Heinous Choreography of Village Massacre as Zelensky Begs for More Weapons at EU Summit
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | October 8, 2023
The horrific missile strike on a Ukrainian village in which 52 people, including a young boy, were killed in a cafe was widely reported by Western media with strident condemnations of a Russian “war crime”.
All the American and European media reports relied solely on Ukrainian security sources for their immediate attribution of the massacre to Russian forces. It was claimed that a Russian Iskander missile hit the village of Hroza (Groza).
Russia did not make any comment on the specific accusations, simply repeating that its military does not deliberately target civilian centers.
The carnage on Thursday, October 5, occurred at the very same time that Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky was addressing a summit in Granada in Spain attended by European Union leaders. Zelensky referred to the missile strike in highly emotive language, condemning it as “Russian genocidal aggression”. EU leaders joined in the denunciation of Russia.
The BBC quoted Zelensky as saying the act “couldn’t even be called a beastly act – because it would be an insult to beasts”.
The purpose of Zelensky’s attendance in Granada was to make a renewed appeal for European NATO members to supply more air defence systems to Ukraine. It was reported that Spain pledged to send the U.S.-made HAWK system to Ukraine.
Zelensky also told European leaders that the political turmoil in the United States over the abrupt Congressional cutting off of financial aid to Ukraine was a “dangerous situation”.
The Biden White House referred to the missile strike on the village of Hroza as a reminder to U.S. lawmakers why continued military aid to Ukraine is essential.
As several Western media reports acknowledged, the targeted village with a population of around 300 did not have any military or tactical value. It is located around 17 miles (27 kms) from the front line between Ukrainian and Russian forces in the Kharkiv region.
The victims of the explosion were attending a funeral for a Ukrainian soldier. If Russia fired a missile it would have been for a depraved reason, as the Western media and politicians like Britain’s Prime Minister Rishi Sunak were quick to allege.
On the other hand, cynical as it might seem, for the Kiev regime there was a big incentive to stealthily carry out the missile strike against its territory for the propaganda value of blaming Russia. The timing comes at a crucial moment when the Kiev regime is “freaking out” over the possible long-term cutting off of military aid by the U.S. and its NATO partners.
Such a false-flag provocation carried out by the Kiev regime has precedent, albeit not reported by the Western media.
Last month, on September 6, the U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Kiev with an additional $1 billion in military and financial aid. Hours before Blinken arrived, the city of Konstantinovka (Kostiantynivka) was hit by a missile killing 17 people. The city is located in territory under the control of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU).
That atrocity was similarly condemned as “Russian terrorism” by Ukrainian President Zelensky while he was hosting Blinken in the capital.
Like the attack on Hroza last week, the one on Konstantinovka was immediately blamed on Russia and reported widely as such by Western media.
It turned out, however, that the missile that hit Konstantinovka was not fired by Russian forces. A follow-up report by the New York Times on September 18 found that the warhead had been fired from AFU positions. The NY Times described it as an “errant missile” that slammed into a busy marketplace by mistake. Nevertheless, despite the evidence, the Kiev regime continues to blame Russia for the crime.
There is good reason to conclude that the missile atrocity on September 6 was not “an error” but rather was deliberately staged by the Kiev regime as a false-flag provocation to highlight the visit by the senior American diplomat, Antony Blinken, and the need for his weapons gifting.
For those who don’t rely on the Western media for their information, it is well-documented that the NeoNazi Kiev regime has a foul habit of staging massacres for propaganda. The Bucha massacre last March was one such macabre event. This was when several civilians were found executed, their bodies strewn on streets, supposedly after Russian forces retreated from the city. All Western media blamed the apparent executions on Russia and continue to do so. But the freshness of the corpses found days after Russian troops pulled out of Bucha proves that the killings were done by others, probably Kiev agents.
Another probable false flag was the missile strike on a railway station in the city of Kramatorsk on April 8, 2022, that killed 63 people. Again, Russia was roundly blamed and condemned by Western media and politicians taking their cue from Ukrainian official sources. In that incident, the missile was later identified as a Tochka-U not in regular use by Russian forces, but more likely used by the AFU.
