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Russia thwarts Ukrainian attack on border area

RT | January 3, 2024

Russia’s Belgorod Region, which borders Ukraine, has come under fresh attack after Kiev’s forces launched a barrage of a dozen missiles, the Russian Defense Ministry has announced, adding that its air defenses had shot down all incoming projectiles.

The ministry wrote on its Telegram channel on Wednesday that “another attempt to carry out a terrorist attack by the Kiev regime on facilities on the territory of the Russian Federation, using multiple launch rocket system ‘Olkha’ missiles and ‘Tochka-U’ tactical ballistic missiles, was thwarted this morning.”

According to the statement, the shelling involved six rockets of each type.

Local residents reported seeing explosions in the skies early on Wednesday morning.

The Ukrainian military also shelled the region on Tuesday evening, using the same type of rockets, the defense ministry said, adding that all incoming missiles had been intercepted.

Earlier in the day, Kiev’s forces launched 17 ‘Olkha’ missiles toward Belgorod Region in three separate attacks. Governor Vyacheslav Gladkov wrote on his Telegram channel that one civilian had died and two were injured as a result of falling debris as the missiles were shot down.

The Russian Defense Ministry estimated that its air defenses brought down a total of 32 Ukrainian drones over Bryansk, Oryol, Kursk and Moscow regions on Monday night and Tuesday morning.

On Saturday, the city of Belgorod came under attack, with a massive Ukrainian barrage killing 25 people and wounding more than 100 others.

Kiev described the strike as retaliation for a previous Russian attack on major Ukrainian cities, including Kiev.

According to an anonymous Russian security source, Saturday’s shelling was personally ordered by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky. Moscow has also claimed that the UK and the US also bear responsibility for the death of Russian civilians in Belgorod.

Ukraine and Russia have since engaged in daily tit-for-tat bombardments.

The Russian Defense Ministry reported on Tuesday that its missile strikes had obliterated a number of military industry facilities, repair shops, and ammunition warehouses in the neighboring country. Ukrainian authorities claimed that most of the projectiles ended up hitting civilian infrastructure and apartment blocks, killing multiple civilians.

January 3, 2024 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

The enabler of our two concurrent world wars: Washington

By Gilbert Doctorow | January 2, 2024

It is only the second day of the New Year, but you turn on the morning news with a feeling of trepidation. Here in Western Europe, the lead stories are death and destruction reported from the front lines of the two conflagrations that some commentators have identified as ‘world wars,’ given the way countries across the globe have aligned themselves with or against the protagonists in each conflict. The outstanding commonality between these two world wars is the position of the United States as their enabler in terms of delivery of essential military and financial support to one side, as well as real-time military intelligence, tactical and strategic counseling by high level officers positioned on the ground and in nearby seas.  From the perspective of Washington, these are proxy wars which put at risk very few of its own men at arms, though some do come home in body bags without word to the press, while preparations proceed apace for the launch of a third proxy war in the South China Sea. The Philippines are the latest recruits to the prospective encirclement and assault on China.

On their talk shows, the Russians speculate on when a mutual defense pact with Iran, China and North Korea will be announced. This will not be a bloc, like NATO, but will enshrine the key principle of ‘one for all and all for one’ in case of attack by outside forces. To its backers in Moscow, this formulation would ensure that NATO generals understand they are up against an enemy of over two billion if we include a few other fellow travelers, not just the 145 million Russians whom they see across the border.

But that is what they say on talk shows. It is not the official voice of the Kremlin, which we find on Vesti television. Vesti maintains a near blackout of news on the Israel-Hamas war in broadcasts to its home audience. Why? Because Russia does not want to get embroiled in that war when it needs all its human and materiel resources to defeat the Ukrainians and their NATO backers. Moreover, Russia can be satisfied that the Iranians and their Houthi proxies have the situation in the Middle East under control, restraining the United States from region-wide escalation by engaging directly on Israeli’s side.

For that matter, Iran is doing just fine in shoring up Russia’s southern borders in the Caucasus. For more than a year, Armenia’s prime minister Nikol Pashinyan has been sitting on two stools: holding consultations with the French and intermittently attending gatherings of the Former Soviet Union republics called by Moscow. A week ago, Iranian leaders issued a direct warning to Armenia not to even think about pursuing the military and political rapprochement that France’s president Macron has been proposing. Said President Raisi: ‘No powers from outside the region are welcome in the Caucasus.’ This warning serves Russian security very well, though it is surely motivated by self-interest in Teheran, because any future French military presence in Armenia could also threaten them.

In Russian news, all attention is on the one conflict in which the Russians are themselves deeply engaged, and there news from the line of contact, news from the home front which a day ago experienced a murderous attack on the border town of Belgorod that killed 25 civilians and gravely injured another fifty or so, news from the United Nations Security Council deliberations of the same, more than fill the time allotted to 14.00 o’clock and 20.00 o’clock wrap-ups.

Anyone following developments of the Ukrainian war these past few days will note the tit for tat nature of the strikes dealt out by the warring parties day after day. The chain of events began early on the morning of Wednesday, 26 December, when the Ukrainians deployed air-launched Storm Shadow cruise missiles to destroy the Novocherkassk, a large landing ship of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet parked in the harbor of Feodosia, on the eastern shores of the Crimea. The ship was said to be loaded with drones and the missile strike set off a fire and explosions that may have killed as many as 74, both on the ship and in the port.

