Poland hosts major NATO wargames
Samizdat | May 1, 2022
Poland is participating in two large-scale multinational drills and is the host nation for one of them, the country’s Defense Ministry revealed on Sunday amid Russia’s allegations that Warsaw is preparing to occupy the western part of Ukraine.
The Defender Europe 2022 (DE22) and Swift Response 2022 (SR22) will be conducted in nine countries including Poland between May 1-27, the Polish ministry said.
“There will be approximately 18,000 participants from over 20 countries training together in both exercises. The portion of the exercises on Polish soil will see some 7,000 troops and 3,000 pieces of equipment,” the statement reads.
Defender Europe is a regularly conducted American-led multinational exercise that aims poised to “build preparedness and interoperability between Allies and partners” of NATO and America. DE22 training will be conducted at several sites in Poland, with Polish soldiers to be joined by personnel from the US, France, Sweden, Germany, Denmark, and UK.
The Swift Response exercise will entail approximately 550 Polish soldiers being deployed to Lithuania and Latvia along with troops from the Czech Republic and a German-Dutch force.
“Joint combined exercises such as these enhance the security of the NATO Eastern Flank through a training in accordance with NATO standards and procedures,” the Defense Ministry emphasized.
It added that the drills also contribute to the allies’ preparedness “to meet new and emerging challenges at the contemporary battlefield in order to deter a potential aggressor.”
The military specifically pointed out that DE22 and SR 22 “are not aimed against any country and are not related to the current geopolitical situation in the region,” in a veiled reference to the ongoing Russian military offensive in Ukraine.
These assurances come as Russian Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) Director Sergey Naryshkin accused Warsaw of preparing to occupy the western part of Ukraine, which Poland considers as “historically belonging” to it. The potential “reunification” of Poland with western Ukraine will come under the guise of deploying a “peacekeeping” mission into the country under the pretext of protecting Kiev from “Russian aggression,” the official alleged. Warsaw denied the claims.
For years, Russia has expressed concern over NATO’s expansion eastwards, which it considers a direct threat to its own security. This factor along with the possibility of Ukraine eventually joining the alliance were named by Moscow as the key reasons for launch of its military offensive.
Moscow says when ‘frozen’ dialogue with US may be resumed
Samizdat | April 30, 2022
The dialogue on strategic stability between Russia and the US may only resume after all the goals of Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine are achieved, a high-ranking Russian diplomat has said.
“As of today, there’s no use talking about any prospects for negotiations on strategic stability with the US,” Vladimir Yermakov, who heads the Department for Non-Proliferation and Arms Control at Russia’s Foreign Ministry, pointed out on Saturday.
“This dialogue is formally ‘frozen’ by the American side,” he said, adding that Washington’s moves concerning the matter “are being pointed in the complete opposite direction” than those of Moscow.
The sides will likely be able to return to “a substantive conversation about the prospects of resuming a full-fledged Russian-American negotiation process on the strategic agenda only after the implementation of all the tasks of the special military operation in Ukraine,” Yermakov added.
The US actively supports Ukraine in the conflict with Russia, providing Kiev with funds and weapons to continue fighting.
Washington has committed $4.3 billion to Kiev’s military since 2021, Pentagon spokesperson John Kirby said on Friday, also revealing that the US has begun training Ukrainian troops in Germany and elsewhere in Europe.
Earlier this week, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin openly acknowledged that, by helping Ukraine, Washinton was trying to see “Russia weakened to the degree that it can’t do the kinds of things that it has done in invading Ukraine.”
Moscow and Washington last discussed strategic stability in Europe, which includes nuclear nonproliferation, during talks in Geneva in mid-January, just over a month before the breakout of the Ukrainian conflict.
According to sources, the Russian delegation “’spoon-fed’ its proposals for a stable continent” to the Americans to avoid any misunderstandings, with the key point being curbing NATO’s eastward expansion. However, the negotiations brought no results.
Russia sent troops into Ukraine on February 24, following Kiev’s failure to implement the terms of the Minsk agreements, first signed in 2014, and Moscow’s eventual recognition of the Donbass republics of Donetsk and Lugansk. The German- and French-brokered Minsk Protocol was designed to give the breakaway regions special status within the Ukrainian state.
The Kremlin has since demanded that Ukraine officially declare itself a neutral country that will never join NATO. Kiev insists the Russian offensive was completely unprovoked and has denied claims it was planning to retake the two republics by force.
The Aggressors Accuse Russia of ‘Blackmail’ for Defending its Currency, Energy Wealth, and Even Its Existential Security
Strategic Culture Foundation | April 29, 2022
The United States and its NATO and European Union allies have imposed unprecedented economic sanctions on Russia that amount to economic warfare. This warfare has been going on, discernibly, since the CIA-backed coup in Ukraine in 2014 on the back of allegations of Russian wrongdoing, for example, the alleged annexation of Crimea. It’s the logic of a poacher posing as the gamekeeper.
For eight years, the U.S.-led economic war against Russia has been pursued without relent. The self-professed “exceptional nation” presumes the privileged, exclusive use of economic terrorism against others who do not bend the knee. In hock to its Washington master, the European Union has imposed round after round of restrictions on trade with Russia in full compliance with American orders. The European compliance to self-inflict damage is astounding especially given that the U.S. economy is not as reliant on Russia as the EU’s and therefore has not been impacted as badly, at least not directly. But the presumed American “free lunch” is beginning to change, as our columnist Declan Hayes cogently surveyed this week.
