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Canceled doctors have message for their colleagues: ‘You have failed Canadians’

By Dorothy Cummings McLean | Life Site News | August 14, 2023

MARKHAM, Ontario – Three physicians and an immunologist have challenged Canadian doctors to find out—and then tell—the truth about COVID and the COVID jabs.

In an interview with LifeSiteNews at their annual general meeting this July near Toronto, Doctors Mary O’Connor, Mark Trozzi, Chris Shoemaker, and Byram Bridle were asked to state their messages to the medical community.

Family physician Dr. Mary O’Connor reflected that she had never said a word when she was in medical school, and now she has spoken up countless times. Her message to doctors is to tell the truth about “what’s going on.” She also wants to persuade people not to follow harmful COVID mandates. Above all, “please don’t get these injections,” she said. “They’re life-threatening.

Emergency medicine expert Dr. Mark Trozzi revealed that a university had fired him for encouraging his students to look at “both sides” of the COVID information presented to them. He told them there were scientists, doctors and others who were “saying things about these injections that were concerning. “

“And I told them, ‘It’s because I really love you guys, and I want you to have a life’,” he recalled. “‘What you’re coming to is not normal medicine. This is a very weird time.’ And I was fired.”

Trozzi told LifeSiteNews that his message to the medical community was the same: “You’ve got to look at this. You cannot continue to say, ‘It’s not my job to question this.’ You can’t continue to say, ‘The top experts in the country are telling us what to do. It’s the right thing.’ You’ve got to look at the science.”

“If you have only two minutes…go back to the Emergency Use Authorization of Pfizer and Moderna and look at the ingredients,” Trozzi continued. “Or, better yet, go to the first 3-month clinical trial data, released March of 2021, which showed a much higher death rate within 3 months than the SARS-CoV-2 virus with the mortality of less than 0.15, that caused no death among young people, and that, if we had been allowed to treat it, would have had a mortality rate that [was] unnoticeable and made flus look bad.”

Trozzi intimated that physicians, like other specialists, often think that they know more than they do. Being an expert on emergency medicine does not, for example, make him an expert on geopolitics and the other subjects he listed. Trozzi believes doctors need to develop humility and take an honest look at the science of COVID-19.

“The science will lead you to many things, and you will realize that COVID is part of a war,” he declared. “It’s part of a bigger agenda, and this agenda will kill your own grandchildren.”

Trozzi believes that the endpoint is a global dictatorship with a “dramatic reduction in the human population and the remaining humans essentially enslaved to a small group of global predators.” For the sake of future generations, he was willing to give up his prized possessions, and he wants his colleagues also to take a stand.

“I think this is a time when doctors have to stop being used by megalomaniacs and start returning to your [Hippocratic] Oath,” he said. “You need to stand up together against the College [of Physicians and Surgeons]. When you’re receiving your lawsuits for the injections that have harmed and killed people, you need to remember who coerced you: the medical regulators and, above all, the Ministry of Health.”

Physician Dr. Chris Shoemaker wants doctors to know the story of 80 hospitalized COVID patients whose loved ones fought in court to have them treated with ivermectin. The relatives of 40 of those patients won their battle, their loved ones were treated with the drug, and all 40 survived. However, the unwitting “control group,” the 40 patients whose relations were unsuccessful in getting them ivermectin, were not so lucky. In fact, 39 of those 40 died.

“So, how’s that for a contrast, doctors?” Shoemaker asked.

The doctor remarked that flu season, which begins in September, was not so far away, and asked the medical establishment to allow appropriate treatment for COVID-19.

“Ivermectin doesn’t help against regular flu,” he said. “It does help against COVID illness. Allow it. Allow it in your pharmacies. Allow it in your hospitals. And stop killing our citizens by not allowing it.”

“That’s my message.”

Of the four speakers, immunologist Dr. Byram Bridle made the harshest indictment of the medical community.

“I’m not a physician—and thank goodness,” he said. “You have failed Canadians.”

Bridle’s advice to doctors is to model themselves on O’Connor, Trozzi, and Shoemaker. He praised the three and their likeminded colleagues for “actually practicing medical ethics over the past three years.”

Bridle divided the rest of Canada’s medical profession into two groups: those who were “oblivious” to the truth about COVID, and those who had concerns but looked after their self-interest and their jobs first. The scientist was clearly furious that the latter allowed O’Connor, Trozzi, and Shoemaker to be “hung out to dry.” He believes that if all the doctors who knew the truth had stood up, the doctors who did speak up wouldn’t have been so easy to single out for punishment.