The Kramatorsk atrocity came on the day that European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen was visiting Kiev, condemning it as “despicable” and vowing tens of billions more Euros in support for the Kiev regime.
The Ukraine war has become an obscene racket for profiteering by the U.S. and European military industries, their lobbyists and most of the Western politicians they have close sponsorship links to, like Blinken and Von der Leyen. It is also a money-spinner for the corrupt Kiev regime whose President Zelensky and other cronies have made up to $400 million in skimming off aid, as reported by Seymour Hersh citing Pentagon sources. This rampant corruption was why the Kiev regime sacked most of its defence officials last month in a desperate attempt to appear as if it were cleaning up the graft.
Western public fatigue and disgust with the war racket are growing and imperilling the continuation of the colossal scam. False-flag atrocities are a logical, heinous way to keep the racket on track.
Biden has ‘creative ideas’ to keep Ukraine cash flowing – Politico
RT | October 8, 2023
The Biden administration is looking for “creative” ways to secure further military aid for Ukraine amid mounting opposition at home, POLITICO has reported. Meanwhile, Britain’s Telegraph newspaper claimed that the White House is considering the possibility of a mega aid package to the tune of $100 billion.
In its article on Friday, POLITICO quoted President Joe Biden hinting on Wednesday that “there is another means by which we may be able to find funding” for Kiev. According to the media outlet, the US leadership is considering using the State Department’s foreign military financing program. Under this, grants or loans are provided to partner countries to purchase weapons and defense equipment.
Another possible scenario presumably on the table has been floated by Democratic Senator Chris Van Hollen. The scheme envisages a three-way swap in which Poland would get America’s Iron Dome systems and send some of its own air defenses to Ukraine, POLITICO said. Israel, a co-producer of the system, which has veto authority over transfers, has previously refused to supply it directly to Ukraine despite Kiev’s repeated requests, the article explained.
The media outlet quoted the US lawmaker arguing that “Poland may be able to deploy its Patriot systems to Ukraine, where we’ve already deployed Patriot systems.”
The article concluded that the sheer fact that the Biden administration is apparently being forced to resort to such unconventional workarounds points to the fact that support for further military aid for Ukraine is waning among American lawmakers.
Representative Michael McCaul told reporters that “it’s going to be even harder now with [Speaker] McCarthy gone,” adding that supporters of aid for Kiev in the US Congress are “running out of time.”
Meanwhile on Saturday, The Telegraph, citing anonymous sources, reported that the Biden administration was considering a potential “one-and-done” Ukraine aid package totaling as much as $100 billion. The idea is presumably aimed at avoiding the requirement for multiple funding approvals from Congress until after the 2024 presidential election.
Last week, US House lawmakers passed a stopgap spending bill to avert a government shutdown, with new allocations for Ukraine conspicuously absent from it. This came as a growing number of Republicans in the House had been calling into question Biden’s generous aid for Kiev.
Congress has already approved four rounds of Ukraine funding, totaling about $113 billion.
Moscow and Kiev react to Israel-Palestine escalation
A destroyed Israeli Merkava tank on Israel-Gaza border in Gaza Strip, Gaza on October 07, 2023. © Getty Images / Anadolu Agency / Abed Rahim Khatib
RT | October 7, 2023
Russia and Ukraine, which have been locked in a major conflict for more than a year and a half, have reacted to the escalation of hostilities between Israel and the Palestinian militant group Hamas.
On Saturday, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Bogdanov urged both sides of the conflict to cease hostilities immediately. Russia’s stance on the latest Israel-Palestine escalation was further explained by the Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, who released a special statement on the matter.
“We call on the Palestinian and Israeli sides for an immediate ceasefire, renunciation of violence, exercising necessary restraint, and the launch, with the assistance of the international community, of a negotiation process aimed at establishing a comprehensive, lasting, and much-awaited peace in the Middle East,” Zakharova said.
The escalation in the region is yet another manifestation of the “closed cycle of violence,” the spokeswoman noted, adding that Russia believes the 75-year-long conflict cannot be solved through military means. The flare-up is a “result of a chronic failure to comply with relevant UN and Security Council resolutions,” as well as a derailment of the peace process by the collective West, Zakharova explained.
Meanwhile, Kiev proclaimed its full support for Israel, denouncing Hamas as “terrorists.”
