Tag: war

There Will Be No Peace

In which Piero San Giorgio and Andrei Martyanov discuss the prospects for peace in Europe and NATO’s total lack of preparation for an escalated conflict with Russia:

Piero: So it was a few days ago that it was Victory Parade, and as you know, for me it is an event that is very dear because it is on May 9th, 1945 that my grandfather was liberated from a prisoner camp in Germany by the Red Army. So we always had this 9th of May as a family important day. And in fact, I will drink to it. I brought this from Moscow – I think it’s a 20mm shell anyway. And I wanted to start asking you the question: what does it mean for you and what does it mean for Russians in general, and what should it mean for everyone else, especially on this 80th anniversary of May 9th Victory Day?

Andrei: Well, it’s part of the family. Every family – literally every – there’s not a single family in Russia which hasn’t been touched by those events. And I understand, especially for you being a European, essentially it wasn’t the fight of Soviet Union, which was historic Russia, Russian Empire, new edition of Russian Empire. It was the fight against the combined forces of… It wasn’t just Germans. People who say that it’s “oh Germany” – yes Germany, but what about Romanian, Italian, Hungarian armies? Finnish half a million force of SS who participated in blockade of Leningrad, the siege of Leningrad. And you look at the SS divisions from France – Charlemagne – you know, Blue Division from Spain.

So when you go and look at this, yes, this was a unified European front against the Soviet Union. And as the result, we had a cataclysmic event of the kind which humanity never experienced. In four years, up to 70 million people on different fronts have been killed. Some of them have been killed in the most brutal way which haven’t been experienced before – be that concentration camps, let alone death camps, the industrial scale annihilation of the civilians like it was in Russia. And 27 million Soviet people died – actually majority of them civilians.

So whenever the so-called revisionists in the West begin… So-called revisionists – they don’t revise things, they just rewrite history. Most of them are not professional historians and they don’t know the first thing about warfare. But when they begin to rewrite history, they forget to say that majority of those were civilians. And the atrocities which have been committed against Soviet Union, and especially the utter destruction of European part of Soviet Union – primarily Russia and Belarus and Ukraine what is today – is unprecedented. And only Poles suffered equally, and obviously Chinese, but they had a much larger population already then.

So that’s the result. Scott Ritter stated a very interesting thing and I liked it very much, and I quote him: he said Russians cannot do anything about it because they have those people looking down at them. This is like… it was such a profundity. One of very few Americans who really grasped what it was.

So my family – no granddads, all killed at the front. My maternal grandfather was killed in 1941 around Donetsk. Then of course when my grandma remarried in 1945 – four years after, you know – she married again a veteran and he fought starting from the Soviet-Finnish War. So it’s in every family. My wife – she doesn’t have grandfathers. Pretty much 80-85% of the 23-year-olds generation in Soviet Union have been killed on the front. Yeah, disaster.

Piero: And it’s even more pitiful to consider the situation of today, that first of all it wasn’t the first time that Europeans tried to invade Russia – the Swedes, the Poles of course, but also Napoleon’s international armies. It was not just French. Crimean War, World War I was also… okay, we can argue on who really started it, but certainly there was a major front on the east in Russia. And all of this for me is very sad because you mentioned Europeans in World War II, the Charlemagne division and all that, and these young men were idealistic for the wrong reasons. And it’s always sad when you see young men dying for stupid reasons against other young men which could have had a bright future on all sides. And it’s such a disaster for me, for Europe and European civilization.

And so Victory Parade, the 80th anniversary last week – what do you… I obviously watched it, of course you watched it as well. What do you feel when you watch it?

Andrei: Well, it’s a sacred event really, and for any Russian. And especially most important thing actually is not even the parade – it’s the tradition, it’s a relatively new tradition of the Immortal Regiment. In St. Petersburg alone, which became Leningrad for a day sort of, 1.1 million people went out with their portraits of their grandfathers and grandmothers who fought and worked in rear to supply the front and all that. So it’s… I don’t even know how to explain it. I mean, many people they do not comprehend what is happening in terms of spiritual importance of all that. And it’s extremely important, extremely important. This is the part of you – you cannot change it, you just cannot change it. It’s there, you know.

