DISNEY SOUVENIR from Vibe Patrol is now available on Spotify, iTunes, and YouTube. And, of course, on Unauthorized. It’s pure, unmitigated candy pop, but it’s certainly catchy.
New Vibe Patrol
Self-Determination
Thanks to Vladimir Putin and the soldiers of Russia, the Russian people of Lugansk are finally free from the murderous usurpers of the Kiev regime:
After the 2014 coup in Ukraine, mass protests against the new Ukrainian leadership began in Lugansk.
On April 27, at a rally, the Lugansk People’s Republic (LPR) was proclaimed within the Lugansk Oblast. On May 11, a referendum on self-determination was held in the republic, with organizers announcing that 96.2% of voters supported independence. On May 12, the LPR authorities proclaimed the republic’s sovereignty. On May 24, the LPR authorities signed an agreement with the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) to create the Union of People’s Republics (from July 2014 – Novorossiya; this decision was solidified in 2015).
On May 18, 2014, the Constitution of the LPR was adopted.
By mid-August 2014, the AFU had managed to establish control over territories in western LPR and partially encircle Lugansk. However, in August, the Army of the Southeast was able to push back the enemy somewhat. A ceasefire agreement was reached on September 5, 2014 in Minsk at a meeting of the Contact Group on Ukraine.
Amid Ukraine’s failure to implement the Minsk agreements on Donbass settlement and escalating tensions on the contact line between LPR forces and the AFU, deputies from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation faction submitted a draft appeal to the State Duma on January 19, 2022, calling on Russian President V.V. Putin to recognize the independence of the DPR and LPR as “independent, sovereign and independent states.” On February 15, the State Duma approved the appeal by a majority vote (351 for, 16 against, 1 abstained) and sent it to the President of Russia.
On February 17, the situation on the contact line became even more acute. The LPR reported the most intense shelling by the AFU in recent months, while the OSCE reported a sharp increase in hostilities. The evacuation of the republic’s population to Russia began, with Russian authorities guaranteeing temporary asylum to refugees. Mobilization was announced in the LPR.
On February 21, 2022, LPR and DPR leaders L.I. Pasechnik and D.V. Pushilin appealed to V.V. Putin to recognize the independence of the Donbass republics. The same day, after an expanded meeting with members of the Russian Security Council, V.V. Putin in a televised address to the nation announced recognition of LPR and DPR sovereignty and signed decrees recognizing the LPR and DPR, ordering the Russian Armed Forces to maintain peace in the republics.
On February 24, 2022, in response to requests for assistance from LPR and DPR leadership, Russia began its Special Military Operation in Ukraine.
On June 30, 2025, LPR Head Leonid Pasechnik announced that the territory of the LPR had been completely liberated from the Nazi invaders of the AFU.
The mainstream media narrative in the West has never been able to admit that the Kiev regime is illegitimate, that the Russian Special Military Operation has always been a war of liberation, and that the moral high ground belongs, first and foremost, to the people of Luhansk and Donask who were never guilty of anything more than pursuing the self-determination that the West has supposedly championed for more than 100 years.
But the West is no longer the West of yore, or it would have been supporting the Novorossyans, not arming and abetting their illegitimate occupiers.
Cathedra Book 2
We’ve got books for all three subscription series to announce, so we’ll start with announcing Castalia Cathedra Book 2, which is PRAYER AND THE CONTEMPLATIVE LIFE by St. Thomas Aquinas. Translated by Hugh Pope.
For more information, an example of the interior layout, and an excerpt from the Introduction, visit the Castalia Library stack. Tomorrow, we’ll announce the next History book, and Wednesday, the next Library book.
They Tell You It’s Not Real
Both /pol/ and Dr. Mark Trozzi have been warning Americans about the scenario from The National Blueprint for Biodefense that involves a bioweapon attack that kills 280,000 Americans on July 4, 2025. Now, we all know that these “hypothetical scenarios” and “training exercises” are sometimes, though not usually, cover for the launch of the real thing. But what I found most interesting, in perusing the document, was the way in which its intrinsic falsity was clearly conveyed within the document itself.
Where, my fellow Omni-Narrational Skeptic, is the clue that this urgent biodefense blueprint is pure bureaucratic fiction?
We also believe that the United States, its allies, and partners in industry, academia, and nongovernmental organizations can eliminate pandemics entirely in 10 years by fully implementing the recommendations we made in our earlier report, The Apollo Program for Biodefense. Ending pandemics is more achievable today than landing on the Moon was in 1961.
