldened by Hezbollah’s defeat, began a couple of days ago go a massive offense in and took over 15 villages as they approach Aleppo. Along the way they killed a Russian special forces team and a couple of Syrian army generals, reported journalists in the area.

In yellow: the area that the rebels in Syria occupied today, with dozens of settlements and at least one large military base of the Assad army. From published photos, several Russian soldiers were killed in the fighting

Meanwhile, media known to be sympathetic with the Assad regime allude to a “new Zionist plot”:

Hours after Netanyahu’s speech last night in which he threatened President Assad that he was “playing with fire”, the ground attack of the rebels in western Aleppo was launched.

Reports are a Russian special forces team was killed.

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How lies become facts and the world ends

Endless repetition by whore media and careless media turn lies into truth.

Whatever media you read, you read that “Russia invaded Ukraine.” The lie  is not limited to official narrative-controllers, such as the NY Times, Washington Post, Reuters, AP, Bloomberg, CNN. Wikipedia, NPR, ABC, CBS, NBC, BBC, Telegraph, Guardian.  It appears in alternative media, such as the Epoch Times and Breitbart. Indeed, the lie is repeated as fact almost everywhere, in the houses of Congress, the UK Parliament, Wall Street, European media and governments.

The fact is there was no Russian invasion at all.  Russian forces entered Donbas at the request of the two independent breakaway republics for help against the US-trained and equipped Ukrainian army and neo-Nazi militias that were about to invade Donetsk and Luhansk. The two independent republics requested Russia to return them to Russia in 2014 along with Crimea, but Putin refused the republics, taking only Crimea because it is the site of the Russian Black Sea fleet. Instead Putin placed his bet on the Minsk Agreement, which kept Donbas as part of Ukraine. 

The enforcers of the Minsk Agreement, Germany and France, later admitted that the Minsk Agreement was used to deceive Putin while Washington created a Ukrainian army to conquer the independent republics and present Putin with political difficulties for failure to defend Russians from those whose forebears fought for Nazi Germany against the Soviet Union. In other words, it was a plan to discredit Putin, for his crime of dissenting from Washington’s hegemony.

Putin’s refusal to restore Donbas to Russia in keeping with the overwhelming vote of the Donbas people subjected Donetsk and Luhansk to eight years of bombardment and many casualties while Putin stood by the Minsk Agreement.  Finally in February, 2022, with Washington, NATO, and the EU refusing Russia a mutual security agreement, and the Donetsk and Luhansk Republics facing invasion, Putin was forced to act to protect the Russian populations in the east and south of Ukraine that had been attached to the Ukrainian province of the Soviet Union by Soviet leaders for political and administration reasons.  Donbas and Crimea were for centuries part of Russia, not Ukraine. Putin, a leader, rebuilding Russian confidence after the Soviet collapse, could not stand aside while Russian people were massacred by an American-provided Ukrainian army.

Putin’s view of his intervention was very limited.  It had nothing whatsoever to do with conquering Ukraine.  His publicly announced “Special military operation” had to do only with driving Ukrainian forces out of Donbas.  Putin made no effort to conquer Ukraine. 

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Biden Asks Congress To Authorize $24BN More To Spend On Ukraine

The Biden administration has asked Congress to approve $24 billion in additional spending on Ukraine as it’s working to ramp up the proxy war as much as possible during President Biden’s final weeks in office.

POLITICO Pro obtained a request from the White House’s Office of Management and Budget that asked Congress to include additional Ukraine spending in a continuing resolution that’s expected to be voted on next month. Two congressional aides said Congress received the proposal on Monday.

The request asks for $8 billion for the Ukraine Security Assistance initiative, a form of military aid that allows the US to purchase weapons for Ukraine, and $16 billion to replace US military equipment that’s been sent to Ukraine.

The money to replenish US weapons would allow the Biden administration to use the remaining Presidential Drawdown Authority for Ukraine, which allows the US to ship weapons directly from US military stockpiles. The administration is looking to rush arms shipments to Ukraine throughout the rest of the transition period.

If Congress agrees to the request, it would bring total US spending on the proxy war, according to publicly available data, to about $210 billion.

Earlier this year, President Biden signed a foreign military aid bill into law that included $61 billion for Ukraine. Before that, the US spent at least $125 billion on the conflict.