So it’s… how can I forget my grandfathers? How? I mean, you know, they defended their motherland. Yes, they didn’t invade somebody, you know. Like people want to say, “Oh yeah, you split Poland between Germany.” Well, you wanted it, you refused to… So people don’t know the history, most people don’t. And in the West it is completely rewritten by the falsifiers and lowlifes, especially British succeeded, and Germans by the way. So when you look at that, what can I say? I mean Europe made up its mind. It’s Europe’s choice and nothing could be done about it. It cannot be changed.

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Continue reading “There Will Be No Peace”

Russia Moves Forward

After giving Kiev and the USA one last chance to avoid the next round of territorial acquisitions, it’s evident that Russia has accepted the futility of attempting to convince anyone on the NATO side to see reason. The Russian logic is impeccable: if the only territory that will be conceded for the purposes of a ceasefire is territory that is already under Russian military control, then there is no reason to hold up the Special Military Operation until all of the territories deemed necessary for a sound long-term defensive strategy have been acquired.

Here are the obvious signs that the next phase has begun and will probably not stop until the five provinces from Sumy to Odessa are under Russian control.

  • Britain, France, Germany and the United States have lifted restrictions on the range of military supplies to Ukraine, German Chancellor Merz said.
  • Russian President Vladimir Putin has officially announced the establishment of a “security buffer zone” along the border with Ukraine. Russian troops, according to the Kremlin, have already been ordered to push ahead and are actively targeting Ukrainian military positions near the frontier. The move is aimed at protecting Russian regions far from the front line – particularly Belgorod, Bryansk, and Kursk – which have faced frequent shelling, drone strikes, as well as sabotage missions launched by Ukrainian forces.
  • Kiev’s Western backers — particularly the UK, France, Germany, and the EU’s leadership — bear responsibility for the latest Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian territory, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov has said during a Q&A session in Moscow.
  • The scale of the onslaught was stunning. Russia hit Ukraine with 367 drones and missiles, making this the largest single attack of the more than three-years-long war, according to Ukraine Air Force spokesperson Yuriy Ihnat. It was “the most massive strike in terms of the number of air attack weapons on the territory of Ukraine since the beginning of the full-scale invasion in 2022,” Ihnat said.

President Trump appears to have recognized that the Russians are no longer interested in his administration’s constant posturing, although he still doesn’t seem to have accepted that he is no longer holding any cards.

I’ve always had a very good relationship with Vladimir Putin of Russia, but something has happened to him. He has gone absolutely CRAZY! He is needlessly killing a lot of people, and I’m not just talking about soldiers. Missiles and drones are being shot into Cities in Ukraine, for no reason whatsoever. I’ve always said that he wants ALL of Ukraine, not just a piece of it, and maybe that’s proving to be right, but if he does, it will lead to the downfall of Russia! Likewise, President Zelenskyy is doing his Country no favors by talking the way he does. Everything out of his mouth causes problems, I don’t like it, and it better stop. This is a War that would never have started if I were President. This is Zelenskyy’s, Putin’s, and Biden’s War, not “Trump’s,” I am only helping to put out the big and ugly fires, that have been started through Gross Incompetence and Hatred.

It may not have begun as Trump’s war, but it is Trump’s war now. He has refused to shut down the flow of aid to Ukraine, and if the German Chancellor is to be believed, he has also lifted restrictions on the range of US missiles being supplied to Kiev, so he is clearly responsible for the Kiev regime being able to continue fighting. If he had, as many serious observers advised at the time, begun his second term in January by unequivocally stating that the US would not continue to provide any weapons and financial aid to the Kiev regime, or to any third party doing so, the war would already be over now. But the president simply didn’t do what the Russians knew he had the power to do, and so they have correctly concluded that if they are going to achieve their objectives, they will need to do so on the battlefield.