“The medical community in Canada is primarily responsible for enabling the greatest medical crisis of all our generation, and this can’t happen again in the future,” Bridle declared. “You need to be able to follow the science.”

The COVID-19 expert told LifeSiteNews that the average medical doctor gets as little as five lectures on immunology, of which vaccinology is a subcomponent, before qualifying. “So, imagine how little education they get on vaccines,” he added.

To doctors he said, “You have to be open to the perspective of all experts when it comes to these medical issues.” He advised them also  to ask why experts whose concerns don’t match the official narrative are being censored.

“The so-called misinformation experts … are not following their own science,” he growled. For one thing, the proper way to handle real misinformation is to have a public debate. None of his critics has been willing to debate Bridle in public, even though he can show a paper saying that “those who fail to show up to a public discussion cause the most harm.”

“So, understand: they are not following their science,” Bridle told LifeSite staff. He castigated his critics as cowards and said he believes they are cowards because they “don’t have a clue as to what they’re talking about, and they don’t have the science to back it up.”

The immunologist dismissed citations of the World Health Organization and other official bodies as “reputational science.”

“Stop referring to these third parties who say that there’s a settled science,” he advised doctors. “You have to be able to understand what the real primary scientific data says, and you need to follow that.”

Bridle called upon doctors to support the canceled physicians and to demand that they be reinstated and paid restitution. He also cajoled them to get rid of their corrupt leadership and to rebuild “the Colleges… so they’re practicing proper medical ethics and actually care, first and foremost, about the health of Canadians.”

Video of interview

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science, Timeless or most popular | , , , | 1 Comment

“There Is No Climate Crisis”… 1600 Scientists Worldwide, Nobel Prize Laureate Sign Declaration

By P Gosselin | No Tricks Zone | August 15, 2023

1609 signatories recently signed a declaration that states there is no climate crisis, thus casting doubt over man’s alleged role in climate change and extreme weather.

Their doubt is based on data showing that natural factors are very much at play, the warming is slower than predicted, the models are unreliable, that CO2 has great benefits and weather disasters have not increased. The media hysteria and weather hype are not supported by data.

There is no climate emergency

Climate science should be less political, while climate policies should be more scientific. Scientists should openly address uncertainties and exaggerations in their predictions of global warming, while politicians should dispassionately count the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of their policy measures.

Natural as well as anthropogenic factors cause warming

The geological archive reveals that Earth’s climate has varied as long as the planet has existed, with natural cold and warm phases. The Little Ice Age ended as recently as 1850. Therefore, it is no surprise that we now are experiencing a period of warming.

Warming is far slower than predicted

The world has warmed significantly less than predicted by IPCC on the basis of modeled anthropogenic forcing. The gap between the real world and the modeled world tells us that we are far from understanding climate change.

Climate policy relies on inadequate models

Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely plausible as policy tools. They do not only exaggerate the effect of greenhouse gases, they also ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere with CO2 is beneficial.

CO2 is plant food, the basis of all life on Earth

CO2 is not a pollutant. It is essential to all life on Earth. More CO2 is favorable for nature, greening our planet. Additional CO2 in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass. It is also profitable for agriculture, increasing the yields of crops worldwide.

Global warming has not increased natural disasters

There is no statistical evidence that global warming is intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts and suchlike natural disasters, or making them more frequent. However, there is ample evidence that CO2-mitigation measures are as damaging as they are costly.

Climate policy must respect scientific and economic realities

There is no climate emergency. Therefore, there is no cause for panic and alarm. We strongly oppose the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy proposed for 2050. Go for adaptation instead of mitigation; adaptation works whatever the causes are.”

Growing skepticism

Nobel Laureate in Physics Dr John F. Clauser also signed the manifesto.

The message is clear: there is no climate crisis. The number of critical scientists who no longer submit to the dogma of the alleged man-made climate catastrophe is growing.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity, Science and Pseudo-Science | Leave a comment

Unexploded device detonates in Donetsk killing three

RT | August 18, 2023

Three utility workers were killed in the Russian city of Donetsk on Friday when a faulty Ukrainian cluster shell exploded, according to local officials. Another worker was injured in the blast.

The workers, who had been repairing water pipes in central Donetsk, were caught in the blast during their lunch break. They were killed on the spot in a “detonation of an explosive device,” Donetsk Mayor Aleksey Kulemzin said. Two others were hospitalized following the blast.