“Ukraine strongly condemns the ongoing terrorist attacks against Israel, including rocket attacks against the civilian population in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv. We express our support for Israel in its right to defend itself and its people,” the Ukrainian foreign minister wrote on X, formerly known as Twitter.
This stance was amplified by Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, who took to Telegram to urge the “whole world” to support Israel in its fight against Palestinians.
“Horrible reports from Israel. My condolences to everyone whose family and friends died in the terrorist attack … Israel’s right to defense is beyond any doubt,” Zelensky stated.
Hamas initiated a major assault on Israel early on Saturday, launching dozens of rockets from Gaza, as well as attacking border checkpoints and infiltrating multiple locations across southern Israel. Footage circulating online suggests multiple Israeli military installations were overrun by Hamas militants, with a significant number of Israelis, both servicemen and civilians, killed or captured.
Israel responded with massive airstrikes on Gaza, which have already killed more than 150 people and injured nearly 1,000, according to the local health authority. Israel has also announced the mobilization of military reservists, with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu saying the country was now “at war.”
‘Biden plots stopgap funding for Ukraine aid’
RT | October 6, 2023
US President Joe Biden’s administration has reportedly set its sights on a State Department grant program to keep weapons and financial aid flowing to Ukraine, while waiting for divided Republican lawmakers to approve more spending to help Kiev fight Russian forces.
One of the stopgap-funding sources under consideration is a fund that provides grants or loans to US allies to buy weapons, Politico reported on Thursday, citing two unidentified government officials with knowledge of Biden’s plans. The president acknowledged on Wednesday that he was worried about a possible disruption to Ukraine aid amid congressional chaos, but he suggested that he might find another way to keep the funding going, at least temporarily, without getting a new spending bill passed.
Washington’s continued support for Ukraine was thrown into doubt last week, when Republicans stripped Biden’s $24 billion aid request out of a spending bill that averted a government shutdown for 45 days. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) was voted out of his leadership position on Tuesday, the first such ouster in US history, reportedly after conservative Republicans heard that he had promised Biden a separate Ukraine funding bill.
The State Department, the Pentagon and Biden himself have warned this week that any disruption to aid could have devastating consequences for Ukraine on the battlefield. Republicans have become increasingly critical of Biden’s Ukraine strategy as public support for funding the bloody conflict wanes. Congress has already approved four rounds of Ukraine funding, totaling about $113 billion.
Biden administration officials have privately admitted that only weeks remain before a potential lapse in US funding to Kiev. The State Department grant program had about $650 million remaining as of September 21. Lawmakers originally allotted $4.6 billion for the program, which was designed to provide military grants and financing to Ukraine and other allies affected by the conflict with Russia.
However, even if the administration uses the financing authority to purchase weapons, it will still need approval from Congress to authorize additional funding for Ukraine, a US official told Politico. A Pentagon official said the White House also would need approval from lawmakers to redirect other defense spending to Kiev.
The Pentagon warned last week that it had exhausted “nearly all available security-assistance funding for Ukraine.” About $1.6 billion in funding remains to replace US weapons that were sent to the Ukrainians.
Europe worried that US support for Ukraine waning
By Ahmed Adel | October 6, 2023
Dutch Defence Minister Kajsa Ollongren made a shocking statement at the Warsaw Security Forum by emphasising the strategic importance of arming Ukraine as a cost-effective means of containing Russia when responding to questions about the sustainability of US and allied support for Kiev given the political turbulence in Washington.
“Of course, supporting Ukraine is a very cheap way to make sure that Russia with this regime is not a threat to the NATO alliance. And it’s vital to continue that support,” she said. “It is very much in our interest to support Ukraine, because they are fighting this war, we are not fighting it.”
Responding to the shocking admittance that NATO only views Ukraine as a “very cheap way” to contain Russia, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said on October 5 that Ukrainians would soon “stop liking” how they are seen and used by the West.
“[The West does not hide its intention to fight to the last Ukrainian and continues to use Ukraine] as cheap soldiers,” the spokesman said when commenting on Ollongren’s recent statement that it was vital to continue to support Ukraine. “[Soon, Ukrainians will begin to hear such statements] in a different light for themselves” and “they will stop liking it.”
