Aletho News

ΑΛΗΘΩΣ

NATO creating new Arctic front against Russia – Lavrov

RT | August 31, 2026

NATO is seeking to turn the Arctic into a new “hotbed” of tensions with its active military buildup in the region, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has warned. The bloc’s activities sow an atmosphere of distrust and risk a potentially dangerous armed confrontation not only with Moscow but with other nations as well, he warned in an article published by Arctic.ru on Monday.

The US-led military bloc ramped up its military activities in the Far North earlier this year by launching the Arctic Sentry initiative. The move was touted as a response to US President Donald Trump’s effort to annex the Danish autonomous territory of Greenland on the grounds that it was allegedly under threat from Russia and China.

Both Moscow and Beijing have repeatedly dismissed the accusations, with China arguing that the US was merely using the claims as a pretext for its own military buildup in the Arctic. Russia has also maintained that, although it has no stake in the feud over Greenland, it would defend its interests in the broader Arctic.

In his Monday article, Lavrov stated that Russia is mainly interested in “preserving the Arctic as an area of peace and cooperation” while accusing NATO of “driving the region towards militarization.”

“Intensive military preparations are underway in close proximity to our northern borders. NATO is conducting large-scale military exercises involving non-regional countries and introducing new components of its command-and-control system,” the minister said.

Back in February, NATO nations held drills focused on Greenland and the broader Arctic, involving Swedish and Danish warplanes in particular. In March, the bloc staged a massive military exercise in Norway and Finland – two Nordic nations bordering Russia – involving a total of 32,500 troops from 14 nations. The troops trained on the territory of both countries, as well as “at sea and in the air,” under “harsh, Arctic conditions,” in what the Norwegian Armed Forces described as the nation’s “largest military exercise in 2026.”

Last week, US, UK and Norwegian forces kickstarted another drill on the Norwegian island of Jan Mayen. The operation is aimed at integrating “multinational sensors, command-and-control nodes and precision fires into a joint kill web,” according to a US Marine Corps release.

Jan Mayen – a remote volcanic island located 1,000 kilometers away from mainland Norway – is described by the US Naval Institute think tank as a key location in the Greenland-Iceland-UK gap – a “chokepoint against entry into the Atlantic Ocean by Russian naval forces” and particularly its Northern Fleet.

“NATO members and other Western countries make no secret of their true motives, openly declaring their intention to turn the Arctic into a new front for opposing the development of Russia and its like-minded partners,” Lavrov said, commenting on the development and warning that such an approach “increases the risk of incidents that could trigger an armed confrontation with potentially disastrous consequences.”

The minister also stated that NATO and the EU not only pose a “direct threat” to Russian security but also seek to “undermine Russia’s legitimate rights in international cooperation” by targeting its partners with sanctions that affect Arctic projects in particular. He also named China and India as Moscow’s key partners in the region.

The EU has targeted Russia with numerous rounds of sanctions, including restrictions aimed specifically at the nation’s Arctic oil and gas development. The measures were designed to restrict Moscow’s access to technologies required for deep-water drilling and Arctic resource extraction, as well as to limit financing for such projects. According to an April report by the Institute for China-America Studies, the sanctions have made Arctic cooperation between Moscow and Beijing more complicated, as Chinese companies fear they could be targeted with secondary restrictions if they invest in large-scale joint projects.

However, despite NATO seeking to turn the Arctic into a new front, Lavrov maintained that Moscow is ready to work “with all constructively minded foreign countries displaying reciprocal readiness” to respect Russia’s interests.

August 31, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Comments Off on NATO creating new Arctic front against Russia – Lavrov

Finland’s Nuclear Moves Will Bring ‘Commensurate’ Response – Russian MFA

Sputnik – 30.08.2026

Finland’s decision to abandon its policy of military non-alignment after joining NATO “not only fails to strengthen its national security but, on the contrary, significantly increases the risks for it in this area,” Artem Studennikov, Director of the Russian Foreign Ministry’s First European Department, tells Sputnik.

According to Studennikov, Russia will take effective measures in response to Finland’s decision to overturn its Cold War-era ban on nuclear weapons, allowing NATO allies to import, transport and store nuclear devices on Finnish territory.

“As for specific response measures to the decisions taken in Helsinki, these fall within the competence of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. The new security situation will, of course, be taken into account in our military planning. I can only say that no one should doubt that such measures will be taken; they will be commensurate with the threats and effective,” he said.

Finnish lawmakers voted to overturn the ban on nuclear weapons in June, allowing NATO’s nuclear deterrent to be deployed in the Nordic region and bringing nuclear weapons directly to Russia’s doorstep.

Russia, which shares a roughly 1,336 km border with Finland, previously warned that such a move would be seen as a direct threat, and the response could include an increased military presence. along the Finnish border.

August 30, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Comments Off on Finland’s Nuclear Moves Will Bring ‘Commensurate’ Response – Russian MFA

Iraqi Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada sets conditions to put weapons under state control

Press TV – August 29, 2026

The Iraqi Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada resistance group says it will begin handing over its weapons as part of a government plan to place all arms under state control, but only on the condition that its demands, including the withdrawal of US forces, are met.

In a statement on Saturday, the group said its response to efforts aimed at regulating weapons and ensuring they fall under state authority was conditional on the complete withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraqi soil, territorial waters, and airspace; an outright ban on the use of Iraqi airspace to attack neighboring countries; and legislation to protect the rights of Popular Mobilization Units (PMU) fighters.

Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada also called for full federal control over Iraqi territory, stronger air defense through the deployment of sophisticated missile systems operated solely by Iraqi personnel, and the withdrawal of Peshmerga forces—the official armed forces of the Kurdistan Regional Government (KRG)—as well as Turkish troops from areas in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan region in northern Iraq, “to divest Ankara of any excuses to launch further attacks.”

Other conditions included placing the border regions of the Kurdistan region under Iraqi army control and forcing separatist anti-Iran Kurdish groups out of the area.

The group further demanded an end to US control over Iraq’s financial and economic institutions, and called on Tom Barrack, the US Ambassador to Turkey and Special Presidential Envoy for Syria and Iraq, to cease interference in Iraqi domestic affairs.

On August 11, the Iraqi prime minister directed officials to draft a bill to place weapons under exclusive state control.

Ali Al-Zaidi gave the instructions during his meeting in Baghdad with Khalid al-Obeidi, head of the Iraqi Parliament’s Security and Defense Committee.

Their meeting covered “the situation in the country and the efforts exerted by the various branches and formations of the security services to impose security and stability and protect the country’s borders and airspace against various threats,” the premier’s office said.

On June 3, Sabah al-Numan, spokesperson for the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, announced the formation of a committee tasked with restricting weapons to state control, affirming that the committee had already begun its work.

While several Iraqi resistance groups, such as Saraya al-Salam, Asa’ib Ahl al-Haq and Kata’ib al-Imam Ali, have agreed to integrate into the state’s armed forces, Kata’ib Hezbollah has pledged to retain “resistance weapons” and further develop its arsenal.

August 29, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | , | Comments Off on Iraqi Kata’ib Sayyid al-Shuhada sets conditions to put weapons under state control

The Coalition of Willing wants a continental war

By Lorenzo Maria Pacini | Strategic Culture Foundation | August 28, 2026

The summit of the Coalition of the Willing held in Kiev on August 24, 2026 – the 35th anniversary of Ukrainian independence – made explicit a stance that until then had remained suspended between rhetoric of support and operational caution. Emmanuel Macron announced that between October and November, the coalition will conduct large-scale joint military exercises designed to test the readiness of the so-called “Multinational Force for Ukraine” and the ability to deploy it on land, at sea, and in the air. The announcement is not a symbolic gesture. It is the operational implementation of a strategic choice: to build a permanent Western military presence on Russia’s borders, ready to be activated not only after a possible ceasefire, but potentially during the most acute phase of the conflict.

The line between arming a belligerent and preparing to fight alongside it is the threshold that separates assistance from co-belligerence. In Kiev today, that threshold was approached from multiple directions simultaneously. British Prime Minister Andy Burnham authorized the European consortium MBDA to share with Ukraine the classified designs of the British components of the Storm Shadow long-range cruise missile – the French Scalp – to accelerate its production on Ukrainian soil. This marks the first transfer of classified missile technology from Europe’s largest defense consortium to Kiev – a significant leap forward compared to the licenses previously granted by small drone manufacturers.

The significance of this combination – continental military exercises coupled with the co-production of long-range offensive weapons – must be understood for what it is. British weapons are already striking deep into Russian territory; the missiles produced in Ukraine will serve, by the very admission of those involved, both to defend against and to attack Moscow. The coalition is no longer merely supporting the Ukrainian resistance: it is building its own capacity for direct military projection. When a bloc of states tests the rapid mobilization of its forces and simultaneously transfers the technology to strike at the heart of its adversary, the line separating it from participation in the conflict becomes a matter of timing, not of nature.

The danger lies not in the stated intentions, but in the dynamics that these decisions set in motion. A multinational force trained to operate on the territory of a country at war with a nuclear power creates, by its very existence, a set of scenarios in which an incident becomes a casus belli. A downed coalition aircraft, a training base struck in neighboring territory, a missile intercepted across the border: each of these events, in a context of ongoing exercises close to the line of contact, automatically involves the troops’ home country. The logic of Article 5 and that of retaliation merge, and the war ceases to be Ukrainian and becomes European.

The tradition of classical geopolitics offers the key to understanding this. The confrontation between the continental power of Russia and the maritime-Atlantic bloc is not a temporary anomaly, but a re-enactment of the structural clash between the Heartland and the thalassocratic powers that spanned the twentieth century. Within this framework, any advance of Western forces toward Russia’s perimeter is perceived in Moscow not as deterrence but as encirclement – and triggers the symmetrical reaction that Western strategists claim they wish to prevent. Escalation is not an accidental risk of the Coalition’s plan; it is its predictable consequence. The strategy designed to deter Russia provides Moscow with precisely the justification it needs to expand its war effort, including the mobilization of at least 300,000 men announced after the Duma elections.

An unequal exchange

The most acute contradiction emerges from the timeline itself. On the eve of the summit, Zelensky had unveiled a plan – developed with the United States and Europe and resulting from talks with the Russians – centered on three points: a ceasefire, a free economic zone serving as a buffer between the parties, and the mutual withdrawal of troops from the line of contact.[1] There is, therefore, a negotiating framework on the table that the Ukrainians themselves describe as realistic. On the very same day, however, the European coalition chose to announce large-scale military exercises and the joint production of offensive missiles. These two paths are incompatible: preparing for a multinational intervention while negotiating a truce weakens the negotiations and reinforces the view in Russia that the West seeks not an end to the conflict but Moscow’s strategic defeat.

