Scholz slammed for revealing UK troop presence in Ukraine
RT | February 29, 2024
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has come under fire from the UK after he suggested that there were British troops operating in the Ukraine conflict. Explaining why Berlin would not supply Kiev with long-range Taurus missiles, Scholz said it would require German military personnel on the ground providing assistance.
He went on to say that Taurus “is a very long-range weapon, and what was done on the part of the British and French in terms of target-control and target-control assistance can’t be done in Germany.”
Commenting on Scholz’s remark, Tobias Ellwood, the former chair of the British Commons defense committee, said it was “a flagrant abuse of intelligence deliberately designed to distract from Germany’s reluctance to arm Ukraine with its own long-range missile system,” as quoted by The Telegraph. The British lawmaker was also sure that the statement would be “used by Russia to rachet up the escalator ladder.”
“German soldiers can at no point and in no place be linked with the targets that this system reaches,” Scholz insisted, even if operating from German soil, according to the DPA news agency.
The German chancellor stated that it would be “not very responsible” for his country to risk becoming a “party to the war.”
Meanwhile, on Tuesday, the Financial Times quoted an anonymous senior European defense official as saying that “everyone knows there are Western special forces in Ukraine – they’ve just not acknowledged it officially.”
Addressing the press following a summit of Kiev’s backers in Paris on Monday, French President Emmanuel Macron noted that “in terms of dynamics, we cannot exclude anything,” referring to a potential ground deployment of Western militaries.
NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg however hastened to clarify that there were “no plans for NATO combat troops on the ground in Ukraine.” This was followed by similar assurances by the leaders of Germany, Poland, the Czech Republic, Sweden and Finland.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov warned that such a development would mean that “we have to talk not about the probability, but rather the inevitability” of an all-out military confrontation between NATO and Russia.
CIA behind Ukrainian disaster
Jason Freeman
By Lucas Leiroz | February 29, 2024
The disastrous actions of American intelligence in Ukraine have been a fact known by analysts since the beginning of the conflict. However, now the Americans themselves are admitting this. Being deceived by Russian pranksters, US mercenaries commented on the CIA’s tactical errors in Ukraine and how mistakes made by Washington’s intelligence and special forces are leading to Ukrainian citizens dying on the battlefield.
Vladimir Kuznetsov and Alexey Stolyarov – alias Vovan and Lexus – two Russian pranksters well known for their work of tricking Western public figures into leaking sensitive information, contacted Jason Freeman, an American mercenary living in Nikolaev. Freeman believed he was speaking directly to former Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko. The pranksters claimed to be creating a private army commanded by the former president, contacting mercenaries to recruit and hire them.
During the conversation, Freeman gave some details about his work in Ukraine. Trying to show his skills as a combatant, he claimed to have killed 21 Russian soldiers and injured at least 13 others. However, Freeman also exposed the problems he faced on the battlefield. He admitted, for example, that his unit was entirely destroyed during the Battle for Artyomovsk (known in Ukraine as Bakhmut).
On the occasion, Freeman also criticized the work of the Ukrainian authorities, reporting problems with payment for soldiers and inefficiency of commanders. The most interesting fact, however, was his opinion on the presence of Western intelligence in the country. Unintentionally, he confirmed reports already made by several analysts about the participation of special agencies such as the CIA in the Ukrainian decision-making process. According to him, bad decisions made jointly by Americans and their proxy Ukrainians are leading to thousands of young, poorly trained soldiers dying in pointless clashes that could have been easily avoided.
“Young Ukrainians are dying because of bad orders or tactics. Most of those here are actually fresh meat,” Freeman said.
A second mercenary named Joshua Randsford was also contacted by the pranksters to be part of “Poroshenko’s army”. He commented something similar to Freeman, emphasizing the “lack of professionalism” of decision makers in Ukraine. According to him, Kiev’s troops are in a very difficult situation, with low morale among both ordinary soldiers and special and intelligence forces. The frequency of defeats on the battlefield severely impacted the Ukrainians, taking away their will to fight and their belief in victory.
Both mercenaries also blamed Ukrainian and American decision-makers for the failure of the summer counteroffensive in 2023. According to them, the fighting in the counterattack was a true “waste of lives”, with thousands of Ukrainians dying in clashes that did not bring any significant gain to Kiev. All these factors led to the current material, human and psychological crisis affecting the regime, with troops suffering from low morale.