However, the outstanding feature of the attack was not the numbers of the dead or the loss of the ship itself: it was the demonstration that Kiev had now been given a Storm Shadow variant with much greater flight range than the initial shipments from the U.K. and France.

From the perspective of the Russian high command, this new ability of the Ukrainians to strike far deeper into Russian territory represented a serious escalation of the conflict which required mirror-image escalation from Russia. The Russian response was not long in coming: on the 27th, Russia launched the largest missile attack on Ukraine since the start of the Special Military Operation, more than 150 ballistic missiles, cruise missiles and armed drones, directed at cities across the Ukraine, including Kiev. Some of these were shot down by Ukrainian air defense, but the Zelensky regime admitted that all 20 Russian ballistic missiles evaded their fire and hit their targets.

From the partial information released by the Russian military, it would appear that their main interest was to destroy caches of the Storm Shadow and also the most advanced Western ground to air missiles. They claim to have destroyed a Patriot complex in the Lvov region, killing a substantial number of French military who were in charge of the installation. This is the sort of information which flits by in a second and is not repeated, so I can say no more.

The Ukrainian response the next day was a concentrated attack on the Russian border city of Belgorod, capital of an oblast of the same name. Belgorod is not more than 20 km from Ukraine’s second largest city, Kharkiv, and it first made international news about six months ago when a Ukrainian team of saboteurs claiming to be anti-Putin Russians crossed into the oblast and attacked residential neighborhoods.  This time missiles were sent into apartment blocks and other civilian structures, killing some 25 Russians and gravely wounding perhaps 50 more, some of whom were evacuated to Moscow by plane on life support.

Yesterday and today the Russians avenged this serious loss by renewed missile attacks, now concentrated on Kharkiv, whence the attack on Belgorod had come. They demolished the headquarters of military intelligence in the city, claiming to have killed many foreign advisers, probably British and Americans, who were guiding the attacks. They also struck air fields across Ukraine which could be used to service planes carrying the Storm Shadow.

I end this overview with the remark that American-British escalation of the weaponry deployed against Russia was at the start of what we have witnessed these past six days. And that can be no accident. It follows from the news of the war in the immediately preceding period, which unequivocally demonstrated that on the ground, along the line of contact, the Russian forces were moving steadily to overrun Ukrainian positions and force a retreat. The storming of Mariinka was emblematic in this sense. The overall impression was depressing for the Ukrainian cause at the very time that Congress was in recess after rejecting efforts by the Administration to pass legislation ensuring continued financial and military aid to Kiev. Now these Ukrainian missile attacks on the Black Sea fleet in the Feodosia harbor and the attack on civilians in what is properly speaking Russian Federation territory of Belgorod oblast would give luster to the Ukrainian cause while prodding the Russians to escalate and perform what Washington would showcase as war crimes.

Escalation is the game Washington is playing. In Ukraine. In the Red Sea. In the Eastern Mediterranean off the coast of Lebanon. Washington seems oblivious to the possibility that the proxy wars it is fanning may yet invite a Russian, or Iranian, or North Korean strike directly on U.S. assets, whether overseas or on the Continental United States.

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

Ukrainians Turn Against War But Are Afraid to Speak Out

By Kyle Anzalone | The Libertarian Institute | January 2, 2024

As the war in Ukraine nears the end of its second year, Ukrainians are turning against fighting and towards diplomacy. One former official said that Ukrainian soldiers are currently fighting and dying for nothing.

The Times reports, “Many Ukrainians are growing tired and weary of the war. One Ukrainian military source admitted that average Ukrainians were talking of a truce yet there were questions around what the price of the truce would be.”

Most people in Ukraine wanted a truce but were “afraid to admit it to themselves,” Mykhailo Chaplyha, a political commentator and former vice-ombudsman of Ukraine, said. There was an atmosphere of “total mistrust and fear” in Ukraine and anyone who dared to think of a truce would immediately become an “outcast and a traitor.”

After Russia invaded Ukraine, President Zelensky targeted dissidents using the security state. The Ukrainian media and Zelensky’s main political opposition has been outlawed. Kiev has targeted branches of the Orthodox church perceived to be too close to Moscow.

A former Ukrainian official said that Zelensky was losing support. He said the West told Kiev not to give up, but there was no war strategy and soldiers were “sent to the front line to die.” The official continued, “It is nonsense to send in our soldiers to die if we don’t have enough armament and resources to win militarily. What is the strategy, to keep us dying for what? And not less important — where is our diplomacy?”

In the early months of the war in Ukraine, the West pushed Kiev to abandon talks with Moscow. The US and its allies promised Ukraine that it would provide Kiev with all the support it needs to win the war.

However, as the war nears its third year, the Western weapons stockpiles are approaching depletion. The White House has run out of funds for arming Ukraine, while future aid is being used as leverage in an immigration debate.

Since October 7, the Biden administration has started to prioritize arming Israel over Ukraine. Israel has received tens of thousands of 155 mm shells, a high-demand weapon for both Kiev and Tel Aviv.

January 2, 2024 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

Ukraine to decide how to use US missiles – ambassador

RT | January 2, 2024

The decision on how to use the American-supplied missiles for HIMARS launchers will be up to the Ukrainian military command, US Ambassador to Kiev Bridget Brink said on Tuesday, according to the Ukrainian outlet Strana.

The US has sent Ukraine around 30 high-mobility artillery rocket systems since mid-2022. The projectiles Washington officially supplied to Kiev have a range of up to 160 kilometers (100 miles). Ukraine has repeatedly demanded longer-range missiles.

