On February 16, 2022, a full week before Putin sent combat troops into Ukraine, the Ukrainian Army began the heavy bombardment of the area (in east Ukraine) occupied by mainly ethnic Russians. Officials from the Observer Mission of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) were located in the vicinity at the time and kept a record of the shelling as it took place. What the OSCE discovered was that the bombardment dramatically intensified as the week went on until it reached a peak on February 19, when a total of 2,026 artillery strikes were recorded. Keep in mind, the Ukrainian Army was, in fact, shelling civilian areas along the Line of Contact that were occupied by other Ukrainians.
We want to emphasize that the officials from the OSCE were operating in their professional capacity gathering first-hand evidence of shelling in the area. What their data shows is that Ukrainian Forces were bombing and killing their own people.This has all been documented and has not been challenged.
So, the question we must all ask ourselves is this: Is the bombardment and slaughter of one’s own people an ‘act of war’?
We think it is.And if we are right, then we must logically assume that the war began before the Russian invasion (which was launched a full week later) We must also assume that Russia’s alleged “unprovoked aggression” was not unprovoked at all but was the appropriate humanitarian response to the deliberate killing of civilians. In order to argue that the Russian invasion was ‘not provoked’, we would have to say that firing over 4,000 artillery shells into towns and neighborhoods where women and children live, is not a provocation? Who will defend that point of view?
No one, because it’s absurd. The killing of civilians in the Donbas was a clear provocation, a provocation that was aimed at goading Russia into a war. And –as we said earlier– the OSCE had monitors on the ground who provided full documentation of the shelling as it took place, which is as close to ironclad, eyewitness testimony as you’re going to get.
This, of course, is a major break with the “official narrative” which identifies Russia as the perpetrator of hostilities. But, as we’ve shown, that simply isn’t the case. The official narrative is wrong. Even so, it might not surprise you to know that most of the mainstream media completely omitted any coverage of the OSCE’s fact-finding activities in east Ukraine. The one exception to was Reuters that published a deliberately opaque account published on February 18 titled “Russia voices alarm over sharp increase of Donbass shelling”. Here’s an excerpt:
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov voiced alarm on Friday over a sharp increase in shelling in eastern Ukraine and accused the OSCE special monitoring mission of glossing over what he said were Ukrainian violations of the peace process….
Washington and its allies have raised fears that the upsurge in violence in the Donbass could form part of a Russian pretext to invade Ukraine. Tensions are already high over a Russian military buildup to the north, east and south of Ukraine.
“We are very concerned by the reports of recent days – yesterday and the day before there was a sharp increase in shelling using weapons that are prohibited under the Minsk agreements,” Lavrov said, referring to peace accords aimed at ending the conflict. “So far we are seeing the special monitoring mission is doing its best to smooth over all questions that point to the blame of Ukraine’s armed forces,” he told a news conference.
Ukraine’s military on Friday denied violating the Minsk peace process and accused Moscow of waging an information war to say that Kyiv was shelling civilians, allegations it said were lies and designed to provoke it.” (Russia voices alarm over sharp increase of Donbass shelling, Reuters)
Notice the clever way that Reuters frames its coverage so that the claims of the Ukrainian military are given as much credibility as the claims of the Russian Foreign Minister. What Reuters fails to point out is that the OSCE’s report verifies Lavrov’s version of events while disproving the claims of the Ukrainians. It is the job of a journalist to make the distinction between fact and fiction but, once again, we see how agenda-driven news is not meant to inform but to mislead.
The point we are trying to make is simple: The war in Ukraine was not launched by a tyrannical Russian leader (Putin) bent on rebuilding the Soviet Empire. That narrative is a fraud that was cobbled together by neocon spin-meisters trying to build public support for a war with Russia. The facts I am presenting here can be identified on a map where the actual explosions took place and were then recorded by officials whose job was to fulfill that very task. Can you see the difference between the two? In one case, the storyline rests on speculation, conjecture and psychobabble; while in the other, the storyline is linked to actual events that took place on the ground and were catalogued by trained professionals in the field. In which version of events do you have more confidence?
Bottom line: Russia did not start the war in Ukraine. That is a fake narrative. The responsibility lies with the Ukrainian Army and their leaders in Kiev.
And here’s something else that is typically excluded in the media’s selective coverage. Before Putin sent his tanks across the border into Ukraine, he invoked United Nations Article 51 which provides a legal justification for military intervention. Of course, the United States has done this numerous times to provide a fig leaf of legitimacy to its numerous military interventions. But, in this case, you can see where the so-called Responsibility To Protect (R2P) could actually be justified, after all, by most estimates, the Ukrainian army has killed over 14,000 ethnic Russians since the US-backed coup 8 years ago. If ever there was a situation in which a defensive military operation could be justified, this was it. But that still doesn’t fully explain why Putin invoked UN Article 51. For that, we turn to former weapons inspector Scott Ritter, who explained it like this:
“Russian President Vladimir Putin, citing Article 51 as his authority, ordered what he called a “special military operation”…. under Article 51, there can be no doubt as to the legitimacy of Russia’s contention that the Russian-speaking population of the Donbass had been subjected to a brutal eight-year-long bombardment that had killed thousands of people.… Moreover, Russia claims to have documentary proof that the Ukrainian Army was preparing for a massive military incursion into the Donbass which was pre-empted by the Russian-led “special military operation.” [OSCE figures show an increase of government shelling of the area in the days before Russia moved in.]
