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NATO preparing for ‘protracted wars’ – Pentagon

RT | July 10, 2024

The US and its allies are planning to continue ramping up defense spending, which will ensure long-term demand for weapons, US Deputy Defense Secretary Kathleen Hicks told a gathering of arms manufacturers during a NATO event on Tuesday.

Speaking at the NATO Summit Defense Industry Forum, the official praised NATO members for boosting their military budgets since the initial flare-up of the Ukraine conflict in 2014, and particularly after the open hostilities between Ukraine and Russia erupted in 2022. Over the past decade, the average annual increase in spending was 72%, adjusted for inflation, she said.

That reversed a period when “defense industries across the Atlantic were affected by decades of inconsistent funding and blinkered demand signals,” she said. She said the current thinking is: “Production matters. Production is deterrence.”

Western arms manufacturers have the ability “not just to compete, but to out-compete and prevail” over Russia and other nations that the US considers its rivals, including China, North Korea and Iran.

“That includes ensuring we are prepared for the possibility of protracted war, which every ally must be prepared for – and not just in Europe, either,” Hicks warned.

Developing the manufacturing base on both sides of the Atlantic in a way that combines “information-age ingenuity and industrial-era capacity” will benefit US allies in the Pacific, such as Australia, Japan and South Korea, the official said.

She claimed that Western political systems are inherently beneficial for building “arsenals of democracy,” since they foster innovation and transnational cooperation. On the other hand, “autocracies,” according to her reasoning, can’t move beyond “just landing at each other’s airfields, or sailing ships alongside each other for a few days at a time.”

The Pentagon is looking for ways “to be a better customer,” Hicks said, by streamlining its internal processes, delivering targeted investments in the defense sector, and providing security services to weapons businesses.

Russian officials have described NATO as a tool of US geopolitical ambition and a way to secure a permanent market for American weapons in Europe. Moscow has cited Washington’s pledge that Ukraine will eventually join the bloc together with NATO’s increased presence in Ukraine since 2014 as among the key triggers of the ongoing conflict.

Beijing has accused the US of being stuck in a “Cold War mentality” and playing “zero-sum games” with non-Western nations, including China.

July 10, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, Timeless or most popular | , , | Leave a comment

Why France’s Snap Election Proves EU’s Warmongering Agenda Flopped

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 10.07.2024

Despite surviving the runoff vote, Emmanuel Macron sustained a crushing and unexpected defeat during the snap election, Fabien Chalandon, French political commentator and writer, told Sputnik. What’s more, the parliament’s new composition may put the brakes on Macron’s bellicosity.

The outcome of the snap election in the French National Assembly has left no party with a majority, leading to uncertainty regarding the formation of a coalition. This raises the question of whether the left-wing and centrist parties will be able to collaborate effectively in order to establish a functional parliament.

“This is the key question,” Fabien Chalandon, chevalier of the French Legion d’Honneur, investor, and writer, told Sputnik. “No party has any majority, and any government can be deposed at any time by a combination of the two other groups. The parliament is therefore in a gridlock and ungovernable. In addition, the left-wing New Popular Front (NFP) is a coalition of small parties all deeply opposed on any subject, including Ukraine, and which have only one common ground: their hate of the National Rally (RN), which cannot provide a common set of practical objectives for an effective governing alliance.”

The NFP, a broad left-wing coalition which brought together Socialists, Communists, Greens and the hardline leftist France Unbowed Party (La France Insoumise), was hastily founded on June 10 with the sole aim of defeating the right-wing RN in the snap legislative election.

According to the commentator, the likelihood of the NFP coalition passing the test of time is “remote as it may explode on the issue of loss of real income, when finally politicians admit that the bulk of the current impoverishment of French middle and poor class has been stoked by inflation directly derived from the Ukrainian conflict.”

Macron’s Bellicosity Backfired During Elections

Meanwhile, it appears that the new composition of the parliament could disrupt French President Emmanuel Macron’s “tour de force” for European leadership.

Over the past several months, Macron has made a series of controversial statements, ranging from putting NATO boots on the ground in Ukraine to doubling the EU budget and promoting the idea of a “major European loan” to finance the bloc’s rearmament effort.

Macron’s sudden transformation into a “Ukraine hawk” – given that France has been ranked 15th in terms of military aid to Kiev – raised questions in the European mainstream press. According to the Spectator, one of the causes of Macron’s bellicosity was his desire to “embarrass” the National Rally in the European elections, “not to mention their predicted victory in the 2027 presidential race.”

The French president’s scheme appeared to have boomeranged. His Renaissance party secured just 15.2 percent of the vote during the EU parliamentary elections last month, while the National Rally got a whopping 31.5 percent.

In the snap election, announced by Macron after the humiliating defeat, the centrist-liberal Ensemble (Together) party survived by pure luck and due to its unholy formal alliance with Les Republicains (LR) and the NFP to obstruct “at all costs” the National Rally in the second round, according to Chalandon.

“Compared to the 2022 elections, the Macron presidential party ‘Together’ lost 100 seats to 168,” the political commentator noted.

“This [snap] election is therefore a second crushing defeat for M. Macron,” the pundit said. “Macron did not expect such a damning result after the first round. In fact, this snap election is overwhelmingly portrayed in the French press and social media as a ‘childish’ decision following the RN tsunami during the previous European elections.”

The election outcome would continue to undermine Macron’s warmongering posture, including his push for rearmament and increased military support to Ukraine, according to the commentator.

“On Ukraine, the NFP is clearly against the EU and EU support of Ukraine. But so is the Unbowed France Party… Any proposal for additional funding to Ukraine may not be approved if these two coalesce to block it, even if they do not coordinate,” Chalandon said.

While the EU’s bureaucracy could circumvent the legislative gridlock in its member states by stealthily boosting its funding to Ukraine within its general budget, the crux of the matter is that Europeans and especially young people across the continent have increasingly started to realize the collective West’s hypocrisy with regard to Ukraine, according to the pundit.

Chalandon notes that Europeans are steadily recognizing the West’s 20-year provocations against Russia, as well as the sabotage of the Istanbul agreement in April 2022 led by the US and UK.

“Moreover, the cause of the recent sharp decline of Europe’s purchasing power is starting to be attributed to the Ukrainian conflict, so far, a taboo subject among politicians. Ukraine’s war and open-ended funding will not continue unabated and may progressively appear for what it is: the main cause of Europe’s recent economic downfall,” the commentator emphasized.