The Ukrainian Armed Forces command will “independently decide on the range of strikes delivered” using the HIMARS projectiles the US plans to deliver “in the near future,” Strana reported Brink as saying on Tuesday afternoon.

Brink made the identical announcement in June 2022. It was reiterated by the Pentagon in February 2023, when the US announced it would send Ukraine Ground Launched Small Diameter Bombs (GLSDB) munitions.

According to a Washington Post article at the time, Ukraine carries out HIMARS launches using “specific coordinates provided by US military personnel,” but chooses the targets itself. The US provides coordinates and targeting information “solely in an advisory role,” an anonymous American official insisted.

Russia has said that this is a distinction without a difference, and repeatedly warned that US and British officials involved in Ukrainian attacks on civilians will be brought to justice.

In October, Kiev boasted about using longer-ranged ATACMS missiles “secretly” supplied by the US. As it turned out, the White House sent over a small number of the rockets armed with the controversial cluster munitions.

On Saturday, Ukrainian long-range rocket artillery struck the main town square of Belgorod city with cluster bombs, killing 25 civilians – including children – and injuring 100 more. Czech-supplied weapons were reportedly used in the attack. Russia has retaliated by targeting Ukrainian command posts, weapons warehouses and military factories in a wave of missile and drone strikes.

January 2, 2024 Posted by | War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

Ukraine and Palestine: A double threat to US hegemony

The outcome of US-led conflicts in Ukraine and West Asia will have a profound impact on the developing world order

By MK Bhadrakumar | The Cradle | January 2, 2024

Geopolitical analysts broadly agree that the war in Ukraine and the West Asian crisis will dictate the trajectory of world politics in 2024. But a reductionist thesis appears alongside that views the Israel-Palestine conflict narrowly in terms of what it entails for the resilience of the US proxy war in Ukraine – the assumption being that the locus of world politics lies in Eurasia.

The reality is more complex. Each of these two conflicts has a raison d’être and dynamics of its own, while at the same time also being intertwined.

Washington’s neck-deep involvement in the current phase of the West Asian crisis can turn into a quagmire, since it is also tangled up with domestic politics in a way that the Ukraine war never has been. But then, the outcome of the Ukraine war is already a foregone conclusion, and the US and its allies have realized that Russia cannot be defeated militarily; the endgame narrows down to an agreement to end the conflict on Russia’s terms.

To be sure, the outcome of the Ukraine war and the denouement of the Israel-Palestine conflict, which is at the root of the West Asian crisis, will have a profound impact on the new world order, and the two processes reinforce each other.

Russia realizes this fully. President Vladimir Putin’s stunning ‘year-enders’ in the run-up to the New Year speak for themselves: daylong visits to Abu Dhabi and Riyadh (watched by a shell-shocked US President Joe Biden), followed by talks with Iran’s president and rounded off with a telephone conversation with the Egyptian president.

In the space of 48 hours or so, Putin touched base with his Emirati, Saudi, Iranian, and Egyptian colleagues who officially entered the portals of the BRICS on 1 January.

The evolving US intervention in the West Asian crisis can be understood from a geopolitical perspective only by factoring in Biden’s visceral hostility toward Russia. BRICS is in Washington’s crosshairs. The US understands perfectly well that the extra large presence of West Asian and Arab nations in BRICS — four out of ten member states — is central to Putin’s grand project to re-structure the world order and bury US exceptionalism and hegemony.

Saudi Arabia, the UAE, and Iran are major oil producing countries. Russia has been rather explicit that during its 2024 chairmanship of BRICS, it will push for the creation of a currency to challenge the petrodollar. Without doubt, the BRICS currency will be at the center stage of the grouping’s summit due to be hosted by Putin in Kazan, Russia in October.

In a special address on 1 January, marking the start of Russia’s BRICS Chairmanship, Putin stated his commitment to “enhancing the role of BRICS in the international monetary system, expanding both interbank cooperation and the use of national currencies in mutual trade.”

If a BRICS currency is used instead of the dollar, there could be significant impact on several financial sectors of the US economy, such as energy and commodity markets, international trade and investment, capital markets, technology and fintech, consumer goods and retail, travel and tourism, and so on.

The banking sector could take the first hit that might eventually spill over to the markets. And if Washington fails to fund its mammoth deficit, prices of all commodities could skyrocket or even reach hyperinflation triggering a crash of the US economy.

Meanwhile, the eruption of the Israel-Palestine conflict has given the US an alibi — ‘Israel’s self-defense’ — to claw its way back on the greasy pole of West Asian politics. Washington has multiple concerns, but at its core are the twin objectives of resuscitating the Abraham Accords (anchored on Saudi-Israeli proximity) and the concurrent sabotage of the Beijing-mediated Saudi-Iranian rapprochement.

The Biden administration was counting on the fact that an Israeli-Saudi deal would provide legitimacy to Tel Aviv and proclaim to the Islamic world that there was no religious justification for hostility towards Israel. But Washington senses that post-7 October it would not be able to secure a Saudi-Israel deal during this Biden term, and all that could be coaxed out of Riyadh is a door left ajar for future discussion on the topic. No doubt, it is a major blow to the US strategy to liquidate the Palestinian question.

In a medium term perspective, if the Russian-Saudi mechanism known as OPEC+ liberates the world oil market from US control, BRICS drives a dagger into the heart of US hegemony which is anchored on the dollar being the ‘world currency.’

