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Did Head of CDC Vaccine Safety Office Delete COVID Vaccine Injury Records?

By Michael Nevradakis, Ph.D. | The Defender | April 11, 2025

A key official at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) responsible for monitoring vaccine safety and reports of vaccine injuries may have mishandled or deleted official records subpoenaed by Congress, Sen. Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) alleged earlier this week. The New York Post first reported the story on Thursday.

Dr. Tom Shimabukuro, director of the CDC Immunization Safety Office, maintained the records in question. Shimabukuro previously authored a key paper and participated in public messaging claiming the COVID-19 vaccines were safe and effective for pregnant women.

Johnson, chairman of the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, requested the records in a subpoena sent in January to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services (HHS). The subpoena pertained to an investigation into internal COVID-19 vaccine safety communications.

According to the New York Post, the subpoena led HHS to discover “potential discrepancies” in the emails maintained by Shimabukuro.

“HHS officials recently informed me that Dr. Shimabukuro’s records remain lost and, potentially, removed from HHS’s email system altogether,” Johnson wrote in a letter he sent earlier this week to U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi, FBI Director Kash Patel and HHS Principal Deputy Inspector General Juliet Hodgkins.

Johnson called Shimabukuro’s possible mishandling of his official records “highly concerning.”

Journalist Paul D. Thacker, a former U.S. Senate investigator, said, “Every American should be concerned about government scientists deleting or hiding federal information to shape a political agenda. That information belongs to the taxpayers.”

Nebraska chiropractor Ben Tapper, whose questioning of the COVID-19 vaccines led the Center for Countering Digital Hate to add him in 2021 to its “Disinformation Dozen” list of the “leading online anti-vaxxers,” said he was “not surprised” by Johnson’s allegations.

“For years, I’ve seen patterns like this before regarding vaccine safety data. The public health establishment often prioritizes profits over people and continuously seems to protect the lies over the truth. The idea that critical records might vanish — whether through negligence or intent — fits a familiar playbook,” Tapper said.

California attorney Rick Jaffe said Johnson’s allegations are “troubling, but not surprising, given longstanding concerns about transparency at the CDC.”

In response to a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request last year, the CDC told Children’s Health Defense the agency has no records of certain internal email communications relating to the agency’s follow-up investigation of safety signals associated with COVID-19 vaccines.

HHS, CDC and Johnson’s office did not respond to requests for comment.

Missing records ‘could contain unfiltered insights’ into vaccine adverse events

Citing an unnamed aide from Johnson’s office, the New York Post said it is unclear which specific records are missing. But according to Johnson’s letter, Shimabukuro’s role included “monitoring adverse events relating to the COVID-19 vaccines.”

Tapper said Shimabukuro may have been “handling sensitive data on adverse events linked to the COVID-19 vaccines,” including data from the U.S. government-run Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) and the V-safe database, as well as studies, raw data and internal communications on vaccine-related safety signals.

Tapper said:

“These records could contain unfiltered insights into side effects that were downplayed or unresolved during the pandemic. For example, I’ve seen cases in my practice where patients developed symptoms like persistent fatigue or heart palpitations post-vaccination, yet struggled to get clear answers from authorities.

“Missing records could hide similar signals, undermining efforts to validate patient experiences or refine vaccine protocols.”

Internal medicine physician Dr. Clayton J. Baker said, “Such records would likely be very damning to all CDC officials who perpetuated the false ‘safe and effective’ narrative about the COVID-19 vaccines from 2021 until the present.”

“Given how damning any evidence of ignored or falsified safety signals would be, I think it is highly likely that Biden-era officials might try to destroy such records if they could. Better to be accused of destruction of federal records than to be charged as an accessory to mass negligent homicide,” Baker said.

In an April 2023 presentation to the CDC Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, Shimabukuro claimed that surveillance conducted by international regulatory and public health partners “has not detected a safety concern for ischemic stroke following bivalent COVID-19 mRNA booster vaccination.”

Yet, a peer-reviewed study published in November 2024 found that mRNA COVID-19 vaccines pose a 112,000% greater risk of brain clots and strokes than flu vaccines, and a 20,700% greater risk of those symptoms than all other vaccines combined. The study called for a global moratorium on mRNA vaccines.

In 2021, Shimabukuro was the lead author of a study in The New England Journal of Medicine (NEJM) on the safety of COVID-19 vaccines for pregnant women. The study concluded that “preliminary findings did not show obvious safety signals among pregnant persons who received mRNA Covid-19 vaccines.”

However, a peer-reviewed study published in 2022 showed that the authors of the NEJM study performed a “statistical sleight-of-hand” that substantially lowered the miscarriage rate in pregnant women, presenting it as 12.6% instead of 82%.

In a Substack post, epidemiologist Nicolas Hulscher said Shimabukuro’s “potential involvement in the deliberate manipulation of critical safety data on COVID-19 mRNA injections during pregnancy carries grave implications — resulting in immeasurable harm to mothers and their unborn children worldwide.”

Shimabukuro ‘may have violated multiple federal laws’

According to a press release from Johnson’s office, Shimabukuro’s actions, if proven to have occurred, “may have violated multiple federal laws.”

Those laws include the Federal Records Act, which requires federal employees to preserve materials “made or received by a Federal agency under Federal law or in connection with the transaction of public business,” the New York Post reported.

Johnson wrote that the destruction of records subpoenaed by Congress may also be “grounds for contempt of Congress,” which, according to the New York Post, is punishable by up to a six-figure fine and 12 months in prison.

Jaffe said Shimabukuro may also face other penalties. He said:

“Under federal law, he could be charged with obstruction of justice or destruction of official records — risking fines, restitution and up to 20 years in prison. His federal pension could also be garnished to satisfy any judgment against him.

“Beyond criminal penalties, he faces permanent disqualification from federal service and career-ending reputational harm.”

In addition, if records relating to vaccine-injured people are missing or destroyed, impairing their legal cases, “courts could impose evidentiary sanctions or presume the destroyed records were unfavorable to the government,” Jaffe said.

Johnson’s letter also referred to Dr. David Morens, an employee of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases who was a close aide of the agency’s former director, Dr. Anthony Fauci. Morens allegedly deleted emails and instructed colleagues to contact him at a personal email account to sidestep FOIA rules.

In his letter, Johnson accused HHS of a “lack of transparency” and failure to investigate the allegations against Morens.

“I had always suspected that Dr. Morens was not the sole evader of federal record-keeping requirements at HHS,” Johnson wrote. “The extent to which HHS officials systemically mishandled, deleted, or destroyed their communications, data, and other information relating to the COVID-19 pandemic and the vaccines must be thoroughly investigated.”

Johnson’s letter asks the FBI, the U.S. Department of Justice and the HHS Inspector General’s Office to investigate the matter, including whether records were intentionally destroyed to “avoid or subvert Congressional oversight or the Freedom of Information Act.”

