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The Andean Shadow Army

How Colombia became the world’s primary reservoir of mercenary manpower

José Niño Unfiltered| September 14, 2026

A few weeks ago Russians with Attitude, posted a blunt prediction after Abelardo de la Espriella won Colombia’s presidency in June.

“It was already bad under Gustavo Petro who didn’t do anything to stop it but at least verbally denounced the outflow of Colombian mercenaries. De la Espriella will likely actively support American-Ukrainian recruitment efforts. There’s already many thousands of them (with around 1,000 confirmed killed). I suspect flooding the Ukrainian army with Third World meat will be the focus of US strategy to solve Kiev’s manpower problems. It’s already the publicly declared Ukrainian strategy.”

Hot take aside, there’s considerable truth behind RWA’s commentary. Colombia now supplies more foreign fighters to Ukraine than any other nation on earth, and it did not arrive at that position overnight.

The International Federation for Human Rights estimates that 2,000 to 3,000 Colombians joined the Ukrainian army as contract soldiers. The Defense Post reported in November 2025 that Ukraine had signed roughly 2,000 Colombians on military contracts, citing the German daily Die Welt. Writing for the Atlantic Council in February 2026, Erin K. McFee noted that official figures do not exist and put Colombians at roughly 25 percent of all personnel drawn from the 65 countries that have joined Kiev’s ground forces. Petro pushed the number far higher, telling Colombians in May 2026 that 7,000 men were fighting and dying in a war that was not theirs.

Citing former Ukrainian economy minister Tymofiy Mylovanov, Petro wrote on X on May 5, 2026, in a post that translates as “There are 7,000 men from Colombia with military training, fighting in a foreign war and dying without cause in Ukraine. We do not want to export death. The mercenary is prohibited by law.”

However uncertain the head count, the body count is harder to dispute. Colombia’s Foreign Ministry gave El Tiempo figures published on June 9, 2026, and current through May, showing 670 Colombians missing and 173 dead across both sides. Of the dead, 140 died in Ukraine, and 130 of those bodies have already come home in coffins, while consular officials in Russia confirmed 33 more using information the Russian government supplied. Of the missing, Ukraine’s armed forces declared 446 lost in combat, families reported another 56, and the Moscow consulate logged 168. The ministry then undercut the totals, explaining in Spanish that Colombian citizens travel to conflict zones individually and without notifying Colombian authorities, so the available figures do not necessarily reflect the full scope of the phenomenon.

Independent estimates fill that gap and they run grim. Writing for the Atlantic Council, Erin K. McFee put Colombian deaths on Ukraine’s side at 300 to 550, citing El País. In a Kiev memorial park, Colombian flags now form a striking patch in a dense blanket of tributes to the fallen. Colombians have lost more men in Ukraine’s International Legion than any other foreign nationality, with Americans second at roughly 100 killed. McFee interviewed a Colombian veteran in Kiev in late 2025 who delivered a warning stripped of romance. “Tell Colombians not to go there, because more die than return.”

The dead accumulate in single afternoons as much as in slow attrition. On July 21, 2025, a Russian missile struck the dining hall of a training camp near Kropyvnytskyi at lunchtime. The New York Times reported that at least a dozen foreign volunteers died, among them citizens of the United States, Colombia, Taiwan and Denmark, and an anonymous American recruit from Florida described seeing at least 15 dead and more than 100 wounded. The unit hit was the International Legion run by Ukraine’s military intelligence, whose spokesman said official casualty figures would stay sealed until the investigation closed.

Colombians who leave the front face a second danger. On November 10, 2025, a court that Russia administers in Donetsk sentenced José Aarón Medina Aranda and Alexander Ante to 13 years each for fighting alongside Ukraine’s armed forces. The two had flown to Caracas on their way home to Popayán. Venezuela handed them to Russia instead.

The supply side explains what the demand side cannot. Colombia has fought drug cartels and guerrilla armies for more than 60 years, and that war produced the deepest pool of combat hardened veterans in the hemisphere. The Associated Press put annual retirements from Colombia’s armed forces at more than 10,000, a figure the Defense Ministry has given as roughly 10,600. Most leave in their late 30s or early 40s after 15 to 20 years fighting the FARC, the ELN, and the cartels, and Colombian law pushes most soldiers and noncommissioned officers out by 45.

Citing the Colombian daily La Patria, McFee reports that rank and file soldiers earn close to $400 a month on active duty, and that retirement often halves whatever they were making. Ukraine pays soldiers in combat operations from $3,000 to $5,000 a month, offers a potential $25,000 signing bonus, and promises families a $350,000 death benefit. At a December 2025 forum in Bogotá on the veteran exodus, convened by the Corioli Institute that McFee founded and directs, one participant described Ukraine as “the first real door that opens,” for economically troubled veterans.

That door has been swinging for decades. Plan Colombia poured American money and training into building one of the Western hemisphere’s largest professional militaries, and the graduates kept arriving faster than the domestic economy could absorb them. Erik Prince got there early. Blackwater affiliates had been placing retired Colombian soldiers in Iraq since 2004, and by 2010 Prince was building something larger. Late that November, a plane carrying dozens of Colombian men landed in Abu Dhabi, where an Emirati intelligence officer waved them through customs and an unmarked bus carried them 20 miles into the desert. They had entered the country posing as construction workers.