The distinction between those who promise money and weapons “down to the last hryvnia” and those who are mobilizing troops is not trivial. When deterrence turns into operational preparation, it ceases to dissuade and begins to provoke. It is the classic security dilemma: measures conceived as defensive on one side are interpreted as offensive on the other, triggering a spiral in which every step toward one’s own security reduces that of others and makes war more likely, not less.

Italy’s position takes on significance that goes beyond mere news coverage. Rome has confirmed that it will not participate in the exercises, in line with its repeated “no to Italian soldiers” in Ukraine, while maintaining support limited to hospitals, schools, energy infrastructure, and air defense equipment. Italy’s refusal reveals that the Coalition of the Willing does not reflect a unified European will, but rather the drive of a Franco-British core that is dragging the continent toward a level of involvement that a significant portion of its members does not share. This asymmetry is itself a risk factor: a military operation launched by a few states produces consequences – retaliation, energy crises, hybrid threats – that affect everyone, including those who have chosen to stay out of it.

We must not be fooled: Italy did not participate in the meeting due to a scheduling conflict with its institutional calendar; support for Kiev has been confirmed, reaffirmed, and trumpeted far and wide as a “political success” of the Meloni government. Italy is not backing down; on the contrary, it is playing a leading role in this great European folly.

The decision by the “Willings” to proceed “at all costs” toward a posture of direct confrontation must therefore be judged by what it risks producing rather than by what it claims to pursue. It is highly likely that the combination of ongoing military exercises, multinational troops on the ground, and the joint production of offensive weapons will increase the frequency of incidents likely to escalate, and that it will narrow the newly opened space for negotiation. Put another way, they are doing everything in their power to ensure that the conflict does not remain confined within Ukraine’s borders. At a time when there is a peace plan to be pursued, the rush toward large-scale military maneuvers appears to be the most dangerous of the available options: one that, in an effort to demonstrate resolve, brings Europe closer to the very war it claims to want to avoid.

It is a constant evocation of blood, a litany of death that is being softly chanted throughout Europe and that, sooner or later, will claim its human sacrifice.

August 29, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Comments Off on The Coalition of Willing wants a continental war

China’s opposition to illegal unilateral sanctions is consistent and unequivocal: FM on possible US sanctions on Chinese banks over Iran ties

By Ma Tong | Global Times | August 28, 2026

China on Friday reiterated that dialogue and negotiation is the only viable way to resolve the Iran issue and that its opposition to illegal unilateral sanctions is consistent and unequivocal, after US President Donald Trump suggested Washington could impose sanctions on Chinese banks doing business with Iran.

“On the Iran situation, we always believe that dialogue and negotiation is the only viable way out. China opposes illicit unilateral sanctions. This position is consistent and clear,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesperson Lin Jian told a regular press briefing on Friday.

Trump on Thursday hinted at possible sanctions on Chinese banks when asked whether Washington would punish them for doing business with Iran. “Who said I’m not? You don’t know if I’m doing it … I don’t have to announce everything, do I?” Trump said, according to Reuters.

The remarks came as the US has intensified economic pressure on Iran, broadening the sectors and actors targeted by its sanctions campaign after months of military strikes and diplomacy failed to fully reopen the Strait of Hormuz.

Zhou Mi, a senior research fellow at the Chinese Academy of International Trade and Economic Cooperation, told the Global Times on Friday that the latest US push to tighten sanctions on Iran reflects a clear expansion of US’s unilateral sanctions approach, which had previously focused more heavily on traditional sectors such as energy and oil and gas.

“What we are seeing is a continued broadening of both the sectors covered and the entities targeted,” Zhou said. He described the trend as a further “generalization” of US restrictions, with the US extending unilateral measures into new areas and to a wider range of actors, in some cases beyond the scope of previous international consensus on Iran-related sanctions.

Washington has already targeted Chinese mainland and Hong Kong entities in previous rounds of Iran-related sanctions. But it stopped short of blacklisting major Chinese banks and refiners, the South China Morning Post reported on Friday.

Zhou warned that extending such measures to financial institutions would sharply magnify the fallout, given the broad, complex and two-way nature of cross-border financial networks. “If such sanctions were actually imposed, the impact would be extensive and may significantly escalate tensions in China-US relations,” he said, adding that such a move would be detrimental to both sides.

The latest threat comes as the US expanded its sanctions on Iran. On Monday, the US Treasury launched “Operation Economic Outcast,” expanding the categories of Iran-related conduct potentially exposed to secondary sanctions and sanctioning nearly 60 entities, individuals and vessels across multiple jurisdictions. It also warned that entities facilitating certain Iran-related activities could risk being cut off from the US financial system.

China has repeatedly rejected such pressure. Lin said on Tuesday that economic warfare and maximum pressure “provide no solution” and would instead fuel tensions and lead to risk spillover, disrupting the global economic and financial order, and harm the legitimate rights and interests of other countries. Lin also stressed that China will do everything necessary to firmly safeguard its rights and interests.

Zhou emphasized that the latest US threats also run counter to efforts to translate the consensus reached by the Chinese and US heads of state into concrete actions and build a more constructive and stable bilateral relationship.

“China’s door to negotiations has always been open,” Zhou said. “If the US genuinely wants to implement the consensus reached by the two sides, it should stop resorting to threats and take concrete steps toward mutually beneficial cooperation, or at the very least, reasonable and fair competition, rather than continuing to rely on unilateral measures.”

