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Poodles and puppet masters – Mutual Defence Agreement puts USA in charge of UK military policy

The Mutual Defence Agreement (MDA) of 1958 effectively ensures that the UK remains a nuclear weapon power by allowing the US to provide it with nuclear materials, including uranium and plutonium, nuclear weapons components, and submarine reactors. It also permits the sharing of staff and know-how between the two countries. 

There will be no dispute mechanisms allowed. No parliamentary scrutiny. And it will not be subject to approval by the US congress.” 

The Mutual Defence Agreement now permanently ties British nuclear weapon dependency to the United States, writes Linda Pentz Gunter

Remember the pet poodle that used to belong to US President George W. Bush? “I must correct you,” I hear you say. It was Scottish terriers that W had, not poodles.

Yes, but I refer here not to Barney and Beazley but to Bush’s third dutiful dog, Blair, as in Tony Blair, the contemporaneous British prime minister, who was routinely featured in cartoons as the compliant canine — specifically a poodle — glued to W’s side.

“I will be with you, whatever,” Blair had written to Bush in a confidential note eight months before the ill-fated invasion of Iraq, launched on the basis of exaggerated and downright false information.That declaration and other professions of poodlish loyalty, were revealed in the 2016 report issued by the Chilcot Commission examining events around the ensuing Iraq war.

“I express more sorrow, regret, and apology than you can ever believe,” was Blair’s response to the report’s findings. Based on his activities since then —which include serving as a well-paid advisor to corporate financial institutions, charging speaking fees as high as $300,000 a pop, and amassing a net worth of at least $60 million — no, we won’t ever believe it.

Perhaps Sir Keir Starmer, whose popularity continues to plummet, is also eagerly awaiting such post-prime ministerial plentitude. At least then, he will be able to pay for his own suitable suits. 

But after winning the UK general election in July and duly ascending to US poodlehood, Starmer knew he needed to quickly mark some territory before the departure of the gray-muzzled mutt then occupying both the dog house and the White House.

In order to ensure that the so-called special relationship — the canine cordiale — between the UK and the US remained intact, Starmer orchestrated a fundamental change to a key joint defense policy, cunningly by-passing parliamentary oversight.

The Mutual Defence Agreement (MDA) of 1958 effectively ensures that the UK remains a nuclear weapon power by allowing the US to provide it with nuclear materials, including uranium and plutonium, nuclear weapons components, and submarine reactors. It also permits the sharing of staff and know-how between the two countries. 

Thus far, a section of the MDA has required renewal by the UK parliament every ten years. Those key clauses were due to expire this December.

Britain is in possession of four Vanguard class attack submarines armed with American-made Trident II D-5 ballistic missiles carrying UK-made warheads. As long time British national security correspondent, Richard Norton-Tayor, explained in Declassified: “The MDA enables the US to provide Britain with nuclear weapons materials and know-how without which Trident would not be able to function.” It also makes the program affordable for UK coffers.

In a briefing put out by the British nuclear watchdog group, Nuclear Information Service, the MDA is described as “the treaty that governs the relationship between the nuclear weapons programmes of the United Kingdom (UK) and the United States (US), which is unique amongst nuclear armed states for the level of dependency and technical integration involved.”

Now the MDA will endure in perpetuity. That’s because the Starmer government skillfully avoided a vote on the lifting of the sunset clause by first introducing its amendment during parliamentary recess, thus guaranteeing six weeks of inaction, then setting the expiry deadline for October 23 during which politicians from both parties were consumed with party conferences and budget issues. 

Consequently, the key amendments to the MDA slipped through without debate.

As NIS’s David Cullen summed it up, “The idea is to put this beyond democratic accountability in perpetuity.”

Specifically, the amended treaty contains three important clauses that leash the nuclear poodle tightly to its American owner. As reported in a debate in the British House of Lords, which did discuss the MDA renewal, can choose to oppose any changes, but has no actual jurisdiction over it, these are:

  • Article 4 which makes the provisions on naval nuclear propulsion cooperation reciprocal and allows the UK to transfer technology to, and share information with, the US.
  • Article 5 which removes the expiry provisions that relate to article III bis and allows for the MDA, as a whole, to remain in force on an “enduring basis”. As such, the agreement will not require renewal every ten years.
  • Article 13 adds new final provisions to the agreement that will ensure that information, material or equipment shared or transferred under the MDA will continue to be protected should the agreement be terminated by either party in the future.

What this means in real terms, explained NIS’s Cullen at a recent conference held in London by the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament, is that Rolls Royce parts “can be used in the next generation of US nuclear submarines. There will be no dispute mechanisms allowed. No parliamentary scrutiny. And it will not be subject to approval by the US congress.” 

The amendment also increases the already considerable secrecy shrouding the precise language in the MDA. “Efforts to scrutinise this relationship are regularly deflected by the government under the guise of national security,” said outgoing CND general secretary, Kate Hudson, in a statement.

According to the NIS report, “no information abut plutonium transfers after March 1999 or transfers of HEU [highly enriched uranium] and tritium outside the three barter exchanges has been made public, and the MOD [Ministry of Defence] has rejected Freedom of Information Requests for information about more recent transfers.”

Likewise, “there is little information in the public domain about the quantity and nature of transfers of non-nuclear components under the MDA,” says NIS.

“This ‘special relationship’ tethers British military and foreign policy to Washington – and makes redundant the claim that Britain has an independent nuclear weapons system,” Hudson added. “Without US support, Britain would be unable to sustain its nuclear arsenal.”

But why the rush to do away with the renewal clause and preserve key terms of the agreement in aspic? The answer, it appears, was insurance, to make the treaty impervious to the bite of the orange attack dog then potentially poised to return to the White House. This was necessary, the argument went, because Donald Trump had already shown a predilection under his previous presidential term for shredding nuclear treaties.

Trump withdrew the US from the 1987 Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty with Russia, a key instrument of global arms control, leaving Russia free to develop as many intermediate-range nuclear missiles as it wants and potentially triggering a new nuclear arms race.

Trump also tore up the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action — or Iran nuclear deal — which, while still in place, at least allowed for independent verification and oversight of Iran’s civil uranium enrichment activities in exchange for sanctions relief. Iran has already said it has now enriched uranium above 60%, well within the weapons-usable range if not yet weapons-grade.