..The bottom line is that Russia has set forth a cognizable claim under the doctrine of anticipatory collective self-defense, devised originally by the U.S. and NATO, as it applies to Article 51 which is predicated on fact, not fiction.
While it might be in vogue for people, organizations, and governments in the West to embrace the knee-jerk conclusion that Russia’s military intervention constitutes a wanton violation of the United Nations Charter and, as such, constitutes an illegal war of aggression, the uncomfortable truth is that, of all the claims made regarding the legality of pre-emption under Article 51 of the United Nations Charter, Russia’s justification for invading Ukraine is on solid legal ground.” (“Russia, Ukraine & the Law of War: Crime of Aggression”, Consortium News)
Here’s a bit more background from an article by foreign policy analyst Danial Kovalik:
“One must begin this discussion by accepting the fact that there was already a war happening in Ukraine for the eight years preceding the Russian military incursion in February 2022. And, this war by the government in Kiev… claimed the lives of around 14,000 people, many of them children, and displaced around 1.5 million more … The government in Kiev, and especially its neo-Nazi battalions, carried out attacks against these peoples … precisely because of their ethnicity. ..
While the UN Charter prohibits unilateral acts of war, it also provides, in Article 51, that “nothing in the present Charter shall impair the inherent right of individual or collective self-defense… ” And this right of self-defense has been interpreted to permit countries to respond, not only to actual armed attacks, but also to the threat of imminent attack.
In light of the above, it is my assessment.. that Russia had a right to act in its own self-defense by intervening in Ukraine, which had become a proxy of the US and NATO for an assault – not only on Russian ethnics within Ukraine – but also upon Russia itself.” (“Why Russia’s intervention in Ukraine is legal under international law”, RT)
So, has anyone in the western media reported on the fact that Putin invoked UN Article 51 before he launched the Special Military Operation?
No, they haven’t, because to do so, would be an admission that Putin’s military operation complies with international law. Instead, the media continues to spread the fiction that ‘Hitler-Putin is trying to rebuild the Soviet empire’, a claim for which there is not a scintilla of evidence. Keep in mind, Putin’s operation does not involve the toppling of a foreign government to install a Moscow-backed stooge, or the arming and training a foreign military that will be used as proxies to fight a geopolitical rival, or the stuffing a country with state-of-the-art weaponry to achieve his own narrow strategic objectives, or perpetrating terrorist acts of industrial sabotage (Nord-Stream 2) to prevent the economic integration of Asia and Europe. No, Putin hasn’t engaged in any of these things. But Washington certainly has, because Washington isn’t constrained by international law. In Washington’s eyes, international law is merely an inconvenience that is dismissively shrugged off whenever unilateral action is required. But Putin is not nearly as cavalier about such matters, in fact, he has a long history of playing by the rules because he believes the rules help to strengthen everyone’s security. And, he’s right; they do.
And that’s why he invoked Article 51 before he sent the troops to help the people in the Donbas. He felt he had a moral obligation to lend them his assistance but wanted his actions to comply with international law. We think he achieved both.
Here’s something else you will never see in the western media. You’ll never see the actual text of Putin’s security demands that were made a full 2 months before the war broke out. And, the reason you won’t see them, is because his demands were legitimate, reasonable and necessary. All Putin wanted was basic assurances that NATO was not planning to put its bases, armies and missile sites on Russia’s border. In other words, he was doing the same thing that all responsible leaders do to defend the safety and security of their own people.
Here are a few critical excerpts from the text of Putin’s proposal to the US and NATO: [on original]………………………….
It doesn’t take a genius to figure out what Putin was worried about. He was worried about NATO expansion and, in particular, the emergence of a hostile military alliance backed by Washington-groomed Nazis occupying territory on his western flank. Was that unreasonable of him? Should he have embraced these US-backed Russophobes and allowed them to place their missiles on his border? Would that have been the prudent thing to do?
So, what can we deduce from Putin’s list of demands?
First, we can deduce that he is not trying to reconstruct the Soviet empire as the MSM relentlessly insists. The list focuses exclusively on security-related demands, nothing else.
Second, it proves that the war could have easily been avoided had Zelensky simply maintained the status quo and formally announced that Ukraine would remain neutral. In fact, Zelensky actually agreed to neutrality in negotiations with Moscow in March, but Washington prevented the Ukrainian president from going through with the deal which means that the Biden administration is largely responsible for the ongoing conflict. (RT published an article today stating clearly that an agreement had been reached between Russia and Ukraine in March but the deal was intentionally scuttled by the US and UK. Washington wanted a war.)
