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Who Bombed Girls’ School in Iran? Reporter Nilo Tabrizy on What We Know About Massacre of 175 People


Democracy Now, 5 Mar 2026

After a strike on a girls’ elementary school in Minab, Iran, killed at least 175 people, nearly all young schoolchildren, online reports spread disinformation about the attack, including claims that the Iranian government itself had bombed the school. Journalist Nilo Tabrizy describes how outside reporters have been able to verify the attack despite Iran’s internet blackout and says attempts are still being made to confirm whether the strike is attributable to the U.S. or to Israel.

Democracy Now! is an independent global news hour that airs on over 1,500 TV and radio stations Monday through Friday. Watch our livestream at democracynow.org Mondays to Fridays 8-9 a.m. ET.

March 8, 2026 Posted by | Iran, Israel, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Preemptive War, Permanent Emergency: The Real Cost of Trump’s Iran Strike

Since January 2025, Trump has carried out more than 600 military strikes on foreign targets that include Iran, Yemen, Nigeria and Venezuela, while threatening forceful military takeovers of Greenland, Colombia and Mexico.

Preemptive force has become policy.

Call it what it is: war.

The Rutherford Institute, John & Nisha Whitehead, March 04, 2026

“From the least to the greatest, all are greedy for gain; prophets and priests alike, all practice deceit. They dress the wound of my people as though it were not serious. ‘Peace, peace,’ they say, when there is no peace.”—Jeremiah 6:13–14

“This is insane. Regime change will result in a bloody civil war… Resist this!”—Charlie Kirk (2025)

The military-industrial complex and the American police state have joined forces.

War abroad and war at home are no longer separate enterprises. They have fused.

This did not happen overnight.

Every modern president has stretched the limits of war-making power. Some have shredded those limits altogether.

Each time that boundary is breached, the Constitution recedes a little further.

This is one of those moments.

In a complete about-face from his claims to being a peace president, Donald Trump has authorized yet another preemptive strike—this time against Iran—without a declaration of war from Congress, without meaningful public debate, and without constitutional clarity.

The gravity of that decision cannot be overstated.

While American troops were being ordered into harm’s way, Trump was hosting a $1 million-a-ticket fundraiser for himself at Mar-a-Lago, trotting out his signature dance moves between curtained war briefings.

That spectacle tells you everything you need to know.

That is how we arrived at Operation Epic Fury.

With its Orwellian proclamations of “peace through strength,” Operation Epic Fury is less strategy than spectacle—an egotistical, muscle-flexing distraction by the Trump administration and an overarching attempt to normalize the use of unilateral force by the executive branch without congressional input or authorization.

This was never about peace. It was always about power.

And the Constitution is clear about how this is supposed to work, even if the White House is not.

Article I, Section 8 grants Congress—not the president—the power to declare war. The president under Article II, Section 2 is designated as commander-in-chief with the power to command the military. He is not commander-of-everything.

Yet here we are.

The Trump administration is advancing a global policing doctrine that mirrors the domestic police state: strike first, ask questions later.

Since January 2025, Trump has carried out more than 600 military strikes on foreign targets that include Iran, Yemen, Nigeria and Venezuela, while threatening forceful military takeovers of Greenland, Colombia and Mexico.

Preemptive force has become policy.

Call it what it is: war.

Despite the word games over its war games—the administration insists its actions in Iran do not constitute a war—members of Trump’s Cabinet use the word “war” freely until congressional authorization is mentioned.

And when the administration is asked to explain themselves, the answer is not constitutional deference but open defiance.

Clearly, they have lost sight of who they answer to—and who funds their war chests: we the taxpayers.

Pete Hegseth—the self-righteous blowhard who brags about lethal weapons and has rebranded the Defense Department as the Department of War—dismissed public accountability outright, expressing in no uncertain terms that it’s none of our business: “Why in the world would we tell you, you, the enemy, anybody what we will or will not do in pursuit of an objective. We fight to win. We fight to achieve the objectives the President of the United States has laid out and we will do so unapologetically.”

The Constitution is the “why.”

The American people have a right to debate war before it begins. We have a right to know how our tax dollars are spent. We have a right to insist our representatives authorize the use of force. We have a right to know why our sons and daughters are sent into harm’s way. We have a right to refuse to have our tax dollars used to kill other people’s daughters and sons.

……………As Cato Institute’s Katherine Thompson explains, “War…costs American blood and treasure. The Founders placed the power to initiate it in Congress precisely to ensure those costs are confronted and debated before the country walks into battle.”

War fuels defense contracts, reconstruction deals and intelligence budgets. It sustains a vast military-industrial apparatus whose profits depend on instability.

Nothing about Operation Epic Fury puts America first. It pushes us toward a fiscal cliff.