In January, Trump will indeed be US president again. Starmer has decided to remain as his nuclear lapdog. The MDA may be impermeable to MAGA meddling. But how else Trump may choose to use his UK nuclear proxy should fill all of us with dread. 

Linda Pentz Gunter is the international specialist at Beyond Nuclear and writes for and edits Beyond Nuclear International. Her forthcoming book, Hot Stories. Reflections from a Radioactive World, will be published in the new year.

November 11, 2024 Posted by | politics international, UK, USA | Leave a comment

UN nuclear head to visit Iran for talks on country’s nuclear program as next Trump presidency looms

VIENNA (AP) — The head of the United Nations’ nuclear watchdog said Sunday he will travel to Iran in the coming days to hold talks regarding the country’s nuclear program. The visit comes amid wider tensions gripping the Mideast over the Israel-Hamas war and uncertainty over how U.S. President-elect Donald Trump will approach Iran after his inauguration in January.

Specifically, the Director General of the International Atomic Energy Agency, Mariano Grossi, will have high level meetings with the Iranian government and will hold technical discussions on all aspects related to the joint statement agreed with Iran in March 2023.

It is intended as a path forward for cooperation between the IAEA and Iran on how to expand inspections of the Islamic Republic’s rapidly advancing atomic program.

The 2023 statement included a pledge by Iran to resolve issues around sites where inspectors have questions about possible undeclared nuclear activity, and to allow the IAEA to “implement further appropriate verification and monitoring activities.”

The meetings in Tehran will build on Grossi’s discussions with Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi on the sidelines of the United Nations General Assembly in September, a statement by the IAEA said.

“It is essential that we make substantive progress in the implementation of the joint statement agreed with Iran in March 2023,” Grossi said. “My visit to Tehran will be very important in that regard.”

Iran is rapidly advancing its atomic program and continues to increase its stockpile of uranium enriched to near weapons-grade levels in defiance of international demands, according to recent reports by the IAEA.

Grossi, has warned that Tehran has enough uranium enriched to near-weapons-grade levels to make “several” nuclear bombs if it chose to do so. He has acknowledged the U.N. agency cannot guarantee that none of Iran’s centrifuges may have been peeled away for clandestine enrichment………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………

As Trump is to take office again in a few weeks, Iranians are divided on what his next presidency will bring. Some foresee an all-out war between Tehran and Washington, particularly as other conflicts rage in the region. Others hold out hope that America’s 47th president might engage in unexpected diplomacy as he did with North Korea.  https://apnews.com/article/iaea-grossi-iran-nuclear-negotiations-efa8ad94a3424135eb21261cccaf4641

November 11, 2024 Posted by | Iran, politics international | Leave a comment

What from Trump? | The West Report

November 10, 2024 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Can Trump 2.0 defuse the nuclear threat? These Washington heavyweights fear not

The concern about Trump rests on his chaotic and erratic method of decision-making and his personal preference for dictators over democrats – for America’s traditional enemies over its allies.

Peter Hartcher, November 9, 2024 

Political and international editor

Bob Woodward is doing his best to remain optimistic in the face of an impending second Donald Trump presidency. “Don’t give up on America’s democracy!”

But when the topic turns to the president’s unique responsibility for US nuclear strategy, his sunny outlook grows dim.

“It’s frightening,” says the noted American journalist and close student of the last 10 US presidents. “We are all walking on eggshells,” Woodward tells me. “Trump is totally unpredictable, he never plans, he operates on instinct.”

Not necessarily because he fears that Trump will recklessly fire off atomic weapons but because he worries about Trump’s ability to deter other powers from doing so.

Woodward, whose initial fame was in breaking the Watergate stories with co-author Carl Bernstein, has interviewed Trump dozens of times over 35 years, and chronicled his political career in four books ripe with insider anecdotes.

Woodward was most impressed with Joe Biden’s management of the nuclear threat from Russia two years ago when Vladimir Putin was threatening to attack Ukraine with a tactical, or battlefield, nuclear weapon. He sets out in detail in his new book, War, how Biden’s administration confronted Moscow, including a phone call from the US Defence Secretary, Lloyd Austin, to his Russian counterpart, Sergei Shoigu:

“It wouldn’t matter how small the nuclear weapon is,” Austin told Shoigu, according to the transcript of the call that Woodward obtained. “If you do this, it would be the first use of nuclear weapons anywhere in the world in three-quarters of a century and it could set in motion events that you cannot control and we cannot control.”

The US would review all the self-imposed restraints it had imposed in supporting Ukraine’s war effort, Austin told him.

Separately, Biden called Xi Jinping to enlist his help. China’s economic support keeps Russia solvent through its war. So Xi’s opinion matters in the Kremlin.

“If Putin were to break the seal on nuclear use, that would be an enormous event for the world,” Biden told Xi, according to the book. China’s president agreed and undertook to warn Putin off. He did so publicly when he said: “Nuclear wars must not be fought.”

America’s Cold War-era plans for nuclear and conventional escalation with the Soviet Union were reworked and refitted for war with Putin’s Russia.

Woodward says he was shocked to learn that, during this episode, the US intelligence assessment of the risk that Putin would actually use a battlefield nuke had started at a 10 per cent chance but peaked at 50 per cent. Putin, of course, ultimately did not act on his threat.

The Biden administration showed “unique, steady, purposeful, informed leadership” in handling the risk from Russia, says Woodward. “It’s a road map for how you avoid a nuclear catastrophe.”

He adds: “There is nothing steady and there is nothing purposeful in Donald Trump’s leadership. He’s focused on himself and his own instinct.”

…………………………………………………………………………..The concern about Trump rests on his chaotic and erratic method of decision-making and his personal preference for dictators over democrats – for America’s traditional enemies over its allies.

But there is a new factor that Trump will have to confront. “All of US Cold War nuclear strategy was bipolar – it was the US and the USSR,” Woodward says. “With China’s rapid nuclear build-up, strategy will have to be tripolar.”