According to media reports and local officials, the explosion was caused by a Ukrainian cluster artillery shell. The unexploded device may have been hanging from a tree or in a trash can, local residents told the media. The shell suddenly detonated and released its sub munitions, which exploded, hitting the civilians.

In recent weeks, the Ukrainian military has ramped up its use of cluster munitions, repeatedly firing them at Donetsk and other locations near the front line. The shells have already caused multiple deaths and injuries among civilians.

The uptick in the use of cluster munitions comes after last month the US sent so-called dual-purpose improved conventional munitions (DPICM) for NATO-caliber 155mm howitzers. The controversial delivery, which was criticized even by some of the US’ closest allies, came as a stop-gap measure to compensate for a shortage of conventional artillery shells, as admitted by President Joe Biden.

Over the course of the ongoing conflict, Russia has accused the Ukrainian military of repeatedly using cluster munitions from its domestic stockpiles to target civilian areas. In particular, Kiev’s forces have on many occasions shelled Donetsk and its surroundings with unguided multiple rocket artillery projectiles containing the controversial anti-personnel PFM-1 petal mines.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Iran and Russia Senior Defense Officials Discuss Military Coop

Mehr News Agency | August 17, 2023

Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Iranian Armed Forces Aziz Brigadier General Aziz Nasirzadeh and Russian Deputy Defense Minister Alexander Fomin held talks on military-technical cooperation.

According to TASS news agency, the meeting took place on the sidelines of the 11th Moscow Conference on International Security.

“The sides discussed current issues of bilateral military and military-technical cooperation. They exchanged views on issues of regional security and the international situation,” the Russian defense ministry said on Tuesday, adding that the sides reiterated their commitment to close dialogue and development of cooperation in the military sphere.

The 11th Moscow Conference on International Security was held on Tuesday at the Patriot Congress and Exhibition Center. In total, according to the Russian Defense Ministry, more than 800 delegates from 76 countries took part in the conference. Interestingly, this list did not include any Western states.

According to the program, China, India, South Africa, Israel, Turkey, Mexico, the United Arab Emirates, Saudi Arabia and North Korea were invited. Representatives of eight international organizations, including the UN, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN), the Arab League and the African Union, took part in the conference.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Iran Commences Construction of Most Advanced-Ever Satellites

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 18.08.2023

A fledgling space power with some of the best-developed space-based capabilities in the Muslim World, Iran’s space program has successfully launched over a dozen civilian and military satellites, created cosmodromes and built a range of homegrown space rockets using knowhow gained in the military sphere.

Iran has formally announced the start of design and construction work on two of its latest generation earth-imaging satellites.

“We had previously made promises regarding the construction of high-precision observation satellites, and today I proudly announce that the Iranian Space Agency has taken a significant step in designing and building domestic high-precision observation satellites. In this regard, the design and construction of two important projects, named Pars 2 and Pars 3, have officially commenced,” Iranian Space Agency chief Hossein Salariyeh told a media event Thursday.

The Pars 2 “is essentially a project to build an observation satellite with 4-meter imaging precision. The process of design and construction has begun for this satellite,” Salariyeh explained. As for the Pars 3, its development will provide Iran with its “most modern and highly accurate” imaging capabilities ever, with “an imaging precision of approximately 2 meters.”

The Pars series (lit. ‘Persia’ or ‘Iran’ in Persian) is one of Iran’s most ambitious satellite projects to date, with the remote-sensing spacecraft to be fitted with high-resolution earth imaging capabilities which can be used in agriculture, natural resource management, environmental and border monitoring, water sciences and mining.

Iran has one of the most advanced home-grown space programs in the Middle East, and in 2009 became the first Muslim nation to independently launch a satellite into orbit. The Iranian Space Agency has also engaged in deep cooperation with Russia and China, engaging in cooperative joint research programs, and piggybacking spacecraft on Soyuz rockets from the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Last year, a Russian rocket helped launch the Khayyam, a 600 kg remote sensing satellite which became fully operational and started its remote sensing activities last month.

Speaking at Thursday’s event, Iranian government spokesman Ali Bahadori Jahromi hailed the progress reached in Iran’s space endeavors, and said the country, whose peaceful space ambitions were born after the victory of the 1979 Revolution, is already reaping economic benefits from its space program.