The letter builds on Johnson’s efforts to investigate COVID-19 vaccine safety.

Earlier this week, Johnson sent letters to the heads of four COVID-19 vaccine manufacturers, requesting they turn over records related to the development and safety of the COVID-19 vaccines and their communications with Big Tech platforms about vaccine-related adverse events.

In November 2024, Johnson wrote a letter to HHS, CDC and FDA, asking the agencies to “preserve all records referring or relating to the development, safety, and efficacy of the COVID-19 vaccines.”

In an October 2023 letter to the then-heads of CDC and FDA, Johnson accused the agencies of an “appalling” lack of transparency regarding COVID-19 vaccine safety signals, depriving Americans of “the benefit of informed consent.”

During the Biden administration, Johnson wrote over 70 letters to HHS officials and its health agencies requesting information on COVID-19 vaccine adverse events and related communications, according to a Jan. 29 press release.

Last year, Johnson hosted a congressional roundtable to discuss the risks of COVID-19 vaccines. Medical experts, political figures, journalists and whistleblowers were among the participants.

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

April 13, 2025 Posted by | Deception, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

Leaked files reveal the Steele Dossier was discredited in 2017 — but sold to the public anyway

By Kit KLARENBERG | MintPress News | April 8, 2025 

On March 25, Donald Trump signed an executive order declassifying all documentation related to Crossfire Hurricane, the FBI’s 2016 investigation into alleged collusion between Russia and then-presidential candidate Donald Trump. The order has unexpectedly resurrected buried documents that cast new light on the Steele dossier — and when it was known to be false.

It is unclear what new information will be revealed, given substantial previous declassifications, two special counsel investigations, multiple congressional inquiries, several civil lawsuits, and a scathing Justice Department internal review. It has long been confirmed the FBI relied heavily on Steele’s discredited dossier to secure warrants against Trump aide Carter Page, despite grave internal concerns about its origins and reliability, and Steele’s sole “subsource” for all its lurid allegations openly admitted in interviews with the Bureau he could offer no corroboration for any of the dossier’s claims.

Such inconvenient facts and damning disclosures were nonetheless concealed from the public for several years following the dossier’s January 2017 publication by BuzzFeed News, now defunct. In the intervening time, it became the central component of the Russiagate narrative, a conspiracy theory that was a major rallying point for countless mainstream journalists, pundits, public figures, Western intelligence officials, and elected lawmakers. In the process, Steele attained mythological status. For example, NBC News dubbed the former MI6 operative “a real-life James Bond.”

Primetime news networks dedicated countless hours to the topic, while leading media outlets invested enormous time, energy and money into verifying the dossier’s claims without success. Undeterred, legacy reporters relied on a roster of mainstream “Russia experts,” including prominent British and U.S. military and intelligence veterans, and briefings from anonymous officials to reinforce Steele’s credibility and the likely veracity of his dossier. As award-winning investigative journalist Aaron Maté told MintPress News :

Media outlets served as unquestioning stenographers for Steele. If his dossier’s claims themselves weren’t sufficient to dismiss it with ridicule, another obvious marker should have set off alarms. Reading the dossier chronologically, a clear pattern emerges – many of its most explosive claims are influenced by contemporary media reporting. For instance, it was only after Wikileaks published the DNC emails in July 2016 that the dossier mentioned them. This is just one example demonstrating the dossier’s true sources were overactive imaginations and mainstream news outlets.”

Even more damningly, leaked documents reviewed by MintPress News reveal that while Western journalists were hard at work attempting to validate Steele’s dossier and elevating the MI6 spy to wholly undeserved pillars of probity, the now-defunct private investigations firm GPW Group was, in early 2017, secretly unearthing vast amounts of damaging material that fatally undermined the dossier’s content, and comprehensively dismantling Steele’s previously unimpeachable public persona. It remains speculative what impact the firm’s findings might have had if they had been released publicly at the time.

‘Financial Incentives’

GPW’s probe of Steele and his dossier was commissioned by Carter Ledyard & Milburn, a law firm representing Mikhail Fridman, Petr Aven, and German Khan — owners of Alfa Bank. The dossier leveled several serious allegations against them. The trio purportedly possessed a “kompromat” on Vladimir Putin, delivered “illicit cash” to him throughout the 1990s, and routinely provided the Kremlin with “informal advice” on foreign policy — “especially about the U.S.” Meanwhile, Alfa Bank supposedly served as a clandestine back channel between Trump and Moscow.

“In order to build a profile of Christopher Steele… as well as the broader operations of both Orbis Business Intelligence and Fusion GPS,” which commissioned the dossier on behalf of Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign and the Democratic National Committee, GPW consulted “a variety of sources.” This included “U.S. intelligence figures,” various journalists, “private intelligence subcontractors” who had previously worked with Steele and Orbis, and “contacts who knew the man from his time with [MI6]…and, in one instance, directly oversaw his work.”

The picture that emerged of Steele sharply contrasted with his mainstream portrayal as a “superstar.” One operative who “acted as Steele’s manager when he began working with [MI6] and later supervised him at two further points” described him as “average, middle of the road,” stating he had never “shined” in any of his postings. Another suggested Steele’s founding of Orbis “was the source of some incredulity” within MI6 due to his underwhelming professional history and perceived lack of “commercial nous.”

Yet another suggested Steele’s production of the dossier reflected his lack of “big picture judgment.” Sources consulted by GPW were even more critical of Fusion GPS chief Glenn Simpson. One journalist described him as a “hack” without “a license or the contacts to do… actual investigations,” instead outsourcing “all” work ostensibly conducted by his firm to others while skimming commissions. They also “openly admitted” to disliking Simpson, described by GPW as “not an uncommon attitude amongst those to whom we spoke.”

GPW also scrutinized “credibility and perceptions of the dossier in Russia,” specifically whether Steele‘s claims that high-ranking Kremlin-linked sources in Moscow provided him with information had any merit. The firm consulted “Western and Russian journalists, former officials from the FSB and the Russian security services more broadly, a former high-ranking official at the CIA who oversaw the agency’s Russian operations, and several private-sector intelligence practitioners operating in Moscow” for this purpose:

The prevailing sentiment from our contacts was one of extreme skepticism as to the accuracy of… the [dossier]. Most found it unimaginable… senior Russian officials would risk life imprisonment (or worse) by speaking to a former foreign intelligence official about such sensitive issues. At the very least… it would have cost Steele a great deal more… than he could afford… Former intelligence operatives (from both the U.S. and Russian services) seriously doubted Steele would have been able to retain Russian sources from his time in MI6.”

GPW also examined “possible sources for the dossier” that had been hypothesized in the media to date. Among them was former FSB General Oleg Erovinkin, who was found dead in his car in Moscow in December 2016. After the dossier’s release, the Daily Telegraph suggested his death was “mysterious” and could have resulted from providing information to Steele. A former high-ranking official in U.S. intelligence mockingly dismissed the proposition, noting that career security and intelligence officer Erovinkin was “unlikely to have needed the money.”

