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Nord Stream Blast: Why the West Still Can’t Name the Culprit

By Ekaterina Blinova – Sputnik – 26.09.2023

Exactly a year ago three out of four Nord Stream pipelines running from Russia to Germany under the Baltic Sea to provide Western Europe with natural gas were destroyed. Western investigators have so far failed to find the saboteurs behind the blast.

Gas leaks from the Nord Stream pipeline system were detected on 26 September 2022, with the EU leadership admitting that this could be the result of a “deliberate attack”.

Two days later, on 28 September, the Kremlin announced that Russia was ready to consider applications from EU countries for a joint investigation into the Nord Stream incident.

However, not only did the West snub Moscow’s request but also blamed Russia for destroying its own pipelines. Later, European and American officials backtracked on their accusations but fell short of naming a potential perpetrator.

On 12 October 2022, Russian President Vladimir Putin called the incident “an act of international terrorism”. Meanwhile, as gas prices soared and US energy producers secured lucrative liquefied natural gas (LNG) contracts with European countries, it became clear that Washington had been the major beneficiary from the Nord Stream destruction.

Furthermore, the US leadership had previously issued several threats that it would destroy the pipelines.

“We know that the United States President Joe Biden, threatened openly that he would stop Nord Stream 2 if the Russians were to militarily intervene in Ukraine,” Philip Giraldi, former CIA station chief and now an executive director of the Council for the National Interest, told Sputnik. “That was repeated by Victoria Nuland, who was Number Three at the State Department. She said basically the same thing. So we had the President and a senior official both saying that they would stop the pipeline if this were to happen. So we have a statement coming from the government itself saying it would do this.”

“And then I would say on top of that, the United States – given its military capabilities – had the capability to do this. They sent divers down to attach explosives and to arrange for a drone satellite that would ignite the charges and blow up the pipelines. It had the capability to do it. And it also had the motive, which was basically to weaken Russia’s ability to use its energy resources to affect politics in Europe. So this is what it was all about,” Giraldi continued.

On 8 February 2023, Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Seymour Hersh dropped a bombshell, detailing an apparent plot by Team Biden and the US intelligence community to blast the Nord Stream pipelines with the help of Norwegian operatives.

Reflecting on Hersh’s version, Giraldi said that he feels that Hersh’s narrative is “correct in every detail.”

“And I can confirm to you that Sy Hersh, whom I know somewhat, has excellent sources inside CIA and inside the Pentagon. So what he’s telling us comes straight from people who know about it,” the CIA veteran said.

Blame Game Time: The Andromeda Yarn

On 7 March, the US and German mainstream sources published two separate articles claiming that international investigators had managed to trace the 26 September 2022 sabotage attack to a “pro-Ukrainian” group operating from the Andromeda, a 15-meter chartered yacht. The story immediately prompted a lot of controversy.

German media, for example, asked how a 15-meter chartered yacht could carry the 1,500-2,000 kilograms of explosives needed to destroy the pipelines, adding that the Andromeda does not have a crane to hoist such quantities safely into the water. It was also unclear how the group of volunteers managed to transport that amount of explosives across Europe.

Another problem, cited by the press, was that at the site of the explosion, the depth of the Baltic Sea is about 80 meters, requiring special diving equipment which the private vessel lacked. On top of this, the gang of saboteurs returned the yacht in bad condition and even left a couple of fake passports on board which made the story even fishier.

Hersh ridiculed the mainstream media yarn while discussing it with an anonymous CIA operative familiar with the issue. According to Hersh, it’s not just a “bad” media story but a deliberate “parody” fed by the CIA to the US and German media.

“In the world of professional analysts and operators, everyone will universally and correctly conclude from your story that the devilish CIA concocted a counter-op that is on its face so ridiculous and childish that the real purpose was to reinforce the truth,” the investigative journalist wrote on 5 April.

The most recent Western media stories alleging Ukraine’s involvement don’t hold water, either, according to Giraldi:

“Look, when you’re doing things in the intelligence world, you look for corroborative details – details that tell you that this story is coming from a good source or that it is fundamentally correct. And I saw none of that in this story. There have been a number of stories, of course, about people from Ukraine having done this, or people even from Germany renting boats and going over there, and they didn’t know what nationality they were. I mean, these are repeated stories. I have no reason to assume that this story is correct.”

The CIA veteran goes on to say that at present there is no story that sounds as credible as Hersh’s version. Besides, the US had the motive; it had the capability to do it; and it also had the objective to do it as a way of weakening Russia’s ability to influence Western Europe, Giraldi summarized.

“So I think that a lot of the background or the backstory supports the fact that the United States basically did it, though, apparently with the assistance of the Norwegians, and I would imagine some of the other NATO allies were also briefed in a certain fashion. In other words, not all the details, but given some indication that something might be happening in the near future in the Baltic.”

Why Couldn’t EU Investigators Name the Culprit?

It’s hardly surprising that despite official investigations in three countries – Sweden, Denmark, and Germany – the question of who is responsible for the sabotage remains unanswered, according to Giraldi.

“The fact that there have been three investigations carried out means nothing because the three countries that carry out the investigation are all NATO members. So they would have no motive whatsoever to challenge the argument that this was carried out by the Russians themselves or by the Ukrainians,” the CIA veteran said.

However, Giraldi suspects that the German investigation probably came closest to the truth. However, what they told the public was essentially a narrative acceptable to the United States and to NATO. The former CIA field officer pointed out that Germany suffered the most from the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines.