Saudi Arabia recently signed a currency swap deal worth $7 billion with China in an attempt to shift more of their trade away from the dollar. The People’s Bank of China said in a statement that the swap arrangement will “help strengthen financial cooperation” and “facilitate more convenient trade and investment” between the countries.

Going forward, sensitive Saudi-Chinese transactions in strategic areas such as defense, nuclear technology, among others, will henceforth take place below the US radar. From a Chinese perspective, if its strategic trade is sufficiently insulated from any US-led program of anti-China sanctions, Beijing can position itself confidently to confront US power in the Indo-Pacific. This is a telling example of how the US strategy for the Indo-Pacific will lose traction as a result of its waning influence in West Asia.

The conventional wisdom is that preoccupation in volatile West Asia distracts Washington from paying attention to the Indo-Pacific and China. In reality, though, the waning influence in West Asia is complicating the capacity of the US to counter China both in the region as well as in the Indo-Pacific. The developments are moving in a direction where the credentials of the US as a great power are at an inflection point in West Asia – and that realization has leaked into other geographic regions around the world.

Way back in 2007, the distinguished political scientists John Mearsheimer of the University of Chicago and Stephen Walt of the John F. Kennedy School of Government at Harvard, wrote with great prescience in their famous 34,000-word essay entitled The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy that Israel has become a ‘strategic liability’ for the United States, but retains its strong support because of a wealthy, well-organized, and bewitching lobby that has a ‘stranglehold’ on Congress and US elites.

The authors warned that Israel and its lobby bear outsized their responsibility for persuading the Bush Administration to invade Iraq and, perhaps one day soon, to attack the nuclear facilities of Iran.

Interestingly, on New Year’s Eve, in a special report based on extensive briefing by top US officials, the New York Times highlighted that “No other episode [as the war in Gaza] in the past half-century has tested the ties between the United States and Israel in such an intense and consequential way.”

Clearly, even as Israel’s barbaric actions in Gaza and its colonial project in the occupied West Bank are exposed and laid bare, and the Israeli state’s campaign to force Palestinian population migration are in full view, two of the US strategic objectives in the region are unravelling: first, the restoration of Israel’s military superiority in the balance of forces regionally and vis-a-vis the Axis of Resistance, in particular; and second, the resuscitation of the Abraham Accords where the crown jewels would have been a Saudi-Israeli treaty.

Viewed from another angle, the directions in which West Asia’s crisis unfolds are being keenly watched by the world community, especially those in the Asia-Pacific region. Most notable here is that Russia and China have given the US a free hand to navigate its military moves – unchallenged, so far, in the Red Sea. This means that any conflagration in the region will be synonymous with a catastrophic breakdown of US strategy.

Soon after the US defeat in Afghanistan in Central Asia, and coinciding with an ignominious ending of the US-led proxy war by NATO against Russia in Eurasia, a violent, grotesque setback in West Asia will send a resounding message across all of Asia that the US-led bandwagon has run out of steam. Among the end users of this startling message, the countries of ASEAN stand at the forefront. The bottom line is that the overlapping tumultuous events in Eurasia and West Asia are poised to coalesce into a climactic moment for world politics.

January 2, 2024 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , , , , | Leave a comment

More discomfort awaits the West in 2024 if it doesn’t adapt to new reality

Illustration: Liu Rui/GT
Global Times | January 1, 2024

What kind of experience did 2023 bring to Western countries? According to mainstream Western media, the most apt term to encapsulate the Western sentiment is “uncomfortable.”

An article from the BBC suggests that the past 12 months have seen a number of setbacks for the US, Europe and other major democracies on the international politics stage. Although none has been disastrous for now, they point to a shifting balance of power away from the US-dominated, Western values that have held sway for years, the article claimed. The mentioned setbacks include regional conflicts such as the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Palestine conflict. Challenges posed by countries perceived as adversarial by the US and the West, such as China, Iran, and North Korea, were also highlighted.

The Ukraine crisis has continued on, and the Israel-Palestine conflict has reignited, while the responses from the international community don’t align with the preferences of the US and its Western allies. All of this has made them feel “uncomfortable.”

When it comes to the Russia-Ukraine conflict, despite receiving support from the West, Ukraine has faced difficulties and failed to progress as expected in its conflict with Russia. This has led to Western fatigue and frustration. Due to partisan divisions in the US, providing aid to Ukraine has become problematic. In contrast, Russia has managed to stabilize its frontlines and handle the prolonged war effectively, Lü Xiang, a research fellow at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, told the Global Times. He noted that sanctions against Russia, with only around 30 countries participating in condemning Russia’s actions, have failed to significantly impact the Russian economy, instead, Russia has demonstrated remarkable resilience, contrary to Western expectations.

In the case of the Israel-Palestine conflict, most developing countries held positions inconsistent with those of the US. Many countries expressed disappointment and regret over the US veto of the Gaza-related drafts demanding an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza, distancing themselves from the US pro-Israel stance.

The BBC states that Arab ministers believe there are double standards in Western approaches to the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the Israel-Palestine conflict, accusing the Western governments of hypocrisy. This reflects a growing opposition from Global South and developing countries against the values advocated by the US and the West in various events, and the Western influence is diminishing, said Yang Xiyu, a senior research fellow at the China Institute of International Studies.