Within days, the costs were staggering: $300 million for three F-15E jets downed by “friendly” fire. $630 million to transport troops, ships and aircraft to the region in advance of the attacks. More than 50,000 troops deployed to the region. $13 million a day just for two aircraft carriers stationed nearby. $43.8 million for 1,250 Kamikaze drones. $2 million each for Tomahawk missiles. $12.8 million each for anti-ballistic missile interceptors.

Forbes estimates that Trump’s military strikes in Iran have already cost American taxpayers over $1 billion, “with a price tag that could approach $100 billion, depending on how long it can stretch on.” The total economic cost of the conflict “could trigger an economic loss for the U.S. of between $50 billion and $210 billion.”

And that is before accounting for the human cost.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….. This unprovoked attack on Iran is turning the Middle East into a war zone, in turn laying the groundwork for Trump to act on the fantasies he has long entertained about cancelling the mid-term elections.

………………………………………………………………………….War is not peace. Preemptive war is not strength. And an imperial presidency—no matter how loudly it wraps itself in flags—is not constitutional government.

The Founders understood that the gravest threat to liberty would not come from foreign enemies alone, but from the concentration of power in the hands of one man who believed himself indispensable.

A president who can send bombs abroad without consent can silence opposition at home without hesitation.

A government that governs by the rule of emergency eventually ceases to govern by the rule of law.

And a nation that trades liberty for spectacle will wake up to find that it has neither.

…………………………………………………………………….As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People and in its fictional counterpart The Erik Blair Diaries, the question is no longer whether America can police the globe. The question is whether our Republic can survive the weight of the Empire it has become.

We are at the point where we must choose: the spectacle of permanent war, or the survival of the American experiment in freedom.

We cannot have both. https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/john_whiteheads_commentary/preemptive_war_permanent_emergency_the_real_cost_of_trumps_iran_strike

March 8, 2026 Posted by | politics, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Negotiation to Detonation

. A peaceful resolution would have prevented the long-term U.S. plan to consolidate and weaponize its control over Middle Eastern oil

By Michael Hudson,   Monday, March 2, 2026, https://michael-hudson.com/2026/03/negotiation-to-detonation/

Last Friday the mediator of the U.S. and Iranian nuclear negotiations in Oman, that country’s foreign minister Badr Albusaidi, pulled the rug out from President Trump’s deceptive pretense threatening war with Iran. Why? Because it had refused his demands to give up what he claimed was its own atom bomb. The Omani foreign minister explained on CBS’s Face the Nation that the Iranian team had agreed not to accumulate enriched uranium and offered “full and comprehensive verification by the IAEA.” This new concession was a “breakthrough that has never been achieved any time before. And I think if we can capture that and build on it, I think a deal is within our reach” to achieve “agreement that Iran will never, ever have a nuclear material that will create a bomb. This is, I think, a big achievement.”

Pointing out that this breakthrough “has been missed a lot by the media,” he emphasized that by calling for “zero stockpiling” went far beyond what had been negotiated during President Obama’s administration, because “if you cannot stockpile material that is enriched then there is no way you can actually create a bomb.”

Ayatollah Ali Khamenei – who already had issued a fatwa against doing any such thing, and had repeated this position year after year – called Iran’s Shi’a leaders and military chief to discuss ratification of the agreement to cede control of its enriched uranium in order to prevent war.

But any such capitulation was precisely what neither the United States nor Israel could accept. A peaceful resolution would have prevented the long-term U.S. plan to consolidate and weaponize its control over Middle Eastern oil, its transportation and the investment of its oil export revenues, and to use Israel and al Qaeda/ISIS as its client armies to block independent oil-producing countries from acting in their own sovereign interests.

Israeli intelligence apparently alerted the U.S. military to suggest that the meeting at the Ayatollah’s compound offered a great chance to decapitate the leading decision makers all together. This followed the U.S. military handbook advice that killing a political leader whom the U.S. deems to be undemocratic will liberate popular dreams of regime change. That was the hope of bombing President Putin’s country residence last month, and it was in line with the U.S’s recent Starlink attempt to mobilize popular opposition for revolution in Iran.

The joint U.S.-Israeli attack makes it clear that there is nothing that Iran could have conceded that would have deterred the long-standing U.S. drive to control Middle Eastern oil, alongside using Israel and ISIS/Al Qaeda client armies to prevent sovereign nations in the region from emerging to take control of their oil reserves. That control remains an essential arm of U.S. foreign policy. It is the key to the U.S. ability to hurt other economies by denying them access to energy if they do not adhere to U.S. foreign policy. This insistence on blocking the world’s access to energy sources not under American control is why the U.S. has attacked Venezuela, Syria, Iraq, Libya and Russia.

