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Walt Zlotow – Democrats, not Trump, betraying Ukraine by promoting endless war destroying Ukraine

Walt Zlotow, Walt Zlotow  West Suburban Peace Coalition  Glen Ellyn IL, 19 Oct 26

Democratic office holders and candidates are pounding the campaign trail and haunting mainstream media with their hair on fire over Trump’s easing of sanctions on Russia to scoop up Russian diesel to drop US diesel under $6 a gallon ahead of the election.

“Trump just gave Putin the best birthday gift he’ll get this year. By giving the Russian economy life support, Trump’s deal with the devil keeps getting dirtier.

“There’s nothing America First about Trump caving to Putin and exempting Russia from US sanctions.”

Democrats are unanimous in support of continuing the war in Ukraine in furtherance of retaking control of Congress November 3. Once back in power, Democrats will likely rejoin NATO in ramping up sanctions and weapons deliveries targeting of Russian assets none of which will save Ukraine from being utterly destroyed by overwhelming Russian military and economic might. But Democrats will not offer one drop of US blood to save Ukraine from impending defeat. For Democrats it’s all bluster and virtue signaling.

An unintended consequence is that it could make general war between Russia and the West break out that could easily go nuclear. European NATO nations are already at war with Russia by supplying missiles, logistics, targeting and intelligence inflicting significant tho non strategic damage to Russian resources. Even the US CIA continues to provide targeting assistance in spite of Trump’s directive to cease and desist. The US deep state simply cannot be controlled by Trump.

Russia ignores the West’s war on them to concentrate on completing Ukraine’s collapse. However, If Democrats follow thru on their deranged promise to reengage in the lost Ukraine war provoked by Demorcrat Biden in 2022, all out nuclear war becomes increasingly likely.

President Trump in is no friend of peace. He’s killed many thousands in criminal warfare in Somalia, Syria, Nigeria, Iraq, Yemen, Afghanistan, Libya, Pakistan, and most recently, his catastrophically lost war against Iran he cannot quit. He’s taken ghoulish delight like a kid in a shooting gallery blasting little unarmed boats in the Caribbean and Eastern Pacific to smithereens, killing hundreds. But he has little interest in further destroying Ukraine to satisfy the bloodlust of US and NATO Russophobes.

For some inexplicable, bizarre reason, Democrats have not learned that sensible lesson.

October 26, 2026 Posted by | politics, Ukraine, USA | Leave a comment

AI firms say UK has a year to head off datacentre protests before construction is threatened.

Opposition to datacentre construction is being fuelled by widening public concern about the safety of AI systems, after a summer in which some of the largest companies, including OpenAI, Anthropic and Google appeared to lose control of some of their most cutting-edge AIs. Some protesters have begun resorting to direct action and the membership of anti-AI campaign groups has been growing rapidly.00


Robert Booth, 22 October26, https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2026/oct/22/ai-firms-say-uk-has-a-year-to-head-off-datacentre-protests-before-construction-is-threatened

Nvidia, Microsoft and Cisco taskforce urges ministers to offer areas greater benefits from tech infrastructure amid fears of US-style opposition

AI companies have told ministers they have 12 months to head off public opposition to datacentres in the UK or risk US-style protests that could threaten their construction.

Successive dry summers and rising energy bills are increasing public scrutiny of plans for the huge computer warehouses that are used to train and run AI models, says a submission to the Labour government from a group including the AI infrastructure companies Nvidia, Microsoft and Cisco.

Amid increasing anti-datacentre activism in the US and Europe, they are calling on ministers to create a “compact” that would show how communities can benefit from hosting datacentres, including allowing councils that host them to retain more tax revenues.

The move by the Sovereign AI Leadership (SAIL) taskforce reflects rising concern among tech companies that arguments that have blocked datacentre developments in parts of the US are taking hold in Britain. Microsoft has promised to invest $30bn (£22bn) in UK AI infrastructure.

Microsoft has built a datacentre in Acton, London and another is under construction in Newport, but wants to build several more facilities and is engaging with local and national leaders, including the prime minister, Andy Burnham, over the balance between the potential benefit of AI to the economy and public opposition to datacentres.

The SAIL group said: “In the United States, organised local opposition has stopped fully permitted datacentre projects, and moratoriums have been announced even in states that are otherwise pro-growth.

“Reporting from those places shows that AI itself is only a surface-level concern; distrust of corporate and government promises, fear of stranded assets and electricity costs run deeper. The same arguments have begun to appear here.”

It added: “Britain has a window – we think of roughly 12 months – to build a compact that earns public consent before that pattern takes hold.”

The taskforce is calling for the government to create a clear framework for councils and mayors to follow that will set out recommended terms for local benefit, including an indicative contribution – likely to be financial or in terms of facilities – scaled to a site’s size..

Opposition to datacentre construction is being fuelled by widening public concern about the safety of AI systems, after a summer in which some of the largest companies, including OpenAI, Anthropic and Google appeared to lose control of some of their most cutting-edge AIs. Some protesters have begun resorting to direct action and the membership of anti-AI campaign groups has been growing rapidly.

The datacentre companies are determined to head off that opposition. The chair of the SAIL taskforce, Steve Rigby, said: “By establishing a clear prosperity compact between government, industry and local communities, we can build the infrastructure we need, equip our workforce with future-ready skills, and ensure Britain’s digital destiny. This taskforce’s goal isn’t another strategy document, but high-impact actions that materially accelerate the UK’s transition to an AI-enabled economy.”

It has not calculated the cost to central government finances if councils that grant permission to datacentres are allowed to keep all of their business rates.

Responding to the proposals, Joseph Miller, the director of PauseAI UK, which campaigns for a global pause to datacentre buildout, said: “People are going to feel it is undignified to be bought off by huge tech companies who do not share their interests.”

He said tech companies were “absolutely right to be worried” about US-style public opposition to datacentres growing in the UK. Kat Jones, the director of Action to Protect Rural Scotland, which campaigns against datacentres, said tech companies had already “missed the boat on containing community opposition to hyperscale AI datacentres”.

“In Scotland, we have 15 community campaigns already working incredibly hard opposing these environmentally destructive developments locally, and a growing national campaign,” she said. “Even the titanic lobbying efforts of US big tech are going to find it a real challenge to change the winds of public opinion, which have already shifted solidly against hyperscale AI datacentres.”

Donald Campbell, the director of advocacy at the tech equity campaign Foxglove, said: “Big tech firms have spent years trying to force vast, highly polluting datacentres through the planning system under a blanket of secrecy and misleading information. Now, with the public waking up to the fact that these facilities plunder resources and wreck the climate, the US tech giants have decided that there’s a problem.”

He warned that incentivising councils to back datacentres by allowing them to keep more of their business rate revenue would mean “these wealthy tech giants would not pay a penny more” while boosts to council funding would “come from the pocket of central government services like the NHS”.

A government spokesperson said datacentres “should create British jobs and supply chains, and provide investment to the communities in which they are built, as well as prioritising clean power, using water responsibly”.