THE APOLLO PROGRAM FOR BIODEFENSE
Technology holds great promise. Within weeks of recognizing the existence of COVID-19, scientists mapped its entire genome and developed and produced vaccines faster than ever before. They accomplished these previously unimaginable feats because of forward-looking programs (e.g., Human Genome Project, advanced research programs that previously led to many vaccines currently used to treat a variety of diseases). Nonetheless, we failed to adequately harness scientific and technological capabilities, and undermined response efforts by failing to implement new strategies and defenses. We have an unknown period to address those shortcomings before the next devastating pandemic occurs.The need to control COVID-19 created momentum to produce many technologies that we previously lacked the will and resources to pursue before the pandemic began. We need to build on that progress and push for technological advances to protect us from the next biological threat. Our Nation rises to seemingly impossible challenges by pursuing grand programs. The United States can similarly put an end to pandemics within a decade, but only with leadership, resources, and interest that go beyond technical constraints and the usual crisis-neglect cycles.
The United States should leverage basic research portfolios to study pathogens of concern, conduct pre-clinical and clinical testing of priority and prototype pathogens, develop products to detect and treat the diseases they cause. These programs must involve domestic, international, private, and public sector partners.
The Commission proposed The Apollo Program for Biodefense in 2021 to undertake targeted research and development to detect and continually trace any new pathogen from the source, distribute rapid point-of-use tests to every household and farm in the country within days of that detection, have effective treatments already in-hand, and develop and rollout vaccines in weeks rather than years. This ambitious program, at about $10 billion annually for ten years, would be a small fraction of the trillions in costs incurred by the COVID-19 pandemic and would contribute immensely to our country’s public health, economic, and national security.
As they say, space may be the final frontier, but it’s filmed in a Hollywood basement. Which means that any “biodefense” program is almost certainly cover for domestic bioattacks on the citizenry. And we can even see whom the parties we’re supposed to believe will be responsible are.
The Department of State assesses that China, Iran, North Korea, and Russia continue to engage in biological weapons-specific or dual-use research activities, and fail to comply with the BWC. New state programs can still access caches of incompletely destroyed or buried biological weapons materials from old state programs, and then smuggle them to other regions for use by today’s militaries and terrorist organizations. Weapons that once consumed a great deal of time and resources to make now take far less, and what the United States could accomplish more than 40 years ago, others can accomplish today.
Now, despite all this documentaion, I tend to doubt that there will be any bioweapon attack on July 4th, and if there is, it will, like the Covid-19 and vaccine attacks, almost certainly be less effective than intended. It also won’t be Iran who is responsible, although obviously that’s who the next false flag will be blamed upon since Clown World still can’t quite wrap its collective head around the fact that it somehow didn’t manage to trigger its long-sought US-Iran war despite multiple attacks by Israel and by the USA itself.
Five Generations of Modern War
Military history buffs and fans of William S. Lind should recognize the form of this AI-generated lecture, which updates his famous Four Generations of Modern War lecture with the latest transformations in warfare. Read the whole thing at AI Central. It’s not too much of an exaggeration to observe that this is probably in advance and more up-to-date than what is presently being taught at most military colleges today, if the actions of various militaries, including the US Navy and the IDF, are any guide. And I think you’ll agree that this is an absolute tour de force of applied AI in action.
The Fifth Generation of Modern War: Drones, Attrition, and the Collapse of the Logistics Sanctuary
A lecture examining how unmanned systems fundamentally transform the nature of warfare by eliminating the distinction between the front lines and the logistics space.
Introduction:
Ladies and gentlemen, what I’m going to present to you today builds directly on the intellectual framework that William Lind laid out in his groundbreaking lecture entitled the Four Generations of Modern War. As Lind emphasized, we cannot determine the consistency of a system from inside itself—we must stand outside it to see clearly. Today, we must step outside not just our current military thinking, but outside the entire framework of the first four generations to understand what is happening in conflicts from Nagorno-Karabakh to Ukraine to the skies over Israel and Iran.
We are witnessing the emergence of the Fifth Generation of Modern War, and like each previous generational shift, it represents what the Hegelians would call a dialectically qualitative change—not merely an evolution in tactics or technology, but a fundamental transformation in the nature of warfare itself. This transformation is driven by the proliferation of unmanned systems—drones—which have done something unprecedented since the Peace of Westphalia: they have eliminated the sanctuary of the logistics space.
For the first time since modern warfare began, there is no safe rear area. The combat zone has expanded from what was traditionally a 5-kilometer depth to 25 kilometers and beyond. This is not simply longer-range artillery or deeper penetration by special forces—this is the permanent, persistent threat of attack against every element of military force, from the frontline rifleman to the supply depot hundreds of kilometers from the front.
But before we examine this revolutionary change, we must understand what came before. Lind’s framework of the Four Generations provides the foundation upon which we must build our understanding of the Fifth.