“Their economy is in trouble. They were dependent on Russian energy and so they are paying a price for it, and I’m sure that many Germans – I do know that many Germans are aware of this and are complaining that this ever took place. I was in Eastern Europe about two months ago, and I heard this a lot from Europeans, how stupid this whole thing was to destroy a resource that was very good for Europe as well as being good for Russia.”

According to Giraldi, it’s interesting to examine who else – apart from the US and Norway – was aware of the Nord Stream plot and was foolhardy enough to get involved in it. Giraldi doubted whether Berlin had been in collusion with the US and Norway from the beginning and said that it did not make sense for a country to sacrifice its own economy willingly.

Furthermore, the Nord Stream pipelines weren’t just a Gazprom asset, Giraldi emphasized: there were other countries – other companies from Western Europe – that participated in the project that had been worth billions of dollars. And because of the US plot, their money had been squandered and their infrastructure had suffered incalculable damage.

But the financial aspect is only half the story: the most worrying part is that those who blew the pipelines up risked escalating the crisis dramatically.

“The destruction of the pipeline was an act of war,” stressed Giraldi, “… so this is an interesting story if we ever find out the truth.”

On 17 September 2023, the First Deputy Permanent Representative of Russia to the UN Dmitry Polyansky said that Russia was calling for the UN Security Council to meet to discuss the Nord Stream gas pipelines and the council will gather on Tuesday, 26 September – a year after the sabotage occurred.

On 27 August, the Prime Minister of the German federal state of Saxony, Michael Kretschmer, announced the need to repair the damaged gas pipelines which he said will help to ensure the country’s energy supply for another five to 10 years.

September 26, 2023 Posted by | Economics, War Crimes | , , , , | Leave a comment

US intel knew Biden planned to blow up Nord Stream prior to Ukraine conflict – Hersh

RT | September 26, 2023

US President Joe Biden initially planned on destroying the Nord Stream gas pipelines to deter Russia from launching its military operation in Ukraine, American journalist Seymour Hersh reported on Tuesday. However, Hersh alleged that the sabotage operation went ahead later not to deter Russia, but to damage the German economy.

The Nord Stream 1 and 2 gas pipelines, which connected Russia and Germany through the Baltic Sea, were destroyed in a series of underwater explosions exactly a year ago on Tuesday. Competing theories have emerged as to who was to blame, with mainstream media in the West blaming a Ukrainian commando unit and Seymour Hersh claiming that the CIA carried out the operation under direct orders from Biden.

In a blog post on Tuesday, Hersh alleged that US National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan convened a series of meetings in late 2021, tasking intelligence officials with coming up with a means of deterring Russian President Vladimir Putin from sending troops into Ukraine.

“The White House’s policy was to deter Russia from an attack,” an intelligence source told Hersh. “The challenge it gave to the intelligence community was to come up with a way that was powerful enough to do that, and to make a strong statement of American capability.”

By January, as Russian forces were massing on the Ukrainian border, the CIA had “solved the problem,” the source said. With a plan in place to plant remotely-detonated explosives on the pipelines under the Baltic Sea, Biden warned in early February that in the event of military action by Russia, “there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”

Following Biden’s statement, which was delivered alongside German Chancellor Olaf Scholz, the CIA team tasked with sabotaging the pipelines received new orders, Hersh claimed. Instead of immediately destroying Nord Stream, the team was instructed to plant the explosives for detonation at a later date.

“It was then that we understood that the attack on the pipelines was not a deterrent because as the war went on we never got the command,” a member of the team told Hersh.

“We realized that the destruction of the two Russian pipelines was not related to the Ukrainian war,” the source continued. “But was part of a neocon political agenda to keep Scholz and Germany, with winter coming up and the pipelines shut down, from getting cold feet and opening up.”

According to Hersh’s earlier reporting, CIA divers planted the explosives last summer with the help of the Norwegian navy, using a NATO exercise in the region as cover. By the time the bombs were triggered in September, the flow of Russian gas to Germany via Nord Stream 1 had already been slowed to a trickle by Russia in response to Western sanctions, while Nord Stream 2 was never certified to begin operation by Scholz’s government. However, with the German economy heavily dependent on Russian gas, Biden reportedly feared that Scholz would choose reproachment with Moscow over support for Ukraine.

“The President of the United States would rather see Germany freeze than [see] Germany possibly stop supporting Ukraine,” Hersh declared earlier this year.

September 26, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Timeless or most popular, War Crimes | , , , | Leave a comment

The US Military Is Laying the Groundwork to Reinstitute the Draft

By Zachary Yost | Mises Wire | September 25, 2023

The most recent edition of the U.S. Army War College’s academic journal includes a highly disturbing essay on what lessons the U.S. military should take away from the continuing war in Ukraine. By far the most concerning and most relevant section for the average American citizen is a subsection entitled “Casualties, Replacements, and Reconstitutions” which, to cut right to the chase, directly states, “Large-scale combat operations troop requirements may well require a reconceptualization of the 1970s and 1980s volunteer force and a move toward partial conscription.”

An Industrial War of Attrition Would Require Vast Numbers of Troops

The context for this supposed need to reinstate conscription is the estimate that were the U.S. to enter into a large-scale conflict, every day it would likely suffer thirty-six hundred casualties and require eight hundred replacements, again per day. The report notes that over the course of twenty years in Iraq and Afghanistan, the U.S. suffered fifty thousand casualties, a number which would likely be reached in merely two weeks of large-scale intensive combat.