How Could US Political Debacle Affect Europe’s Ukraine Policy

Nonetheless, the EU elites are unwilling to change their stance on the Ukraine conflict, especially given their political dependency on their peers in Washington.

However, US neocons have recently found themselves on the horns of a dilemma given that their major “pro-war” presidential candidate Joe Biden appears to be “unsellable” to American voters, as Wall Street analyst Charles Ortel noted in an earlier interview with Sputnik.

“The key factor which could affect French and Europe’s attitude in the Ukrainian conflict is if M. Trump wins the US election and decides to force Ukraine to negotiate by interrupting its military aid,” Chalandon said, referring to the Republican frontrunner’s plan to stop the fighting and look into peace negotiations.

The political commentator noted, however, that despite Trump’s high-powered numbers across US nationwide polls, his victory is not a done deal given the lawsuits brought forward by his political opponents.

Likewise, the Biden camp is also teetering in the balance as the Democratic Party is waging a behind the scenes battle over a possible replacement for the aging Biden. This potential change could allegedly shift Washington’s attitude on the Ukraine conflict.

“Since European efforts towards Ukraine cannot survive a withdrawal by the US, Europe and France will be left with no other option than to cave in,” the French political commentator remarked.

Chalandon concluded that if a new US context were to arise, Europe’s determination to carry on with the ongoing military “solution” to the Ukrainian conflict would amount to nothing more than empty posturing.

In parallel to his investment banking career, Chalandon co-founded and ran a French political think tank, Fondation Concorde, and was awarded the French Legion d’Honneur in 2000 and wrote for leading French newspapers on political issues. His father, Albin Chalandon, served as minister of various governments under President Charles de Gaulle and Georges Pompidou and then minister of justice between 1986 and 1988 in a Jacques Chirac-led government under then President Francois Mitterrand.

July 10, 2024 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite | , , | Leave a comment

US Provides $2 Billion Military Aid Package to Warsaw

By Connor Freeman | The Libertarian Institute | July 8, 2024

Washington is providing its NATO ally Poland with a second $2 billion foreign military financing (FMF) package in less than a year, Breaking Defense reports. In recent weeks, Warsaw has given Kiev a green light to use Polish-provided weapons to strike the Russian mainland as well as signed a bilateral military pact with Ukraine, agreeing to shoot down some Russian missiles.

A State Department official boasted to the outlet of how the two FMF loans are benefiting the US arms industry as well as strengthening the Washington-led bloc embroiled in its Ukraine proxy war with Moscow. “It’s impressive that it hasn’t even been a year and they [Poland] are moving out pretty quickly… We’re happy with the process. We see it as a success. We’re happy that they’ve been able to move out quickly — not only does it help NATO, it helps the US defense industry as well, the US economy. So, we’re definitely happy with the process.”

As with typical FMF loans, the funds furnished by the State Department to a foreign government must be spent on American-made weaponry and equipment. What makes this loan unique, however, is instead of a grant to purchase arms, this loan includes interest which Warsaw must repay. The US is putting up $60 million to guarantee the loan and cover initial fees. The official said details regarding how the funds will be spent, on what kinds of weapons, will not be shared during this week’s NATO summit. Instead, he insisted the Poles “[have] a list of things they want to achieve” and said to expect future announcements.

The official noted the previous FMF loan, issued last September, has either been totally spent or is earmarked for purchases including four aerostat-based early warning systems which accounts for approximately half the first loan. The unusual loan-based structure allows “the interagency to get FMF funding to foreign allies without needing to wait on the appropriations process,” the outlet notes, adding Congress extended the authority to issue these loans through the end of the 2025 fiscal year.

Asked if other countries will receive such loans, the official answered “We are looking at it, and there are other countries that remain competitive… The reason you’re seeing Poland is, of course, the situation with the ongoing war in Ukraine. They’re ready to move out.” The official emphasized that talks with multiple countries are ongoing, while repeatedly praising Warsaw’s high military spending and deeming Poland “the tip of the spear on this for us right now.”

The State Department stated “Poland is a leader in NATO, currently spending four percent of GDP on defense, the highest in the Alliance. Poland hosts thousands of U.S. and Allied forces, including U.S. V Corps Headquarters (Forward) in Poznan.” The US has roughly 10,000 troops stationed in Poland. Since Russian forces invaded Ukraine, Warsaw has announced plans to buy a myriad of American arms including Abrams tanks, Black Hawk and Apache helicopters, HIMARS rocket launchers. Poland is seeking more Patriot air defense batteries as well.

This latest financial and military infusion comes after Ukraine and Poland signed a bilateral military pact this week which includes a mechanism for Warsaw to shoot down Russian missiles and drones. This provision entails the potential to provoke a NATO-Russia war, something Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has long sought.

During a joint presser with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk on Monday, Zelensky declared “We are especially grateful for the special arrangements, and this is reflected in the security agreement. It provides for the development of a mechanism to shoot down [by Poland] Russian missiles and drones fired in the airspace of Ukraine in the direction of Poland.”

In November 2022, after a Ukrainian air defense missile killed two people in Poland, Zelensky and his top advisors said it was a Russian strike and demanded NATO take action. “Hitting NATO territory with missiles. … This is a Russian missile attack on collective security! This is a really significant escalation. Action is needed,” Zelensky railed in a video address.

This assessment was completely at odds with those made by the US, Poland, and NATO which determined the Polish casualties were not the result of a Russian missile strike. At the time, a diplomat from a NATO member state told Financial Times “The Ukrainians are destroying [our] confidence in them. Nobody is blaming Ukraine and they are openly lying. This is more destructive than the missile.”

July 9, 2024 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Poland to shoot down Russian missiles – Zelensky

RT | July 8, 2024

A newly signed pact between Warsaw and Kiev contains provisions that would allow Poland to shoot down Russian missiles and drones in Ukrainian airspace, Vladimir Zelensky has said.

Zelensky spoke in Warsaw on Monday, after signing the security deal with Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk. The government in Kiev has been making bilateral pacts with NATO member states over the past several months, in lieu of formally joining the US-led bloc.