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Negotiating with the Agreement-Incapable

Reportedly, the Russian delegation said that the Ukrainians need to withdraw from the four new Russian regions if they want a ceasefire. Ukrainian delegation said no. The Russian side stood up, said “Next time, it’ll be five,” and left the room.

When negotiating, it’s very important to understand the power dynamics in place. This may be a genuine report or it may be apocryphal, but the fact is that it is entirely up to the Russians when and where they decide to stop. The Kievites can preen and posture all they like, but they are entirely at the mercy of the Russians. One wonders for whom they think they are performing.

The most recent body exchange:

  • 34 bodies of dead Russian soldiers
  • 909 bodies of dead Ukrainian soldiers

That’s a 26.7-1 fatality rate. Russia isn’t merely winning the war, it is obliterating the UFA.

UPDATE: “We didn’t say five. We said eight.”

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The Charade is Ending

The Russians are observably tiring of all the Western antics and attempts to spin their way out of obvious defeat:

I hope everyone can understand why the Russian President didn’t come to Turkey or even consider the EU proposed Ceasefire.

This is a waste of our time.

We are all for peace, but we have the might to keep the SMO going, not you. The only ones to suffer will be the Ukrainian population.

Don’t act like this is us begging you, we could declare war and crush you in days if Putin decides, and the world would watch us do it.

We do this to spare your population.

Sooner or later the Russians will put an end to the Kiev regime, and, one hopes, the Brussels regime as well. But until then, we’ll have to listen to the yapping of the satanic little lapdogs desperately trying to word-magic reality more to their liking.

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The End of Airpower Confirmed

Simplicius observes how the US failure in the Red Sea has underlined the lessons of the NATO-Russian war.

The US is unable to safely conduct operations near even Yemen’s airspace, with its so-called ‘rudimentary’ air defenses. F-35s—claimed to be ‘the most advanced fighter jets ever assembled’—are unable to safely operate without being detected. What do you think it could be that’s allowing the Houthis to detect “invisible” F-35s to such an extent as to fire on them, causing evasive maneuvers? Is it hand-me-down Iranian radars, which themselves are likely hand-me-down Russian ones? How would the vaunted F-35s and B-2s handle the far larger and superior national Iranian AD network if they can’t even handle the Houthi one?

The costs of that complete failure have been staggering:

He proposed an eight- to 10-month campaign in which Air Force and Navy warplanes would take out Houthi air defense systems. Then, he said, U.S. forces would mount targeted assassinations modeled on Israel’s recent operation against Hezbollah, three U.S. officials said.

Saudi officials backed General Kurilla’s plan and provided a target list of 12 Houthi senior leaders whose deaths, they said, would cripple the movement. But the United Arab Emirates, another powerful U.S. ally in the region, was not so sure. The Houthis had weathered years of bombings by the Saudis and the Emiratis.

By early March, Mr. Trump had signed off on part of General Kurilla’s plan — airstrikes against Houthi air defense systems and strikes against the group’s leaders. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth named the campaign Operation Rough Rider.

At some point, General Kurilla’s eight- to 10-month campaign was given just 30 days to show results.

In those first 30 days, the Houthis shot down seven American MQ-9 drones (around $30 million each), hampering Central Command’s ability to track and strike the militant group. Several American F-16s and an F-35 fighter jet were nearly struck by Houthi air defenses, making real the possibility of American casualties, multiple U.S. officials said. That possibility became reality when two pilots and a flight deck crew member were injured in the two episodes involving the F/A-18 Super Hornets, which fell into the Red Sea from the aircraft carrier Harry S. Truman within 10 days of each other…

But the cost of the operation was staggering. The Pentagon had deployed two aircraft carriers, additional B-2 bombers and fighter jets, as well as Patriot and THAAD air defenses, to the Middle East, officials acknowledged privately. By the end of the first 30 days of the campaign, the cost had exceeded $1 billion, the officials said.