The attack on negotiators (the second time America has done this to Iran) is a perfidy that will go down in history. It was to prevent Iran’s intended move to peace, before its leaders could have disproven Trump’s false claim that Iran had refused to give up its desire to obtain its own atom bomb.

The markets last week were vastly underestimating the risk of closing the Oil Gulf. U.S. oil companies will make a killing. China and other oil importers will suffer. U.S. financial speculators also will make a killing, because their oil production is domestic. This fact may even have played a role in the U.S. decision to end the world’s access to Middle Eastern oil for what promises to be a lengthy period.

The trade and financial disruption in fact will be so worldwide that I think we can think of Saturday’s February 28 attack on Iran as the true trigger of World War III. For most of the world, the imminent financial crisis (to say nothing of the moral outrage) will define the next decade of international political and economic restructuring.

European, Asian and the Global South countries will be unable to obtain oil except at prices that make many industries unprofitable and many family budgets unaffordable. The rise in oil prices also will make it impossible for Global South countries to service their dollar debts falling due to Western bondholders, banks and the IMF.

Countries can save themselves from having to impose domestic austerity, currency depreciation and inflation only by recognizing that the U.S. attack (supported by Britain and Saudi Arabia, with ambiguous Turkish acquiescence) had ended the U.S. unipolar order – and with it the dollarized international financial system. If this is not recognized, acquiescence will continue until it becomes unsustainable in any case..

If this is the inaugural real battle of World War III, it is in many ways a final battle to decide what World War II was all about. Will international law crumble as a result of the unwillingness of enough countries to protect the rules of civilized law supporting the principles of national sovereignty free from foreign interference and coercion from the 1648 Peace of Westphalia to the UN Charter? And with regard to wars that inevitably are to be waged, will they spare civilians and non-belligerents, or will they be like Ukraine’s attack on its Russian speaking population in its eastern provinces, Israel’s genocide against ethnic Palestinians, Wahabi religious cleansing of non-Sunni Arab populations, or indeed the Iranian, Cuban and other populations under U.S.-sponsored attack.

Can the United Nations be saved without freeing itself and its member countries from U.S. control? An early litmus test of where alliances are sorting out will be which countries join the legal move to declare Donald Trump and his cabinet war criminals. Something more than the present ICC is needed, given the U.S. Government’s personal attacks on ICC judges that found Netanyahu guilty.

What is required is a Nurenberg-scale trial against the Western military policy that has been seeking to plunge the entire world into political and economic chaos if it does not submit to the U.S. unipolar ruler-based order. If other countries do not create an alternative to the US-European-Japanese-Wahabi offensive, they will suffer what U.S. Secretary of State Rubio called (in his recent Munich speech) a resurgence of the Western history of conquest to the basic principles of international law and equity.

An alternative requires restructuring the United Nations to end the U.S. ability to block majority resolutions. In view of the fact that U.N. Secretary-General Antonio Guterres has said that it may be bankrupt by August and have to close its New York City headquarters, this is a propitious time to move it out of the United States itself. The U.S. has banned Francesca Albanese from entering the United States as a result of her report describing Israeli genocide in Gaza. There can be no rule of law as long as control over the U.N. and its agencies remains in U.S. hands and those of its European satellites.

March 8, 2026 Posted by | Iran, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

According to Pete Hegseth “They are toast”

The language matters. “They are toast” is not the language of statesmanship. It is the language of certainty – the kind that precedes catastrophic miscalculation.

We have seen this before. We know how it ends.

5 March 2026 Dr Andrew Klein, https://theaimn.net/they-are-toast/

“They are toast”: A Critical Analysis of Pete Hegseth’s Press Conference and the Dangerous Rhetoric of Endless War

Introduction: The Performance

On 4 March 2026, U.S. Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth stood at a Pentagon podium and delivered what can only be described as a performance. Flanked by Gen. Dan Caine, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Hegseth spoke for nearly an hour about Operation Epic Fury – the ongoing US-Israeli military campaign against Iran.

His language was not the measured cadence of a statesman. It was the swagger of a cable news host, which he once was. It was the bravado of someone who believes that confidence can substitute for clarity, and that bravado can replace strategy.

“I stand before you today with one unmistakable message about Operation Epic Fury – America is winning decisively, devastatingly, and without mercy,” he declared.

“They are toast – and they know it,” he said of Iran’s leadership.

“We are punching them while they are down, which is exactly how it should be.”

This article examines Hegseth’s statements against the available evidence. It contrasts the rhetoric with reality. And it asks the question that no one at that press conference thought to ask: what happens next?

What Hegseth Actually Said

The full transcript of Hegseth’s remarks reveals a pattern of escalation framed as inevitability.