The New York Times reported that they were the first recruits for a battalion of 800 foreign troops Prince was assembling for the crown prince of Abu Dhabi, financed with $529 million from the Emirates. In 2015 the same two reporters found that Emirati money had sent roughly 450 Latin American fighters, hundreds of them Colombian, to fight the Houthis in Yemen. At around 1 a.m. on July 7, 2021, a team of just over two dozen mercenaries, most of them former Colombian soldiers, stormed Haitian President Jovenel Moïse’s home above Port-au-Prince and shot him dead. A Miami jury convicted four more plotters in May 2026. The 18 Colombians arrested in Haiti are still jailed without trial, and no one has established who ordered the hit.

The most recent destination is also the darkest. In May 2026 Human Rights Watch published an 83-page report by Joey Shea and Jean-Baptiste Gallopin, From Bogotá to El Fasher, documenting how the Abu Dhabi firm Global Security Services Group appears to have hired hundreds of Colombian contractors and routed them through Emirati military facilities to fight alongside the Rapid Support Forces. Investigators geolocated video of Spanish speaking contractors fighting in El Fasher, and six residents of the city said they saw men they believed were Colombian standing armed at the sites of the October 2025 mass killings and rapes that the UN fact finding mission called consistent with genocide.

One contractor told Human Rights Watch he trained RSF recruits near Nyala and that many of them were young children. The Treasury Department had already sanctioned the Colombian recruiter A4SI on December 9, 2025, finding that the firm ran campaigns through its website, group chats and town halls to fill slots for drone operators, snipers and translators.

UN experts have put only a rough number on the whole enterprise. After visiting Colombia from March 16 to 27, 2026, the Working Group on the use of mercenaries reported that more than 10,000 Colombians have been “recruited into armed conflicts worldwide, both through legal and irregular means,” many of them former soldiers, police and veterans, and many offered between $2,000 and $6,000 a month. Its preliminary findings are blunter about the limits of that count.

Working Group member Joana de Deus Pereira told reporters in Bogotá that proliferating conflicts had raised demand and Colombians were filling it, naming the escalation in the Middle East, the war in Sudan, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Chairperson Michelle Small said foreign buyers seek out former Colombian personnel, and warned that deceptive contracts, where firms pay far less than advertised or write outright fake ones, can amount to labor exploitation and human trafficking.

Petro met the crisis with a statute, though its reach remains uncertain. The House approved the bill in December 2025 by 94 to 17, and Petro signed Law 2569 on March 17, 2026, adopting the 1989 convention against mercenary recruitment. Colombia has not actually ratified it yet. The Constitutional Court must review the law first, which is why the UN experts urged Bogotá to hurry. Whether it bites is another question.

The next administration inherited the law and a very different set of priorities. De la Espriella took office in August promising to rebuild security ties with Washington, which largely frayed under his predecessor. He will also look to stay in Washington’s good graces by towing a pro-Zionist line.

Part of this rapprochement will likely also involve Colombia reactivating its mercenary pipelines in the Russo-Ukrainian theater, as Washington increasingly leans on proxy forces and covert operations in what is beginning to look like a pyrrhic victory for Russian forces.

The brief, defiant interlude of the Petro administration has been decisively shut down, and Colombia has been reset to its default setting as a loyal vassal state of the Judeo-American empire. Under Abelardo de la Espriella, Bogotá will remain the premier supplier of disposable infantry for Washington’s global destabilization schemes from Kiev to the Middle East.

Ultimately, Bogotá’s most lethal and dependable global export is neither coffee nor cocaine, but the expendable blood of veterans marching straight from one meat grinder into the next.

September 15, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, War Crimes | , | Comments Off on The Andean Shadow Army

Russia Wants to End Ukraine Conflict – Lavrov

Sputnik – 15.09.2026

MOSCOW – Russia wants to end the Ukrainian conflict, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said on Tuesday.

On Ukraine

“We want to resolve this conflict and appreciate our friends’ willingness to help in this effort,” Lavrov said at the embassy roundtable on the situation around Ukraine, adding that if the US had not abandoned the Anchorage agreements, we would have been living in peace already for one year.

Russia is always ready for negotiations on Ukraine and has never delayed them or tried to complicate them, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said, commenting on the prospects for the imminent convening of a new round of negotiations.

“We are always ready for negotiations. We have never delayed these negotiations or tried to complicate them,” Lavrov said.

If Ukraine is ready to resume negotiations, Russia agrees to them and has something to say, the minister said, adding that Russia has never changed its position on talks on Ukraine.

“We are ready to seek reasonable compromises within the framework of this position, but fundamentally, we have not changed our goal: to ensure our security, to prevent NATO from appearing on our borders, and to safeguard the legitimate rights of Russians and Russian‑speaking people who have lived on these lands for centuries,” Lavov added.

On Russia-US Relations

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said that he plans to meet with US Secretary of State Marco Rubio on the sidelines of the UN General Assembly in New York.

“I have a meeting with secretary Rubio scheduled in New York on the sidelines of the General Assembly,” Lavrov said.

September 15, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Comments Off on Russia Wants to End Ukraine Conflict – Lavrov

US Flaunts On-Orbit Weapon to Supercharge Space Arms Race

Sputnik | September 15, 2026

Reports of a US-deployed “on-orbit” weapon confirm that the West has already turned outer space into an extension of the Ukraine battlefield, air defense historian Yuri Knutov tells Sputnik.

US and French reconnaissance satellites are already feeding battlefield intel to Ukraine’s military, with Finland about to join in, reminds the military expert, and Poland plans to deploy its own reconnaissance satellites.

Other countries are developing “inspector” spacecraft built to maneuver close to other satellites to spy on them.

Elon Musk’s Starlink satellite communications and broadband systems are used in space – and guide Ukraine’s drones.

It is fair to say that “an arms race in space is already underway,” says the pundit, and the US space weapons claim seeks to accelerate this orbital race further.