So many precision munitions were being used, especially advanced long-range ones, that some Pentagon contingency planners were growing increasingly concerned about overall stocks and the implications for any situation in which the United States might have to ward off an attempted invasion of Taiwan by China.

And through it all, the Houthis were still shooting at vessels and drones, fortifying their bunkers and moving weapons stockpiles underground.

Airpower as it has been conventionally understood is over. Anti-air defenses are only going to improve, given the pressures created by drone warfare, and what can shoot down a tiny, agile drone is usually going to be able to take down a much larger, much less agile jetfighter.

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Hungary Moving on Transcarpathia

There are multiple reports that Hungary has moved potential invasion forces to the Ukrainian border:

Unexpected: Hungary pulls tanks and heavy armored vehicles to the border with Ukraine

Hungary has deployed tanks and armored vehicles to 5 main checkpoints on the Hungarian-Ukrainian border: Zakhony, Beregshurany, Tisabech, Barabash and Nagybodosh.

It is noteworthy that this happened after the espionage scandal, when Hungary expelled two Ukrainians from the embassy who were engaged in espionage. This led to the breakdown of negotiations in Uzhhorod, where 11 conditions for the restoration of the rights of the Hungarian national minority were to be discussed on May 12.

Since the EU is already threatening to strip Hungary of its right to vote, Hungary might as well take action to recover the land that was historically Hungarian and is populated by Hungarian-speaking Hungarians. There certainly won’t be anything that the Kiev regime could do about it, and it would open another front at a time that the regime’s forces are on the verge of collapse all across the various Russian fronts.

Hal Turner sees this potential reclamation of Transcarpathia as a major threat to the stability of the European Union.

If this is what Hungary is actually doing, re-taking Transcarpathia, the European Union will likely go berserk. They are already fed-up with Hungary voting to deny additional aid to Ukraine. A vote coming later this week, is specifically being designed to neutralize Hungary’s ability to bloc further EU aid to Ukraine; they will adopt legislation in a manner that prevents a single nation from blocking more aid. Prime Minister Viktor Orban, who leads Hungary, has already seen the writing on the wall of Europe when, last month, discussions took place to strip Hungary of EU voting rights.

If Hungary is going to switch sides, as it certainly should, this would probably be an optimal time to do so, since there aren’t any forces in Europe capable of intervening, especially not if Russia recognizes Hungary’s right to reclaim its historical land and respects the rights to self-determination of the Transcarpathians.

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Col Macgregor Calls Out AIPAC

34 years ago it was my honor and privilege to lead American soldiers to victory in battle to witness the courage and valor of American soldiers at a time and a place when death was all around us. Fortunately we sustained very few casualties however in the years that followed I watched many of the soldiers I served with pass on, not on foreign battlefields, but on American soil, frequently forgotten by the nation they served. In one case, a major who served with me as a lieutenant in 1993 committed suicide, the memories of the friends he lost in Iraq during a pointless, self-defeating occupation after 2003 were more than he could bear.

Yet who today remembers the Iraq war that began in 2003, or that the American military intervention was justified on the utterly false grounds that weapons of mass destruction were being built inside Iraq. The conflict took the lives of nearly 4,500 Americans in uniform, not including contractors, of course, and cost $2 trillion. At least 800,000 Iraqi citizens were internally displaced and several hundred thousand Iraqi citizens lost their lives.

Tonight I break my silence, not just for the young officer that committed suicide, but for the wives, husbands, children, and parents who endured the crushing grief of loss, who received a folded flag and were left alone to trace the name of a loved one on a cold gravestone. War is a predator. It consumes our best, our strength, and our resources, but its most terrible damage is often unseen. War also forces Americans to embrace brutality, to justify barbarism, to become something harder, colder, less humane. President Trump promised to stop the endless wars; now he really needs to do it. Americans currently stand at what Lincoln would call the fiery trial, through which we pass war with Iran or peace for America. The choice will echo through generations. We’re very fortunate the Iranians are willing to talk to us again, and perhaps we can reach a solution but, there are no guarantees. That will take leadership from the highest levels from President Trump.