The agreement “provides for the development of a mechanism [for Poland] to shoot down Russian missiles and drones fired in the airspace of Ukraine in the direction of Poland,” Zelensky said, according to Ukrainian media.

He added that Warsaw and Kiev “will work together to work out how we can quickly implement this point” of the deal.

Tusk confirmed the existence of the provision but said it merely “indicates the need for talks on this matter,” according to Polish media.

“We need clear cooperation within NATO here, because such actions require joint NATO responsibility,” the Polish PM added, explaining that it would be in the interest of both Poland and Ukraine to get a “stamp” of international solidarity first.

“We will include other NATO allies in this conversation. So we treat the matter seriously as open, but not yet finalized,” Tusk said, according to Poland’s RMF24 Radio.

Zelensky has been asking NATO to shoot down incoming Russian missiles for several months already. He has compared it to what the US and UK did for Israel in mid-April, during an Iranian reprisal bombardment, and argued that it would not directly involve the bloc in the conflict.

“NATO will not become part of the conflict,” the bloc’s secretary-general, Jens Stoltenberg, replied at the time. “There are no plans to send NATO troops to Ukraine or to extend NATO’s air-defense shield to Ukraine,” he added.

While US and EU officials shot down Zelensky’s comparison with Israel, they agreed to other things he asked for, from additional Patriot missile launchers and rockets to permitting Ukraine to use the weapons they supplied to strike deep into Russian territory.

During his visit to Warsaw, Zelensky also announced that Poland would raise, train and equip a ‘Ukrainian Legion’, made up of volunteers. “Every Ukrainian citizen who decides to join the legion will be able to sign a contract with the Ukrainian armed forces,” he added.

Tusk did not comment on the legion business, but said that every word in the security pact meant something and that it’s about “practical mutual commitments, not empty promises.”

July 8, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Republika Srpska’s leader won’t allow Bosnia, Herzegovina to join NATO

Al Mayadeen | July 7, 2024

President Milorad Dodik states he will not allow Bosnia and Herzegovina to join NATO, emphasizing that Republika Srpska supports maintaining neutrality.

Republika Srpska will not allow Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) to join NATO due to the Serbs’ memory of past suffering, Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik told Sputnik.

“I will be very clear: Bosnia and Herzegovina will not join NATO, referring to the procedure and the law by which the Parliamentary Assembly must reach an agreement on this issue on the basis of a majority of the decisions envisaged for adoption. So this agreement cannot and will not be reached. Serbs will never forget the suffering of innocent civilians, so we will never give our consent for Bosnia and Herzegovina to join NATO,” Dodik stated.

In the spring, Denis Becirovic, the Bosniak member of the BiH Presidency, told NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg that BiH’s strategic goal is to join NATO. In January, Dodik expressed that while Republika Srpska allows cooperation with NATO, it opposes BiH’s membership in the alliance.

July 7, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Russian Experts Gain Access to Storm Shadow Missile Warhead

Sputnik – July 7, 2024

Russian specialists have studied the cumulative warhead of European Storm Shadow/SCALP missiles, determining the penetration depth and detonation distance above the ground, an engineer and weapons specialist told Sputnik.

“The primary cumulative projectile of the Storm Shadow/SCALP missile consists of the nose cap, the primary charge, and then the main warhead. It is necessary for the initial penetration of an obstacle. It creates holes using the cumulative effect, through which the inertial warhead penetrates, causing an explosion. We understand the penetration depth, the detonation distance from the surface, the types of target sensors used, and the potential penetration depth,” the specialist said.

The cumulative warhead of the Storm Shadow/SCALP missile is a cylindrical object about half a meter in length with approximately the same diameter. The nose section is shaped like a cone, directed inward towards the body.

The study of the missile by Russian specialists will enable the implementation of countermeasures to protect against such weapons, including the creation of shelters with the necessary characteristics, the specialist explained.

The Storm Shadow is a low-observable, air-launched cruise missile. It is launched from aircraft and has a strike range of 250 to 560 kilometers, depending on the modification. It was developed jointly by France and the United Kingdom (in France, it is named SCALP and is produced by the MBDA consortium). The Ukrainian Armed Forces have been actively using the Storm Shadow since last year.

The Storm Shadow and SCALP-EG cruise missiles can approach their targets stealthily by using navigation correction via American satellites, Lieutenant General Andrey Semenov, Commander of the Air Defense and Missile Defense Forces and Deputy Commander of the Russian Aerospace Forces earlier said.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that Moscow may respond asymmetrically to the supply of long-range weapons to Ukraine. The transfer of high-precision long-range weaponry to Kiev is a path to very serious problems, he emphasized.

July 7, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Ukraine asks West for submarines

RT | July 7, 2024

Ukraine needs Western submarines to bolster its military capabilities in the Black Sea, Navy chief Admiral Aleksey Neizhpapa, has said.

He argued that deploying underwater craft could strategically improve Ukraine’s positions across the Black Sea during the conflict with Russia.

“We are thinking about it, submarines are necessary for us, they should be part of the navy,” Neizhpapa said in an interview with journalist Natalya Moseychuk, posted on her YouTube channel on Saturday.

The head of the Ukrainian navy added that the country does not need large submarines, as “they are useless in the Black Sea.”

“Locating only near Odessa means having nothing, we should look further, spread the fleet throughout the Black Sea and use its entire area,” he said, expressing hope that Ukraine would turn “from a coastal state into a maritime power.”

Since the Russia-Ukraine conflict erupted in February 2022, Western states have supplied vast quantities of weapons to Kiev, while denying direct involvement in the hostilities. However, with the fighting well into its third year, there have been numerous reports of dwindling support, with delays in arms and ammunition deliveries.

Earlier this week, Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky said in an interview with Bloomberg that US weapons were taking too long to reach the country, despite Congress approving a $61 billion assistance package in April.

NATO diplomats told the agency that the US-led military bloc had agreed to provide at least €40 billion ($43 billion) in military aid for Ukraine per year, without specifying how long the aid would continue.

July 7, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

The Prince And The Spy

By Whitney Webb | The Last American Vagabond | May 12, 2023 

A TLAV investigation has found that Erik Prince, the man behind the Blackwater mercenary group, recently teamed up with an Israeli spy, creating a front company with her to help Israeli defense technology providers exploit loopholes and sell their products to the American military.

