38,000 Russian Troops Committed To Kursk Counteroffensive: Report

Russia is stepping up its pressure on Ukrainian forces in the Kursk region, after launching its counteroffensive there last week. It’s now reported that as many as 38,000 Russian troops have been committed to the operation, while Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has been forced to defend the incursion — which began in August — against mounting criticism.

report in The Financial Times cites a senior Ukrainian military intelligence official who assessed the number of Russian soldiers now involved in the counteroffensive, with some of these having been redeployed from southern Ukraine. Despite this, the same source says that the counterattack is “still not large-scale,” and Russia will need to introduce more of its combat-proven assault brigades before making more significant gains. In the past, Zelensky has mentioned 100,000 Russian troops being required to fully repulse the incursion.

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Alleged would-be Trump assassin Ryan Routh wrote 2023 memoir about how Ukraine must win ‘unwinnable war’ and advocating for killing Trump

Ryan Wesley Routh, the man under investigation for a second assassination attempt on Donald Trump on Sunday, wrote a book with his fiancé about how Ukraine must win the “unwinnable war” against Russia in which he discussed Donald Trump being assassinated. The book was published last year.

The book is titled, “Ukraine’s Unwinnable War: The Fatal Flaw of Democracy, World Abandonment, and the Global Citizen-Taiwan, Afghanistan, North Korea, and the End of Humanity.” It was written by Routh and his fiancé Kathleen Schaffer.

While discussing the Russia-Ukraine war, Routh wrote, “I presume that I must be clear, that while on the current path Ukraine will not win, it is imperative for the world that they do win, and that’s why this book is so important, for us to recognize that losing is not an option and what we must do to win.”

Routh wrote of Trump in the book with disparaging terms and supported the assassination of the now-GOP nominee.

“I must take part of the blame for the retarded child that we elected for our next president that ended up being brainless, but I am man enough to say that I misjudged and made a terrible mistake and Iran I apologize,” he wrote.

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Trump Assassination Attempt Suspect Ryan Routh Was Coordinating with Foreign Soldiers to Fight for Ukraine — Sought to Recruit ‘Revolutionaries’ to ‘Take This Whole System Down’

The man accused of attempting to assassinate former President Donald Trump, Ryan Wesley Routh, 58, has been connected to a bizarre web of pro-Ukraine activism and a history of erratic behavior.

Routh, who was apprehended in West Palm Beach with a scoped AK-47 before the Secret Service intervened, had previously expressed an obsessive fixation on Ukraine and even conducted interviews boasting of his commitment to die for their cause.

In a now-deleted X (formerly Twitter) post directed at Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, Routh declared his intentions: “I am an American coming to fight with you in Ukraine; I am flying into Krakow and will take any transport to Kyiv to meet you and fight to the death. We must get every civilian in the world to come and join the fight; I will be the example. Attack Moscow now.”

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Putin’s Bluffing ‘Until He Isn’t’: Ex-UK Official

Kim Darroch, Britain’s former national security adviser, said in an interview published Saturday that the West should consider Russian Vladimir Putin’s threat of a major escalation before allowing Ukraine to use long-range missiles to strike deep inside Russia.

“If they are confident that he’s bluffing, then fine. But he’s bluffing until he isn’t,” he told The Financial Times.

U.S. President Joe Biden and the collective West continue to gamble.

This is a major shift from when Biden told reporters on 11 March 2022, just weeks after the Russian invasion, that providing “offensive” equipment to Ukraine was off-limits.

“Look, the idea… the idea that we’re going to send in offensive equipment and have planes and tanks and trains going in with American pilots and American crews, just understand – and don’t kid yourself, no matter what you all say – that’s called WWIII,” he said at the time.

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From Carolina Roofer To Ukraine Activist: Would-Be Trump Assassin Ryan Routh Gave Many Interviews With MSM 

Fox News confirmed earlier that the suspect in the second assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump has been identified as Ryan Wesley Routh. 

Using public records, Routh appears to be from Greensboro, North Carolina (some reports say he now lives in Hawaii) and was or still is part owner of United Roofing and Construction Inc. 