August 29, 2026 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , | Comments Off on China’s opposition to illegal unilateral sanctions is consistent and unequivocal: FM on possible US sanctions on Chinese banks over Iran ties

Made in America. Hidden in Berkshire. Dropped on Iran.

Introducing RAF Welford the largest repository of Weapons of Mass Destruction in the country

By Daid Miller | UK Column | July 26, 2026

Tucked away off an obscure exit from the east-bound M4 near Swindon is a military base referred to regularly in the local press as ‘secret’. What is the connection between this obscure RAF facility and the mass destruction of civilian infrastructure in Iran in March and April this year? Back then we saw reports of attacks on the desalination plants in Qeshm Island, and commercial and energy infrastructure targets in Bandar Abbas, which also caused noted civilian casualties. There were also reports of attacks on Kashan International Airport, including on civilian infrastructure such as passenger terminals. Serious bombs were dropped in Isfahan, destroying the protected Shah Mosque heritage site and causing civilian deaths among facility workers and nearby residents.

In the recent resumption of daily US attacks on Iran, it has been reported that the planes dropping the bombs have come from RAF Fairford in Gloucestershire.

One thing connecting all these incidents is that the bombs in the long range bombers came from a little-known location in the sleepy Berkshire countryside. Perhaps it’s surprising to learn that the RAF were involved, but here’s the thing: Welford is not an RAF base any more. Rather, it’s the largest US bomb arsenal in the UK, and the second largest in Europe. The bombs stored here are transported by road to RAF Fairford where they are loaded onto long-range B-1 and B-52 bombers.

Mainstream reporting by the BBC as well as in independent media like the Canary and Declassified UK have all described the goings on at RAF Fairford. But hardly anyone seems to know about the secret munitions dump only miles away. Let’s examine what’s been going on there.

The Base

RAF Welford used to be a functioning air force base with three runways laid out to form an intersecting triangular pattern. Aerial photographs from the 1940s show the base clearly, but it has not functioned as an airstrip for many years. The US Air Force doesn’t fly in here, either — in fact, they dug up the runways and replaced them with a myriad of cavernous underground bomb silos.

The base is referred to as secret in part because there are opaque signs on the motorway indicating ‘Works unit only’, with no further information. Before 2015 these signs were edged in red, an indication, at least, that the destination was a military installation. Reviewing data from Google Street View indicates that the signs were changed between April 2015 and September 2016 to the current blue colour indicating, deceptively, a civilian installation.

The previous, less deceptive, sign. Image: Google Street View, April 2015.

The replacement sign. Image: Google Street View, September 2016.

Munitions stored at, or supplied from, RAF Welford have supported USAF bomber operations from RAF Fairford in multiple conflicts, including the 1991 Gulf War (Operation Desert Storm) and the 2003 illegal invasion of Iraq, plus operations in Afghanistan, Syria, and elsewhere. Operations against Iranian targets in 2026 have involved bunker-busting and precision-guided bombs loaded for B-1B missions and launched from Fairford.

Bombs being loaded at RAF Welford

These JDAMs are among the types of bomb loaded at RAF Fairford. Image: USAF

The massive stockpiles of bombs at Welford are looked after by the USAF 420th Munitions Squadron, part of the 501st Combat Support Wing which is headquartered at RAF Fairford. Welford functions as the second largest conventional munitions storage area in Europe and one of the largest heavy munitions compounds for the entire United States Air Forces in Europe–Air Forces Africa (USAFE-AFAFRICA).

In May 2019, the USAF moved 450,000 pounds (200 tonnes) of explosives to the site which hides a huge variety of bombs. They include three key types — ‘smart’, ‘dumb’ and ‘stand off’:

  • ‘Iron’ or ‘dumb’ bombs (Mk 82/Mk 84 ): 500-pound/2,000-pound unguided general-purpose bombs. Blast/fragmentation for troops, vehicles, buildings, rail yards, infrastructure.
  • Joint Direct Attack Munition or ‘smart’ bombs (technically GBU-31 JDAM): These are GPS-guided 2,000-pound ‘precision’ bombs. They are essentially an add-on to ‘dumb’ bombs to make them more accurate. They can also use BLU-109 penetrator add-ons — so called ‘bunker busters’ — for hardened bunkers/underground facilities. Intended for military bunkers, infrastructure, fixed/relocatable targets. These, of course, were responsible for the attacks on civilian infrastructure and the inevitable civilian casualties caused.
  • Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (AGM-158 JASSM): Stealthy long-range stand-off cruise missile for high-value, defended military targets from range. The US uses these if they want to avoid Iranian air defences and the possibility of their planes being shot down, as started to happen in April this year.

RAF Welford is directly linked to RAF Fairford, the USAF’s primary bomber forward operating location in Europe. The 420th Munitions Squadron at Welford supplies munitions to bombers (including B-1, B-2 and B-52 bombers) deployed at Fairford, enabling heavy bombing missions. Moves occur when heavy bombers (B-1B, B-52) deploy to RAF Fairford for exercises or operations. Bombs are then fitted with JDAM kits and loaded onto aircraft.

These munitions and bombs are routinely transported by road between RAF Welford and Fairford, which lie on opposite sides of Swindon. Convoys — reportedly highly secure with armed escorts — travel west via the M4 motorway, a distance of approximately 32 miles. Movements often take place at night with no identifying markings on vehicles for operational security.

However, quite strict rules apply to transporting bombs on British streets and motorways! Military high explosives (UN Class 1) moved by road from RAF Welford to RAF Fairford are regulated under the Ministry of Defence Explosives Regulations (JSP 482) and JSP 800 Volume 4b (Transport of Dangerous Goods by Road).