Now that the proxy war against Russia has escalated into “Total War” – the historically sinister phrase used by France’s economy minister Bruno Le Maire – the full nefarious scope of the Western objective has become even more explicit. The U.S. and its NATO partners want to achieve the complete collapse of the Russian economy leading to regime change in Moscow. The eruption of violence in Ukraine following Russia’s military intervention on February 24 is but the opportunity to ramp up the U.S.-led war campaign against Russia.
The explicitly stated objective of cutting off Russia’s vital energy trade and the theft of the country’s foreign monetary reserves can only be interpreted as part of a wider imperial plan to crush the Russian nation, subjugate it and conquer its vast natural wealth.
Eight years of NATO-backed military aggression by the Neo-fascist Kiev regime against Russian-speaking populations has gone hand-in-hand with the installation of U.S. strategic weapons across Europe, including Dark Eagle hypersonic missiles in Germany and biological weapons of mass destruction in Ukraine. The military threat to Russia has been in tandem with the relentless economic warfare from sanctions. In addition, there is the intransigence by the U.S. and its NATO partners to engage with Moscow in resolving security concerns through diplomacy. All of this culminated in the present war in Ukraine. The concerted and rapid imposition of further draconian sanctions on the Russian economy from the blockade on virtually its entire banking system as well as the extreme censorship of Russian international media – all of that indicates that the U.S. and its partners were already on a war footing and ready to escalate hostilities.
In this context, ominously, Ukraine is resembling Bosnia-Herzegovina and the pre-World War One assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand as a fatal flashpoint.
The reckless flooding of weapons into Ukraine over recent weeks by the United States, NATO, and the European Union is also proof of a premeditated pent-up war agenda. This week, U.S. President Joe Biden is calling for his Congress to release $33 billion in “emergency aid” for Ukraine to “defend against Russian aggression”. This represents a tenfold increase in the record military support that the Biden administration has already plowed into the Kiev regime. This is tantamount to stoking a powder-keg.
The ludicrous, bitter laugh about this is that when Russia seeks to defend itself and Russian-speaking people, then Moscow is accused of “aggression”.
The latest twist in this Western duplicity and rank hypocrisy comes with the accusations that Russia is using “blackmail” by warning it will cut off its prodigious gas supplies to Europe. Moscow has simply and reasonably demanded that all European importers must henceforth pay for their gas supplies in the Russian currency, the ruble, as opposed to dollars or euros. The move was prompted in part because the Western countries had seized Russia’s foreign reserves and have banned most Russian banks from the international payment system. In other words, it is they who have politicized their currencies as weapons. So what is Russia supposed to do? Give away its vast natural gas wealth for free? To countries that are waging an economic war and increasingly a military proxy war against it?
This week, Russia’s state-owned energy industry Gazprom announced it was suspending the supply of gas to Poland and Bulgaria. The two EU and NATO member states had bluntly refused to pay for their vital energy needs in Russian currency. In that case, Russia has the right to withhold the selling of its commodity.
The move to mandate payment for gas in ruble was an essential counter-measure that has succeeded in defending the Russian currency and economy from collapse. That collapse was being deliberately orchestrated by Western sanctions aimed at strangling Russia. And yet when Russia acts to defend its vital existential interests it is accused of using “blackmail”. One of the shrill voices was that of European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen. The former German defense minister is a rabid Russophobe. Her logic of accusing Russia of wrongdoing is like a Third Reich minister lambasting the Warsaw Ghetto uprising as an insolent insurrection.
Von der Leyen and her elite, unelected Brussels bureaucracy are calling for all EU members to refuse payments to Russia. They are effectively endorsing the theft of Russia’s wealth. Their arrogance is not surprising. But that arrogance is leading to rebellion across Europe from the economic damage and unbearable cost-of-living crisis hitting the majority of the EU’s 500 million population. Bulgarian and Polish workers are demanding their governments resume trade with Russia to prevent a crash to their livelihoods.
A further mockery in this absurd scenario is that anti-Russia hawks in the United States and Europe have been vociferously jeering for all energy and other trade with Russia to be cancelled. Of course, this mania is all about propping up U.S. capitalism, hegemony over Europe, the weapons industry, and the transatlantic feeding trough for effete European lackeys.
Then, when Russia cuts off the energy supplies because of non-payment, there is an uproar about Moscow “weaponizing trade”.
The Western accusations of economic blackmail are analogous to perverse claims of military blackmail. The criminally reckless aggression that the United States and its NATO partners have pursued against Russia has escalated into war in Ukraine. As a British government minister demonstrated this week, the NATO powers are now directing their proxy Kiev regime to launch attacks on Russian territory. Yet when Russia warns of the dangerous risks of world war veering into a nuclear conflagration, the Western powers and their dutiful media turn around and accuse Russia of using “nuclear blackmail”.
America and Europe’s dubious political “leadership” is exposing itself as delusional, duplicitous, and criminally insane. They are insanely willing to push the world into a catastrophic war. And when Russia stands up to their madness, it is accused of being a reprobate.
In a funny sort of way, such farcical Western leadership is good. For it only further exposes how utterly unhinged and corrupt the Western elite rulers are in the eyes of their increasingly restive, angry populations.
It is Western callous, sociopathic leaders who are the ones blackmailing their own citizens and indeed the rest of the world. Their ultimatum is: destroy Russia or we will destroy everything. This is the mindset of totalitarianism.
The Western public’s enemy is not Russia, and it’s not China nor Iran, Syria, Venezuela, North Korea, Cuba, or some other designated foreign foe. All our enemy is the Western system of U.S.-led imperialism, its capitalist elite, and their political flunkies like Joe Biden and Ursula von der Leyen.
Biden’s Mammoth $33BN Ukraine Package Includes Help With Wartime Propaganda
By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | April 28, 2022
Politico’s Christopher Miller noted earlier that the record-smashing $33 billion spending package that the White House is proposing for Ukraine actually “dwarfs the annual defense budgets of most nations.” To which we naturally asked: how many billions of dollars does it take to turn a ‘proxy’ war into a ‘direct conflict’?
For starters it’s clear that such a massive amount of taxpayer money means that Washington clearly doesn’t expect that the war will end anytime soon, as multiple US defense and intelligence officials have recently testified. In fact General Mark Milley, the chair of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told the House Armed Services Committee during the first week of this month that he sees this as a “very protracted conflict” to come that will be “at least measured in years.”
Biden in his Thursday rollout remarks described that the new aid package “begins the transition to longer-term security assistance.” But interestingly as part of this assistance, a key area that the US will fund is what’s essentially information warfare…
Independent journalist and media commentator Michael Tracey has pointed out…
White House fact-sheet says part of the mammoth $33 billion spending package it’s requesting for Ukraine will be to “support independent media.” Because nothing screams “independent” like being directly funded by the US Government as part of its “information warfare” initiative.
Of course, going back to at least 2014 the US government has funded such Ukraine initiatives as “citizen journalism” to push back against ‘Russian influence’ in the country.
As WikiLeaks has documented long ago, there was similarly heavy State Department and US intelligence funding of “independent” and “opposition” media in Syria in the lead-up to and during the decade-long war to try and overthrow Assad.
But this marks a huge expansion of the United States much more directly assisting Ukraine in its media and wartime propaganda efforts. The White House fact sheet detailing the scope of the security aid package spells out in a bullet point:
- Counter Russian disinformation and propaganda narratives, promote accountability for Russian human rights violation, and support activists, journalists, and independent media to defend freedom of expression.
This as “freedom of expression” is often suppressed at home, ironically enough especially targeting independent media outlets.
Also of little comfort to the US taxpayer in terms of a potential eventual path to WW3 between two nuclear armed powers is this section under a header titled Help Ukraine Defend Itself Over the Long-Term…
- A stronger NATO security posture through support for U.S. troop deployments on NATO territory, including transportation of U.S. personnel and equipment, temporary duty, special pay, airlift, weapons system sustainment, and medical support.
Ultimately this means hundreds of millions will go toward propping up “independent media” which will actually in truth be US-state funded pro-NATO information efforts.
‘US to give Ukraine more intelligence’
Samizdat | April 28, 2022
The US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines has reportedly lifted more restrictions on intelligence-sharing with Ukraine, sources told Bloomberg on Wednesday, adding that the expanded access is aimed at helping Kiev seize the breakaway republics in Donbass.
The source claimed Haines told Congress about the expanded intel-sharing after Congressman Mike Turner (R-Ohio), the chief Republican on the House Intelligence Committee, insisted in a classified letter that the Biden administration remove any restrictions on sharing intelligence.
Turner has long criticized the administration’s backing of Ukraine as insufficiently forceful, arguing for more weapons to be sent to Kiev by claiming this would somehow prevent an “actual direct conflict” between the US and Russia. However, Moscow has called for the US and Europe to stop arming Ukraine, claiming that the growing pile of arms sent Kiev’s way amounts to a proxy war against Russia.
Republicans from the Senate Intelligence Committee had previously urged Haines to “proactively share intelligence with the Ukrainians to help them protect, defend, and retake every inch of Ukraine’s sovereign territory” – a category, they argued, that includes the Crimea peninsula and the Lugansk and Donetsk republics of Donbass.
Last week, the US reportedly lifted some of its geographic limits on transferring “actionable information,” of the sort used in making split-second decisions on the field of battle, allegedly removing language related to specific locations in eastern Ukraine. However, the directive continues to limit information regarding military forces and potential targets across the border in Russia or Belarus.
The White House has previously held back on sharing such information “because that steps over the line to making us participating in the war,” Congressman Adam Smith (D-Washington), who chairs the House Armed Services Committee, said last month. The administration has also refused to give Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky the no-fly zone he initially demanded, viewing it as an escalation that would directly involve the US and NATO in the war.
However, some members of Congress have been more hawkish in their approach. Turner made a point last month of asking the NATO commander for Europe, General Tod Wolters, if he was “satisfied” with the speed at which information was reaching Ukraine.
Wolters replied that he was “comfortable” but would like to see it “speed up,” adding that he would “say that even if it occurs in one second, I want it tomorrow to be in a half a second.”
How Selling the ‘Russia-China’ Threat Serves the US
By Salman Rafi Sheikh – New Eastern Outlook – 27.04.2022
Today, if there is one issue in the United States that draws equal support from both the Republicans and the Democrats, it is the fact that China presents the most serious threat to the US global supremacy. Related to this is the other point of agreement i.e., developing a global coalition against China. The Trump administration’s Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo, was on a mission throughout his tenure to build that coalition. The Biden administration, too, has devoted itself to the same task. Indeed, the level of deterioration we have seen in the US-China relations during the Biden era surpasses the trouble that the Trump administration caused. The same holds true about US geopolitics vis-à-vis Russia. The ongoing Russian military operation in Ukraine has allowed the US to cement its position vis-à-vis Europe.
One very useful way for the US to maintain its hegemony is through the sale of its weapons to its allies. Selling weapon systems is a multi-dimensional activity. On the one hand, the US makes billions of dollars by selling weapons. On the other hand, by selling its weapon systems to its allies, the US enhances these countries’ dependence on the US. All of this is achieved, first and foremost, by selling the China-Russia threat to the world. It is, therefore, not surprising to see that ever since the beginning of tensions between Russia and Ukraine – which began because of the US push to expand NATO to Eastern Europe to encircle Russia – the US military-industrial complex’s finances have jumped massively.
As reports in the US media have indicated, ever since the breakout of the Russia-Ukraine war, market shares of major US military companies have jumped massively, with Lockheed Martin’s registering a growth of 25% while Raytheon’s shares have gained 16.4% in the same period. For these companies, the US-created crisis is, thus, a major business opportunity. This was indeed confirmed in so many words by James Taiclet, the CEO of Lockheed Martin himself.
On January 25, in an ‘earning call’ meeting with investors, the Lockheed CEO told his that,
“If you look at the evolving threat level and the approach that some countries are taking … especially Russia today, these days, and China, there’s renewed great power competition that does include national defense and threats to it … And the contribution we can make at Lockheed Martin is to increase the efficiency and the reliability of our products that we have today for our customer. And secondly, to try to bring this 21st century digital technology to the enterprise in a way that allows us to keep up with the adversaries while we’re developing even newer and more advanced systems.”
They are minting money already in ways that complement the overall political economy of the US. The US has been providing military assistance to Ukraine – weapon systems that are supplied directly by these companies. Military assistance worth millions of dollars being provided to Ukraine is part of the total aid package of $13.6 billion for Ukraine. This aid makes the US, on the one hand, the sole ‘protector’ of Europe, and on the other, paves the way for other countries to rely more and more on the US for their defence needs. As it stands, many countries in Europe – including Germany – have adjusted their defence policies. Germany is even buying F-35 jets, thus creating many more business opportunities for the US military-industrial complex.
The exponential growth the US military-industrial complex is experiencing is not tied to the Russia-Ukraine conflict alone. The US has been effectively selling the China threat to countries that are relevant, e.g., Australia.
As some recent reports indicate, Australia is all set to purchase more weapon systems from the US to shield itself against the ‘China threat.’ On April 5, Australia’s Defense Minister Peter Dutton, referring to the ‘Russia-China threat’, said that they will be spending US$2.6 billion to increase Australia’s deterrence to potential adversaries. To quote him, “There was a working assumption that an act of aggression by China toward Taiwan might take place in the 2040s. I think that timeline now has been dramatically compressed.”
Given the so-called ‘imminent’ nature of the Chinese attack, Australia’s FA-18F Super Hornet fighter jets would be armed with improved U.S.-manufactured air-to-surface missiles by 2024.
In addition to this, Australia has also hired Raytheon Technologies and Lockheed Martin to help build guided weapon systems in the country. As reports indicate, the Australian government is planning on spending US$761 million to build a system of guided missiles.
This partnership with the US military-industrial complex is in addition to AUKUS allies’ April 5 statement that showed cooperation in the field of “hypersonics and counter-hypersonics, and electronic warfare capabilities, as well as to expand information sharing and to deepen cooperation on defense innovation.”
Importantly enough, this renewed cooperation comes against the backdrop of what the statement called “Russia’s unprovoked, unjustified, and unlawful invasion of Ukraine”, showing how the US, alongside its time-tested ally, continues to sell the ‘Russian threat’ across the Pacific to maintain what the US calls a “free and open” Pacific Ocean.
However, as the details of the profits and contracts that the US companies are generating through these very crises shows that, for the US, it is never about doing anything to maintain a ‘free’ system.’ On the contrary, it is always about benefitting the US, both geopolitically and economically.
More contracts for the US military companies means more business, which means more jobs for the Americans in those companies. The more these countries buy weapons from the US, the greater their reliance on the US for their defense and survival. This is how Washington aims to maintain its supremacy.
Salman Rafi Sheikh is a research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs.
Putin warns the US to back off in Ukraine
BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | APRIL 27, 2022
The Western narrative of the two-month old war in Ukraine imbued with the rhetoric of “democracy versus autocracy,” has dramatically changed with the assertion by the US Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin at a news conference in Poland Monday following his and Secretary of State Antony Blinken’s trip to Kiev, that Washington wants to “to see Russia weakened.”
David Sanger at the New York Times noted that Austin was “acknowledging a transformation of the conflict, from a battle over control of Ukraine to one that pits Washington more directly against Moscow.” But this is not really a transformation. Sanger’s colleague at the Washington Post, David Ignatius, had written over three months ago that the Biden Administration was working on a road map to get Russia bogged down in Ukraine and attrition it in a way that it becomes a much diminished power on the world stage.
For the Kremlin, most certainly, Austin’s remark would not have come as surprise. As recently as on Monday, President Vladimir Putin repeated at a meeting in the Kremlin that the US and its allies have sought to “split Russian society and destroy Russia from within.” Putin revisited the topic again on Wednesday pointing out that “the forces that have been historically pursuing a policy aimed at containing Russia just don’t need such an independent and large country, even enormously large, in their view. They believe that its very existence poses a threat to them.”
In fact, several perceptive Western observers had estimated that the Kremlin has effectively fallen into a trap laid by the US that is intended to bring down Putin’s regime. Come to think of it, that famous gaffe on 26 March wasn’t a gaffe after all, when President Biden, speaking in Warsaw, had blurted out the impromptu, unscripted remark: “For God’s sake, this man (Putin) cannot remain in power.”
All the same, Austin’s remark signifies that a dramatic change is taking place in the geopolitical situation, which could have positive or negative results. On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov warned the West that staying involved in the Russia-Ukraine war posed “serious” and “real” risks of a World War III and “we must not underestimate it.”
To be sure, the conflict is slowly but steadily turning into a new phase. Foreign fighters and soldiers from NATO regular units are increasingly beefing up the depleted Ukrainian army’s front lines.
That said, the optics also need to be understood. Austin’s war cry comes soon after Mariupol fell to the Russian forces. A couple of thousands Ukrainian nationalists and a few hundred military personnel from NATO countries are trapped in an underground labyrinth at the Azovstal complex in the city, which Russian forces have sealed off. It has been a severe blow to the US’ prestige.
The Russian special operation is on track — “grinding” the Ukrainian forces to the ground, to borrow the graphic expression from UK prime minister Boris Johnson. On Monday, Russian high-precision missiles hit at least six railway substations in Western Ukraine destroying railway facilities in Krasnoe, Zdolbunov, Zhmerinka, Berdichev, Kovel, Korosten, which were meant to be key transshipment points for the supply of Western weaponry to the Ukrainian forces in the Donbas region. Rail communication in several western regions of Ukraine is effectively blocked.
Reports from the east show that Ukrainian forces are suffering heavy losses. Russian forces have taken the city of Kremennaya and are approaching the town of Lyman, which would give them control of a direct road to Slavyansk from the east.
Austin’s hyped up rhetoric notwithstanding, Ukraine is not only not showing any signs of winning but keeps bleeding, and the territory under the actual control of the Ukrainian government is steadily shrinking. US officials admit that the Pentagon lacks the ability to track the weapons that are going in. Yet, the Biden administration has so far spent around $4 billion on Ukraine. Therein hangs a tale. Who are the real beneficiaries of the US supplies? The level of corruption in Ukraine is legion.
The plain truth is that it will be many weeks or months before meaningful volumes of heavy weapons could be delivered to Ukrainian combat units but in the meanwhile, the Battle of Donbass will be fought almost entirely on the basis of the current strength on the ground. In a detailed analysis this week, a former colonel in the US Army and prolific media commentator Daniel Davis concluded: “It will take too long for Western governments to come up with a coherent equipping plan and then prepare, ship, and deliver the kit to its destination in a timeframe that could provide Kyiv’s troops the ability to tip the balance against Russia.”
The bottom line is this: The Biden Administration’s geopolitical agenda is to prolong the military conflict, which apart from weakening Russia militarily and diplomatically, turns Europe into a battlefield and makes the continent heavily dependent on the US leadership for a very long time to come. For Biden, the war provides a useful distraction in US politics in an election year.
Austin hosted a conference of the US’ allies on Monday at the American base in Germany to form a monthly contact group on Ukraine’s self defence to coordinate the “efforts to strengthen Ukraine’s military for the long haul.” It has the ominous look of a “coalition of the willing.” Even Israel was recruited. But the US is underestimating the steely Russian resolve to fully realise the objectives behind the special operation in Ukraine. Moscow will not brook any roadblocks, no matter what it takes.
Putin issued a stern warning today: “If someone from outside moves to interfere in the current developments, they should know that they will indeed create strategic threats to Russia, which are unacceptable to us, and they should know that our response to encounter assaults will be instant, it will be quick.”
He was explicit that Russia has military capabilities that the US cannot match. “We have all the tools to do it, the tools that others can’t boast of at the moment, but as for us, we won’t be boasting. We will use them if the need arises and I would like everyone to be aware of it. We have made all the necessary decisions in this regard,” Putin warned.
The White House is Turning the War in Ukraine into a New Gold Rush
By Valery Kulikov – New Eastern Outlook – 27.04.2022
The Americans have a saying that every new president needs his own “splendid little war.” They understand perfectly that a war of that kind will enrich the incoming political and military establishment and also solve many social and financial problems in the country, not least unemployment, and help reduce foreign debt.
The political establishment has found it easy to arrange matters behind the back of the indecisive and ailing 46th US president, Joe Biden (about whose mental acuity many, both in the US and internationally, are now seriously concerned), and continue the work of previous administrations in drawing Russia deeper into the Ukrainian crisis.
As a result, Washington clearly has no interest in finding a peaceful solution to the conflict, and in provoking its escalation into outright war the White House has found itself forced to put together an anti-Russian coalition and supply more and more consignments of arms to the Ukrainian government.
On March 2, 2022 Dmytro Kuleba, Ukrainian Foreign Minister, claimed that Ukraine had “mobilized an international anti-war coalition, which already has at least 86 states and 15 international organizations” and that “19 countries are giving weapons to Ukraine.” And in a briefing on March 8 Pentagon Press secretary John Kirby confirmed that Ukraine was receiving weapons form 15 countries, including the USA.
The press briefing, published on the official web site of the US Department of Defense, stated that the United States had committed more than $4 billion in military assistance to Ukraine since the beginning of the Biden administration, including $3.4 billion since the beginning of Russia’s special operation! According to the briefing, the US had provided security assistance including 700 Switchblade drone systems, 16 Mi-17 helicopters, more than 1,400 shoulder-launched Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems, 183,000 155mm Howitzer artillery rounds and 72 tactical vehicles to tow them, 200 armored personnel carriers, 121 Phoenix Ghost tactical drones and more than 7,000 small arms. The Pentagon is also providing the Ukrainian armed forces with 5,100 Javelin anti-tank missiles and more than 14,000 “other anti-tank systems.”
As for the claim that representatives of the US military and political establishment have a financial stake in the Ukrainian conflict, it is enough to take the example of the Javelins. According to a number of US experts and industry publications, the US has provided Ukraine with approximately a third of its stock of Javelin anti-tank missiles. Significantly, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin has taken personal charge of supplying the Javelins to Ukraine. The reason is clear – he has long been closely linked to the manufacturer, and is now able to place government orders for these weapons. And with Javelin stocks steadily decreasing, the US army has requested new supplies, which means that Lloyd Austin is placing new orders, and may soon be making a big profit from these transactions.
Let us now look at the articles that have appeared in the US media – clearly planted by the Pentagon – suggesting that the transfer of the US’s supplies of Javelins may damage its own defense readiness, as there is the risk that remaining stocks may be insufficient to respond in the event of an “unexpected conflict.” Naturally, articles of this type are a form of propaganda, aimed at promoting the interests of the Department of Defense and of its head, Lloyd Austin. Currently the US army is not directly engaged in conflict, and is therefore able to replace its reserves of these weapons without difficulty. And by stepping up production volumes, Washington is able to boost its profits and create new jobs.
Many of the Javelins that have fallen into the hands of the Russian, PRD and PRL armies during the current conflict have an expiry date of 2022. Many media have reported on an embarrassing incident in the Yavoriv training ground, while US military specialists were instructing Ukrainian soldiers in the operation of the Javelin system – using a Javelin whose service life had expired. After firing the missile, the missile, fortunately without its warhead attached, fell to earth, almost under its users’ feet.
In other words, the war in Ukraine will, for a long time to come, boost the wealth of members of the United States’ political and military elite, including Pentagon officials, as they offload old stock, attract new orders from other countries, and embroil Washington in the “remote conflict” of their own creation. As for the European governments, US puppets who are supplying more and more of their own arms to Ukraine at Washington’s behest, they will, in the end, start to realize that this policy is harming them. By providing military assistance they are merely serving to draw out Russia’s military operation and tighten the financial noose around their own necks – which is one of the USA’s main goals. For, as a result of Washington’s rush to pressurize them into supplying Kiev with “sponsored military support,” in the end the European nations’ own arms reserves will run low, and they will be forced to restock by ordering new armaments from the USA.
It should therefore come as no surprise that the US government is standing on the sidelines and watching on with glee – it knows that when Europe and Nato need to replenish their arsenals, it will be the US military industrial complex that gets the contracts. And, in their joy the heads of the armament industry are drinking themselves into oblivion.
According to a recent article in The Independent, the arms companies are rushing to cash in on this new “gold rush” triggered by the escalation of the conflict in Ukraine. While to pickings from supplying arms to Kiev may be fairly modest, remilitarizing Europe would bring the US arms manufacturers huge profits. And the arms bosses have already started making promises to their shareholders and talking to the media about the profits to be gained from this project. Countries such as Germany, committed to a policy of pacifism since the end of World War II, are now trying to reform their militaries. Germany has already ordered 35 F-35 fighters, the most modern combat aircraft, from the American manufacturer Lockheed Martin, as well as 60 Chinook CH-47F heavy transport helicopters from the US aerospace giant Boeing.
Poland’s Ministry of Defense has signed a contract for the purchase of 250 US-made Abrams M1A2 SEPv3 tanks, the latest version of this vehicle. It has also signed an agreement for logistical and training support, including training for tank teams. In total, it has budgeted some $6 billion for the purchase of these tanks. According to the Polish army, this is its largest arms purchase since the Second World War.
To make sure no-one else benefits from this new Gold Rush the US intends to coordinate the international supply of arms to Ukraine, and to this end is organizing a conference on Ukraine at the United States European Command in Stuttgart, as reported by the German news television channel Welt.
U.S.-Led NATO Is at War Against Russia
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation |April 26, 2022
We are now in the realm of World War Three. The abysmal situation is such that the war is in danger of going nuclear in which case the future of the planet is at stake.
Incredibly, to warn of this danger leaves a person open to the accusation that they are peddling Russian propaganda. Blindly, the Western governments are doubling down on the powder-keg.
The U.S.-led NATO alliance is flooding Ukraine with heavy offensive weaponry capable of hitting Russia, and the British government this week has openly called for Ukraine to target Russia’s “depth” with NATO weapons.
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov commented that the U.S. military alliance is now fully-fledged in a proxy war against Russia. He said there is a “serious danger” of confrontation spiraling into a nuclear conflagration.
Only a fool or an insane person could remain insouciant about the dynamic unfolding.
Ominously, there is evidently no diplomatic will from Washington and its allies to address the background to the war in Ukraine or Russia’s long-held security concerns. The United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres is being vilified for even attempting to negotiate a peace settlement by going this week to Moscow before traveling on to Kiev.
There is a palpable sense that the U.S. and NATO are recklessly pushing a military showdown with Russia – albeit under the cynical guise of “defending Ukraine”. All the while, the Western public is being kept in the dark by a complicit corporate-controlled news media.
This week saw the United States host what can only be called a war conference at its European command center in the Ramstein airbase, Germany, where NATO military chiefs coordinated their weapons delivery to Ukraine. This is a war footing.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin said the United States and its NATO allies would “move heaven and earth” to get more weapons into Ukraine to defeat Russia’s military intervention in that country. Austin’s rhetoric was a disturbing malapropism with apocalyptic resonance.
But it does reveal the determination to take on Russia that is now openly visceral. The conflict in Ukraine is emerging for what it is – a war between the U.S.-led NATO bloc and Russia. Moscow has long held that the U.S. and NATO are a hostile entity tacitly aiming to subjugate Russia. Such claims have been derided as Russian paranoia. However, it’s now apparent that the actual intent is hostility and defeat of Russia.
Austin stated at the Ramstein conference that America’s allies are now openly exploiting an opportunity to “weaken Russia” and pursue the regime change objective in Moscow that U.S. President Biden referred to in his controversial Warsaw speech last month.
Earlier this week, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken accompanied Austin, the Pentagon’s civilian chief, on a secret visit to the Ukrainian capital, Kiev. American news media dutifully complied with an embargo on reporting the Sunday visit which shows that these media are complicit in conforming to Washington’s agenda of belligerence.
The American envoys held three-hour discussions with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky during which they pledged more military support on top of the huge arsenal already provided by the U.S. The meeting is a stark signal to Moscow of what the real American intentions are. This is not about resolving Russia’s grievances over NATO expansionism and the neutrality of Ukraine. That discourse was never taken seriously by the United States anyway. No, now relations are in the framework of the U.S. waging a war against Russia, with Ukraine merely the present battleground.
When the top American officials returned to Poland they held a press conference Monday at a warehouse shipping NATO weapons to Ukraine. At one stage, Austin told reporters about the earlier meeting with Zelensky: “So our focus in the meeting was to talk about those things that would enable us [sic] to win the current fight and also build for tomorrow [sic].”
Unable to contain his enthusiasm for confrontation, the Pentagon chief went on to make the direct U.S. involvement more apparent: “In terms of our – their ability to win, the first step in winning is believing that you can win. And so they believe that we can win; we believe that they – we can win – they can win if they have the right equipment, the right support. And we’re going to do everything we can – continue to do everything we can to ensure that that gets there.”
When Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered what he called “the special military operation” in Ukraine on February 24, he said Russia had no choice but to defend the Russian-speaking people of the Donbass who had endured eight years of a deadly offensive by the NATO-backed Kiev regime forces.
The United States, NATO, and the Kiev regime have shown no will whatsoever to resolve the civil war in Ukraine peacefully by implementing the Minsk accords negotiated in 2015.
It is more apparent than ever that the conflict in the Ukraine was never a localized civil war but rather was always a front line in a bigger geopolitical confrontation between the U.S.-led NATO bloc and Russia, as Bruce Gagnon explained in a recent interview for Strategic Culture Foundation.
Instead of an earnest effort to genuinely resolve the conflict, the NATO-backed Kiev regime and its openly Nazi regiments are mobilizing in a general war footing against Russia.
The rationale is now explicitly stated as the U.S. and its allies wanting to defeat Russia and subjugate it.
British armed forces minister James Heappey even went as far as telling the BBC this week that Ukrainian forces should strike Russia’s depth with NATO weaponry.
Russia’s military defense doctrine forgoes first-use of nuclear weapons but it reserves the right to use such weapons if the country comes under existential threat even from conventional military assault.
The United States and its NATO allies have willfully ignored Russia’s decades-long concerns about its security and in particular the use of Ukraine as a cat’s paw to destabilize and dissipate Russia. The full-on U.S. imperial war agenda of targeting Russia for defeat is now coming into focus. The crazies are in charge of the asylum. And shouting about it too.
The NATO Lie
By Jacob G. Hornberger | FFF | April 26, 2022
Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has brought to the forefront the NATO treaty to which the United States is a party. President Biden and the Pentagon have steadfastly maintained that a Russian attack on any NATO member automatically obligates the United States to go to war against Russia. That, of course, would necessarily mean the virtual certainly of all-out nuclear war between Russia and the United States, a war that would, needless to say, end up destroying both countries and killing hundreds of millions of people in the process.
There is one big problem with the Biden/Pentagon position: It’s a lie. In fact, the NATO treaty does not obligate the United States to automatically come to the defense of any NATO member in the event Russia attacks that particular country. That’s because the NATO treaty does not operate to amend the U.S. Constitution.
The Constitution is the document that the American people used to call the federal government into existence. The Constitution established a federal government of limited powers. The government was divided into three branches — executive, legislative, and judicial — with enumerated powers being delegated to each branch of government.
With respect to war, the Framers delegated the power to declare war to Congress and the power to wage war to the president. What that meant was that the president is prohibited from waging war against another nation without first securing a declaration of war from Congress.
When the U.S. government was converted from a limited-government republic to a national-security state after World War II, a fourth branch was effectively added to the federal government: the national-security branch, consisting of the Pentagon, the CIA, and the NSA.
While it has been said that these entities are actually part of the executive branch, as Michael Glennon has pointed out in his excellent book National Security and Double Government (which I cannot recommend too highly), the national-security section of the federal government, owing to its overwhelming power, is actually the part that is running the show, with the other parts of the federal government operating deferentially in support.
The Constitution provides for the specific ways to amend the Constitution. Quoting whitehouse.gov: “An amendment may be proposed by a two-thirds vote of both Houses of Congress, or, if two-thirds of the States request one, by a convention called for that purpose. The amendment must then be ratified by three-fourths of the State legislatures, or three-fourths of conventions called in each State for ratification.”
Notice something important: The Constitution does not provide that it can be amended by treaty. The Framers did not want federal officials to have the power to amend the Constitution by simply entering into treaties with other nations that changed the terms and conditions of the Constitution.
Therefore, the NATO treaty cannot operate to amend the constitutional provision that requires a congressional declaration of war before the president can legally wage war. Thus, if Russia attacks, say, NATO member Poland, the Constitution requires the president to secure a declaration of war from Congress against Russia before the president, the Pentagon, and the CIA can wage war against Russia.
Now, take a look at an article entitled “The NATO Treaty Does Not Give Congress a Bye on World War III” by Michael Glennon, who I mentioned above. It’s posted at a website entitled lawfareblog.com. This is one of the most important articles that you will read in your lifetime. I cannot emphasize too highly why you should read this article and, equally important, share it with everyone you know and, equally important, ask them to share it with everyone they know.
Glennon is professor of international law at The Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University. From 1977-1980, he served as counsel to the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. You can read more about his credentials on Wikipedia by clicking here.
Glennon’s article makes the scholarly but easily readable case that the NATO treaty does not — and cannot — automatically obligate the United States to go to war in the event Russia (or any other nation) attacks a NATO member.
Of course, there is a much more fundamental question that Americans must confront: Why is the United States in NATO at all? NATO was established after World War II to ostensibly protect Western Europe from an attack by the Soviet Union, notwithstanding the fact that there was never any real likelihood that the Soviet Union, which was totally devastated in World War II, had any interest in going to war with Western Europe (and a nuclear-armed United States).
Regardless of whether NATO was necessary or whether it was just part of the Cold War racket, one thing is crystal clear: Once the Soviet Union dismantled, NATO’s mission became moot. At that point, this Cold War dinosaur should have been dismantled and sent into extinction.
Instead, what the NATO bureaucrats did was keep this dinosauric entity in existence and, even worse, began using it to absorb former members of the Soviet Union, which enabled the Pentagon to establish its nuclear missiles ever closer to Russia’s borders. It was when the Pentagon, operating through NATO, announced an intention to absorb Ukraine that Russia decided to invade Ukraine, as the Pentagon knew it would, in order to prevent the Pentagon from establishing its nuclear missiles (and military bases, troops, tanks, and other weaponry) on Russia’s border.
Thus, one of the keys to getting America back on the right track — toward liberty, peace, prosperity, and harmony with the people of the world — is to immediately withdraw from NATO, which would bring the immediate dissolution of this Cold War dinosauric entity, as well as bring U.S. troops home from Europe (and everywhere else). It is U.S. foreign interventionism that is a root cause of the loss of liberty and prosperity in America as well as America’s disharmony with the people of the world.
In the meantime, it is in the interest of every American to understand the nature of the NATO lie, a lie that holds that the NATO treaty automatically obligates the U.S. government to go to war against Russia in the event of an attack by Russia on another member of NATO. That’s why, again, I highly recommend reading Michael Glennon’s article and sharing it with everyone you know and asking them to share it with everyone they know.
Germany to supply Ukraine with heavy weaponry
Samizdat | April 26, 2022
The German government has given the green light for the delivery of self-propelled anti-aircraft guns to Ukraine, the country’s Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht said on Tuesday.
Speaking at US-hosted defense talks at the American airbase Ramstein in Germany’s Rhineland-Palatinate state, Lambrecht said that the leadership in Berlin made the decision on Monday. She emphasized that Germany was “determined to help the Ukrainian people with unified resolve in this existential emergency.”
The minister explained that “Ukraine will order” hardware from German manufacturers and “Germany will pay.” Berlin would earmark some 2 billion euros to that end, Lambrecht added.
The armored vehicles in question are Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft guns, which were decommissioned by the German military back in 2010. Designed to take out cruise missiles and aircraft, Gepards can also be used against targets on the ground. As many as 50 heavy vehicles could reportedly be delivered to Ukraine. Defense firm Krauss-Maffei Wegmann will now refurbish the equipment before transferring it on to Kiev, Germany’s dpa news agency reported. It is, however, not known when exactly Ukraine can expect delivery of the anti-aircraft systems.
Lambrecht also announced that Berlin “has initiated a swap scheme with our partners in eastern Europe” that is ensuring that “Ukraine is quickly obtaining heavy weaponry that doesn’t require lengthy training.” But, according to the minister, Germany could do a lot more in this respect.
On top of that, Berlin will be cooperating with the US and the Netherlands when it comes to providing training to Ukrainian troops on German soil in the use of various artillery systems.
Lambrecht made the announcements during a meeting of defense ministers from 40 countries hosted by US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Tuesday.
Earlier this month, several German outlets reported that Germany’s Rheinmetall arms manufacturer was prepared to sell 88 decommissioned Leopard tanks, as well as ammunition, spare parts and tools to repair the hardware. Training on the equipment would also be provided to Ukrainian troops. The company was awaiting the German government’s approval, the media said at the time.
Moscow has repeatedly condemned NATO arms supplies to Kiev, saying they only destabilize the situation on the ground and hamper the prospect for peace. It also warned that any equipment deliveries will be considered a legitimate military target for the Russian forces once they cross into Ukrainian territory.
“NATO is essentially going to war with Russia through a proxy and arming that proxy. War means war,” Russia’s Foreign Minister said on Monday.
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From the Archives
A sample of vaccine and injectable medication tragedies during my lifetime
This is what happens when you demand speedy production in an era of politicized regulation
By Meryl Nass, MD | February 12, 2022
All these tragedies have been due to failures of testing or failures in manufacturing processes. Most occurred before vaccine manufacturers were given virtually complete protection from liability in 1987.
With the duration of patent exclusivity determining how much new products earn, products are rushed to market as quickly as possible, most using a shortened path for FDA review. Recalls and market removals of approved products are much more common than they used to be. We can only expect more of these disasters in the future, especially if the products are mandated for everyone. … continue
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