The “Toast” Declaration

“They are toast and they know it. Or at least, soon enough, they will know it.”

This was not a one-off line. Hegseth returned to it repeatedly, framing the conflict as a foregone conclusion. “The Iranian air force is no more. The Iranian navy rests at the bottom of the Persian Gulf. Combat ineffective, decimated, destroyed, defeated – pick your adjective. It is no more.”

The Control of Airspace

“We will fly all day, all night, day and night, finding, fixing and finishing the missiles and defence industrial base of the Iranian military.”

Hegseth claimed the U.S. and Israel would have “uncontested airspace and complete control” of Iranian skies within days.

The Torpedo Claim

In a particularly dramatic moment, Hegseth announced that a U.S. submarine had sunk an Iranian warship named the Soleimani – a vessel named after the Iranian general killed by U.S. drone strike in 2020.

“An American submarine sunk an Iranian warship that thought it was safe in international waters. Instead, it was sunk by a torpedo, quiet death – the first sinking of an enemy ship by a torpedo since World War II.”

He added: “Looks like POTUS got him twice.”

The Assassination Claim

Hegseth also revealed that U.S. forces had killed an Iranian official allegedly involved in a plot to assassinate President Trump.

“The leader of the unit who attempted to assassinate President Trump has been hunted down and killed. Iran tried to kill President Trump and President Trump got the last laugh.”

He acknowledged that this was not the focus of the operation, and that Trump never raised it as a priority. But “I ensured, and others ensured, that those who were responsible for that were eventually part of the target list.”

The “Not Endless” Promise

In a brief moment that seemed designed to preempt criticism, Hegseth insisted: “This is not Iraq. This is not endless. I was there for both. Our generation knows better, and so does this president.”

He promised “no nation-building quagmires, no democracy-building exercise, no politically correct wars.”

The Reality Check

Hegseth’s rhetoric is forceful. But force is not the same as truth.

The Contradiction on Endings

Hegseth declared the war “not endless” while simultaneously refusing to define any endpoint. Asked about the timeline, he deflected:

“President Trump has all the latitude in the world to talk about how long it may or may not take. Four weeks, two weeks, six weeks.”

Gen. Caine was more direct: “We expect to take additional losses.”

This is the classic language of wars that become endless. There is no exit strategy because there is no defined objective beyond “destroy” and “defeat” – terms that are infinitely elastic.

The Casualty Count

While Hegseth boasted of American dominance, the human cost continued to mount:

Hegseth’s “they are toast” rhetoric obscures the reality that toast cuts both ways.

The Intelligence Gap

Perhaps most troubling: in closed-door briefings with congressional staff, Pentagon officials acknowledged that there was no intelligence indicating Iran was preparing to launch a pre-emptive strike against U.S. forces before the American and Israeli attacks.

This directly contradicts the administration’s public justification that the operation was necessary to eliminate “imminent threats.”

The Constitutional Question

Congress has not authorised this war. The Senate is set to vote on a War Powers resolution that would limit Trump’s authority to conduct additional strikes – the first formal attempt by Congress to weigh in on a campaign launched without its approval.

Senator Tim Kaine’s words are worth remembering: “I pray so hard for my colleagues to exercise the judgment that this is not the right time for more war.”

The Regional Spread

Hegseth presented the conflict as contained. In reality:

  • Iran and Hezbollah launched coordinated missile attacks on Israel
  • UAE air defences intercepted three ballistic missiles and more than 120 drones
  • Qatar shot down 10 drones and two cruise missiles
  • Strait of Hormuz – through which 20% of global oil passes – is now under Iranian threat

This is not a contained operation. This is a regional conflagration.

The Language Problem

The Tone

Even Hegseth’s supporters might wince at the language. A forum commenter captured the sentiment:

“The tone of these White House press conferences and the rhetoric within them is incredible. If you didn’t know you’d assume they were the rabid dictatorship in this scenario.”

Another wrote:

“Listening to Hegseth on the ITV news. Putting it mildly, he is not very statesmanlike. Phrases like ‘they are toast’ etc. It should be embarrassing, but he is (as ITV has just said) gleeful.”

This is not diplomacy. It is theatre.

The Iraq Echo

Hegseth repeatedly invoked the Iraq war as a contrast – “this is not Iraq” – while using language that eerily echoes the early days of that conflict. The promise of “no nation-building” sounds remarkably like the assurances that preceded two decades of exactly that.

When Hegseth says “this is not endless,” one recalls the similar assurances made about Afghanistan, about Iraq, about every war that was supposed to be quick and clean and never was.

The Assassination Framing

The claim about killing the Iranian official involved in the Trump assassination plot is particularly striking. Hegseth acknowledged it was never a priority, never raised by the president, yet it became part of the target list.

This suggests mission creep before the mission has even fully begun.

