Tag: Russia

WWIII is Already Underway

If Ron Unz is correct and Vladimir Putin and Xi Xinping have already reduced their international travel due to concerns about assassination by Clown World, I think it’s safe to conclude that peace is not even a remote possibility in the near future:

The Hudson Institute is a leading DC think-tank, quite influential in mainstream political circles, and a report with five co-authors that runs 128 pages must surely carry considerable weight in establishment circles. So when it suggests that the Chinese government is fragile and might soon collapse, those policy makers hostile to China are likely to take such views quite seriously.

Suppose that a leading Chinese think-tank with close ties to the PRC government published a weighty report predicting that America might soon collapse, then went on to argue that Chinese military forces would need to be deployed in our own country to seize our key military and technological assets and also establish a new government organized along Chinese lines. I doubt that most American political leaders or ordinary citizens would view such Chinese proposals with total equanimity, and indeed the blogger quoted a shocked Western pro-China business executive who succinctly summarized some of the striking elements in that Hudson Institute research study:

…which provides detailed operational plans for inducing Chinese regime collapse through systematic information operations, financial warfare, and covert influence campaigns, followed by detailed protocols for U.S. post-collapse management including military occupation, territorial reorganization, and the installation of a political and cultural system vassalized to the U.S.

Rand and Hudson are two of our leading mainstream think-tanks and the New Yorker is one of our most prestigious media outlets. Taken together those major articles and reports could easily convince the ignorant and suggestible ideologues in our government that the Chinese military was weak and the Chinese government fragile and ripe for collapse.

If delusional beliefs regarding the fragility of the Iranian and Russian governments had already led to American assassination attempts against their top leadership, similar reasoning might easily result in targeting those of China as well, especially President Xi Jinping, widely regarded as the strongest Chinese leader in decades. And given all of the recent American assassination projects, the Chinese government might certainly have itself reached such conclusions.

China and Russia are the two leading members of the BRICS movement, which held its 17th summit last month in Brazil. The media noted that neither Russian President Putin nor Chinese President Xi attended in person, with the latter missing his first BRICS summit since he came to power 13 years ago.

Xi’s surprising absence caused some discussion in the media. I initially paid little attention to this issue, but then some commenter suggested an obvious explanation: Both Xi and Putin were concerned about the possible risk of American assassination.

Brazil is located within the Western Hemisphere, a region under full American military domination. Given the extremely reckless and unpredictable behavior of the American government, with President Trump having publicly threatened to assassinate Iran’s top leader just a couple of weeks earlier, both China and Russia may have believed that some risks should best be avoided.

Over the years, Xi and Putin had both met on numerous occasions with Iranian President Raisi, with whom they had developed an excellent working relationship, and surely his 2024 death in a mysterious helicopter crash while returning from a foreign trip would have concentrated their minds.

It’s been very difficult for Americans to understand that the rest of the world doesn’t aspire to become like them. And while Americans also like to think of the USA as the big dog on the world stage, I don’t think many of them grasp that many countries around the world, including some very powerful ones, are beginning to conclude that the big dog is now rabid.

And what is the point of talking to a rabid dog? What can one possibly hope to accomplish?

DISCUSS ON SG

The Russia That Will Say No

Hal Turner contemplates the significance of the US Special Envoy’s trip to Moscow:

What does Witkoff bring to Moscow?

  • Cosmetic concessions, presumably in the area of de facto territorial recognition
  • Hints of economic cooperation
  • Classic threats of sanctions – if Moscow doesn’t “give in”

What Witkoff won’t do:

Accept the Russian minimum demands which are . . .

  • Recognition of the new regions (Luhansk, Donetsk, Kherson, and Zaporozhe) as part of Russia.
  • Demilitarization and neutrality of Ukraine.

He won’t accept them because that would mean: The West would have lost. And the world would have seen it.

Scenario: A Russian “no” to Witkoff’s offer would most likely not simply lead to a new low in negotiations – but to Phase II of a global systemic conflict. Then the world would no longer be in the shadow of a unipolar center, but in a new bipolar confrontation.

On the one side: The expanded West – that is, the NATO states, the EU, plus Australia, Japan, South Korea, and some dependent partners in the Global South.

On the other side: An emerging counterweight – with Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, and possibly other members of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization.

In this scenario, it is only a matter of time before the previously “frozen” conflict over Taiwan also actively emerges – as the next geopolitical leverage in the struggle for influence, sovereignty, and system dominance.

Conclusion: Witkoff’s trip is not a diplomatic exchange – It is an attempt to delay the end of the unipolar world order.