Trump’s costly Golden Dome project, touted as a global missile defense system, fits into the same aggressive vision, the military expert pointed out.

  • the ground-based tier is a system that has already been partially deployed, capable of intercepting ballistic missiles, including artificial Earth satellites in space
  • it partly relies on the Aegis system, as well as advanced weapon systems employing new physical principles – electromagnetic guns (that fry spacecraft electronics) and combat lasers (potentially megawatt-class, but so far 300-kilowatt)
  • space-based tier to feature satellites armed with space-to-space missiles capable of intercepting ballistic missiles and destroying enemy satellites, alongside space-based lasers

“The Americans appear to have already begun building out the space-based arsenal, judging by the US secretary of the Air Force’s remarks,” adds the expert.

September 15, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Comments Off on US Flaunts On-Orbit Weapon to Supercharge Space Arms Race

Alternative ‘Führer’ Deutschland? Alarmism over AfD win is absurd

By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | September 9, 2026

The shockwave reaction to the Alternative für Deutschland landslide election victory in Germany is absurdly out of proportion. It also defies any easy categorization of conventional right, left, or centrist politics.

What it does signify is a massive popular protest against the warmongering political establishment in Europe and the United States. The Western establishment has right, left, and liberal adherents, so it is confounding to interpret the AfD election win as reflecting a precise position on the political spectrum.

Western establishment politics and media have labelled AfD as a “far-right party,” a label which the party rejects. It claims to be conservative, nationalist, Eurosceptic, anti-immigration, and seeking more reasoned foreign relations.

The far-right epithet seems to be a more politicized term that the establishment uses to demonize opponents, as it does in France and elsewhere. “Far left” is also used as a term of abuse to marginalize opponents. But what does it mean when those in the “liberal center” are more often the ones who are more warmongering and supportive of censorship, repression and anti-democratic powers?

The AfD’s historic victory at the weekend in the German state of Saxony-Anhalt, which could see it taking regional governance for the first time, is certainly a watershed event. The party was only formed in 2013 and is now tipped to win national elections in 2029. That’s pretty “seismic.”

Its populist politics are gaining support among German voters. AfD is the biggest opposition party in the Bundestag, the federal parliament. It has made major gains in other state elections across Germany, although its stronghold is in the east of the country.

The AfD’s success is as much about the collapse of the establishment parties. The Christian Democrats of Chancellor Friedrich Merz have seen their electoral support crash, as have the Social Democrats.

However, it seems a wild overreaction to portray the electoral rise of AfD as a rerun of the Nazi Party’s takeover in the 1930s. European media headlines are screaming about the first time a “far-right party” in Germany has been elected since Hitler’s National Socialists won a majority in 1932 and went on to form a fascist dictatorship.

The AfD leadership under Alice Weidel maintains that it does not deny the crimes of Nazi Germany. Rather, the party says it wants to emphasize other facets of rich German culture and history and not dwell on wartime guilt of the 12-year Third Reich.

Here’s where contradictions complicate the international reaction to the AfD’s victory.

The party is highly critical of Merz’s government and other establishment parties for what it decries as reckless support for Ukraine and the war against Russia. The AfD is campaigning on ending the massive financial and military aid to Ukraine. It wants to restore normal relations with Moscow and resume the traditional energy trade that had been crucial to Germany’s economy.

If the AfD were following in Hitler’s footsteps, it wouldn’t be seeking to end support for the NeoNazi regime in Kiev and to restore friendly relations with Moscow. It would be gung-ho for more war.

The shrill denunciations and pearl-clutching over the AfD are ironically coming from parties that are supposedly “centrist” and “liberal”.

Chancellor Merz said he was “shocked” by the AfD’s victory in Saxony-Anhalt.

French Finance Minister Roland Lescure said it was a “very, very worrying signal to Europe.”

Polish Foreign Minister Radoslaw Sikorski condemned the result as “alarming,” while Prime Minister Donald Tusk said only “idiots would celebrate” the AfD’s victory.

These politicians and media outlets like Britain’s Guardian and BBC, which are supposedly “liberal” are posing as defenders of democracy and opponents of fascism. Yet, it is these same parties that are backing the NeoNazi regime in Kiev in fighting a catastrophic NATO proxy war against Russia, with endless supplies of weapons and the expenditure of public money destroying European societies.

The AfD’s nationalist politics and “Germany First” platform are hardly a cause for hysterical alarm, if we are objective about who is really driving war in Europe.

The real culprits for war are found among those liberal, centrist political parties who use a veneer of bourgeois politeness to hide what is imperialist warmongering.

The likes of Britain’s Andy Burnham is another case in point. He is supposed to be a leftwing democrat and says he wants to relieve cost of living crisis for ordinary people, yet Burnham, like Merz, Macron, Tusk and others, wants to throw billions of public money at fueling a war in Europe against Russia. These “liberals” have no problem aligning with a regime in Kiev that glorifies World War Two collaborators with Nazi Germany. So who are the fascists? The AfD or the alternative liberal führers of Europe?

There’s no easy positioning of the AfD and international reaction. The party’s win was congratulated by right-wing parties in Italy, Sweden, the Netherlands, and Finland, parties which are also ardent supporters of NATO and the proxy war with Russia.

Trump and his MAGA advocates, like Elon Musk, welcomed the AfD victory, yet this U.S. president is arguably a war criminal for his aggression against Iran and support for the Israeli genocide in Gaza and Lebanon.