Convoy vehicles on the M4 are required to display plain orange plates at the front and rear of each transport unit, along with explosive hazard placards (Class 1 diamonds) on both sides and the rear. It’s not clear whether these rules are always adhered to.

The route from RAF Welford to RAF Fairford is fairly restrictive and predictable. Image: Google Maps

Within Range?

According to the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, the Islamic Republic has deliberately capped its missile range at 2,000 km. If this policy has not been changed, it would be difficult for the IRGC to eliminate the USAF’s UK bunkers of death with a missile attack. That’s because RAF Welford is some 4,035 km from Tabriz in north-west Iran, the closest location from which missiles might be fired. Nevertheless, as a result of Burnham’s reckless decision, the Iranian Foreign Minister has now announced that these bases are legitimate targets for Iran.

Andy Burnham has put British citizens at risk.

RAF Welford is not, however, beyond the range of anti-war campaigners in England. Newbury is less than 10 miles away. Reading, Oxford, and Swindon are less than 30 miles away, Bristol 58 miles, and central London less than 70 miles.

A quick examination of Google Maps shows that when US bombs leave Welford they need to take country roads and can only access the M4 heading west at Junction 14, Shefford Woodlands. They likely then leave the motorway at Junction 15, Badbury, onto the A419. It should not be too difficult to find ways to mount effective demonstrations or blockades to markedly interfere with the smooth supply of death-dealing to US bombers.

No bombs on the planes means no bombs on civilian heads.

You know what to do.

August 28, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , , | Comments Off on Made in America. Hidden in Berkshire. Dropped on Iran.

Mearsheimer: IRAN WINNING THE BATTLE FOR WORLD OPINION

Daniel Davis / Deep Dive – August 26, 2026

Prof. John Mearsheimer joins Daniel Davis LIVE to discuss the latest developments in the Iran war, U.S. strategy, Israel, and the broader geopolitical consequences of the conflict.

August 27, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, Video, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Comments Off on Mearsheimer: IRAN WINNING THE BATTLE FOR WORLD OPINION

Ukraine’s Western-Supplied Tanks Useless Against Russian Drones – Report

Sputnik – 26.08.2026

Once among Ukraine’s most coveted Western weapons, tanks like the German-made Leopards now mostly sit idle, The New York Times reported.

The $10 million vehicles are currently “hidden in forests and collecting cobwebs” as the Ukrainian military is “trying to imagine new ways to deploy them.”

Ukraine’s 33rd Brigade was created specifically to field and operate those Western tanks, but by the time they reached the battlefield in 2023, Russian drones “were already inflicting a deadly toll and were able to strike tanks at their most vulnerable points.”

A number of tanks have sustained damage during evacuation efforts while towing disabled vehicles—reducing the costly battle tanks to little more than overpriced recovery tractors. Ukrainian crews concede that they are able to operate only in poor weather, when wind, rain, and low visibility help obscure them from the ever-present drone threat.

Earlier, Western media reported that Leopard 2 tanks had failed to deliver the battlefield breakthrough Ukraine had hoped for, suffering losses to mines and proving vulnerable to drones. Up to 40 such tanks have reportedly already been lost.

August 26, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , | Comments Off on Ukraine’s Western-Supplied Tanks Useless Against Russian Drones – Report

Israel exports 6 times more arms per capita than US, 19 times more than Russia

MEMO | August 26, 2026

Israeli arms exports per capita in 2025 were roughly six times greater than the United States and 19 times greater than Russia, a new study has found, revealing the extraordinary scale of Israel’s weapons industry relative to its population.

The latest study by Palestinian-American author Susan Abulhawa found that Israel exported arms at a rate equivalent to roughly $263 per citizen in 2025, compared with $41 per person in the US and $14 in Russia. Calculated against Israel’s Jewish population alone, the figure rises to $340 per person, around eight times the US rate and 25 times Russia’s.

The findings are based primarily on figures from the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute (SIPRI), whose Arms Transfers Database tracks major conventional weapons. Although the US remains by far the largest weapons exporter in absolute terms, Abulhawa found that adjusting exports for population produces a dramatically different picture.

Israel ranked seventh in total arms exports between 2020 and 2025, behind the US, France, Russia, Germany, China and Italy. But once the same data is divided by population, Israel moves far ahead of every major weapons-exporting country. Its per-capita arms exports were roughly 2.5 times those of Norway, the nearest competitor, and more than six times those of the US.

The study found that this dominance is not the result of a single exceptional year. Israel has been either the world’s largest arms exporter per capita, usually by a considerable margin, or close to the top in every year of the past 25 years.

Looking across the entire 1960-2025 period covered by the database, Israel also recorded the highest average arms exports per capita of any country, at the equivalent of $56 per person every year over 65 years. The study found that Israel’s lead over competing arms exporters has widened particularly sharply during the past decade.

Abulhawa also examined arms exports against the size of national economies, showing how deeply the weapons trade is embedded in Israel’s economic model.

Using SIPRI figures, Israeli arms exports amounted to around 0.25 per cent of GDP in 2023, more than three times the equivalent proportion in France and more than six times that of the US.

But SIPRI does not count much of Israel’s lucrative trade in drones, ammunition, small arms, cyber technology, surveillance equipment, services and training. Using governments’ own wider figures for defence contracts instead, Israel reported $13 billion in arms-export agreements in 2023, equivalent to around 2.5 per cent of its GDP.