This smacks of a desperate Hail Mary thrown by the Short Fake Trump fake administration, and I see absolutely no sign that Russia is inclined to accept anything short of its core demands because it is winning both the economic war and the military war. Everyone, and especially the Russians, has learned that accepting Clown World’s shiny beads and trinkets comes at a steep price and is never, ever worth it over time.

And I think Hal Turner is right to believe that the Clown Worlders running the USA, the UK, and the EU will try to fight a war they know they can’t win rather than accept the inevitable end of “the unipolar world order” that they ruled for nearly 40 years. To do so would be foolish and stupid, but then, they are foolish, stupid, and evil.

DISCUSS ON SG

Tripling Down on Failure

Western sanctions on Russia have completely failed. Additional sanctions on China have completely failed. So now, instead of accepting their defeat in both economic and proxy war in Ukraine, both the USA and the EU are going to try sanctioning India. This effort too will fail.

On Sunday, a top aide to President Donald Trump accused India of financing Russia’s war in Ukraine by buying oil from Moscow. “What he [Trump] said very clearly is that it is not acceptable for India to continue financing this war by purchasing the oil from Russia,” said Stephen Miller, deputy chief of staff at the White House and one of the US president’s most influential aides. “People will be shocked to learn that India is basically tied with China in purchasing Russian oil. That’s an astonishing fact,” Miller said on Fox News.

This marks a significant hardening of tone, signalling that bipartisan pressure on India’s Russia policy may persist regardless of the administration in power.

The Indian government issued a stern response, saying Delhi would keep purchasing oil from Moscow if it is in line with national interests. Its foreign ministry stated that country’s energy purchases are guided by market dynamics and national interests. “⁠The government is committed to prioritizing the welfare of Indian consumers. Our energy purchases will be based on price, availability and market conditions,” the statement read.

Despite Trump’s claims that India had stopped buying Russian oil after his threats, the Indian government said it is not aware of any pauses in imports. People in the oil and gas industry have confirmed that the government has not issued any officials requests to refiners to stop purchasing Russian oil.

As global energy flows are increasingly weaponized, India’s path is becoming tougher, but also more clearly defined. This is no longer merely a question of compliance with sanctions; it is about resisting the politicization of trade and asserting agency in a fragmented global order. The message to the West at large: India’s energy decisions will not be dictated by external red lines.

The era of quiet compromise is over. In its place, a more assertive India is stepping forward, redefining its energy calculus, managing geopolitical headwinds, and defending its autonomy with both pragmatism and resolve.

It’s really remarkable to observe how prodigiously stupid the flailing actions of a declining empire and the posturing rhetoric of its retarded politicians are. It’s as if they have no ability to grasp the fact that they are in no position to demand the things they are demanding.

DISCUSS ON SG

Report: Russia Captured British Officers

Hal Turner and others are reporting that Russian special forces operators have captured three British officers

Special forces of the Russian Federation have captured several NATO officers in Ukraine. This is the first real-life proof that NATO itself is actively waging war against Russia.

Lieutenant Colonel Richard Carroll, and Colonel Edward Blake, both active-duty officers of the British Army, along with as as-yet unidentified Agent of British MI-6 (Intelligence) were captured during a daring raid by Russian Special Forces, in the city of Ohakiv. Lt. Col. Carroll is detailed to the British Ministry of Defense.

The third individual taken in the raid is referred-to only as “A member of MI-6 Intelligence.”

A long-time Intelligence-Community colleague of mine from my years working with the FBI Joint Terrorism Task, Force (JTTF), whom I trust implicitly, told me Russian special forces disembarked from several ships and penetrated a command center of the Ukrainian armed forces. They captured British soldiers who coordinated the use of British missiles and drones against Russian forces and against civilian targets.

He went on to say the operation lasted about 15 minutes. Hours after the operation, diplomatic relations between London and Moscow deteriorated sharply. The British have been caught, red-handed, and the implications for Britain, and NATO as a whole, are now E X T R E M E L Y bad.

Representatives of the British Ministry of Foreign Affairs asked the Russian Ministry of Defense to return the British officers ‘lost’ in Ukraine. The official London version is: the arrested officers traveled to Ukraine as tourists and “accidentally” ended up in Ochakiv. The British had the gall to tell the Russians that the men “were interested in naval history and wanted to visit the coast where battles were fought during the Second World War.”