The so-called establishment reaction to the AfD is absurd and hypocritical. This is not an “alternative führer” that is suddenly threatening moral decent Western democracy. The West’s sponsoring of war in Ukraine and the Middle East – and the media’s role in covering it up – would tend to show that fascism and imperialist war are already alive and well within the ruling establishment.

Rather than raising the alarm over the AfD, it is possible to view its growing support among voters as a healthy sign of protest and rejection of “mainstream” propaganda. Trump’s election and other populist parties can also be seen in the same way, only Trump has ended up betraying his supporters. Will the AfD go the same way? Maybe.

But the positive takeaway from the recent German election is that the Western public wants radical change from the moribund mainstream political class. Change is possible. A different political and economic order is possible, one that delivers genuine democracy and peaceful international relations.

September 10, 2026 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Militarism | , | Comments Off on Alternative ‘Führer’ Deutschland? Alarmism over AfD win is absurd

The Long Road In, and the Short Way Out: How the West Built Ukraine into a Weapon Against Russia

By Larry C. Johnson | Sonar21 | September 10, 2026 

Across three pieces I’ve written for Sonar21, I have been making one continuous argument: The war in Ukraine was not a crisis that erupted in 2022. It was the payoff of a deliberate, decades-long Western project to turn Ukraine into an instrument for weakening Russia — carried out under the cover of “partnership” and “peacekeeping.” And having spent thirty years building that instrument, Washington and NATO will do with Ukraine exactly what they have done with every client before it: discard it the moment it stops paying.

The camel’s nose: 1992–1999

The West slipped its nose under the Ukrainian tent almost the instant the Soviet Union collapsed. The formal machinery started in 1992, when Ukraine joined NATO’s North Atlantic Cooperation Council. The practical military ties came fast behind it: the U.S.–Ukraine State Partnership Program with the California National Guard in 1993, Ukraine’s entry into the Partnership for Peace and its first joint exercise in 1994, and the standing-up of the Yavoriv training area near Lviv.

The “peacekeeping” label was camouflage, and the drills themselves give it away. Once the Sea Breeze exercises in the Black Sea began incorporating anti-submarine warfare in the late 1990s, the humanitarian pretense was finished. You do not rehearse hunting submarines to deliver disaster relief. You do it to prepare to fight the Russian navy. I spent 23 years scripting military exercises for U.S. Special Operations Forces, and I know the difference between a training game and a rehearsal for war. These were rehearsals — a structured program to train and equip Ukraine to fight Russia, if need be with NATO at its side.

Set that against 1999, when NATO took in Poland, Hungary, and the Czech Republic. That expansion broke James Baker’s assurance that the alliance would not move “one inch” to the east — a promise Bill Clinton simply threw away. And it is no accident that when the war came, Russia struck the Yavoriv facility in the opening weeks of March 2022. They knew exactly what had been built there, and why.

From partner to de facto member: 2000–2010

The next decade finished the job, turning Ukraine into a NATO member in everything but name. Consider one figure: between 2000 and 2010, Ukraine ranked among the top six hosts of NATO and U.S. European Command exercises, with Georgia right behind it. Two non-members hosted more allied exercises than the overwhelming majority of the actual member states. That is not partnership. That is prima facie evidence that the West meant to bring both countries in, whatever Moscow said.

By 2010, only two things still separated Ukraine from a full member: it paid no dues, and it had no Article 5 guarantee. In every operational sense — Sea Breeze, Rapid Trident, the Yavoriv pipeline, the annual target plans — it was already inside the alliance. And this was never only a military effort. U.S. and British intelligence, the CIA included, were coordinating with NATO and EUCOM to pry Ukraine out of Russia’s orbit and lock it into the West’s. When the 2008 Bucharest Summit declared that Ukraine “will become a member” — even as France and Germany blocked the formal Membership Action Plan — the trajectory to 2014 and everything after was set.

The exit: under the bus

That is how the instrument was built. Here is how it gets discarded. Any foreign government that trusts an American security promise should first study what happened to the South Vietnamese, the Afghans, the Iraqis, the Libyans, the Cambodians. When a war stops serving Washington’s purposes, the U.S. says adios.

The recriminations over the failed counteroffensive are the opening of exactly that. The West is lining up to blame Kyiv while its pledges of weapons turn out to be lip service. The maritime-drone strikes on Russian ships are pinpricks — militarily trivial, and dangerous mainly because the Western surveillance that guides them invites Russian retaliation against NATO reconnaissance over the Black Sea and stiffens Moscow’s resolve to strangle Ukraine’s ports. If you want an honest barometer of where this war is heading, forget the briefings from British intelligence and the Institute for the Study of War. Watch for the day the London bookmakers start taking bets on when Zelensky falls.

The through-line

Lay the three pieces end to end and the shape is plain. The first two document the patient construction — three decades of exercises, training centers, intelligence coordination, and summit declarations, all aimed at Russia. The third describes the disposal: the moment the project stumbles on the battlefield, the same patrons who spent thirty years cultivating it start hunting for the door. The line running from the 1992 partnership councils to the blame game of 2023 is not accident, and it is not drift. It is design. The men who built the road into this war have no intention of walking back out of it alongside the country they sent down it.

Videos

September 10, 2026 Posted by | Deception, Militarism, Video | , , | Comments Off on The Long Road In, and the Short Way Out: How the West Built Ukraine into a Weapon Against Russia

Kiev plotted terror attack on UK ambassador in Moscow – FSB

RT | September 10, 2026

Russian security operatives have foiled a Ukrainian plot to carry out a false-flag attack on the British ambassador and other diplomats in Moscow, which was intended to draw the UK into a direct conflict with Russia, the Federal Security Service (FSB) has said.