While conceding that financial incentives could encourage such a breach… [if] Steele had offered Erovinkin £100,000, the mooted budget for the entire project, ‘Erovinkin would have said he needed to see three more zeros before opening his mouth. It’s just a ridiculous proposition to think he would speak to a former intelligence officer from the UK, or anyone else for that matter, for such a paltry sum of money.’”

Overall, GPW concluded: “The quality and level of the sourcing was greatly exaggerated in order to give the dossier and its allegations more credibility.” This impression was reinforced by “informed sources from both government and the private sector” in Russia who were “very dismissive” of the dossier’s content. Many pointed to “woeful inaccuracies” contained therein “and its author’s general lack of understanding around Russian politics and business.” This “deficiency was particularly acute with respect to the dossier’s coverage of Alfa Bank.”

‘Reputational Damage’

GPW’s investigation also proved prescient in other areas. For example, several knowledgeable sources the company consulted — including former senior Russian and U.S. intelligence officials — suggested the dossier’s “most likely sources” were Russian émigrés, “providing… their own views.” They also noted the Steele dossier’s “hyperbole and inaccuracies” were “typical of the hyperactive imaginations of the subcontractors widely used in the business intelligence sector.” This was not confirmed until July 2020.

That month, the Senate Judiciary Committee released notes taken by FBI agents during February 2017 interviews with Igor Danchenko, Steele’s “subsource” and the dossier’s effective author. A Washington think tank journeyman jailed years earlier on multiple public intoxication and disorderly conduct charges and investigated by the FBI for potentially serving as a Kremlin agent, Danchenko admitted he had been fed much of the dossier’s salacious content by his Russian drinking buddies, who lacked any high-level access. Steele then embroidered their dud information further.

Other striking passages in the leaks refer to a conversation between GPW and “a source from within the business intelligence sector in London [who] knows Christopher Steele well, both socially and professionally, and is familiar with his company.” They relayed various details and “commentary” gleaned “directly from speaking to Steele.” For example, they noted that contrary to its self-description as a “leading corporate intelligence consultancy,” Orbis was “not a major operation” and seemed to employ just two junior analysts “who looked like recent graduates.”

The source revealed that “other, larger firms in the sector were approached before Steele and turned the work down before he took it on,” and the dossier was his solo project. “The rest of the company wasn’t involved at all, either to help on the research side of things or to look through the product before it went out,” and “Steele basically collated the information himself.” They further suggested the dossier’s sources let their imaginations run wild, believing their claims would never see the light of day:

I think they got carried away — they didn’t think the material would ever be made public because at that point it was very unlikely that Trump was going to get into power…Steele was rather naive about the whole thing. He didn’t think that it would get exposed in the way it did.”

In other investigative briefs, GPW noted it was unusual that “Steele would have permitted (or indeed facilitated) the distribution of such questionable material under his name,” given the dossier’s apparent falsity. The firm postulated that “in sharing the material with U.S. government figures,” the former MI6 operative “may have thought he was currying favor with them by doing so,” but ultimately, “he never intended for the dossier to be made public in the manner it was.”

One possible answer to this question is found in a defamation case brought against Orbis by Petr Aven, Mikhail Fridman, and German Khan in Britain in May 2018. In July 2020, a British court ruled that the dossier’s allegations against them and Alfa Bank were “inaccurate and misleading,” awarding damages “for the loss of autonomy, distress and reputational damage.” During the trial, Steele made a notable disclosure:

Fusion’s immediate client was law firm Perkins Coie… it engaged Fusion to obtain information necessary for Perkins Coie to provide legal advice on the potential impact of Russian involvement on the legal validity of the outcome of the 2016 U.S. Presidential election. Based on that advice, parties such as the Democratic National Committee and [“Hillary for America”] could consider steps they would be legally entitled to take to challenge the validity of the outcome of that election.”

In essence, the dossier was commissioned by Clinton’s campaign as a contingency in the event she lost the election. However, as GPW’s source close to Steele noted, when the MI6 operative took on the work, the prevailing perception was that “it was very unlikely” Trump would win. As a result, Steele may have had the motivation to fill the dossier with unverified material, believing it would never be used for its intended purpose. He also had a commercial incentive to exaggerate his high-level access. A serving CIA official told GPW:

Steele was known to have been ‘up and down the alley’ pitching for business – a reference to the major defense firms, such as Lockheed Martin, which are located close to one another in Arlington, Virginia. She did not know which firms Steele had worked for in particular, if any, but he has visited several of them in person at their headquarters.”

‘Supposedly Unaware’

A core mystery at the heart of the Steele dossier saga has never been satisfactorily resolved — one that Trump’s latest declassification order could help illuminate. In his December 2019 report on Crossfire Hurricane, Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz criticized the FBI’s use of the dossier to obtain warrants against Carter Page but insisted Steele’s assorted claims “played no role” in the bureau opening its investigation of Trump’s campaign, reportedly on July 31, 2016.

As extensively documented by Aaron Maté, this claim is difficult to reconcile with the numerous contacts and meetings between Steele and senior FBI and Justice Department officials in the weeks leading up to that date. The former MI6 officer provided material that would later comprise the dossier to senior U.S. government officials, including Victoria Nuland, prior to the official opening of Crossfire Hurricane. Nuland reportedly encouraged the bureau to investigate the contents.

According to the FBI’s electronic communications that initiated Crossfire Hurricane, the probe’s founding predicate was a vague tip provided to the bureau by Australian diplomat Alexander Downer. He claimed that low-level Trump campaign staffer George Papadopoulos had “suggested” to him over drinks in London that “the Trump team had received some kind of suggestion [emphasis added] from Russia that it could assist… with the anonymous release of information during the campaign that would be damaging” to Clinton. The EC further acknowledged that “It was unclear whether he or the Russians were referring to material acquired publicly or through other means. It was also unclear how Mr. Trump’s team reacted to the offer.”

As Maté told MintPress News, this was an “extraordinarily thin basis upon which to investigate an entire presidential campaign.” He added that “upon officially opening Crossfire Hurricane, FBI officials immediately took investigative steps that mirrored the claims in the Steele dossier, even though they were supposedly unaware of it.” The FBI’s first probes into individual Trump campaign figures — Carter Page, Michael Flynn, and Paul Manafort — began in August 2016. All are mentioned in the dossier. Maté concludes:

To accept the official timeline, one has to stipulate that the FBI investigated a Presidential campaign, and then a President, based on a low-level volunteer having ‘suggested’ Trump’s campaign had received ‘some kind of suggestion’ of assistance from Russia. One would also have to accept that the Bureau was not influenced by the far more detailed claims of direct Trump-Russia connections – an alleged conspiracy that would form the heart of the investigation – advanced in the widely-circulating Steele dossier.”