For years, Erik Prince – the founder of mercenary firm Blackwater (now Academi) – has been a major source of controversy. Ever since he left Blackwater over a decade ago, Prince has appeared in the news for pushing to privatize several wars, his ties to former President Donald Trump’s presidential campaigns, his violation of international arms embargoes and his unusually close ties with Project Veritas, among other notable events and connections.

However, some of Prince’s antics in recent years have not yet made it into the news – namely his decision to team up with an Israeli spy to build a very secretive company that has – until now – evaded scrutiny. That company, Comframe Solutions, appears to operate as an intelligence front and explicitly targets parts of the American military involved in highly sensitive combat operations. As this investigation will show, Prince’s partner in Comframe – Lital Leshem – has been tied to a series of apparent, and admitted, Israeli intelligence front companies, several of which have a focus on technology. Yet Prince and his close associate Chris Burgess – Comframe’s supposed president – have done everything they can to hide their association with the incredibly secretive company. Why might that be and what exactly is Comframe up to?

From “Army Brat” to Cyber Spy

Lital Leshem was raised as an “army brat” in Reut, Israel and Pennsylvania, USA. She later enlisted in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) as she was “truly devoted to safeguarding the State of Israel.” She quickly rose in the ranks, becoming Operations Officer in the IDF of the besieged Gaza Strip and later becoming a Major, a position she continues to hold to this date through her “reserve duty activities.” According to her LinkedIn, she served in Israeli military intelligence from 2005 to 2011 and, more specifically, served in its signals intelligence unit – Unit 8200. She later attended IDC Herzliya, an Israeli university deeply tied to its military and intelligence apparatus. There, she met Amir Elichai and the two would co-create the company Reporty, which later became Carbyne911 – today known only as Carbyne.

Carbyne was originally founded as Reporty in 2014 by Leshem, Elichai and Alex Dizengof. Leshem and Elichai are Unit 8200 veterans, while Dizengof previously worked for Israel’s Prime Minister’s Office. Before it was revealed that Jeffrey Epstein had poured at least 1 million dollars into the company at the behest of his close associate Ehud Barak, Cabryne’s board of directors – which Barak chaired – included the former commander of Unit 8200, Pinchas Buchris, as well as Epstein associate turned venture capitalist Nicole Junkermann. In the wake of the Epstein scandal, Buchris, Barak and Junkerman, among others, were removed from the board and were largely replaced with veterans and former heads of American intelligence and law enforcement agencies. Leshem had left the company in 2017, but has continued to own shares in the company.

Carbyne is a Next-Generation 9-11 (NG911) platform and the explicit goal of NG911 is for all 911 systems nationwide to become interconnected. It is currently active throughout the United States, its main target market. Its software has been criticized due to “serious privacy concerns” about the amount of information it harvests from smartphones that call a 911 call center running Carbyne’s software. For instance, Carbyne’s smartphone app extracts the following information from the phones on which it is installed:

“Device location, video live-streamed from the smartphone to the call center, text messages in a two-way chat window, any data from a user’s phone if they have the Carbyne app and ESInet, and any information that comes over a data link, which Carbyne opens in case the caller’s voice link drops out.”

The potential for Carbyne as a tool for mass surveillance has been extensively reported by Narativ, MintPress News and other outlets. In addition, Carbyne stores all data on past calls and events in order to “enabl[e] decision makers to accurately analyze the past and present behavior of their callers, react accordingly, and in time predict future patterns.” As a result, Carbyne – along with other Israeli intelligence-connected companies seeking to dominate the American “public safety” market – has the potential to facilitate controversial “predictive policing”, i.e. pre-crime, policies.

In addition to Carbyne, Leshem also worked for Black Cube, which has since been removed from her LinkedIn. There, she had been the firms Director of Marketing. Black Cube was specifically outed as an Israeli intelligence front organization in a 2019 article published by Calcalist Tech. That same article also contains the stunning revelation that many Israeli companies, including Black Cube, have been founded as fronts for intelligence operations since 2012. It states that “since 2012, cyber-related and intelligence projects that were previously carried out in-house in the Israeli military and Israel’s main intelligence arms are transferred to companies that in some cases were built for this exact purpose.” The article also adds that:

“In some cases, managers of development projects in the Israeli military and intelligence arms were encouraged to form their own companies which then took over the [military and/or intelligence] project.”

With Leshem having worked for one company already known to be a product of this deliberate policy, it is worth scrutinizing Carbyne as being one such front, especially considering the common tie of Ehud Barak to both companies. In addition, Leshem has also worked for another company tied to Barak that has been described as worse than the NSO Group, which produced the notorious Pegasus software. Called Toka, its top executives – like Carbyne – are largely veterans of Israeli’s Unit 8200, where Leshem also served, or former commanders of Israeli military cyber operations.

Toka, which Ehud Barak founded in 2018, is very, very likely to be one of the front organizations produced as a result of the aforementioned 2012 Israeli intelligence policy. The company is directly partnered with Israel’s Ministry of Defense and other Israeli intelligence and security agencies since its founding and the company only sells its products to countries that are considered allies of Israel. It purports to be able to hack, not just smartphones, but any device with internet connectivity, such as doorbell cameras and other “smart” devices. As will be noted later in this article, Leshem herself has noted that Toka has a relationship with the CIA.

After being involved with a series of Israeli intelligence fronts and her enduring ties to Israeli military intelligence through her “reserve duty activities”, Leshem was courted by a surprising figure – Erik Prince, war profiteer and founder of the controversial mercenary outfit Blackwater.

Partnering with Prince

Leshem says that she met Prince after she “randomly stumbled across his path and joined his team.” There, per her website, she “managed his business portfolio and his global investments.” Her LinkedIn lists her as serving as the executive director of global business development of Frontier Resource Group (FRG) from 2018 to 2021. Frontier Resource Group was founded by Prince and is “an Africa-dedicated investment firm partnered with major Chinese enterprises, including at least one state-owned resource giant that is keen to pour money into the resource-rich continent,” according to the South China Post. It not only operates in Africa, but also other countries due to its contracts to support China’s One Belt One Road initiative, which were signed in 2019.