In a statement on Thursday, the agency said it had detained a Russian national who worked for an organization contracted to protect the British Embassy in Moscow. The man collected sensitive information about embassy security on instructions from a Ukrainian contact, as well as personal data on diplomatic personnel, including photographs, home addresses, details of vehicles, and itineraries, the FSB said.

“The Kiev regime planned to carry out sabotage and terrorist attacks against British diplomatic representatives in Moscow to subsequently blame Russia for them in order to draw the United Kingdom into direct armed conflict with the country, secure additional weapons deliveries [to Kiev], and ramp up sanctions on Russia,” the agency said.

Neither the UK Embassy in Moscow nor British Ambassador Nigel Casey has commented on the statement.

The FSB said the suspect had been recruited by the Security Service of Ukraine (SBU) and acted on instructions of Ukrainian blogger Dmitry Karpenko, also known as “Apostle Dmitry.”

Karpenko, 44, became known for recording interviews with Russian prisoners of war and covering POW swaps between Moscow and Kiev, as well as for propagating videos featuring Russian nationals collaborating with the Ukrainian military.

Karpenko was also criticized by Ukraine’s Commission on Journalistic Ethics, which said his videos exposed prisoners’ identities and at times resembled interrogations. The blogger also faced accusations of Islamophobia after an interview with a captured Russian serviceman from Chechnya, during which he made remarks widely seen as offensive to Muslims.

Britain has been one of Ukraine’s biggest backers since the escalation of the conflict in 2022, providing billions of pounds in military and financial assistance to Kiev. London has also refrained from condemning Kiev over a string of assassinations and bombings targeting Russian military officials and public figures inside Russia.

After Ukraine claimed responsibility for the 2024 killing of Russian General Igor Kirillov, commander of the Radiological, Chemical, and Biological Protection Forces, Downing Street said Britain would “not mourn” his death.

September 10, 2026 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism | , | Comments Off on Kiev plotted terror attack on UK ambassador in Moscow – FSB

It’s OK to fight for a foreign army (as long as they’re our friends)

That’s the unwritten rule for Britain’s media

By DES FREEDMAN | Declassified UK | September 2, 2026

The death of a British national, Bradley Townsend, killed in Ukraine in June while fighting for Russian forces has been widely reported in the media.

“British traitor who joined Vladimir Putin’s army ‘killed by Ukraine drone’” splashed the Daily Star while former security minister Tom Tugendhat told LBC that Townsend was “extremely misguided” for “engaging in an army that is committing the most barbarous war crimes that the world has seen in decades.”

Compare this to the far more positive coverage in the media of individual British nationals who have served in the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) during a genocide that has killed more than 70,000 Palestinians.

When Declassified, for example, revealed exclusively that more than 2,000 British subjects had joined the IDF since October 7, the only reference to this in the mainstream media was a short article in The London Standard.

There are, however, no stories describing British nationals as ‘traitors’ for joining the IDF, nor ministerial condemnations of subjects taking part in what the United Nations has described as “war crimes” and “crimes against humanity”.

On the contrary, British subjects enlisting in the IDF are routinely humanised and their justifications reported without criticism.

A Times story in October 2023, headlined “Meet the Britons defending ‘the only place Jews feel safe’”, described IDF soldier Sam Sank as a Tottenham fan and dog owner while also referring to another dual national, Joe, as a “Chelsea fan… camping out with an emergency supply of PG Tips tea.”

BBC News interviewed British-Israeli soldier Alex Moeller on 17 November 2023 drawing on his experience in an ‘IDF anti-terror unit’.

Moeller spoke, without rebuttal, about how Israeli forces had committed to “minimise civilian casualties and obviously minimise humanitarian impact”.

He opposed a ceasefire, describing it simply as a ‘tactical’ ploy by Hamas.

There was a marked distinction in the reporting of British nationals fighting for Russia, which is extremely negative, describing them as “thugs”, “yobs” and seriously misguided people.

For example, the Sun reported in November 2024 on Jay Fraser, the “Scots mercenary fighting for Vladimir Putin” while the Observer described him as a “university dropout” who was “captivated by ‘manly’ Russia”.

In March 2024, the Mirror reported on the “British traitors” fighting on the Russian side, Ben Stimson and his best friend Aidan Minnis, describing the latter as a “former National Front member and convicted thug.”

The article quotes former British army commander Colonel Richard Kemp: “These two are an absolute disgrace and are traitors who upon their return to the UK should be arrested and jailed.”

It then carries a Home Office statement saying that: “Any person who travels from the UK to conflict zones to engage in unlawful activity, should expect to be investigated upon their return.”

There are no stories that reveal similar threats being made against dual nationals fighting for the IDF other than a single reference on late-night BBC radio on 22 July 2025.

Defence journalist Tim Ripley suggested that the UK government could use a law to stop British citizens “commuting to the war in Gaza”.

The suggestion was not explored afterwards by any outlet.

Heroes in Ukraine

In contrast to the coverage of pro-Russian Britons, articles on British subjects fighting on the side of Ukraine have been far more positive.

The Sunday Times, for example, reported sympathetically about the case of ‘Baby’, a young Scot who signed up for Ukrainian forces but who, on his return from the frontline, was prevented from joining Police Scotland.

There was also blanket coverage in February 2025 – including on the BBC and Sky – of former Tory MP Jack Lopresti who joined Ukrainian forces after losing his seat in the 2024 general election.

This includes particularly sympathetic profiles in the Telegraph and Mail. The Guardian was equally positive in its account which highlighted Foreign Office advice that “it is illegal for British citizens to fight in Ukraine”.