Issues such as the Ukraine crisis and the Israel-Palestine conflict increasingly demonstrate that the West, particularly Europe and the US, can no longer bring positive values to the world. More and more countries and their people in the Global South have become aware of this and refuse to accept Western double standards.

Today, an increasing number of developing countries are expressing clear opposition to irresponsible actions by the US and Europe. The major demand of these countries is to have a peaceful and stable international environment for national development. However, Western countries, the US in particular, are acting as the world’s largest disruptor of peace and creator of conflicts. In the cases of the Ukraine crisis and the Israel-Palestine conflict, the US not only fuels the flames but also opposes proposals for peace talks raised by other countries. In pursuit of its selfish interests, the US has caused suffering to the people of Ukraine and the Gaza Strip, hindering the resolution of other urgent global issues. In such circumstances, more and more developing countries are becoming courageous enough to say no to the US and the West.

In 2024, the influence and dominance of the West, whether in the Russia-Ukraine conflict or the Israel-Palestine conflict, will continue to decline. If 2023 did not unfold according to their expectations, 2024 is likely to deviate even further. This will bring more discomfort for them. Washington now has to adapt to a new reality: Global South countries are becoming more mature and gaining more decision-making autonomy. US politicians, who are used to dictating terms to countries worldwide and expecting developments to revolve around US interests, must reflect on and adapt to this new change. Otherwise, when the media summarizes 2024, it may not be as simple as just feeling uncomfortable; the experience might be more agonizing.

January 1, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, Progressive Hypocrite, Russophobia, Wars for Israel | , , , , | Leave a comment

Putin names Russia’s real enemies

Ukraine itself is not an enemy, the Western elites backing it are, the Russian president has said

RT | January 1, 2024

Ukraine is a mere tool in the hands of the collective West, which has been using it to fight Russia, President Vladimir Putin said on Monday. He made the remarks at a military hospital in Moscow where he was meeting Russian servicemen wounded during the Ukraine military operation.

Asked about the enduring Western support for Kiev, the president said the elites of the collective West were actually the true enemy of Russia, rather than Ukraine itself.

“The point is not that they are helping our enemy, but that they are our enemy. They are solving their own problems with [Ukraine’s] hands, that’s what it’s all about,” Putin stated.

The conflict between Moscow and Kiev was orchestrated by Western elites, who seek to defeat Russia, he suggested. However, the collective West has been unable to achieve its goals, with the failure already showing in the change of its rhetoric on the conflict, the president explained.

“Those who only yesterday were talking about the need to inflict a ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia are now looking for words on how to quickly end the conflict.”

“We want to end the conflict too, and as quickly as possible, but only on our terms. We have no desire to fight forever, but we are not going to give up our positions either,” Putin said.

The battlefield situation is now changing despite all the aid Kiev has been receiving from the West, the president observed. Russia has been effectively outproducing the whole West militarily, he suggested, with the country’s output destined to grow even further.

“Despite the fact that from time immemorial [the West] has had such a goal – to deal with Russia, it looks like we will deal with them first,” Putin stated.

“You probably see it on the battlefield that they are gradually ‘deflating’. When a shell flies, it is probably difficult to tell whether they are ‘deflated’ or not, but in general you probably know: the situation on the battlefield is changing. And this is happening despite the fact that the entire so-called civilized West is fighting against us,” he told the servicemen.

According to Russia’s latest estimates, over 380,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed or wounded during the conflict. Ukraine has also sustained heavy materiel losses, with an estimated 14,000 tanks and other armored vehicles destroyed. Nearly 160,000 of the troop losses were during Kiev’s botched counteroffensive, launched in early June last year, Moscow says.

January 1, 2024 Posted by | Russophobia | , , , , | Leave a comment

Western War Machine is in Panic Mode

By Salman Rafi Sheikh – New Eastern Outlook – 01.01.2024 

The sheer inability of the collective West to force Russia into submission in Ukraine plus the fast-changing global opinion about the West in the context of the latter’s support for Israel’s brutal war on the Gazans has put the so-called ‘liberal-democratic’ world into a panic mode. The White House has already said that it will run out of money to fund Ukraine into 2024 unless the US Congress gives approval for more funding. This has led the Western war machine – primarily led by the US – to anticipate a possible defeat. “There is no guarantee of success with us, but they are certain to fail without us”, a senior US military official told CNN recently. Without the military support, US officials now estimate, Ukraine would fall by the summer of 2024. But, in Western calculations, Ukraine’s fall does not just mean Russia’s victory; it also implies a possible collapse of NATO and the eventual downfall of the Western-dominated global political, economic, and security order.

A recent piece in the Wall Street Journal said,

“Even more important, Russia’s success in Ukraine would increase a threat to NATO’s Eastern flank—in particular the Baltic states and Poland. Outside of Europe it would embolden Moscow’s allies Iran and North Korea and provide a template for China for the military solution of the Taiwan dispute. In all those cases, the U.S. and NATO troops could find themselves in the midst of a military conflict of the sort that Ukraine fights today without direct involvement of NATO”.

Such prospects are causing severe problems. Germany, for instance, is considering shelving voluntary force and making a return to conscription. “I believe that a nation that needs to become more resilient in times like these will have a higher level of awareness if it is mixed through with soldiers,” said Jan Christian Kaack, the chief of the German Navy. This is in addition to the fact that the German army is too small to defend itself against any threat; hence, the renewed emphasis on conscription.