So a president given to simplistic plans and impulses must deal with a whole new level of nuclear complexity for which neither he nor the US system is yet equipped. Woodward need not fear contradiction on this point: “This is such a dangerous time.”  https://www.theage.com.au/world/north-america/can-trump-2-0-defuse-the-nuclear-threat-these-washington-heavyweights-fear-not-20241108-p5kp0n.html

November 9, 2024 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

UK says it voted against UN nuclear war panel because consequences already known

 The UK was one of three countries to vote against creating a UN scientific
panel on the effects of nuclear war because, the Foreign Office argued, the
“devastating consequences” of such a conflict are already well known
without the need for a new study. The UK, France and Russia were the only
countries to vote on Friday night against a UN general assembly committee
resolution drafted by Ireland and New Zealand to set up an international
scientific inquiry to take a fresh look at the multifaceted impact of
nuclear weapons use.

 Guardian 4th Nov 2024 https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/nov/04/uk-joins-russia-and-france-in-voting-against-un-nuclear-war-inquiry

November 7, 2024 Posted by | politics international, UK | Leave a comment

Iran says it rejects nuclear weapons but will defend itself by all means

Iran International, 4 Nov 24

Iran’s Foreign Ministry said on Monday it remains committed to a peaceful nuclear program but asserted Tehran would prepare whatever it takes to defend itself against Israel.

“The official stance of Iran in rejecting weapons of mass destruction and regarding the peaceful nature of the Islamic Republic of Iran’s nuclear program is clear,” said Foreign Ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei.

“As emphasized in the recent speech by the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution, we will equip ourselves to the extent necessary for the defense of Iran,” he added.

For weeks, Iranian officials have ramped up their narrative that Tehran possesses the capability to produce nuclear weapons, asserting that only Khamenei’s religious fatwa prevents it from doing so.

Baghaei also claimed that the country will use all its “material and spiritual resources to respond to the recent aggressions by the Zionist regime.”

This statement comes as Iran’s leadership intensifies its stance amid escalating tensions with the United States and Israel.

Khamenei has called on officials to make every necessary preparation to defend the country against the US and Israel…………………………………………………………………………… more https://www.iranintl.com/en/202411041034

November 5, 2024 Posted by | Iran, politics international | Leave a comment

WILL THE 2024 U.S. PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION BRING AN END TO THE WAR IN UKRAINE?

In March-April 2022, first in Minsk and later in Istanbul delegates ultimately came close to an agreement. A previsional document was initialled with more work envisioned being done to reach a final comprehensive agreement. At that point a visit to Kiev by Boris Johnson, then prime minister of Britain, ended the entire process.

 https://aearnur.substack.com/p/will-the-2024-us-presidential-election, 1 Nov 24

Who wants to see more war? Very few. But when those few occupy the highest political positions… more war is exactly what we get.

The question is no longer whether the Ukrainian regime will win against Russia. The question now is how long the western powers will sustain the regime until it loses. The secondary question related to this is how will the western powers react when their narratives about this conflict begin to collapse, as they are in the process of doing now. ‘Project Ukraine’ is crucial to these powers in their dedication to weakening first Russia, then China. Could it be that the upcoming presidential election in the USA will bring about the end of the Ukrainian war and ultimately, an end to the West’s determination to achieve global hegemony.

The prospects for an eventual global peace via multipolarity rests in the present day upon the conclusion to the Ukrainian war, the West’s ‘Project Ukraine’ and all that goes with it, including the prospective war of the West against China. The upcoming election in the USA is a crucial element regarding the western neocon elite to whom there never was such a thing as a bad war. To defeat and permanently defeat this way of thinking will involve a massive change. The result of the 2024 presidential election in the USA has the potential to be crucial in this respect. The fixed policy of the current western political elite is embedded within its ‘Project Ukraine’. The task involved in terminating it will involve immense effort and dedication due to its importance as seen by the neocons who have achieved ascendancy in the West since 9/11.


The pressure on Russia was unrelenting by the western powers as they sought to drive it into a war with the Ukrainian regime. The preparations were meticulous as we have seen through the length of time the Russian military has taken to break through the 1,000+ km line of Ukrainian fortifications. The West developed the Ukrainian army to NATO standards as the vital complementary component to man them. Along with the sanctions regime against Russia and what they thought would be the entire world on their side, it was believed Russia and its authorities would crumble.

With successive Ukrainian regimes since the US-fomented Maidan coup in 2014, the western nations drove Russia into the only viable course of action left to it if it wished to maintain its security and long term sovereign stability. Every possibility to resolve the Ukraine problem was taken to its full conclusion by Russia in a near decade-long attempt via the Minsk process to find a diplomatic solution whereby peace and reconciliation could be accomplished. As we now know from statements by Angela Merkel and Petro Poroshenko the entire process was merely a sham to give the West time to build the Ukrainian army and the fortifications across the entire line of contact with the Russian-speaking republics of the Donbass.

In addition to Minsk, in a last gasp attempt to persuade the western powers that peace was possible, Russia offered to negotiate a new security architecture for Europe which would safeguard the security of all. Missives on this basis were sent to both NATO and the western powers. These were dismissed out of hand, especially so by NATO whose stance was that they could do whatever they wished in accepting nations into their organisation and Russia had no say in this whatsoever.

Then, after Russia was left with zero good choices having tried everything possible to avoid war, it began its special military operation, a limited strategy designed to bring the Ukrainian regime to its senses and to implement the Minsk agreements that had been ratified at the UN, the two sides held negotiations seeking a way forward. In March-April 2022, first in Minsk and later in Istanbul delegates ultimately came close to an agreement. A previsional document was initialled with more work envisioned being done to reach a final comprehensive agreement. At that point a visit to Kiev by Boris Johnson, then prime minister of Britain, ended the entire process.

The history of western leaders seeking to attack Russia in almost every possible way short of outright military attack is a long one. The verbal abuse had been constant for decades. Then came the economic war against Russia through sanctions that has been the most unrelenting economic attack on a nation ever seen. Yet Russia has stood resiliently determined to see things through and its economy has in fact grown stronger rather than weaker over these years. The second arm of the attack against Russia whereby all nations would cut ties with it, also failed. The third arm, the massively prepared siege line the West built facing the Donbass and the professional army designed to defeat Russia by NATO is now in the process of collapse. The West’s entire plan has backfired in all its parts, leaving the western war powers scrambling for any means to reverse this, including desperately promulgating continuously false narratives.