What Iran Says

Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian responded with words that stand in stark contrast to Hegseth’s bravado:

“We tried, with your help, to avoid war through diplomacy, but the American-Zionist military attack left us no choice but to defend ourselves. We respect your sovereignty and still believe peace in the region must be ensured by the countries of the region.”

This is the language of a nation that understands it cannot win a conventional war but can make it costly enough that the other side eventually tires.

Iranian Deputy Foreign Minister Majid Takht-Ravanchi was more pointed:

“Time is not of the essence. We will do whatever necessary to protect our sovereignty and our people – no matter what.”

The Unanswered Questions

Hegseth’s press conference raised more questions than it answered:

  1. What is the definition of victory? If the goal is to destroy Iran’s missile program and navy, what happens when those are rebuilt – as they inevitably will be?
  2. What is the exit strategy? There is none articulated. “Not endless” is not a plan.
  3. Who governs Iran after Khamenei? Trump admitted that potential successors were killed in the strikes. What fills the vacuum?
  4. What about the 115,000 Australians still stranded in the region? The first repatriation flight has landed, but most remain.
  5. Why no congressional authorisation? The Constitution requires it. The administration has ignored it.

The Forum Wisdom

Sometimes the most insightful analysis comes not from experts but from ordinary people watching the same press conferences we watch.

Victoria wildlife guide

“The tone of these White House press conferences and the rhetoric within them is incredible. If you didn’t know you’d assume they were the rabid dictatorship in this scenario.”

“Lads, it’s bone spurs.”

The last comment is a reference to Trump’s Vietnam-era deferments. It’s a reminder that those who send others to war rarely feel its weight themselves.

What This Means for Us

The language matters. “They are toast” is not the language of statesmanship. It is the language of certainty – the kind that precedes catastrophic miscalculation.

We have seen this before. We know how it ends.

But we also know something else: we are not helpless. We watch. We document. We prepare. We protect our own.

Sources………………………………………

March 8, 2026 Posted by | PERSONAL STORIES, spinbuster, USA | Leave a comment

Obscene US-Israeli murder of Iranian schoolchildren cannot be whitewashed

Western media is either silent or implicitly blaming Tehran for the strike that killed 168 girl

Eva Karene Bartlett, Substack,, Mar 05, 2026

In Iran, under ongoing US-Israeli attacks, a mass funeral took place today for 168 Iranian schoolgirls aged 7-12, killed by an Israeli airstrike on February 28.

The strike hit the Shajareh Tayyebeh girls’ primary school in Minab, southern Iran, in broad daylight, when the children were at school. Fourteen teachers were also killed in the bombing. The bombing occurred as part of US-Israeli attacks sadistically dubbed ‘Operation Epic Fury’, attacks which have to date targeted schools, hospitals, residential areas and other civilian infrastructure.

It was a scene all too familiar to Palestinians: grief-stricken parents collapsing sobbing at the site of their daughters’ murders, clutching bloodstained backpacks, pulling out schoolbooks and personal items of their slain daughters. Children’s desks covered in debris from the bombing. A child’s shoe in the rubble. Death where life had flourished.

None of this is being conveyed by Western legacy media – only ghoulish gloating over the US-Israeli bombardment of Iran and the murder of Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, Iran’s supreme leader, and his young granddaughter and children.

On March 2, Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi posted a photo of the graves being dug on X, noting, “These are graves being dug for more than 160 innocent young girls who were killed in the US-Israeli bombing of a primary school. Their bodies were torn to shreds. This is how “rescue” promised by Mr. Trump looks in reality. From Gaza to Minab, innocents murdered in cold blood.”

At the time of this writing, 69 of the murdered girls remain unidentified.

International media reaction: Silence

If the bombed school had been in Israel or Ukraine, news of it would have been plastered on front pages of Western media for days, with widespread demands for retaliation, or at least for justice and accountability. Back in 2016, Western media alleged Syria or Russian planes had injured Aleppo boy Omran Daqneesh. His photo went viral, for weeks, even years. A CNN news anchor fake-sobbed for the boy.

In 2017, in his Aleppo home, his father told me their home was not hit in an airstrike, but rather terrorists shelled it and used the boy in a cynical, and effective, photo op.

Footage shared on Telegram and on X clearly show horrific scenes of some of the young girls torn apart in the US-Israeli bombing of their school. But just like the untold thousands of Palestinian children killed by Israel, as well as the half a million Iraqi children killed by US sanctions, these Iranian children’s lives don’t merit Western media outrage. Instead, they produce cynical reports that not only lack any semblance of empathy, but suggest that Iran is either lying about or is to blame for the murders.