Clown World is going to clown. But either Clown World really wants Russia to attack the EU and the UK or NATO, NATO is getting careless about keeping its officers out of harm’s way, or the Russian advance has picked up the pace to the point that the NATO “military advisors” can’t retreat fast enough to avoid getting captured.

At this point, the only thing protecting the civilians of Great Britain and Europe is the restraint of the very man they’ve spent the last three years demonizing, Vladimir Putin. But there are only so many stupid provocations that even the most patient and intelligent man can accept.

DISCUSS ON SG

Short Fat Trump Gets Stroppy

I don’t care what India does with Russia. They can take their dead economies down together, for all I care. We have done very little business with India, their Tariffs are too high, among the highest in the World. Likewise, Russia and the USA do almost no business together. Let’s keep it that way, and tell Medvedev, the failed former President of Russia, who thinks he’s still President, to watch his words. He’s entering very dangerous territory!

Oh, no, only 11 days left until the next TACO. Clearly the BRICS alliance is quaking. What sort of meaningless posturing will they be subjected to next?

DISCUSS ON SG

12 Days and Counting Down

Donald Trump made another move in his feckless game of global checkers today in Scotland, with the announcement that he is giving Russia a new, much shorter deadline—10 to 12 days from now—to end the war in Ukraine. Trump warned that if President Vladimir Putin does not reach a deal by around August 7–9, the US will impose new sanctions and “severe tariffs” on Russia and countries supporting its war effort. Trump’s new deadline elicited a collective yawn in Moscow.

Trump’s threat of new sanctions is just a blowhard bloviating… Ending shipments of fertilizers and precious metals is not going to hurt the Russian economy one bit. Thanks to the sanctions Biden levied in 2022, Russia’s economy grew to be the fourth largest in the world as measured by purchasing power parity. Western propaganda that the Russian economy is failing–citing current growth of 1.4%–ignores the fiscal policies that the Russian central bank put in place in 2024 to cool inflation. But those measures were only temporary, with the central bank announcing a two percent cut in interest rates late last week.

That means that Trump, if he is serious, will impose bone-crunching tariffs on China and India. Both countries appear unfazed by Trump’s bullying bluster. China in particular holds some very strong cards… Rare-earth minerals desperately needed by the US military industrial complex. I think this will be another Trump nothing-burger.

It’s obvious that more sanctions aren’t going to hurt Russia. Which raises the obvious question? Why the reduction of 38 days from the original deadline? Whatever the reason, it doesn’t smack of confidence, to the contrary, it reeks of desperation.

And when Putin ignores the deadline, what then? Threaten another one?

DISCUSS ON SG

Clown World Calls Time

The Black Rider has no more use for Zelensky and presumably will be throwing him from the horse this autumn:

For Ukraine’s sake, Zelensky must now step aside

Volodymyr Zelensky was once Ukraine’s saviour. In the first hours of the Russian invasion, as Putin’s paratroopers advanced on Central Kyiv with specific orders to kill him, Zelensky refused to evacuate.
Instead, he rallied his people to a heroic resistance that surprised the world – and Ukrainians themselves. It was thanks to Zelensky’s relentless lobbying and inspiring showmanship that Western nations were cajoled into sending rockets, artillery and tanks where once they had offered helmets and bandages.

But those times are gone. Zelensky is no longer part of the solution to Ukraine – he is part of the problem. Over the last year Zelensky has used emergency wartime powers to exile, investigate and jail many leading political opponents and critics. Opposition media have been shut down, and thousands of businesses have been seized by Zelensky cronies under the pretext of alleged links to Russia.

Zelensky has played an epic role in saving his country from destruction. Now there is a danger of his imitating his corrupt predecessors, and he should step aside, for Ukraine’s sake.

If a headline article in The Daily Telegraph is not a very clear signal for Zelensky to resign and run for one of his mansions in Florida or Tuscany while he still can, I don’t know what is. Short of Boris Johnson showing up in Kiev and telling him “it’s over” to his face, this is about as direct an order as Clown World ever gives.

This doesn’t mean the neoclowns have gotten any more realistic about what it will take to convince Putin to call off the Russian Army. The problem is that since the proxy war has gone global, it’s not just about what former Ukrainian territory will be transferred to Russian sovereignty, it’s also about ending the West’s economic war on Russia and its partners.

DISCUSS ON SG

They Hate Their People

Between Angela Merkel blessing the third world invasion of her country and her current successor in the Chancellorship, Friedrich Merz, promising German-assisted long-range missile strikes on Russia, it’s eminently clear that the German politicians hate the German people.