US officials have told The Washington Post that the Biden administration is trying to put Ukraine in the best position possible before President-elect Donald Trump might push for an end to the war.

US officials acknowledged that within a few months, Ukraine could be pushed into negotiations and could end up ceding territory. “Biden’s reversal of his previous policies on mines and missiles was intended in part to give Ukraine the strongest possible hand as it enters those potential talks,” The Washington Post wrote.

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Russian Politician says Country Possesses ‘Super-Weapon’

On Wednesday Russian Federation Council chairwoman Valentina Matvienko said during a Senate meeting that the country possesses ‘super-weapons’ which can be deployed against the West in a ‘tangible and inevitable response’. The politician did not elaborate on the nature of these super-weapons, although the statement came soon after Russia began using a new ballistic missile system called Oreshnik.

“This is our response to the ongoing escalation by the West and the steps that led to the attack on Russian facilities using long-range weapons. We warn that this is unacceptable,” Matvienko said, according to RT. She said that the use of missiles are a “demonstration that we are ready for any development of events and we have the means, including super-weapons, to give a tangible and inevitable response.” 

She was commenting on Russian President Vladimir Putin’s address to the nation regarding the use of the new Oreshnik hypersonic ballistic missile against a military facility in Ukraine last week.

Interestingly, back on Monday, talkshow host Mike Adams discussed the novel weapons system Russia deployed which he said is a type of checkmate to the conflict.

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WORLD AT WAR: British Troops Deployed to US Air Bases in England To Protect Them From Drone Attacks

In the context of increasing tensions in Europe, the appearance of surveillance drones over US Air Force Bases in England is a worrying development.

It arises that British troops are now deployed to these bases to protect them from drone attacks.

While it hasn’t been confirmed that the UAVs are ‘hostile’, there’s widespread concern of ‘sinister’ involvement from foreign foes.

Personnel with counter-drone and surveillance equipment are deployed to counter the multiple unidentified drones reported flying three air bases over the past week.

The Telegraph reported:

“It is understood that to counter any threats, personnel from the RAF Regiment, trained in security tasks related to air power delivery, will be operating the force’s Orcus Counter-Uncrewed Air System at RAF Lakenheath and RAF Mildenhall, in Suffolk, and RAF Feltwell, in Norfolk. The system can detect, track, identify and if necessary defeat hostile drones.”

The US Air Force continues to monitor the airspace over the three bases.

“Military sources told The Telegraph that while it was not known whether they were dealing with a ‘troublemaker’ or something ‘more sinister’ – such as Russian involvement – there were concerns that a state actor could be behind the disruption.”

‘Small unmanned aerial systems’ hovered over US bases last week, and again on Monday.

Besides that, a ‘mystery drone’ also followed British aircraft carrier HMS Queen Elizabeth into the port of Hamburg, in Germany, last Friday.

“In a statement, a spokesman for the US Air Force in Europe, said: ‘We can confirm there were sightings yesterday [Monday] during night-time hours and can only confirm that the number fluctuated and varied between the bases over the night’.”

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Israel ‘outright denied’ 90 percent of aid deliveries to north Gaza in November: UN

Israel “outright denied” 82 out of 91 attempts since 26 October to deliver aid to besieged areas in northern Gaza, said Georgios Petropoulos, head of the UN humanitarian office in Gaza.

More attempts were unsuccessful because of “denials of specific locations or specific supplies,” he said in a statement reported by The Washington Post on 26 November.

The aid that has reached Gaza is being looted by criminal gangs, which are able to operate freely after Israel began killing members of the Gaza police attempting to secure aid deliveries earlier this year.

“It is tactical, systematic, criminal looting,” Petropoulos told the BBC.

He says this is leading to “ultra-violence” from “the looters towards the truckers, from the IDF towards the police, and from the police towards the looters.”

“Hamas’ security control dropped to under 20 percent,” the former head of Hamas police investigations told the BBC.

“We are working on a plan to restore control to 60 percent within a month.”

The BBC was told that “thefts often happen in clear sight of Israeli soldiers or surveillance drones but that the army fails to intervene.”

“Stolen goods are apparently being stored outside or in warehouses in areas under Israeli military control,” the BBC wrote.

As a result, hunger and malnutrition among Palestinians are increasing.

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