April 13, 2025 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Deception, Russophobia | , , , | Leave a comment

Somaliland Offers Trump Red Sea Base in Exchange for Recognition

Sputnik – 13.04.2025

Somalia’s breakaway region of Somaliland wants to be recognized as an independent state by US President Donald Trump in exchange for leasing its Berbera port and airstrip to the US, media reported on Saturday.

In March, the Semafor daily newspaper reported that Somalian President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud had offered the US control over ports and airbases located in Somaliland and another breakaway region, Puntland, in an attempt to prevent Washington from recognizing them.

Somaliland, however, plans to strike a deal with Trump, offering the US to lease its airstrip and port, which will ensure smooth military and logistical access to the Gulf of Aden, in exchange for Washington’s recognition of its statehood, The New York Times reported.

The airstrip at the Berbera International Airport was built by the Soviet Union in the 1970s. Stretching for over 2.5 miles, it is the longest airstrip in Africa.

The Associated Press reported in mid-March, citing a US official, that the US was in talks with Somaliland to determine what it could offer in exchange for its recognition. The US is reportedly exploring options for resettling Palestinians from the Gaza Strip.

Somalia ceased to exist as a unified state in 1991 following the fall of dictator Siad Barre. The international community recognizes the federal government of Somalia, which controls Mogadishu and parts of the country.

April 13, 2025 Posted by | Ethnic Cleansing, Racism, Zionism, Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

US, Iran take a leap forward in trust building

By M. K. BHADRAKUMAR | Indian Punchline | April 13, 2025 

With the foreplay over and US-Iranian talks commencing in Muscat on Saturday, a constructive engagement has begun in right earnestness. The sure sign of it is that Iran’s currency rose nearly 6 percent on Sunday. The Tehran bazaar, the weathervane of Shia politics, has spoken. 

Most important, the two key negotiators in Muscat Steve Witkoff and Abbas Araqchi have decided to return to the talks on April 19 in exactly a week’s time after reporting back to their principals in Washington and Tehran respectively and seeking fresh guidelines going forward. 

The White House said the talks were positive and constructive and appreciated that “direct communication was a step forward in achieving a mutually beneficial outcome.” Witkoff described the talks as “very positive and constructive.” 

Iran’s foreign ministry said the talks were held in “a constructive atmosphere based on mutual respect. Araqchi also described the negotiations as “promising and constructive.” Significantly, Araqchi told the Iranian national television that the talks brought the two sides closer to establishing “the basis of negotiations” for future discussions.

He added cryptically that while Oman will continue to act as mediator in the upcoming round on April 19, the venue for the next session may change.

Signalling to Witkoff and addressing the domestic audience, Araqchi gave an insightful perspective. He said the discussions aimed to create a structured agenda for the negotiations based on a timeline. The following remarks by Araqchi must be noted carefully: 

  • “We agreed to hold a second round next Saturday, and in the next session, we will delve into the overall framework that a deal can take to see how far this process can advance.”
  • It is important to set a basis for the talks; “If we can finalise the basis in the next meeting… we can begin real discussions based on that basis.”
  • The talks were conducted in a “calm and very respectful atmosphere. No inappropriate language was used. Both sides demonstrated their determination to advance the talks until an agreement is reached that is desirable for both parties and is based on an equal footing.”  
  • Neither Iran nor the US wants to “negotiate for the sake of negotiating” and does not favour protracted “attritional talks.” Both sides voiced their keenness to achieve an agreement “at the shortest time. This, however, will not be easy and requires full determination of the two sides.”
  • “When leaving, the two delegations encountered each other, and we talked for a few minutes. This is a completely accepted issue. We have always observed diplomatic courtesy when dealing with American diplomats, and this time, too, an initial greeting was exchanged, and then we left the place. It was nothing extraordinary.”

Dr Mohammad Jafar Qaempanah, President Masoud Pezeshkian’s trusted chief of staff who holds the position of vice-president for executive affairs — and, incidentally, a medical doctor by profession with research papers and foreign citations to his credit — that the negotiations “were conducted well with dignity, prudence, expediency, and in line with the interests of the Iranian people.” 

President Donald Trump reined himself in his early comments to the media from Air Force One, “Nothing matters until you get it done, so I don’t like talking about it, but it’s going OK. The Iran situation is going pretty good, I think.”

Elsewhere, Trump added, “I want Iran to be a wonderful, great, happy country, but they can’t have a nuclear weapon.” But that is Iran’s strategic choice, too. 

That said, both in the US and in Iran, the hardliners are straining at the leash to throw stones. Then there are also the third parties with their own agenda. If the Iranians spurned the initial US attempt to have the UAE mediate, and instead also bypassed Qatar and opted for Oman as their preferred mediator for the talks, it tells a tale by itself of the complex regional alignments in the Gulf as well as Tehran’s need to keep Israelis miles away from messing around. 

The crux of the matter is that the initial round of talks in Muscat represents a turning point in the challenging dynamics between Tehran and Washington. According to the Tehran grapevine, the talks focussed on two intertwined contentious issues — sanctions relief and the nuclear issue — as in the past negotiations.

Reaching a mutually agreeable framework for dialogue could pave the way for reducing tensions and returning to a diplomatic path. It is doable today from all indications. The game changer is that both sides have shown willingness to reduce tensions and seek a middle ground. Araqchi’s positive spin on the atmospherics at the Muscat talks signalled that the enduring mutual distrust notwithstanding, both sides acknowledge the necessity of continuing discussions, and are determined to avoid deadlock and explore new opportunities. 

This is not to overlook that the path ahead remains challenging and fraught with obstacles. Sensitive issues need to be sorted out such as the the timing of sanctions relief, the scope of nuclear commitments, and verification mechanisms. Nonetheless, the bottom line is that the return to diplomacy after such high spiralling of tensions in recent months provides an opportunity to rebuild relative trust and recalibrate US-Iran relations—at least on technical and substantive levels.

Indeed, Witkoff and Araqchi are just the negotiators with the temperament not to succumb to the temptations of oneupmanship and grandstanding and instead proceed with precision, patience, and creativity in an all-out attempt to capitalise on the good start.

Witkoff already signalled an openness to compromise when he told Wall Street Journal that “our position today” starts with demanding that Iran completely dismantle its nuclear program. “That doesn’t mean, by the way, that at the margin we’re not going to find other ways to find compromise between the two countries.

“Where our red line will be, there can’t be weaponisation of your [Iran’s] nuclear capability,” Witkoff added underscoring that any deal must include extensive oversight measures to guarantee Iran is not developing an atomic weapon. Nuclear experts from the US state department are assisting Witkoff. 

Iran has consistently denied seeking to acquire nuclear weapons. On Friday, foreign ministry spokesman Esmaeil Baqaei said in Tehran that Iran is “giving diplomacy a genuine chance in good faith and full vigilance. America should appreciate this decision, which was made despite their hostile rhetoric.”