The most blatant false narrative created by the western powers was that Russia’s entry into Ukraine was “unprovoked”. The hymn sheet instructing every western official of any note to use this word went out very early. Saying Russia made an “unprovoked” attack on and invasion of Ukraine was meant to discourage anyone from looking at the genesis of the conflict. As anyone with an independent frame of mind can easily see, Russia was massively provoked, and over and over again constantly since 2008 when the Bush administration twisted European arms to support Ukraine’s entry into NATO. The provocations against Russia during the entire time leading up to its special military operation begun on February 24th 2022 have been massive and continuous.

The lie that Russia made an unprovoked attack on Ukraine is being exposed now as never before. This is due to the fact that as the war in Ukraine has dragged on it has stimulated ever more people to look deeper than the headlines. Online commentators who have demonstrated their trustworthiness over these years such as Alexander Mercouris of The Duran website have been available to relate in detail the true origins of the Ukraine conflict. Besides Alexander there have been others such as Larry Johnson, Scott Ritter, Ray McGovern, Daniel Davis, Colonel Douglas Macgregor and an increasing number of others. Now we can see more and more politicians both in Europe and in the USA who are refusing to mouth the agreed-upon narratives insisted on by others. Viktor Orban in Hungary, Robert Fico in Slovakia and those around Donald Trump in the USA are no longer willing to support the distortions that have been rife in the West for almost three years of war in Ukraine. They seek peace in Ukraine, not the continuous war, with all its massively tragic consequences, sought by the elite neocon cabal of the West.

The lying narratives promulgated by the top echelon of the western powers are being exposed as never before. Just as Zelensky’s corrupt and inhuman regime is crashing and burning before us, so too are the utterly false narratives of the warmongering western neocon elites. The politicians who have been telling these lies about Putin, Russia and the genesis of the Ukraine war are being exposed as never before. What will they do in response? Certainly they will attempt to cancel those among them who have chosen to broadcast the truth, to degenerate them, call them traitors and any other pejorative term possible. I suspect their chances of succeeding as the Ukrainian regime goes down are slim. The humiliation awaiting those who chose to lie for war rather than seek peace is approaching fast.

November 3, 2024 Posted by | politics international | Leave a comment

UK urged to break with France, North Korea and Russia on UN nuclear war resolution


  Julian Borger Guardian 31st Oct 2024

Non-proliferation groups call on government not to oppose creation of a study into effects of nuclear conflict

Non-proliferation groups are urging the UK government to make a late about-turn on plans to vote alongside France, Russia and North Korea against a UN resolution to study the effects of nuclear war.

In a debate on Friday, a UN general assembly committee will discuss a resolution to create an international panel of scientific experts to examine the global impact of different nuclear conflict scenarios.

The resolution, drafted by Ireland and New Zealand, is expected to be overwhelmingly approved by the committee and then later by the full assembly. Diplomats involved in preparations for the vote say the US and China are expected to abstain but that the UK, France, Russia and North Korea had indicated they were likely to vote against.

London and Paris joining forces with Moscow and Pyongyang would not stop the resolution but could have an impact on their reputations when it comes to other nuclear proliferation issues.

The UK and French missions to the UN did not respond to requests for comment and diplomats in New York said final decisions could be left until the last hours before the vote.

Arms control advocates expressed disappointment on Thursday that, with just 24 hours to go before the debate, the UK’s new Labour government had shown no signs of changing course.

“People naively thought that, with a Labour government, you would see a shift away from this kind of weird line that the UK has taken on this particular type of thing,” said Patricia Lewis, the head of the international security programme at the Chatham House thinktank. “Maybe this is the Labour party trying to be more Catholic than the pope when it comes to nuclear weapons, but why not vote with the US, and abstain?”

The panel proposed in Friday’s resolution would be the first such UN-mandated study since 1988 and experts say a lot has changed since then, in science and the nuclear threats around the world. For example, Russia and North Korea, countries which have made aggressive nuclear threats, have entered a deepening partnership.

Lewis argued that a no vote by the UK and France would undermine their credibility with other UN member states, especially when London and Paris are trying to rally global support for criticism of Moscow.

“The UK has been struggling to get countries like South Africa and Brazil onboard over the whole issue of Russia’s behaviour, so this is an opportunity for the UK to say: ‘Yes, we hear you,’” Lewis said.

Observers believe the UK position could be the result of a pact with France to fend off criticism of their nuclear arsenals………………………………………………………………………………………

In April, the UK Royal Society was part of a joint statement by the national academies of science of the G7 member states, which said: “Among the roles of the scientific community are to continue to develop and communicate the scientific evidence base that shows the catastrophic effects of nuclear warfare on human populations and on the other species with which we share our planet.”

While some governments and national scientific institutions have done their own research, supporters of the resolution said a UN panel could establish a global consensus and a scientific “gold standard”, emulating the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and have an impact on policy.

“Studying the results of nuclear war will flesh out how bad it would be to have one, and maybe add pressure on countries who would otherwise think about using nuclear weapons,” said Andrey Baklitskiy, a senior researcher at the UN Institute for Disarmament Research. “Their leaders, their elites would maybe study or read it, or their populations, or partners or allies, who would maybe say we really don’t want this to happen.”
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/oct/31/uk-urged-break-france-north-korea-russia-un-nuclear-war-resolution

November 2, 2024 Posted by | politics international, UK | Leave a comment

Biden to Bibi: ‘OK to continue Gaza genocide till after election’

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coaliton, Glen Ellyn IL, 27 Oct 24

On October 14, President Biden sent a letter to Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu giving Israel 30 days to allow more aid of food, water and medicine into Gaza’s 139 square miles being utterly destroyed by Israel for the past year. It’s noteworthy that the 30 day time limit ends 9 days after the US election. Biden’s letter is brilliant politics and grotesque governance. Biden, who has been funding, supporting and enabling the yearlong genocide in Gaza, desperately needs to appear peace loving ahead of the election. He knows a majority of his Democratic voters are horrified by his genocide enabling. They want him to end the so far 50,000 tons of weapons he’s already given Israel to demolish Gaza.

The letter, designed to promote his concern for the devastation he’s enabled, will do nothing to end the genocide in Gaza. Netanyahu has ignored every one of Biden’s pleas for supplying life sustaining aid there. The letter doesn’t even state Biden will cut off aid to Israel. It merely implies that if US demands aren’t met, the US might consider enforcing foreign assistance laws. Those laws forbid the US from sending weapons to any nation committing wholesale destruction of civilian populations. But not one word about actually cutting off those weapons destroying Gaza.   