It is curious to see how the personal opinion of the pro-Kiev fighters themselves absolutely contradicts the mainstream media’s narrative about the war. Those who know the reality of the battlefield are dissatisfied with the way American strategists manage the conflict. These fighters know that what is happening in Ukraine is a senseless massacre that could have been avoided if the war effort had actually been intended to “save Ukraine.” It is possible to see that the Western objective in the conflict is just to continue fighting the Russians, no matter how many Ukrainian lives are lost to make this happen.
In fact, the participation of American intelligence in Ukraine is not classified information anymore, as even large American newspapers have exposed this fact. The US appears increasingly less concerned with disguising its war intentions. The existence of an intelligence network in Ukraine is a vital part of the strategy of “fighting to the last Ukrainian”, because in this way Washington is able to coerce its proxies to continue fighting, regardless of losses, taking away from them the power to command their own citizens.
There is an interesting point to be analyzed: by having its participation in the war admitted, the US becomes co-author of all the crimes committed by the Ukrainians. Terrorist attacks, murder of civilians and incursions into Russia’s undisputed territory have been frequent since 2022. Russia does not react symmetrically, opting only to target military and infrastructure facilities. However, Moscow has already made it clear that any Western agent operating in decision-making centers on Ukrainian soil is a legitimate target. In this sense, it is possible that the Russians will begin to escalate their attacks against the American intelligence assets in Ukraine, if Ukrainian attacks on Russian civilians persist.
These data only show what the mainstream media tries to “refute”: the fact that the West is solely to blame for this conflict and the entire humanitarian tragedy in Ukraine. In this war, Kiev is just a proxy, having no real decision-making power. This is why it is necessary to understand the conflict as a proxy war waged by NATO against Russia through the Ukrainian regime.
Lucas Leiroz is a journalist and researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant.
NATO’s Debate Over Whether To Conventionally Intervene In Ukraine Shows Its Desperation
BY ANDREW KORYBKO | FEBRUARY 27, 2024
French President Macron hosted over 20 fellow European leaders in Paris on Monday to discuss their next moves in Ukraine, including the possibility of a conventional NATO intervention, which he said they hadn’t ruled out for reasons of “strategic ambiguity” despite not reaching a consensus on this. His Polish counterpart Duda also confirmed that this subject was the most heated part of their discussions. The very fact that this scenario is being officially considered shows how desperate NATO has become.
Russia’s victory in Avdeevka, which was the natural result of it winning the “race of logistics”/“war of attrition” with NATO, prompted policymakers to contemplate what they’ll do in the event that it achieves a breakthrough across the Line of Contact (LOC) and starts steamrolling through the rest of Ukraine. They hadn’t previously considered this to be a serious possibility until last summer’s failed counteroffensive exposed the weakness of their military-industrial complex and tactical-strategic planning.
It’s now a credible scenario that’s reviving speculation about a Polish-led intervention aimed at drawing a red line in the sand for halting any potential Russian breakthrough before it gets too far. This would preserve the G7’s “sphere of (economic) influence” in Ukraine while preventing that former Soviet Republic’s collapse and thus averting another Afghan-like foreign policy disaster for the West. The problem, however, is that Poland also doesn’t want to be put up to this only to be hung out to dry.
Although Poland has comprehensively subordinated itself to Germany after the return of Berlin-backed Prime Minister Tusk to power late last year and envisages carving out its own “sphere of influence” in Western Ukraine, this doesn’t mean that it wants to lead a Western intervention there. The risk of World War III breaking out with Russia by miscalculation is much too high and Poland might fear that NATO won’t activate Article 5 if it clashes with Russia inside Ukraine in order to prevent that from happening.
These concerns could explain why there wasn’t any consensus during Monday’s meeting on this issue since other members wisely won’t want to take the chance of catalyzing an apocalyptic scenario, ergo the reason why the West might be plotting a false flag in Poland to blame on Russia and Belarus. President Lukashenko warned about that in late February, and if it comes to pass, then it could serve as the trigger for pushing Poland into leading a Western intervention in Ukraine without full NATO backing.