“For most proposed datacentre developments, community benefits are considered through the relevant local planning processes,” they said. “We have already announced measures which will enable local authorities hosting datacentres in AI growth zones in England to keep all the additional business rates they generate.”

October 26, 2026 Posted by | technology, UK | Leave a comment

Calder Hall at 70 – the sickening hype from the Nuclear Industry belies the Reality

By mariannewildart, https://lakesagainstnucleardump.com/2026/10/22/calder-hall-at-70-the-sickening-hype-from-the-nuclear-industry-belies-the-reality/

In all the media regurgitation of Sellafield’s triumphant press releases about “Calder Hall at 70” featuring the young Queen Elizabeth pressing the button to turn the reactors into nuclear waste, there is no mention that Calder Hall was built to provide plutonium for bombs. As the Tribune points out in 1982:

“WHEN the Queen opened Britain’s first nuclear reactor, Calder Hall, on October 17,1956, she said: “It may well prove to have been among the greatest of our contributions to human welfare that we led the way in demonstrating the peaceful uses of this new source of power.” But Calder Hall had nothing to do with either human welfare or with peace – its purpose was to produce plutonium for the manufacture of nuclear weapons. The hypocrisy of the British Establishment knew no bounds and the public was duped. Newsreels proclaimed an era of nuclear-generated electricity that would be cheap and clean and would bring prosperity to Britain. It was only in later years that the nuclear industry began to concede that Calder Hall was not what it had been made to seem. As the General Manager of Windscale, Calder Hall and Chapelcross admitted ten years later: “The primary function of the reactors at Calder Hall was to produce plutonium for the military programme and the design was optimised for this purpose.”

Another feature of Calder Hall is its name. Named after the beautiful Lakeland stone and slate farm the government compulsory purchased to provide land for the bomb making enterprise, along with a whole host of other Lakeland farms now gobbled up by the nuclear industry and either used as offices or demolished.

The nuclear industry vies with Beatrix Potter in its purchase of Lake District farms. Potter purchased around 16 farms, and the nuclear industry has purchased at least 11 that we know of in the West Cumbria area alone. Many of these have been demolished.

  • Calder Hall Farm, Seascale
  • Fleming Hall Farm, Seascale
  • Seascale Hall Farm, Seascale
  • Longlands Farmhouse and cottage, Gosforth
  • Town End Farm, Gosforth
  • High Ling Bank Farm, Ponsonby, Gosforth
  • Calder Town End Farm, Seascale
  • Greenmoorside Farm
  • Mid Tarn Farm
  • Tarn Head Farm
  • Yottenfews Farm House (now a corporate office for Sellafield)

The only difference between Beatrix Potter’s farm purchases and the nuclear industry’s purchases of Lake District farms is intention.

Beatrix Potter, best known as the author-illustrator of “The Tale of Peter Rabbit“, supported the efforts of the National Trust to preserve not just the places of extraordinary beauty but also those heads of valleys and low grazing lands that would be irreparably ruined by development… She left nearly all her property to the National Trust, including over 4,000 acres (16 km2) of land, sixteen farms, cottages and herds of cattle and Herdwick sheep. Hers was the largest gift at that time to the National Trust, and it enabled the preservation of the land now included in the Lake District National Park and the continuation of fell farming.

A friend of Beatrix Potter, the sculptor Josefina Vasconcellos who arrived in Cumbria in the 1930s remarked: “When I first came to the Lake District whenever John or I walked there were birds but since the atomic station came there have been less and less and less, they almost died out.” The atomic (nuclear power) station to which she refers is Windscale, which opened in 1950 and Calder Hall. The site was renamed Sellafield.

Nuclear power produces enormous amounts of waste heat. This requires lots of water for cooling. During this cooling process, Nuclear Power Plants are also legally allowed to discharge long-lived, lethal, radioactive materials into the air and water, along with heat.

Water from Wastwater lake is pumped to Sellafield nuclear waste site as a fresh water supply. The NDA (Nuclear Decommissioning Authority) has taken over the licence once held by BNFL (British Nuclear Fuels plc) which allows them to extract a maximum of 18,184.4 m³ a day (over 4 million gallons) and 6,637,306 m³ a year from Wastwater to use on site for various processes.” This is still not enough so an equivalent amount of water is also taken from rivers and boreholes to cool the heels of the nuclear industry. It was farmers in Wasdale and Ennerdale who stopped the nuclear industry taking even more of the Lake District’s top quality water, however the industry still has first dibs on our fresh water.

It is well known that Ruskin, Beatrix Potter and Wordsworth are Lake District icons. Not one of these icons would have separated the West Coast of Cumbria from the Lake District as we have been taught to do in the nuclear age.

The Lake District National Park is an artificial construct which does itself or us no favours in its readiness to publicly disown West Cumbria rather than publicly oppose the diabolic nuclear developments in the Lake District.

This is what the Lake District National Park Authority said said in 2012 about the plan for a geological dump for heat generating nuclear waste:

“It remains a concern that significant media interest highlights the potential location of the geological disposal facility in the ‘Lake District’ rather than ‘West Cumbria.”

Roll on to 2026 and the Chair of the plan for the nuclear waste dump in the Lake District, aka GDF (Geological Disposal Facility) in South and Mid Copeland is Andy Pratt. Andy Pratt is also the Lake District National Park’s “Member of Development Control Committee and the Strategy meeting.” No conflict of interest there then?!

The Lake District National Park Authority’s insistence that ‘West Cumbria’ is an entirely different geographical area to the ‘Lake District’ is an entirely artificial construct which has come about as a direct result of the ruinous nuclear industry.

When the Lake Counties included Cumberland, Westmorland and part of Lancashire there was none of today’s parochialism and narrow mindedness about what constituted the Lake District.

Today the plan for the “Biggest Nuclear Development in Europe” is promoted as if in an isolated industrial “West Cumbrian” bubble, despite being only 20 miles from Keswick and 25 miles from Ambleside as the crow flies.

Where are the protectors of the Lake District?”

Conservation in the Lake District is now focussed on rewilding but far from the fells being covered in trees the pre-Neolithic landscape would have been a relatively open park-like mosaic rather than closed forest.

It is a very safe bet that there are far fewer of Beatrix Potter’s beloved Herdwick on the Lakeland fells now than there were when she was the Ennerdale Show President in the 1930’s.

It is also very safe to say that the wildlife of the Fells was far more abundant in Beatrix Potters hayday. Research into the ‘brand’ of Cumbria has shown that farming and tourism are the two industries most damaged by nuclear developments.

Undermining farming and tourism would leave the field wide open for the nuclear industry to achieve its ambition of new build and burying heat generating nuclear waste under Cumbria.

Back to the friend of Beatrix Potter, the sculptress Josefina de Vasconcellos who arrived in Cumbria in the 1930s:


“When I first came to the Lake District whenever John or I walked there were birds but since the atomic station came there have been less and less and less, they almost died out”.

Josefina’s observations are backed up by science. Lancaster University has been studying the effects of chronic long-term radiation on animals. This includes: “Severe effect on reproduction hatching and abnormal larvae (fish).”