READ MORE: Steve Witkoff’s Iran mission holds seamless possibilities, Indian Punchline, April 11, 2025 

April 13, 2025 Posted by | Wars for Israel | , , , | Leave a comment

The Media Playbook for Measles Looks a Lot Like Its COVID Playbook — This Time, Kids Are the Pawns

By Mary Holland, J.D. | The Defender | April 8, 2025

There are moments in the history of a movement that test its resolve. For the medical freedom movement, this is one of those moments.

We are in the midst of another full-on attack by the pharmaceutical-industrial complex, aided and abetted by a beholden mainstream media united around its allegiance to a $69 billion vaccine industry.

Five years ago, we fought back as our government, Big Media and Big Pharma orchestrated and executed a COVID-19 fear campaign — a campaign built on lies, deception and censorship — and then parlayed the public’s fear into dangerous and deadly medical mandates and hospital protocols that continue to cause profound harm.

The upside to COVID-19 global disaster?

It opened the eyes of millions more people to the dangers of shoddily tested vaccines, regulatory agency hubris and one-size-fits-all “medicine.”

As our movement has grown exponentially, so has our threat to Big Pharma.

In response, we’re seeing the same tactics rolled out again. This time, it’s measles. This time, children are the pawns in pharma’s playbook.

Children’s Health Defense (CHD) stood strong and stayed true to our mission during COVID. We’re standing just as strong now. We remain just as committed now to the truth, informed consent and medical freedom as we were during the pandemic.

As pharma ramps up its measles playbook, our No. 1 job is to dismantle the vaccine industry’s lies — broadcast far and wide through the industry’s most reliable and faithful megaphone: mainstream media.

The media would have you believe that measles is a “deadly” disease. But any suggestion that MMR (measles-mumps-rubella) vaccines are safer than measles infection isn’t supported by facts.

In fact, between 2000 and 2024, nine measles-related deaths were reported to the CDC. During the same period, 141 deaths following MMR or MMRV vaccination were reported in the U.S. to the Vaccine Adverse Event Reporting System (VAERS) — suggesting the MMR vaccine can be deadlier than measles.

The media echo the same familiar refrain: The MMR vaccine is “overwhelmingly safe.”

In fact, the MMR vaccine is associated with serious health risks. The package insert for Merck’s MMRII says, “M-M-R II vaccine has not been evaluated for carcinogenic or mutagenic potential or impairment of fertility.”

Research also shows the MMR vaccine causes febrile seizures, anaphylaxis, meningitis, encephalitis, thrombocytopenia, arthralgia and vasculitis. In 2004, researchers at the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention found that boys vaccinated with their first MMR vaccine on time were 67% more likely to be diagnosed with autism compared to boys who got their first vaccine after their 3rd birthday.

The media insist there’s no viable treatment for measles — hence prevention, with the MMR vaccine, is the sole solution.

In fact, as CHD reported, doctors in West Texas are successfully treating measles with budesonide and vitamin A. Even the World Health Organization recommends vitamin A.

Yet some hospitals and doctors are refusing to treat measles patients with budesonide. Texas health officials rejected pleas by a treating physician to endorse the treatment and get the word out to hospitals about its effectiveness.

Sound familiar?

We saw this identical playbook with COVID. Media parroted public health officials’ claim that the vaccine alone would save us — while discouraging, ridiculing and even outright sanctioning the use of ivermectin, hydroxychloroquine, budesonide and other treatments known to reduce COVID severity and death.

Last month, a 6-year-old child in West Texas died after developing pneumonia while recovering from measles. Media seized the opportunity to disparage the parents, members of a Mennonite community, for not vaccinating their child.

As our science and CHD.TV teams uncovered — after enlisting experts to review the child’s medical records — the little girl died not “from” measles, as media claimed, but from a tragic medical error.

In fact, the hospital properly diagnosed the little girl’s pneumonia — a community-acquired pneumonia that, when treated properly is not life-threatening. Unfortunately, the doctors failed to use the standard antibiotic indicated for treating her pneumonia until it was too late.

Even after CHD exposed the accurate cause of death, The New York Times reported the 6-year-old died from measles — and accused us of making “unfounded claims” about the death.

Last week, a second child in West Texas died. The media and Texas health officials reported the death as “measles pulmonary failure.” CHD is working with the child’s parents to analyze her medical records. We will report, accurately, on what we find.

The media have accused CHD and the health freedom movement — or “anti-vaxxers” as reporters love to call us — of “weaponizing” the tragic death of the 6-year-old who died because of a medical error. (We should point out that death by medical error is not uncommon in the U.S. It’s estimated that at least 250,000 people die every year as a result of the wrong diagnosis or treatment, making it the third-leading cause of death).

The death of any child, for any reason, is heartbreaking. But in this case, who are the real “weaponizers?”

If media are genuinely concerned about children’s lives, where are the reports on children’s injuries and deaths from COVID-19 vaccines? From MMR vaccines? From the other 14 shots on the CDC-recommended schedule?

Last month, CHD reported on the senseless death of a 1-year-old roughly 12 hours after the child’s pediatrician insisted on administering six shots of 12 vaccines at once.

Where were the headlines deploring this child’s death, denouncing the child’s pediatrician? Where were the reports on the known dangers of “catching up” babies and children on vaccines?

As the media remain radio silent on the carnage inflicted on innocent children by a powerful, greedy industry and its minions in Congress, CHD is honoring the legacy of these children by reporting the facts, telling the truth and insisting on the rights of parents to make independent, informed medical decisions.

This latest round of attacks on the health freedom movement is a measure of pharma’s fear. We are winning. Pharma knows it.

We have no intention of backing down from the facts: Vaccines cause serious injuries, including death. As Big Pharma and Big Media wage a renewed battle for the hearts and minds of parents, we must strengthen our resolve, we must stay true to our mission.

Our children deserve nothing less.

This article was originally published by The Defender — Children’s Health Defense’s News & Views Website under Creative Commons license CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. Please consider subscribing to The Defender or donating to Children’s Health Defense.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Science and Pseudo-Science | , | Leave a comment

AfD leader slams latest German military aid to Kiev as ‘catastrophic’

Al Mayadeen | April 11, 2025

Germany’s plan to ramp up military support for Ukraine has drawn sharp criticism from Alice Weidel, co-leader of the right-wing Alternative for Germany (AfD) party. Speaking on Friday, Weidel condemned Defense Minister Boris Pistorius’ announcement of further arms deliveries, warning that the move fuels conflict rather than advancing peace.

According to a report by RedaktionsNetzwerk Deutschland (RND), Pistorius revealed that Berlin will allocate an additional 8 billion euros ($9 billion) in military assistance to Ukraine by 2029. This comes on top of roughly 7 billion euros worth of equipment pledged for delivery in 2025. Germany has already committed nearly €44 billion in aid to Ukraine since the war began in 2022, including military, financial, and humanitarian support, making it one of Kiev’s largest backers in Europe.

Responding to the announcement on social media platform X, Weidel said: “Pistorius announces new arms deliveries to Ukraine. This makes it clear: the small coalition continues the catastrophic course of escalation carried out by the ‘traffic light’ coalition. This is explosive. We must support the US efforts to achieve a ceasefire.”

Weidel and the AfD have long opposed German military aid to Ukraine, arguing that continued arms shipments escalate tensions and jeopardize German national interests. She has also criticized sanctions on Russia, warning they disproportionately harm Germany’s economy. In her public statements, Weidel has urged Berlin to adopt a neutral foreign policy stance and support diplomatic initiatives, particularly those backed by US President Donald Trump.

Russian officials have frequently argued that Western weapon supplies prolong the war and position NATO countries as active participants in the conflict. Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov reiterated that any shipment containing arms intended for Ukraine is considered a valid military target under Russian policy.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Why Does Trump Want to Own Major Ukrainian Gas Pipeline?

Sputnik – 12.04.2025

Trump now wants to claim the pipeline used to transport Russian gas to Europe through Ukraine, according to a Reuters report on the April 11 US-Ukraine talks.

How could the US profit from owning the pipeline?

It’s all about the fact that the Ukrainian pipeline can be used to ship gas in reverse, says Dr. George Szamuely, a senior research fellow at The Global Policy Institute.

  • Rather than being used to pump Russian gas to European consumers, the pipe can serve to deliver American LNG to Ukrainian consumers.
  • By controlling the pipeline, the US can monopolize the Ukrainian gas market, further solidifying Washington’s hold on the country, which would become dependent on American LNG.
  • The pipeline could also be used by the US to deliver American LNG to EU countries, making them dependent on US energy resources as well.

Europe and Ukraine “brought this on themselves” by cutting off cheap Russian energy and relying on more expensive American imports, Dr. Szamuely says.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Economics | , , | Leave a comment

Here we go again – $1 trillion for US ‘defense’

By Drago Bosnic | April 12, 2025

Remember when President Donald Trump promised to make the US military “far more powerful, but for much less money”? Remember when he pledged to end the NATO-orchestrated Ukrainian conflict in 24 hours? Well, me neither. In all seriousness, we can always say that Trump is a politician and that truth or consistency are not exactly the defining qualities of any politician.

On the other hand, the Messianic Complex among many Trumpists is certainly concerning, as there’s little questioning of Trump’s policies. He’s most definitely a very polarizing figure. The vast majority of people are either his staunch supporters or have TDS (Trump derangement syndrome). This prevents a more objective view of his performance, both at home and abroad.

Namely, Trump is exposed to numerous interest groups, many of which have very diverging views on how America should be. The old Deep State sees him as the greatest threat to “Pax Americana” and wants him out at all costs (including through physical removal), while other interest groups think extreme measures are unnecessary and that simply influencing Trump’s decision-making is more than enough.

The latter seem to be leading the charge, while the remnants of the previous administration are engaged in largely pointless protests. However, despite superficial enmity between them, there’s a quite solid continuity in many policies of the two administrations. This is particularly true when it comes to foreign policy and financing the US military.

In the case of the former, the Biden administration’s crawling economic warfare against the European Union (primarily through the destruction of its trade with Russia while the US continued to buy critical commodities from Moscow and even resell them to Europe) has been augmented by Trump’s trade wars.

In the case of the latter, there’s a robust continuity with virtually every US administration in the last 35 years (at the very least). Namely, the consistent increase in American military spending is a clear indicator that the same people are making the final decision on this issue, regardless of who’s in power. The Trump administration’s latest announcement regarding the US “defense” budget effectively proves this is precisely the case.

Namely, on April 7, President Trump and his Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth revealed that the Pentagon will get its first $1 trillion. Interestingly, what should’ve been breaking news was sidelined by global panic regarding the impact of new tariffs. In his usual manner of using superlatives, Trump said that “nobody’s seen anything like it”, adding that “we have to build our military, and we’re very cost-conscious, but the military is something we have to build, and we have to be strong”. It’s certainly commendable to see a government exercise “cost-consciousness”, with Trump employing Musk’s DOGE to be “the ultimate auditing organization”. However, giving a trillion dollars to the unaudited US military sounds like anything but frugality.

On paper, the administration has been adamant about cutting excess government spending, so this move doesn’t make much sense (unless all the auditing was designed to help find the money for the Pentagon). The logical conclusion is that Trump is exposed to the influence of the Military Industrial Complex (MIC) just as much as any other president.

Hegseth was certainly happy with the arrangement, as evidenced by his announcement on Twitter/X where he thanked Trump and presented the development as something “fantastic for everyone”. It would be interesting to see what American taxpayers think about the fact that their money will be invested in more death and destruction instead of restoring America’s crumbling infrastructure.

As previously mentioned, the first official $1 trillion for the US military was only a matter of time, as the troubled Biden administration announced it two years ago, when it pledged to double the Pentagon’s budget. The latest increase is in line with this plan, as the actual US DoD spending has been well over $1 trillion for years (many of its expenses are distributed to other departments). In addition, the Biden administration’s 2025 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) was officially $895 billion, so the latest increase is nothing out of the ordinary and is in line with regular spikes in military spending with every US government in recent history. This certainly breaks the Trump administration’s attempts to present itself as “anti-establishment”.

In addition, the move can only exacerbate America’s debt crisis, particularly after it reached $35 trillion last year and is expected to go over $40 trillion next year. Experts are warning that the latest increase in military spending will likely add at least another trillion to the already rapidly growing debt and that budget cuts are yet to affect the Pentagon, adding that the US military “does precisely nothing to defend the USA” and that it “exclusively interferes in other countries”.

And indeed, Trump’s reshuffling at the Pentagon was largely political and never affected its financing. Worse yet, he also supports continued US aggression in the Middle East, where a war with Iran is looming. In addition, the new Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff wants to expand the US nuclear sharing policy.

Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst. He is a Research Associate of the Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG).

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Economics, Militarism | | Leave a comment

Disaster in the Making: Secretary of State Rubio Proclaims the US Should Spend Five Percent of GDP on ‘Defense’

By Adam Dick | Peace and Prosperity Blog | April 12, 2025

Since his first term, we have grown used to President Donald Trump badgering governments of fellow NATO countries to increase their “defense” spending to five percent of their respective GDPs. Quote marks are used in the preceding sentence because such spending by these governments, or the US, will largely be used for offense, feeding the military-industrial complex, and other purposes far removed from defense.

So far, fellow NATO members have steered clear of achieving this spending goal. Their residents should be happy that is the case as the money can instead be left in their pockets or at least be hoped to be spent by government on something that may provide them with some benefit instead of furthering death and destruction — butter, not guns.

Interestingly, the US government, despite all its hectoring, has also refrained from reaching that five percent of GDP figure for its spending on the Department of Defense. The targeted spending level would come in at nearly double current spending on what is already a top area of government spending. That increase would drop down some if various spending beyond the Defense Department spending is included as “defense” spending.