If Germany provides weapons (Taurus) and material assistance to Ukraine to target inside Russia (The Kiev Dictatorship can’t operate these missiles without German direct input). There is a real possibility that Russia will strike weapons production and transit sites in Germany.

Fortunately, Vladimir Putin is a patient man and he is unlikely to target civilian centers in Germany. Unfortunately, he has shown real restraint in not taking out the enemy political elites that are so willing to sacrifice the masses.

DISCUSS ON SG

The Wrong Lesson

The grand strategery of Clown World is quite possibly going to get an enormous number of soldiers killed because their abject retardery knows no bounds. This is what purports to be a military history piece encouraging direct US and European intervention published a year ago by the director of something called “Lazard Geopolitical Advisory” which makes an excellent case for never taking the advice of Lazard Geopolitical Advisory:

Northern Russia must have felt bitterly cold to U.S. soldiers, even though nearly all were from Michigan. On Sept. 4, 1918, 4,800 U.S. troops landed in Arkhangelsk, Russia, only 140 miles from the Arctic Circle. Three weeks later, they were plunged into battle against the Red Army among towering pine forests and subarctic swamps, alongside the British and French. Ultimately, 244 U.S. soldiers died from the fighting over two years. Diaries of U.S. troops paint a harrowing picture of first contact:

We run into a nest of machine-guns, we retire. [Bolsheviks] still shelling heavily. Perry and Adamson of my squad wounded, bullet clips my shoulder on both sides. … Am terribly tired, hungry and all in, so are the rest of the boys. Casualties in this attack 4 killed and 10 wounded.

These unlucky souls represented just one prong of the sprawling and ill-fated Allied intervention in the Russian civil war. From 1918 to 1920, the United States, Britain, France, and Japan sent thousands of troops from the Baltics to northern Russia to Siberia to Crimea—and millions of dollars in aid and military supplies to the anti-communist White Russians—in an abortive attempt to strangle Bolshevism in its crib. It’s one of the most complicated and oft-forgot foreign-policy failures of the 20th century…

Despite the current pall of pessimism pervading Western capitals, today’s war in Ukraine presents some of the more propitious circumstances a policymaker could hope for—unlike those faced by the Allies during the Russian civil war. Ukraine is a worthy and competent ally, fighting to defend its territory with a highly motivated population behind it. The Ukrainian cause is a righteous one, with a Manichean quality to it easily explained to Western publics. While Putin’s personal will to win is strong, it’s clear by his actions and hesitancy to fully mobilize Russian society that he senses a ceiling on what he can ask from his population. Though Russia’s manpower and materiel are larger than Ukraine’s, the amount needed to keep Ukraine armed and in the fight is completely manageable. A $60 billion aid supplement from the United States—currently held up by far-right Republicans in the House of Representatives—is a pittance compared with the returns: holding the line on international norms; standing up for the Ukrainians and, in doing so, Western values; bogging down Russia in a strategic sinkhole and reducing its capacity to threaten the rest of NATO’s eastern flank; and fortifying the trans-Atlantic alliance. Today, Western capitals are much more united than they were in 1918, and defense coordination among them is strong. Though they can sharpen the shared sense of an endgame in Ukraine, everybody knows that the conflict will end in some sort of negotiated settlement—the questions will be on whose terms.

If the United States and its allies can avoid the pitfalls of the Western intervention in the Russian civil war—developing a clear long-term strategy, continuing to coordinate closely, and reinforcing domestic support by making the case to their own populations—then they have a real shot of prevailing over Putin. 

Despite the current pall of pessimism pervading Western capitals, today’s war in Ukraine presents some of the more propitious circumstances a policymaker could hope for—unlike those faced by the Allies during the Russian civil war. Ukraine is a worthy and competent ally, fighting to defend its territory with a highly motivated population behind it. The Ukrainian cause is a righteous one, with a Manichean quality to it easily explained to Western publics. While Putin’s personal will to win is strong, it’s clear by his actions and hesitancy to fully mobilize Russian society that he senses a ceiling on what he can ask from his population. Though Russia’s manpower and materiel are larger than Ukraine’s, the amount needed to keep Ukraine armed and in the fight is completely manageable. A $60 billion aid supplement from the United States—currently held up by far-right Republicans in the House of Representatives—is a pittance compared with the returns: holding the line on international norms; standing up for the Ukrainians and, in doing so, Western values; bogging down Russia in a strategic sinkhole and reducing its capacity to threaten the rest of NATO’s eastern flank; and fortifying the trans-Atlantic alliance. Today, Western capitals are much more united than they were in 1918, and defense coordination among them is strong. Though they can sharpen the shared sense of an endgame in Ukraine, everybody knows that the conflict will end in some sort of negotiated settlement—the questions will be on whose terms.

