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Putin: Kiev Has Lost 186 Tanks, 418 Armored Vehicles, Losses Mounting

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 16.06.2023

Ukrainian forces launched a long-awaited counteroffensive earlier this month after stocking up on NATO weapons, including Leopard heavy tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles. The offensive has stalled after running into well-prepared Russian defensive lines, with even Kiev’s Western backers expressing concerns about Ukraine’s heavy losses.

Ukraine has failed to reach any strategic objectives amid its ongoing counteroffensive, losing 186 tanks and 418 armored vehicles to date as losses continue to mount, Russian President Vladimir Putin has said.

“In some places Ukrainian forces manage to reach the first line of defense, in some places not. That’s not the question,” Putin said, speaking to reporters during the plenary session of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum on Friday.

“The question revolves around the fact that they are using their so-called strategic reserves, which consist of several components. The first is meant to be used to break [Russian] defenses, the second to use forces to entrench their foothold over territory. They have not reached their goals at a single section of the front. This is what is important,” he said.

“Their losses are indeed very large, even more than ten to one compared to the Russian army. This is a fact. In terms of equipment, losses are mounting daily. As of today, this includes 186 tanks lost and 418 armored vehicles of various classes,” Putin said.

Russia’s defense enterprises are working round-the-clock to supply the military with weapons, working double or even triple shifts, Putin said. “We have increased the output of military production by 2.7 times, and when it comes to the most needed equipment – by 10 times.”

As for Ukrainian forces, Putin predicted that “soon they will stop using its own equipment” entirely because it’s being systematically destroyed. “Everything they’re using to do battle, and everything they’re using is coming from abroad. One can’t fight that way for long,” he said.

Origins of Conflict

Putin also once again took the opportunity to delve into the root causes of the present crisis, saying “the war in Ukraine, in southeastern Ukraine, was started by the Kiev regime with the support of their Western sponsors in 2014. But everyone in the West tries not to speak about this. I am forced to remind them that aviation, tanks, artillery were used used against the Donbass [back then]. What is this if not a war?”

Kiev “refused” to entertain an end to the Donbass crisis using peaceful means, Putin said, “forcing us to use our armed forces to attempt to put an end to this war.”

It wasn’t Russia that led its Western partners “by the nose” between 2015 and 2022 by signing the Minsk peace deal for Donbass, “without any plans to implement it, as they publicly admitted recently,” he added, referring to recent revelations by the former Ukrainian, German and French leaders that they only signed the Minsk deal to give Kiev time to rearm and prepare for war with Russia.

June 16, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Kiev pressuring Brazil to attend “Peace Summit”

By Lucas Leiroz | June 16, 2023

Kiev continues its work to attract supporters in its campaign against Russia. Now, an aide of president Vladimir Zelensky is pressuring Brazil to take part in the so-called “Global Peace Summit” – an event organized by the regime whose intention will be to unilaterally show the Ukrainian proposal for “peace”, without taking into account Russian interests.

The Head of the Office of the president of Ukraine Andrey Yermak has been speaking to Brazilians in recent days to talk about Ukrainian interest in Brasilia’s participation in a summit organized to promote Kiev’s “peace” proposal. On June 12th, the official spoke to Brazilian journalists linked to CNN and stated that he hopes that Brazil assumes a leadership role in the quest to achieve the “solution” suggested by the regime.

On the occasion, the head of office highlighted the importance of Brazil and other countries of the Global South in the current geopolitical situation and used this argument to suggest that the emerging powers participate actively in the peace dialogue. However, he highlighted what had already been said previously by Ukrainian authorities: no peace proposal that meets Russian interests will be considered by the regime, and it is necessary to unilaterally meet Ukrainian requirements in order to reach any agreement.

During the interview, Yermak also emphasized the role that Brazil plays in what concerns the environmental debate. According to the Ukrainian authorities, Russia is responsible for the (non-existent under international law) crime of “ecocide,” which is why it should be punished and isolated internationally. As evidence of this crime, they point to the recent attack on the Novaya Kakhovka dam, which, according to Ukrainians and Westerners was carried out by Russia. However, until now, nothing substantial has been presented to prove Russian responsibility for the attack, while on the other hand, the Ukrainian military had already stated, months before, that they were planning such an operation.

Two days after the controversial interview for CNN, the Ukrainian aide returned to dialogue with Brazilians, this time with Chief Advisor to the President of the Federal Republic of Brazil Celso Amorim. Both officials had already met before, when Amorim visited Kiev to propose to the Ukrainian authorities the creation of a “peace club” mediated by neutral countries, according to the plan of Brazilian President Lula da Silva. Dialogues around the creation of such group, however, did not develop since Ukraine is only interested in its own “proposals”.

In the telephone call with Amorim, Yermak resumed the points he had already discussed with CNN journalists and emphasized the importance of Brazilian participation in the summit, mainly taking into account environmental factors.

“Of course, we are extremely interested in Brazil’s participation in this summit. We are ready to talk, and it is very important for us to hear your opinion (…) Russia’s destruction of the Kakhovka hydroelectric power plant has shown the extreme relevance of the Ukrainian Peace Formula, in particular the security and environmental clauses”, – he said.

In fact, the Ukrainian attempt to attract support from Brazil and other countries of the Global South is part of a context of seeking legitimacy in the face of global public opinion. Recently, Ukraine’s international image has become increasingly negative, as the regime’s crimes against Russian civilians and undisputed zones of the Federation’s territory have become repeated and undisguised. In addition, the Ukrainian rejection of any attempt at negotiation also worsens the country’s image and makes it clear which side is bellicose and pro-war in this conflict.

With the creation of the “Global Peace Summit”, Kiev plans to show the world that it is really interested in peace and diplomacy. The problem is that obviously “peace” as proposed by the regime does not interest the Russians who will not even be invited to the event, which severely undermines the validity of the Ukrainian proposal. So, as an alternative to try to justify its proposals, Kiev is inviting Brazil and countries from the Global South, thus seeking to improve the acceptability of the event.

In the same sense, by using environmental rhetoric, the neo-Nazi regime is making even more efforts to bring Brazil into the summit, as the South American country has suffered strong international harassment because of the Amazon rainforest, which the US and Europe claim with no evidence that is being destroyed. Yermak hopes to get Brazilian support for the Ukrainian meeting through coercion using ecological arguments, but this plan may also fail.

In 2021, Russia prevented environmental rhetoric from being used against Brazil and other countries of the Global South by vetoing a UN resolution proposed by the West to consider climate change a security issue, which in practice would legitimize international interventions against countries that allegedly violate environmental norms. This would legitimize, for example, Brazil to suffer international intervention in the Amazon. So, in other words, Russia helped Brazil to protect its own sovereignty, making it unlikely that Brasilia will now act against Russia precisely using environmental rhetoric.

The “Peace Summit” is likely to take place, but its results will be insignificant. Peace can only be achieved through an agreement that reflects Russian interests. The countries of the Global South, even if they participate in the event, certainly will not endorse measures that do not attend Russia’s demands.

You can follow Lucas on Twitter and Telegram.

June 16, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

America At War – Provoking The Consequences

By Christopher Black – New Eastern Outlook – 15.06.2023 

The United States of America is at war with Russia. There is not much point in using terms such as “proxy war” to describe the situation. If a belligerent in a war is acting as a proxy for another power and that power is not engaged directly in the war, the term can be useful. But when the power, for which the “proxy” engages in the war, is directly involved in the war itself, then it is a co-belligerent, a party to the war directly, not simply by proxy.

The issue is whether each state is pursuing its own interests and has its own independent means of doing so, or whether the interests and forces of the allied powers are subordinate to the interests and forces of a leader. In such a case, the enemy being attacked can regard all its opponents as a single entity.

In this regard, Clausewitz said that, “if you can vanquish all your enemies by defeating one of them, that defeat must be the main objective of the war. In this one enemy, we strike at the centre of gravity of the entire conflict.”

If we analyse the war in the Ukraine theatre of operations in these terms, it becomes clear that the Ukrainian military forces are in fact forces of the United States of America. They have been created, armed, trained, supplied, financed, and are directed and commanded by the Americans, for American interests. The government for whom they nominally fight is a puppet state, installed in power by the United States and its NATO allies in a coup d’etat in 2014. It has no independent interests outside of American ones, and no control over the war or the forces nominally under its command.

The United States of America is the leader of a hostile military alliance, the purpose of which, since its inception, has been to isolate, threaten, attack and destroy Russia, has conspired with its alliance for years to achieve this end, has spent vast resources to prepare the attack, and has, with malice and determination, sabotaged any proposals for peace. It insists on war. It is the centre of gravity of the entire conflict.

The American government claims that it is not engaged even in a proxy war with Russia, that they are merely assisting an independent nation suffering aggression from another, that this does not put them at war with Russia, a war which, they claim, they are trying to avoid despite their actions and daily propaganda.

But, like the British, and the rest, the truth is the United States of America is a party to the war directly, according to all accepted criteria under international law. It supplies money to conduct the war, tanks, armoured vehicles, aircraft, arms, ammunition, military provisions and other war materials, engages its own military forces-military advisors and combatants, provides military intelligence, obtained on a real-time basis from its spy networks, satellite observations and electronic data collection, engages in an intense propaganda war against Russia, has attempted, through “sanctions,” to impose a blockade on Russia and its economy and people, blew up the Nord Stream gas pipeline, sends, on a regular basis, senior government and military officials, including the American President, Congressional bigwigs and the leaders of other members of the military alliance, to meet with and direct the actions of their lieutenant Zelensky, and conducts constant military exercises further threatening attacks against Russia. The NATO Air Defender military exercises begin in Europe on June 12, the day I write this, involving hundreds of NATO aircraft.

Make no mistake. The United States of America is at war with Russia. No amount of rhetoric can hide that fact and what the consequences for the United States will be. To quote Clausewitz again,

“Danger is part of the friction of war. Without an accurate conception of danger, we cannot understand war.”

The problem is that the neither the Americans nor the other members of its unholy alliance, seem to realise the danger they are in, neither their leaders nor their citizens. Like the British, they suffer from the delusion that they are insulated from the consequences of their war, that they are invulnerable, that Russia will not dare to respond to the attacks upon its territory and people by attacking their territories. This shared delusion makes them ever more dangerous, since they think they can keep escalating their actions in the war without any limits. They cannot-not without consequences.

On June 8th Tass reported, following the statement by the former head of NATO, Fogh Rasmussen, that NATO countries may send their forces into the conflict directly, that Dmitry Medvedev stated,

“Fogh Rasmussen wasn’t a very smart man before. And now he has sunk into a doctrinaire’s dementia. In an interview with The Guardian, he stated that even if Banderavite Ukraine doesn’t receive an invitation to join NATO in Vilnius, the countries of the alliance will be able to send their troops there. Sort of on their own.”

“Well, have the people of these countries been asked? Who among them wants war with Russia? Do they really want hypersonic strikes on Europe? And what does Uncle Sam think about this? It would affect him too, wouldn’t it?”

Again, on June 1, TASS reported that Dmitry Medvedev stated, in connection with the attack on Russians in the Belgorod region by NATO-Ukrainian forces,

“The aim was simple – to cause damage, to harm to the civilian population somehow, And the fact that our enemy is already behaving as a terrorist characterizes in a very specific way both the Ukrainian regime and those who are behind it – first of all the Americans and the Europeans, who, in fact, have got on the warpath with us. Terrorist acts must entail the harshest retaliation possible.”

Medvedev’s views have been stated by other members of the government, by members of the Duma and by President Putin when he referred to Russian strikes on command and decision centres wherever they may be.

The Americans can whistle in the dark, lie to their people, try to fool the world, but what matters is what the Russian government thinks and knows, and it thinks, because it knows, that the United States of America is at war with Russia and seeks Russia’s complete defeat and subjugation. The campaign in Ukraine is just a phase of this war, is the current geographical space for this war, so for the United States and its allies to assume that they can carry out attacks on Russia and not suffer being dealt with in kind or worse, that war cannot be waged on their territories, is a serious mistake.

Indeed, on May 31, Dmitry Medvedev stated with respect to Britain,

“London is, in fact, waging an undeclared war on Moscow, which means that any British official can be viewed as a legitimate military target.

“Today, Great Britain is acting as an ally of Ukraine, by providing it with equipment and personnel as military assistance, that is de facto waging an undeclared war against Russia. Therefore, any of its officials, both military and civilian ones, who are making a contribution to the war effort, can be viewed as a legitimate military target,”

Medvedev was commenting on a remark by British Foreign Secretary James Cleverly who had justified the drone attacks on Moscow, saying that Ukraine had the right to attack targets on Russian territory for self-defense.

He added,

“Foolish officials in the UK, our eternal enemy, should remember that under universally recognized international law governing the conduct of war in modern conditions, including the Hague and Geneva Conventions with their additional protocols, their situation can also be qualified as being at war.”

The same analysis applies in spades to the United States of America.

An interesting comment in this regard was made by the Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov on June 3rd when, according to Tass, he stated in an interview on the Rossiya-1 TV channel, that,

“Ukraine has simply become a tool of the West’s ‘hybrid war’ against Russia, and therefore it is futile to deal with it in resolving the conflict. Now, Ukraine is actually a tool of conflict. The conflict has indeed become broader, as the collective West is waging a hybrid war against our country. It is futile to deal with this tool in order to resolve the conflict, and this must be understood too.”

All the rhetoric from NATO about whether or not Ukraine can become a member of NATO is just a smokescreen to hide from their people the fact that Ukraine is already de facto part of NATO. Whether or not the formalities of signing pieces of paper, of getting the approval of NATO states is followed through, is irrelevant.

Remember that on March 26, 2022, in Warsaw, President Biden stated,

“We have a sacred obligation under Article 5 to defend each and every inch of NATO territory with the full force of our collective power.”

He was referring not only to Poland but to Ukraine as well. What Russia feared is now the reality. Ukraine is de facto a NATO state. And all the rhetoric from the West and commentators about whether or not NATO will invoke Article 5 is another smokescreen designed to mask what is really happening, for NATO has already activated Article 5 of the NATO Treaty.

The talk about invoking it in the future is an attempt to hide NATO’s weakness, its defeats on the military, economic and political fronts, even as they throw one weapon system after another at Russia, and inject NATO forces into the fighting only to have their equipment and forces destroyed.

They have nothing left to throw at Russia that can defeat it. So, they pretend NATO is not yet really engaged. But these facts make the USA even more dangerous as it becomes clear that the combined West cannot defeat Russia, a nuclear power, using conventional means.

Remember also that the United States has a first strike nuclear arms policy, and they have already placed, in Romania and Poland, land-based versions of the Aegis Air Defence System, which can be used to launch nuclear-armed missiles at Russia. These systems have been tested. The one in Poland is reported to be fully operational as of June 30. The danger to Russia is immediate and existential. Those systems are one of the reasons Russia activated its military operations. Russia has further responded to this, and to the attacks on Russia, clearly planned and ordered by the US and UK, by placing tactical nuclear weapons in Belarus which are to be made operational after July 7, when the facilities to store and use them will be completed.

Those tactical nuclear weapons are designed for battlefield use. We hope it never comes to that, but Russia faces a direct threat from people bent on its destruction that think they are untouchable. So, Russia faces very difficult choices on what to do and how to prevent an escalation to all our nuclear war while ensuring its own security.

On May 23, during his visit to Laos, Deputy Head of the Russian Security Council Dmitry Medvedev issued a warning on the day Russian security forces destroyed the Ukrainian raiding force that attacked civilians in the Belgorod region.

“The North Atlantic alliance does not take the threat of nuclear war seriously enough, thus making a big mistake. NATO is not serious about this scenario. Otherwise, NATO would not have supplied such dangerous weapons to the Ukrainian regime. Apparently, they think that a nuclear conflict, or a nuclear apocalypse, is never ever possible. NATO is wrong, and at some point, events may take a completely unpredictable turn. The responsibility will be placed squarely on the North Atlantic Alliance,”

Medvedev pointed out that no one knows whether the point of no return has been passed,

“No one knows this. This is the main danger. Because as soon as they provide something, they say: let’s supply this, too. Long-range missiles or planes. Everything will be all right. But nothing will be fine. We will be able to cope with it. But only more and more serious types of weapons will be used. That’s what the current trend is.”

So, we come back to Clausewitz. The American government and people cannot understand the war they are engaged in unless they understand the danger, they are in. They have to understand their country is the centre of gravity in this war, whose defeat will mean the defeat of all its minions in NATO. The Russian people know the danger they are in. The Americans, through NATO, through their NATO puppets in Ukraine, have attacked Russians in Russia. It is logical to expect that Russia will decide to bring home to the Americans what war means, what danger they are in, and they do not need to use nuclear weapons to achieve this.

Russia can strike using its conventional hypersonic weapons as well, against which the USA has no defence whatsoever, as has been established with the destruction of the Patriot Air defence complexes in Ukraine which could not stop Russian missiles. They have no other air defence systems operational in the United States territory or on its naval forces that can stop them either. Russia has not decided to take this step yet. But it can and the Americans can do nothing about it except bluster about using nuclear weapons against Russia. But Russia took that possibility into account when the special military operation began.

The American people have not directly experienced war in their own territory for a long time. They have no idea what it is. They have no idea of the danger they are in so long as their government continues its aggressive policies, not only against Russia, but China as well. The American people, misled and misinformed, have no conception of the dangers of this war anymore than the British people and the peoples of the other NATO countries do. The American people must be warned. The United States of America is at war, and no amount of bluffing and lying can protect them from the consequences their government is provoking. To repeat what I said in my warning to the people of Britain, the consequences are predictable and they will be catastrophic.

Christopher Black is an international criminal lawyer based in Toronto. He is known for a number of high-profile war crimes cases and recently published his novel Beneath the Clouds. He writes essays on international law, politics and world events.

June 15, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

US sends more fighter jets to its Middle East

RT | June 15, 2023

The US military has sent additional fighter jets to the Middle East after accusing Russia of “increasingly unsafe” aircraft activity in the region, including during several incidents in Syria.

F-22 Raptors with the 94th Fighter Squadron have been deployed from Langley Air Force Base in Virginia, according to Central Command (CENTCOM), which oversees US military operations in the Middle East, Central Asia and parts of Africa.

The decision was part of a “multifaceted show of US support and capability in the wake of increasingly unsafe and unprofessional behavior by Russian aircraft,” CENTCOM said in a press release on Wednesday.

Pentagon officials have accused Moscow of reckless flights over US bases in Syria in recent weeks, with CENTCOM chief General Erik Kurilla claiming there has been a “significant spike” in “provocative” actions since March.

In an interview with the Wall Street Journal in April, Air Force Lieutenant General Alexus Grynkewich warned that the rise in tensions could lead to a “miscalculation” among Russian and American pilots operating in Syria, stating there were 60 separate incidents between March and April alone.

Moscow has similarly accused Washington of unprofessional behavior in Syria. Last month, Rear Admiral Oleg Gurinov, deputy head of the Russian Center for the Reconciliation of Warring Parties in Syria, said American warplanes continued to commit “gross violations” of deconfliction protocols.

“US Air Force pilots continue to activate weapons systems when approaching in the air with Russian Aerospace Forces aircraft performing planned flights in eastern Syria,” the official added.

The US currently maintains about 900 ground troops in Syria and operates a network of air bases around the region. The new aircraft deployment also comes after CENTCOM said it would strengthen the US “defense posture” in the Middle East with additional naval assets, vowing to carry out “heightened patrols” in the Persian Gulf in response to “destabilizing” actions by Tehran.

June 15, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

Washington Trying to Blackmail Armenians in Karabakh Into US-Brokered Talks: Here’s Why

By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 14.06.2023

The dispute between Armenians and Azerbaijanis over the landlocked mountainous region of Nagorno-Karabakh has been a source of severe tensions between the Caucasus nations, with several conflicts fought over the territory over the past 35 years. Moscow has worked tirelessly to mediate the crisis.

Washington is reportedly making a concerted, behind-the-scenes push to interfere directly in negotiations between Azerbaijan and the ethnic Armenian-led unrecognized Republic of Nagorno-Karabakh, including by blackmailing the Armenian side with the threat of a fresh round of violence in the region.

Informed sources cited by Russian media indicated that US officials – which until recently had limited their “mediation” efforts to talks between Azerbaijan and Armenia proper, are now trying to force their way into the sensitive negotiations between Baku and Stepanakert (Nagorno-Karabakh’s self-proclaimed capital).

“In the form of an ultimatum, Washington is forcing Nagorno-Karabakh representatives to agree to a meeting with the Azeri side in the near future in a third country under the supervision of American curators. Moreover, the Karabakh leadership has been told that if they refuse, they will be threatened with something close to an Azerbaijani ‘counter-terrorist operation’ in the region,’” the sources indicated.

The “ultimatum” has reportedly been received negatively in Stepanakert overall, but got support from Sergey Ghazaryan, the self-proclaimed republic’s foreign minister.

The past few weeks have seen a flurry of US and EU diplomatic activity in the Southern Caucasus, with Armenia and Azerbaijan’s foreign ministers meeting in Washington with Secretary of State Antony Blinken in early May, and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev holding talks in Brussels mediated by European Council chief Charles Michel the same month. In late May, Pashinyan, Aliyev, and Russian President Vladimir Putin held trilateral talks in Moscow. Pashinyan and Aliyev got into an argument much reported on in Western media about transport corridors during the Eurasian Economic Union Summit, with Putin intervening to quell the dispute.

US and EU mediators spoke of “significant progress” in the Armenian-Azeri talks, but few details were made public. However, on May 22, Pashinyan made the bombshell announcement that Yerevan would be ready to recognize Nagorno-Karabakh as part of Azerbaijan if the security of its ethnic Armenian population was guaranteed. This move was sharply criticized by some observers as a de-facto concession by Yerevan to leave the Karabakh issue “practically to the mercy of Western sponsors,” with autonomy guarantees for the region left off the table.

Moscow deployed a 2,000 troop-strong peacekeeping contingent to Nagorno-Karabakh three years ago after the September-November 2020 war, with these forces patrolling the Lachin corridor connecting Armenia proper to Nagorno-Karabakh. Russia’s strategy has revolved around seeking to maintain the status quo, ensuring the safety and security of the local civilian population, and preventing any further hostilities from breaking out.

Concerted Push to Eject Russia From Region

Retired Russian Foreign Ministry senior advisor Alexander Ananiev fears US and its allies and sympathetic actors in Yerevan and Baku have decided to try to remove Russia from its mediation role, and to eliminate Russia’s presence in the Southern Caucasus generally (including through the removal of the Russian military base in Armenia proper, and Yerevan’s withdrawal from Russian-led integration processes and defense agreements).

“Yerevan, with a geopolitical turn away from Russia, wants to receive the support of the West, but, in accordance with the ‘post-Soviet traditions’, not to lose anything from Russia in economics terms. For Baku, it’s important to distance itself from Moscow due to sanctions and the desire to gain a foothold as an important energy supplier to the European Union,” Ananiev wrote in a recent article in a major Russian international affairs journal.

‘Perfect’ Timing

Stanislav Tarasov, a veteran Russian political scientist specializing in Caucasus affairs, points out that the timing of the reported US “mediation effort” in Nagorno-Karabakh lines up perfectly with the signing of a major railway construction agreement by Russian and Iranian officials last month to bring the ambitious North South Transport Corridor one step closer to reality.

“The West offers nothing, have no solution of their own. They play on contradictions between Yerevan and Baku which Moscow is trying to neutralize or eliminate,” Tarasov told Sputnik.

“America’s interests are very simple. First, they would potentially like to use the South Caucasus as a springboard for ‘containing Iran.’ So far, this has not been achieved, although they did manage to carry out an operation to complicate ties between Azerbaijan and Iran. Second, they have managed to preserve a hotbed of regional tension via the Karabakh conflict. Third, the implementation of the North-South Corridor’s transit routes requires huge investments –investments which do not flow to an area facing the potential threat of war. This means Russia will seek to resolve this situation… while the West will try to destabilize it, so that Russia can’t break through the Southern Caucasus and unblock its communications,” the observer explained.

North South Transport Corridor (NSTC)

For Russia, the opening of new trade and transit routes is particularly vital today, Tarasov said, owing to the breakdown in economic relations with the West after the escalation of the Ukraine crisis, which deprived Moscow of key routes for global trade.

Consequently, “in order to block Russia in this region, the West began to put spokes in the wheels, including relating to the peace processes formed which emerged after the Second Karabakh War, but which, unfortunately, could not be fully resolved at the time,” he said.

June 14, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , , , , , | Leave a comment

How Will The US Respond After The Failure Of Kiev’s NATO-Backed Counteroffensive?

BY ANDREW KORYBKO | JUNE 14, 2023

Kiev’s NATO–backed counteroffensive has been disastrous, which even the Mainstream Media was forced to acknowledge after it became impossible to deny. CNN revealed that it already lost around 15% of its Bradley infantry fighting vehicles during the first week, while Forbes reported that about the same percentage of German Leopard tanks were destroyed as well as half of its “unique” breaching vehicles. Meanwhile, President Putin claimed that 25-30% of all their total foreign equipment was lost.

Biden’s re-election hinges on the success of the West’s most important military campaign since World War II, thus prompting the question of how the US will respond after its failure. The best-case scenario is that it’ll force Kiev to begin ceasefire talks with Russia aimed at reaching a Korean-like armistice, but that probably won’t happen until all other options are exhausted. These include expanding the conflict to Belarus, Moldova, and/or Russia’s pre-2014 borders and approving a Polish-led military intervention.

All of these options could lead to American-provoked nuclear brinksmanship with Russia, which is already being prepared for as evidenced by NATO’s largest-ever air drills that are presently occurring in Germany and the reported strengthening of its nuclear capabilities on the continent. There’s no chance of this dangerous gamble succeeding and Russia capitulating to blackmail, however, since it’s more than capable of guaranteeing that the West would be totally destroyed if it dared to use nukes first.

Russian subs prowl the oceans and are always ready to launch a retaliatory nuclear strike if the order is given. On the European front, Kaliningrad has been turned into a nuclear-equipped fortress, while tactical nukes are about to be deployed to nearby Belarus. Russian Kinzhal hypersonic missiles can pierce the US’ so-called “missiles defense shield” so there’s no hope of it preventing “mutually assured destruction” in the event that liberal–globalist warmongers decide to strike first.

These purely defensive capabilities should more than suffice for deterring the apocalypse, though it can’t be taken for granted that the US will react rationally after the failure of its proxy’s counteroffensive. Too much is riding on the impossible scenario of Kiev completely removing Russia from all the territory that it claims as its own for Washington to simply accept defeat. Its policymakers might therefore think that they should “escalate to de-escalate” out of desperation to achieve something that can be spun as a “victory”.

There’s no chance that Russia will ever make unilateral concessions on its objective national security interests, let alone in the face of nuclear blackmail, which is why the US’ liberal-globalist warmongers should banish the thought before they put humanity’s existence at risk. Whatever their reaction to the failure of Kiev’s counteroffensive will be, it must be guided by this fact and ideally de-escalate the NATO-Russian proxy war since it’s impossible to achieve anything from further escalating this conflict.

June 14, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Ukraine has lost hundreds of pieces of Western-supplied hardware – Putin

RT | June 13, 2023

Ukrainian forces have already lost dozens of tanks and hundreds of armored vehicles in their attacks on Russian positions, President Vladimir Putin told war correspondents on Tuesday. Kiev’s troops have so far failed to achieve success on any of the fronts in their long-touted counteroffensive, he added.

Kiev’s forces have been attacking the Russian positions in four major directions, the president said during the meeting, adding that reserves, including those equipped with the Western-supplied military hardware, have also been thrown into the fray. The offensive has led to massive personnel and material losses for Kiev, Putin added.

Ukraine has lost “at least 160 tanks and 360 armored vehicles,” Putin said, adding that the military hardware destroyed by the Russian troops accounts for between 25% and 30% of all Western military equipment supplies.

“There are also losses that we do not see, which are a result of long-range high-precision strikes,” Putin said, adding that Ukraine’s real losses are likely higher than the figures he named. As for the personnel losses, Putin said they were “ten times lower” among the Russian troops than among the Ukrainian ones.

The president also said that “fundamental goals” of the Russian military operation in Ukraine remain the same and the Kremlin does not plan to change them. At the same time, he also maintained that Moscow “sincerely sought” to reach an agreement with Kiev and resolve the differences existing between formerly Ukrainian southeastern regions, which have since joined Russia following a series of referendums in autumn 2022, and the rest of the county.