Warsaw could be misled to believe without any written guarantees that it has the bloc’s support and Article 5 would be activated if its forces clash with Russia’s there, but only to be hung out to dry if that happens so as to stave off World War III by miscalculation for the greater good. Nevertheless, it would still serve the purpose of drawing a red line in the sand that could halt Russia’s advance since NATO might escalate via brinksmanship afterwards by promising to activate Article 5 if the clashes continue.
Poland would also be left to pick up the tab in that event by having to pay the financial and physical costs of this de facto NATO intervention, thus representing an amoral form of “burden-sharing” that would fall solely on its taxpayers instead of the rest of the bloc’s. The farmers’ protests that are rocking that country right now could lead to a full-blown rebellion if that happens since others could join in, however, which the ruling liberal-globalists would prefer not to unfold since they fear that they’d risk losing power.
That’s why they’re reluctant to lead a Western intervention in Ukraine since there’s a high chance that it’ll backfire on them in particular and Poland’s national interests in general despite being to the benefit of Western hegemony as a whole. Whatever ends up happening, the takeaway from Monday’s meeting in Paris and the details that were revealed about their discussions is that NATO is planning for a possible Russian breakthrough across the LOC later this year but isn’t yet sure how to react if that happens.
Poland could either be pushed to preempt that voluntarily or after being manipulated by the false flag that President Lukashenko warned last week is being plotted, with the second option also potentially being employed right after any breakthrough. If this occurs before NATO’s “Steadfast Defender 2024” drills wrap up in June, then those of the bloc’s forces that are presently training in Poland for its largest continental exercises since the Old Cold War could play a pivotal support role or possibly join in as well.
Should a breakthrough occur after those war games end as part of the Russian offensive that Zelensky claimed is being planned for as early as May, however, then Poland probably couldn’t count on as much NATO support and would likely be pressured to go it alone (at least at first) with only vague promises. Another possibility is that the exercises are extended, whether in whole or in part, including through the semi-permanent stationing of some other NATO forces like Germany’s there until the offensive ends.
That might give Poland enough reassurance to take a leap of faith in plunging head-first into Ukraine with the expectation that the rest of NATO will follow even if they purposely lag behind in order to avoid World War III with Russia by miscalculation as was previously explained. It remains to be seen what’ll happen, but as Macron himself said, “we will do everything needed so Russia cannot win the war” and this therefore means that NATO will certainly intervene to some extent if Russia breaks through the LOC.
The bloc can’t afford another Afghan-like disaster, let alone on European soil in the most geostrategically significant conflict since World War II, which is why it won’t sit idly on the sidelines as Ukraine collapses if there’s a credible chance of that happening and Russia steamrolling through the ruins. The only reason why they’re now planning for this is because Russia’s victory in the “race of logistics”/“war of logistics” makes it conceivable sometime later this year, though it of course can’t be taken for granted either.
Time magazine begrudgingly admits “Ukraine Can’t Win the War”
By Ahmed Adel | February 27, 2024
The Ukrainian counteroffensive failed, and Russia’s liberation of Avdeyevka signalled a new reality that Volodymyr Zelensky was forced to recognise, the American magazine Time wrote on February 24. Yet, despite the acknowledgement of the impossibility of Ukraine’s victory growing day by day, the Kiev regime insists on begging for more weapons from Western countries.
“The long-awaited counteroffensive last year failed,” Anatol Lieven, director of the Eurasia Program at the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, wrote in an editorial, adding that Washington’s rhetoric had changed accordingly.
“The Biden Administration’s strategy is now to sustain Ukrainian defence until after the US presidential elections, in the hope of wearing down Russian forces in a long war of attrition,” Lieven continued.
According to the author, the hope now is that Kiev’s forces will achieve the long-awaited breakthrough in 2025 or perhaps the following year, but “Russia will never agree at the negotiating table to surrender land that it has managed to hold on the battlefield.”
“Many Ukrainians in private were prepared to accept the loss of some territories as the price of peace if Ukraine failed to win them back on the battlefield and if the alternative was years of bloody war with little prospect of success. The Biden Administration needs to get America on board too,” he added.