Comments made last week by US Secretary of Defense Marco Rubio indicated the goal is for the US to also reach this spending level. Rubio declared ahead of a NATO meeting that “we do want to leave here with an understanding that we are on a pathway, a realistic pathway, to every single one of the [NATO] members committing and fulfilling a promise to reach up to five percent of spending; that includes the United States will have to increase its percentage.”

Hopefully, this is just talk. To follow through on this course would be to invite disaster.

With a huge and growing debt, the US cannot afford the increase. Such an increase will help bring the nation more quickly toward financial disaster. It will likely even help ensure increased spending in other areas as was experienced during the Ronald Reagan administration when the executive branch bargained with legislators for more military spending by agreeing to increased spending in other areas too.

More war can be expected as a result as well. The temptation for politicians to use a “new and improved” military brought into being by the increased spending would be immense.

More debt and more war is a literally killer combination for America.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , | Leave a comment

The fix is in for new Air Force F-47 — and so is the failure

By Andrew Cockburn | Responsible Statecraft | April 7, 2025

If and when it finally comes to be written decades from now, an honest history of the F-47 “fighter” recently unveiled by President Trump will doubtless have much to say about the heroic lobbying campaign that garnered the $20 billion development contract for Boeing, the corporation that has become a byword for program disasters (see the KC-46 tanker, the Starliner spacecraft, the 737 MAX airliner, not to mention the T-7 trainer.)

Boeing, which is due to face trial in June on well-merited federal charges of criminal fraud, was clearly in line for a bailout. But such succor was by no means inevitable given recent doubts from Air Force officials about proceeding with another manned fighter program at all.

“You’ve never seen anything like this,” said Trump in the March Oval Office ceremony announcing the contract award.

Well, of course we have, most obviously in recent times with the ill-starred F-35. Recall that in 2001 the Pentagon announced that the F-35 program would cost $200 billion and would enter service in 2008. Almost a quarter century later, acquisition costs have doubled, the total program price is nudging $2 trillion, and engineers are still struggling to make the thing work properly.

Thus, succeeding chapters of the F-47’s history will likely have to cover the galloping cost overruns, unfulfilled technological promises, ever-lengthening schedule shortfalls, and ultimate production cancellation when only a portion of the force had been built.

There seems little risk in predicting the F-47 — “a beautiful number,” said the 47th president — will follow the same dollar-strewn path. As Trump truthfully remarked, “we can’t tell you the price.” And don’t imagine that, if the development phase reveals that the program can’t fulfill any or most of its projected requirements, the Air Force will call it a day and kill the program. The official Air Force press release accompanying the announcement states: “This phase will produce a small number of test aircraft for evaluation. The contract also includes competitively priced options for low-rate initial production.”

In other words, the fix is in. “Low rate initial production” means that subcontracts will be spread across the political landscape, ensuring the creation of an unstoppable lobby preventing any future effort to strangle this boondoggle in its cradle.

For confirmation, look only at the F-35, 1,000 or so copies of which were cranked out before Lockheed got the go-ahead for full-scale production. In confident anticipation that nothing will interrupt the production cycle, Boeing has invested a reported $2 billion in expanding production facilities at its St. Louis, Missouri, plant, where production of the F-15EX (a costly version of the venerable F-15, originally gold-plated to sell to the Qataris) is due to end this year.

Extolling the plane’s advertised virtues, Trump singled out its presumed invisibility to radar. “America’s enemies will never see it coming,” he said.

Stealth has indeed been the holy grail of aerospace development ever since the days when Jimmy Carter sought to kill the B-1 bomber program in favor of the F-117 stealth bomber. (We did of course end up buying both.) Claims for this technology appeared to be justified when Lockheed’s F-117 diminutive bomber was advertised as having effortlessly penetrated Iraqi air defenses undetected on the first night of the 1991 Gulf War.

Only later did a GAO report reveal that in fact the planes had required the protection of a fleet of electronic warfare planes, and they missed most of their assigned targets, and furthermore failed to destroy Saddam’s air-defense network as claimed.

In the 1999 Kosovo war, the Serbs managed to knock down one F-117 and severely damage another using clever tactics and a modified ancient Soviet SAM missile system. Nowadays both the Chinese and Russians claim to have developed technologies to detect stealth intruders — there are even claims that the Chinese system could passively employ signals from Elon Musk’s SpaceX Starlink satellite array!

Nevertheless, the F-47 designers have clearly prioritized stealth, despite the fact that obligatory features, such as carrying all bombs and missiles internally, enlarge the fuselage. Hence the large nose-on profile, apparent even in the uninformative images so far released. This militates against aerodynamic performance and maneuverability, unfortunate deficiencies for a fighter.

Such carping aside, the most notable feature of the F-47 program is that it will purportedly not fly alone, but be accompanied by unmanned Collaborative Combat Aircraft, or drones, “as many as you want,” according to Trump. The Air Force plans to buy 1,000 of them, at around $30 million a pop.

Under the overall direction of the F-47 pilot, they will in theory at least be able to engage enemy planes, attack targets on the ground, or perform reconnaissance. Two contractors, General Atomics and Anduril, are already competing for the initial CCA contract and have been displaying mockups of their candidates at trade shows since last year while hurling insults at each other via social media and the trade press.

“Anduril is the Theranos of defense,” jibed General Atomics spokesman Mark Brinkley during the Air Force Association jamboree in Washington D.C. last September, referencing the infamous Palo Alto startup that fraudulently claimed to perform comprehensive medical diagnostics from a single drop of blood. Both contestants are supposed to put prototypes in the air this summer.

Pentagon insiders are not impressed either with the concept or at least progress to date. One veteran observer of technologically ambitious programs suggested to me that the Air Force staff officers supervising the CCA program may be easy prey for the contractors.

“They’re not nearly skeptical enough about General Atomics or Anduril. I don’t see any of the skepticism they should be exhibiting for pouring out this kind of money,” the observer said.

Hopefully, these glib enthusiasts will be mulling the problems associated with the software required to enable an F-47 “quarterback” pilot to oversee the operations of the wingmen drones. After all, their peers in the F-35 program are still struggling with “Technology Refresh-3,” the latest (failing) effort to make the plane’s software work adequately. Mulling other inevitable problems facing an F-47 in combat, such as surviving enemy efforts “to find you, track you, and kill you” before getting into position to deploy the unmanned aircraft with their missile loads

“I don’t know why we’re doing it, I don’t get it,” the observer concluded.

Last December, then-Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall suggested that the Air Force might not be able to afford a next-generation fighter as well as the collaborative drone, in addition to a next-generation refueling tanker, and that “we have to get somewhat creative…to meet the threat.” As it turned out, no creativity at all was required, as the history books will most assuredly record.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Corruption, Militarism | | Leave a comment

Maidan and Odessa – The West’s Ukrainian Massacres

By Sonja van den Ende | Strategic Culture Foundation | April 12, 2025

In 2016 and 2017, I was invited by the families of the victims of the 2014 Odessa Trade Union House massacre to document this atrocity. The slaughter on May 2, 2014, received little – if any – attention in Western media. Over 40 people were burned alive after a mob of neo-Nazi hooligans, backed by the West, attacked peaceful protesters demonstrating against the fascist regime installed in Kiev. This regime was the product of a 2013 coup d’état orchestrated by the U.S. and its EU accomplices, branded as the “Maidan Revolution.” By 2014, its violence had spread to Odessa.

The Mothers of Odessa – echoing Argentina’s Mothers of the Plaza de Mayo – sought justice for the massacre. Like the Argentine mothers who protested the disappearances under military dictatorship, they demanded accountability for May 2, a day the West has long buried in silence – because it was complicit in Kiev’s coup and, indirectly, Odessa’s tragedy.

That day, a football match between Kharkov’s Metalist and Odessa’s Chornomorets had drawn hooligans, including followers of Andriy Parubiy – a self-proclaimed admirer of Hitler’s national socialism. Many of these neo-Nazis later joined the Azov Regiment, entrenching themselves in Mariupol’s Azovstal plant. But on May 2, 2014, they descended on the Trade Union House, slaughtering 42 protesters.

Parubiy, a fascist and neo-Nazi, would later ascend to Ukraine’s political elite, serving as Secretary of the National Security and Defence Council and Speaker of Parliament. He was warmly received by EU officials, including Victoria Nuland, even as he pushed laws banning Russian, Crimean Tatar, Romanian, and Hungarian in official spheres.

In March 2025, the European Court of Human Rights finally ruled on the case – eleven years late. It found Ukraine guilty of failing to investigate and awarded each victim’s family a meagre €14,000 in damages. The court also condemned Kiev for delaying the return of one victim’s body to his family. A token verdict for state-sanctioned murder.

The police and judiciary’s refusal to act in Odessa mirrored the Maidan massacre in February 2014, where fascist gunmen – backed by the U.S. and EU – fired on protesters from the Hotel Ukraina, sparking chaos to enable the coup. Among the orchestrators were EU figures like the late Dutch politician Hans van Baalen (VVD) and Belgium’s Guy Verhofstadt, who incited the mob with inflammatory speeches.

Recent revelations expose the role of Georgian mercenary Mamuka Mamulashvili and U.S. sniper Brian Christopher Boyenger, a former US Army soldier. Both apparently helped lead the group of snipers who fired on the protesters from the Ukraina hotel in Kiev during the Maidan coup.

It’s worth noting that these efforts were likely supported – and possibly encouraged – by former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili. Mamuka Mamulashvili, who served as a senior military advisor to Saakashvili, played a key role in what was termed the “revolution” in Ukraine. Saakashvili’s involvement bore fruit: on May 30, 2015, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko appointed him governor of Odessa. To assume the role, Saakashvili took Ukrainian citizenship, renouncing his Georgian ties. However, in 2017, his Ukrainian citizenship was revoked, leaving him stateless and residing in the Netherlands. Later, President Volodymyr Zelensky reinstated Saakashvili’s citizenship and, in May 2020, appointed him head of Ukraine’s National Reform Council. In 2021, Saakashvili returned to Georgia, where he was arrested on corruption charges and remains imprisoned.

Mamuka Mamulashvili has led the Georgian Legion, a military unit fighting against Russia in Ukraine, and is wanted by Russian authorities. Likely recruited between 2013 and 2014, Mamulashvili allegedly served American interests, including acting as a sniper in Kiev during that period. His involvement spans decades of conflicts in the Caucasus, including wars in Abkhazia, Chechnya, South Ossetia, and now Ukraine, where he commands the Georgian Legion.

A recent report highlighted American fighters returning from Ukraine, bringing violence home. One such figure, Brian Christopher Boyenger, served with the Right Sector in Ukraine during the summer of 2016. Boyenger appeared in a Ukrainian documentary aired in April 2016, alongside another American, showcasing their combat roles. A former sniper with the U.S. 101st Airborne Division in Iraq, Boyenger later joined the 2014 Maidan events in Kiev as a sniper.

The conflict in Ukraine didn’t begin with Russia’s Special Military Operation in 2022 but traces back to the 2013 coup, often labelled a “revolution.” This event, one of many U.S.-backed regime changes – frequently in collaboration with the EU – spiralled out of control. The West believed it had Russia cornered, expecting NATO’s expansion to Ukraine would weaken Moscow. The U.S. and Europe anticipated an easy victory in this proxy war, pushing toward Odessa to spark another uprising. They overlooked Odessa’s predominantly Russian-speaking population, miscalculating the city’s loyalties. The ultimate aim was regime change in Russia, a goal partially achieved in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria. Yet Ukraine exposed the limits of Western hubris, costing countless lives since 1945. Europe now faces decline, no longer aligned with the “MAGA” vision of America.

The “Make America Great Again” movement prioritizes self-interest but hasn’t abandoned imperialism. It backs Zionism – a colonial project since 1948 – in Israel and seeks global dominance through commerce, though it shuns investment in Gaza, as Trump recently stated. America now operates like a ruthless corporation, trading overt wars for business deals while still fuelling conflicts in Palestine, Syria, and Yemen. Europe, meanwhile, reels from its defeat in Ukraine, fearing an eventual war with Russia – perhaps by 2030, some speculate.

The scars endure in Odessa, Kharkov, Mariupol, and Volnovakha, where war has claimed countless loved ones. Calls for peace echo loudly, yet for the residents of Russia’s four new regions, peace remains elusive. They know who fired the shots: Western proxies, including Americans and Europeans, with the latter still clinging to the path of conflict.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | False Flag Terrorism, Militarism | , , , , | Leave a comment

Ukraine’s Kursk Incursion Robbed Western Taxpayers of $7.8Bln in Lost Military Equipment

Sputnik – 12.04.2025

MOSCOW – Kiev lost in the Kursk Region 5,500 units of equipment supplied by the West worth $7.8 billion, Sputnik calculations based on the data provided by the Russian Sever group of forces, as well as on the data on the equipment’s cost from open sources revealed on Saturday.

Earlier Sputnik, on the basis of the data from the Russian Sever group of forces calculated that during the hostilities in the Kursk Region Kiev spent more than $27 billion, which is more than half of all foreign financial aid received by Ukraine from Western countries in 2024.

According to open sources, the average cost of a tank is $4.5 million, a self-propelled artillery unit – $4 million, an APC – $300,000, a BMP – $600,000, etc. The total value of the trophy equipment destroyed and taken by the Russian Armed Forces was calculated by Sputnik and amounted to about $7.8 billion.’

“Part of the allocated funds was spent by the Ukrainian armed forces for supplemental staffing and partial repairs before sending the equipment into combat operations,” the Sever group of forces said.

April 12, 2025 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

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