Take the BBC’s report, which describes the massacre as a “reported” strike on a school, which “Iran has blamed the US and Israel” for. Casting doubt is standard for legacy media whitewashing the US and Israel’s crimes. The US is “looking into reports.” Israel is “not aware.” Just one of those mysterious unknown strikes.

The BBC then overtly blamed the Iranian government as untrustworthy, writing, “Deep mistrust of the Iranian regime, however, makes official reports difficult for many to accept, and some Iranians directly blamed the regime for the attack.”………………………………………….

Most Western media cite The US military’s Central Command (Centcom) as saying it was “looking into reports of the incident,” and the Israeli army as saying it was “not aware of any IDF operations in the area.”Ah yes, the guilty shall investigate themselves. Right.

Even if you set aside the actual culprit of the school bombing, legacy media reports are devoid of any concern for the slaughtered children: no details, no empathy, no mention that they were murdered in the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The tone would be radically different were the children Israeli, Ukrainian or American. We would see names, ages, stories about them. They would be humanized – if only they were not Iranian (or Palestinian, or Lebanese, or Syrian)………………………………………………… https://evakarenebartlett.substack.com/p/obscene-us-israeli-murder-of-iranian?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3046064&post_id=189965341&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

March 8, 2026 Posted by | Atrocities, media | Leave a comment

TEPCO planning to send probe into Fukushima nuke reactor

By TOMOYUKI SUZUKI/ Staff Writer, March 4, 2026 ,
https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/16341286

Tokyo Electric Power Co. will soon launch a probe, the first of its kind, into the pressure vessel at one of the hobbled reactors at its Fukushima No. 1 nuclear power plant to scope out the current conditions.

The effort is part of TEPCO’s long-standing goal of retrieving melted nuclear fuel debris, left in the aftermath of the triple reactor meltdowns following the 2011 Great East Japan Earthquake and tsunami.

TEPCO officials said they are planning to insert a camera-equipped fiberscope into the plant’s No. 2 reactor to shoot footage and measure radiation levels during the first half of fiscal 2026 between April and September.

An estimated 880 tons of fuel debris remain inside the No. 1, 2 and 3 reactors at the Fukushima No. 1 plant.

TEPCO plans to approach the contaminated debris, which remains in the pressure vessels, from the tops of the reactor buildings and pulverize the debris to reduce the volume and collect it by sucking it from the side or by other means.

TEPCO officials are hoping, during the planned probe, to monitor the interior of the pressure vessel visually and ascertain the radiation levels on a location-by-location basis to help work out concrete methods for retrieving the fuel debris.

The fiberscope to be used in the probe, which resembles an endoscope, will be inserted into the pressure vessel from the side through piping.

The officials said they will be probing not the core part of the vessel but the outer side of a shroud of stainless steel, which has been installed to surround nuclear fuel, to determine, among other things, if the shroud has been deformed and if there is any debris in sight.

They said they will conduct mock-up drills in the days and months to come. They added that they will take measures to block air from leaking from the pressure vessel’s interior so workers will not be exposed to radiation.

The probe was initially scheduled to begin in fiscal 2024, but the work has been delayed because the development of a dosimeter-equipped fiberscope and other processes have turned out to be more time-consuming than expected.

“When the distribution of dose levels is known, that could, depending on the circumstances, help give an estimate of the amount of residual fuel (which has yet to turn into debris),” said Akira Ono, president of TEPCO’s Fukushima Daiichi Decontamination & Decommissioning Engineering Co., which is overseeing the corresponding processes at the Fukushima No. 1 nuclear plant.

TEPCO plans to start large-scale retrieval of the Fukushima No. 1 plant’s debris at its No. 3 reactor in fiscal 2037 or later.

The dose levels and circumstances of the areas surrounding the reactor buildings are not the same for the No. 1, 2 and 3 reactors.

TEPCO officials said they have set a target date of 2027 for studying the design of debris removal equipment and other specifics for those reactors.

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March 8, 2026 Posted by | Fukushima continuing, wastes | Leave a comment

14 March – Protesters to rally at Faslane base in anti-nuclear demonstration

 PROTESTERS are set to rally at the Faslane naval base to protest against
the UK’s nuclear arsenal. The rally, organised by the Scottish Campaign for
Nuclear Disarmament (CND), will be held at HMNB Clyde’s north gate on March
14. The Scottish CND told The National that “nuclear weapons are a threat
to Scotland and the whole world”, saying the presence of the UK’s nuclear
submarines in Scotland is putting “a target on our backs”.