On Yelp, one negative review for “United Roofing” in late 2016 said:

“As a military member trying to buy a home before returning from a deployment, the proprietor, Ryan Routh, insulted me for trying to buy a house site unseen as many military members do returning from overseas.” 

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US Provoked the 1979 Russian Invasion of Afghanistan: Parallel to the Ukraine War?

The December 1979 invasion of Afghanistan was a watershed event, one that definitively ended “détente” between the global superpowers, the United States and the USSR, and inaugurated a new and more intense phase of tension. The invasion was a clearcut violation of international law and was widely condemned. At the time, it appeared that the Soviet invasion was completely unprovoked, either by the Afghans themselves or by the United States.

In the nearly half century that that has elapsed since the invasion, a large amount of new information has emerged that casts doubt on the benign image of the US government, as a bystander in the Afghan calamity, and suggests that US officials deliberately provoked the invasion; and then, after the invasion occurred, some US officials actively welcomed its occurrence.

A reexamination of the 1979 Afghan case seems especially relevant today, given the obvious parallels to the 2022 Russian invasion of Ukraine. Indeed, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton declared that the US response to the invasion of Afghanistan offers a model of what US officials should seek to achieve in Ukraine. The similarities between the two historical cases are indeed striking: Above all, the 1979 Afghan invasion was widely viewed at the time as being an unprovoked act of aggression, very much the way that the Ukraine invasion is being viewed now. We will see that such claims are contradicted by the historical record. It was US provocation that triggered both conflicts.

The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was widely presented as a major threat to Western security, but this was largely a propaganda invention. If one surveys the record of declassified documents from 1945 all the way to the late 1970s, one finds little US interest in Afghanistan, which was regarded as a strategic backwater, due to its exceptionally rugged geography and lack of access to the sea. The overarching US perspective was succinctly stated by a 1973 article in the Wall Street Journal, which was entitled: “Do the Russians Covet Afghanistan? If So, it is Hard to Figure Why.” The article went on to characterize Afghanistan as “a vast expanse of desert waste.” From the US National Security Council, a 1974 document stated: “Afghanistan is of no major importance to us.”

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CIA, MI6 Chiefs Praise Ukrainian Invasion of Russia for Inflicting War on ‘Ordinary Russians.’

CIA Director William Burns and MI6 Chief Richard Moore made an unprecedented joint appearance in London on Saturday, discussing the Ukraine war. The event, hosted by the globalist Financial Times, saw both intelligence leaders praise Ukrainian forces’ incursion into Russia’s Kursk region.

Moore commended Ukraine’s controversial counter-invasion of Russia as “typically audacious and bold on the part of the Ukrainians,” praising it for having “brought the war home to ordinary Russians.” The surprise offensive on August 6 has bogged down in recent days but saw success early on, with around 500 square miles of Russian territory seized.

However, while portrayed as a great embarrassment for Russian leader Vladimir Putin, the Kursk operation may prove to be a significant strategic mistake. Ukraine has used limited reserves, armed with valuable Western equipment such as American HIMARS artillery systems and British Challenger 2 tanks, for the offensive—meaning they cannot be used to reinvigorate Ukrainian forces buckling under a grinding Russian offensive in the Donbas region.

The Kursk offensive does not appear to have diverted enough Russian resources from the Donbas to halt Russian offensive operations in that theater, with the Ukrainians losing several towns and villages as the Russians close in on the vital logistics hub of Pokrovsk.

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World War III Watch: Russia Threatens to Wipe Kiev Off the Map If Biden and NATO Send Ukraine Long Range Missiles to Fire Deep Inside Russia

Secretary of State Tony Blinken and Joe Biden’s handlers are working diligently to escalate the War in Ukraine and initiate World War III before the November presidential election.

The globalist elites want to approve Western made high precision long range missiles in attacks inside Russia.

Vladimir Putin pointed out that it will take Western intelligence to operate these weapons. The US will not only be providing these long range missiles to fire deep inside Russia but Western intelligence will operate the weapons for Ukraine using Western satellite systems.

Vladimir Putin warned on Thursday that the NATO approval will change the essence of the conflict. Putin also warned that Kiev would be destroyed.