Home to one of the world’s oldest continuous major civilizations, Iran has gifted the world with many of its earliest space scholars, including mathematicians and astronomers Omar Khayyam, Al-Khwarizmi, and Ibn al-Haytham. After the Muslim conquest of Persia during the 7th century, Ancient Persian astronomy became intermeshed with that of the wider medieval Islamic World, with Persian scholars contributing heavily to the creation of advanced mathematical formulas to calculate the movement of the Sun and planets in our solar system and the positions of various heavenly bodies. Persian contributions to ancient Islamic astronomical sciences helped spark the broader flourishing of the sciences in the Islamic World from the 8th through 13th centuries.

Modern Iran’s space-based efforts have been subject to derision by some US officials, with now former United States Space Command chief John Raymond once ridiculing the Islamic Republic’s Noor (‘Light’) satellite as a “tumbling webcam in space” unlikely to provide any useful intel. Several months later, the Noor, operated by the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps’ Aerospace Command, sent back detailed snapshots of Al-Udeid Airbase, largest US military facility in the Persian Gulf region.

Iran repeated the feat in 2022, with the Noor-2 sending back a panoramic image centered on the headquarters of the US Fifth Fleet in Bahrain.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Science and Pseudo-Science | | Leave a comment

Russians gained wealth amid war in Ukraine while Western countries lost trillions of dollars: Report

Press TV – August 18, 2023

Russia got richer last year amid the war in Ukraine, while the Western countries that provided funds and weapons to Kiev to fight against Moscow lost trillions of dollars of their wealth.

Russia added $600 billion of total wealth in 2022, the Business Insider (BI) reported this week, citing the latest annual Global Wealth Report of the Union Bank of Switzerland (UBS) published on Tuesday.

According to the BI, the number of Russian millionaires rose from around 350,000 to about 408,000 last year. However, in 2022, about 1 million of an estimated 23.7 million lost their millionaire status in the United States.

It said 4,500 Russians joined the super-rich people’s club of ultra-high-net-worth individuals (UHNW) — people with more than $50,000,000 — last year.

In the meantime, the collective West, North America and Europe together, lost $10.9 trillion, UBS said, noting that the US alone shed $5.9 trillion of its wealth.

The Swiss bank suggested that Russia’s gains might be attributed to the rising price of oil, a major export commodity and a key economic engine for Russia.

Russia’s added wealth came amid the West’s unprecedented anti-Moscow economic sanctions.

Western officials have admitted that the West’s sanctions on Russia had backfired, hurting Europeans instead.

Amid the West’s planning for anti-Moscow sanctions shortly after the start of war in Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin warned European buyers of Russian oil and natural gas that punitive measures imposed by the West would backfire, and those Western countries would be hit worse by the bans.

After Western countries banned Russia’s oil, Moscow turned to the East and increased its sales of crude to other countries which in turn re-exported oil to the European countries.

As a result, Mexico, India, and Brazil also gained significant amounts of wealth in 2022, while the US, Japan, Canada, and Australia lost the most, the UBS report suggested.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Russophobia | , , | 1 Comment

Diplomacy with Russia necessary for Europe – former French President

By Lucas Leiroz | August 18, 2023

Showing realism and willingness for dialogue, former French President Nicolas Sarkozy strongly criticized the West’s stance on the Ukrainian crisis and demanded more diplomatic efforts. For the former politician, it is necessary for Europeans to live peacefully with Russia, as it is not possible to continue a policy of confrontation and aggression in the long term.

Sarkozy’s criticisms were made during an interview with the French newspaper “Le Figaro”. He spoke with journalists about possible solutions to the current conflict in Ukraine and endorsed the need to pursue peace through diplomacy. Sarkozy condemned the policy of prolonging the war through unlimited military assistance to Kiev, which has been one of the main points of Emmanuel Macron’s foreign policy.

For Sarkozy, Macron failed to continue to deal with the reality of the conflict mainly “due to pressure from [some] eastern Europeans”. Last year, Macron was severely slammed by Polish leader Mateusz Morawiecki because he was trying to negotiate with Moscow in the early weeks of the special military operation. In May 2022, Morawiecki compared Macron’s stance to an “attempt to negotiate with Hitler”. Sarkozy sees this event as an important point of international pressure, boosting Macron’s decision to adhere to the policy of unlimited support to Kiev.

The former president also negatively assessed the project of Ukrainian membership in the European Union. For him, these plans are merely “fallacious promises that will not be held”. Sarkozy compared the Ukrainian access to the Turkish one, making it clear that in both cases the projects are unlikely to succeed.