Third, it shows that Putin is a reasonable leader whose demands should have been eagerly accepted. Was it unreasonable of Putin to ask that “The Parties shall refrain from deploying their armed forces and… military alliances.. in the areas where such deployment could be perceived by the other Party as a threat to its national security”? Was it unreasonable for him the ask that “The Parties shall eliminate all existing infrastructure for deployment of nuclear weapons outside their national territories”?
Where exactly are the “unreasonable demands” that Putin supposedly made?
There aren’t any. Putin made no demands that the US wouldn’t have made if ‘the shoe was on the other foot.’
Forth, it proves that the war is not a struggle for Ukrainian liberation or democracy. That’s hogwash. It is a war that is aimed at “weakening” Russia and eventually removing Putin from power. Those are the overriding goals. What that means is that Ukrainian soldiers are not dying for their country, they are dying for an elitist dream to expand NATO, crush Russia, encircle China, and extend US hegemony for another century. Ukraine is merely the battlefield on which the Great Power struggle is being fought.
There are number points we are trying to make in this article:
Who started the war? Answer– Ukraine started the war
Was the Russian invasion a violation of international law? Answer– No, the Russian invasion should be approved under United Nations Article 51
Could the war have been avoided if Ukraine declared neutrality and met Putin’s reasonable demands? Answer– Yes, the war could have been avoided
The last point deals with the Minsk Treaty and how the dishonesty of western leaders is going to effect the final settlement in Ukraine. I am convinced that neither Washington nor the NATO allies have any idea of how severely international relations have been decimated by the Minsk betrayal. In a world where legally binding agreements can be breezily discarded in the name of political expediency, the only way to settle disputes is through brute force. Did anyone in Germany, France or Washington think about this before they acted? (But, first, some background on Minsk.)
The aim of the Minsk agreement was to end the fighting between the Ukrainian army and ethnic Russians in the Donbas region of Ukraine. It was the responsibility of the four participants in the treaty– Germany, France, Russia and Ukraine– to ensure that both sides followed the terms of the deal. But in December, former German Chancellor Angela Merkel said in an interview with a German magazine, that there was never any intention of implementing the deal, instead, the plan was to use the time to make Ukraine stronger in order to prepare for a war with Russia. So, clearly, from the very beginning, the United States intended to provoke a war with Russia.
On September 5, 2014, Germany, France, Ukraine and Russia all signed Minsk, but the treaty failed and the fighting resumed. On February 12, 2015, Minsk 2 was signed, but that failed, as well. Please, watch this short segment on You Tube by Amit Sengupta who gives a brief rundown of Minsk and its implications: (I transcribed the piece myself and any mistakes are mine.) …………………. [Transcription on original]
There’s no way to overstate the importance of the Minsk betrayal or the impact it’s going to have on the final settlement in Ukraine. When trust is lost, nations can only ensure their security through brute force. What that means is that Russia must expand its perimeter as far as is necessary to ensure that it will remain beyond the enemy’s range of fire. (Putin, Lavrov and Medvedev have already indicated that they plan to do just that.) Second, the new perimeter must be permanently fortified with combat troops and lethal weaponry that are kept on hairtrigger alert. When treaties become vehicles for political opportunism, then nations must accept a permanent state of war. This is the world that Merkel, Hollande, Poroshenko and the US created by opting to use ‘the cornerstone of international relations’ (Treaties) to advance their own narrow warmongering objectives.
We just wonder if anyone in Washington realizes whet the fu** they’ve done?
Biden and Blinken must not let the spy balloon controversy stand in the way of talks on nuclear crisis management and arms control.
Foreign Policy By Sahil Shah, a Senior Fellow and Program Manager at the Council on Strategic Risks’ Janne Nolan Center on Strategic Weapons. 6 Feb23
Shortly before U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken was slated to depart for Beijing on the Biden administration’s first cabinet-level visit, the trip was postponed. The last-minute schedule change came after a Chinese surveillance balloon was confirmed to be floating above sensitive U.S. military sites, including potentially an active nuclear missile silo field in Montana. Over the weekend, the balloon was shot down by a U.S. F-22 fighter jet once the expected debris no longer posed a threat to civilians.
The incident is reminiscent of those that occurred during the Cold War involving the United States and the Soviet Union—and it comes at a time when many are debating whether Washington and Beijing are now headed toward a similar relationship. Blinken’s now-postponed visit was an attempt to follow up on the Biden-Xi meeting at the G-20 summit in Bali, Indonesia, last year. Encouragingly, the summit provided the best recent opportunity for diplomacy between the United States and China—one that could provide some answers on how the two countries can best avoid a “new Cold War” and reduce the risks of unnecessary conflict and inadvertent escalation.