Every day dozens, hundreds, even a thousand or more Palestinians die in Gaza, obliterated by Biden’s 2,000 lb. bombs, or killed more slowly from disease or starvation. Biden does not care. His toothless letter begging for more aid to the 2,300,000 Palestinians will do nothing to alleviate their suffering. But it may mollify his antiwar critics enough to help achieve Democratic victory Election Day.

Win or lose November 5, Biden is unlikely to do anything substantive to end the genocidal ethnic cleansing of Gaza. It goes against everything he’s believed in and supported about Israeli colonial domination of Palestine for his entire 52 year governmental career. But it will ensure he descends into historical infamy for enabling the worst genocide of the 21st century. 

October 29, 2024 Posted by | Israel, politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Israel’s Iran reprisal, Middle East destabilized.

By Dan Steinbock, 27 Oct 24,
On Saturday, Israel’s retaliatory attack was framed as “carefully
calibrated.” But in the absence of ceasefire, regional turmoil is
simmering close to an edge, thanks to the escalation ladder.

Early on Saturday, Israel hit Iran with a set of airstrikes, stating it was targeting
military sites in retaliation for the 180 missiles that Iran fired into Israel over 3
weeks ago (which itself was a reprisal against a prior Israeli offensive).

Officially, it was a “carefully orchestrated, underwhelming retaliation” that was
preceded by Israel’s message to Iran ahead of the impending attack. But not
everything is what it seems to be in the Middle East.

The stories behind the stories
The Israeli retaliation was designed to be underwhelming; not by the
Netanyahu cabinet, but by the White House and the Pentagon.

Presumably, portions of Iranian military sites in three provinces – Tehran, Ilam
and Khuzestan – were hit. Iran said its air defenses successful and damage
was estimated as “limited.”

Yet later, Israel Defense Forces (IDF) stated Israel targeted “missile
manufacturing facilities used to produce the missiles that Iran fired at the state
of Israel over the last year.” It also hit surface-to-air missile sites and
“additional Iranian aerial capabilities.”

To stress that the retaliation was more effective, the Israeli Air Force later
claimed that these attacks had destroyed “the backbone of Iran’s missile
industry”, a critical component of its ballistic missile program. The targets
struck were sophisticated equipment that Iran could not produce on its own
and had to be purchased from China. Subsequent reports claim Israel
destroyed air defense systems near oil refineries in retaliatory strike on Iran.

If that’s the case, Netanyahu government was trying to minimize the damage
it caused in Iran, to appease the White House and defuse a potential Iranian
response. By the same token, Netanyahu struggled to deflect international
attention away from atrocities in northern Gaza and southern Lebanon.
The Netanyahu cabinet was playing with fire.

Retaliation scenarios and repercussions
Since early October, I had argued that there were basically three basic
scenarios for an Israeli retaliation:

  1. First, a proportionate Israeli retaliation would signal might without
    causing widespread economic and human costs.
  2. A disproportionate escalation would also target vulnerable
    infrastructure.
  3. Finally, if the aim is to seek regime change, the retaliation would
    additionally target Iranian nuclear sites and critical military
    infrastructure, hoping to destabilize Iran for a US-style regime change.

In the first case, Iran would likely contain its further response. In the second,
Iran would escalate. In the third, all bets would be off in the Middle East and
global reverberations would ensue.

Israel’s Saturday attack seems to have been positioned within the scenario 1
(unless critical infrastructure was, indeed, destroyed which takes us into
scenario 2 and more lethal consequences). This was a surprise to many who
expected a massive Israeli reprisal, as President Netanyahu and his defense
minister Gallant had pledged and the cabinet’s far-right had urged.

Reaction in Israel
The net effects in Israel? PM Netanyahu lost political capital. In part, he will
suffer heavy criticism by the Messianic far-right. It seeks a war with Iran and
would like to drag the U.S. administration into a regional conflict.

At the same time, the opposition blames Netanyahu for the failure to better
sync Israeli responses with Washington (the argument of center-right Benny
Gantz). Another part of the opposition says Israel should have deployed a
stronger response against Iran (the argument of the centrist Yair Lapid)

The fact that a pure scenario 2-like retaliation did not happen – if that proves
to be the case – is likely a direct outcome of hard American pressure. After all,
the initial Israeli retaliation plan was leaked, which undermined the expected
scenario 2 attack.

Most likely, Israel’s initial plans were far more aggressive and offensive. Most
probably, those plans were buried after U.S. pressure. If the Biden
administration and/or its stakeholders were behind the leak, it would not be
surprising.

A regionwide war in the Middle East is the last thing the Democratic White
House needs just two weeks before the U.S. presidential election –
particularly as the fragile lead of Vice-President Kamala Harris is softening.

Israel, Iran and US presidential race
The way the Israeli response was constrained may contain the ongoing
destabilization in the Middle East in the short-term; until the U.S. election day.
That, however, is predicated on the assumption that the impending attack by
Hezbollah against more than two dozen Jewish settlements in northern Israel
will not further escalate the status quo.

Nonetheless, during the U.S. presidential transition – between November and
mid-January – there is another vacuum when much can still happen. 

It is not in the interest of Iran to attack. But it is very much in the interest of the
Netanyahu cabinet and particularly PM Netanyahu to retaliate harder. To
retain his immunity and avoid prosecution for corruption, Netanyahu depends on the far-right support.

The bottom line: If Harris wins the US election, Netanyahu will face some
constraints. If Trump emerges as the winner, Netanyahu is likely to see it as a
carte blanche for a broad-scale Iran attack.

Currently, both Israel and the U.S. share the strategic objective of
destabilizing Iran and undermining its government. As I show in my book The
Fall of Israel, these goals were developed in the US already two decades ago.

The question is not “what” and “why”, but “when” and “how.” 
The Middle East crisis is far from over. Tragically, the future of the Middle East
is effectively a hostage of the U.S. presidential race.

Regional uncertainty
There are many possible scenarios, as long as Israel is able and willing to
execute offensive actions in multiple fronts, thanks to the incessant flow of
U.S. weapons to Israel, American bases in Israel and the region at large, and
massive financial inflows of U.S. military aid.