 The National 3rd March 2026,
https://www.thenational.scot/news/25903195.protesters-rally-faslane-base-anti-nuclear-rally/

March 8, 2026 Posted by | opposition to nuclear, UK | Leave a comment

Coastal erosion risks to planned Sizewell C nuclear power station

 Letter Nicholas Malins-Smith: : The comment by Sir David King, the former
chief scientific adviser, about how the eastern side of Britain is
“tilting into the sea”, particularly around Norfolk and Suffolk, is the
result of more than just aggressive coastal erosion caused by climate
change (“Residents lambast ‘nuts’ location of Sizewell C as coastal
erosion gains pace”, Report, February 24).

Britain is still experiencing
land mass movement where the north and western parts are slowly rising,
while the south and eastern parts are sinking. This phenomenon is a very
gradual geological process known as “glacial isostatic adjustment”
(GIA). During the last ice age, the weight of massive ice sheets pressed
down on Scotland and northern Britain, forcing the land to subside.
Meanwhile, the southern part of Britain acted as a counterweight and was
raised slightly. The melting of the ice sheets resulted in the land that
was pressed down to begin slowly rising, causing a “see-saw” effect
that lowers the south by an approximate equal amount.

The “tilting”
effect of GIA has been going on quite independently of more recent concerns
about sea-level rise caused by climate change, although the combination
exacerbates the likely impact on certain coastal areas.

The Suffolk
shoreline has long known about the effects of coastal erosion. Most of the
original town of Dunwich was lost to the sea in storms a very long time
ago. The little that is left of Dunwich is about 3.5 miles north of where
the Sizewell C nuclear power station will be built.

 FT 4th March 2026, https://www.ft.com/content/bb9265e4-a235-4830-8c4b-49b6953cf753

March 8, 2026 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

You Deserve Better, Iran

The Here and Now, Mar 03, 2026

I’ve spent the last three days obsessively refreshing the New York Times app. Every few minutes there are updates: missiles raining down in Tehran, nearly 200 girls massacred by a bomb “accidentally” hitting their school in southern Iran, retaliatory attacks carried out by the country’s (few) allies, the death of the tyrannical Ayatollah Khamenei. But nowhere on the screen—no matter how far past the fold I read—is there coverage of the Ebrahimi family and what has become of them. Instead, I find locations that have been bombed and I enter them into Google Maps, plotting how far they are from my family’s apartment. I look at the red, inverted teardrop pinpointing their building, and I wonder if they will make it through this alive………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

My anger reaches back to the past, all the way to 1953 and the coup. So few Americans know that Iran wasn’t always an Islamic regime. The democratically-elected Prime Minister Mohammad Mossadegh nationalized Iran’s oil so that his country could benefit from their primary natural resource. The US couldn’t have that. So the CIA orchestrated a coup, overthrowing Mossadegh, and reinstalling Reza Pahlavi, the former Shah, who was essentially a puppet of the West. The 1979 Iranian Revolution was a direct response to this, and that’s when the Islamic Republic of Iran was born. And it has suppressed and terrorized its people ever since.

………………………………………………………………  From the constant fear of internal crackdowns and external war, to the failing economy and assault on civil liberties, Iranians haven’t known peace in decades. But they continue to stand up and fight for their rights, they continue to educate themselves to contribute to their society and the world, and they continue to sacrifice their lives so that their children can know a better day. 

…………………………………………………………… I’m no historian or political scientist, but even I know that regime change cannot come from external forces. It has to come from within. Khamenei may have been killed, but there is no organized opposition coming to step in and rule, there is no charismatic leader around which the people can coalesce, there is no one to save the day and liberate Iran. Instead, there is the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC), the military that protects the interests of the Islamic Regime, and it is still very much alive. No one knows how this war will play out, but the likeliest scenario is that the IRGC will retain control, and whoever they tap to lead Iran will be even worse than Khamenei. 

………………….. I have a hard time believing that’s what this is. This is Epstein. This is midterm elections. This is a narcissist vying for a Nobel Prize. But most of all, to Trump and the others, this is a game. It even has a game’s name: Operation Epic Fury. They don’t give a fuck if their own people die, why would they care about some brown people halfway across the globe.

…………………. https://substack.com/home/post/p-189699508

March 8, 2026 Posted by | history, Iran | Leave a comment

U.S. Military Leaders Tell Troops Trump Is Waging Iran War To Bring Forth Second Coming Of Jesus

Trump has been “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.”

Troops allege they’re being brainwashed with eschatological propaganda of “Judeo-Christian” design.

blueapples, DDGeopolitics Substack, Mar 05, 2026

As the Trump administration continues to grapple with the fallout from the betrayal of its core campaign promise to abandon the cycle of endless wars in the Middle East that have marred U.S. history since the dawn of the new millennium, the American public isn’t the only target of the barrage of propaganda it has unleashed in a hapless attempt to save face. The administration has undertaken the same tactics with the hopes of brainwashing its military in order to build support for Trump’s war in Iran. Instead of political rhetoric, the propaganda aimed at U.S. troops is rooted in a darker Messianic message that underscores the ulterior motives driving the conflict.