Mentioning developments “overseas,” referring to the US, Ollongren said it is “worrying and also I think we have to address that worry.”
“We cannot pretend that we’ll just wait and see how the American elections are going,” she said before highlighting that if Washington’s support for Ukraine falls, that would be “substantial.”
Her concern about the situation in the US comes as a survey by the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, published on October 4, found that 47% of Americans believe the US should support Ukraine for as long as necessary, a drop from 58% in July 2022; support for providing economic and military assistance to Ukraine has dropped from 78% in March 2022 to 61% in September 2023; and, support for sending US troops to Ukraine dropped from 36% in March 2022 to 26% in September 2023.
According to the survey, “There have been dips in support, which is not surprising given that both the length of the conflict and the extent of the US financial contribution have likely exceeded Americans’ initial expectations.”
“Americans express less confidence now than in previous surveys that Ukraine is doing better than Russia on the battlefield. Now only 14 percent of Americans say Ukraine has the advantage in the war, compared with 26 percent in November 2022,” the Chicago Council on Global Affairs report added.
US President Joe Biden has long been confident that Congress would continue to provide billions of dollars in support to Ukraine, even as the situation becomes increasingly tense in a divided Washington. The last agreement was only to avoid a collapse of the American government. However, it should not last long as it became clear how unpredictable Washington can be in its negotiations to support Ukraine as it continues encountering serious difficulties.
To avoid the collapse of the government, on September 30, a decision to leave Ukraine out of the budget was made, demonstrating that the situation is not only delicate but there is also great pressure from critics of the support given by Biden to Kiev. The challenge now, especially for the Europeans, is that a politically polarised America extends to foreign policy.
Despite all the domestic financial problems, the US continues to allocate huge funds to Ukraine. Since February 2022, Kiev has received more than $110 billion from Washington. This means that the “very cheap way” to fight Russia is turning out to be very expensive, as demonstrated by the fact that the government of the world’s greatest superpower almost shut down.
The removal of House Speaker Kevin McCarthy from the US Congress only worsens the already troubled process of Washington’s military and financial aid for Ukraine as its counteroffensive against Russia grinds on with little change to the frontlines. This is significant because, without a Speaker, the House cannot pass legislation, throwing Washington’s military backing for Kiev into doubt since it could be another week or more before a successor is elected.
Although Ukraine is not a “very cheap way” for NATO to fight Russia, the statement by Ollongren provides a fascinating insight into how the Atlantic bloc views the beleaguered Eastern European country – nothing more than an expendable proxy weaponised against its far larger and more powerful neighbour.
Ahmed Adel is a Cairo-based geopolitics and political economy researcher.
Ukraine’s backers blinded by Russia hate – top analyst
RT | October 5, 2023
Kiev’s globalist and neo-conservative supporters in the West are so driven by their hatred of Russia that they completely disregard the hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians who are dying in a futile effort to defeat Moscow’s forces, US public policy analyst Jeffrey Sachs has argued.
Sachs, an award-winning economist who advised the Russian and Ukrainian governments following the breakup of the Soviet Union, made his comments in an interview posted on Thursday by US podcast host Andrew Napolitano. Asked how the US and its NATO allies can ignore the catastrophic destruction of Ukraine while prolonging the conflict and making false claims of battlefield successes, Sachs said they are “blinded” by their hatred of Russia.
“They are not counting the Ukrainian dead,” the analyst said. “They have lied to the public all along about the military situation . . . . They want so much to fight Russia and have someone else do the fighting and the dying that they want another massive recruitment of the remaining Ukrainian young men that can be grabbed off the streets and be thrown into the killing fields.”
More than 83,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed during a Donbass counteroffensive that began in June, according to an estimate released by the Russian Defense Ministry last month. Despite knowing that the Ukrainians have no chance of making major gains on the battlefield amid Russia’s air superiority and artillery dominance, Kiev’s benefactors have shown a “grotesque” disregard for the heavy casualties, Sachs said. He argued that the UK, in particular, has championed the counteroffensive because of London’s centuries-long and deeply embedded desire to crush Russia.