Vladimir Putin: The key is that only NATO servicemen can enter flight assignments into these missile systems. Ukrainian servicemen cannot do this. And so this is not about allowing the Ukrainian regime to strike Russia with these weapons or not. It’s about deciding whether NATO countries are directly involved in the military conflict or not. If this decision is made it will mean nothing other than the direct participation of NATO countries, the United States, European countries, in the war in Ukraine. This is their direct participation and this already significantly changes the very essence and the very nature of the conflict… This would mean that NATO countires, the United States are at war with Russia.

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. urged Joe Biden and his handlers to “Stop It!”

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Americans Can’t Hide From Nuclear War, Moscow Warns As West Mulls Escalation

The Kremlin has issued yet more warnings following reports that the Biden administration could soon greenlight long-range attacks by Kiev forces on Russian territory using US-supplied arms.

Both the UK and Canada are on board, we reported earlier, and British Prime Minister Ken Starmer is visiting Washington where he’s directly lobbying Biden to jump on board and grant Zelensky’s urgent request to lift all restrictions on Western weaponry.

However, The New York Times suggests that saner minds are prevailing at this point. “President Biden’s deliberations with Prime Minister Keir Starmer of Britain about whether to allow Ukraine to attack Russia with long-range Western weapons were fresh evidence that the president remains deeply fearful of setting off a dangerous, wider conflict,” the publication writes.

Let’s hope this is the case, given this is arguably the most dangerous moment and decision-point of the war to date. Pentagon leadership has recently stressed that granting the permission for long-range strikes will do little strategically to change the battlefield, where Russian momentum has continually gained in eastern Ukraine.

Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov on Friday added to prior Kremlin warnings, telling Rossiya 24 channel that he fears American leadership and the people are under “illusion”.

He said they seem to think that “if there is a conflict, it will not spread to the territory of the United States of America.”

Antonov continued by stressing that Americans can’t hide from nuclear war if this unthinkable happens. “I am constantly trying to convey to them one thesis that the Americans will not be able to sit it out behind the waters of this ocean. This war will affect everyone, so we constantly say – do not play with this rhetoric,” Antonov stated according to state media translation. 

As for UK PM Starmer’s visit to Washington, The Wall Street Journal had earlier previewed that “While the final decision on Storm Shadow will be made by the U.K. government, British officials will ask for the Biden administration to weigh in because some components of the missiles are made in the U.S.”

But based on NSC spokesman John Kirby’s words as of Friday afternoon, Washington’s policy has not changed and no permission has yet been given to Ukraine.

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UK’s Starmer, Canada’s Trudeau, Pressure Biden To Escalate With Russia Despite Putin Warning Of ‘War’ With NATO

Kirby came out on Friday and told reporters that there’s been no change in US policy regarding Ukraine using Western arms for long-rage strikes inside Russia. But the pressure is quickly ramping up: first Canada’s Trudeau said he supports greenlighting this, despite Putin making clear this would mean ‘direct war’ between Russia and NATO, and now UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer is coming out in support. According to breaking reporting in The Wall Street Journal

U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer is expected to urge President Biden on Friday during a visit to Washington to sign off on allowing Ukraine to use long-range European-made cruise missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia, according to U.S. and Western officials.

…A decision to lift a ban on Kyiv using the Storm Shadow missile, which can hit targets 155 miles away, to fire into Russia would be a major win for Ukraine, which has been urging Western countries for months to loosen restrictions on long-range weapons.

Yes, Zelensky has been essentially begging for it, but we highly doubt a “win” will follow especially given as we detailed below Putin still holds many cards, and would likely escalate attacks on Kiev in a big way.

“While the final decision on Storm Shadow will be made by the U.K. government, British officials will ask for the Biden administration to weigh in because some components of the missiles are made in the U.S.,” WSJ continues in the Friday afternoon report.

Hours earlier, PM Trudeau made his position clear

Canada fully supports Ukraine using long-range weaponry to “prevent and interdict Russia’s continued ability to degrade Ukrainian civilian infrastructure”, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said on Friday.

Trudeau told reporters that Russian President Vladimir Putin was trying to deeply destabilize the international rules-based order and added: “That’s why Canada and others are unequivocal that Ukraine must win this war against Russia.”

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