As was true during the Cold War, spy balloons are not the only things looming over the fraught relationship between the United States and China—nuclear weapons are, too. In addition to ever-increasing tensions over Taiwan, it is no secret that China’s ambition for a diversified nuclear arsenal and wider military modernization is accelerating, with Beijing expanding strategic and conventional forces to back up its “wolf warrior” diplomacy.
Since university researchers made it public two years ago that China is developing extensive missile silo fields and Beijing shocked U.S. intelligence services by testing a hypersonic fractional orbital bombardment system just weeks later, there has been a growing conversation on how Washington can adequately deter Beijing. However, there is another side that cannot be ignored: The United States and China must return to talks at the earliest available opportunity to discuss their shared responsibility to reduce the risk of nuclear war through crisis management and arms control.
Foreign-policy chief Josep Borrell sees no good alternative to reviving the nuclear deal even as the Biden administration shifts focus
KYIV, Ukraine—The European Union’s top diplomat, Josep Borrell, is refusing to give up on efforts to rescue the 2015 Iranian nuclear deal, even as Tehran cracks down on protesters at home and helps Russia in its war against Ukraine.
The Pentagon earlier said on Friday that the balloon did not pose a “military or physical” threat.
It’s widely known that US aircraft, appearing in civilian or military purposes, operate around China much more frequent than Chinese aircraft do around the US
China expressed strong dissatisfaction and protest on Sunday against the US’ move to shoot down a non-threatening Chinese airship for civilian use, calling the US’ move an overreaction and vowing to reserve the right to take necessary actions. By turning an unintentional accident into an incident that has been hyped by the US officials and media, Washington is adding new uncertainties into the already-intense relations with China, creating a bad precedent for blurring the line between civilian and military uses, experts said.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry expressed strong dissatisfaction and protested against the US’ use of force to shoot down a Chinese civilian unmanned airship, urging the US to properly handle the incident.
The Chinese side has verified the situation and communicated with the US side multiple times, saying the unintended entry of the airship into US airspace was due to force majeure and the incident was totally an accident, the ministry said.
The US military on Saturday local time shot down a “suspected Chinese spy balloon” off the Carolina coast following an authorization of the Biden administration after the airship has been flying over the US for days. The action was hailed by the US President Joe Biden as “a success,” according to US media reports.
The “balloon episode” went viral on the US social media. A number of US hawks on China-related matters have been hyping the use of balloon for spying purpose and deliberately distorted it as “a direct assault on the US national sovereignty.”
“The US attack on Chinese civilian unmanned airship by force is an obvious overreaction,” Senior Colonel Tan Kefei, a spokesperson at China’s Ministry of National Defense, said in a statement on Sunday.
China will reserve the right to take necessary measures in dealing with similar situations, Tan said.
Tan’s remarks mean that if a foreign airship accidentally enters the Chinese airspace, the Chinese forces could also shoot it down in a similar manner, observers said.
Biden was first briefed on the balloon Tuesday and has been receiving updates from his national security team, CNN said. The Pentagon earlier said on Friday that the balloon did not pose a “military or physical” threat………………………………………….
Overreaction, bad precedent
The US shooting down the Chinese civilian balloon is also considered an overreaction from a technical point of view, said military aviation experts.
Despite admitting that the balloon did not pose a military or physical threat, an F-22 fighter of the US Air Force fired an AIM-9X air-to-air missile and shot down the balloon, supported by F-15 fighters, tankers and warships, the Pentagon said on the day on its website.
The missile was fired from the F-22 from an altitude of 58,000 feet (17,678 meters) when the balloon was 60,000 and 65,000 feet, the Pentagon said.
This is like shooting a mosquito with a cannon, which is not only overreacting but also impractical, a Chinese military expert who requested anonymity told the Global Times on Sunday.
Compared with an unmanned balloon that flies with the wind, the US interception method that featured an advanced stealth fighter jet and fired a missile is too costly………………………………….
It’s widely known that US aircraft, appearing in civilian or military purposes, operate around China much more frequent than Chinese aircraft do around the US, Lü noted. ………… more https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202302/1284857.shtml
Last September, Fiona Hill and Angela Stent wrote this in Foreign Affairs: “According to multiple former senior U.S. officials, in April 2022, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators appeared to have tentatively agreed on the outlines of a negotiated interim settlement.”
In the end, of course, no such settlement was agreed. Which may be, at least in part, because Boris Johnson advised Zelensky not to sign it during his “surprise visit” to Kiev in early April.
As you may recall, one of Zelensky’s “close associates” told Ukrainska Pravda that Johnson was an “obstacle” to negotiations because he’d brought two simple messages: “Putin is a war criminal, he should be suppressed, not negotiated with. And secondly, if you are ready to sign any agreements on guarantees with him, then we are not. We can with you, but not with him, he will still abandon everyone.”