According to the Military Religious Freedom Foundation (”MRFF”), a non-profit civil rights watchdog aimed at protecting the religious liberties of enlisted personnel, U.S. military commanders are accused of telling troops that Trump’s war in Iran is designed to be the apocalyptic catalyst that brings forth the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. According to the MRFF, it has received over 100 complaints from troops across 40 different units spanning 30 different military sites making this accusation. One complaint from a non-commissioned officer filed with the MRFF distilled the nature of these allegations by detailing how their combat-unit commander claimed that Trump has been “anointed by Jesus to light the signal fire in Iran to cause Armageddon and mark his return to Earth.” The complaint goes on to read that “He [the commander] urged us to tell our troops that this was ‘all part of God’s divine plan,’ and he specifically referenced numerous citations out of the Book of Revelation referring to Armageddon and the imminent return of Jesus Christ.”

When confronted with the volume of complaints filed with the MRFF by U.S. military personnel, a White House official denied the accusation that commanders were invoking any end times prophecies to cultivate support for Operation Epic Fury. Instead, the White House official responded by reiterating the objectives the Trump administration has put forward: destroying Iran’s ballistic missile program, its munitions industry, and its navy. Pentagon officials did not respond to requests for comment regarding the complaints filed with the MRFF.

………………………………….. The eschatological narrative U.S. commanders are accused of conditioning troops with in complaints made to the MRFF follows a troubling tone instilled by senior officials of the Department of Defense. No official has been more vocal with this rhetoric than Secretary of Defense Hegseth, who has long echoed the views of conservative theologian Douglas Wilson in advocating for the restoration of guiding principles rooted in Christianity over U.S. governance and society. 

However, like most members of the Trump administration, Hegseth’s version of Christianity is perverted by the contradictory belief in “Judeo-Christianity.” This corruption of Hegseth’s “Christian” worldview is evidence from remarks he made in 2018, when speaking during the Arutz Sheva conference at the King David Hotel in Jerusalem. During his speech, Hegseth categorized the decision of the first Trump administration to recognize Jerusalem as the capital of Israel as a miracle. Hegseth then proclaimed that “there’s no reason why the miracle of the re-establishment of the temple on the Temple Mount is not possible,” going on to proclaim that “a step in that process, a step in every process, is the recognition that facts and activities on the ground truly matter.” Years later after being appointed Secretary of Defense in the second Trump Administration, Hegseth now appears to be manifesting that vision by leading the U.S. assault on Iran.

Christian leaders aligned with the Trump administration have also amplified the message that war with Iran is a sign of the coming Apocalypse in an effort to cultivate support for the conflict…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..

While remarks from Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Senator Mark Warner illustrate the Israel-driven interests behind entering into war with Iran, the speech made by Secretary Hegseth in 2018 reveals a deeper motive that goes far beyond the political realm, revealing the esoteric forces ultimately shaping it to do their bidding. The remarks made by Hegseth in 2018 center on the sacred tenet of the building of the Third Temple at the core of Jewish eschatology. Moreover, they highlight how the version of “Christian” nationalism shamelessly espoused by members of the Trump administration like him and U.S. Ambassador to Israel Mike Huckabee is nothing more than a vehicle to further instill Zionism as the driving force behind U.S. policymaking. The complaints filed with the MRFF reveal how deeply that influence has corrupted the Trump administration, erasing any doubt that its decision to wage war on Iran is not a religious mission anointed by any Christian concept of God. Instead, it is one being done at the behest of its masters in Israel, who, as its actions show, the Trump administration has come to revere more than Christ. https://ddgeopolitics.substack.com/p/us-military-leaders-tell-troops-trump?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=1769298&post_id=189851466&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

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March 8, 2026 Posted by | Religion and ethics, USA | Leave a comment

Capenhust-based nuclear facility faces prosecution after uranium leak

 A WIRRAL company that transports uranium overseas will be prosecuted for
health and safety offences following an incident involving a leak at its
facility. The Office for Nuclear Regulation (ONR) has notified
Capenhurst-based  Urenco ChemPlants Ltd that it faces prosecution
alongside contractor Babcock Critical Services Ltd after the incident in
2024. According to the ONR  in February 2024 at the Tails
Management Facility on the Urenco UK Ltd. nuclear licensed
site in Capenhurst, a metal container holding almost 11
tonnes of uranium oxide powder fell from a forklift
truck, striking surrounding equipment within the facility.  

 Wirral Globe 4th March 2026, https://www.wirralglobe.co.uk/news/25905939.capenhust-based-nuclear-facility-faces-prosecution-uranium-leak/

March 8, 2026 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment