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Ukrainian advance into Russia’s Kursk Region halted – Moscow

RT | August 7, 2024

Ukraine’s attempted incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region has been halted, the chief of the Russian General Staff, Valery Gerasimov, said on Wednesday. Kiev’s forces have suffered 300 casualties in the attack, he added.

Reporting to Russian President Vladimir Putin, Gerasimov stated that border security services had stopped the Ukrainian advance with the help of reinforcement units, air strikes, missile forces, and artillery fire.

Kiev’s forces suffered 315 casualties during the attempted incursion, with at least 100 troops killed and 215 wounded, Gerasimov estimated. Ukraine also lost 54 armored vehicles, including seven tanks, he added.

Ukraine initially launched the attack at 5:30am on Tuesday with a force numbering up to a thousand, with the goal of taking over the Sudzhinsky district of Kursk Region, Gerasimov said.

He insisted that Russia’s counter-operation will end with the enemy forces being destroyed or driven back beyond the border.

Previously commenting on Tuesday’s attack, Putin stated that the incursion was yet another large-scale provocation undertaken by the Kiev regime, which he said has again resorted to indiscriminately targeting civilians.

Ukrainian forces “are conducting indiscriminate fire from various types of weapons, including rocket weapons, at civilian buildings, homes and ambulances,” Putin said at a government meeting on Wednesday.

More than 2,000 people have fled the border areas, some with the assistance of rescuers, since the fighting broke out on Tuesday morning, regional governor Aleksey Smirnov has reported. Authorities have provided emergency shelters for those who need them, while neighboring regions are also offering their help to the refugees.

August 7, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, War Crimes | , | Leave a comment

Toward a Second Cuban Missile Crisis?

Theodore Postol, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Glenn Diesen | August 6, 2024

I had a very interesting discussion with Alexander Mercouris and Theodore Postol – a nuclear engineer and missile technology expert professor from MIT and former advisor to the Pentagon.

Professor Postol spoke about the new missiles that the US will deploy to Germany, which will be able to reach Moscow within 2-3 minutes and thus dramatically elevate the potential for a successful nuclear first-strike. Russia will have very little time to respond to a possible strike, which increases the risk of an accidental nuclear war or a NATO nuclear first-strike. Russia will have to respond by decentralising decision-making and granting more people the authority to launch a counter-strike against the US to reduce the threat of a decapitating strike against Russia’s decision-making headquarters, and Russia will be under pressure to launch a pre-emptive strike on the US/NATO if it suspects a first-strike in coming. This has happened before when NATO’s Able Archer exercise in 1983 almost triggered a Soviet nuclear attack as Moscow thought the NATO military exercise was a cover for a first-strike.

As the world was almost consumed by a nuclear holocaust, both Washington and Moscow recognised the need to extend the warning period for a possible nuclear first-strike. The result was the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty in 1987 to remove an entire class of missiles from Europe (500-5,500km range). In 2019, the US unilaterally withdrew from the INF Treaty, and new missiles will now be deployed to Germany which will give the US the possibility to strike Moscow with almost no warning. The US and Germany are thus setting the stage for something comparable to another Cuban Missile Crisis. The decision has no clear purpose in terms of improving security, it does not respond to any changes in the Russian nuclear posture, and the obedient media has offered no critical reporting.

August 7, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, Video | , , , | Leave a comment

Shoigu Arrives in Iran to Discuss Global, Regional Security

Sputnik – 05.08.2024

TEHRAN – Russian Security Council Secretary Sergei Shoigu has arrived in Iran for a planned working visit to discuss global and regional security issues, the Russian Security Council said on Monday.

Shoigu will hold talks with his Iranian counterpart, Ali Akbar Ahmadian, and Chief of the General Staff of the Iranian armed forces Mohammad Bagheri. Shoigu will be received by Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian.

The agenda includes a wide range of issues of cooperation between Russia and Iran in Tehran, including security and economy.

Previously, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry revealed that Russian President Vladimir Putin would be meeting with Masoud Pezeshkian at the BRICS summit in Kazan in October. In July, the Iranian President-elect released a message underscoring that Russia is “a valued strategic ally and neighbor to Iran and my administration will remain committed to expanding and enhancing our cooperation.”

“I will continue to prioritize bilateral and multilateral cooperation with Russia, particularly within frameworks such as BRICS, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and Eurasia Economic Union,” Pezeshkian stated.

Sergei Shoigu’s visit comes as Israel has been bracing for a potential attack from Iran and Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah in the wake of the assassination of Haniyeh and Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr last week.

August 5, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Solidarity and Activism | , , , | Leave a comment

West too fearful of escalation with Russia – Zelensky

RT | August 5, 2024

Ukraine is pushing NATO nations to create a coalition that would attempt to intercept Russian missiles, Vladimir Zelensky has said. The US-led military bloc has previously declined to do so.

Kiev has long been pressuring its Western backers to become more involved in the conflict with Moscow and start shooting down Russian drones and missiles over Ukrainian territory. However, its efforts have been rebuffed by foreign powers reluctant to engage in a direct military confrontation with Russia.

“[Western nations] are always concerned about possible escalation. We are fighting against that. We will work on it,” Zelensky told journalists on Sunday. The government in Kiev is considering “technical possibilities for neighboring nations to use military aircraft against missiles that strike Ukraine” after flying in the general direction of NATO countries, he added.

Zelensky has been calling for the establishment of a no-fly zone over Ukraine since the outbreak of hostilities with Russia in February 2022. Military experts pointed out that any realistic enforcement of Kiev’s wish would require NATO members to attack Russian planes in the air and at airfields inside Russia.

The idea of a less ambitious shield over Western Ukraine was floated last month, as Kiev signed a bilateral security deal with Warsaw and ramped up its lobbying efforts ahead of a NATO leaders’ summit in the US.

The Polish government indicated it was willing to answer the Ukrainian call, provided that NATO approved, although other nations, including the US, objected. Washington said it believed that supplying more air defense systems to Ukraine to operate on its own was the best way to counter Russian barrages.

Zelensky spoke to the press after confirming that sponsors had delivered US-designed F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. Media reports have suggested that the new Ukrainian capability is too small-scale to become a gamechanger on the front line. It would likely be used to intercept cruise missiles delivering long-range strikes instead, defense experts have suggested.

Moscow has been targeting Ukrainian military assets as well as some key infrastructure sites, such as power stations, which it considers crucial for Kiev’s war effort. According to Russian officials, the conflict is a US-led proxy war in which Ukrainian troops serve as “cannon fodder” for Western geostrategic interests.

On Saturday, Zelensky said Kiev wants to attack targets deep inside Russia, a type of operation for which Ukraine is not allowed to use donated Western weapons and relies on domestically produced kamikaze drones instead.

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

Russia Ranks Among G20’s Lowest in National Debt Per Capita

Sputnik – August 3, 2024

This year, Russia has entered the top three largest economies in the world with the lowest level of national debt per capita, according to an analysis by Sputnik of the latest data from G20 countries. On average, government debt among those countries is $23,600 per citizen. Only six countries exceed that mark.

New data shows Russia has one of the lowest per-capita debt levels of the G20 group of nations.

India has the most modest sovereign debt, with the latest data from the G20 showing $1,316 per person. Indonesia follows with $1,747 and Russia is third with $2,076 per capita at the end of the first half of this year.

Other countries with national debts less than $5,000 per person include Turkiye ($2,800), China ($3,000) and South Africa ($4,500).

Countries with debts ranging from $5,000 to $10,000 include Brazil, Mexico, Saudi Arabia and Argentina.

South Korea’s national debt is almost twice that of Argentina, at $16,000 per capita, Germany’s is $20,900 and Australia’s is $21,200 per capita.

The six countries with above-average national debts are all members of the Group of Seven (G7).

Of those, Canada has the lowest debt at $25,300 per capita. France’s debt stands at $40,300 per citizen, while the UK and Italy have accumulated debts twice as large as Canada’s at $51,600 and $51,900 per person. Japan has the second-largest national debt at $70,400 per capita.

The United States continues to have the highest sovereign debt, at $104,500 per capita — 80 times higher than India’s and 50 times higher than Russia’s. Among all countries in the world, only Singapore has a higher debt figure at $149,300 per person.

August 3, 2024 Posted by | Economics | , , | Leave a comment

Truths about the War in Ukraine – Part Eighteen of The Anglo-American War on Russia

Tales of the American Empire | August 1, 2024

In 1945, American President Roosevelt met with Soviet Premier Stalin at Yalta to discuss the post war world. Yalta is on Russia’s Crimean peninsula where tens of thousands of Russians had recently perished fighting the invading Nazis. Both leaders would be stunned to learn that 70 years later, American leaders would insist that Crimea does not belong to Russia.

America’s corporate media is closely controlled so their reporting supports the American empire. Six massive media companies control 90% of the American market. Reporting guidelines are sent from a secret cabal to news editors then down to so-called “journalists.” Soon after direct Russian military intervention in Ukraine in early 2022, NATO launched a massive “Information War” formally known as propaganda. Russian news sites were blocked from the internet as well as many small independent western sites. Corporate propaganda was all that most Americans encountered so they are now bewildered when told Russia is winning in Ukraine.

August 3, 2024 Posted by | Timeless or most popular, Video | , , , | Leave a comment

Trump Facilitated Collapse of US-Russia Arms Control by Scrapping INF Treaty

Sputnik – 01.08.2024

WASHINGTON – Then-President Donald Trump made a “stupid mistake” by deciding to scrap the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, as the consequences of that fateful decision have been the collapse of strategic arms control policies between the United States and Russia, analysts told Sputnik.

The INF treaty, signed between the Soviet Union and the US in 1987, banned the countries from developing and possessing ground-launched ballistic and cruise missiles with ranges from 500-5,500 kilometers.

In 2019, Trump withdrew the US from the treaty, which prompted Russia to suspend its participation in the Cold War-era accord in response.

August 2 marks the fifth anniversary of the US’ formal withdrawal from the INF Treaty.

Restraint Abandoned

“The consequences have been that strategic arms control policies between Russia and the US/NATO have largely been abandoned and both sides have developed nuclear capable intermediate range missiles that raise the likelihood that they will be resorted to in a potential escalating conflict like in Ukraine,” former CIA analyst, founder and chair of the Council for the National Interest Philip Giraldi said.

There were sharp differences of opinion in the Trump administration on whether to retain the treaty, in spite of both sides’ claims that there was “cheating,” Giraldi recalled. “The neocons predictably won the argument.”

Back in the 1980s, despite hawkish governments in London and Bonn, popular sentiment across Europe, especially in Germany overwhelmingly favored creating the treaty, Giraldi emphasized.

“Interestingly enough, I was in the CIA German station in Hamburg 1982-5 when the whole issue of intermediate range missiles, which theoretically allowed for no warning devastating nuclear capable attack, was being debated,” he said.

“There were huge demonstrations in all German cities against the deployment and in favor of an agreement,” Giraldi reported. “The US Consulate General was located near Hamburg’s central lake, the Alster and thousands of demonstrators would gather along the lakefront and storm the front of the building by crossing the access road that surrounded the lake.”

Attempt to Show He’s ‘Tough’ on Russia

American University in Moscow President Edward Lozansky, a former Soviet nuclear physicist, noted that Trump had heeded his two most influential advisers at the time, CIA chief and then secretary of state Mike Pompeo and national security adviser John Bolton, both of whom were determined to kill the treaty.

“One has to look at Trump’s two critical foreign policy and security advisers at the time, Pompeo and Bolton. Trump foolishly appointed them to prove he is tough on Russia. He made many other stupid mistakes for the same reason,” Lozansky said.

One can excuse Trump for being a “political novice who miraculously won in 2016 and found himself in an ocean of sharks,” he added.

The recent events show that “the Deep State learned the 2016 lessons” and the chances of Trump repeating the miracle of that year are quickly decreasing, at least for now, according to Lozansky.

“Almost each of the next 100 days till November 5 elections might bring unexpected events, not all of them bright for America and mankind,” the expert concluded.

August 2, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Israel’s allies block Security Council statement condemning Tehran attack

The Cradle | August 1, 2024

The US, UK, and France blocked a Russian-proposed statement at the UN Security Council (UNSC) condemning the assassination of Hamas politburo chief Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, Iran’s envoy to the UN Amir Saeid Iravani said on 1 August.

“Russia’s proposed statement condemning Israel’s heinous act was blocked by the US, UK, and France,” Iravani told Russian media following an emergency UNSC meeting on Wednesday night.

“It is now absolutely necessary to hold the occupying [Israeli] regime accountable for the atrocities it committed,” the Iranian diplomat added. “This regime cannot be allowed to escape accountability and consequences for the violations it has committed.”

During the session, Iravani stressed that Tehran “reserves its inherent right to self-defense in accordance with international law” and said that “the responsibility of the United States as a strategic ally and main supporter of the Israeli regime in the region cannot be overlooked in this horrific crime. This act could not [have] occurred without the authorization and intelligence support of the US.”

Permanent UNSC members Russia and China strongly condemned Israel’s attacks on the Iranian and Lebanese capitals, blasting Tel Aviv for once more sabotaging Gaza ceasefire talks and pushing the region to the brink of all-out war.

“China is deeply concerned about the potential for this incident to further destabilize the region,” Fu Cong, China’s permanent representative to the UN, emphasized during the meeting. “China strongly opposes and condemns recent irresponsible actions, including Israel’s attacks on southern Beirut,” he added.

Fu also called on Tel Aviv to cease all military actions in Gaza and appealed to “influential countries” to “put more pressure and work more vigorously … to put out the flames of war in Gaza.”

Russia’s first deputy envoy to the UN, Dmitry Polyansky, also condemned Haniyeh’s killing, calling it an “attempt” to drag Iran into war.

“This provocative attack was carried out while the Hamas leader was in Iran on an official invitation to attend the inauguration ceremony of the President-elect of the Islamic Republic of Iran, Masoud Pezeshkian. Those behind this political assassination had to realize how dangerous the consequences could have been for the entire region,” Polyansky said.

“The misguided practice of targeted liquidations of prominent political and military figures is bringing the Middle East to the brink of a region-wide war,” the Russian diplomat added.

Feda Abdelhady Nasser, the deputy permanent observer of the State of Palestine to the UN, told the gathered diplomats that the global community “has a choice to make” between “peace and security” or letting “Israel drag us all to the abyss.”

“Israel has been the oppressor, tormentor, and murderer of Palestinians for decades, and it is the longstanding destabilizer of our region,” Nasser highlighted.

Lebanon’s Acting Permanent Representative to the UN, Hadi Hashem, contested Israel’s claims that the attack on the Beirut suburb of Dahye this week was an act of “self-defense.”

“Israel’s claim that it seeks to protect the population it occupies is a display of hypocrisy,” Hachem said, adding, “The real goal of Israel is to prolong and escalate the hostilities. And it is ironic that the killer of tens of thousands of children in Gaza sheds tears for the children of the occupied Syrian Golan.”

Similarly, Syria’s UN ambassador, Qusai al-Dahhak, stressed that “Israel is responsible for the crime in Majdal Shams” and noted that the territory is Syrian, accusing Israel of “weaponizing” the attack on the Druze community “to continue its aggression on the states of the region.”

Robert Wood, deputy US ambassador to the UN, called on UNSC members with influence over Iran “to increase pressure on it to stop escalating its proxy conflict against Israel and other actors.”

France and the UK took a similar line, reiterating a call for an “immediate ceasefire” in Gaza and condemning what they said was Iranian support for “destabilizing actors in the region.”

August 1, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, War Crimes | , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Shooting down Russian missiles is ‘act of war’ – Ritter

RT | July 31, 2024

Vladimir Zelensky’s idea to have Poland shoot down Russian missiles would get NATO directly involved in the conflict with Moscow, former US Marine and UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter has said.

Ukraine’s leader has been asking his Western partners for a “defense shield” for months. He claimed to have finally received a commitment from Warsaw in early July, as part of a security pact. Poland has said it would not target Russian missiles without NATO approval, which the US-led bloc has yet to give.

“Zelensky is operating on the assumption that NATO can have Patriot missiles in Poland that can shoot down Russian missiles that are headed towards militarily sensitive targets in the vicinity of Lviv,” Ritter told YouTube host Danny Haiphong in an interview posted on Tuesday.

“He doesn’t understand: that’s an act of war,” Ritter added. “That’s Russian military equipment, on a Russian military mission, in support of a Russian national security objective.”

Shooting down those missiles, even locking on to them with radar, would make NATO “literally a party to the conflict,” Ritter explained.

The US-led bloc has been trying to maintain a pretense that it’s not directly involved in the Russia-Ukraine conflict, despite donating billions of dollars worth of weapons, equipment and ammunition to Kiev’s armed forces and in some cases literally paying the salary of Ukrainian government employees.

Kiev is trying to have NATO set up a de facto “no fly zone” over western Ukraine, Ritter argued, which he described as “something Russia simply won’t tolerate.”

“Zelensky is just desperate right now, so he’s trying to invent rules of engagement,” Ritter concluded.

Ukrainian forces have been suffering steady setbacks along the front for weeks, with no prospect of replenishing their losses in either men or materiel.

The first handful of F-16 fighters reportedly arrived on Wednesday and will most likely be armed with modern US missiles. Zelensky has already complained that he would need more than 100 jets to actually make a difference, however.

Ritter is a former US Marine Corps major who served as a UN weapons inspector. He famously disagreed with the foreign policy establishment in Washington in the early 2000s, insisting that Saddam Hussein’s Iraq did not have weapons of mass destruction – a pretext the US later used to invade the country. He has been a RT contributor and saw his passport seized by the US government when he tried to attend the St. Petersburg International Security Forum in June.

July 31, 2024 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

Scott Ritter: EU’s Anti-Russian Sanctions ‘Have Boomeranged Back on Europe’

By Oleg Burunov – Sputnik – July 31, 2024

EU packages of sanctions on Russia have backfired, becoming “one of the greatest economic disasters in modern European history,” former US Marine Corps intelligence officer and ex-UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter pointed out.

“These sanctions, which are designed to punish Russia, have failed to do so. In fact, they’ve boomeranged back on Europe. And Europe continues to move forward, putting more sanctions into more sanctions, all the while Russia gets stronger economically,” the ex-US Marine Corps intelligence officer noted.

He dubbed the EU “the economic arm of a gaggle of organizations and institutions, which include the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, all of which serve fundamentally at the behest of the United States.”

“So the sanctions that were implemented by the European Union were done so because the United States wanted Russia to be isolated” and “confronted by Ukraine that was functioning as a de facto proxy of NATO,” Ritter argued.

The former UN weapons inspector insisted that America is using the sanctions “to achieve a larger strategic objective, not only weakening Russia but also weakening Europe, so that the United States emerges from this [Ukraine] conflict stronger.”

“It’s been the goal of the United States for decades to break Europe of its addiction to cheap Russian energy. So the sanctions and the blowback are achieving that result. Maybe Europe doesn’t realize this, or they haven’t woken up to the reality that the United States isn’t their friend,” Ritter concluded.

He was echoed by Gunnar Beck, outgoing member of the European Parliament for the Alternative for Germany party, lawyer and academic specializing in EU law, who told Sputnik that it’s safe to say the EU shot itself in the foot by deciding to impose sanctions on Russia.

“There’s no doubt that the economic impact [from the sanctions] is felt to a much greater extent here in the EU itself compared to Russia. I mean, the Russian economy, according to the official data, is doing very well and it appears to have adapted to the sanctions,” Beck pointed out.

The EU’s sanctions on Russian raw materials, including oil and gas “have hurt primarily the European economies,” which “used to be able to rely on predictable, high quality and cheap gas and oil imports from Russia,” according to the expert.

These economies, he went on, “still cannot do without importing oil and gas from Russia, but they’re now doing it via third countries at much higher prices,” with Russia continuing to sell its oil and gas.

“So the EU has basically harmed itself with these sanctions, or rather to be more precise, the bloc has massively harmed European industry and European consumers. But it [the restrictive measures] don’t appear to have had much impact on the Russian economy,” Beck emphasized.

The sanctions “have not had the impact that the EU hoped they would have,” which was predictable, per the expert.

“The EU probably underestimated the degree to which the Russian government had prepared for the eventuality of sanctions, including far-reaching restrictions on energy imports into the EU, as well as financial transactions. On this occasion, I think the sanctions have proved ineffective and they have failed insofar as Russia is concerned,” Beck summed up.

July 31, 2024 Posted by | Economics | , , , | Leave a comment

Russia and China challenge US claims to marine seabed – media

RT | July 31, 2024

US claims to a vast section of potentially resource-rich seabed floor have no basis in international law and should be rejected, Russian and Chinese government representatives have said, according to Bloomberg.

The statements were reportedly made during a session this week of the International Seabed Authority, held in Kingston, Jamaica, and were in response to recent claims by the US that it would be adding about one million square kilometers (386,100 square miles) to its continental shelf in the Bering Sea, the Pacific Ocean, the Atlantic Ocean and the Gulf of Mexico.

Both the representatives of Russia and China stressed that Washington’s unilateral claims contradict the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS), which the US has never ratified, Bloomberg wrote on Tuesday.

Adopted in 1982, UNCLOS sets out rules relating to the world’s oceans and seas, covering issues including territorial limits, resources and protection of the marine environment.

Under the law, countries have the right to any resources in the sea or seabed floor within their so-called exclusive economic zones, which can stretch up to 200 nautical miles (370 km) off a country’s coast.

States that have ratified UNCLOS undergo a lengthy process to reach agreement on where the boundaries of underwater continental shelves lie, which will define exclusive economic rights to potentially lucrative seabed resources based there.

The US’ unilateral claims jeopardize a fragile international balance, as well as the integrity of the convention, Russia’s representative reportedly said and added that Moscow rejects Washington’s selective approach to international law.

China’s delegate at the Seabed Authority meeting also argued that the US doesn’t have the right to make such claims unilaterally, and can’t expect to enjoy the benefits of the convention without having ratified it, Bloomberg reported. The unnamed representative described the resources in the international seabed as the common heritage of mankind and said any act that threatens that shouldn’t be accepted. Both Russia and China ratified UNCLOS in the 1990s.

The US representative Gregory O’Brien defended his nation’s position, according to reports, claiming it followed the rules of the convention in making the claims.

The US announced the extensions of its claims on the ocean floor in December 2023, as part of an effort to boost access to so-called critical minerals that are necessary for electric vehicle batteries and renewable energy projects. The claims were “about geography, not resources,” the State Department insisted.

The extension “highlights American strategic interests” in securing hard minerals, such as lithium and tellurium, on its seabed and subsoil, “lying sometimes hundreds of miles offshore,” according to an article by James Kraska, chair and professor of International Maritime Law at the US Naval War College.

The latest US Geological Survey, conducted in 2008, estimated that about 90 billion barrels of undiscovered oil and 1,670 trillion cubic feet of gas lie inside the Arctic Circle, along with critical metals needed for electrification. However, most of that estimate is based on land studies and the offshore potential is largely unexplored, Bloomberg wrote.

July 31, 2024 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Leave a comment

Iran Rejects US Intelligence Words on Tehran’s Alleged Interference in Elections – Reports

Sputnik – 30.07.2024

TEHRAN – Iran’s mission to the United Nations has rejected US intelligence statements regarding Tehran’s alleged interference in the upcoming elections in the United States, the IRNA news agency reported on Tuesday.

On Monday, media reported that the office of the Director of National Intelligence of the United States had unsubstantiated claims that Russia, China and Iran allegedly use marketing, communications and other means to influence US voters and the outcome of the upcoming presidential election.

“Iran has no purpose or activity aimed at influencing the US elections. Most of these accusations are being made as part of psychological actions to artificially revive election campaigns,” the Iranian mission to the UN said, as quoted by the news agency.

July 30, 2024 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering | , , , | Leave a comment