Proportionally, that makes Israel’s arms-export economy around eight and a half times larger than that of the US and almost nine times larger than France’s, according to the study.

The figures suggest that while larger powers make more money from weapons in absolute terms, no comparable country derives as much arms-export business relative to the size of its population and economy as Israel.

August 26, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | | Comments Off on Israel exports 6 times more arms per capita than US, 19 times more than Russia

Netanyahu Claims Reaching Agreement With Iran Impossible

Sputnik – 26.08.2026

TEL AVIV – Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said on Wednesday that reaching a “good” agreement with Iran’s authorities is impossible.

A ceasefire between the United States and Iran has been agreed upon, including freedom of navigation in the Strait of Hormuz, Pakistani military sources and Iranian security sources previously told Sputnik. The parties are expected to officially announce the ceasefire in the coming days.

Speaking at an event on settling the West Bank, the Israeli prime minister said that he is determined to ensure no threats from Iran. Netanyahu said that he discussed this with US President Donald Trump a few weeks ago at the White House.

“We discussed three options. I told him about an old option – to reach a good agreement. We have no objections. But I doubt that with this group of people … an agreement can be reached. I told him [Trump] that an agreement is impossible,” Netanyahu said.

The prime minister said that the second option is a resumption of hostilities.

Trump announced the launch of an economic operation against Iran on August 20, calling it “isolation on an unprecedented scale.” He urged US allies to join Washington.

Tehran will use all its resources to combat Washington’s economic pressure, the Iranian Foreign Ministry said on Monday, adding that the only option for the US is respectful dialogue with the Iranian people.

August 26, 2026 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Comments Off on Netanyahu Claims Reaching Agreement With Iran Impossible

Blame Churchill for World War 2. Not Hitler

By Mike Whitney • Unz Review • August 25, 2026

Winston Churchill, for all his triumphs and successes, was probably the man most responsible for the early and rapid collapse of the British empire….What brought the British empire down as rapidly and terribly as it did was world War 2. In my opinion, WW2 was exactly what Churchill called it “The Unnecessary War”. And the fatal blunder was the decision in panic of the British government after Czechoslovakia fell apart in March, 1939, was to give an unsolicited war guarantee to a collection of Polish colonels who had a romantic view of their own warlike capacities , who participated in the breakup of Czechoslovakia, and Britain gave them this guarantee to back them in a cause –control of Danzig– where they thought the Germans were fundamentally right. And that war guarantee which stiffened the Polish spine, gave the Poles the backbone to stand up to Hitler who now had no way out but to take Danzig. Hitler attacked Poland, Britain declared war on Germany, and that six year war brought down the British empire. And the man who was driving hardest for war with Germany was Winston Churchill Pat Buchanan Interview, You Tube (:29 seconds)

Video Link

“We must recognize that many of the fundamental ideas that dominate our present-day world were founded upon a particular understanding of that wartime history, and if there seems good reason to believe that narrative is substantially false, perhaps we should begin questioning the framework of beliefs erected upon it.” Ron Unz, Editor The Unz Review

I have long thought that our over-simplified, “cartoonish” portrayal of Adolf Hitler as ‘the embodiment of all evil’ has distorted our understanding of the events leading up to the Second World War. Hitler may have been a tyrant and a monster, but his strategic objectives do not appear to align with what we are told by western analysts and historians. Hitler’s invasion of Poland was not the first step in a broader campaign aimed at world domination nor did he plan to conquer all of western Europe. His goals were much more modest and reasonable. He simply wanted to recapture the territory that had been seized from Germany under the terms of the universally reviled Versailles Treaty. The Treaty –which arbitrarily partitioned Germany, stole its material assets, slashed the size of its army, and imposed reparations so big that the nation would remain a permanent colony of western bankers and financiers– also left 8 million German nationals marooned in countries outside of their own sovereign borders. Poland was one of those countries and Hitler intended to ‘put it right’. Here’s how Ron Unz summed it up:

Hitler’s final demand, that 95% German Danzig be returned to Germany just as its inhabitants desired, was an absolutely reasonable one, and only a dreadful diplomatic blunder by the British had led the Poles to refuse the request, thereby provoking the war. The widespread later claim that Hitler sought to conquer the world was totally absurd, and the German leader had actually made every effort to avoid war with Britain or France….

(Hitler) hoped to finally settle the Polish border dispute, offering concessions far more generous than any of his democratically elected Weimar predecessors had ever considered. But Poland’s dictatorship instead spent months rejecting his attempts at negotiations and also began brutal mistreatment of its German minority, finally forcing Hitler into declaring war. Why Everything You Know About World War II Is Wrong, Interview Ron Unz

So, the dominant narrative that we all learned in grade school is (as Unz says) “substantially false” which calls into question the “framework of beliefs erected upon it”, particularly that WW2 was the “good war”, a Manichean struggle between the forces of good and evil. But it wasn’t a struggle between good and evil, because as Unz points out, Hitler’s claims were “reasonable” and legitimate. Versailles was a catastrophe from the get-go and Hitler set out to roll back its demands as would any German patriot. Imagine if the US went to war with Mexico and foreign politicians decided that the US must hand over Texas, Arizona and California as part a final settlement. The public outcry would be so ferocious that eventually a politician would emerge (like Hitler) who would promise to retake the stolen territories by hook or crook. That same rule applies to Hitler. He was just doing what he was elected to do.