However, Lieven explains that those who believe in Ukraine’s final victory “have engaged in hopes that range from the overly optimistic to the magical,” with an example being the delusional retired US Army General, Ben Hodges, who pushes the false idea “that Russia can be defeated, and even driven from Crimea, by long-range missile bombardment.”
It is obviously ludicrous to believe that a long-range missile bombardment will drive out Russian forces from liberated territories, including Crimea. This does not stop the likes of Hodges from selling this delusion, which also plays into the hands of the Kiev regime, which continues their humiliating begging for more weapons from the West.
Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba declared on the same day as the publication of the Time article that Kiev is “pressuring” its allies to obtain more weapons.
When asked on local television about Plan B if Ukraine stops receiving military aid from Washington, the Ukrainian Foreign Minister, who is also a top regime propagandist, stressed that he is focusing on implementing Plan A.
“When a Plan B is created in times of war, you need to be sure that Plan B will not occur because, in a war, you have to always be focused on Plan A,” he stated, detailing that this plan consists of “maximum consideration of their interests.”
“We are not in a position to make concessions on military supplies,” Kuleba added.
In this context, the minister stated that if they do not receive projectiles from the US, “we will go around the world and bring projectiles from other parts of the world.”
It is recalled that Zelensky warned on February 23 that his country could only “defeat Russia” with military help from the US and that it would certainly fail without this financial help.
Meanwhile, Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council of Ukraine Oleksiy Danilov urged Western countries to hand over to the country’s Armed Forces all the weapons and military equipment they have because, in his opinion, in the future, “the bet will be on something else, the war will be completely different.”
“[This weaponry] will be scrap that they won’t need because there will be a completely different war,” he said.
The Kiev regime refuses to acknowledge that its professional armed forces no longer exist and that no amount of Western weaponry, if it even does arrive, can reverse the tide of Russia’s victory. Effectively, the regime continues to send thousands of Ukrainians to be slaughtered all because it holds onto the faux belief that the lost oblasts and Crimea can be recovered.
But as Lieven writes, “there is no realistic chance of total Ukrainian victory next year, or the year after that,” even if US military aid continues.
He concludes his article by stating: “The lost Ukrainian territories are lost, and NATO membership is pointless if the alliance is not prepared to send its own troops to fight for Ukraine against Russia. Above all, however painful a peace agreement would be today, it will be infinitely more so if the war continues and Ukraine is defeated.”
Lieven is not the sole voice, and there is a crescendo growing in the West affirming the reality that Ukraine cannot win the war, no matter how much support it receives short of direct intervention. It is unsurprising that this corresponds with Donald Trump’s growing popularity over Joe Biden, who claims he can quickly resolve the war in Ukraine in the run-in to the US elections in November. As the months pass and we approach the US elections, it can be expected that scepticism about Ukraine’s victory will increase, especially as Russia is expected to liberate more territories once the winter snow and early spring mud dissipate.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.
Nuland accidentally reveals the true aim of the West in Ukraine
By Rachel Marsden | RT | February 27, 2024
US State Department fixture and Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, Victoria Nuland, aka “Regime Change Karen,” apparently woke up one day recently, took the safety off her nuclear-grade mouth, and inadvertently blew up the West’s Ukraine narrative.
Until now, Americans have been told that all the US taxpayer cash being earmarked for Ukrainian aid is to help actual Ukrainians. Anyone notice that the $75 billion American contribution isn’t getting the job done on the battlefield? Victory in military conflict isn’t supposed to look like defeat. Winning also isn’t defined as, “Well, on a long enough time axis, like infinity, our chance of defeat will eventually approach zero.” And the $178 billion in total from all allies combined doesn’t seem to be doing the trick, either. Short of starting a global war with weapons capable of extending the conflict beyond a regional one, it’s not like they’ve been holding back. The West is breaking the bank. All for some vague, future Ukrainian “victory” that they don’t seem to want to clearly define. We keep hearing that the support will last “as long as it takes.” For what exactly? By not clearly defining it, they can keep moving the goal posts.
But now here comes Regime Change Karen, dropping some truth bombs on CNN about Ukrainian aid. She started off with the usual talking point of doing “what we have always done, which is defend democracy and freedom around the world.” Conveniently, in places where they have controlling interests and want to keep them – or knock them out of a global competitor’s roster and into their own. “And by the way, we have to remember that the bulk of this money is going right back into the US to make those weapons,” Nuland said, pleading in favor of the latest Ukraine aid package that’s been getting the side eye from Republicans in Congress.
So there you have it, folks. Ukrainians are a convenient pretext to keep the tax cash flowing in the direction of the US military industrial complex. This gives a whole new perspective on “as long as it takes.” It’s just the usual endless war and profits repackaged as benevolence. But we’ve seen this before. It explains why war in Afghanistan was little more than a gateway to Iraq. And why the Global War on Terrorism never seems to end, and only ever mutates. Arguably the best one they’ve come up with so far is the need for military-grade panopticon-style surveillance, so the state can shadow-box permanently with ghosts while bamboozling the general public with murky cyber concepts that it can’t understand or conceptualize. When one conflict or threat dials down, another ramps up, boosted by fearmongering rhetoric couched in white-knighting. There’s never any endgame or exit ramp to any of these conflicts. And there clearly isn’t one for Ukraine, either.
Still, there’s a sense that the realities on the ground in Ukraine, which favor Russia, now likely mean that the conflict is closer to its end than to its beginning. Acknowledgements abound in the Western press. And that means there isn’t much time left for Europe to get aboard the tax cash laundering bandwagon and stuff its own military industrial complexes’ coffers like Washington has been doing from the get-go. Which would explain why a bunch of countries now seem to be rushing to give Ukraine years-long bilateral security “guarantees,” requiring more weapons for everyone. France, Germany, Canada, and Italy have all made the pledge. Plus Denmark, which also flat-out said that it would send all its artillery to Ukraine. If security for Europe is the goal, that sounds kind of like the opposite. Particularly when Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmitry Kuleba told the EU that “Russia has gotten closer to your home” in the wake of the most recent defeat in Avdeevka. He sounds like one of those guys in TV ads trying to peddle burglar alarms. Seems like Russia only exists in the minds of the West these days to justify sending weapons to Ukraine to get blown up, while also justifying to taxpayers why they should continue funding this whole charade.
Meanwhile, the West’s drive towards peace seems to be taking the scenic route. “As we move forward, we continue our support to Ukraine in further developing President Zelensky’s Peace Formula,” G7 leaders said after a recent meeting with Zelensky in Kiev. Nice to see that he’s devoting all his time to this magic peace formula instead of running around extorting his friends for cash by threatening them with Putin.
It was already a pretty big hint of what’s really been going on when the EU decided to use the taxpayer-funded European Peace Facility to reimburse EU countries for the unloading of their mothballed, second-hand weapons into Ukraine, where Russia can then dispose of them before anyone could be accused of overcharging for clunkers. Now, with the clunker supply running dry, they just have to make more weapons. Maybe funneling cash into weapons for themselves will be the Hail Mary pass that saves their economies that they’ve tanked “for Ukraine”?
Thanks to Nuland’s nuking of any plausible deniability on Ukrainian “aid” not going to Washington, it’s now clear that Ukrainians continue to die so poor weapons makers don’t end up shaking tin cans on street corners. She has also removed any doubt about the ultimate US goal being Russian regime change, calling Putin’s leadership “not the Russia we wanted,” and sounding like someone who chronically sends back a meal to kitchens of a dining establishment. “We wanted a partner that was going to be Westernizing, that was going to be European. But that’s not what Putin has done,” she told CNN. That’s exactly what Putin has done, actually. It’s the West that’s moved away from itself and is becoming increasingly unrecognizable by its own citizens. Pretty sure that it goes beyond just wanting a country to be “European,” too. Because Germany’s European, and an ally, and Nuland wouldn’t shut up about how much she hated its Nord Stream gas supply — until it mysteriously went kaboom.
Regime Change Karen saying the quiet part out loud has decimated the Western establishment’s narrative so badly that it’s a miracle no one has yet accused her thermonuclear mouth of being an asset of Russia’s weapons program.
Rachel Marsden is a columnist, political strategist, and host of independently produced talk-shows in French and English.
By making war threats against China, Ukraine proves to be US vassal state
By Lucas Leiroz | February 27, 2024
The statement was made by deputy Aleksey Goncharenko during an interview with CNN on February 23. On the occasion, Goncharenko emphasized calls for the US to continue sending military aid, criticizing American politicians who are focused only on domestic issues and ignoring Ukraine. According to him, the US needs to “fulfill the promises” made to Kiev about permanent military support.
The legislator’s words, however, were not just about demands from the US. He also made it clear that his country is willing to cooperate militarily with the US in a broad and unrestricted manner – even willing to go to war with other states if Washington deems it necessary. In the interview, he stated that Kiev could fight directly against countries such as China, Iran and North Korea, with no fear regarding the consequences of a conflict of such scale. For him, Ukraine must be prepared to face any US adversary, showing “true friendship” between both countries.
“[If there’s a war, the US] will need people who will stand shoulder to shoulder with them (…) Ukrainians are ready… We are ready to stand with the United States shoulder-to-shoulder, either in trenches near Tehran, or in North Korea, or near Beijing. [There is] no difference (…) Because we appreciate your support,” he said during the interview.
Goncharenko also praised Ukraine’s combat potential, stating that Kiev has “the second strongest army in the free world” – after the US only. This alleged Ukrainian power is the reason why he considers Kiev a “valuable ally” of the US. Obviously, he did not show any data to prove this claim about his country’s military capacity. Kiev is currently severely weakened by the consequences of the conflict with Russia, definitely not being among the most powerful armies in the world.
As bold and controversial as Goncharenko’s statements are, they do not sound surprising considering the parliamentarian’s personal history. He is known for his unrealistic and bellicose positions. For example, he had previously made a declaration saying that Kiev should receive nuclear weapons in order to guarantee its “national security”. According to him, NATO should give Ukraine weapons of mass destruction to prevent a new conflict with Russia from happening in the future. In other words, instead of providing security guarantees to Moscow to prevent war, Goncharenko simply prefers to escalate tensions and create a scenario of possible nuclear confrontation.
“Once again I will say directly and openly: I support the return of nuclear weapons to Ukraine. And I believe that this is our only option for survival,” he said at the time.
In fact, extremist and bellicose statements have become commonplace in Ukraine. However, it is notorious how the regime’s officials no longer even disguise Kiev’s subservience to American interests. By stating that Ukraine is ready for war with China, Iran and North Korea, Goncharenko is not only threatening these countries, but also making it clear that Ukraine is willing to do whatever the US tells it to do, regardless of the national interests and well-being of the Ukrainian people.
Goncharenko is showing that his country is a vassal state, without sovereignty or decision-making power, being completely submissive to the American political will. In practice, this means that the Ukrainian people will never be safe under the Kiev regime, since at any time Ukrainian citizens could be sent to battlefields around the world to defend American interests. Indeed, Goncharenko is proving that the Kiev Junta sees the Ukrainians as mere NATO cannon fodder.
The deputy’s threats are especially controversial at a time when the US is in fact close to engaging in a real conflict situation with the multipolar powers. The crisis in the Middle East could lead to a war between the US and Iran, just as growing tensions in the Pacific could culminate in a military confrontation between Washington and Beijing – or Pyongyang. The possibility of such wars actually occurring makes Goncharenko’s threats a real problem, with the countries he mentioned in the interview having sufficient reasons to be cautious and take measures such as military preparation.
In addition to threatening other nations and demoralizing his own country, Goncharenko is also making Ukraine diplomatically isolated by proving the bellicosity of the neo-Nazi regime.
Lucas Leiroz, journalist, researcher at the Center for Geostrategic Studies, geopolitical consultant.
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NATO Countries Did Not Make Decision to Send Their Military to Ukraine – Polish President
Sputnik – 26.02.2024
WARSAW – NATO countries disagree on sending their military to Ukraine and have not made a decision to do so, Polish President Andrzej Duda said on Tuesday.
On Monday, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said that several EU and NATO countries are considering the possibility of sending their military to Ukraine on the basis of bilateral agreements.
“If we are talking about providing specific assistance, then individual countries decide what kind of assistance they specifically provide to Ukraine. There was a heated discussion about sending soldiers to Ukraine, and there was no absolute mutual understanding on this issue. There are different opinions. But I want to emphasize that there are absolutely no such decisions,” Duda told reporters after the end of a conference on supporting Ukraine, held in Paris.
French President Emmanuel Macron added that “nothing can be ruled out,” commenting on the possibility of sending NATO troops to Ukraine.
NATO troops in Ukraine can’t be ruled out – Macron
RT | February 26, 2024
French President Emmanual Macron has argued that deployments of troops to Ukraine by NATO members and other allies cannot be ruled out because Western powers must stop at nothing to ensure that Russia does not defeat Kiev’s forces.
“There’s no consensus today to send, in an official manner, troops on the ground,” Macron told reporters after hosting a meeting of European leaders on Monday in Paris. “But in terms of dynamics, we cannot exclude anything. We will do everything necessary to prevent Russia from winning this war.”
France hosted Monday’s summit of Ukraine backers to demonstrate steadfast support and European unity amid concerns that US aid to Kiev may stop, especially if Donald Trump wins this year’s presidential election. Macron said that while Ukraine’s European allies want to avoid escalating the conflict into a direct war with Russia, they agree that they must do more to ensure that Moscow doesn’t win.
“We have to take stock of the situation and realize our collective security is at stake,” the French leader said. “We have to ratchet up. Russia must not win, not only for Ukraine, but secondly, we are, by doing so, ensuring our collective security for today and for the future.”
Macron noted that the allies who say “never, ever” today about direct troop deployments to Ukraine are the same ones that previously ruled out escalations of military aid that were later granted, including long-range missiles and fighter jets. “Two years ago, a lot around this table said that we will offer helmets and sleeping bags, and now they’re saying we need to do more to get missiles and tanks to Ukraine. We have to be humble and realize that we’ve always been six to eight months late, so we’ll do what is needed to achieve our aim.”
There is broad consensus among the nations represented at Monday’s meeting that the allies must provide more aid to Ukraine and step up more quickly, Macron claimed. “We are not at war with the Russian people, but we cannot let them win in Ukraine,” he said, adding, “We are determined to do everything necessary for as long as necessary. That is the key takeaway from this evening.”
Washington ran out of money for Ukraine last month, after burning through $113 billion in congressionally approved aid packages. US President Joe Biden is seeking an additional $60 billion in Ukraine funding as part of an emergency spending bill that also includes aid for Israel and Taiwan. Conservative Republican lawmakers have balked at approving more aid for Ukraine, saying Biden is merely prolonging the conflict without changing its outcome. Trump has claimed he will end the crisis within 24 hours by forcing Ukrainian and Russian leaders to the negotiating table.
After Two Years, Neocons Desperate For More War in Ukraine
By Ron Paul | February 26, 2024
In a recent CNN interview, the normally very confident US Under Secretary of State Victoria Nuland sounded a little desperate. She was trying to make the case for Congress to pass another $61 billion dollars for the neocons’ proxy war project in Ukraine and she was throwing out the old slogans that the neocons use when they want funding for their latest war.
Asked by CNN whether she believes that Congress will eventually pass the bill, Nuland responded that she has confidence that, “we will do what we have always done, which is defend democracy and freedom around the world…”
What Nuland is attempting here is what the neocons always do. They try to wrap their terrible policies up in the American flag and sell it to the American people as something reflective of “our” values. If you oppose another neocon war, well then you are unpatriotic according to their trickery.
But Americans are waking up to the lies of the neocons and more and more are realizing that there is no “we” when the neocons are trying to sell another war. It is “them.” The “we” in the equation are the people who are being robbed to pay for what will inevitably be another neocon failure.
Does any American still believe that Washington was “defending democracy and freedom” when it used a pack of lies to get us into Iraq, where a country was destroyed and perhaps a million people were killed? How about when, after 20 years in Afghanistan, we managed to replace the Taliban… with the Taliban? And Syria and Libya and all the other interventions?
Was Washington “defending democracy” when Nuland and the rest of the neocons successfully overthrew a democratically elected government in Ukraine in 2014?
It’s getting harder and harder for the American people to choke down the war lies of the neocons. That is something that should make us feel optimistic. In the same interview, Nuland said she was confident that when House Members return to session next week, “after they’ve been out in their districts hearing from the American people,” they will vote to send the $61 billion to Ukraine.
Looking at public opinion polls, however, it is far more likely that any Member meeting with constituents during the break will hear the opposite. It is likely they will hear a demand that not another penny be spent on the brutal, futile, and disastrous Ukraine war. According to a Harris poll taken earlier this month, some 70 percent of Americans want talks to end the Ukraine war!
Americans no longer support the neocon war project in Ukraine. That is something to celebrate.
Perhaps in a last show of desperation, Victoria Nuland debuted another argument for keeping the war money flowing for Ukraine. She said, “we have to remember that the bulk of this money is going right back into this economy to make those weapons…”
Is this supposed to be attractive to the American people? The middle class and the poor are being destroyed by inflation and squeezed by a debased currency so that the wealthy, politically-connected weapons manufacturers can get even richer? Instead of money to rebuild this country and protect its borders, Americans should be thrilled to see their hard work go up in smoke, literally, in Ukraine?
NYTs Report: CIA OPS in Ukraine for a Decade
Turns out Russia had good reason for grave concern
BY JOHN LEAKE | COURAGEOUS DISCOURSE | FEBRUARY 26, 2024
The New York Times just reported that the CIA has been very active in conducting anti-Russian operations in Ukraine for over a decade, and is now playing an active role in combat operations against Russia.
To be sure, many analysts in the United States and Europe have known this for years, but the New York Times report confirms our worst suspicions. It seems to me that every sensible person who understands basic concepts of national security should now be asking himself: Why should Russia tolerate the CIA turning Ukraine into an arena for undermining Russian security? How would the United States government respond to Russian intelligence agencies setting up shop on the Mexican border to run operations against the United States? For my part, I’m surprised that Putin tolerated the CIA’s activities in Ukraine for as long as he did.
Now it seems to recent drone strikes on Russian assets are being assisted by the CIA, and the cat is out of the bag, putting the United States yet another step closer to a full blown military confrontation with Russia.
Some EU, NATO States Ponder Possibility of Sending Military to Ukraine – Slovakia’s Fico
Sputnik – 26.02.2024
BRATISLAVA – Some EU and NATO countries are mulling over the possibility of sending their military to Ukraine on the basis of bilateral agreements, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico said on Monday.
Later in the day, Paris will host a meeting where members of the EU and NATO will discuss the situation in Ukraine.
“For me, today’s meeting [in Paris] is confirmation that the West’s strategy in Ukraine has failed, but I want to be constructively prepared for it … It follows from these arguments that a group of NATO and EU countries are considering [the option] to send their military to Ukraine on the basis of bilateral agreements,” Fico told reporters after a meeting of the government and the security council.
Possible deployment of the EU and NATO military to Ukraine will not allow them to achieve concessions from Russia, but will only lead to an escalation of the conflict, the prime minister said.
Slovakia is not planning to send its soldiers to Ukraine, Fico added.
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From the Archives
Neocons confess: “We did 9/11-anthrax”
By Kevin Barrett | Press TV | September 6, 2014
As the 13th anniversary of the crimes of September, 2001 approaches, the neoconservatives are shrieking from the rooftops – and effectively confessing that they were the real perpetrators of the 9/11-Anthrax false flag operation. (The neocons, you may recall, openly called for a “new Pearl Harbor” in September, 2000 – and got one exactly one year later.)
Every year at this time, the neocons orchestrate and hype a series of public relations stunts designed to magnify fears of “radical Islam” and reinforce their crumbling 9/11-Anthrax cover story. But this year’s propaganda campaign is so extreme that it represents a tacit confession: The neocons know that the truth about the 9/11-Anthrax operation is slowly closing in on them; so they are over-reacting by desperately trying to stoke the dying embers of the so-called War on Terror, in order to maintain the myth that Muslims (rather than neoconservative Zionists) attacked America in the autumn of 2001.
When a hysterical person exhibits guilty demeanor by trying too hard to blame a crime on someone else, that person is almost certainly the real perpetrator. As the neocons try much too hard to blame Islam for 9/11 and “terrorism” in general, their hysteria inadvertently reveals their own culpability. Like Shakespeare’s Lady MacBeth, the neoconservative movement has blood on its hands and “doth protest too much.” … continue
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