FRG is a subsidiary of Frontier Services Group (FSG), which Prince also founded. In 2013, he sold a majority share of FSG to the China International Trust Investment Corporation (CITIC), a state-owned Chinese investment company that is among the largest of the country’s state-run conglomerates. CITIC, during the mid-1990s, was chaired by Wang Jun, who doubled as China’s chief arms dealer and was a key figure in the “Chinagate” scandal of the Clinton White House. As detailed in One Nation Under Blackmail, that scandal involved the illicit transfer of American military technology to China and the illicit transfer of Chinese weapons, whose sale in the US was banned during this time, into the United States. Mark Middleton, a White House aide, and Jeffrey Epstein are some of the names apparently involved with those activities. “Chinagate” appears to have been a joint venture between factions of the CIA and Israeli intelligence and has never been properly investigated by federal authorities. It seems that Prince, who was (and may still be) a CIA asset, and Leshem have engaged in similar activities via FRG/FSG. For example, TRTWorld reported that Leshem is “speculated” to have transferred Carbyne’s technology to China via her role at FRG and her connection to Prince. China launched an app that was nearly analogous to Carbyne, but more explicitly focused on surveillance, at the same time that Carbyne launched its first 911 call system in the United States.

In addition, TRTWorld notes, the company DarkMatter, a UAE surveillance and intelligence group that employs former US intelligence operatives, attracted the attention of Chinese officials at a smart cities conference in 2015. DarkMatter, which was launched to modernize Emirati intelligence and military operations, signed a Global Strategic Memorandum of Understanding with Huawei, the Chinese tech giant. The middle man in this sale was none other than Erik Prince. Leshem and another Prince associate, Dorian Barak, also have business ties to the UAE via their prominent roles at the UAE-Israel Business Council.

As TRTWorld concluded:

“With similar technology being used, and the same mercenary middle-man between Carbyne and China who brought together UAE’s DarkMatter surveillance technology with China, indications point to a likely transfer of surveillance technology from Epstein’s Israeli company [Carbyne] to China.”

Comframe – Secretive Company or Intelligence Front?

Prince’s and Leshem’s joint activities after Leshem left FRG suggest that this pattern of behavior has not only continued, but deepened. According to Leshem’s website, a year and a half after she started working for Prince, she and Prince “joined forces to found Comframe, a company that takes the best of Israeli defense technology providers, and helps them penetrate the American market by bridging prevalent gaps.” Leshem also says Comframe was assisted by her “premier integrator and business development platform for deploying advanced military, special operations, public safety and HLS solutions in the United States, and a wide network of partnership, both government and civilian.”

In discussing Comframe elsewhere, Leshem writes that the company she co-founded with Prince “is led and staffed by Special Operations and defense procurement veterans with billions of dollars of successful sales to USG and foreign government to their names.” She says that Comframe has a “track-record of success implementing complex procurement and integrations programs from intelligence gathering & analysis, to contracting, program sales and personnel deployment, is exceptional.”

What Leshem says of the company clashes with Comframe’s threadbare public presence. For instance, its website, which is notably short on content, lists the following companies as partners – TomCar, BlueBird Aero Systems, General Robotics, SafeStrike, Ops-Core (now part of Gentex Corp) and Axon. On its partners page, Comframe says that this is “a small sampling of our current partners we have chosen to work with.” Most of these companies were created by Israeli military/military intelligence veterans.

Aside from the partners page, there is little other information available on the Comframe site. It describes its mission as “to source cutting-edge, innovative technologies that safely and securely solve articulated U.S. government problems” and touts its “get it done” commitment and how its employees “wake up every morning wanting to find solutions that keep the U.S. government safe and more lethal.” It lists the company’s president as Chris Burgess. Burgess, a former NAVY Seal who trained with Erik Prince, does not list Comframe on his LinkedIn or in any other site discussing his work history. He is currently the CEO of military contractor Regulus Global. Burgess previously ran a mercenary firm he founded, Greystone Ltd., that was previously affiliated with Prince’s Blackwater and was originally intended to be Blackwater’s “sister company.”

Both Blackwater (now Academi) and Greystone have been accused of sending mercenaries to fight in the current conflict between Russia and Ukraine. Both companies deny this. The accusations came after Prince had planned to create a “private army” in Ukraine, something he has attempted to do (and sometimes succeeded) in various conflict zones, such as Afghanistan. Prince has also attempted to offer “lethal services” to Russia’s Wagner group.

Aside from Burgess’ apparent unwillingness to associate himself publicly with Comframe, there is also the fact that the only employee publicly associated with Comframe at all is Lital Leshem. Indeed, even Erik Prince has declined to publicly affiliate himself with the company. Another oddity is the fact that Comframe’s website has an “Industry News” page that contains several blog posts with titles discussing oil markets and geopolitics. However, the content of the posts themselves are all filler generated by WordPress. Was Comframe also intended to work in commodities markets? The odd and sparse nature of the website seems to clash with Leshem’s characterization of the company.

So, what is Comframe exactly and what is it intended to do? Why are the only people associated with the company two professional mercenaries, one of whom is a known CIA asset, and an Israeli spy? A 2020 article published in the Jerusalem Post seems to highlight Comframe’s mysterious inner workings and likely purpose.

That article notes that Comframe acted as a middleman in forging an agreement to create an assembly line in El Paso, TX in order for the Israeli company Tomcar to “offer its latest models to the US Armed Forces.” The agreement was made between Tomcar and Prince Manufacturing, a major contract manufacturing company that works with Ford, General Motors and Tesla, among others. Prince Manufacturing was notably founded and run for many years by Edgar Prince, Erik Prince’s father. Notably Tomcar, its founder – Yoram Zarchi – and his son (works for Tomcar) – Ram Zarchi – appear in the Panama Papers as does the former holding company that owned Tomcar from 2004 to 2011.

The article notes that Comframe “is focused on recognizing needs in the US defense industry and matching them to possible solutions, usually involving innovative Israeli companies.” However, the article notes, “to meet the demands of American security needs, one must have an American entity.” Leshem is then quoted as saying, “Ram [Zarchi of Tomcar] had been living in Phoenix for 15 years, but he can’t do that [sell to the American military because he is not a US citizen]. We can.”

In other words, per Leshem, Comframe utilizes Prince and presumably Burgess to sell Israeli defense technology and products to the American military that would otherwise not happen due to national security concerns around buying foreign-made products for sensitive defense and military operations. Leshem goes on to state Comframe sells “to the US Special Forces and other branches of the service [i.e. US military],” noting that Comframe is specifically targeting Special Ops. She also suggests that, aside from the US military, another intended market for the company is NATO – she told the Jerusalem Post that the US “controls 70% of NATO’s defense industry.”

The article ends by stating that, for Comframe, when sales are related to national security, one still has to have “boots on the ground,” suggesting why Comframe has such a minimal web and online presence. This is similar to another company Leshem has been working for while at Comframe, Ehud Barak’s Toka. Notably, at the end of this very article, Leshem uses Toka as an example regarding Comframe’s “boots on the ground” sales approach. She states:

“Hi-tech companies like Toka with clients like the CIA, can’t discuss what they do using Zoom.”

A New Pattern for Prince

Comframe is a very suspect company – it is highly, highly secretive, targets sensitive American military agencies with foreign technology, and its known employees are apparent spooks and intelligence-linked mercenaries. Not only that, but the history of Israeli espionage in the United States – from Jonathan Pollard and PROMIS to Comverse and beyond – shows a concerted effort to target the American military and security agencies, often with bugged or “backdoored” technology.

In addition to the above, Prince has also recently engaged in efforts to market a very suspect smartphone to MAGA Republicans as being “unhackable” and “unsurveillable.” That phone was “designed in Israel” and the company that produces it is called Unplugged. According to reports, Unplugged’s “day-to-day technology operations are run by Eran Karpen, a former employee of CommuniTake, the Israeli start-up that gave rise to the now infamous hacker-for-hire firm NSO Group.” Karpen, like Leshem, is also a veteran of Unit 8200.

Notably, DarkMatter, the UAE private intelligence company that was mentioned earlier due to its association with Prince, once marketed an “ultrasecure” phone called Katim, only to be later outed for hacking dissidents and journalists. In addition, Prince debuted Unplugged’s phone on Steve Bannon’s “War Room” program. Both Prince and Bannon have controversial relationships with exiled Chinese billionaire Guo Wengui, also known as Miles Guo.

That Prince would help market this phone specifically to MAGA Republicans is disturbing given that his associate Leshem and other Israeli intelligence veterans and operatives have played a major role in developing the infrastructure for the US’ “War on Domestic Terror,” which is mainly targeted at the political right and has already utilized mass surveillance through smartphones and other technologies to justify arrests, including “pre-crime” arrests. Given the content of this investigation, Prince’s ties to foreign governments and intelligence agencies should be heavily scrutinized, especially Comframe – whose secretive activities may be drastically undermining American national security.

July 7, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Timeless or most popular | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Zelensky owes Orban an explanation

By Lucas Leiroz | Strategic Culture Foundation | July 5, 2024

Instead of an improvement in bilateral relations, the recent meeting between Vladimir Zelensky and Viktor Orban only intensified tensions between both countries. The Hungarian Prime Minister’s visit to Kiev appears to have been a kind of ultimatum for the Ukrainian regime to stop its irresponsible actions and accept a peace negotiation. Given Zelensky’s insistence on war, Hungary is expected to take increasingly tough actions to boycott military support for Ukraine within the Western organizations in which it is part (NATO and EU).

Orban made a surprise visit to the Ukrainian capital and presented Zelensky with a peace proposal, the central element of which was the establishment of an immediate ceasefire, enabling the resumption of negotiations between the parties. On the same day, the Ukrainian authorities rejected the Hungarian proposal, remaining firm in their desire to continue the war to the last consequences. Orban has repeatedly clarified that the West wants war with Russia, which will not benefit Europe at all and could lead to a major continental conflict. Zelensky and the entire Kiev Junta, however, are not aligned with European interests, preferring to obey American orders directly.

Orban’s words in Kiev can be seen as a genuine call for peace – while also sounding like a final warning. The Hungarian leader often tried to prevent the advance of Western military support to Ukraine, thus aiming to promote a de-escalation of the conflict. Due to its dissident stance in the EU, Hungary has suffered economic blackmail, boycotts and even attempts at color revolution. The country appears to be a target for NATO and EU strategists, even though it is a member of both groups.

The reasons why Hungary tries to de-escalate the war are many and go beyond the interest of avoiding a continental war. Orban is a conservative leader who has as one of his main political agendas the defense of Christianity and traditional values – a topic on which he sympathizes with the Russian Federation and is in total disagreement with Ukrainian woke Nazism. The West’s promotion of an anti-traditional cultural agenda has created significant tensions between Hungary and its partners, making the country actually isolated from other NATO and EU members.

One of the most important points for Orban’s skepticism towards Kiev, however, is the ethnic persecution promoted against Hungarian citizens in the western regions of Ukraine, mainly in Transcarpathia. Cities with an ethnic Hungarian majority have suffered from racist policies in a similar way to what Russians in Donbass have suffered since 2014. Just as the Russian language has been banned from being taught in schools and used in official documents, the Hungarian language is also being banned, affecting the ethnic and cultural identity of thousands of Hungarians.

One of the most shocking practices of the Kiev regime is the ethnic instrumentalization of forced recruitment policies. The Ukrainian armed forces constantly forcibly capture non-Ukrainian ethnic citizens from the country’s streets, sending them to the front lines without proper training, making death a mere matter of time. Ethnic Russians and Hungarians have been constantly recruited to certain death at the front, with local authorities trying to “spare” Ukrainian soldiers as much as possible.

During the Battle of Artymovsk (known in Ukraine as “Bakhmut”), several reports emerged from local observers denouncing the forced recruitment of hundreds of Hungarians from Transcarpathia. The battle became known as the “meat grinder”, due to the high rate of casualties among Ukrainian troops during clashes with the Russian private military company Wagner Group. Apparently, Kiev used the “meat grinder” as a tool to accelerate the process of ethnic cleansing in Transcarpathia, sending ethnic Hungarian citizens to certain death.

Hungary has repeatedly denounced the Kiev Junta’s racist policies against Hungarians who are under Ukrainian jurisdiction. The inaction of international organizations – mainly NATO and the EU, of which Hungary is a part – has only increased Hungarian impatience. Kiev has not changed its practices. Zelensky also did not use the last meeting with Orban to give him an “explanation” – if that is even possible – or at least promise to change his policies. So, given the certainty that Kiev will continue the war and the extermination of Hungarians, perhaps Orban’s peace proposal will become a true ultimatum.

Without any goodwill on Ukraine’s part, Orban now has no alternative but to actually do everything he can to thwart Kiev’s plans. It is possible that he will harden his positions within NATO and the EU, vetoing pro-Ukraine proposals even under economic blackmail. More than that, Orban could even launch a policy of seeking strategic partnerships with emerging countries, and discussions about leaving NATO and the EU will inevitably begin to advance on the Hungarian domestic scenario.

It is also necessary to remember that since 2022 there have been rumors that Hungary might eventually intervene militarily in Ukraine to stop ethnic cleansing in Transcarpathia. Even though these rumors have no proof so far, with Ukrainian insistence, it is possible that at some point there will be internal pressure in Hungary for these rumors to become reality.

Hungary is realizing, before all NATO and EU members, that membership in these organizations is a real trap. Orban does not seem willing to accept that his country become a victim of a continental war initiated by Ukraine, nor does he want to continue seeing his Hungarian compatriots dying in hostilities with Russia. He will certainly do everything possible to make the Hungarian future different from the Ukrainian one.

July 5, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Is stopping World War Three the Donald’s ‘trump card’ for winning the White House?

By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | July 4, 2024

Donald Trump seems to have hit on a winning plan for returning to the White House – by convincing voters he is the candidate to prevent World War Three.

The Republican candidate is lately pitching the importance of ending “the horrible war” in Ukraine to prevent the United States from sliding toward a nuclear conflagration with Russia.

Trump is slamming Democrat rival Joe Biden for fueling the conflict by recklessly supplying U.S. weapons that are provoking Russia and risking the start of World War Three. That’s true enough.

After Biden’s disastrous TV debate with Trump last week, the polls are showing Trump slightly pulling ahead. The Democrat campaign is in panic mode after the incumbent president’s shaky performance confirmed public misgivings about his deteriorating mental health.

Still, however, Trump has not capitalized on taking a decisive lead in the polls. The Republican is at most a couple of points ahead of Biden –  even after the latter’s slow-motion car-crash TV debate.

Trump could pick up a lot of ballots among large numbers of undecided voters and propel his return to the White House by posing as the “anti-war candidate”.

At election rallies, the former president is touting his supposed ability to bring an immediate end to the war in Ukraine. Trump is saying he would cut off military aid to Ukraine and call on the Kiev regime to negotiate with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Trump is boasting that he could broker an immediate peace deal if he wins the election in November and implement a settlement even before his inauguration in the Oval Office in January 2025. Thereby preventing World War Three between the nuclear-armed U.S. and Russia.

That might seem like a sound campaign plan. A large majority of Americans – some 70 percent – want their government to find a diplomatic solution to the two-and-a-half-year war in Ukraine. This reflects public opposition to the perception of another endless American war and the growing apprehension over an escalation in the conflict between nuclear powers.

Astutely, Trump is tapping into those legitimate concerns.

On the other hand, Biden’s administration is pushing ahead with military support for the Kiev regime in a way that seems insanely reckless. This week, Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin announced another $2.3 billion in military aid to Ukraine. Biden has said he will support Ukraine for as long as it takes and shows no sign of backing away from military confrontation. The president has approved the supply of longer-range missiles to Ukraine and given his permission to strike Russia.

The issue of war and peace – and without exaggeration the issue of world peace and survival of the planet – could be the one that wins the White House for Trump.

Biden does not have a reverse gear when it comes to his policy of supporting Ukraine in a futile war that it is losing badly and only provoking Russia.

Such madness is bound to be a vote loser and yet Biden and his administration appear to have no way back from the abyss. Combined with Biden’s appalling policy of supporting Israel – especially for younger American voters who would normally lean toward a Democrat – Trump could exploit the anxiety over Ukraine to his electoral advantage.

It’s not just about the danger of an all-out war with Russia. The American public is rightly incensed by the vast amounts of taxpayer money – over $100 billion at least – being shelled out for a corrupt regime in Kiev while so much public need is neglected at home.

The trouble is Trump’s lack of credibility. Ordinarily, a presidential candidate declaring his opposition to starting World War Three would be a clear winning platform, one would think.

Recall the first time Trump ran for the White House back in 2016 when he promised all sorts of splendid things about making America great again by stopping endless U.S. wars around the world and putting an end to “American carnage” at home.

Trump did not deliver then despite all his braggadocio about “draining the swamp”. During his presidency, Trump broke the taboo of supplying lethal weapons to Ukraine. In 2018, he approved sending $47 million worth of Javelin anti-tank missiles to the Kiev regime while it was attacking the ethnic Russian population in the former Ukrainian territory of Donbass. That military backing of the Kiev regime led to the current conflict after Moscow intervened in February 2022 to stop the merciless killing of the Russian population.

On Trump’s recent bragging about how he would quickly end the war in Ukraine, Russia’s ambassador to the United Nations, Vassily Nebenzia, dismissed it as empty “subjective” talk. That’s a diplomatic way of saying Trump hasn’t a clue about resolving the conflict.

Trump is all about the expedient winning of votes, not about winning genuine peace. The only way to create a peaceful resolution in Ukraine and elsewhere is for the U.S.-led NATO military bloc to scale back from Russia’s borders and eventually disband in conformity with international law. NATO is a self-appointed war machine to serve Western imperialist power and one that is in flagrant violation of the UN Charter and the upholding of international law. NATO exists to enforce U.S. power unilaterally without any respect for international law – despite the American and European rhetoric about “rules-based order”.

The war in Ukraine is but one symptom of the United States as a failing and frustrated imperialist power. Washington’s hostility towards Russia is consonant with its relentless belligerence towards China and its support for Israel’s genocide in a desperate bid to control the Middle East. Trump is on board with U.S. imperialist power projection against China and slavishly supporting the Israeli regime. His talk about criticizing NATO expenditures is just carping to get Europeans to pay more for the American protection racket. The only thing different from Biden is a superficial matter of style and a seemingly more reasonable view of the conflict in Ukraine.

Posing as a candidate to avert World War Three over Ukraine might be enough to get Trump back to the White House. It might work as an electioneering ploy. But it won’t change a damn thing about stopping U.S. imperialist violence and the constant threat to world peace that Washington and its NATO war machine engender. The Donald’s “trump card” for peace in Ukraine is another worthless deuce.