The whole idea that Poland was just the first steppingstone in a broader campaign for world domination is laughable. There’s no evidence to support that at all. Hitler wanted to rebuild post-Versailles Germany and put as many of the 8 million German nationals who found themselves outside the country, back under German rule. This wasn’t a global power-grab, it was a firm but responsible way to reach a just outcome, which is evident by the way he pursued his goal, through negotiation. Once again, most educated people in the west seem to think that Hitler overpowered Czechoslovakia and then marched into Poland the next day. Wrong. Hitler pursued a diplomatic path for nearly a year. Negotiations with Poland lasted roughly 10 months, from late October 1938 until the invasion on 1 September 1939. In other words, Hitler showed great restraint and patience. So why would an impulsive, tyrannical hothead look for a diplomatic solution when he could simply deploy the Wehrmacht and crush the anemic Poles beneath his tank-tracks without batting an eye?

Maybe because he wasn’t an impulsive, tyrannical hothead after all. Maybe that’s just more of the same hyperbolic narrative that has colored our understanding of Hitler from the very beginning.

Video– Historian Darryl Cooper on Churchill — “Churchill Is the Chief Villain in WWII. ..Churchill is a terrorist… Hitler didn’t war with England.”

Here’s where it gets interesting, because Poland is not some little blip on the radar. The whole history of WW2 rests on our understanding of who started the war and who is ultimately responsible for the war. And that honor goes to England not Germany. It wasn’t Germany that declared war on England. It was England that declared war on Germany on September 3, 1939, two days after Germany invaded Poland.

But if Germany invaded Poland than Germany must be responsible for starting the war.

No, because as Buchanan points out in the opening statement, Poland regarded Chamberlain’s “unsolicited war guarantee” as an insurance policy against a German invasion. As the author says, “that war guarantee which stiffened the Polish spine, gave the Poles the backbone to stand up to Hitler”. In other words, Polish leaders were duped into believing that they could thumb their nose at Hitler because the Brits ‘had their back.’ They didn’t need to negotiate or be reasonable because big brother would bail them out. Of course, big brother couldn’t bail them out because England had no combat troops, no military bases, no airfields, and no naval bases anywhere near Poland. So there was no way they could rescue Poland if Hitler attacked. Even so, they ignored all of that, shrugged off Hitler’s demands, and forced Hitler to invade. Poland fell in two weeks and Chamberlain never lifted a finger to help. (So much for British guarantees) In fact, it’s worse than that, because Hitler had formed an alliance with Stalin to divide Poland between themselves (The Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact) thinking that the alliance would deter Chamberlain from declaring war. But Chamberlain wasn’t deterred. He stood firm and declared war anyway offering up Poland as a sacrificial lamb in order to drag all of continental Europe into a World War with Germany.

Buchanan describes Chamberlain’s war guarantee to Poland the “greatest blunder in British history” worse than the Munich Agreement. It provided a “blank check” to the Polish government who then refused to negotiate over Danzig (an overwhelmingly German city) and the Polish Corridor, issues that many British leaders believed should have been resolved in Germany’s favor. The guarantee transformed a limited German-Polish border dispute into a general European war that pitted Germany against the Allied Forces in western Europe and US. The eventual outcome of the conflict would be the destruction of Poland, the fall of France, the Blitz, and tens of millions of deaths, outcomes that were entirely avoidable.

So, Chamberlain’s war guarantee was the proximate cause of World War 2, not Hitler’s invasion. The guarantee not only ensured that Poland would be destroyed but also that a large swath of countries in eastern Europe would fall under the iron grip of Soviet Russia after the war ended. Apparently, none of the geniuses in Chamberlain’s cabinet were able to anticipate that dreary outcome.

Historian David Irving reveals Hitler’s secret peace offering to Churchill in June, 1940 (while Churchill was bombing Berlin)

“I will withdraw all German forces from everywhere in Europe except for the provinces which had always been German and which had been taken away from Germany at the end of the first world war… I have the greatest admiration for the British and the British empire and I want the empire to survive into perpetuity and grow larger and larger. If the British empire at any time should threatened by some outside force,.. I guarantee that I will provide to the British whatever forces they may ask for to throw these aggressors out of the empire.”

And the consequences for England were equally dismal due largely to Churchill’s zealous commitment to a conflict in which Britain never should have participated. This is part of the story you will never find in the western histories where “bulldog” Churchill is regularly lionized as a symbol of moral fortitude and true grit. What’s lost in these glowing panegyrics is that the dissolute PM’s “incurable bad judgement” precipitated the end of the Empire and the sharp decline of Britain’s role in the world order. Churchill was given a prosperous and prestigious state to oversee, and left it a broken, bankrupt shambles requiring the handouts from foreign creditors.

Keep in mind, England was the world’s biggest creditor state when the war began but wound up as the world’s biggest debtor by war’s end. Take a look:

Grok– Before the Second World War began in 1939, the United Kingdom was still one of the world’s leading creditor nations (often described as the largest or among the very largest in terms of accumulated overseas investments and net external assets). British holdings of foreign securities, direct investments, and related income streams remained very large. By the end of the war in 1945, Britain’s position had been reversed:

Large volumes of overseas assets had been sold or liquidated to pay for essential war supplies. Britain had accumulated massive external liabilities, particularly the “sterling balances” owed to Commonwealth countries, India, Egypt, and others, plus obligations linked to American assistance. Net income from overseas investments fell sharply… Contemporary official assessments stated that Britain had “ceased to be a large-scale creditor country” and faced a severely weakened external financial position, ranking among the world’s major debtors relative to its pre-war standing.