These test studies are backed up by findings in the real world. Many universities worldwide have been studying evidence from nuclear accidents:


“Low-dose radiation has been known to have negative consequences for living beings for almost 100 years. Indeed, background radiation causes the death of tens of thousands of humans annually. These ‘natural’ effects may be exacerbated by the 23 nuclear accidents recorded during the last century”.

Radiation Free Lakeland believe Sellafield to be the equivalent of an ongoing accident with routine releases of radiation to sea, air and groundwaters.

Beatrix Potter left a vast area of Cumbria to the National Trust to be farmed with the express wish of keeping Herdwicks on the land. Her life’s work was to retain the delicate balance created by the domestic and wild community that share and maintain the Lake District.

Nuclear is needed in that living landscape like a hole in the head.

The hype surrounding “Calder Hall at 70” is nuclear propaganda while the reality of at least a dozen Lake District farms bought up abandoned and demolished by the industry are the warning we should all heed.

October 26, 2026 Posted by | spinbuster, UK | Leave a comment

Scottish Greens co-leader issues warning ahead of nuclear vote

A SCOTTISH Greens co-leader has said she firmly opposes a key party motion which
would, if passed, change party policy to support new nuclear power in
Scotland.

Scottish Greens members are set to debate the controversial
motion at their party conference in Inverness this weekend. It comes after
the Green Party of England and Wales (GPEW) – which is separate from the
Scottish Greens – voted to drop their opposition to nuclear power.

The Scots motion supports the construction of nuclear plants in Scotland on the
condition that certain criteria are met, such as being “passively safe and
do not produce large quantities of nuclear waste”.

Speaking to The National
ahead of the party’s conference, co-leader Gillian Mackay said she would be
surprised if the motion passed a members’ vote. “It’s up to my members as
to whether it’ll pass or not. I certainly don’t think it should,” she said.
She added: “[Nuclear power] is hugely expensive, takes an age to build,
it’s not clean energy like renewables, there’s waste to be disposed of. “We
see here in the Highlands with Dounreay actually how long it takes to
decommission these plants as well, it’s the full life cycle of it.” “So
certainly, I won’t be supporting it,” she went on. “I’d be surprised if
members did vote for it, in all honesty.”

The National 24th Oct 2026,

https://www.thenational.scot/news/26665218.scottish-greens-co-leader-says-party-keep-anti-nuclear-stance/

October 26, 2026 Posted by | politics, UK | Leave a comment

EU summit in Brussels: European powers intensify war drive against Russia

Ever more billions for war

Zelensky put Ukraine’s war costs for 2027 at €155 billion and demanded at least €70 billion in additional European support. With this money, Ukraine could produce two to three times as many drones and massively increase military pressure on Russia. The EU has already set in motion a €90 billion loan for 2026 and 2027. No decision was reached in Brussels on the new demands for billions; the Commission has been tasked with developing financing options.

Johannes Stern@JSternWSWS16 October 2026, https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/10/17/gbsa-o17.html

The EU summit held on Thursday and Friday in Brussels was an expression of the dangerous escalation of the international war crisis. While the Trump administration, amid its conflict with the European powers, is seeking at least for the moment a certain accommodation with Russia, the EU governments, led by Berlin, are pressing for the continuation and expansion of the Ukraine war. They want to shoulder an increasing share of the financial and military burdens themselves and build Europe into an independent military power.

This is accompanied by an escalation that threatens to provoke a direct war between NATO and Russia, including nuclear war. At the same time, the summit discussions on rearmament, “competitiveness,” trade war and migration underscore that the war drive abroad is inseparably linked to intensified social attacks and authoritarian measures at home.

Conflicts between Washington and Europe

At the center of the summit was the demonstrative support for Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. Following an agreement with Putin on Russian diesel supplies, Trump had eased sanctions and criticized Ukrainian attacks on Russian oil refineries. He also demanded a change in Ukraine’s leadership. The European governments, by contrast, are determined to continue attacks on Russia’s energy infrastructure and tighten sanctions.

European Council President António Costa declared on Friday, standing alongside Zelensky: “Now is not the time to withdraw support for Ukraine. Now is not the time to ease sanctions against Russia.” Instead, the EU must increase its support and pressure on Russia. European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announced preparations for a 22nd package of sanctions.

The German government is taking a particularly aggressive stance. Chancellor Friedrich Merz declared that the EU must “once again … increase” its funding for Kiev in order to “provide lasting support” to Ukraine. This was necessary, he said, to defend “the political order of Europe.” The conflict with Washington now also concerns control over approximately €210 billion in frozen Russian central bank assets in Europe. According to reports, US negotiators want to use part of these assets in negotiations with Moscow. Merz brusquely rejected this: “That is our affair, and we will decide on it.”

Behind these differences lie rival geostrategic and economic interests. The European powers fear that Trump could conclude an agreement with Putin that would undermine their own war aims and influence in Eastern Europe. At the same time, Ukraine’s war effort remains dependent on American military technology and intelligence support. Reports of restrictions on the satellite-based Starshield system demonstrate this dependence particularly starkly.

Ever more billions for war

Zelensky put Ukraine’s war costs for 2027 at €155 billion and demanded at least €70 billion in additional European support. With this money, Ukraine could produce two to three times as many drones and massively increase military pressure on Russia. The EU has already set in motion a €90 billion loan for 2026 and 2027. No decision was reached in Brussels on the new demands for billions; the Commission has been tasked with developing financing options.

The scale of the sums already mobilized is enormous. According to a study by the Kiel Institute for the World Economy, the German government puts its Ukraine support to date, including commitments, at around €100 billion. Approximately €41.7 billion is recorded as direct aid to Ukraine, while another €22 billion consists of future military commitments and possible expenditures. Together, this amounts to €63.7 billion, of which approximately €56.3 billion is military aid. In addition, €35.9 billion has been spent predominantly on Ukrainian refugees in Germany. Not all of the budgeted funds recorded have yet been disbursed.

The political thrust of the Kiel study is revealing. Under a headline emphasizing that “only” €41.7 billion actually went to Ukraine, it stresses that spending on refugees does “not support the Ukrainian government in its defense.” This juxtaposition alone makes the political orientation clear: While support for refugees and other social expenditures face growing pressure for cuts, ever larger sums are to be mobilized for the war effort. Added to this are hundreds of billions more that are to flow into military budgets in the coming years.

Concrete preparations for a NATO-Russia war

Parallel to the summit, the military confrontation is intensifying. NATO Supreme Allied Commander Europe Alexus Grynkewich presented his “Theory of Victory” in Warsaw: “Block, Blunt, Break.” A potential attack is first to be repelled, then the opposing armed forces smashed, and finally the command, supply and production structures supporting them disabled. Grynkewich describes the strategy as defensive, but in a major war the planned operations could extend deep into Russian territory. He praised Germany as the “engine of NATO.”

At the same time, NATO conducted the nuclear war exercise “Steadfast Noon” in Italy this week, involving 17 countries, including German Tornado fighter jets. NATO describes it as a routine exercise without live nuclear weapons. Yet it rehearsed procedures for nuclear operations at a time when the risks of escalation are rapidly increasing.

Russia is responding to NATO’s constant provocations with nuclear threats. In early October, Putin warned that Russia could use its entire arsenal in the event of a blockade of Kaliningrad. Now, State Duma Deputy Alexei Zhuravlyov has told Lenta.ru that, in the event of a NATO attack, Russian nuclear strikes could target NATO headquarters, as well as US nuclear weapons bases in Germany, Belgium, Italy and Turkey. Zhuravlyov’s threat is not an official government statement. His remarks nevertheless demonstrate how concretely sections of the Russian establishment are discussing nuclear war in Europe.

Russian military commentators warn that NATO’s strategy could serve as a cover for “preemptive” strikes. They draw parallels to Hitler’s war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, which Nazi propaganda likewise justified as “defense” against an allegedly planned Soviet attack.

Regardless of NATO’s specific timetable for war, the mutual threats already demonstrate that an escalation could rapidly spiral out of control. In the Black Sea, Romania and Bulgaria are demanding additional NATO measures against Russia following drone attacks on merchant ships.

These sums have immediate social consequences. While debt rules are relaxed for rearmament, European governments are organizing historic cuts to social benefits and public services. Under the slogan of “competitiveness,” the EU summit adopted measures for deregulation, accelerated approval procedures and further economic restructuring. Jobs are being eliminated on a massive scale, wages cut and working conditions worsened.

The EU also wants to create new trade policy instruments to take tougher action, particularly against China. Merz stated that the Commission had been given a mandate to this end. Von der Leyen announced additional import restrictions.

Rearmament and social devastation

The migration debate at the summit also revealed its reactionary direction. Italy, Denmark and Poland attacked Spain’s planned legalization of the residence status of around 600,000 migrants. Discussions included tightening detention provisions in border procedures and suspending asylum applications in times of crisis. In the Middle East, against the backdrop of the US-Israeli war of aggression against Iran, the summit focused above all on securing trade and energy routes.

As the EU advances its global war offensive and reactionary domestic agenda, tensions among the European imperialist powers are growing. The dispute over the next EU budget for 2028 to 2034 exposed these rivalries. Net contributors, such as Sweden, are refusing the higher contributions being demanded, while the EU seeks to mobilize additional funds for strategic and military projects. No agreement has yet been reached.

The extreme escalation of war is also a response to growing social and political opposition in Europe. In France, Spain and other countries, mass protests and strikes are developing against social cuts, militarism and authoritarian measures. Confronted with the deep crisis of the established parties, the ruling classes are attempting to divert this opposition outward through war propaganda and nationalism and force the population to rally behind their war policies.

But this course will only further intensify social antagonisms. The gigantic military expenditures, the destruction of jobs and social benefits, and the increasing attacks on democratic rights will not extinguish the resistance of the working class and youth but further fuel it. At the same time, the escalating confrontation with Russia threatens to plunge all of Europe into a nuclear world war.

Europe’s response to the war and the crisis of its alliance with Washington is a gigantic rearmament program. “ReArm Europe” is intended to make possible up to €800 billion in additional defense spending by 2030, while the SAFE program provides €150 billion in loans. In Germany, defense spending is to rise to approximately €140 billion in 2027—and to well over €200 billion in 2029. The German government wants to build the Bundeswehr into Europe’s strongest conventional army.

The decisive task is to arm the growing opposition with an independent socialist perspective. The working class must organize independently of the established parties and unite its struggles across all national borders against capitalism, militarism and war. The nationalist and militarist project of the European governments must be opposed with the struggle for the United Socialist States of Europe.

October 26, 2026 Posted by | EUROPE, politics international | Leave a comment

Campaigners warn Welsh island could be target in nuclear attack amid fears of ‘no safe evacuation’

22 Oct 2026, Dale Spridgeon, Local Democracy Reporter, Nation CYMRU

.

The campaign group raised its concerns in an open letter to the Secretary of State for the Department for Energy Security and Net Zero (DESNZ), Miatta Fahnbulleh MP.

Wylfa was selected by the UK Government in April and the nuclear project is being led by Great British Energy – Nuclear (GBE-N) and Rolls-Royce SMR in a £2.5 billion partnership

It’s expected to create 8,000 jobs across the UK, including 3,000 in North Wales.

DESNZ has stated the “highest standards” of safety and security surround the UK’s nuclear sites.

GBN-E said it “recognised” that the people of Ynys Môn had questions about the plans and “looked forward to discussing them openly and constructively.”

But the promises of new jobs and safety assurances have not reassured the anti-nuclear campaigners who have expressed their “deep concerns”.

Increasing threats

In their letter to Ms Fahnbulleh, they said: “Increasing threats of war mean that we will be targets for attack. Russia and Iran have both threatened us due to our interventions in Ukraine and the use of British bases for the bombing of Iran. Nuclear power stations are now regular targets for attack.

“How are we to be protected? How are we to get off the island in the event of an attack or nuclear accident?

“There are two bridges connecting us to the mainland, and even if there were three, there would be no safe evacuation possible, without the danger of accidents.

“RAF Valley is also on the island, making us a further target.”

They also believe that waste produced by the possible new nuclear reactors will also “serve as an ongoing target and risk” and would “remain on-site for at least 100 years, being too hot to remove”.

“Our future generations will be responsible for this; not a legacy we want to bequeath.”

They dispute claims “electricity generated at Wylfa would go to homes” adding: “how are we to know the end use of the electricity to be generated by these nuclear reactors.”

They also believe droughts and wildfires “have threatened the safety” of nuclear plants all over the world including at Sizewell B, this year.

“We implore you to reconsider pouring more money into these nuclear reactors, yet to receive the Generic Development Consent order, and instead concentrate our resources to upgrading the grid, as you propose, and using our excellent renewable energy sources.”…………………. https://nation.cymru/news/campaigners-warn-welsh-island-could-be-target-in-nuclear-attack-amid-fears-of-no-safe-evacuation/

October 26, 2026 Posted by | opposition to nuclear, UK | Leave a comment

Walt Zlotow – Thank you Mr. President for stopping the flow of most US treasure to the Ukraine proxy war


Walt Zlotow West Suburban Peace Coalition Glen Ellyn IL – 23 Oct 26

Former President Biden squandered upwards of $175 billion in direct and indirect aid to Ukraine in America’s senseless proxy war to weaken, destroy Russia.

Back in November, 2021, Russian President Putin reached out to President Biden one last time to avert military action against Ukraine massing troops to finish off Ukrainian Donbas separatists seeking autonomy and peace from their Kyiv masters. Included was Russia’s security demand that Ukraine not join NATO, a Russian red line it had been warning the US not to cross since America’s 2008 NATO membership pledge to Ukraine.

Biden’s response? Russia’s security concerns regarding Ukraine NATO membership and Donbas autonomy were not even on the agenda. Biden knew that meant Russia would launch an invasion which occurred 3 months later. He cared not one whit how many would die, believing that Russia would self destruct from US aid to Ukraine like Russia did in Afghanistan between 1979 to 1989.

Biden left office 3 years later with Ukraine in ruins with no chance of prevailing, Russia stronger than ever, and $175 billion of precious US treasure squandered on death and destruction in furtherance of America pretending it still ruled Europe, indeed the world.

Trump began his second term boasting he’d end the war on Day One. Six hundred forty days in, Trump still flails around seeking an end to Biden’s insane Ukraine proxy war so he can concentrate on polishing off Iran to please his Israeli masters.

But thankfully, he has largely cut off squandering endless tens of billions for the lost cause of defeating Russia to please the Russophobes that infest both the Republican and Democratic Parties, the military, the CIA; virtually the entire national security state. They are all supported by mainstream media which totally censures any pushback to the madness of continued war in Ukraine till the last Ukrainian soldier is dead.

There are many reasons to revile President Trump. But his cutting off squandering our precious treasure to continue the destruction of Ukraine in order to weaken, destroy Russia is not one of them.

October 26, 2026 Posted by | business and costs, politics international, Ukraine, USA | Leave a comment

Jeffrey Sachs – A Framework for Peace in Ukraine

This proposed settlement—designed to help end a conflict that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and carries a continuing risk of confrontation—addresses the causes of the war rather than only its symptoms.

The trouble is – this would be difficult, tricky, time-consuming, to bring about. Just keeping on killing is so much quicker and easier – and indeed, fun, using all the newest toys. Negotiation is so boring – and old-fashioned stuff.


Jeffrey D. Sachs, Oct 20, 2026, https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/framework-for-peace-in-ukraine

The war in Ukraine can be ended permanently on terms that protect Ukraine’s statehood, meet Russia’s security concerns, and lay the foundation for a durable European security order. As another round of negotiations gears up in Norway, I propose a settlement concluded as a single package, signed by Ukraine and Russia, adopted by a vote of the United Nations Security Council under Chapter VII of the Charter, and guaranteed jointly by the five permanent members of the Council together with other states that choose to join. The proposal rests on the principle of indivisible security set out in the Helsinki Final Act and the Charter of Paris.

The package would have four core commitments.

The first is Ukraine’s permanent neutrality, adopted in a constitutional law on the model of Austria’s law of 1955, which would return Ukraine to the founding choice of its Declaration of State Sovereignty of 1990. Ukraine would join no military alliance and host no foreign bases or forces, whether of NATO, the European Union, their member states, or Russia. Neutrality would not mean disarmament, and Ukraine would retain armed forces for its own defense.

The second is that Ukraine would pursue its candidacy for membership in the European Union as a permanently neutral state, with a neutrality protocol in its accession treaty on the model of Ireland’s, and Russia would affirm that Ukraine’s membership in the EU is consistent with Russia’s security.

The third is an armistice line drawn along the line of contact on the date of signature. Each side would exercise de facto jurisdiction on its side of the line, neither would recognize the other’s territorial claims, and both would renounce force in any future adjustment. This formula is compatible with both countries’ constitutions, which bar or severely restrict the cession of territory.1

The fourth is the end of NATO enlargement eastward. At signature the North Atlantic Council would declare that NATO will not admit Ukraine or other new members in Eastern Europe or the South Caucasus, withdrawing the Bucharest pledge of 2008.

The settlement would take effect as a permanent end of hostilities on signature, not as a temporary ceasefire, and its provisions would be implemented in stages under international verification. No element would be negotiated in isolation, and no party would be asked to make a concession in advance of signature.

The territorial arrangements are designed to address the concerns and claims of both sides. Ukrainian forces would withdraw from the part of Donetsk region that Ukraine now controls, which would become a demilitarized special zone. Russian forces would not enter it, the existing local civil administration would continue to function, and its final status would be left to negotiation. Russia would withdraw from the areas it holds in Dnipropetrovsk region and from the Kinburn Spit. A Northern Security Zone would be demilitarized on both sides of the Russian-Ukrainian border, and Russian forces would leave the areas they hold in Kharkiv and Sumy regions as Ukrainian forces withdraw from their side. The Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant would remain under Russian control with IAEA safety oversight and would sell an agreed share of its electricity to Ukraine at cost.

A demilitarized belt would run along both sides of the armistice line, with heavy weapons and long-range strike systems withdrawn to agreed distances, and mutual ceilings on forces would apply in the border regions on both sides. In the Black Sea and the Sea of Azov, commercial navigation would be free for all Ukrainian and Russian ports, and attacks on shipping and ports would be prohibited.

The settlement in Ukraine should also begin the repair of European security as a whole. NATO and Russia would agree on a moratorium on ground-launched intermediate-range missiles in Europe, refrain from deploying nuclear weapons in any additional state, and restore the NATO-Russia Council. Normal diplomatic relations would be restored on both sides. The parties would convene the first summit of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe since 2010 to entrust the OSCE with monitoring the settlement, verifying arms limits, and overseeing the provisions on rights.

Questions of language, education, culture, and religion would be resolved according to European standards, with the Russian language treated on the same basis as Ukraine’s other minority languages, and Russia would accept the same obligations toward Ukrainian speakers and religious communities on its side of the line. All obligations concerning extremism and incitement would be mutual and monitored by the OSCE. Prisoners of war would be exchanged on an all-for-all basis, detained civilians released, and separated children reunited with their families.

Sanctions would be lifted during 2027. Russia’s immobilized sovereign assets would also be released, and private property seized or immobilized on both sides would be restored. An international reconstruction fund administered by the European Investment Bank would finance reconstruction on both sides of the line, with contributions from all parties, Russia included, in a common effort rather than as reparations. Gas transit through Ukraine could resume wherever there are willing buyers, without any commitment by the European Union to purchase Russian gas.

A report of serious violation by an OSCE monitoring mission of unarmed observers from states outside NATO would trigger consultations among the guarantors and referral to the Security Council. Ukraine would lift martial law and hold elections under OSCE observation, and the newly elected Verkhovna Rada would ratify the settlement and adopt the constitutional law on neutrality, while the Russian Federal Assembly would ratify it at the same stage.

This proposed settlement addresses the causes of the war rather than only its symptoms. Europe has been largely absent from the design of the peace. By putting forward such a framework, European governments can take the lead in building Europe’s indivisible security and help end a war that has cost hundreds of thousands of lives and carries a continuing risk of confrontation between nuclear powers.

October 25, 2026 Posted by | politics international, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Work begins in UK for arming new nuclear submarines at £7.75bn each

Work begins on Coulport building for Dreadnought submarines, 19th October, By Donald Erskine

WORK has started on a building which will arm the Royal Navy’s new multi-billion-pound nuclear submarines.

Naval Base Commander Clyde Commodore Andy Bray recently broke ground on a new facility at Royal Naval Armament Depot (RNAD) Coulport to support future classes of submarines.

Building 300 at the site will house the Vertical Embarkation System, or VES, a new facility used to load tactical weapons onto future Dreadnought-class deterrent submarines.

The House of Commons approved replacing the current submarines in 2016, despite opposition from anti-nuclear groups and campaigners concerned about the cost.

Built at a cost of £7.75bn per unit, four Dreadnought submarines will replace the current Vanguard ships, which constantly patrol the seas carrying ballistic missiles equipped with thermonuclear warheads.

The Trident system is designed to act as a deterrent to other nations with nuclear capability, as a first strike on the UK would not eliminate the ability to strike back, given some of the country’s weapons are continuously at sea.

The building is designed to receive, store, assemble, and maintain Spearfish torpedoes, the Royal Navy’s primary underwater weapon for both anti-submarine warfare and anti-surface warfare. The VES will also be used to train personnel to handle the weapons…………………………………………………
https://www.helensburghadvertiser.co.uk/news/26648451.work-begins-coulport-building-dreadnought-submarines/

October 25, 2026 Posted by | UK, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Why trade is vital to understanding how Ukraine needs western capital to stay afloat and how Russia can pay for its war effort without new debt

Four graphs [on original]that tell a bigger story

Ian Proud, The Peacemonger, Oct 20, 2026

I have wanted to write an article for sometime about the differing fates of Russia and Ukraine since the onset of the conflict in 2014. The headline is that Ukraine has never made up the difference in increased trade with Europe having cut its trade with Russia to the bone since 2014. This has inadvertently meant that Europe has had to inject significant sums of capital into Ukraine just to prevent its currency from collapsing as the war has gone on. Russia has diversified its trade away from Europe such that its export model is as strong today as it was in 2014, giving it the liquidity it needs to underwrite the war effort.

Key finding:


  • Ukraine exported 24% less and imported 46% more in 2025 than in 2014. The war has driven up imports while exports never recovered from the signing of the DCFTA and have been hampered by the war effort.
  • The yawning trade deficit Ukraine has built since the war started has placed greater strain on European sponsors to provide the capital Ukraine needs to prevent its currency collapsing, in addition to providing funding to meet its fiscal requirements.
  • This funding challenge for Europe will persist after the war ends until Ukraine can become self-sufficient in boosting exports and/or attracting sufficient foreign investment to offset its trade deficits.
  • Russia’s export strength and consistent surpluses have been unaffected by war. After the Ukraine crisis started, Russia started to diversify its major energy exports away from Europe, allowing it to weather the progressive reduction of exports to Europe. Indeed, Russia gained a huge windfall in 2022 from surging energy prices. There is no evidence that sanctions have impacted Russia’s export model in a significant way.
  • Russia has already started to reaccumulate FX reserves after the oil price collapse of late 2014, until before the war started. Following the immobilisation of $300bn in Russian FX reserves, Russia started to accumulate reserves in monetary gold, to sanction-proof future earnings. Russia now has liquid reserves of over $420bn meaning the immobilisation of its foreign currency reserves is no longer an economically limiting factor.

Detailed analysis

Russia’s export model in which it runs consistently large trade surpluses has ensured it can generate the reserves of foreign currency and gold which have undoubtedly helped to bankroll the war in Ukraine. Ukraine’s trade deficit has yawned since the war started, requiring continual injections of European capital to prevent its currency from collapsing.

This helps to explain by Russia can sustain the war for longer; it doesn’t need to take on significant new debt, its debt remaining low at 20%. Ukraine can only fund the war and keep its national accounts in balance with European money that cannot be guaranteed long-term and which, in any case, has increased Ukrainian debt by an average of 20% of GDP each year since the war started. This is not sustainable.

The Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement of 2014 has disadvantaged Ukraine because it forced a choice away from trading with Russia.………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

by encouraging Ukraine to trade with Europe and not with Russia, Europe has imposed a deadweight economic loss on Ukraine which took a sovereign decision to forgo a previously profitable trade relationship, to pursue a political goal of EU integration……………………………………………………………………………..

Dragged into a persistent and growth trade deficit by war, Ukraine needs continued injections of foreign funds to prevent its currency collapsing.…………………………………………………………………………………………………..

………………………………………………… While Russia would undoubtedly like to see the return of its immobilised assets after the war ends (big question mark) it has nevertheless built up a significant financial buffer to the tune of over $420bn in reserve assets in addition to those assets that remain frozen.

This deep well of reserves undoubtedly helps to underwrite Russia’s war effort without the need for significant borrowing. Russia’s debt today sits at around 20% of GDP.

In 2021 Ukraine’s debt sat at around 49% of GDP. Today it sits at around 110% of GDP……………………………………………… https://thepeacemonger.substack.com/p/why-trade-is-vital-to-understanding?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=3221990&post_id=221204744&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email

October 25, 2026 Posted by | business and costs, Russia, Ukraine | Leave a comment

Ukraine’s Black Sea escalation threatens global trade, with risks of spiralling

Ukraine’s expanding Black Sea attacks are disrupting shipping, raising insurance costs, and threatening global food and energy trade. As “wild-card” Zelensky raises the stakes (angering the US), the risk of a wider confrontation grows.

Friday, October 16, 2026, https://infobrics.org/en/post/103298

Uriel Araujo, Anthropology PhD, is a social scientist specializing in ethnic and religious conflicts, with extensive research on geopolitical dynamics and cultural interactions.

Black Sea shipping is in crisis, adding pressure to a global economy already absorbing Red Sea and Strait of Hormuz disruptions. Commercial vessels face rising risks, insurance costs have climbed, and tanker freight rates have surged.

Ukraine has stepped up attacks on Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, ports, oil facilities, and vessels associated with Russian trade, expanding the conflict’s geographical scope. Grain, oil, fertilizers, and other commodities move through these waters, including shipments for non-belligerent countries.

S&P Global reported on October 9 that tanker freight rates rose sharply amid attacks, sanctions, and security concerns disrupting Russian energy exports. According to maritime security consultancy Ambrey, Kyiv expanded its campaign beyond naval assets and oil infrastructure to merchant ships trading with Russian ports.

In November 2025, attacks had already expanded to commercial vessels, particularly oil tankers, in the open sea. In May 2026, Ambrey attributed strikes on three Russia-linked tankers inside Turkey’s exclusive economic zone to Ukrainian naval drones.

By July, targeting expanded to dry-bulk carriers, general cargo, container ships, and roll-on/roll-off vessels. In September, insurers widened the high-risk zone. Ambrey data shows 45 merchant vessels struck outside the previous war-risk area in 12 months, 31 after July 1, 2026.

Ambrey’s finding is that Ukraine-attributed strikes (on Russia-linked shipping far offshore) helped drive insurers’ growing risk perception across the Black Sea.

Russia has responded by also conducting strikes in the Black Sea. As Modern Diplomacy puts it, Moscow has made any Black Sea truce conditional on Kyiv ceasing attacks on Russian energy infrastructure.

This is, after all, a proxy war of attrition, marked as it is by considerable military asymmetry. Russia possesses a larger population, defense-industrial base, strategic arsenal, air force, and navy, as well as greater resources for prolonged warfare.

Ukraine, despite developing formidable drone capabilities and long-range strike capacity, remains heavily dependent on Western assistance.

Global Firepower’s 2026 ranking places Russia second and Ukraine twentieth. The military asymmetry is therefore considerable.

The hard truth is that, notwithstanding any legitimate criticism one may have of Moscow’s campaign, Russia has refrained from employing its full destructive capabilities.

Such restraint, particularly in the war’s early stages, may have reflected not only humanitarian and military calculations but also (on Moscow’s end) awareness of historical and cultural ties between the two countries – which may have a psychological effect on decision-makers.

Kyiv, in contrast, since the 2014 ultra-nationalist revolution, has launched an anti-Russian campaign to distance the nation from Moscow. Even so, 42.6% of Ukrainians still regularly spoke Russian in December 2022, despite the war and media censorship restrictions.

Former US diplomat Chas Freeman and retired US Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor have both argued that Moscow exercised restraint.

Poland’s Centre for Eastern Studies likewise noted in June 2022 that Russia had refrained from systematically destroying key infrastructure – while the US Congressional Research Service observed that the initial bombardment was more limited than expected.

For comparison, Bono Vox performed in Kyiv on May 8, 2022, less than three months after Moscow launched its campaign. One could hardly imagine Bono performing in Baghdad shortly after the US invasion! Or in 2011 Libya, for that matter.

The broader point here is that the Russian Federation retains substantial military advantages, despite Ukrainian advances, but Western support has enabled Kyiv to sustain a prolonged war of attrition – increasingly targeting Russian energy.

In August, Ukrainian drone strikes on Russian and Iranian-linked vessels in the Caspian Sea risked expanding the conflict into a vital Russia-Iran logistics corridor.

The attacks risked further “proxifying” the conflict by aligning Kyiv with US and Israeli interests against Tehran, potentially merging the European and Middle Eastern theaters – a scenario that never materialized.

In any case, Ukrainian attacks on Russian energy infrastructure continue amid mounting political pressure, with Trump even saying it is “time for Ukraine to get new President.” I’ve commented before on Zelensky’s resilience, despite several reported plots against him.

The Ukrainian leader has shown a habit of acting unpredictably, sometimes behind his Western patrons’ backs. In 2023, leaked documents revealed wild Ukrainian plans that risked widening the conflict. More recently, attacks on Russian refineries drew attention amid rising diesel prices and reports of moves angering Washington.

This “wild-card” tendency risks triggering a dangerous spiral, with potentially disastrous consequences for Ukraine – and the global economy. Repercussions for food, energy, and fertilizer trade are already visible, while the danger of crossing red lines has arguably never been greater.

October 25, 2026 Posted by | Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Rosyth councillor raises concerns over submarine dismantling

By Jamie Szmitz, Dunfermline Press 19th Oct 2026
https://www.dunfermlinepress.com/news/26648971.rosyth-councillor-raises-concerns-submarine-dismantling/

FRESH concerns have been raised about nuclear submarine dismantling plans at Rosyth Dockyard.

Councillor Brian Goodall has voiced renewed opposition to the long-term storage of radioactive material in the town, following recent discussions at the SNP annual conference in Aberdeen.

At the political party gathering he quizzed Gareth Hedicker, Babcock International’s Marine Chief Operations Officer, on the plans for radioactive waste that’s being removed from the first of seven old nuclear subs that are laid up at the West Fife yard.

Cllr Goodall said: “I’ve still not had any response from Babcock on how long, and where, they intend to store the highly radioactive reactor pressure vessel that they intend to cut out of the decommissioned nuclear submarine, Swiftsure, over the next few weeks, as part of the ongoing Submarine Dismantling Demonstrator Project.”

In a social media post he also stated: “I challenged the chief operations officer about the poor communication with the local community in relation to the activities at the nuclear regulated site at Rosyth Dockyard.”

He raised concerns about the outdated mailing list used for stakeholder meetings and criticised the lack of clarity around plans for storing the highly radioactive reactor pressure vessel from the decommissioned submarine HMS Swiftsure.

Cllr Goodall said he intends to accept an invitation to meet Mr Hedicker as soon as possible.

Rosyth Dockyard is at the centre of the UK Government’s Submarine Dismantling Programme, which aims to safely dismantle and recycle decommissioned Royal Navy nuclear submarines.

HMS Swiftsure is the first vessel to undergo dismantling under the programme.

Cllr Goodall has consistently opposed proposals to expand the programme at Rosyth, warning that bringing additional submarines to be cut up at the site would be “totally outrageous” and would go against assurances previously given by the Ministry of Defence.

He believes that long-term storage of radioactive materials at Rosyth is inappropriate given the dockyard’s proximity to homes, businesses, and the new Caledonia High School development.

The debate comes as a wider conversation continues about the future of the submarine dismantling programme and Rosyth’s role within it.

October 25, 2026 Posted by | decommission reactor, UK | Leave a comment

Concerns over scrutiny of nuclear factory plans

Questions have been raised over whether West Berkshire Council has the
expertise and resources needed to scrutinise plans for a major
redevelopment at the Atomic Weapons Establishment (AWE) in Aldermaston. The
nuclear weapons site is expected to submit plans for its Future Materials
Campus, part of a wider £15bn investment in the UK’s warhead programme.


During a meeting on Thursday, Conservative councillor Dominic Boeck said
residents had concerns about the impact of the project and asked how the
authority would independently assess an application of such scale and
complexity. Liberal Democrat deputy council leader Denise Gaines said any
proposal would be examined by qualified professionals and specialist
consultants to ensure all technical and environmental issues were properly
considered.

BBC 19th Oct 2026, https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/articles/cm369jg6d2wno

October 25, 2026 Posted by | safety, UK | Leave a comment

Massive Ukrainian drone attack on St. Petersburg escalates US-NATO war against Russia.

Under these conditions, there is a growing admission within the US and international media that NATO and Russia are entering a “world war.” In one of the foremost examples, the Financial Times published Saturday a column titled, “Are we sleepwalking into World War III?”

The old imperialist powers retain a military superiority they no longer possess economically.

Andre Damon,18 October 2026, https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2026/10/19/yudl-o19.html

Ukraine attacked Russia with more than 1,000 drones overnight Saturday, in the largest bombardment of St. Petersburg since the Second World War. The attack, in which Russia’s Defense Ministry counted 1,015 drones across 15 regions, Crimea and the Black Sea, was one of the heaviest bombardments of Russian territory since the war began.

These strikes are directly funded by the NATO powers, which have provided Ukraine with over $100 billion in weapons, and are carried out on the basis of targeting data provided directly by their militaries.

The latest attack is a response by the NATO powers to the warning Russia gave European governments on September 30, that threats to Russia’s territorial integrity would be met with “the entire arsenal of forces and capabilities at its disposal, including nuclear weapons.”

Faced with this blunt warning that their actions risk triggering a nuclear war, the NATO powers are escalating. On October 12, General Alexus Grynkewich, NATO’s top commander in Europe, threatened to “break” the enemy’s “warfighting system,” including “anything and everything that supports, sustains, or controls that force.”