Sachs, now a UN adviser and director of the Center for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, has argued that NATO’s expansion into Eastern Europe helped trigger the current crisis. He said Washington and its allies missed many opportunities to avoid the current conflict, then kept it going by discouraging Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky from finalizing a peace deal with Russia in March 2022.
Responding to claims by former US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton that critics of Washington’s Ukraine policy are “siding with” Russian President Vladimir Putin, Sachs argued that he’s showing concern for the Ukrainian people. “I don’t want Ukraine to be completely destroyed by these neocons, by their fantasy world, by their desire to throw Ukrainians by the hundreds of thousands to their deaths,” he said. He added, “This isn’t siding with Putin or siding with anybody. This is trying to protect Ukraine from American zealots.”
Sachs claimed that US President Joe Biden must reach out to Putin to negotiate an end to the bloodshed, which would involve ruling out adding Ukraine to NATO, as well as addressing Russia’s legitimate security concerns. “We have stoked so much provocation in this, so much anxiety, overthrowing governments, starting multiple wars, pushing NATO enlargement, abandoning nuclear agreements, and then saying, ‘Oh, he doesn’t want to negotiate,’” the analyst said.
McCarthy’s Ouster Signals US ‘Preparing Populace at Large’ to Defund Ukraine
By Ilya Tsukanov – Sputnik – 05.10.2023
Kevin McCarthy lost the House speakership this week after his GOP colleague Matt Gaetz tabled a motion to remove him over alleged “side deal” talks with President Biden and the Democrats on Ukraine funding. The shock ouster comes amid growing weariness among Americans over the proxy war, and possible preparations to dump Kiev, experts told Sputnik.
The fallout over Kevin McCarthy’s historically unprecedented removal as speaker of the House of Representatives continues to send shockwaves of confusion and dread across the furthest reaches of the American empire, including in Ukraine.
“We are freaking out. For us it is a disaster,” Ivanna Klympush-Tsintsadze, a senior Ukrainian lawmaker responsible for lobbying Kiev’s efforts to join the European Union, told US media, commenting on the threat of Washington cutting off its military and financial support.
“We are interested in getting things sorted out so American democracy can function, and so we can restore the bipartisan consensus on supporting their own national interest by supporting Ukraine,” Klympush-Tsintsadze emphasized. Apparently, to the politician, a “functioning” American democracy seems to mean continuing to pump tens of billions of additional dollars into Kiev, which faces a looming debt crisis, and is now dependent on Washington and its allies for some 70 percent of all government expenses, as Western creditors prepare to collect dividends on their “investments.”
“There is nothing good, but, objectively, we have simply become hostages of their internal politics,” Ukrainian parliament finance committee deputy chairman Yaroslav Zheleznyak complained, referring to last week’s budget deal showdown – in which Republicans threatened to force a shutdown if the budget included billions in additional funding for Kiev.
The Zelensky government estimates that Kiev still has access to about $1.6 billion in US defense support and $1.23 billion in budgetary assistance. The Pentagon says some $5.4 billion in cash also remain in Presidential Drawdown Authority funds –allowing for weapons stocks from American armories to be sent to Kiev. However, senior Biden administration officials, including the president himself, have expressed fears that “only weeks remain” before a lack of additional funding will start becoming “a serious battlefield concern” for Kiev.
“It does worry me,’ Joe Biden told reporters Wednesday, when asked about the possibility of funds drying up. “But I know there are a majority of members of the House and Senate in both parties who have said that they would support funding Ukraine,” he added. “I’m going to make the argument that it’s overwhelmingly in the interest of the United States of America that Ukraine succeeds.”
“Obviously, time is of the essence,” an administration official stressed, warning of the risks of Congress sitting on its hands without appropriating additional cash to Kiev before the current short-term spending package runs out in mid-November.
Preparing the Public for Bad News?
“I have difficulty thinking of Ukraine as a primary issue for American politicians,” Dr. Nicolai Petro, an international politics professor at the University of Rhode Island, told Sputnik, commenting on the role played by Ukraine funding in the chaos in Washington over the past week.
“I think it is more of a symbolic issue and that their primary interest is not voting up or down on Ukraine aid,” but “what that symbolizes and how it can play out in the American political process.”