Even though it was revealed in February 2026 that Lopresti had joined the neo-Nazi Azov Brigade, the Telegraph then carried a story the following month with the headline: “Jack Lopresti is a rare example of a politician who puts his money where his mouth is”.

The article was written by Colonel Richard Kemp, the same person who had called for the jailing of the two Britons fighting on the Russian side.

September 8, 2026 Posted by | Progressive Hypocrite, Russophobia | , , , | Comments Off on It’s OK to fight for a foreign army (as long as they’re our friends)

Ukrainian Scam Machine Rakes in $1 Billion per Month Robbing European Citizens — Report

Sputnik – September 8, 2026

Western spy agencies originally cultivated and trained Ukrainian hacker groups “to counter Russia”, but they all quickly spun out of control, mutating into fraud networks, the Aydınlık outlet reports.

As of 2026, an estimated 1,000 call centers operate in Ukraine, employing roughly 60,000 people and targeting citizens of at least 29 countries through a range of schemes—including fake investment pitches, romance-baiting, and impersonation of banks or government agencies.

Various criminal ploys are used, including threats and blackmail, and different schemes are employed for different countries — for example, fake official documents in Germany, bogus cryptocurrencies in France, “safe bank accounts” in Greece and “tax authorities” in Canada and the US.

The network’s total monthly revenue is estimated at roughly $1 billion, with a single call center alone pulling in $8 million from Germany and approximately $1 million from the Baltic states, the outlet adds.

September 8, 2026 Posted by | Deception | , , , | Comments Off on Ukrainian Scam Machine Rakes in $1 Billion per Month Robbing European Citizens — Report

‘Russophobia a national sport’ – Polish party rallies against push to war

RT | September 7, 2026

Polish protesters have accused Warsaw of whipping up anti-Russian hostility and dragging the country toward war as the government continues to arm Ukraine and deepen confrontation with Moscow.

Supporters of the Confederation of the Polish Crown party marched through Gniezno on Sunday behind a banner reading “Poland for Peace,” carrying Polish and party flags.

“They’re trying to turn Russophobia into our national sport. But we won’t give in,” activist Marta Czech told the crowd, urging “prudence” as tensions with Russia continue to rise.

Another speaker, Lukasz Pakulski, accused the authorities of frightening Poles with talk of tanks, nuclear weapons, and a wider conflict. “They are pushing us into war,” he said, declaring that “Poles stand for peace.”

The Crown is a traditionalist, Euroskeptic party founded by MEP Grzegorz Braun. It campaigns for tighter immigration controls, less power for Brussels, and Poland’s withdrawal from the EU, while opposing deeper Polish involvement in the Ukraine conflict.

The protest comes as Prime Minister Donald Tusk’s government has continued to support Kiev, arguing that Ukraine’s security is inseparable from Poland’s own. Warsaw has provided around $6.8 billion in aid to Kiev since 2022, including more than $5 billion in military assistance. Poland also hosts around 961,000 Ukrainians under temporary protection.

However, public enthusiasm for the policy has been fading, with a July poll finding that 52% of Poles opposed accepting more Ukrainian refugees, while another survey showed 67% backed deporting unemployed Ukrainian men of military age.

Another survey found 27% believed Western aid to Ukraine was too large, compared with 22% who wanted more, while opposition to Ukrainian EU membership reached a record 40%.

Relations between Warsaw and Kiev have also recently deteriorated over historical grievances after Vladimir Zelensky named a military unit after the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), which Poland holds responsible for massacring up to 100,000 ethnic Poles during World War II.

President Karol Nawrocki later stripped Zelensky of Poland’s highest state honor, while other politicians have called for an end to free weapons deliveries to Kiev.

Moscow has consistently accused Warsaw of deliberately stoking anti-Russian sentiment while supporting Kiev’s war effort.

Russian officials have also highlighted the Kiev-Warsaw UPA dispute, arguing that even one of Ukraine’s strongest backers can no longer ignore Kiev’s embrace of neo-Nazi ideology and glorification of figures linked to wartime atrocities.

September 7, 2026 Posted by | Militarism, Russophobia | , | Comments Off on ‘Russophobia a national sport’ – Polish party rallies against push to war

How Britain built a war network around Russia

The UK is spinning a web of influence designed to survive any Ukraine peace deal

By Oleg Yanovsky | RT | September 5, 2026

Last week, UK Prime Minister Andy Burnham announced in Kiev that defense manufacturer MBDA had been authorized to disclose information concerning the British components of the SCALP missile, the French version of the long-range Storm Shadow, to Ukraine.

Officially, the decision concerns documentation required to organize local assembly, but in practice, it could facilitate the transfer of blueprints, components, assembly kits or finished missiles.

Moscow regards this technology transfer as the UK crossing a red line, as London hasn’t even attempted to shift responsibility onto intermediaries and the decision was publicly authorized by the prime minister. Britain has therefore assumed direct responsibility for the resulting escalation and deepened its involvement in military operations against Russia.

SCALP was developed through a joint British-French program and its assembly requires classified information about British components and French sub-assemblies, as well as access to a secure facility. Ukraine doesn’t possess a complete production cycle, but even a partial transfer of classified data would integrate Ukrainian assembly into the British-French manufacturing chain and bind all three parties together for years.

Before this decision, Britain had been far more careful about covering its tracks. For example, the Flamingo missile, marketed as a product of the Ukrainian company Fire Point, is identical to a design unveiled in 2025 by the British-Emirati Milanion Group. That arrangement allowed London to keep its distance, with formal responsibility for the missile’s development and deployment resting with Kiev.