Let me speak plainly about what awaits if Washington chooses war with Iran. Within hours of the first strike, Iran will seal the straight of Hormuz, choking the artery through which one of the world’s oil flows. Gas prices will not merely rise they may erupt like a volcano burning through family budgets. The economic security Americans built with their own hands since the pandemic disaster could be wrecked. Immediate price increases and loss of supplies could also result, yet the cost and treasure stands as nothing before the cost in blood. Iran is not the Iraq of our past wars. Iran consists of 85 million people fortified by mountains when the Roman Empire was young, defended by modern weapons and effectively allied with nuclear-armed powers, Russia and China, that have drawn clear and unambiguous red lines.

For the first time since missiles stood in Cuba we face not only the shadow but the real substance of nuclear confrontation, not for our country, but for the regional ambitions of a foreign state 7,000 miles from home. We must face the truth that weaker allies often attempt to make their wars our wars. America’s soldiers, sailors, airmen, and Marines should not be sacrificed for territoria lexpansions that serve no vital American strategic interest.

I did not witness war through PowerPoint slides or sanitized screens and situation rooms, but through bloody fog of war. I tell you with the full authority of my battlefield experience, this war, if it comes with Iran, is not necessary. this war is also not just. This war is not worthy of America. We must not sacrifice American lives on foreign soil while American soil thirsts for our attention. We must not trade American prosperity for another state’s regional hegemony while American prosperity deteriorates. We must not abandon America’s democratic principles for imperial ambition while those principles, our best hope for justice, fade for lack of devotion. The true strength of America has never been measured by regimes toppled, but by lives improved.

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Putin Calls Out Kiev

The Russian President has offered unconditional peace talks to the Kiev regime.

I will repeat: we have proposed steps towards a ceasefire on many occasions. We have never refused to engage in dialogue with the Ukrainian side. Let me remind you again: it was not us who interrupted the negotiations in 2022; it was the Ukrainian side. In this connection, despite everything, we propose that the authorities in Kiev should resume the negotiations that they interrupted at the end of 2022 and resume direct talks. And, I stress, without any preconditions.

We suggest starting without delay next Thursday, May 15, in Istanbul, where they were held earlier and where they were interrupted. As you know, Turkish colleagues have repeatedly offered their services to organize such talks, and President Erdogan has done a lot to organize them. I recall that as a result of these talks a joint draft document was prepared and initialed by the head of the Kiev negotiating group, but at the insistence of the West it was simply thrown into the basket.

Tomorrow we are going to have a conversation with the President of Türkiye, Mr Erdogan. I would like to ask him to provide such an opportunity to hold talks in Türkiye. I hope that he will confirm his desire to contribute to the search for peace in Ukraine.

We are set on serious negotiations with Ukraine. Their aim is to eliminate the root causes of the conflict and to achieve a long-term lasting peace for a historical perspective. We do not rule out that in the course of these negotiations it will become possible to agree on some kind of new truce and a new ceasefire. And a real ceasefire that would be observed not only by Russia but also by the Ukrainian side and would be the first step, I repeat, towards a long-term, sustainable peace, rather than a prelude to continuing armed conflict after the Ukrainian armed forces have been rearmed, re-equipped and frantically digged trenches and new strongholds. Who needs such peace?

Our proposal is, as they say, on the table.

Even President Trump says that Kiev should accept:

“President Putin of Russia doesn’t want to have a Cease Fire Agreement with Ukraine, but rather wants to meet on Thursday, in Turkey, to negotiate a possible end to the BLOODBATH. Ukraine should agree to this, IMMEDIATELY,” the US leader wrote. If it becomes clear that reaching a deal is not possible “European leaders, and the US, will know where everything stands, and can proceed accordingly,” Trump stated.