According to Roman Romanyuk, writing in Ukrainska Pravda:
Behind this visit and Johnson’s words lies much more than a simple reluctance to engage in agreements with Russia. The collective West, which back in February suggested that Zelenskyi surrender and run away, now felt that Putin is actually not as all-powerful as they imagined him to be. Moreover, right now there was a chance to “press him”. And the West wants to use it.
It should be noted that Romanyuk disagrees that Johnson’s visit was the main reason the deal fell through. In his view, concerns that “Ukrainian society might not accept such a deal” loomed larger. Others interpret the evidence differently.
Putin himself has claimed the West scuttled negotiations, noting in his September 21st speech that “after certain compromises were coordinated, Kiev was actually ordered to wreck all these agreements”.
Now, the former Israeli PM Naftali Bennett has lent credence to this view, claiming that the West “blocked” a draft peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. The revelation came in a long interview (in Hebrew) posted on Bennett’s YouTube channel.
Bennett’s words cannot be dismissed as mere speculation, given that he played a central role mediating between the two sides, after a request from Zelensky at the war’s outset.
In the interview, Bennett states that he believed Israel’s national interest would be served by a policy of neutrality, which is why he accepted the request to mediate. Toward this end, he sought to understand the interests of both sides.
“Putin’s perception,” he says, “was wait, when the wall came down, we reached an agreement with NATO that they wouldn’t expand … why are you introducing Ukraine into NATO?” Later in the interview, he states that “the war broke out because of the demand to join NATO”.
After a sequence of phone calls with the two leaders, Bennett flew to Moscow on March 7th. (Meanwhile, Russian and Ukrainian negotiators were holding talks at Gomel in Belarus.)
He says that Putin then “made two big concessions”. He promised not to “take out” Zelensky, and he “renounced disarmament of Ukraine”. The same day, Zelensky also “made a big concession” – he “relinquished joining NATO”. Describing these as “huge steps on each side”, Bennett’s impression was that “both sides very much want a ceasefire”.
According to the former Prime Minister, Putin was “very pragmatic”, and “so was Zelensky”. As an example of Putin’s pragmatism, he mentions that Putin “totally understood Zelensky’s political constraints”. Asked whether Putin is “gung ho to fight at all costs”, Bennett replies “no” because “he has goals to achieve”.
Regarding the various Western leaders involved, he says that “Boris Johnson adopted the aggressive line”, whereas “Macron and Scholz were more pragmatic”, and “Biden was both”.
Then we get to the most interesting part. “I think there was a legitimate decision by the West,” Bennett explains, “to keep striking Putin”, to take the “more aggressive approach”. “So they blocked it?” the interviewer asks. “Yes. They blocked it.”
Bennet’s account obviously comports closely with Romanyuk’s observation that the West felt there was a chance to “press” Putin.
One reason to be sceptical is that, insofar as Bennett’s mediation efforts ultimately failed, he has an incentive to blame outside forces (in this case, the West). For now, we can’t be sure exactly what happened. But the revelations are striking, consistent as they are with the earlier report in Ukrainska Pravda – down to the detail of Johnson being particularly hawkish.
The latest row comes as the IAEA chief hopes for progress in a potential visit to Tehran in February.
Tehran, Iran – Iran and the Western parties to its 2015 nuclear deal have once more clashed over the country’s nuclear programme, this time after a report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) on the sensitive Fordow uranium enrichment site.
The global nuclear watchdog said in a confidential report on Wednesday leaked by Western media that the interconnection between two cascades of advanced IR-6 centrifuges at Fordow had been changed in a way that was “substantially different” from what Iran had declared.
The agency also pointed out this is inconsistent with Iran’s obligations under a safeguards agreement required by the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (NPT).
Iran’s nuclear chief, Mohammad Eslami, dismissed the report on Thursday by calling it “incorrect” and claiming an agency inspector had made a mistake.
“We immediately offered explanations that were communicated the same day and the agency inspector also became aware of their mistake,” he said, denouncing the fact that confidential IAEA reports are regularly leaked to the media.
But the E3 – France, Germany and the United Kingdom – and the United States, Western signatories to Iran’s 2015 nuclear accord with world powers that also included China, Russia and the EU, rejected Iran’s stance in a statement on Friday.
“We judge Iran’s actions based on the impartial and objective reports of the IAEA, not Iran’s purported intent,” they said, calling on Iran to fully cooperate with the agency.
“We recall that the production of high-enriched uranium by Iran at the Fordow Enrichment Plant carries significant proliferation-related risks and is without any credible civilian justification.”…………………………..
The Fordow site is so important that enrichment there had been forbidden under the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), as the nuclear accord is officially known. But Iran has gradually abandoned any limits set in the accord after the US unilaterally withdrew from it in 2018 and imposed sanctions.
Talks to restore the deal remain deadlocked since September, with the US publicly maintaining it does not currently prioritise advancing the talks following deadly protests in Iran, while Tehran claims Washington is secretly sending messages to reach an agreement.
The latest clash on Fordow comes as IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi had said last month he hopes to visit Tehran in February to hold talks with Iranian officials on the unresolved cases of nuclear particles found years ago at several Iranian sites.
We, the governments of France, Germany, the United Kingdom and the United States, take note of the report by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) that Iran has implemented a substantial change in the configuration of some of its centrifuges without informing the Agency in advance.
These centrifuges produce high-enriched uranium up to 60% and are located at the Fordow Enrichment Plant. As stated by the Agency, this unnotified change is inconsistent with Iran’s obligations under its NPT-required Comprehensive Safeguards Agreement.
Such lack of required notification undermines the Agency’s ability to maintain timely detection at Iran’s nuclear facilities. The newly reported change in configuration of centrifuge cascades used to produce near-weapons-grade uranium underscores the need for Iran to meet all its safeguards reporting obligations, and to accept whatever safeguards monitoring the IAEA sees as necessary in light of Iran’s production of such highly enriched uranium.
The US embassy in the Solomon Islands reopened on Thursday, decades after being shut down as redundant, amid concerns in Washington about the South Pacific archipelago’s overtures to Beijing.
The mission in Honiara will consist of a charge d’affaires, a “couple” of State Department employees and a “handful” of locals, according to Associated Press, which described the reopening as part of an effort to “counter China’s push into the Pacific.”
In a pre-recorded statement, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken said that through its new embassy, Washington will be “better positioned” to advance democracy and “tackle shared challenges.”
Located about 1,800 kilometers northeast of Australia, the Solomons last hosted a US diplomatic mission in 1993, when the State Department decided to downsize due to the end of the Cold War. The US had played a key role in liberating the archipelago from Japanese occupation during the Second World War, in the bloody Guadalcanal campaign.
In 2019, however, Honiara decided to transfer its diplomatic relations with China from the nationalist exiles in Taiwan to the Communist government in Beijing. The decision touched off riots in Guadalcanal, with protesters targeting Chinese businesses and setting fire to the prime minister’s residence.
In 2022, Honiara signed a security agreement with China, causing further alarm in the US and Australia. The State Department informed Congress that reopening the embassy was a priority given China’s “growing influence” and fears of a military build-up in the Solomons.
The US had told the Solomons that Washington would have “significant concerns and respond accordingly” to any “permanent military presence, power-projection capabilities, or a military installation” by China.
The Australian government said any kind of Chinese naval base in the archipelago would be a “red line” for Canberra, while some commentators even called for invading the islands.
In response to those concerns, Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare said that Australia remains the “security partner of choice,” and issued assurances that there would be no Chinese military base, insisting the security pact with Beijing “had solely domestic applications.”
France leads push for EU to boost nuclear-produced hydrogen
By Kate Abnett 4 Feb 23, BRUSSELS, Feb 3 (Reuters) – France is leading a campaign for the European Union to recognise low-carbon hydrogen produced from nuclear power in its renewable energy rules, but some member states oppose the idea for fear of undermining efforts to quickly scale up wind and solar.
Ministers from France, Poland, the Czech Republic and six other EU countries wrote to the European Commission this week urging it to open up EU renewable energy targets to include hydrogen produced from nuclear energy.
EU countries and lawmakers have been preparing for negotiations next week on the law, which will guide the pace of Europe’s renewable energy expansion this decade.
EU Parliament’s lead negotiator has asked for next week’s talks to be delayed because the European Commission has still not published rules to define “renewable” hydrogen more clearly, which were scheduled for late last year, EU officials said on Friday……………
Ukraine Is Sinking. Are Western Elites Bailing Out? The UNZ REview, MIKE WHITNEY • FEBRUARY 1, 2023
What makes the RAND Corporation’s latest report on Ukraine so significant, is not the quality of the analysis, but the fact that the nation’s most prestigious national security think-tank has taken an opposite position on the war than the Washington political class and their globalist allies. This is a very big deal.
…………… The RAND Corporation’s new report, “Avoiding a long war: US policy and the trajectory of the Russia-Ukraine conflict”, represents just such a split. It indicates that powerful elites have broken with the majority opinion because they think the current policy is hurting the United States. We believe this shift in perspective is going to gain momentum until it triggers a more-assertive demand for negotiations. In other words, the RAND report is the first step towards ending the war.
Consider, for a minute, this excerpt from the preamble of the report:
“The costs and risks of a long war in Ukraine are significant and outweigh the possible benefits of such a trajectory for the United States.”
This quote effectively sumarizes the entire document. Think about it: For the last 11 months we have been told repeatedly that the US will support Ukraine “for as long as it takes.” The above quote assures us that that’s not going to happen. The United States is not going to undermine its own interests to pursue the unachievable dream of expelling Russia from Ukraine.(Even the hawks no longer believe that is possible.)