Britain is also attempting to free future missile projects from the American vetting process, so under Project Brakestop, the Ministry of Defense has commissioned MBDA UK, MGI Engineering and Rotron Aerospace to produce three prototypes of long-range missiles for Ukraine. The purpose is to reduce dependence on US authorization and, consequently, on the position of the administration in Washington. London wants to determine for itself when and under what conditions such weapons are transferred.

British drones are already being used by Ukraine to strike targets deep inside Russia. They include the Nyan jet-powered drone, manufactured by Callen-Lenz, a subsidiary of BAE Systems. For its developers, the battlefield offers something particularly valuable: operational data with which to refine the weapon.

Russia has also repeatedly pointed to the direct involvement of British specialists in the deployment of Storm Shadow missiles.

On the same day as the SCALP announcement, London secured access to Avengers AI Labs, an extensive body of data gathered by Ukrainian frontline sensors, so now British companies will be able to use this information to train target-recognition and autonomous-control systems, greatly shortening the journey from development to battlefield deployment.

Five British governments have come and gone during the active phase of the Ukraine conflict, but the country’s anti-Russian course has remained remarkably consistent.

Boris Johnson began a program to develop the Ukrainian navy, Rishi Sunak signed a ten-year security agreement, Keir Starmer followed with the Centenary Partnership Agreement and Burnham has now authorized access to classified missile technology. Each government has built upon the commitments made by its predecessor.

The same continuity is visible in Britain’s strategic doctrine, where Sunak’s Conservative government described Russia in its 2023 Integrated Review Refresh as the “most acute threat” to British security and Starmer’s Labour government retained that position. The 2025 National Security Strategy called Russia “the most obvious and pressing example” of confrontation, while the Strategic Defence Review described it as an “immediate and pressing threat.”

That review established the principle of “NATO first, but not only NATO” and committed Britain to preparing for war.

These doctrines are supported by long-term financial obligations, given London has promised Ukraine £3 billion, approximately $4 billion, annually until at least the 2030-31 financial year. The century-long partnership agreement provides for joint production, technology transfers and cooperation in the Baltic, Black and Azov seas where Britain’s presence is intended to endure for decades, regardless of when the current military campaign ends.

The declaration signed by Britain, France and Ukraine on January 6, 2026, already outlines arrangements for the postwar period. These include multinational forces, military logistics hubs, secure facilities and a special legal regime for foreign personnel. In London’s calculations, a ceasefire wouldn’t end its involvement, but it would consolidate a new phase of Britain’s military and industrial presence.

To coordinate these efforts, Britain is assembling several overlapping structures, such as the Joint Expeditionary Force, the Maritime Coalition, the “coalition of the willing,” the International Fund for Ukraine and Lancaster House 2.0. Meanwhile, a classified British-German program known as Deep Precision Strike also envisages developing weapons with a range exceeding 2,000 km during the 2030s.

The International Fund for Ukraine is financed by Britain and 15 other countries, while the British Ministry of Defense administers procurement. Participating states receive technology, contracts, guarantees and a place at the planning table while London turns the resources of its partners into instruments of British influence.

Ukraine is not the only front in this strategy, and across northern and eastern Europe, Britain’s coalition network already rests upon established military infrastructure.

The Joint Expeditionary Force coordinates national and NATO operations during the transition from crisis to conflict, at the same time Britain is doubling its contingent in Norway, expanding its presence in Estonia and deploying equipment stocks, command systems and targeting capabilities. A network of supply, communications and fire-control facilities is being constructed close to Russia’s borders to enable rapid combat deployment.

Britain also seeks a leading role in coordinating NATO defense initiatives. This allows London to shape allied plans, establish standards and monitor their implementation, while also influencing how other countries build their armed forces and prepare for a possible war against a specifically identified opponent. Yes, Russia, of course.

Britain’s elected governments merely provide public legitimacy for this strategic course, as beyond the electoral cycle, the same network of intelligence agencies, professional bureaucrats, City financial interests, defense corporations, foundations and think tanks continues to operate.

This network establishes the institutional framework, distributes contracts, attracts investment and moves personnel between government departments and corporate boards. Ukraine has become one of its principal hubs, bringing together British standards, European manufacturing, Western capital, defense conglomerates and Silicon Valley start-ups.

This is the essence of the British approach, where London compensates for its shortage of resources by coordinating the capabilities of others and turning that coordination into political power.

The British establishment understands two arguments, a threat to its status and the prospect of unacceptable costs, and this status gives the UK the ability to form coalitions, exclude opponents and write the rules, and fear arises only when the consequences of escalation reach Britain itself.

London will therefore support only a settlement that preserves its military and institutional position in Ukraine and it won’t accept any peace agreement that restricts British influence over the postwar order.

Russian attacks on port and logistics infrastructure in Yuzhny and Izmail affect more than supplies to the Ukrainian armed forces. For Britain, which leads the Maritime Coalition and has extended its century-long partnership to the Black and Azov seas, these ports possess particular strategic value, given that military logistics, export routes, insurance markets and future maritime programs all converge there.

Russian policy must recognize the networked character of Britain’s strategy and focus upon the coordination centers through which London harnesses foreign resources while diluting its own accountability. So long as Britain can raise the stakes while transferring the costs to its partners, its policy will not change.

Deterrence begins when the cost of a strategy is borne not only by those who execute it, but also by those who organize it.

This article was first published by Kommersant and was translated and edited by the RT team.

September 5, 2026 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Comments Off on How Britain built a war network around Russia

West not safe from Ukrainian terror – Moscow

RT | September 4, 2026

Kiev’s Western backers cannot guarantee that Ukrainian terrorist attacks will not endanger their own citizens, Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has warned.