The military is already facing an enormous recruiting shortfall. Last year the army alone fell short of its goal by fifteen thousand soldiers and is on track to be short an additional twenty thousand this year. On top of that, the report notes that the Individual Ready Reserve, which is composed of former service personnel who do not actively train and drill but may be called back into active service in the event they are needed, has dropped from seven hundred thousand in 1973 to seventy-six thousand now.

Prior to the Ukraine war, the fad theory in military planning was the idea of “hybrid warfare,” where the idea of giant state armies clashing on the battlefield requiring and consuming vast amounts of men and material was viewed as out of date as massed cavalry charges. Instead, these theorists argued that even when states did fight, it would be via proxies and special operations and would look more like the past twenty years of battling nonstate actors in the hills of Afghanistan. In a recent essay in the Journal of Security Studies, realist scholar Patrick Porter documents the rise of this theory and the fact that it is obviously garbage given the return of industrial wars of attrition.

As military planners have woken up from the fevered dream of imagining that modern war consisted of chasing the Taliban through the hills with complete and overwhelming airpower, they have similarly started to wake up to the idea that industrial war has vast manpower requirements and that seemingly the only way to fill these requirements is by forcing young people into the ranks. That has certainly been the only way Ukraine has been able to maintain its forces, although it has required increasingly draconian measures to do so as conscripts face attrition rates of 80 to 90 percent by Ukraine’s own admission.

Obviously, the reintroduction of conscription is an extremely disturbing prospect given America’s propensity for getting involved in meaningless wars that accomplish nothing other than empowering our enemies, killing and maiming our soldiers, and wasting vast resources.

This is especially true given the unstated assumptions implicit in this paper. Who is the enemy that would be inflicting thirty-six hundred casualties a day? A war in the Pacific against China would primarily be a naval and airpower war with an extremely limited role for the army (even the current inept regime seems unlikely to be stupid enough to try and wage a land war against China) which obviously leaves Russia as the main adversary that would require the U.S. Army to round up conscripts to feed into the attritional meat grinder.

There Is No American National Interest That Requires a Standing Army

However, while these manpower shortages may be a valid concern for someplace like Russia, Ukraine, or Poland, we here in the U.S. are quite fortunate that we have no compelling national interest that would require us to engage in an industrial war of attrition in Eastern Europe.

To the extent we are at risk of becoming involved in such a disastrous mess, it is entirely of our own doing via the entangling alliance known as the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and our leader’s own messianic gnostic crusades for democracy or whatever pseudo religious ideology is presently in vogue.

The U.S. is blessed as being the most secure power in history. We are the hegemon of the western hemisphere, with vast moats in the form of the Atlantic and Pacific Oceans that no other state has the capability to project military force across, and all our neighbors are weak and relatively friendly. We are not at any risk of being forced to fight an industrial land war on the home front. Any war the army would be used in would be as an expeditionary force fighting in the eastern hemisphere, where we have no compelling defensive need to do so.

From the beginning of the U.S., there have been warnings against the dangers of both entangling alliances and standing armies. The best solution to the military recruitment crisis is to simply abolish the standing army and not plan to wage a costly and pointless war on the other side of the planet that would result in trillions of dollars down the drain and who knows how many tens or hundreds of thousands of Americans being killed, maimed, and psychologically scarred.

September 26, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Militarism | , | Leave a comment

FDA rush to approve killer ‘vaccines’ but reject life-saving allergy treatment

By Roger Watson | TCW Defending Freedom | September 25, 2023

The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA), quick to approve an experimental and untested Covid-19 ‘vaccine’, is now stalling over approval of a new device that could save the lives of people who go into anaphylactic shock.

Anaphylactic shock, or anaphylaxis, is an extreme immune system reaction to an allergy which leads to a massive release of chemicals around the body, principally histamine, in an effort to deal with an allergen. This reaction of the body is, in fact, an overreaction and the response leads to difficulties with breathing and sudden and dramatic drop in blood pressure (shock). If untreated it can be fatal.

One of the first lines of treatment for anaphylaxis is an EpiPen which can be carried by those who know they have allergies. It is a device containing the drug noradrenaline (called norepinephrine in the US) that counteracts the shock induced by anaphylaxis. However, an EpiPen requires the injection of noradrenaline intramuscularly. This is invasive and if the person is unable to administer the drug others can be reluctant, either not knowing how to use the device or being afraid to. Also, the drug has to get from the musculature to the bloodstream to be effective. This can take five to ten minutes during which time the person may die.

How much better if noradrenaline could be administered more directly into the bloodstream. Manufacturing a device to do this intravenously, far less expecting anyone other than a medic, nurse or paramedic to have the expertise to do this in an emergency, is a tall order. But drugs can be administered rapidly into the bloodstream nasally and a company, ARS Pharmaceuticals, has developed an injection-free device for administering noradrenaline nasally in the form of an epinephrine nasal spray.

What’s not to like, you may think. Well, the FDA don’t like it and have withheld approval pending further testing. The FDA objections are based on the need for further clinical data in people with anaphylaxis due to the fear that it may fail to work.

It is, surely, heartening that the FDA has the best interests of potential anaphylaxis sufferers at heart. If only they had had the same concern on 2021 when they approved the Pfizer Covid-19 vaccines. It has been exposed in these pages from the start of the Covid-19 vaccine rollout that these were ‘experimental’ medications and had not been tested adequately before approval. Well, they have been tested now and the outcome is clear: they were completely unnecessary; they do not work; and they are extremely dangerous leading to injury and death. They undoubtedly have played a large part in the level of excess deaths observed in recent years.