Also, Sarkozy emphasized the importance of maintaining good relations with Russia due to the geographical factor. Considering the proximity between the EU and Russia, it is necessary that both sides are diplomatically close, without friction and conflicts. Sarkozy admits that the confrontation with Russia is only of American interest, not European, and therefore there must be a reformulation of Europe’s Ukraine policy.

“Russia is a neighbor of Europe and will remain so (…) In this regard, European interests are not aligned with American interests. We cannot stick to the strange idea of ​’fighting a war without fighting”, he said.

Another subject commented by Sarkozy was the territorial issue. For him, peace negotiations will have to deal rationally with the possibility of recognizing Crimea and Russian historic territories. Sarkozy states that with Ukraine’s impossibility to win the war, there are only two alternatives: freeze the conflict or recognize the territorial loss. The first option seems inadequate because a new war situation would arise in the future, while on the other hand the recognition of territories can be legitimate, if done by referendum with international observers.

“When it comes to this territory (Crimea), which was Russian until 1954 and where a majority of the population has always felt Russian, I think any step back is illusory (…) If the Ukrainians do not completely manage to win them back, then the choice will be between a frozen conflict – which we know will inevitably lead tomorrow to a new hot conflict – or we can come out on top by resorting, again, to referendums strictly supervised by the international community to settle these territorial questions in a definitive way”, he added.

It is necessary to note that Sarkozy does not adopt a “pro-Russian” opinion. He echoes the Western “consensus” of criticizing Russia’s decision to intervene militarily in Ukraine, even referring to the special military operation by the biased word “invasion”. The very proposal to redo the referendums in Crimea and other regions shows Sarkozy’s distrust of Russia, since Moscow has already held referendums that have been widely verified by invited international observers, having no need to redo them. So, the former president’s opinion is undoubtedly aligned only with European interests, with no pro-Russian bias.

The problem is that Europe is now conditioned to believe that American interests are its own. And this is precisely what Sarkozy is criticizing. He reminds how geography is a basic principle of international politics. Neighboring regions must strive to maintain friendship and respect so that there are no conflicts, as they will always be close and have to deal with each other, rationally overcoming disagreements. And this is what Sarkozy advocates for EU-Ukraine-Russia relations – that, despite disagreements, a peaceful [and realistic] solution is found as soon as possible.

Obviously, the Ukrainian neo-Nazi regime rejected Sarkozy’s proposal. Zelensky’s aide Mikhail Podoliak accused the former French leader of “deliberately participating” in “genocide and war” by simply advocating diplomacy. For the Ukrainian official, Sarkozy’s ideas are “fantastic” and “criminal”, as Crimea and Donbass are supposedly “unconditional territories of Ukraine”. In fact, this type of position on the part of Kiev is not surprising, since in addition to being one of the sides directly involved in the conflict, the regime works as a proxy for Washington, completely adhering to American anti-Russian narratives.

What really matters is whether French and European politicians will be attentive to Sarkozy. The former president is denouncing an obvious reality: to satisfy American interests, Europe is destroying itself and harming its relations with a neighboring power. Current politicians need to be aware of this scenario and reverse it. However, unfortunately, it seems the current generation of heads of state does not have the same strategic understanding as Sarkozy.

Lucas Leiroz, journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant.

You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | 1 Comment

A Vicious Blame Game Is Breaking Out After The Counteroffensive Predictably Failed

BY ANDREW KORYBKO | AUGUST 17, 2023

Two back-to-back pieces published by Newsweek and Politico confirm that a vicious blame is breaking out after the counteroffensive predictably failed. The first was released on Wednesday and reported how “Zelensky’s Pivotal Counteroffensive Call Threatens to Divide Leadership” between the presidential administration that wants to prepare for a potential Russian offensive and the armed forces that want to continue pushing ahead. An unnamed source also alleged that politicians felt misled by the military.

As for the second, which came out the day later on Thursday, its author observed that “As Ukraine counteroffensive gets bogged down, it’s back to the drawing board”. The problem is that nobody knows what to do next, however, since they can’t agree on what went wrong to begin with. According to their report, everyone is pointing fingers at who’s to blame for getting hopes unrealistically high about this failed campaign.