In the past, U.S. military aid to Israel amounted to $3.8 billion per year; last
year, it soared to $18 billion. It is not transparent aid. The Biden administration
has not disclosed its true extent. Financially, it contributes to the soaring U.S.
debt, which already exceeds the size of the American economy. In the Gaza
Strip and possibly in southern Lebanon, this aid has made U.S. complicit to
genocidal atrocities.

Thanks to the continued destabilization, the turmoil in the Middle East is
simmering close to an edge. Worse, the uncertainty is likely to prevail as long
as:

  • Israel’s genocidal atrocities, backed by U.S. weapons and funds,
    continue in the Gaza Strip and elsewhere in Israel’s proximate
    neighborhood;
  • there is no ceasefire between Israel and Hamas;
  • the Israeli hostages are ignored by the Netanyahu cabinet;
  • the anti-Arab pogroms prevail in the West Bank which is effectively
    being annexed into Israel;
  • the IDF keeps pushing deeper into southern Lebanon;
  • Iran’s government and critical civilian and military infrastructure remain
    Netanyahu cabinet’s ultimate targets, with intelligence and logistical
    support by the United States.

The worst is not behind. It has only been deferred, for now.

On the new book, The Fall of Israel, see
https://www.claritypress.com/product/the-fall-of-israel/
Dr. Dan Steinbock is an internationally recognized strategist of the multipolar
world and the founder of Difference Group. He has served at the India, China
and America Institute (USA), Shanghai Institutes for International Studies (China) and the EU Center (Singapore). For more, see
https://www.differencegroup.net

October 28, 2024 Posted by | MIDDLE EAST, politics international | Leave a comment

Iran complains to IAEA about possible Israeli attack on nuclear sites

Iran International, Oct 21, 2024, 

Iran has written to the UN nuclear watchdog to complain about Israel’s threats against its nuclear sites in a possible retaliatory strike, foreign ministry spokesperson Esmail Baghaei said on Monday.

“Any acts of aggression towards nuclear sites are condemned under international law,” Baghaei said during his weekly news conference.

He added that Tehran had officially communicated its position to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), saying, “we have sent a letter about it to… the UN nuclear watchdog.”

Israel has vowed to attack Iran in retaliation for a volley of Iranian missiles launched on October 1, leading to widespread speculation that Iran’s nuclear sites could be among Israel’s targets.

On October 1, Iran fired more than 180 missiles at Israel, a move described as retaliation for the killings of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran and Hezbollah Secretary General Hassan Nasrallah in Lebanon. It was the second Iranian attack on Israel this year. Israel responded to the first missile volley in April with an air strike on an air defense site in central Iran.

After the attack, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu warned that Tehran had made a “big mistake tonight” and vowed that “it will pay for it.” Later, the Biden administration revealed that it told Israel not to attack Iran’s nuclear sites.

Last week, Netanyahu’s office said Israel would listen to key ally the United States regarding a response to Iran’s missile attack but would decide its actions according to its own national interest.

His statement was attached to a Washington Post article which said Netanyahu had told President Joe Biden’s administration that Israel would strike Iranian military targets, not nuclear or oil sites.

Baghaei, responding to a question about the possibility of Iran changing its official nuclear doctrine, said “weapons of mass destruction have no place in our policy”. Tehran would decide on how and when to respond to any Israeli attack.

Israel, which has long accused Tehran of plans to develop nuclear weapons, regards Iran’s nuclear activities as a threat. Tehran denies these accusations, insisting that its program is entirely peaceful.

Additionally, Israel’s former premier Naftali Bennett called for the country’s leaders to launch an attack on Iran’s nuclear facilities as the Jewish state weighs its response to the barrage of 181 ballistic missiles.

Bennet slammed Biden who had called for a “proportionate” response, saying, “President Biden has said that Israel can retaliate against Iran, but must keep the response ‘proportionate’. The president also urged Israel not to attack Iran’s nuclear program.”

Moreover, prominent Israeli opposition lawmaker and former defense minister Avigdor Liberman also called on the government to use “all the tools” at its disposal to confront the threat of Iran’s nuclear program, tacitly suggesting that Israel should use a nuclear weapon against the Islamic Republic.

“In order to stop the Iranian nuclear program, which is already at weaponization stages, we must use all the tools at our disposal… It must be clear that, at this stage, it is impossible to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons via conventional means.”……………………………………………………………………………………https://www.iranintl.com/en/202410210736

October 25, 2024 Posted by | Iran, politics international | Leave a comment

Top Australian honour (whaa-at !!!!) for American politician who helped push Australia into the shonky AUKUS agreement

Rex Patrick, 24 Oct 24

Albanese pours $5B of Australian taxpayers’ cash into US shipyards (with no guarantee #AUKUS subs will ever be delivered). He then arranges for the local US Congressman to get a top Australian honour. Icing on the cake for that guy.

Rep. Courtney to receive Australia’s top civilian award

WSHU | By Brian Scott-Smith, October 23, 2024 

U.S. Rep. Joe Courtney (D-CT-2) has been chosen for one of Australia’s top civilian awards. Courtney is one of a few Americans to be given the Order of Australia, which recognizes extraordinary service by a non-citizen…………………… He has also been instrumental in the AUKUS trilateral defense agreement between Australia, the UK and the U.S. to help provide nuclear submarines to Australia. It’s the first time the U.S. has entered into such an agreement with another country……..  https://www.wshu.org/connecticut-news/2024-10-23/ct-joe-courtney-australia-civilian-award

October 25, 2024 Posted by | AUSTRALIA, politics international | Leave a comment

Path to peace in Ukraine is thru negotiated settlement, not escalatory war that could go nuclear.

Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL 21 Oct 24

Ethan Finegold’s October 20 letter ‘The US has the power to end the war in Ukraine’ offers just one simplistic remedy to achieve a Ukrainian victory over Russia. Finegold argues the US must approve long range missile strikes by Ukraine with the missiles we’ve already provided but restrict their long range use.

There are 2 problems with this solution. First, long range missile strikes will have no effect on achieving a Ukrainian victory. This is not just the opinion of we in the community including esteemed University of Chicago political science expert John Mearsheimer. It’s the opinion of his polar opposite, Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, who argues such strikes will have no effect because Russia has already moved over 90% of its strategic targets beyond the range of these long range missiles.

The second reason is decidedly more ominous. Russia has made clear both publicly at the UN and privately in backchannel talks with the Biden administration, that such attacks using US/UK missiles, fired using US technology and logistics, will put Russia at war with NATO. These communications so unnerved Biden that he rebuffed UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer and Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky last month who both sought US approval for such strikes. Russia upped the ante against such strikes by publicly revising its nuclear strategy to allow for use of nuclear weapons if a non-nuclear state strikes deep into Russia supported by weaponry from a nuclear state. So far, President Biden has wisely gotten the message.  

Finegold is correct in stating “Every day that this war is allowed to continue is another day that risks Russia’s use of nuclear weapons on the battlefield.” That is precisely why the US must pivot from endless weaponizing this 32 month long unwinnable war to a sensible negotiated peace.

October 23, 2024 Posted by | politics international, Ukraine | Leave a comment

“Goodbye Lebanon” – High Israeli Official. Biden Says OK, So Far.

By Ralph Nader / Nader.org, October 18, 2024

Biden’s bombs and missiles, dropped daily on Lebanon, a U.S. ally, by his puppet master Netanyahu, is wreaking havoc in this small defenseless country. The Israeli genocidal machine is waging an incinerating assault on fleeing civilians and critical facilities. The scorched-earth Israeli strategy is the same as what we have seen in Gaza. Attack in Lebanon anyone who moves or anything that stands – whether a hospital, a dense residential area, a café, a municipal building, a market, a school, or a Mosque – and allege there was a Hezbollah commander or a Hezbollah site here or there. Two recent New York Times headlines express some of the impact of this latest Israeli war: “In Just a Week, a Million People in Lebanon Have Been Displaced” and “Lebanon’s Hospitals Buckle Amid an Onslaught: ‘Indiscriminate’ Strikes Overwhelm Health System, U.N. Says.”

Historical note: Hezbollah, also a political Party and social service organization, was created to defend impoverished Shiite Muslims in southern Lebanon in 1982 right after the Israeli army once again invaded Lebanon and badly mistreated the residents during an 18-year-long military occupation.

No matter what or who the Israeli Air Force’s American F-16 fighter aircraft bomb, no matter the deaths and injuries to thousands of Lebanese families, many of them children and women, Biden keeps unconditionally and savagely shipping weapons of mass destruction. He is violating six federal laws requiring conditions be met – such as not violating human rights or not obstructing U.S. humanitarian aid. Netanyahu is violating these and other conditions and mocking his major benefactor, the United States government.

Israel has long had designs on a slice of Lebanon going up to and including the Litani River area. Water is valuable. Over the years, Israel has routinely violated Lebanese air space, executed incursions into Lebanon and has used forbidden cluster bombs and white phosphorous. According to Aya Majzoub, Deputy Regional Director for the Middle East and North Africa at Amnesty International, “It is beyond horrific that the Israeli army has indiscriminately used white phosphorous in violation of international humanitarian law.”

The White House knows all this. It doesn’t care. Wherever Israel invades, bombs, assassinates, or boobytraps pagers and walkie-talkies, Bibi-Biden continues his servility to the Israeli terror regime and its genocidal leader Netanyahu, who is despised by three out of four Israelis for his domestic policies and is under indictment by Israeli prosecutors for corruption.
Despite reports that Biden steams in private against Netanyahu, and considers him a liar and a supporter of Trump’s re-election, Biden knows that that this foreign authoritarian has the big card: CONGRESS. Most of the legislators who attended his noxious address to a joint congressional session last June gave him a record-breaking 52 standing ovations. Former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi said, “Benjamin Netanyahu’s presentation in the House Chamber today was by far the worst presentation of any foreign dignitary invited and honored with the privilege of addressing the Congress of the United States.”

Biden, who is known to conduct foreign and military policy without any authorization by Congress, doesn’t want to offend the powerful “Israel government can do no wrong” Lobby in the U.S. – to which he has been indentured for his entire fifty-year political career. This includes Israel’s current destruction of Lebanon, where tens of thousands of Americans are residing. The Washington Post reports that the Biden White House “has so far given full backing to Israel’s ground operations in Lebanon, even amid a growing international outcry over the civilian toll … and Israeli clashes with United Nations peacekeepers,” who have been assigned there for decades.

Having full U.S. government backing, and now backed by U.S. warships, Marines and logistics, plus 100 U.S. soldiers arriving this week in Israel, Netanyahu knows he has a free hand to attack Iran and drag the U.S. into a regional war.

Both Netanyahu and Bibi-Biden have been briefed about the possibilities of “blowback” (the CIA’s term) against the U.S. These concerns come from U.S. intelligence agencies who study scenarios like future 9/11s or the recent inexpensive armed drones that can be constructed and deployed anywhere. Militarists and corporatists in the U.S. aren’t that concerned because whenever “blowback” occurs they can concentrate more power, with bigger military budgets and profits, in another “war on terror,” silencing dissent and subordinating or sidelining critical domestic priorities.

That is the lethal fix and fate that America has been subjected to by its cowardly, Constitution-violating politicians from both Parties. The power structure – the corporate state – or what Franklin Delano Roosevelt once called in a 1938 message to Congress “fascism,” is telling the American people: “Heads we win, Tails you lose.”

Here is how bad Biden has gotten. Recently, two letters signed by 65 American doctors and health workers back from the horrors, the killing fields of Gaza, to President Joe Biden, have gone unanswered. (See, “65 Doctors, Nurses and Paramedics: What We Saw in Gaza” by Feroze Sidhwa, New York Times Sunday, October 13, 2024). Their letters plead for a ceasefire and immediate humanitarian aid for the starving, dying people of Gaza. They request a meeting with President Biden, who has often met with the pro-Israeli lobby. Scranton Joe says no way.

These brave physicians and nurses also are requesting that Joe Biden demand that Netanyahu allow children in Gaza who are seriously burned or are amputees be air-lifted to America to be treated by compassionate specialists in ready American hospitals. Biden, a practicing Catholic, has no interest.

President George Washington warned his country about avoiding foreign entanglements in his farewell address. Were he possessed of more prescience; he would have added the word “surrenders.”

October 21, 2024 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Volodomyr’s World: A Delusional ‘Victory Plan’

RUSSIAN and UERASIAN POLITICS, by Gordonhahn, October 17, 2024,

Ukraine’s Volodomyr Zelenskiy lives in a world of productions, PR, simulacra and, therefore, delusion. Hence, the bizarre content of his so-called Victory Plan as presented to Ukraine’s parliament, the Verkhovna Rada, on October 16th. It contained five points, each out of touch with the real world in its own way……

The first point is Ukraine’s immediate admittance to NATO. This is none other than an extension to the level of the absurdity of his policy of trying to bring the alliance into the NATO-Russia Ukrainian War as an open and direct combatant party. Despite repeated escalations, the reluctance or hesitation to grant Ukraine the right to use Western-supplied long-range missiles against targets deep inside Russia demonstrates the limits of Western commitment.

So does the reduction of Western weapons and financial assistance to Ukraine, and repeated claims by Western leaders that their countries weapons reserves are depleted, and the lack of a war time production plan demonstrate that the West will not fight Russia directly any time soon, no less immediately, as granting Ukraine NATO membership would soon lead to.

Moreover, Western leaders have repeatedly rejected this idea. Saying that Ukraine’s membership in NATO was only “in the future” and that even another country might be admitted prior to Ukraine, new NATO Gen Sec Rutte Mark Rutte poured cold water on any “immediate” NATO membership for Ukraine the day after Zelenskiy outlined his Victory Plan to the Rada…..

The second point includes many of the faults of the first in that it calls for the West to build up Ukraine’s defensive and, crucially, offensive military capacity as a deterrent to Russian aggression and, more importantly, to allow Kiev to turn the war back onto Russian territory. This point includes Western approval so that Kiev can use long-range missiles provided by the West to attack targets deep inside Russia…. To this point is attached a secret protocol, the contents of which are known to the leaders of the US, UK, and Italy

Thus, Zelenskiy is proposing that NATO engage in attacks on Russia directly as an alliance or by one of its members, Ukraine. In short he is proposing that NATO with Ukraine as a member wage war against Russia.

To be sure, building up Ukraine’s defense to such a level that it could spearhead a NATO attack on Russia with any hope of success would take at least several years, by which time Ukraine is unlikely to exist. Pushing the war onto Russian territory has just been tried in Kursk to disastrous effect, with Ukrainian troops on the verge of encirclement and destruction.

Assuming an existing Ukraine, such a plan would require the West virtually to transition to a war economy if to have any prospect of success, with all the catastrophic effects for the parties which adopted such a decision and likely for domestic stability that would have as well.

Most dangerous is Zelenskiy’s reiteration of his plea to be allowed to hit deep inside Russia with long-range missiles, which can only be undertaken by using Western targeting and other technical means data and Western military officer-operators. Putin has said this would establish the countries in the armed forces of which these operators serve as combatants in the war and legal targets for Russian retaliation.

The third point is the ‘containment’ of Russia by way of the deployment of non-nuclear, long-range ballistic missiles in Ukraine. This point has the look of a post-war military strategic initiative and also has a secret protocol attached. The prospect of such a move by the West was one of the causes of Putin’s decision to begin the present ‘special military operation.’ Thus, as with the first three points the ‘Victory Plan’ is a road map to escalation and a direct NATO-Russian war; again, a long-standing goal of Zelenskiy since February 2022.

The fourth point is for the West to help rebuild Ukraine’s military-industrial base, as another means of protecting Ukraine and containing Russia. This point also has a secret protocol and likely pertains more to any post-war period, since Russia will have no trouble destroying any new military-industrial plants during the war.

The fifth point is also post-war oriented, stipulating that the forces of what should become Europe’s leading military power – Ukraine – as a surrogate for American power on the continent. It is proposed that Ukrainian forces would replace American forces across Europe. Thus, NATO would become Ukrainian-oriented and Ukraine a veritable European superpower. This point has the scent of many ultranationalist and neofascist visions of a Great Ukraine, master of an eastern European “Intermarium” stretching from the Baltic Sea to the Black Sea. This smacks of a certain megalomania in Zelenskiy’s thinking that supplements his Victory Plan’s delusions. This may be fine for a sitcom or even a film manuscript — a geopolitical feel-good’ story — but not the real world of cut throat self-interest and lessons learned and hardened by the crooked, cruel path of human history.

The absurdities and extravagant demands and expectations in Zelenskiy’s Victory Plan may explain in part – along with the domestic political needs of the impending U.S. presidential election — the delaying tactics being used by Washington to put off strategic decisions such as whether or not to pressure Zelenskiy to negotiate with Russia, to negotiate behind Ukraine’s back, or to change the political configuration (remove Zelenskiy) in Kiev. 

The U.S. Biden administration has been doing everything in order to delay until after the elections any decisions or announcements of decisions already made in relation to the future of its support for the NATO-Russia Ukrainian War and the Zelenskiy Maidan regime’s strategies.

First, in September the administration began postponing and still is any decision on whether  or not to grant permission to Kiev to use Western-supplied long-range missiles in order to target deep inside Russia…………………………………………………………………………………….

The administration can now put off any strategic decisions, including rejection of Zelenskiy’s absurd ‚Victory Plan‘ until next month—that is until November at the earliest. One can be sure they will not be announced before the results of the U.S. presidential election are known and perhaps significantly later. …………………………………………………………………………………….

In the meantime, Ramstein will approve a new package of assistance, military and financial, to Ukraine to ensure there is no full collapse of the front and/or regime until after Biden’s departure from office. 

Nevetheless, difficult strategic decisions await decisionmakers in the West in order to soften the appearance of defeat at Russia’s hands. Otherwise, they confront a perhaps decade-long war supporting a Ukrainian underground, terrorist attacks, and a disappearing indigenous Ukrainian economy and society reduced to a shrinking western Ukraine as Russian forces cross the Dneiper River and grind through the land to Ukraine’s western, southwestern and northwestern borders, to Odessa in the south, Lvov and Uzhgorod in the west, and Lutsk and Kovel in the north.

And all along the threat of direct war with Russia and nuclear escalation will hang over their heads and those of their electorates. To a significant degree, Zelenskiy and his delusions stand in the way of the West’s only reasonable exit path: de-escalation and peace, sans defeat and loss of face for NATO. Indeed, difficult decisions and bad options are the path ahead.  https://gordonhahn.com/2024/10/17/volodomyrs-world-a-delusional-victory-plan/—

October 19, 2024 Posted by | politics international, Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

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