The Ukrainian authorities had been touting their offensive for months since early 2023. The operation was finally launched last week and has so far failed to bring any dramatic changes on the frontline.

The Russian Defense Ministry has since repeatedly reported on the Ukrainian forces losing dozens of military hardware in their attacks, including tanks and armored vehicles supplied by the West. The ministry also published several videos showing the Russian forces successfully striking the Ukrainian heavy equipment.

Earlier on Tuesday, one such video showed Russian soldiers seizing a German-made Leopard 2 main battle tank and US-produced Bradley infantry fighting vehicles. Kiev demanded more tanks from Berlin this week.

June 13, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Ukrainian combat vehicle crews surrender to Russia

RT | June 13, 2023

The crews of two Ukrainian BMP-1 infantry combat vehicles have surrendered to Russian troops near the Donbass city of Avdeyevka, TASS reported on Tuesday, citing an unnamed Russian security official.

According to the official, a member of a platoon in Ukraine’s 110th separate mechanized bridge had radioed Russian troops, requesting“medical assistance for their wounded soldiers” after commanders had “declined” to evacuate his unit.

The Ukrainian officer reportedly asked for safe passage and said that “the remainder of his units would surrender with all of their weapons, including two BMP-1s.”

Overall, ten soldiers were taken into custody, including some with serious injuries, the Russian official said. The official added that the captured service members were receiving medical aid and were being vetted for complicity in war crimes.

Russian war correspondent Andrey Rudenko posted a video on Monday evening that allegedly showed Russian soldiers detaining the crews of Ukrainian BMP-1s. The uniforms worn by the surrendering soldiers bore markings resembling those used by Ukrainian forces.

Kiev launched its long-anticipated counteroffensive last week, attacking Russian forces in multiple areas along the front line. According to Moscow, Ukrainian troops failed to breach Russian defenses and did not achieve their goals. Several German-made Leopard 2 heavy tanks and US-made M2 Bradley armored vehicles were destroyed or abandoned during the fighting.

June 13, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Ukrainian military lost most of the M2 Bradley AFVs that were used in its recent counter-offensive

By Ahmed Adel | June 13, 2023

Ukrainian soldiers said that most US-made M2 Bradley armoured vehicles were destroyed during the counter-offensive in the Zaporozhye region. According to AFP, the vehicles were destroyed just outside the small town of Orikhiv.

“Of nine vehicles attached to the group’s mechanised infantry unit — not the only one involved in the battle — six were wrecked, three damaged but repairable, and one was unscathed,” AFP reported, adding that a Ukrainian soldier said only “very small progress” was made against the Russian army.

“Who would be happy receiving those orders, ‘Go and take those Russian positions which are well protected’?” a senior officer, who asked not to be identified, said according to AFP.

In early June, Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said that in the direction of Zaporozhye, Ukrainian troops consisting of 1,500 fighters and 150 armoured vehicles tried to break through Russian defences but lost up to 350 troops and 30 tanks in two hours. The minister stressed that the Ukrainian brigade was stopped in all zones toward Zaporozhye.

With the Ukrainian offensive underway, Kiev has virtually no gains to show. In contrast, images of destroyed Leopard tanks and Bradley infantry fighting vehicles used by Ukrainian troops have circulated on social media. For this reason, several experts have warned about a heavy military defeat for Ukraine and another geopolitical failure for NATO, which again is resorting to intervention in remote territories outside its jurisdiction to achieve its objectives against Russia.

While the US and its allies have generously provided Ukraine with weapons and military vehicles during the current conflict, Ukrainian forces are institutionally and operationally incapable of successfully absorbing the wide and inconsistent array of equipment and weaponry on the battlefield.

Nonetheless, the US and the UK need Ukraine to launch a counteroffensive as they are the main financiers of Kiev’s escalation but are experiencing growing poverty and economic crises and therefore need to justify to their citizens the vast money sent to Ukraine.

Former Central Intelligence Agency agent and Executive Director of the Council for the National Interest, Philip Giraldi, warned that Western media are trying to make it appear that the Ukrainian counter-offensive is succeeding and that Ukraine’s forces are encroaching on Russian positions. In this sense, and despite what is happening on the battlefield, Giraldi stressed that US, UK, and German politicians are obliged to speak positively about the situation in Ukraine.

Despite the rhetoric, images of destroyed M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles and German-built Leopard 2A6 tanks abandoned and burning on the Ukrainian battlefield, the harsh truth about the futility of defeating Russia is starting to sink in. The reality is that Ukraine never had the capabilities to achieve its stated goal of piercing Russian defences to sever the land bridge connecting Crimea to Russia proper.

The Western hope was that Russia would be demoralised by these casualties and accept a negotiated end to the conflict on terms acceptable to Ukraine and its Western allies. Evidently, Ukraine and its allies have failed.

The genesis of this failure can be attributed to two things. First, the low opinion that Ukraine and its NATO allies had of the combat capabilities of the Russian Army and the forces deployed in the Zaporozhye region, and second, the unrealistic expectations placed on the NATO training and equipment that were provided to Ukrainian forces and assigned to the task of breaking through Russian defences.

It is reasonable to assume that, using intelligence assessments that highlighted perceived command and control weaknesses and low morale among Russian forces, NATO and Ukrainian military planners believed that Russian defences in the Zaporozhye sector would collapse under the weight of a NATO-style assault.

Although fighting in Zaporozhye is not yet over, initial results on the battlefield show that contrary to the expectations of Ukraine and its NATO partners, the Russian military professionally performed their tasks, decisively defeating Ukrainian forces. NATO and Ukraine gambled that Russia lacked the military capability to successfully implement its military doctrine, believing that Russian command teams lacked the necessary communications to coordinate the complex operations needed and that Russian forces — especially those that were recently mobilised — lacked the training and morale to perform well in stressful combat conditions.

NATO and the Ukrainian high command threw the Ukrainian brigades into the grip of the Russian defensive lines without adequate fire support, thinking that the Russians were unable to maximise their superiority in artillery and air power to neutralise and destroy the forces of Ukrainian attackers before they could generate the momentum expected. Instead, this led to the humiliating loss of most of the US-made M2 Bradley provided to the Ukrainian military for this front.

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

June 13, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , | Leave a comment

CNN Admitted That Kiev Lost Around 15% Of Its Bradley Infantry Fighting Vehicles In A Week

BY ANDREW KORYBKO | JUNE 12, 2023

Kiev’s NATO–backed counteroffensive is off to a rough start after losing around 15% of its Bradley infantry fighting vehicles in a week according to CNN’s latest report. The outlet cited a Dutch open-source intelligence website that’s collected visual evidence of each side’s military equipment losses since the start of Russia’s special operation. While Ukrainian supporters are celebrating the recapture of some long-contested villages along the Line of Contact, these were pyrrhic victories considering the costs.

The first line of Russia’s multilayered defenses in the Zaporozhye Region has yet to even be reached, which suggests that Kiev’s already very high losses will likely spike the closer that its forces get to there. Russia’s Ministry of Defense earlier shared footage showing some of the same Bradley vehicles that CNN later confirmed were indeed destroyed, which also included a German Leopard tank. Observers should therefore assume that there’s truth to Moscow’s claims that some of the latter were destroyed too.

Kiev’s loss of such American and German “wunderwaffen” was to be expected since it was never realistic that either piece of equipment would reshape the military-strategic dynamics of the NATO-Russian “race of logistics”/“war of attrition” that have been trending in Moscow’s favor since the start of this year. Nevertheless, the Ukrainian and Western publics were misled by their governments’ information warfare campaigns into pinning their hopes of victory on those two and others.

The deep disappointment that they’d inevitably feel after seeing footage of them being destroyed by their opponents explains why Kiev released a propaganda video last week urging everyone to remain tight-lipped about the counteroffensive and not to share any unconfirmed claims about it. This narrative context makes it all the more surprising that CNN just informed their global audience that Ukraine lost around one out of every seven Bradley vehicles before it even reached the first line of Russia’s defenses.

Kiev will obviously be displeased by this, but there isn’t anything that it can do in response. According to Semafor, the regime has already threatened, revoked, or denied the credentials of Western journalists in the country over their coverage of this conflict, including CNN’s. That outlet’s latest report, however, was derived from third-party open-source intelligence and not its own sources on the ground. In fact, CNN might even have published it as a form of protest against Kiev’s censorship of its journalists.

After all, they usually toe the Western line on this conflict, which is why their report stands out so much. CNN didn’t have to inform their global audience about the scale of Kiev’s losses thus far just one week into the counteroffensive and contrary to that side’s demand not to share any unconfirmed claims. For this reason, it can be seen not only as an act of protest against Kiev, but also against that regime’s Western patrons who support their proxy’s censorship of foreign journalists like CNN’s by their silence.

Kiev and its patrons should therefore have expected that some of these same Western outlets whose journalists’ work the regime impeded would eventually rebel and do so in a way that embarrasses them. Both would have preferred for proof of these “wunderwaffens’” destruction to be kept under wraps, but now there’s no denying this after CNN’s latest report. They can’t reflexively claim that this is “Russian propaganda” either since no Westerner believes that this outlet is under Moscow’s control.

The public’s artificially manufactured hopes that the Bradley vehicles and Leopard tanks would lead to a speedy victory for Kiev have thus been shattered, but most will likely cope with this by taking false comfort in the recapture of some long-contested villages. Those whose eyes have finally been opened by CNN’s surprising report, however, might rightly fear what could happen in the event of a direct NATO-Russian conflict since it’s clear that the West can’t rely on these “wunderwaffen” to win.

June 12, 2023 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Most Countries Side With Russia in Ukraine Conflict While US’s Credibility Slips – Hersh

Sputnik -12.06.2023

Most of the world’s population supports Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine, while the United States lost its credibility, Pulitzer Prize-winning US investigative journalist Seymour Hersh said on Sunday.

“The percentage of the [countries], particularly of the African and Central Asian and South Asian countries, that have changed from being pro-America to being pro-Russia is really quite dramatic. Much more than a half of the world’s population supports Russia in the war and not the United States. This was never the way it was,” Hersh said in an interview with talk show host George Galloway.

The journalist opined that “things are not as good as they used to be in Russia” amid Western sanctions, but “the idea that they are desperate is just wrong.”

Hersh also argued that Washington “lost so much credibility around the world,” citing Saudi Arabia’s diplomatic rapprochement with Iran as an example.

“It’s happened because, I think, because of Ukraine and dislike of the war. Saudi Arabia, by the way, they’re selling 25% of [their] oil to China, as I have mentioned, but the Saudis immediately cut a deal. And the Iranians immediately responded … They have a lot of control in Yemen over the Houthi tribes,” Hersh said.

Russia launched its special military operation in Ukraine on February 24, 2022, following calls for help from the breakaway republics of Donetsk and Luhansk. The world has split into those who support Moscow and accuse NATO of provoking the conflict, and those who condemn Russia’s actions and impose sanctions on the country, while also ramping up their financial and military aid to Kiev. Some countries have avoided taking sides in the conflict.

June 11, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

Asia-Pacific is where China-Russia “no limits” partnership will be put to test

BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | JUNE 11, 2023 

The power dynamic in Northeast Asia is undergoing a dramatic change against the backdrop of the “no limits” strategic partnership between China and Russia. Ukraine’s defeat in the war with Russia may compel the Biden administration to put “boots on the ground” triggering a global confrontation and, equally, the US-China relations are at their lowest point since their normalisation in the 1970s, while Taiwan issue may potentially turn into a casus belli of war. To be sure, the Northeast Asian theatre is going to be a crucial arena in the brewing big power confrontation.    

Symptomatic of the cascading tensions, Russian foreign ministry summoned the Japanese ambassador on Friday and a protest was lodged in extraordinarily harsh language, as it came to be known that the 100 vehicles that Tokyo innocuously promised last week to Ukraine would in reality be armoured vehicles and all-terrain vehicles. Apparently, Tokyo was dissimulating, since Japan’s export rules ban its companies from selling lethal items overseas! 

Tokyo is crossing a “red line” and Moscow is not amused. The foreign ministry statement on Friday “stressed that the administration of Prime Minister Fumio Kishida should be ready to share responsibility for the deaths of civilians, including those in Russia’s border regions… (and) driving bilateral relations even deeper into a dangerous impasse. Such actions cannot remain without serious consequences.”

Significantly, on Friday, in a video conference with General Liu Zhenli, Chief of Staff of the Joint Staff Department of China’s Central Military Commission, the Chief of the General Staff of Russian Armed Forces and First Deputy Minister of Defence General Valery Gerasimov expressed confidence in the expansion of military cooperation between the two countries and noted, “Coordination between Russia and the People’s Republic of China in the international arena has a stabilising effect on the world situation.” 

The Chinese media later reported that the two generals agreed that Russia will participate (for the second time) in the Northern/Interaction-2023 exercise organised by China, signalling a new framework of China-Russia joint strategic exercises alongside the  joint air patrol over the Sea of Japan and the East China Sea by their strategic bombers. By the way, the sixth such joint air petrol was conducted on Tuesday since the practice began in 2019. 

The big picture is that the shift in Japanese policies through the past year — close alignment with the US regarding Ukraine; copying the West’s sanctions against Russia; supply of lethal weaponry to Ukraine, etc. — has seriously damaged the Russo-Japanese relationship. On top of it, Japan’s re-militarisation with American support and its  growing ties with the NATO (which is lurching toward the Asia-Pacific) makes Tokyo a common adversary of both Moscow and Beijing. 

The imperative to push back this resurgent US client is strongly felt in Moscow and Beijing, which also has a global dimension since Russia and China are convinced that Japan is acting like a surrogate of American dominance in Asia and is subserving western interests. On its part, in a turnaround, Washington now actively encourages Japan to be an assertive regional power by jettisoning its constitutional limits to rearmament. It pleases Washington that Japan pledged a long-term increase of over 60 percent in defence spending. 

What worries Moscow and Beijing is also the ascendance of revanchist elements — vestiges of Japan’s imperial era — in the top echelons of power in the recent period. Of course, Japan continues to be in denial mode as regards its atrocities during the period of its brutal colonisation of China and Korea and the horrific war crimes during World War 2. 

This trend bears striking similarity to what is happening in Germany, where too the pro-Nazi elements are reclaiming habitation and a name. Curiously, a German-Japanese axis is present at the core of Washington’s strategies against Russia and China in Eurasia and Northeast Asia. 

The German Bundeswehr is expanding its combat exercises in the Indian and Pacific Oceans and will deploy more naval and air force units to the Asia-Pacific region next year. A recent German report noted, “The intensification of German participation in Asian-Pacific regional manoeuvres is taking place at a time when the United States is carrying out record-breaking manoeuvres in Southeast Asia, in its attempts to intensify its control over the region and displace China as much as possible.”

Japan’s motivations are easy to fathom. Apart from Japanese  revanchism which fuels the nationalist sentiments, Tokyo is convinced that a settlement with Russia over Kuril Islands is not to be expected now, or possibly ever, which means that a peace treaty will not be possible to bring the World War 2 hostilities to an end formally. Second, Japan no longer visualises Russia to be a “balancer” in its  troubled relationship with China. 

Third, most important, as Japan sees the rise of China as a political and economic threat, it is rapidly militarising, which in turn creates its own dynamic in terms of both upending its power position in Asia as also integrating itself with the West (“globalising”). Inevitably, this translates as promoting NATO in the Asian power dynamic, something that cuts deep into Russia’s core national security and defence strategies. Consequently, whatever hopes the strategists in Moscow had nurtured in the past that Japan could be weaned away from the US orbit and encouraged to exercise its strategic autonomy have evaporated into thin air. 

Arguably, in his zest to integrate Japan into the US-led “collective West”, Prime Minister Kishida overreached himself. He behaves as if he is obliged to be more loyal than the king himself. Thus, on the same day that President Xi Jinping visited Moscow in March, Kishida landed in Kiev from where he went to attend a NATO Summit and openly began lobbying for establishment of a NATO office in Tokyo. 

Kishida followed up by hosting NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg in Tokyo and giving him a platform to berate China publicly from its doorstep. There is no easy explanation for such excessive behaviour. Is it a matter of impetuous behaviour alone or is it a calculated strategy to gain legitimacy for the ascendance of revanchist elements whom Kishida represents in the Japanese power structure?

To be sure, Northeast Asia is a priority now for China and Russia, given their overlapping interests in the region. NATO expansion to Asia and the sharp rise in the US force projection bring home to the defence strategists in Beijing and Moscow that the Sea of Japan is a “communal backyard” for the two countries where their “no limits” strategic partnership ought to be optimal. The Chinese commentators no longer downplay that the Russian-Chinese military ties “serve as a powerful counterbalance to the US’ hegemonic actions.” 

It is entirely conceivable that at some point in a near future, China and Russia may begin to view North Korea as a protagonist in their regional alignment. They may no longer  feel committed to observe the US-led sanctions against North Korea. Indeed, if that were to happen, a host of possibilities will arise. The Russian-Iranian military ties set the precedent. 

June 11, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

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