But Germany is not an exceptional case. In fact, it mirrors developments in the rest of Europe. The UK, otherwise known to possess one of the best fighting forces in the world, is running into some problems of a fundamental nature. The Sky News reported earlier in the year that, a senior US general “privately told Defence Secretary Ben Wallace the British Army is no longer regarded as a top-level fighting force”. It was further reported that the “The armed forces would run out of ammunition in a few days if called upon to fight” and that “The UK lacks the ability to defend its skies against the level of missile and drone strikes that Ukraine is enduring”.

On top of it is the fact that the Russian military position in Ukraine remains strong, making it a lot harder for the West to provide enough funding. The Biden administration is facing its own challenges vis-à-vis more funding for Ukraine. As far as Europe is concerned, a recent report showed that pledges for funding made in August 2023 fell by almost 90 percent compared to the same period last year.

This is war fatigue that is being compounded by a well-sustained Russian resolve to achieve its objectives. For the West, Vladimir Putin remains “stubborn”. As Putin recently reiterated, “There will be peace when we achieve our goals… Now let’s return to these goals – they have not changed. I would like to remind you how we formulated them: denazification, demilitarisation, and a neutral status for Ukraine.”

Speaking from a position of strength – and keeping in mind the war fatigue in the West – Putin further said that Russian forces are “improving their position almost along the entire line of contact. Almost all of them are engaged in active combat. And the position of our troops is improving along [the entire line of contact.]”. This being the case, Putin conveyed no ideas of making a compromise with the West over Ukraine. Speaking from the Russian perspective, it would make no sense to offer negotiations and, thus, turn Russian tactical victories into unsustainable settlements.

Clearly, Russia has no intention of withdrawing from its victories, which is why there is a panic, especially in Europe. If Russia continues to win and the US funding stalls, Europe will be left to fend for itself. Germany’s defence minister minced no words to express this fear last Saturday when he said that the US “was losing interest in European affairs and that security tensions in the Pacific would likely leave the European Union having to fend for itself”, adding that “One can assume that the USA will be more involved in the Pacific region in the next decade than it is today – regardless of who becomes the next president,” he said. His conclusion is: “This means that we Europeans must increase our commitment to ensure security on our continent.”

In a nutshell, for the US, if the war in Ukraine was to unify the West, it is beginning to have an exactly opposite effect. There lies a very strong reason for the US to reconsider its strategy. This reconsideration can go in two directions. First, the US can withdraw from its obsession with expanding NATO to include Ukraine. Second, the US can make one last push and make Ukraine fight for as long as it can, hoping that this might break Russia. The Biden administration favours the second option, which is why it is pushing for the US$61 billion aid package. But will a Republican victory allow this to happen? A Republican victory could not only end support for Ukraine but also leave Europe in a total lurch. Tough times ahead.

Salman Rafi Sheikh is a research-analyst of International Relations and Pakistan’s foreign and domestic affairs.

January 1, 2024 Posted by | Militarism, Wars for Israel | , , , , , | Leave a comment

Group of retreating Ukrainian soldiers shot by anti-retreat forces

Sputnik – December 31, 2023

The Kiev regime has been accused of using anti-retreat forces, which are military units tasked with preventing the withdrawal of their own troops. In mid-October, the governor of the Kherson region, Vladimir Saldo, said that Ukrainian barrier troops had opened fire on Ukrainian servicemen for refusing to cross the Dnepr River.

A Ukrainian barrier unit has shot at a group of retreating fighters from the Ukrainian Armed Forces, a source familiar with the situation told Sputnik, providing the agency with video footage taken by a drone confirming it.

“The Ukrainian Armed Forces are using the tactics of anti-retreat forces, and with them they are trying to hold back mobilized and territorial defense forces unwilling to die at the positions,” the source said.

The footage shows the Russian military assaulting a Ukrainian stronghold. As soon as two Russian fighters enter the trench, five Ukrainian soldiers start running out the other side of the trench towards rear positions. However, after the fleeing soldiers reached their trench, Ukrainian barrier troops positioned there started shooting at their fellow soldiers and then threw grenades at them.

One of the retreating Ukrainian soldiers tried to run further to the rear, but the fighters from the barrier unit spotted him and started shooting him in the back.

See also:

Captive Ukrainian serviceman tells how National Guard shoots retreating soldiers in back

December 31, 2023 Posted by | Video, War Crimes | | Leave a comment

Russia explains retaliation for Ukrainian ‘terror attack’

RT | December 31, 2023

Russia’s military has conducted a string of high-precision missile strikes targeting Ukrainian military facilities and officials in response to the Ukrainian strike on Belgorod on Saturday that left more than 20 civilians dead, the Defense Ministry has said.

In a statement on Sunday, the ministry said that Moscow’s forces had struck decision-making centers and other military targets in the city of Kharkov, not far from the border between the two countries.

It noted that a high-precision missile strike on the building formerly housing the Kharkov Palace Hotel eliminated “representatives of the Main Intelligence Directorate and the Armed Forces of Ukraine, who were directly involved in the planning and execution of the terrorist attack in Belgorod.”

The building also housed up to 200 foreign mercenaries who were gearing up for “terrorist raids” into Russian territory, officials added.

Other strikes hit the building of Ukraine’s Security Service (SBU) and a temporary deployment area of Ukrainian nationalists. “Representatives of the SBU leadership, foreign mercenaries and fighters of the Kraken unit, who were directly preparing sabotage on Russian territory, have been taken out,” officials said.