Here are some analyses of the relevant events leading up to this vicious blame game:

* 24 January: “Deciphering Ukraine’s Destabilizing ‘Deep State’ Dynamics”

* 14 February: “NATO’s Self-Declared ‘Race Of Logistics’ Confirms The Bloc’s Military-Industrial Crisis”

* 14 March: “The Washington Post Finally Told The Full Truth About How Poorly Kiev’s Forces Are Faring”

* 24 April: “US Propaganda Is Responsible For Unrealistically High Hopes About Kiev’s Counteroffensive”

* 29 April: “Poland’s Top Military Official Shared Some Unpopular Truths About The NATO-Russian Proxy War”

* 3 May: “Garry Kasparov’s Cognitive Dissonance Is Typical Of Kiev’s Average Supporters Right Now”

* 13 May: “Ten Critical Observations At The Onset Of Kiev’s NATO-Backed Counteroffensive”

* 21 May: “What Comes Next After Russia’s Victory In The Battle Of Artyomovsk?”

* 1 June: “Kiev Faces Seven Key Challenges Ahead Of Its Counteroffensive”

* 2 June: “Viktor Orban Is Right: The Counteroffensive Will Be A Bloodbath For Ukraine”

* 11 June: “Kiev’s NATO-Backed Counteroffensive Is The West’s Most Important Military Campaign Since WWII”

* 12 June: “CNN Admitted That Kiev Lost Around 15% Of Its Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles In A Week”

* 14 June: “How Will The US Respond After The Failure Of Kiev’s NATO-Backed Counteroffensive?”

* 20 June: “Putin Strongly Suggested That A Political Solution To The Proxy War Is Still Possible”

* 21 June: “Lavrov Sent The Clearest Signal Yet That Russia Is Interested In Freezing The Proxy War”

* 5 July: “Will Zelensky Become The New Saakashvili?”

* 7 July: “Pay Attention To What NATO Chief Stoltenberg Conspicuously Omitted From His Latest Speech”

* 8 July: “Cluster Munitions Are The Latest Wunderwaffe That’s Doomed To Disappoint The West”

* 10 July: “Removing Ukraine’s MAP Requirement For Joining NATO Isn’t As Important As It Seems”

* 17 July: “Kiev’s Latest Attack Against The Crimean Bridge Was A Desperate Distraction”

* 24 July: “The New York Times Finally Told The Truth About The Failure Of Kiev’s Counteroffensive”

* 6 August: “The Jeddah Talks Backfired On Zelensky”

* 11 August: “The Polish President Said Kiev Isn’t Doing The West Any Favors & Its Counteroffensive Failed”

* 16 August: “Bolton’s Criticism Of Biden’s Ukraine Policy Doesn’t Stand Up To Scrutiny”

Simply skimming the headlines reveals that the counteroffensive’s failure was predictable due to Russia’s growing edge in the “race of logistics”/“war of attrition”, yet it still went ahead anyhow for ulterior military and political reasons. Regarding the first, these concerned the West’s interest in obtaining invaluable battlefield data for its weapons, while the second involved Kiev’s inability to walk back its maximalist demands for ending the NATO-Russian proxy war in Ukraine.

This disaster was therefore entirely avoidable, which the Western public is quickly realizing as it begins to dawn on them that their over $165 billion in taxpayer-provided aid to Kiev failed to break the stalemate that set in last winter. The wisest among them might soon start wondering why a ceasefire wasn’t agreed to back then in order to focus on war-torn Ukraine’s reconstruction, which is why their leaders are now desperately trying to shift the blame to redirect rising public anger away from themselves.

Tens of thousands of Kiev’s troops have been killed since January and tens of billions of dollars spent just for the sake of gaining less than 100 square miles, which wasn’t worth it from the perspective of average Ukrainians or Westerners. The only party that profited was the military-industrial complex that obtained invaluable battlefield data for its weapons, though this was at the expense of further depleting the West’s stockpiles, which makes it more difficult for this New Cold War bloc to respond to sudden crises.

On the Ukrainian front, military-political divisions are reportedly widening per Newsweek’s report, which also claims that Russia is gearing up for its own offensive that’s slated to begin sometime this fall before scaling into a full-fledge one by next spring. Meanwhile, the Western front is less dramatic per Politico’s report as officials mostly try to pin the blame on the expert and media communities, though opposition parties like the Republicans are also of course trying to capitalize on this ahead of coming elections.

These latest observations about how counterproductive the counteroffensive has been for Ukrainian-Western unity, solidarity within their respective ranks, and Ukraine’s human and military resources mean that Russia’s prior interest in a ceasefire can no longer be taken for granted. Russia arguably has more to gain by continuing to fight than freezing the conflict since its enemies’ recent weaknesses raise the chances that all the entirety of those former Ukrainian territories that it claims can finally be liberated.