Pointing to the deeply murky nature of US spending on Ukraine and the “hide the ball” approach to appropriations, Petro predicted that the Biden administration will likely be able to squeeze out more cash from already appropriated funding for some time even if additional Congressional funding dries up.
The growing debate in Washington over Ukraine has also rippled across the Atlantic to Britain – the second-staunchest supporter within NATO of continuing the proxy war. Even there, Petro pointed out, a debate seems to be gaining strength over just how much more money can be lifted from taxpayers’ pockets and transferred to Kiev.
“London and Washington seem to be on the same wavelength here. We’re both at the same time ramping up production and are not sure how much we have and how much is even needed. Last month, for example, the new UK defense minister said London would deliver tens of thousands of new artillery shells. Three weeks later, it’s ‘we’ve given away as much as we can afford’. This sort of flip-flop is very convenient when you’re preparing the populace at large for a transition of policy from ‘we’ll do whatever it takes as long as it takes’ to ‘no we really need to be thinking about the cost.’ That’s a very different argument to make,” the academic emphasized.
This shift in rhetoric is related to the fact that the US and some of its allies are approaching crucial elections, with “all the polls and the recent elections [in Europe] suggest[ing] that this NATO proxy war in Ukraine is extremely unpopular. And that in and of itself it is going to at least affect the narrative between now and several key elections,” Petro said.
Dems Shoot Themselves in the Foot
McCarthy was ousted Tuesday by an extremely narrow margin of 216 in favor to 210 opposed, with only eight Republicans – led by rebel Florida Congressman Matt Gaetz, supporting his removal alongside Democrats.
“My biggest question going forward is, is this going to be the right move for Democrats?” independent US journalist Rachel Blevins told Sputnik.
“Because they may have just shot themselves in the foot a little bit by getting rid of someone like Kevin McCarthy, who was trying to work with them, you know, maybe promising a separate vote to ensure funding for Ukraine and all that. Well now it could end up being that the next Republican speaker does not want to work with them whatsoever,” the observer pointed out.
The ouster could have repercussions for Ukraine going forward. While interim House Speaker Patrick McHenry has repeatedly supported Congressional votes on Ukraine funding – apart from last week’s attempt to roll assistance into the government funding bill, several candidates vying for the speakership have expressed opposition to further aid, including Ohio Congressman Jim Jordan, Oklahoma Representative Kevin Hern, and Florida Congressman Byron Donalds.
What a Difference a Year Makes
“I know that Joe Biden is not happy right now,” Blevins emphasized. “He’s probably the most furious with all of this, because he was expecting McCarthy to get that funding through. He was not happy that it was not there in that bill to keep the government open.”
“What was interesting was to see that back and forth” over Ukraine, the observer added. “Because in the Senate, they had at least $6 billion for Ukraine, which is a lot of money to the average person, obviously. But when it comes to Ukraine, that’s just enough to keep it rolling for a few months. So they come up with $6 billion. Then in the House, they basically put Democrats in a position where they said, ok, here’s a funding bill to keep the government open. If you say you’re against it, it’s literally just over Ukraine funding. So that’s on you. And you have to answer to your constituents and saying that you wanted a government shutdown just so that you could fund a country that most Americans can’t find on a map,” the observer said.
“Also notable is the latest polls show that half of the American public doesn’t think Congress should keep continuing to approve funding for Ukraine. And so whenever those members of Congress go in there, they’re going to have to find a better justification for it than now, because it’s something that at least half of Americans don’t say is a priority. And that’s certainly not where Congress was even just one year ago when they were passing unprecedented funding and there was no fight about it whatsoever,” Blevins summed up.
NATO member suspends military aid to Ukraine
RT | October 5, 2023
Slovakia is halting military aid to Ukraine due to opposition from political parties currently negotiating to form a new government, the Dennik N news outlet reported on Wednesday, citing presidential spokesman Martin Strizinec.
The official told the outlet that the Slovak head of state, President Zuzana Caputova, pointed out that there is the need to “respect the results of democratic elections.” The victorious Slovak Social Democracy (SMER-SD) party has promised voters “not a single round [of ammunition] for Ukraine.”
“It would not be a good precedent to decide to provide military equipment in such a situation when there is a change of political power after any election,” Strizinec said.