In addition to this, an attack was carried out on a branch of the national space control center in western Ukraine, which had been used by Kiev for reconnaissance. Fuel depots in Kharkov and the Kiev-controlled part of Russia’s Zaporozhye Region were also destroyed, according to the statement. At the same time, the ministry stressed that the Russian military “only strikes military targets and infrastructure directly associated with them.”

Ukrainian officials in Kharkov have confirmed the barrage, saying that there had been six strikes that damaged “civilian infrastructure,” with 28 injured.

The new attack comes in response to a Ukrainian bombardment of Belgorod that killed at least 24 people, including four children, with 108 injured. Moscow has said that the barrage used both cluster munitions, as well as Czech-made projectiles. On Saturday, Vassily Nebenzia, Russia’s envoy to the UN, accused Western countries of complicity in the attack, warning that those who orchestrated it would be “punished.”

December 31, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , | Leave a comment

Putin lifts the fog of war in Ukraine

BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | INDIAN PUNCHLINE | DECEMBER 29, 2023 

Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine is entering a new phase. President Vladimir Putin lifted the fog of war and hinted at what can be expected going forward in a landmark speech at the National Defence Control Centre while addressing a meeting of the Russian Defence Ministry Board on December 19.  

Russia has gained the upper hand in the proxy war while the United States is struggling to recreate a new narrative. For Putin, this is a moment of triumph where he has no reason to take advantage of the fog of war in Ukraine, whereas, for President Biden, the fog of war continues to serve a useful purpose of dissimulation in the crucial election ahead where he seeks a second term. 

Putin’s speech exuded a buoyant mood. The Russian economy has not only regained its pre-2022 momentum but is accelerating toward a 3.5% growth rate by the yearend, marked by rising incomes and purchasing power for millions of its citizens and an increase in living standards. Unemployment is at an all-time low and Russia has beaten back the Western sanctions and the attempts to isolate it in the international arena. 

The leitmotif of Putin’s speech is that this is a war that Russia never sought but was imposed on it by the US. Putin had listed last year in February five clear-cut objectives of the Russian military operation — security of the Russian population; de-nazification of Ukraine; demilitarisation of Ukraine; striving for a friendly regime in Kiev; and, non-admission of Ukraine into NATO. These are of course interlocked objectives. The US and its allies know it but continue to pretend otherwise. Their focus in the proxy war has been a military victory and regime change in Russia. 

Putin’s message is that any new Western narrative on the war is doomed to meet the same fate as the previous one unless there is realism that Russia cannot be militarily defeated and its legitimate interests are recognised. 

The heart of the matter is that the West all along perceived Ukraine as a geopolitical project targeting Russia. Today, even with defeat staring at its face, the West’s priority lies in forcing Russia to agree to a ceasefire on the basis of the existing line of contact without any geopolitical or strategic obligations on the part of Washington or the transatlantic alliance — which, de facto, would mean leaving the door for the rearmament of the battered Ukrainian military and for Kiev’s accession to NATO through the back door. 

Suffice to say, the discredited agenda of using Ukraine as a pawn to pursue the West’s anti-Russian policy is still very much around. But Moscow will not fall for the US’ trap a second time, risking another war that may erupt at a time that suits NATO. 

Unsurprisingly, Putin’s speech paid great attention to revving up Russia’s defence industry to meet any military exigencies that might arise. But towards the end of his speech, Putin also dwelt on Russia’s politico-military options under the circumstances. 

On the military side, clearly, Russia will press forward the attritional war to its logical end of pushing the Ukrainian military into a strategic dead-end, which would mean seeking tactical improvements along the frontline, undermining Ukraine’s economic potential, inflicting military losses, and boosting Russia’s own defence industry on a scale that tips the balance of forces to weigh against any military adventures by NATO.  

In the final analysis, Putin asserted, Russia is determined to reclaim the “vast historical territories, Russian territories, along with the population” that the Bolsheviks transferred to Ukraine during the Soviet era. However, he drew an important distinction as regards the “western lands” of Ukraine (west of Dnieper) that are a legacy of World War II over which there could be territorial claims from Poland, Hungary and Romania, which at least in the case of Poland is also linked to the transfer of “eastern German lands, the Danzig Corridor, and Danzig itself” following the defeat of the Third Reich. 

Putin took note that “people who live there (western Ukraine) – many of them, at least, I know this for sure, 100 percent – they want to return to their historical homeland. The countries that lost these territories, primarily Poland, dream of having them back.” 

That said, interestingly, Putin simply washed his hands of any territorial disputes that may arise between Ukraine and its eastern neighbours (all of whom are NATO countries.) Looking ahead, this is going to be a can of worms for the US. Recently, Russia’s intelligence chief Sergey Naryshkin used a powerful metaphor, warning that the US may face a “second Vietnam” in Ukraine that will come to haunt it for a long time. 

The bottom line, as Putin framed it, is as follows: “History will put everything in its place. We (Moscow) will not interfere, but we will not give up what is ours. Everyone should be aware of this –- those in Ukraine who are aggressively disposed towards Russia, and in Europe, and in the United States. If they want to negotiate, let them do so. But we will do it only based on our interests.”

Putin concluded saying that if the final arbiter is military prowess, that explains why Russia is focusing on a “strong, reliable, well-equipped, and properly motivated Armed Forces” backed by a strong economy and “the support of the multi-ethnic people of Russia.” 