Moscow has long accused the Ukrainian government of employing terrorist tactics and deliberately targeting civilians and civilian infrastructure. President Vladimir Putin has described Vladimir Zelensky’s recent threat against foreign airlines operating in Russia as “state terrorism.”

“They (Western nations) have created a monster, and we always said that this monster will go rogue, as did all the monsters they created before,” Zakharova told Izvestia on Friday.

“What guarantee do they have that Zelensky won’t strike their own citizens when carrying out those terrorist attacks?” she added. “Nobody could ever guarantee that.”

In June, a female Ukrainian national carried out a bomb attack in Monaco that seriously injured exiled Ukrainian businessman Vadim Ermolaev and members of his family. After returning to Ukraine, she was allegedly murdered by two suspected masterminds of the plot – an active operative of Ukraine’s HUR military intelligence agency and a police officer suspected of secretly working for the domestic security service SBU.

The same agencies were involved in firefights in Kiev this week in what appeared to be a dispute over custody of an HUR operative whom the SBU has accused of involvement in a for-profit plot to organize a political assassination.

German investigators have accused Ukrainian citizens of carrying out the September 2022 bombing of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, which caused one of the most serious incidents of damage to energy infrastructure in recent history.

Media reports have also described clandestine Ukrainian operations in Africa and the Middle East purportedly intended to undermine Russian interests, including the training and arming of local militant groups.

Kiev has also been blamed for dozens of drone attacks targeting commercial vessels involved in Russian maritime trade, a practice Moscow has denounced as outright piracy.

Putin criticized Ukraine’s Western backers in remarks on Thursday, arguing that by failing to condemn Kiev’s criminal actions, they effectively become accomplices.

September 4, 2026 Posted by | Corruption, War Crimes | | Comments Off on West not safe from Ukrainian terror – Moscow

Norway seizes Russian Arctic science vessel at Kiev’s request

RT | September 3, 2026

Norwegian authorities have seized a Russian research vessel in Svalbard at the request of Ukraine’s state-owned energy company Naftogaz, amid growing tensions between Moscow and NATO states over access to and control of the Arctic.

The Professor Molchanov was detained on Wednesday while docked in Barentsburg, a Russian settlement on the Norwegian-administered archipelago. The Governor of Svalbard said the move followed an August 31 order by the Nord-Troms and Senja District Court granting Naftogaz the right to seize the ship. The vessel has been barred from leaving Barentsburg until further notice.

The crew and passengers aboard the vessel learned about the seizure from media reports, a TASS correspondent traveling with the expedition said. Russian Far East and Arctic Development Minister Aleksey Chekunkov said on Thursday that “the crew is safe,” adding that lawyers for the Arktikugol trust would soon issue a legal response and intended to challenge the seizure order.

The Professor Molchanov is a Russian state-owned research vessel operated by the country’s hydrometeorological service, Roshydromet. Alongside scientific expeditions, it has served since last year as a regular passenger and cargo link between Murmansk and Barentsburg, transporting scientists, employees of the state-owned Arktikugol, contractors, their families and supplies to the Russian settlements on Svalbard.

Direct air links between Russia and Svalbard ceased in 2020, while direct maritime passenger service was restored in 2025. The Professor Molchanov is currently the only vessel operating the route, with ten round trips between Murmansk and Barentsburg planned for 2026.

Under the 1920 Svalbard Treaty, Norway exercises sovereignty over the archipelago, while signatory nations are granted equal rights to engage in commercial and scientific activities there. Russia has maintained a presence on Svalbard for decades, with Arktikugol serving as its principal economic operator on the islands.

Naftogaz said it sought the seizure as part of an international effort to enforce a Hague arbitration award over assets it lost in Crimea following the peninsula’s reunification with Russia in 2014.

Russia has rejected the arbitration tribunal’s jurisdiction over the dispute, arguing that the Crimean assets in question could not qualify as Ukrainian investments made on Russian territory under the relevant bilateral investment treaty.

Acting Naftogaz chief Sergey Fedorenko praised the move as “another important step toward restoring justice,” pledging to continue the hunt for Russian assets worldwide.

Naftogaz, which claims Moscow currently owes it approximately $4.22 billion, plus interest and legal costs, has previously pursued Russian state property elsewhere in Europe. Finnish authorities froze a number of Russian-owned properties in 2024 at the company’s request. The Kremlin vowed to challenge the measures, while the Russian Foreign Ministry denounced them as illegitimate and warned of possible retaliatory steps.

The latest seizure comes just weeks after Moscow issued unusually explicit warnings against Western attempts to detain Russian vessels.

President Vladimir Putin described plans to seize Russian ships and sell their property as “piracy and robbery,” warning that Moscow would respond in kind and could do so in whatever part of the world it considered appropriate. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov subsequently said Russia would choose its own targets, including vessels operating in the interests of countries that had made such seizures their policy.

Tensions have also been mounting in the Arctic itself. In an article published earlier this week, Lavrov accused NATO states of seeking to turn the region into a “new front” against Russia and its partners. He pointed to large-scale Western military exercises and expanding command infrastructure near Russia’s northern borders, warning that the buildup increased the risk of an armed confrontation with potentially disastrous consequences.

Lavrov maintained that Moscow wants the Arctic to remain an area of peace and cooperation, but warned that Russia would defend its interests “by all available means” if confronted with hostile actions.

September 3, 2026 Posted by | Aletho News | , , | Comments Off on Norway seizes Russian Arctic science vessel at Kiev’s request

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