Rational members of the foreign policy establishment are going to evaluate Ukraine’s prospects for success and weigh them against the growing likelihood that the conflict could unexpectedly spiral out-of-control. That, of course, would serve no one’s interest and could ignite a direct clash between Russia and the United States. Also, US policymakers will decide whether the ballooning collateral damage is worth the expense. In other words, are the ruptured supplylines, the rising inflation, the increasing energy and food shortages, and the declining weapons stockpiles a fair trade-off for “weakening Russia”. Many would say, “No.”
In some respects, the RAND report is just the first in a long line of falling dominoes. As Ukraine’s battlefield losses mount –and it becomes more evident that Russia will control all the territory east of the Dnieper River– the flaws in Washington’s strategy will become more apparent and will be more sharply criticized. People will question the wisdom of economic sanctions that hurt our closest allies while helping Russia. They will ask why the United States is following a policy that has precipitated a strong move away from the dollar and US debt? And, they will wonder why the US deliberately sabotaged a peace deal in March when the probability of a Ukrainian victory is near zero. The Rand report seems to anticipate all these questions as well as the ‘shift in mood’ they will generate. This is why the authors are pushing for negotiations and a swift end to the conflict. This is an excerpt from an article at RT:
The RAND Corporation, a highly influential elite national security think tank funded directly by the Pentagon, has published a landmark report stating that prolonging the proxy war is actively harming the US and its allies and warning Washington that it should avoid “a protracted conflict” in Ukraine…
(The report) starts by stating that the fighting represents “the most significant interstate conflict in decades, and its evolution will have major consequences” for Washington, which includes US “interests” being actively harmed. The report makes it very clear that while Ukrainians have been doing the fighting, and their cities have been “flattened” and “economy decimated,” these “interests” are “not synonymous” with Kiev’s.” (“Rand calls for swift end to war“, RT)
While the report does not explicitly state that ‘US interests (are) being harmed’, it certainly infers that that is the case. Not surprisingly, the report doesn’t mention any of the collateral damage from Washington’s war on Russia, but, surely, that must have been foremost on the minds of the authors. After all, it is not the $100 billion or the provision of lethal weapons that is costing the US so dearly. It is the accelerating emergence of international coalitions and alternate institutions that has put the US empire on the fasttrack to ruin. We assume that the analysts at RAND see the same things that every other sentient being sees, that Washington’s misguided conflagration with Moscow is a ‘bridge-too-far’ and that the blowback is going to be immense and excruciating. Hence, the urgency to end the war quickly. Here’s a excerpt from the report that was posted in bold print halfway through the text:
“Since avoiding a long war is the highest priority after minimizing escalation risks, the United States should take steps that make an end to the conflict over the medium term more likely.”
…………………………….. Washington’s foolish intervention is clearing the way for the greatest strategic catastrophe in US history. And yet, even now, the vast majority of corporate and banking elites resolutely back the existing policy while shrugging off the obvious signs of failure. Case in point: The World Economic Forum posted a blanket statement of support for Ukraine on its website. Here it is: [on original]
……………………………….. the RAND report may represent the views of the Pentagon and the US Military establishment who believe the United States is racing headlong towards a direct conflagration with Russia. In other words, the report may be the first ideological broadsides against the neocons who run the State Department and the White House. We suspect this split between the War Department and ‘State’ will become more visible in the days ahead. We can only hope that the more judicious faction at the Pentagon prevails.
19 Feb 2021Western media portrays Australia as a beautiful nation with independent people and a close ally of the United States. But the American Empire has no allies, only vassal states. Australia became a colony of the American empire in 1975 after an Anglo-American coup. Australians noticed nothing since Australia had been an British colony since its inception and dispatches military forces when ordered to fight empire wars.
In a recent essay for the Bulletin, we argued that the global nuclear order is fundamentally unjust. We called for critical reflection on past, ongoing, and future nuclear injustices to better connect the dots between scholarly fields and social movements. For this roundtable, we invited four scholars, practitioners, and abolition advocates to further articulate what a research agenda on nuclear injustice should look like.
Rebecca Gibbonsstresses the importance of including those most burdened by past nuclear injustices in the discussion. Setting forth the impact of nuclear testing on the Marshallese people, Gibbons highlights their calls for an apology by the US government, sufficient medical care, and the right to return to a safe and remediated environment.
Alexander Kmentthighlights the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons as a useful prism to examine current efforts—both substantive and procedural—to address nuclear injustice. Kmentt emphasizes the treaty’s contribution to the democratization and reframing of nuclear debates.
Benoît Pelopidaswarns of the pitfalls of a nuclear injustice lens, which could ultimately strengthen arguments in favor of nuclear weapons if based on a conservative reading of nuclear deterrence. Instead, Pelopidas outlines several avenues for a productive research agenda, including a critical reflection on the consequences of nuclear injustice.
Mari Fainesconsiders the effects of colonialism, White supremacy, and racial injustice on nuclear weapons policy. She concludes that efforts to address nuclear injustice must include marginalized voices, build on today’s young people, and be sensitive to intersectionality.