According to UK government figures, the overall fatality rate from Covid-19 (always a disputed figure due to the difficulty in distinguishing ‘with Covid’ from ‘from Covid’) is 0.1 per cent. The estimated fatality rate from anaphylaxis – made uncertain by the fact that many suspected cases are dead before being found – is between 0.7 and 2 per cent. Recent England hospital Covid-19 admissions are approximately 3,000 per month at the latest available figures. The annual rate of hospitalisation in England for anaphylaxis in 2022-23 was 26,000; at approximately 2,000 monthly, the same order of magnitude as the Covid-19 admissions.

Bearing in mind that it is not easy to distinguish Covid-19 from other respiratory infections but that anaphylaxis is unmistakable and more fatal and, assuming a similar situation in the US, the recent FDA decision regarding nasally administered noradrenaline for anaphylaxis in the light of their unseemly haste over Covid-19 vaccinations is hard to understand. Could political and financial pressured be involved? Surely not!

September 25, 2023 Posted by | Corruption, Science and Pseudo-Science | , , | Leave a comment

She’s Doing it Again: Clinton Claims Russia Seeks to Meddle in 2024 Election

By James Tweedie – Sputnik – 25.09.2023

Operation Crossfire Hurricane — the FBI’s attempt to discredit Donald Trump’s election as president in 2016 — was found by a Congressional inquiry to be based on falsehoods. But Democrats and their sympathetic media continue to repeat the claims of ‘Russian interference’.

Failed presidential runner Hillary Clinton has repeated her discredited claims of Russian interference in US elections.

Clinton dusted off the 2016 ‘Russiagate’ conspiracy theory she used to explain her defeat by Donald Trump in an interview with MSNBC’s Jen Psaki — the former White House press secretary renowned for her inability to answer journalist’s questions.

Psaki claimed that Russian President Vladimir Putin had “interfered in our elections in the past” — directly contradicting the findings of special counsel John Durham’s inquiry that the claim was “uncorroborated” — and asked Clinton if she feared it would happen in 2024.

“I don’t think, despite all of the deniers, there is any doubt that he interfered in our election, or that he has interfered in many ways in the internal affairs of other countries, funding political parties, funding political candidates, buying off government officials in different places,” Clinton claimed.

Her tone became increasingly paranoid as she went on.

“He hates democracy. He particularly hates the West and he especially hates us,” Clinton ranted. “And he has determined that he can do two things simultaneously. He can try to continue to damage and divide us internally, and he’s quite good at it.”

The former secretary of state and senator, the wife of disgraced ex-president Bill Clinton, even believed that Putin had a personal grudge against her.

“Part of the reason he worked so hard against me is because he didn’t think that he wanted me in the White House,” Clinton complained. “Part of the challenge is to continue to explain to the American public that the kind of leader Putin is.”

She then reeled off a series of unproven allegations against the Russian president, including that he was responsible for the deaths of opposition figures and journalists — and interfered in the 2016 US elections to ensure she lost to Trump.

“I fear that the Russians will prove themselves to be quite adept at interfering, and if he has a chance, he’ll do it again,” Clinton concluded.

Durham’s report, finally released in June 2023, found that former Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI) Director James Comey’s operation Crossfire Hurricane probe — oddly named after a Rolling Stones lyric — was founded on “raw, un-analyzed and uncorroborated” intelligence and should never have been launched.

It said the FBI was guilty of misconduct and was in need of reform, but did not lay individual blame on any of the numerous officials involved — from Comey to Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, two agents entwined in an extra-marital affair at the federal agency.

September 25, 2023 Posted by | Deception, Fake News, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , , | Leave a comment

Most Russian oil exports bypassing price cap – FT

RT | September 25, 2023

The EU and G7 countries have largely failed to enforce a $60 per barrel price cap on Russian seaborne oil exports, Financial Times reported on Monday, citing an analysis of shipping and insurance records.

In August, around three-quarters of Russian oil was reportedly being shipped overseas without Western insurers, which was considered one of the tools helping to limit the price at which Russian crude was being sold on the global market.

About half of Russian oil exports did not use Western insurance services during the entire spring, according to Kpler data, as cited by the media, suggesting Moscow “is becoming more adept at circumventing the cap.”

Meanwhile, global prices for crude are on the rise, nearing 13-month highs. Brent futures for November delivery were trading at $93.51 per barrel on Monday, while US West Texas Intermediate crude (WTI) climbed above $90 per barrel. Russian crude was no exception, with the Far Eastern blend ESPO trading at over $88 per barrel, and with Urals crude above $78 per barrel.

In June, US Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo claimed that the price cap imposed by the Western allies in December was working as intended.

“In just six months, the price cap has contributed to a significant decline in Russian revenue at a key juncture in the war,” he said.

In August, Acting US Assistant Treasury Secretary Eric Van Nostrand said that he was “confident that the price cap is achieving its twin goals of restricting Russian revenues while helping stabilize energy markets.”

According to FT, Russian, Chinese, and Indian insurers have stepped in to replace Western majors, while a “dark fleet” of tankers, built for transporting Russian crude around the world, has helped Moscow to avoid Western insurers and shippers.

September 25, 2023 Posted by | Economics | , | Leave a comment

How could Russia respond when Kiev gets ATACMS missiles and armed drones?

By Drago Bosnic | September 25, 2023

It’s virtually guaranteed that the Kiev regime will get the MGM-140 ATACMS (Army Tactical Missile System), a US-made tactical/theater ballistic missile system with a maximum engagement range of approximately 300 km and a supersonic speed of up to Mach 3. While its capabilities are far from Russian counterparts, such as the now legendary “Iskander” with a hypersonic speed (up to Mach 8, with maneuvering capabilities for its missiles) and a range of approximately 500 km, this is still enough to jeopardize Russian supply lines, as well as civilian settlements deeper within Moscow’s territory. The ATACMS can also be fired from two platforms, namely the tracked M270 MLRS (Multiple Launch Rocket System) and the wheeled M142 HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket System), both of which have been delivered to the Neo-Nazi junta forces well over a year ago.

When paired with adequate ISR (intelligence, surveillance, reconnaissance) assets, which NATO fields extensively, particularly in the vicinity of Russian borders, the ATACMS can be quite a challenge. Its battlefield performance can be significantly amplified through the effective usage of real-time ISR data that essentially acts as a major force multiplier. This is where the legal “grey areas” of warfare get even more complicated. Namely, Moscow is doing its best to keep the scope of the SMO localized, but NATO continues to escalate, as evidenced by the resurgent presence of its ISR platforms around Russia’s borders, particularly in the Black Sea. The Russian military already shot down some of NATO’s ISR platforms, resulting in several months of pause in flights close to the SMO zone. However, the belligerent alliance recently restarted this highly destabilizing practice.

Moscow is perfectly aware that the political West controls the Kiev regime’s targeting, even issuing orders which Russian assets are to be attacked. The sole reason why Russia hasn’t responded by shooting down all NATO ISR platforms in the relative vicinity of its forces is that it wants to avoid escalating the conflict. However, the US-led political West sees this as a weakness and an opportunity to hurt Russia, because the way the Ukrainian conflict is being conducted is highly beneficial to NATO. Namely, the way that the political West is engaged in hostilities in Ukraine would simply be impossible in a shooting war with Moscow. The reason is quite simple. One of the very first targets for Russian Aerospace Forces (VKS) would be NATO’s ISR platforms. Precisely these are responsible for the vast majority of data being relayed to the Kiev regime.

As Ukraine borders four NATO members, this gives the belligerent alliance a unique opportunity to use their airspace for ISR flights. And while the political West argues that these are “perfectly legal” and that the aircraft “just passively collect information”, the impact of their activities is anything but “passive”. NATO ISR platforms are directly responsible not only for the deaths and injuries of Russian servicemen, but also civilians. The United States Air Force (USAF) and the British Royal Air Force (RAF) are the most active NATO members in this regard, particularly with their Boeing RC-135V/W SIGINT (signals intelligence) aircraft that regularly fly over the Black Sea. These are among the belligerent alliance’s most commonly used strategic ISR assets and play a crucial role in spying on Russian forces, covering the collection of ELINT (electronic intelligence) and COMINT (communications intelligence).

These are used to find gaps in Russian defenses (particularly radar coverage) which are then reported to the Neo-Nazi junta forces that can exploit them to launch attacks on valuable assets, as evidenced by recent air strikes with NATO-sourced cruise missiles. This makes ISR aircraft far deadlier than satellites that simply cannot loiter in an area to provide a constant supply of real-time data. NATO SIGINT aircraft also complicate Russian communications significantly, as military units are forced to maintain radio silence or use encryption, which slows down battlefield coordination, thus degrading their effectiveness. More precisely, Moscow’s military planners simply have to pay close attention to what sort of information will end up in the hands of NATO, as this could help in the creation of better countermeasures against Russian forces.

The sheer magnitude of ISR data collected by SIGINT aircraft has helped the Kiev regime forces to a certain extent, but not nearly enough to create conditions for defeating Russian troops. Still, it’s often enough to bring the much-needed PR “victories” that are a crucial part of the overall propaganda war. However, with the delivery of the ATACMS, things can become a lot more complicated, forcing the Russian military to expand the scope of the SMO. Namely, since it’s a land-based missile system, the ATACMS is logistically far less strenuous than the Franco-British “Storm Shadow/SCALP EG” or the German-Swedish “Taurus”, both of which are air-launched and are limited by the number of carrier aircraft (in the case of Neo-Nazi junta, that would be the Soviet-era Su-24), as well as the logistics for the said aircraft. To say nothing of the possibility these could get shot down.

On the other hand, the launch of a single ATACMS is not only more difficult to detect on time, but the weapon is also several times faster than air-launched cruise missiles, meaning that Russian air and missile defenses have significantly less time to respond. This changes the calculus for Moscow, as its major assets could be targeted, causing significant losses that will not be easy to replace, while it may prove difficult to detect and destroy the ATACMS launchers. Once again, it would be impossible for NATO to wage a direct war against Russia in this way, as the VKS would simply send its fighter jets, such as the superfast, high-flying MiG-31BM interceptor or the state-of-the-art Su-35S, both of which carry unrivaled long-range air-to-air missiles (AAM), such as the 400-km-range R-37M, known for its ability to maneuver at hypersonic speed (Mach 6).

Such AAMs would be used to easily destroy any ISR aircraft and other supporting assets hundreds of kilometers around Russian borders. Having the Neo-Nazi junta do all the heavy lifting and dying for “a NATO mission” while the belligerent alliance collects battlefield data is perfect for the political West, but only as long as they can maintain plausible deniability of involvement. However, as Moscow is losing patience for this sort of insolence, the conflict that is still largely limited to Ukraine could inevitably escalate, as Russia can decide to legally redefine what constitutes direct involvement. For the time being, the Russian military might decide to shoot down unmanned SIGINT assets, such as the RQ-4B “Global Hawk”. This was already done once, when a Russian Su-27SM3 masterfully downed a USAF MQ-9 “Reaper” back in March.

What’s more, the political West is close to approving deliveries of such drones as well, specifically the MQ-9 and the medium-range MQ-1C “Grey Eagle”. However, these were designed to fight low-tech enemies, meaning they’re completely useless against opponents like Russia, which shot down over 100 “Bayraktars” by April. And while some ISR drones, such as the RQ-4B are extremely expensive and strategically important, the “Global Hawk” is still just a machine, unlike the RC-135, which is manned by up to 30 crewmen. Still, if the political West decides to continue escalating even in that case, then Moscow will be forced to shoot down all of NATO’s ISR assets, which could potentially lead to a world-ending thermonuclear confrontation. If the belligerent power pole thinks it’s worth risking the fate of the world over this, then so be it, as Moscow has had enough.

Drago Bosnic is an independent geopolitical and military analyst.

September 25, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

U.S. Offshore Wind Plans Are Utterly Collapsing

By David T. Stevenson | Real Clear Energy | September 21, 2023

Offshore wind developer Ørsted has delayed its New Jersey Ocean Wind 1 project to 2026. Previously, the company had announced construction of the project would begin in October 2023. The delay was attributed to supply chain issues, higher interest rates, and a failure so far to garner enough tax credits from the federal government. For now, they are not walking away from all their U.S. projects but will reconsider long-term plans by the end of this year. Ørsted’s stock price has fallen 30% in 5 days. This is just the latest bad news for offshore wind.

Ocean Wind 1 had one of the highest guaranteed prices among the 18 projects currently in the approval queue. The actual wholesale price guarantees for Ocean Wind 1 start at $98.10/MWh, rising 2% a year to $145.77. Over twenty years revenue will average $126.47/MWh according to the New Jersey Board of Public Utilities (BPU). Ørsted is seeking higher guarantees from the BPU and an increase in federal Investment Tax Credits from 30% to 40%. Recognizing the potential financial problems, New Jersey’s largest public utility, Public Service Electric & Gas Company sold its 25% share of the project to Ørsted in January.

The company said it is “reconfiguring” Ocean Wind II in New Jersey, and its Skipjack Wind project off the coasts of Maryland and Delaware because they do not currently meet its projected financial standards. The Maryland Public Service Commission guaranteed Skipjack Wind $146.42/MWh average over twenty years and also gets to keep revenue from sales to the regional grid. Apparently, the higher guarantee is still not enough to meet the company’s financial goals. Ørsted is working to renegotiate guaranteed prices on two other projects, Sunrise Wind and Revolution Wind, that would need a 30% increase just to meet the current Ocean Wind 1 guaranteed price.

Meanwhile, projects off New York are asking for an average 48% increase in guaranteed prices that could add $880 billion a year to electric rates, or almost $18 billion over twenty years (see table below).

Center for Energy & Environment, Caesar Rodney Institute

In North Carolina, the latest long-term energy plan from Duke Energy drops offshore wind entirely in favor of nuclear, solar, and onshore wind. Furthermore, Duke has committed to only close any existing power plants once replacements are in operation, an idea that other states should follow. Two new offshore wind lease areas in the Gulf of Mexico failed to attract a bid. Vineyard Wind off Nantucket has begun construction but faces three unresolved lawsuits.

Wind turbine manufacturers are faring no better. Siemens Gamesa has announced almost $5 billion in 2023 losses from warranty repairs for turbines much smaller than those planned in the US. The company also faces price pressure. The stock price has dropped 30% since June.

This is not the time for Delaware to be considering offshore wind.

Clearly, the industry is in disarray, facing rising costs, durability, and legal issues. An 800 MW project similar in size and the current guaranteed price to Skipjack 2 may raise Delaware residential electric prices by $400 to $545/year and for businesses by the tens of thousands. A Monmouth University poll shows a major decrease in public support for offshore wind in New Jersey, falling from 84% to 54% with 40% opposed.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Economics, Malthusian Ideology, Phony Scarcity | | Leave a comment

Raeisi: 60% uranium enrichment came after Europeans ‘trampled on JCPOA commitments’

Press TV – September 24, 2023

President Ebrahim Raeisi says Iran’s uranium enrichment to the purity level of 60% was in response to the lack of commitment by the European parties to the 2015 nuclear agreement.

Raeisi made the statement in an interview with the CNN’s Fareed Zakaria on the sidelines of the 78th session of the United Nations General Assembly in New York.

“In the beginning, we were not seeking 60% levels of enrichment. They (European states) trampled upon their commitments,” the Iranian president said. “What the Islamic Republic of Iran did was in response to a breaking of commitment of the signatories to the (2015) agreement.”

Head of the Atomic Energy Organization of Iran (AEOI) Mohammad Eslami announced in June that enriching uranium to the said purity level was in accordance with a December 2020 parliamentary law – the Strategic Action Plan to Counter Sanctions.

The law was passed with the purpose of removing anti-Iran sanctions as well as the production of radiopharmaceuticals and detectors, among other aims.

Earlier in the month, Reuters cited a confidential report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) claiming that Iran’s stockpile of 60% enriched uranium continued to grow, albeit at a slower pace than in the previous quarter.

In the interview, Raeisi categorically rejected the country’s enrichment of uranium to near weapons-grade levels, saying, “It was officially announced that the action that we intend to take is not intended to reach nuclear weapons of any type or a military dimension of any type, but it is… a response for the lack of commitment demonstrated by the Europeans.”

He also reiterated Tehran’s long-standing conviction that the Islamic Republic does not plan to acquire a nuclear bomb.

The United States, under former President Donald Trump, abandoned the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) in May 2018 and reinstated crippling sanctions that the agreement had lifted.

The talks to revive the 2015 deal kicked off in Vienna in April 2021, with the intention of removing anti-Iran sanctions and examining Washington’s seriousness in rejoining the JCPOA.

The discussions, however, have been at a standstill since August 2022 due to Washington’s refusal to remove all the sanctions imposed by the previous US administration.

The European Union, which acts as the coordinator of the talks, forwarded at the time a new proposal to the Islamic Republic in order to break the impasse. Iran submitted its response to the draft proposal on August 15, 2022, a week after the latest round of talks wrapped up in Vienna.

After submitting its response to the EU proposal, Tehran urged Washington to show “realism and flexibility” in order to reach an agreement. However, it took almost ten days for the administration of President Joe Biden to submit its response to Iran’s comments on the EU draft.

Iran blamed the failure of the JCPOA’s revival on the procrastination of the American side in providing an answer and said moving to the next stage would have been possible had the US government shown serious willpower and acted responsibly in its promises.

Israeli normalization deals will fail

In the interview with CNN, Raeisi said the US-mediated efforts to normalize Israeli relations with Persian Gulf Arab states, including Saudi Arabia, “will see no success.”

President Biden declared on July 28 that a deal for Israel and Saudi Arabia to normalize relations may be on the horizon following National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan’s talks with Saudi officials in Jeddah.

In order to sign a deal with Israel, Riyadh publicly asked Tel Aviv to implement the 2002 Arab Peace Initiative to establish a Palestinian state first.

However, members of the Israeli cabinet led by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu say they will not make any concession to the Palestinians as part of a potential deal for normalization of relations with Saudi Arabia.

Under the Abraham Accords, the United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Sudan, and Morocco signed US-brokered normalization deals with the Israeli regime in late 2020. Palestinians have denounced the deals as a “betrayal” of their cause.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Aletho News | , , , , , | Leave a comment

US government stopped me from interviewing Putin – Tucker Carlson

RT | September 24, 2023

Former Fox News host Tucker Carlson has alleged in a recent interview that unnamed figures in Washington obstructed his attempts to interview Russian president Vladimir Putin.

“I tried to interview Vladimir Putin, and the US government stopped me,” Carlson claimed in an interview with Swiss publication Die Weltwoche published on Thursday. He also explained that he felt let down by the lack of support for his situation that he says he received from US news media.

He said: “I don’t think there was anybody who said ‘wait a second. I may not like this guy but he has a right to interview anyone he wants, and we have a right to hear what Putin says’.” The 54-year-old added: “You’re not allowed to hear Putin’s voice. Because why? There was no vote on it. No one asked me.”

The often-controversial media personality didn’t elaborate on the circumstances under which he says there was government intrusion into his plans to interview Putin but it appeared to suggest that it was the current Biden administration which was behind the meddling. Carlson also didn’t mention when the interview with the Russian leader was supposed to take place.

“I’m an American citizen,” Carlson told Die Weltwoche. “I’m a much more loyal American than, say, Joe Biden or Kamala Harris, who didn’t even grow up in this country; she grew up in Canada. And they’re telling me what it is to be a loyal American?”

Carlson –previously Fox News’ biggest star– parted ways with the broadcaster in April shortly after the news network settled for $787.5 million a lawsuit with voting-machine company Dominion Voting Systems. Fox News had regularly discussed claims on some of its shows that Dominion’s machines were involved in ‘rigging’ the 2020 US presidential election.

Carlson’s show Tucker Carlson Tonight, during which he frequently discussed issues like gender, race, sexuality and ‘woke’ ideology, was specifically referenced in the Dominion lawsuit.

Since leaving Fox News, Carlson has broadcast abridged versions of his news show on X (formerly Twitter) which regularly draw tens of millions of views.

Meanwhile, Russia TV news channel Rossiya 24 has aired a teaser trailer for a weekend show it says is to be hosted by Carlson. The promo was first broadcast earlier this month and again on September 22 along with the words “at the weekend.” It adds that the “high-profile American presenter is moving to another level. Here.”

Rossiya 24 didn’t state when the show will debut or if it will be original content or translated versions of Carlson’s X broadcasts.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Civil Liberties, Full Spectrum Dominance, Mainstream Media, Warmongering, Russophobia | , | Leave a comment

Latest news on the war: these past two days we have advanced considerably to a full-blown Russia-NATO war

By Gilbert Doctorow | September 23, 2023

This past week most Western media discussion of the Russia-Ukraine war has focused on developments in New York, where Zelensky and Biden gave their propaganda speeches about Russian imperialism threatening the world order, and then in Washington, where Zelensky met with Congressional leaders and with the President in his pursuit of further deliveries of arms. The focus was on air defense systems, on F-16 fighter jets and on the ATACMS ground to ground missiles.

This past week Western media broke ranks on the prospects for a Ukrainian victory. It appeared that there is growing consensus that the Ukrainian counter-offensive had failed and there was more talk of Ukraine-fatigue in American political circles. Speculation now turned both in major media and in dissident media on how the United States will respond to a looming defeat in Ukraine. Many decided that Washington would just move on after ‘throwing Ukraine under the bus’ and raise the war cries against China so as to avoid getting bogged down in recriminations over ‘who lost Ukraine.’

However, that was two days ago. Today Washington’s Plan B is becoming clearer. And what I see does not look good for world peace and for our chances of surviving this conflict.

Plan B took the form of the Storm Shadow strike a couple of days ago directly on the General Staff building of the Russian Black Sea Fleet in Sevastopol.   You have not seen or heard much about this in Western media and the Russians were dead silent until today. And even today what little information we have comes from the civilian administration in Sevastopol, not from the Russian Ministry of Defense, a fact which by itself raises the intrigue.

The Russian news tickers, by which I mean Dzen (formerly Yandex news) and mail.ru, tell us that one staff member of the general staff is unaccounted for. We are told by the Governor of Sevastopol that another strike may be expected and people were warned not to visit the downtown area. As for the building itself, the attack touched off a fire which took several hours to bring under control. There were reports that debris was scattered up to several hundred meters away. There was talk of back-up equipment being prepared to carry on the functions that were performed in the staff building. Finally, the attacking missile has been identified as a British-made Storm Shadow air-to-ground cruise missile. There may have been a cluster of these missiles incoming, because Russian air defense is said to have shot down five.

Judging by past experience when the Ukrainians have committed some sensational act, such as their bombing of the Crimean bridge or the destruction of the Kakhovka dam or their incursion across the border to the Belgorod region of Russia, there was some menacing response from the Russian Defense Ministry. Now there is silence. Why? Russian state television news yesterday and today has carried on as if there is nothing more important than the price of diesel fuel and whether the new ban on export will dampen the price and improve availability across the country.

The next troublesome straw in the wind is the reversal of the Biden administration on the question of sending the ATACMS to Kiev. The optimal moment to announce such a decision would have been during Zelensky’s day on Capitol Hill and meetings in the Oval Office. Instead Jake Sullivan told reporters that no decision had been taken as yet by the President.

I believe there is a clear connection between the successful Storm Shadow attack on the general staff building in Sevastopol and the decision to ship ATACMS to Ukraine now. I also note that the decision to supply the American missiles will surely be followed in a few days by the German decision to ship its long-range TAURUS missiles. Both decisions have till now been held back on grounds that they would lead to a Russian escalation of the war. Now it would appear that, facing imminent defeat, the Biden administration is throwing caution to the wind and is ready to risk outbreak of a direct, not proxy Russia-NATO war.

As a further straw in the wind, I point to another deeply troublesome bit of information that you will not find in The New York Times. The Russian news ticker today carries a report from a Russian commander in the field in Ukraine that his unit just destroyed a Leopard tank and found that the entire crew was Germans. Two of them were killed and one injured tank officer was taken prisoner. Those manning a Leopard surely were not soldiers of fortune but genuine Bundeswehr boys. Put in other words, NATO is now directly on the battlefield and not as advisers or instructors. We are headed into very dangerous territory.

Poscript:

One reader has sent in a valuable further bit of information that is not in mainstream reporting:

This, coming from Turkish sources, says that the Russians retaliated to the Sevastopol destruction by staging their own cruise missile attack on the Kremenchug Airport, the launch site used by the Ukrainians. “Both SCALP and Storm Shadow missiles, which were stationed at the airbase, along with the SU24M/MR bombers responsible for today’s attack, have been detroyed. A substantial number of firefighters and ambulances have been dispatched to the airfield. There are significant casualties among pilots, ground personnel and even NATO personnel, including Poles, who were involved in coordinating the operatoins and maintaining the missiles.”

This all suggests an additional reason for Biden to consent to shipment of the ATACMS missiles to Ukraine now: unlike the Storm Shadow, they are launched from the ground on mobile launchers similar to HIMARS. Therefore the loss of airfields and bombers and pilots does not constrain their use and holds the promise of more destuction of Russian assets in Crimea. I would also wager that US forces will be sent not just to maintain but to target and launch the ATACMS.

©Gilbert Doctorow, 2023

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , , | Leave a comment

NATO membership for Ukraine not in US interests – DeSantis

RT | September 24, 2023

Ukraine joining NATO would be of no benefit to the US and would become yet another burden for Washington, Florida governor and Republican presidential candidate Ron DeSantis has said.

In an episode of The Glenn Beck Program podcast on Saturday, he was asked whether he believed Ukraine should give a commitment never to join the US-led military bloc in order to make peace.

“I don’t think NATO membership is in our interest,” replied DeSantis, who is considered a top rival of former president Donald Trump in the GOP primaries.

“All that would do is add more obligations to us, so … if you’re adding more obligations, then what are the benefits that we’re getting in return? In that case, I don’t know what the benefits necessarily would be,” he added.

Ukraine applied to join NATO in September 2022 after four of its regions overwhelmingly voted to join Russia in referendums. While the bloc’s members have declared that Kiev will eventually become a member of NATO, they have not provided any timelines.

DeSantis also reiterated that he categorically opposes sending American troops to Ukraine, adding that Washington’s goal should be to end the conflict. He criticized the current “blank-check” policy of supporting Kiev with financial and military aid.

This position has been gaining traction within the ranks of the GOP in recent months, with some Republicans repeatedly raising accountability concerns. Earlier this week, a group of more than two dozen of the party’s senators and Congress members submitted a letter to the White House demanding answers.

“The American people deserve to know what their money has gone to. How is the counteroffensive going? Are the Ukrainians any closer to victory than they were six months ago? What is our strategy, and what is the president’s exit plan?” they asked the Biden administration.

The lawmakers indicated that, until those questions are answered, they will oppose additional spending in support of Ukraine. Their pushback came as Congress debates whether the US, which has already provided tens of billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, should approve Biden’s latest request to send another $24 billion in assistance.

September 24, 2023 Posted by | Militarism | , , | Leave a comment

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