July 4, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

‘Doing Everything to Reelect Biden’: Duped Hillary Clinton Spills Cringy Details to Prankster Duo

By Svetlana Ekimenko – Sputnik – 03.07.2024

After conning British Foreign Secretary David Cameron into divulging that Ukraine won’t be invited to join NATO at the alliance’s next summit, the Russian prankster duo of Vovan and Lexus have successfully duped Hillary Clinton.

Despite her crushing defeat to Donald Trump in the 2016 US presidential elections, Hillary Clinton has adamantly refused to be put out to pasture or written off from big politics. Hence, her current bid to dabble in the ongoing proxy conflict in Ukraine.

It comes as no surprise that the former US Secretary of State eagerly accepted the offer to speak with ‘former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko’. Little did she realize that she was divulging her political game regarding the US and Ukraine to the well-known Russian prankster duo, Vovan (Vladimir Kuznetsov) and Lexus (Alexey Stolyarov).

Clinton jumped right into the conversation, assuring ‘Poroshenko’ that US aid has been positioned to reach Ukraine “very quickly”.

At this point, her conversational partner lamented over another looming “threat”, in the face of presidential hopeful Donald Trump, who could “give us some problems” if elected, since he “hates Ukraine”, she piped up:

“You’re right. It is terrible. And I am doing everything I can to reelect President Biden. And I am very hopeful that that will be the outcome in November.”

Clinton took a swipe at Trump, calling him a “very dangerous candidate,” and said he would be “bad for the United States, as well as for the rest of the world, including Ukraine.”

But despite Joe Biden’s disastrous first debate against his main opponent, Clinton is confident that Trump will lose. Moreover, she appeared to indicate that Biden’s path to a second term should be paved with the bodies of Ukrainian soldiers. She assured that Washington would be “giving you the means you need to support yourself to try to not only hold the line but engage in an offensive. And then obviously many of us in this country will do everything we can to reelect President Biden.”

“The more that Ukraine could continue to demonstrate its resilience and its resolve and do what you’re doing on the battlefield, do what you’re doing in a very strong message to the rest of the world, […] go forward as best you can… the rest of us will do everything we can to continue supporting you, and to support President Biden,” reiterated Hillary Clinton.

Hillary also wholeheartedly “supports” Ukraine’s NATO membership aspirations, saying that “We are working very hard to persuade the Germans and the Americans to move on this. I don’t know what the final decision will be, but as you say, Rasmussen and Yermak, and others, are working very hard.” This was a reference to former NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen and Zelensky’s chief of staff Andriy Yermak, who have been spearheading a working group to gain support for Kiev’s NATO bid across the alliance.

Clinton emphasized that “everyone has a stake in making sure that you are successful in pushing the Russians out as far as you can.”

‘Porshenko’ bantered at this point that “dictators didn’t learn their lesson after Gaddafi,” in a reference to the former Libyan leader ousted and killed in the wake of NATO’s bombardment of the North African country in 2011. During that time, as Barack Obama’s foreign policy chief, Hillary Clinton, she was the public figure of the project and had cackled with laughter during a TV interview after rebel forces backed by NATO had captured and brutally killed Muammar Gaddafi. Clinton famously quipped, “We came, we saw, he died!”

“Yeah, I think that’s true,” replied Clinton to the Poroshenko imposter.

Turning the conversation back to the “main threat” namely, Trump, the pranksters warned that “he will ask for money back, and it will be a disaster,” as he “wants to end the conflict on Russia’s terms.”

“He’s a very bad guy, as I know personally from having to run against him,” reiterated Hillary Clinton, and applauded an offer of help from the Ukrainian side to dig up some new dirt on Trump.

“Well, anything you can do to attack him, I’m all for it. Because he’s a very dangerous man,” reiterated Clinton.

She eagerly rounded off the conversation with “Slava, Ukraina” (“Glory to Ukraine”), a wartime fascist salute originally adopted by the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), an infamous nationalist militant group that collaborated with the Nazis during World War II, and now widely used by Ukrainian paramilitary groups, promoted by the Kiev regime.

July 3, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

NATO chief’s push for Ukraine funding fails – report

NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg in Paris, France on June 24, 2024. © AFP / Bertrand GUAY/AFP
RT | July 3, 2024

NATO member states have rejected a proposal by Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg to spend €40 billion ($43 billion) a year on aid for Ukraine, several media outlets have reported. The constituent countries, however, have agreed to earmark this sum for Kiev’s needs next year, Reuters claimed.

Since late May, the outgoing secretary general has on multiple occasions urged member states to make a long-term funding commitment at the upcoming NATO summit in Washington, DC on July 9-11.

During a press conference last month, Stoltenberg claimed that “allies have provided around €40 billion worth of military support to Ukraine each year” since 2022. The NATO chief said he wanted to “maintain this level of support for as long as necessary,” securing “fresh funding every year.”

On Wednesday, Germany’s Deutsche Presse-Agentur, citing unnamed sources from several delegations present at NATO consultations, claimed that Stoltenberg’s proposal had fallen through due to opposition from member states.

Reuters also reported that Stoltenberg’s original request had been turned down, with member states merely stating their intention to re-evaluate allied contributions at future NATO summits.

They also vowed to prepare two reports over the course of the next year to clearly establish each nation’s area of responsibility in terms of aid for Ukraine. The mechanism would supposedly be based on the GDP of member states, with more affluent nations expected to foot most of the bill.

Speaking during a press conference in mid-June, Stoltenberg recounted how the “United States spent six months agreeing to a supplemental for Ukraine.” He also lamented that “some of the promises that the European allies have made have not been delivered.”

“And if we turn this into not voluntary contributions, but NATO commitments, of course it will become more robust, it will become more reliable,” he argued at the time.

Stoltenberg also touted the creation of a Security Assistance Group for Ukraine, which would be based in Wiesbaden, Germany. The structure is expected to coordinate NATO military assistance for Ukraine, with the chief of the US European Command, General Christopher Cavoli, at the helm.

Some observers have speculated that the new, less-US-centered infrastructure is meant as a substitute, should the existing Ramstein group begin to falter. These concerns are understood to have been growing within NATO as a second Trump term stateside appears more likely.

The Republican hopeful has repeatedly criticized the Biden administration’s generous handouts to Kiev, and vowed to end the Ukraine conflict in short order if elected.

July 3, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

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