That’s not to say that there’s no possibility of Russia agreeing to a ceasefire in the unlikely event that the US complies with President Putin’s demand from late June to cut off arms shipments to Ukraine as the prerequisite for resuming related talks, but just that it would be his most surprising “goodwill gesture” yet.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Think tank experts pushing for endless conflict in Ukraine share a common benefactor

By Rachel Marsden | RT | August 18, 2023

Experts with important-sounding titles linked to academic-sounding entities have been shaping hearts and minds in the press, both at home and abroad, in favor of endless conflict in Ukraine. Guess what deep-pocketed benefactor lurks beneath the surface?

During the Iraq War, the Pentagon guided retired generals in making the rounds of TV and radio shows as ‘military analysts’ to promote the Bush administration’s agenda in the Persian Gulf. It was like inviting Ronald McDonald on a program to debate and discuss the merit of Big Macs. You could almost see the strings attached to the puppets, linked to the military-industrial complex that benefited from war without an off-ramp.

Fast forward 20 years, and the sales tactics have drastically changed. The generals have been replaced by various experts with academic credentials, typically linked to one or more ‘think tanks’. Far from the neutral academic centers of intellectual integrity that the names suggest, these entities are little more than laundromats for discreet special interests. I should know – I used to be a director of one.

Every Wednesday, some of the highest-ranking figures of the Bush administration would come to our Washington, DC office to deliver their main agenda points for the week, requesting assistance in placing and promoting them to both grassroots activists sympathetic to the cause and to the general public. The experts within the think tank were hired based on political litmus tests, no doubt to ensure that their views aligned with the organization’s. When they no longer do, you’re either fired or you leave.

The donors, many of whom were well-known millionaires and billionaires driven by a passion for certain issues, would come straight out and ask for bang for their buck in exchange for the opening of their wallets. In some cases, an entire project or department would be mounted at the think tank with the understanding that it would be fully funded by a single donor. These rich, influential folks typically had business or investment interests that benefited from shaping the establishment narrative in their favor, and they wanted to do so without leaving any footprints. What better way than to have it all fronted by a shiny veneer of expert credibility?

So while the generals of the Iraq War era had all the subtlety of a sledgehammer in representing the interests of the military-industrial complex, the new salesmen of endless armed conflict in Ukraine have overwhelmingly adopted the more subtle model. A study published in 2020 found that the top 50 think tanks received over a billion dollars from the US government and its defense contractors and manufacturers, including some of the biggest beneficiaries of weapons production today ‘for Ukraine’. The top recipients of this funding include the Atlantic Council, German Marshall Fund of the United States, Brookings Institution, Heritage Foundation, Center for Strategic and International Studies, New America Foundation, RAND Corporation, Center for a New American Security, Council on Foreign Relations, and the Stimson Center.

Some of these black boxes are more ideologically-driven than others. The Heritage Foundation, for example, leans overwhelmingly neoconservative and interventionist. Others, like the Atlantic Council and German Marshall Fund, are effectively force multipliers for NATO talking points. But the RAND Corporation also houses systems analysts and scientists specializing in space and computing. The fact that not all of these entities – or even the people who work within some of them – can be tossed into the same basket and labeled mere parrots for the special interests of their organization’s benefactors helps to muddy the waters.

In an analysis published in June of media coverage related to US military involvement in Ukraine, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft found that, when a think tank is cited regarding the issue, 85% of the time it’s a think tank with “financial backing from the defense industry.” Taken at face value, this risks being interpreted by the general public as expert ‘consensus’ on the need for US taxpayers to continue flooding Ukraine with weapons, unaware that it’s really just a bunch of Pentagon-backed actors agreeing with each other about the need to pursue the most profitable course of action on behalf of their War Inc. sugar daddies. Just like when climate scientists, who have parlayed climate change into endless funding and a perpetual justification for their existence, aren’t going to kill their cash cow by arguing that the climate can’t be controlled by man and that throwing cash at the issue – or at them – is futile.

Many of the Ukraine think tank experts are quick to attack analysis and information published on platforms they don’t like – such as RT – as ‘Russian-backed’. You’d have to be living under a rock these days to not know that RT is linked to Russia. No transparency issues there. But there is far less transparency around their own organizations’ financing. Where is their insistence on being above board about the use of defense industry cash to influence not just the general public but the course of the conflict itself? Around a third of top foreign policy think tanks don’t disclose this Pentagon funding, according to the Quincy Institute. Nor is it unheard of for these experts to springboard from these establishment-friendly platforms and the public notoriety they provide, right into public office – where they can translate the same agenda that they promoted into actionable policy. Isn’t it important for voters to consider the powerful hidden hand who helped to get them there?