It appears Kiev is rapidly running out of rope. The Russians don’t need peace to acquire whatever they want, but the Ukrainians do if they are going to survive as an independent state; Poland and Hungary are already looking at taking back some of their historical lands when the Kiev regime collapses. The problem, of course, is the the Kiev regime is not Ukrainian and doesn’t give a damn about the Ukrainian nation, only its own ability to somehow extricate itself from the situation with all of its ill-gained loot.

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The Emptiest of Threats

The total emasculation of the European countries and the irrelevance of the US military has never been more obvious than seeing the British Prime Minister and other Clown World puppets shaking their tiny little fists at the Russians.

Prime Minister Sir Keir Starmer has ‘called Putin out’ and demanded ‘no ifs or buts’ as he joined world leaders in cranking up pressure on Russia to accept a ceasefire in Ukraine. The leaders of Britain, France, Germany and Poland arrived in Kyiv on Saturday for talks with Ukrainian President Zelensky in a show of unity of the ‘coalition of the willing’, a day after Putin hosted his allies for a Red Square Victory Day parade.

Speaking in a press conference alongside his European counterparts, Sir Keir said Europe is ‘stepping up’ on the 80th anniversary of VE day to secure Ukraine’s long-term future – after Putin called a three-day ceasefire for his Moscow event.

‘Volodymyr, we stand with you to secure the just and lasting peace that Ukraine deserves,’ the PM said.

‘It’s almost two months now since you agreed to an immediate 30 day ceasefire. In that time, Russia has launched some of the most deadly attacks on civilians of the entire war, including here in Kyiv. Normal lives, homes, families, destroyed.

‘This is what Russia offers in place of peace along with delays, smoke screens, like the current 72 hour ceasefire. And so all of us here together with the US are calling Putin out. 

‘If he’s serious about peace then he has a chance to show it now. By extending the VE day pause into a full unconditional 30 day ceasefire, with negotiations to follow immediately after a ceasefire is agreed. No more ifs and buts, no more conditions and delays. Putin didn’t need conditions when he wanted a ceasefire to have a parade. And he doesn’t need them now.’

This isn’t that hard. Putin wanted a parade. He doesn’t want Kiev to rearm its depleted military. If Kiev is going to rearm during a ceasefire, then there will be no ceasefire. Russia has already been through this twice already and does not intend to do so again.

Who, or what, do these clowns think they’re impressing? I think the only reason the Russians don’t simply hazeltree the lot of them at one of their bi-weekly ritual gatherings is because Putin knows that even if their posturing is tedious and annoying, their ineffectual non-leadership isn’t getting in the way of the Russians achieving their objectives.

It’s like a spin on the old Robin Williams joke. “Sanctions! Now stop, or I shall sanction you again!”

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When Society Fears its Veterans

It is a society that no one will defend and is not long for this world. A veteran of the Iraqi War explains that he’s not merely a “right-winger” but a man who was betrayed by his government.

Everyone thinks I’m a right winger but they are wrong. That’s way too simple of an explanation. I’m a product. I’m a result. I’m what happens when society kicks the can of betrayal down the road for too long. I am unfortunately necessary. I will never negotiate with evil. I cannot be bought. I do not care about power. I do not care about money. I do not care about success. My dog in this fight isn’t any of these earthly trinkets everyone is grasping at. I am here for justice. I am here to make amends for the sins I’ve committed. I am here to witness the evil so it can be judged. I am here to be the voice for the weak, helpless, and silent. So help me God.

Meanwhile, the Russians are doing the precise opposite, by putting a plan in place to groom military veterans for political and business leadership, and ensuring they find an honored place in Russian society.

The program “Time of Heroes”, aimed at the development of participants and veterans of the SVO, starts today, its goal is to prepare managers to work in government, Dmitry Peskov said. Requirements for participants of the “Time of Heroes” program: citizenship of the Russian Federation, higher education, experience in managing people, participation in SVO and no criminal record. The program will be mentored by the heads of the presidential administration, governors, members of the government, mayors, heads of leading companies.

This is what is possible when a nation is not ruled by a foreign elite that fears its replacement by a nationalist elite.

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