If the United States and its allies can avoid the pitfalls of the Western intervention in the Russian civil war—developing a clear long-term strategy, continuing to coordinate closely, and reinforcing domestic support by making the case to their own populations—then they have a real shot of prevailing over Putin. 

This is totally insane advice. In addition to the obvious fact that a) there is zero domestic support for war with Russia in any country outside of the Baltics and Finland, b) the Russian industrial advantage with regards to weaponry, vehicles, missiles, and ammunition is insurmountable, and c) Russia’s global allies outproduce, outnumber, and outgun the entire forces of the West, the historical invaders had one massive advantage that Russia’s current enemies lack.

The Western forces of 1918 had the ability to transport and stage their troops without fear of being attacked. In 2025, any trans-oceanic transports carrying men and materials to invade Russia will be sunk with hypersonic missiles long before they come anywhere close to the Russian coast. Not only that, but the entire logistics line leading all the way back to factories in Dusseldorf and Columbus, Ohio is similarly vulnerable to complete destruction.

The inability of Clown World’s elite to understand that it is no longer 1950, much less 1918, is truly remarkable. Andrei Martyanov is absolutely right to denigrate and disregard the military doctrine of the Western militaries, because their grasp on the history of warfare and how it applies to the present appears to be nonexistent.

DISCUSS ON SG

Russia Acknowledges WWIII

In my opinion, WWIII began in the spring of 2014 with the US-backed coup given the highly Orwellian name “the Revolution of Dignity” and the Russian occupation of Crimea. This is similar how WWII actually began eight years before most people realized with the Japanese invasion of Manchuria in 1931. But regardless, it’s clear that the Russian intellectual elite are fully aware of the situation.

Many now speak of humanity’s drift towards World War III, imagining events similar to those of the 20th century. But war evolves. It will not begin with a June 1941 Barbarossa-style invasion or a Cuban Missile Crisis-style nuclear standoff. In fact, the new world war is already underway – it’s just that not everyone has recognized it yet.

For Russia, the pre-war period ended in 2014. For China, it was 2017. For Iran, 2023. Since then, war – in its modern, diffuse form – has intensified. This is not a new Cold War. Since 2022, the West’s campaign against Russia has grown more decisive. The risk of direct nuclear confrontation with NATO over the Ukraine conflict is rising. Donald Trump’s return to the White House created a temporary window in which such a clash could be avoided, but by mid-2025, hawks in the US and Western Europe had pushed us dangerously close again.

This war involves the world’s leading powers: the United States and its allies on one side, China and Russia on the other. It is global, not because of its scale, but because of the stakes: the future balance of power. The West sees the rise of China and the resurgence of Russia as existential threats. Its counteroffensive, economic and ideological, is meant to put a halt to that shift.

It is a war of survival for the West, not just geopolitically but ideologically. Western globalism – whether economic, political, or cultural – cannot tolerate alternative civilizational models. Post-national elites in the US and Western Europe are committed to preserving their dominance. A diversity of worldviews, civilizational autonomy, and national sovereignty are seen not as options, but as threats.

This explains the severity of the West’s response. When Joe Biden told Brazil’s President Lula that he wanted to “destroy” Russia, he revealed the truth behind euphemisms like “strategic defeat.” Western-backed Israel has shown how total this doctrine is – first in Gaza, then Lebanon, and finally Iran. In early June, a similar strategy was used in attacks on Russian airfields. Reports suggest US and British involvement in both cases. To Western planners, Russia, Iran, China and North Korea are part of a single axis. That belief shapes military planning.

Compromise is no longer part of the game. What we’re seeing are not temporary crises but rolling conflicts. Eastern Europe and the Middle East are the two current flashpoints. A third has long been identified: East Asia, particularly Taiwan. Russia is directly engaged in Ukraine, holds stakes in the Middle East, and may become involved in the Pacific.

The war is no longer about occupation, but destabilization. The new strategy focuses on sowing internal disorder: economic sabotage, social unrest, and psychological attrition. The West’s plan for Russia is not defeat on the battlefield, but gradual internal collapse.

The irony, of course, is that it is not Russia that is being destabilized, but all of the Western governments from France to the USA. Influence and subversion are no substitute for material power once the latter is aware of the situation.

But regardless, the author is correct. “The time for illusions is over.”

DISCUSS ON SG