How China is Ending Divorce
The recent memes about the changes to Chinese divorce law are more than a month out of date and a little exaggerated. But the changes show that the Chinese government is serious about winning the 21st century as the West continues to spiral downward into dyscivilization:
China has made significant changes to its divorce laws, aimed at making marriage registration simpler and divorce harder. A new 30-day cooling-off period has been introduced, requiring couples to wait before finalizing their divorce. This period gives couples a chance to reconsider their decision, potentially preventing hasty decisions, but it also raises concerns about women who may feel trapped in abusive or unhappy relationships.
The law overhauls property division, shifting from equal distribution to ownership based on who paid for the property. This means that if one spouse paid for the property, they retain ownership even if the other spouse’s name is on the title. Property gifts from family members to one spouse are also exempt from being shared. Additionally, the law grants equal custody of children to both parents, meaning both parents retain their rights to the children unless there are extenuating circumstances. This aims to reduce custody battles, making the process smoother and ensuring that both parents have a say in raising their children after separation.
The West is going to have to follow suit sooner or later, because the current female-favoring divorce laws are not only destroying far too many existing marriages, but are preventing men from pursuing marriage, or even relationships, in the first place.
Simply refraining from distributing men’s property to women and preventing women from being able to use access to children as a post-marital weapon would significantly remove some of the current disincentives to marriage.
Last Day for Cathedra
\This is just a note to remind those who are interested in the Castalia Cathedra subscription that this is the final day to subscribe and get a copy of Book #1: THE EVERLASTING MAN by GK Chesterton.
Book #2 in the subscription will be announced tomorrow. I’m also pleased to be able to say that the initial print run will be in the 400 to 500 range, although we cannot calculate a precise number until the initial six-month period comes to an end. I can also say that we will be making use of the higher-quality pigskin leather for the Cathedra line.
The Fifth Generation of War
After all the various debates about what would comprise the next generation of warfare, the recent conflicts between Armenia and Azherbaijan, Russia and Ukraine, and Iran and Israel have made it abundantly clear that it is drone warfare that is the Fifth Generation of War:
Last night, Russia also launched one of the largest strikes of the war, when you count total assets used. The missile count was relatively low, but the drones numbered nearly 500 Shaheds and other decoys in total, which is likely a record for single day usage. Counting missiles, it was well over 500+ units launched in one night. The attacks wreaked havoc on various sites, from Ukrainian airports, to energy infrastructure in Poltava, the Drohobich refinery in Lvov, and Kremenchug oil refinery as well.
But most eye-opening was the new statement from top Ukrainian radio-electronics expert Serhiy ‘Flash’ Beskrestnov. He is rarely alarmist, so the urgent tone raised quite a few eyebrows in Ukraine What he’s referring to are the predictions that Russian production capabilities for Shahed drones would soon reach levels allowing Russia to launch upwards of 500-700 of these drones per night, as they did last night.
Not only that, but both Ukrainian and Russian sources indicate that most casualties are inflicted by drones, and two-thirds of those casualties are in the logistical zone outside of the traditional battlefield.
UKRAINE: FPVs represent 49%, artillery only 13.6%, with Russian Kab/Fab bombs only 3.7%. More specifically, they distinguish that 35% of FPV hits are on troops in positions, such as trenches and foxholes, while 65% are hits on roads, i.e. vehicles or troops in transit. For the record, the full list in the left column is: FPV, artillery, infantry, drone-dropped mines, mortars, Kab/Fab, and Lancets.
RUSSIA: The losses of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the combat contact line are only 35%, and 65% are in logistics in the 20-kilometer zone form the contact line. Russian units are knocking out most of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ manpower during rotation with the help of drones.
This extension of the zone of lethality has significantly expanded the effective size of the battlefield. Unlike many previously suggested concepts, this expansion is truly indicative of a fundamental transformation of the way in which war is now waged and therefore worthy of the designation as Fifth Generation War.
The Commandant of the Marine Corps once said: “Amateurs talk about tactics, but professionals study logistics.” But with the recent expansion of the combat zone, tactics and logistics tactics are now being fused into a single concept that will have to be addressed by new military doctrines and mastered by a new breed of military officers.
Yes, I Do Read Screencaps
Given the sad loss of great sports-related weekly columnists from the recent past, like Peter King, Dr. Z, and even Bill Simmons, who, though still alive and well, is more a media mogul than a writer now, the best column currently running is Screencaps on Outkick, which is amusingly eclectic and keeps regular tabs on everything from bikinis to books. I responded to Joe’s recent call for library pictures, which will look familiar to most Darkstream viewers, and he featured it along with one of Castalia Library’s upcoming books.