Under these conditions, there is a growing admission within the US and international media that NATO and Russia are entering a “world war.” In one of the foremost examples, the Financial Times published Saturday a column titled, “Are we sleepwalking into World War III?” by its chief foreign affairs commentator, Gideon Rachman. The title of his essay is taken from a 2012 book by Australian historian Christopher Clark, The Sleepwalkers: How Europe Went to War in 1914, which provided an apologetic explanation for the policies of German and European imperialism.

According to Clark, the war was the unforeseen outcome of mistaken judgments. The governments of the time and their leaders were not guilty of planning and starting war to achieve geopolitical and economic objectives. This benign interpretation of the war was especially welcomed by the German government and media, which praised Clark’s work and turned him into an intellectual celebrity.


Building upon Clark’s metaphor, Rachman depicts the imperialist powers as similarly clueless about the consequences of their actions. He writes, “Regions and countries that have for decades taken peace for granted—western Europe, east Asia, the Gulf states—now have to wrestle with the prospect, or the reality, of war.” It has become “commonplace,” he notes, “for world leaders to speculate publicly about the outbreak of a third world war.”

Read more: Massive Ukrainian drone attack on St. Petersburg escalates US-NATO war against Russia.

Rachman, citing a quote attributed to Leon Trotsky, declares, “You may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you.”

But the US and European leaders are not political somnambulists who are “sleepwalking” into World War III. They have been marching toward it with eyes open since the dissolution of the Soviet Union. The first President Bush proclaimed a “new world order” on the eve of the 1991 Gulf War. That war was followed by the intervention in Somalia, the bombing of Bosnia and the 1999 war against Serbia, the invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq, the destruction of Libya, the proxy war in Syria and the US-backed Saudi war in Yemen.

Since 2022, these wars have merged into a single global conflagration. It includes the US-NATO war against Russia in Ukraine; the Israeli genocide in Gaza, armed and defended by Washington; the bombing of Iran in June 2025; and the war against Iran launched on February 28 of this year.

The objective is the redivision of the world among the old imperialist powers. This violent and ongoing project includes the breakup of the existing Russian state, which will open up the vast Eurasian landmass to unfettered capitalist exploitation. For the oligarchs of finance capital, the loss of a few hundred million lives would be a small price to pay for this rich prize.

In Rachman’s telling, however, the danger of world war proceeds entirely from the actions of Russia and China. In this narrative, the threat of “world war” began with the decision Putin made in February 2022, with no antecedent history. Rachman asserts that an inflection point was reached when “Putin launched his ‘special military operation.’ In that time, the global political atmosphere has been transformed.”

The Russian invasion of Ukraine did not come out of nowhere. It was a reactionary and desperate response by the Russian capitalist oligarchy to years of provocations by NATO. NATO’s own leadership has said as much. In an interview published by the Washington Post in May 2023, then-NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg declared that the war “didn’t start in 2022. The war started in 2014.”

Stoltenberg continued, “And since then, NATO has implemented the biggest reinforcement of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War … Until 2014, NATO allies were reducing defense budgets. Since 2014, all allies across Europe and Canada have significantly increased their defense spending … this is a huge transformation of NATO that started in 2014.”

The Russian invasion of Ukraine did not come out of nowhere. It was a reactionary and desperate response by the Russian capitalist oligarchy to years of provocations by NATO. NATO’s own leadership has said as much. In an interview published by the Washington Post in May 2023, then-NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg declared that the war “didn’t start in 2022. The war started in 2014.”

Stoltenberg continued, “And since then, NATO has implemented the biggest reinforcement of our collective defense since the end of the Cold War … Until 2014, NATO allies were reducing defense budgets. Since 2014, all allies across Europe and Canada have significantly increased their defense spending … this is a huge transformation of NATO that started in 2014.”

But the Maidan coup was itself an outcome of decades of imperialist policy that had pushed the boundaries of the NATO alliance to Russia’s doorstep.

Rachman correctly centers the driving force of the eruption of global war in “a shift in the global balance of power.” He notes that, “In 1989, the year of the fall of the Berlin Wall, the G7 nations—the US, UK, Germany, France, Italy, Canada and Japan—accounted for around two-thirds of global economic output … By 2022, the G7 represented about 43 percent of global GDP.”

This shift, according to Rachman, is “encouraging revisionist powers to challenge the global dominance of the US and its allies.” China’s share of world output rose from under 2 percent in 1989 to about 17 percent in 2024, according to World Bank figures.

However, by 2022, Rachman notes, the G7 still accounted for “about half of global military spending.” The old imperialist powers retain a military superiority they no longer possess economically. It is they, not China, that have spent the past 35 years at war, seeking to reverse by force what they are losing in the world economy.

The most bizarre element of Rachman’s column is his effort to blame the reemergence of global war on the public’s opposition to it. He writes that “the growth of anti-war sentiment in the US” has “created an opening for revisionist powers,” that US President Donald Trump “is clearly attracted to the idea that the US should retreat from its security commitments to its allies” and that “the greatest risk of a third world war may lie in that very uncertainty.”

Beset by an all-pervasive capitalist crisis and the growth of working class opposition, the imperialist powers seek through war a way out of their problems. The global eruption of imperialist war is only intensifying the class struggle and the capitalist crisis. It is driving workers and youth into struggle around the world, from the United States to France—where students and workers filled the streets this week against a government that has billions for rearmament and nothing for social needs.

The working class and youth must reject and oppose the insane imperialist militarism that is inciting global conflict and threatening humanity with a nuclear conflagration.

October 25, 2026 Posted by | Russia, Ukraine, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Zelensky still the most dangerous man in the world.


Walt Zlotow  West Suburban Peace Coalition  Glen Ellyn IL, 20 October, 26

Ukraine President Volodymyr Zelensky has been pushing all out war between the West and Russia since the Russian invasion of February 2022. And ‘all out’ only has one inevitable outcome…nuclear war.

That’s a long time to be put under threat of nuclear annihilation by a former comedian. Zelensky used his celebrity to win the Ukraine presidency in 2019, promising to make peace with the Russian leaning Ukrainians in Donbas on Russia’s border being brutalized by the ultra nationalist Kyiv government for years preceding Zelensky.

The Kyiv deep state quickly disabused Zelensky of reproachment with Donbas Ukrainians and Russia. With the US and NATO cheering Zelensky on, this made the Russian invasion nearly 3 years later.

Zelensky went along, foolishly believing Western aid would defeat an overwhelmingly more powerful Russia that Ukraine had no chance of defeating single handedly.

But right at the start, President Biden, most responsible for provoking the war, declared no US troops or long range weapons for Zelensky because ‘that would lead to nuclear war.’ That essentially sealed Ukraine’s fate, a truth Zelensky could not comprehend.

How right Biden was then and how wrong Zelensky was and is today, demanding endless long range NATO weapons that are reaching deep into Russia.

October 24, 2026 Posted by | PERSONAL STORIES, Ukraine | Leave a comment

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