We welcome these valid arguments in favor of broadening the debate about nuclear injustice as they point to the necessity of an inclusive agenda, reaching beyond the usual boundaries of the nuclear policy field and community. One such boundary which deserves more emphasis pertains to the well-being of future generations……………………………………………………… https://thebulletin.org/2023/02/roundtable-making-nuclear-injustice-an-agenda-for-change/
BEIJING, Feb 3 (Reuters) – China “firmly objects” to further cooperation between Britain, U.S. and Australia on nuclear submarines, its foreign ministry said in a regular briefing on Friday.
Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Mao Ning said, “China is gravely concerned about this and firmly objects to it,” in response to a question that cited a media report saying British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s visit to the United States in March may yield announcements on more nuclear submarine cooperation…………. Reporting by Yew Lun Tian and Joe Cash ; Writing by Liz Lee; Editing by Christian Schmollinger https://www.reuters.com/world/china-objects-more-nuclear-sub-talks-among-uk-us-australia-2023-02-03/
New START is on the ropes after years of neglect and abuse from Moscow and Washington. VICE, By Matthew Gault 30 Jan 23
Russia signaled to the U.S. on Monday that the world may soon see the end of nuclear-arms control, decades long agreements between nations that have helped limit the production of weapons that can end civilization. New START, an Obama-era treaty that limits the number of nuclear missiles Moscow and Washington can deploy, will expire in 2026. According to Russia, renewing that treaty will depend on whether or not the U.S. seeks the strategic defeat of Russia in Ukraine.
“The entire situation in the sphere of security, including arms control, has been held hostage by the U.S. line of inflicting strategic defeat on Russia,” Deputy Foreign Minister Sergei Ryabkov told state-owned news agency RIA Novosti. “We will resist this in the strongest possible way using all the methods and means at our disposal.”
Part of that resistance might mean holding enforcement of the New START treaty hostage. Signed in 2010, the treaty limits Russia and America’s deployment of strategic nuclear warheads to 1,550 each and deployed missiles and bombers to 700 each. As part of the treaty, each country agreed to inspections to verify that they’re abiding by the treaty.
America and Russia control 90% of the world’s nuclear arsenal and have used treaties to control and limit the deployment of those nukes for decades. The Partial Test Ban Treaty of 1963 ended above ground nuclear testing, the Interim Agreement on Offensive Arms of 1972 stopped both countries from deploying new nukes, a revision of this treaty in 1979 further limited each country’s deployed arsenal.
New START is a sequel, of sorts, to a treaty that began negotiations under Ronald Reagan called Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START). Reagan was famous for pursuing an arms build up and antagonizing Russia, but nuclear weapons frightened him. After watching the TV movie The Day After, he became depressed. “My own reaction was one of our having to do all we can to have a deterrent and to see there is never a nuclear war,” he wrote in his diary.
Representatives from 37 African states have gathered in Pretoria at the African Regional Seminar on the Universalisation of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons (TPNW) to discuss how to get every African state to sign and ratify the UN nuclear ban treaty as soon as possible.
The two day Seminar, co-hosted by South Africa’s Department of International Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO), ICAN, and the International Committee of the Red Cross, will serve to take stock of the TPNW from a regional perspective and consider the need for further progress towards universalisation of the treaty on the continent.
African countries have been long-time leaders on nuclear disarmament. The continent is a nuclear-weapon-free zone under the Treaty of Pelindaba, and the TPNW enjoys strong support from all the countries in the region. So far 33 African UN member states out of 54 have signed the TPNW and 15 have ratified it.
While opening the Seminar, Deputy Minister of DIRCO, Mr Alvin Botes, highlighted South Africa’s history as one of the few states to start developing and then fully dismantle its nuclear arsenals to being an active supporter of the TPNW. “South Africa’s own experience has shown that neither the possession nor the pursuit of nuclear weapons can enhance international peace and security. The continued retention of nuclear weapons based on the perceived security interests of some states comes at the expense of the rest of humanity.”
He also called on all African states “to sign and ratify the TPNW at the earliest possible opportunity and thus reassert Africa’s leadership in nuclear disarmament and contributing to international peace and security.”
ICAN’s Executive Director Beatrice Fihn also highlighted this leadership during the opening speeches:“African states are rightly proud of the role they played in the TPNW’s negotiation and adoption. Support for the treaty in this region is universal, even if much work remains to be done to bring all states on board as parties,” calling on the 21 states that had not yet done so to sign and ratify the treaty. She also celebrated African civil society for their tireless efforts to raise public awareness of the TPNW and promote its universalisation.
A number of ICAN partner organisations are represented at the meeting, and ICAN campaigners have been delivering presentations about the TPNW’s status, and campaign activities throughout Africa, as well as engaging with representatives of the countries that have yet to sign the treaty to make it a priority.
7pm Central Time (8pm ET, 6pm MT, 5pm PT) UTC – 5 From NRC & DOE Deregulation to Techno-Fascist Billionaires Going Nuclear, Plus a Few Songs from Atomic Cabaret REGISTER
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