After winning the parliamentary election on Sunday, SMER-SD leader Robert Fico, a former prime minister, told journalists that “Slovakia and the people of Slovakia have bigger problems than Ukraine.”
He added that if his party successfully forms a government, it would still be open to helping Ukraine, but only in a humanitarian way.
Last week, Kiev hosted the International Industries Defense Forum with participants from 30 countries, where Ukrainian officials went on a “charm offensive directed at weapons-makers,” Politico reported. An unnamed European official told the agency that there was no way to “keep giving from their own stockpiles” because they had already sent Ukraine everything that does not endanger their own security.
According to the Wall Street Journal, the Ukrainian government will be unable to pay civil servants if the US Congress fails to approve continued financing for Kiev.
Ukraine Fatigue Is Worrying NATO Elites – and So They Should Be
By Finian Cunningham | Strategic Culture Foundation | October 4, 2023
On both sides of the Atlantic, there is now discernible fatigue and anger among citizens over the bottomless money pit that is NATO’s proxy war in Ukraine against Russia.
The only wonder is that it has taken so long for the Western public to get wise to the scam.
The disgraceful adulation of a Nazi war criminal by the whole Canadian parliament in a perverse show of solidarity with Ukraine against Russia has helped focus public attention on the obscenity of the NATO proxy war.
All told, since the NATO-induced conflict blew up in February last year, the American and European establishments have thrown up to €200 billion into Ukraine to prop up an odious Nazi-infested regime.
All that largesse that is billed to U.S. and European taxpayers has resulted in a slaughter in Europe not seen since the Second World War – and a failed Ukrainian state. And of course huge profits for the NATO military-industrial complex that bankrolls the elite politicians.
Times are changing though. In the United States, the financially conservative Republicans have had enough of the blank checks to the Kiev regime. The U.S. Congress finally showed a modicum of sanity to prevent a government financial shutdown – by dropping military aid to Ukraine. That shows how twisted Washington’s priorities have become when national self-interest has to wrestle with funding for a Nazi regime.
And then following the Congressional vote to temporarily end funding for Ukraine, the Kiev regime’s foreign minister Dmytro Kuleba dared to reprimand American lawmakers: “We are now working with both sides of Congress to make sure that it does not (get) repeated under any circumstances.”
Meanwhile in Europe, Slovakian citizens have voted for a new government to end the military fueling of war in Ukraine. The Smer-SD party led by Robert Fico won the parliamentary elections primarily on the vow to shut off any further weapons supply to the Kiev regime.
This week also saw massive protests in Germany against Olaf Scholz’s coalition government over the latter’s abject pro-war policies in Ukraine. German Unity Day on October 3 prompted a mass rally in Berlin denouncing the NATO proxy war in Ukraine and calling for peace negotiations to end the conflict.
There were also unprecedented protests across Poland in Warsaw, Lodz and other cities against the PiS government’s slavish implementation of the U.S.-led NATO proxy war in Ukraine. Faced with millions of Ukrainian refugees and neglect of social needs for Poles, the PiS ruling party has recently threatened to end weapons supply to Kiev – a move less about principle and more about trying to buy votes in the forthcoming election on October 15. Nevertheless, the belated move by the Polish government illustrates the concern among European leaders about growing public disdain over the seemingly endless financial aid allocated to Ukraine.
Josep Borrell, the European Union’s top diplomat, says it is a “worrying” sign that Washington for the first time closed the coffers for Ukraine.
The EU foreign ministers held a summit in Kiev on Monday. It was the first time that their summit was convened in a non-EU country. The agenda was a little too self-conscious, slated as a show of “solidarity” with Ukraine.
Borrell and the other EU diplomats said the summit was a warning to Russia to not count on “weariness” among Europeans over support for Ukraine. Who is he trying to convince? Russia or Europeans?
The unelected European elites described the war in Ukraine as an “existential crisis” which requires never-ending support for the Nazi regime against Russia.
Such melodrama needs serious qualification. The conflict is only “existential” for certain people: the NATO ideologues, the elitist leaders, the military-industrial complex, and the corrupt Nazi regime in Kiev. But it’s not existential for most other people who want to end this insane slaughter, grotesque wasting of public finances, and perilous flirting with nuclear war.