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | | Leave a comment

Deploying elite brigade will not revitalise Kiev’s failed counteroffensive

By Ahmed Adel | August 18, 2023

The Ukrainian 82nd Air Assault Brigade, one of the last reserves of the Ukrainian Army but described as its “most powerful unit,” has entered the battlefield and is combating Russian forces. However, their entry will not revitalise an already failed and exhausted counteroffensive.

The Russian Army confirmed on August 15 that it repelled three attacks from this elite Ukrainian unit near Robotyne, Zaporozhye. In the battle, 200 Ukrainian soldiers were killed, and five tanks, eight armoured and infantry fighting vehicles and two Msta-B howitzers were destroyed.

Forbes reported that the brigade — which had spent most of the last two and a half months in reserve as the Ukrainian army tried to mount its counteroffensive — had finally been deployed, calling it “good and bad news” for Kiev.

Equipped with Challenger 2 tanks armed with depleted uranium shells, the Ukrainian 82nd Air Assault Brigade is also armed with Marder and Stryker armoured vehicles, among the most modern NATO equipment delivered to Kiev.

The 82nd Brigade is said to be among “the last major units” at the disposal of the Ukrainian command. Their deployment “could significantly boost” the firepower of the Ukrainian forces in the near term. Still, when the 82nd and its sister, the 46th Air Assault Brigade, withdraw, “there might not be any equally powerful fresh brigades to fill in for them,” meaning “the counteroffensive could lose momentum,” Forbes warned.

“If the Russians in Robotyne can hold their ground, and endure what is likely to be a major but temporary surge in Ukrainian combat power, they might eventually find themselves in a position to strike back at the Ukrainians—once the surge brigades rotate off the front line without replacement,” the article concluded.

Nonetheless, the author exaggerates the capabilities of the 82nd Air Assault Brigade, which is not even a division. To date, Ukrainian troops have been unable to break through the first line of Russian defences. Therefore, throwing an elite reserve into battle already demonstrates Ukraine’s desperate situation of being unable to break the meat grinder.

The fact that the 82nd Air Assault Brigade is armed with British tanks and modern Western combat vehicles does not mean it can change the situation. This is because Ukrainian forces cannot overcome minefields and break through the opposition posed by Russian reconnaissance and strike forces operating along the entire line of contact.

Deploying the 82nd Air Assault Brigade also points to Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu correctly assessing that Ukraine’s military resources are almost exhausted.

“The preliminary results of the fighting show that Ukraine’s military potential is practically exhausted,” Shoigu said when speaking at the 11th International Security Conference in Moscow on August 15.

While the counteroffensive has failed, Kiev and Western leaders have started pointing the finger. Ukrainian officials blame Western governments and media for the overoptimism surrounding the counteroffensive. However, this is gaslighting by the Kiev regime as they were the source of much hype and propaganda surrounding the offensive, which Western governments and media were more than happy to disseminate.

It is recalled that in the preparation stages of the counteroffensive in 2022, Chief of Ukraine’s Main Directorate of Intelligence Kyrylo Budanov predicted that the capture of Crimea would happen “not in summer [of 2023], but by the end of spring – perhaps, even a little earlier.”

Budanov said he was not afraid of making such predictions because “it’s not even the beginning of the end [of the war]; it’s a process, and it’s in the making.” He even refused to backtrack from his audacious predictions when given an opportunity in April, saying he had “no reason” to reassess his prediction.

As it turned out, the much-lauded offensive did not even begin in the spring, but in the first week of summer, humiliating Budanov’s predictions that led to NAFO ridiculously planning parties and events in Crimea in the expectation the peninsula would be captured by Ukrainian forces.

For his part, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky tried to control expectations while also building Western confidence to maintain the flow of equipment, weapons, and, of course, money. Zelensky only attempted to temper expectations when it was evident that the highly promoted spring offensive would become a summer one.

It can be said that deploying the elite 82nd Air Assault Brigade into the Russian meat grinder is the last throw of the dice for Ukraine with only weeks of summer left, which marks a symbolic and literal reminder of how the “spring” offensive was an utter failure. Ukraine has reportedly committed over 90% of its troops in recent days, and in the likelihood that they fail in their objectives, the country will be left with no serious fighting forces, leaving it at the mercy of the Russian military.

Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.

August 18, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | | Leave a comment