You just never know who’s reading Screencaps
— Vox writes:
If it doesn’t have leather books, is it even a proper library?
The non-leather books include complete sets of The Cambridge Medieval History series, 1911 edition, and The Cambridge Ancient History series 1928 edition. There is also a set of the original Dispatches and Letters of Lord Nelson, published in 1845, and one of the 300 original copies of The Bibliography of Military Books up to 1612 published in 1900.
I run one of the world’s only leather book binderies, so we buy a lot of rare books in order to make perfect high-end reproductions of them, like the first edition of Pride and Prejudice and the first complete English
translation of The Tale of Genji. We do high-end books in cowhide and pigskin, and even higher-end ones in goatskin with real gold. If you’re interested, let me know and I’ll send you one. I’ve also included a
picture of the book we’re currently binding, part of a two-volume set for Cambridge University Press.
Speaking of the bindery, we hope to have some excellent news for everyone very soon, although unfortunately, it appears that we have become even more exclusive than we were last week when that note was sent, as the world’s number of leather book binderies just shrank by one with the closure of Maltby’s Bookbinders and the Green Street Bindery, an Oxford-based bindery originally established in 1834.
Tomorrow we’ll be announcing the new books for Library, History, and Cathedra. It also appears as many as FIVE books will be bound this month, but we’ll provide more details on that when I have confirmation.
Iran’s Deep Bench
Given the proclivity of both the USA and Israel to wage war through assassination and regime change, it shouldn’t come as a surprise that their enemies are now anticipating decapitation strikes, which was the section of this interview with a former Iranian general that caught my attention.
There’s the issue of the leadership vacuum the Zionist entity sought to create by assassinating leaders of the Revolutionary Guard, followed by subsequent operations. But what we witnessed instead was the strength of our armed forces: leadership positions were filled within just three to four hours, and the command structure was swiftly and efficiently reorganized. What did the people witness afterward? How do you assess the Zionist entity’s belief that creating a leadership vacuum would weaken you?
Mohsen Rezaei: I believe Israel made a grave military miscalculation. They assumed Iran was similar to Hezbollah, even though they themselves have failed to dismantle Hezbollah. They should have learned from that experience. Look at the leadership figures that have emerged within our armed forces. Major General Pakpour, for example, is an exceptionally strong field commander—courageous, with a remarkable operational vision.
Amir Hatami, who joined from the regular army, is a brave and seasoned officer. The same goes for Mr. Mousavi in the aerospace sector. And also for Mr. Mousavi who succeeded the martyred General Bagheri in the General Staff—he is a dedicated man, aligned with the resistance movement.
Though they come from the regular army, there is full coordination between them and the Revolutionary Guards. What the enemy did failed to create any structural void within the armed forces. In fact, it could be said that certain aspects have grown more effective, as recent events have shown. That’s one point.
Secondly, we now have no fewer than ten additional layers of trained commanders and officers—some from the generation that fought in the war, and others who gained valuable field experience in later years, particularly in the fight against ISIS. Many of our forces who fought in Iraq and Syria against ISIS have, through those field experiences, become akin to senior war commanders like Hussein Kharrazi and Ahmad Kazemi—young, capable leaders fully prepared to command the armed forces.
It was a profound error on the part of the Israeli military not to recognize the deep hierarchical structure and the robust bench of ready leadership within our ranks. This internal architecture and the organizational evolution of the armed forces entirely compensated for any potential gaps. In my view, this challenge has already been overcome. And in the near future, our dear people will see that those who have stepped into the shoes of our fallen leaders will ensure that no imbalance or vacuum arises in the management of the armed forces.
The high command—led by His Eminence, the Commander—is fully acquainted with each of these leaders. They have been selected with care and discernment. I am absolutely confident that there will be no void in leadership.
A very common mistake often seen throughout military history is projection, or analyzing the enemy as if it were a mirror image of one’s own forces. Both Israel and the USA have very thin strategic and command benches, which is why they assume that taking out the top layer or two of enemy leadership will lead to complete confusion and disarray.
Which, to be fair, would likely happen in the case of either country suffering the loss of its leadership. But it’s clear that Iran and China are both very well prepared in an institutional sense for rapid leadership transitions that will avoid the confusion and military paralysis that are the primary objective of decapitation strikes. Russia, perhaps not so much, which may account for the monomaniacal focus on President Putin’s well-being, although my suspicion is that his successor will be less patient with the West and more hardline.
Regime change works when you’ve got your candidate all ready and in position to assume command and negotiate a surrender. But it can’t when you don’t have a candidate, and worse, the enemy is already set up to make a series of orderly transitions if necessary.