Significantly, the contrived EU summit in Kiev was not attended by Hungary’s foreign minister Peter Szijjarto. In highly critical comments on the EU’s misplaced priorities, he said that other countries do not understand why Europe “has made this conflict global” and why people living in Asia, Africa and Latin America have to pay for it due to growing inflation, energy prices and unstable food supplies.
The Hungarian diplomat slammed the EU leaders for their double standards and hypocrisy, adding: “I can say that the world outside Europe is already really looking forward to the end of this war because they do not understand many things. They do not understand, for example, how it can be that when a war is not in Europe, the European Union, looking down with fantastic moral superiority, calls on the parties to peace, advocates negotiations and an immediate end to violence. However, when there is a war in Europe, the European Union incites the conflict and supplies weapons, and anyone who talks about peace is immediately stigmatized.”
At least two members of the EU and the NATO alliance – Hungary and Slovakia’s new government – are opposed to the absurd military and financial support fueling the war in Ukraine. Both countries want peace negotiations with Russia to be prioritized. There is an unavoidable sense that this common sense dissent will grow into a domino effect because it is the truth and has an unassailable moral force.
What the conflict in Ukraine has demonstrated clearly to the Western public is just how morally bankrupt their governments and media have become. American and European elitist leaders may kid themselves a little longer by pretending there is no weariness and fatigue over their proxy war against Russia. The more they pretend the greater the eventual crash and downfall from public anger.
Defense Stocks Fall As Paralyzed House With No Speaker Puts US Ukraine Aid At Risk
By Tyler Durden | Zero Hedge | October 4, 2023
On Tuesday evening, Kevin McCarthy, a Republican, was voted out (216-to-210 vote) as the Speaker of the US House of Representatives. Hardline Republicans were angered by McCarthy’s willingness to fund Ukraine’s war while arguing that the money could have been better spent to protect the southern border and restore law and order in imploding major US cities. The historic ouster of the speaker has weighed on defense stocks as traders anticipate challenges for the new speaker in securing further funding for Ukraine.
“The conservative revolt that ousted McCarthy has left the chamber in a state of paralysis until a new speaker is found. That raises the chances of a US government shutdown next month and a delay in further Ukraine assistance,” Bloomberg said.
In a note to clients, Goldman’s Alec Phillips said:
All other things equal, the leadership change raises the odds of a government shutdown in November, though with several weeks left until the deadline, many outcomes are possible. With many policy disputes remaining and a $120bn difference between the parties on the preferred spending level for FY2024, it is difficult to see how Congress can pass the 12 necessary full-year spending bills before funding expires Nov. 17. The next speaker is likely to be under even more pressure to avoid passing another temporary extension—or additional funding for Ukraine—than former Speaker McCarthy had been.
On Wednesday morning, European defense stocks, such as Rheinmetall, Saab, BAE Systems, and Leonardo, slid in the cash market. Bloomberg said this was because of the oustering of McCarthy.
German arms manufacturer Rheinmetall dropped as much as 4.8%.
Swedish aerospace and defense company Saab fell 3%.
British multinational arms, security, and aerospace company BAE Systems slid 3.5%
And Italian defense contractor Leonardo was down 2%.
In the US, uncertainty over funding will likely weigh on defense stocks. The S&P 500 Aerospace & Defense Index has been running into resistance for much of this year.
Washington’s endless stream of taxpayer funds to Ukraine has benefited the military-industrial complex. Now, it appears that the pipeline of easy money is in question due to the ouster of McCarthy.
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Jewish Guilt is the Discourse of The Goyim
By Gilad Atzmon | April 24, 2018
For quite some time the British have accepted that British Jewish organizations have hijacked the political discourse. As has happened in other Western countries, the British political establishment has engaged is a relentless rant against antisemitsm. Sometime the focus drifts for a day or two. An alleged ‘Russian nerve gas attack’ provided a 48 hour pause. Occasionally we bomb Arabs in the name of ‘human intervention’ only to realize a day or two later that we have, once again, followed a premeditated foreign agenda. But, somehow, we always return to the antisemitism debate, as if our media and politicians are a herd of flies gravitating to a pile of poop. … continue
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