There is a strong likelihood of Russian military operations moving further westward toward the Dnieper in the coming months, well beyond the four new territories that joined the Russian Federation last year — Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporozhia, and Kherson. In the absence of any negotiated settlement, Russia may choose to unilaterally “liberate” those southern regions of Ukraine that were historically part of Russia, which would presumably include Odessa and the entire Black Sea coast, or Kharkov to the north of the Donbass region. 

Russia is expecting that the combat capabilities of the Ukrainian forces will sharply diminish in the near future and the army faces difficulty already to get new recruits. That is to say, through the year ahead, the balance of forces at the front will shift due to the Ukrainian military’s heavy losses and the drop in Western aid, and, at some point, Ukraine’s defences will begin to crumble.     

Russia’s recent gains in military operations — eg., Soledar, Artyomovsk (Bakhmut), Avdeevka, Maryinka, etc. — already testify to a shift in the balance of forces between the two armies. This shift will further accelerate as Russia’s military-industrial complex is functioning optimally and Russia is massively deploying new types of weapons, such as gliding aviation bombs, which have altered the role of the Russian Air Force in the conflict. 

Dozens of  heavy aerial bombs are dropped every single day and similarly, there is increase in the use of modern barrage ammunition and some other systems, including precision-guided munitions. T-90M tanks and new types of light armoured vehicles have also appeared on the battlefield. 

In comparison, Ukraine faces a decrease in arms supplies due to limited production capacities in the West where sustainable production growth on an industrial scale is not attainable in the near term. Meanwhile, the Middle East crisis and the tensions around Taiwan become major distractions for the US. 

All these factors taken into account, a decisive shift in the balance of forces against Ukraine is entirely conceivable by the end of next year, leading to an end of the conflict on Russia’s terms.

December 29, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , | Leave a comment

Ex-Pentagon Analyst: Honest Audit of US’ Ukraine Funding Only Possible Without Team Biden

Sputnik – 28.12.2023

The US government has reportedly been able to trace just $1.5 billion of the $75.4 billion it has approved for Ukraine, as per an RT analysis of a newly declassified US State Department IG report.

RT has obtained and analyzed materials from a declassified report by the inspector general of the US State Department concerning the costs of military support for Ukraine.

As per the report, Kiev has received at least $44 billion from the State Department since the beginning of the Russian special military operation. This was the most significant part of the total flow of American funding into Ukraine which amounted to at least $75.4 billion during 2022 and 2023. For its part, the Pentagon has provided the Ukrainian defense industry with almost $13 billion annually since 2022.

However, the US State Department has so far managed to trace only $1.5 billion – i.e. less than 2% of all monies approved by American lawmakers for Ukraine – explaining that the audit of the remaining funds has been complicated by military conditions. The materials reviewed by RT also blamed the lack of transparency on endemic corruption in Ukraine’s public and private sectors.

“The way the bureaucracies work here is that each department (State, USAID, Pentagon, etc) gets funding, and they dole it out, engage contractors, and associate that money with one of their ‘mission goals’,” retired US Air Force Lt. Col. Karen Kwiatkowski, a former analyst for the US Department of Defense, told Sputnik.

“There are at least three departmental channels, with the USAID paying for government salaries. The various channels by which US dollars are shipped into Ukraine probably contain overlap, especially in terms of Pentagon direct aid and foreign military sales activities, conducted by the State Department. While this creates more room for corruption in Kiev and elsewhere, in effect it simply broadens the field for people in the Ukrainian government and military to re-direct and misdirect those resources.”

Washington has routinely funded the Ukrainian military since 2014. Even though the US-funded 2021 Global Organized Crime Index called Ukraine one of the largest arms trafficking markets in Europe, military funding was considerably stepped up in 2022. Still, Ukraine corruption concerns related to an alleged waste of Western aid were openly articulated only at the end of 2023.

“As the US enters into a presidential campaign year, waste of money and fraud in Ukraine becomes an issue that is able to be leveraged by the Republicans and some Democrats who may be unhappy with Biden’s record of waste in Ukraine over the past several years,” explained Kwiatkowski. “Fraud and waste is always a hot-button voter issue, and it is today in the context of the severe drawdown and lack of supplies and munitions we have experienced in the US military, and NATO as well, since the Ukraine war started.”

Washington began on-site inspections in Ukraine to keep track of the arms it supplied around October 2022, following a series of reports alleging that US weapons were hard to trace in Ukraine and warning about potential arms smuggling. In 2023 several US government teams were dispatched to Ukraine to monitor ongoing US security assistance to Kiev.

In October, a confidential US strategy document obtained by Politico revealed that the Biden administration was far more concerned about Ukraine’s corruption than it publicly admitted. The document proposed a series of reforms to root out malfeasance in the US government and its numerous agencies, arguing that “perceptions of high-level corruption” could “undermine the Ukrainian public’s and foreign leaders’ confidence in the war-time government.”

So, will the latest effort to track US aid in Ukraine work?

“Audits take time, and are effective only when there is some institutional reward for cutting costs and exposing waste,” the former Pentagon analyst said.

“I have seen no reports of significance from past audit teams or these most recent efforts. The effective, more honest, audit will only occur after the Biden administration is displaced, whether at the end of 2024 or some later date, if Biden gains re-election. Until then, having ‘audits’ and audit teams in Ukraine are simply window dressing, designed to make Congress feel better about pouring more badly needed cash into the black hole of the Zelensky regime.”

December 28, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Deception, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

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