By 1945, Britain’s external financial position had reversed dramatically: it faced large net liabilities, reduced investment income, and dependence on American financial support…. This shift from global creditor to major debtor was a direct consequence of the enormous cost of the wars and the need to finance them by drawing down assets and accumulating obligations. Grok

So, the war’s biggest cheerleader (Churchill) was, in reality, an incompetent, drunken buffoon who dragged his country to ruin in order to engage in a conflict which he later admitted was “unnecessary”. Shocking.

August 25, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular, Video | | Comments Off on Blame Churchill for World War 2. Not Hitler

Dozens of ex-lawmakers, staff landed at military firms since 2015

By Julian Cooper | Responsible Statecraft | August 24, 2026

In the last decade, 31 former members of Congress and top staff have left Capitol Hill and joined the military-industrial complex as lobbyists or contractors, according to a new report from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

The 21 lawmakers named in the report served on either the House or Senate Armed Services Committee, the legislative bodies that set the Pentagon’s annual policies through the annual National Defense Authorization Act. In addition, the report names 10 former senior committee staffers who transitioned to working as weapons industry government liaisons or lobbyists.

These 31 former officials represent a snapshot of the military-industrial complex’s “revolving door,” through which ex-policymakers transition from setting the Pentagon’s agenda in Congress to cashing in on those same policies in the private sector. “That report we published is the most direct explanation we’ve ever seen of why the defense budget always goes up,” said John Mecklin, the author of the report and former editor-in-chief of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists.

The report highlighted a variety of potential ethics conflicts, focusing in particular on the growing path between Congress and Silicon Valley defense tech startups.

Chris Vieson, the former staff director of the House Armed Services Committee (HASC), was appointed earlier this year to the National Commission on the Future of the Navy, established to advise Congress on everything “from shipbuilding and acquisition to maintenance and repair, workforce, training, and modernization.” Vieson is also an active registered lobbyist for two defense startups: Saronic Inc., a manufacturer of unmanned maritime vehicles; and watercraft builder Whiskey Project Group. Previously, Vieson worked as a lobbyist for Andreessen Horowitz, the venture capital firm gaining influence in the Pentagon and pushing AI integration.

According to its executive director, the National Commission on the Future of the Navy aims to modernize the Navy to prepare for conflict with China and Iran. As part of this goal, the Commission will “test emerging ideas such as a hybrid fleet and expanded use of unmanned systems.” Vieson’s lobbying client, Saronic Inc., is one manufacturer of such unmanned systems.

While the revolving-door phenomenon is not new, the report captures the increasing influence of a new generation of Silicon Valley military firms. Former HASC member Mike Gallagher and staffer Jeff Miller have taken up jobs as an executive and a lobbyist, respectively, for Palantir. Former Republican staff director of the Senate Armed Services Committee (SASC) Christian D. Brose is now the Chief Strategy Officer for Anduril, an autonomous weapons startup valued at $61 billion in its latest round of fundraising.

According to Mecklin, Congress is eager to let Silicon Valley officials into their bureaucracy. “It takes the Pentagon many, many years to acquire a new defense system like a fighter plane. With a high-tech system, you just can’t wait that long,” he said. “So they found a way around the complicated acquisition processes of the Defense Department.”

Likewise, Silicon Valley weapons startups that wish to challenge prime contractors like Boeing and Lockheed Martin are desperate to hire former politicians. “If you’re a company that wants to get into defense contracting, it’s highly beneficial to hire people that understand the process of federal appropriations in the defense sector,” Mecklin explained.

The Bulletin’s revolving-door report also details a who’s-who of top congressional stock traders. Rep. Austin Scott (R-Ga.), who has served on HASC since 2015, has been trading GE Aerospace stock via his spouse since 2023. Scott’s trades this year violated the STOCK Act, a bill passed in 2012 to curb insider trading. That makes Scott one of seven Armed Services Committee members to violate the STOCK Act this year, generally for failing to disclose trades within 45 days, as the law mandates.

Rep. Lisa McClain (R-Mich.) is another HASC member who has benefited from military contractor stocks. In December 2025, she disclosed her husband’s $100,000-$250,000 purchase of stock in Elon Musk’s xAI, which merged with SpaceX soon after in February. McClain’s husband’s xAI shares were converted into SpaceX shares months before the company’s historic IPO in June. McClain previously violated the STOCK Act for her delayed disclosure of a trade worth up to $450,000 in Palantir stock.

The report also makes note of Sen. Tommy Tuberville (R-Ala.) trading stock for prime defense contractor Lockheed Martin and aerospace manufacturer Honeywell. Tuberville, one of the most active stock traders in Congress, has served on SASC since 2021. When President Donald Trump faced criticism this spring for his own portfolio of weapons stocks, Tuberville told a reporter for MeidasTouch, “I do the same thing.”

Mecklin believes that laws like the STOCK Act are insufficient to curb members of Congress cashing in on defense spending. “The way you really stem this kind of behavior is to have inspectors general and law enforcement agencies that are on the lookout for them. Occasionally, take up one of these egregious cases and just prosecute it,” said Mecklin.

“Unless you have a system that actually scares these people so they cut it out, it’s going to continue.”

Julian Cooper is a Chicago-based journalist, an editorial intern for The Progressive, and a research intern for the Quincy Institute’s Democratizing Foreign Policy program.

August 24, 2026 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | | Comments Off on Dozens of ex-lawmakers, staff landed at military firms since 2015

« Previous Entries