Biden to Zelensky: ‘Our $210 billion not enough…send 18 year olds to die in our Russian proxy war
Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition, Glen Ellyn IL, 2 Dec 24
In 34 months of Russian war in Ukraine provoked by US NATO expansion, the US has squandered $185 billion of our precious treasure to keep Ukraine men dying by hundreds of thousands in a lost US foreign misadventure.
But as President Biden heads for the White House exits, he’s demanding and will get another $25 billion from Congress, making the total cost pushing a quarter trillion dollars.
Not a single military or administration strategist believes that will make any difference in American’s unwinnable proxy war. Even Biden’s National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan fessed up “Our view has been that there’s not one weapon system that makes a difference in this battle. It’s about manpower, and Ukraine needs to do more, in our view, to firm up its lines in terms of the number of forces it has on the front lines.”
Biden concurred and now demands Zelensky lower the draft age from 25 to 18. Zelensky lowered the draft age last April from 27 to 25, also at US, urging, but it has done nothing to stem the inexorable Russian advancement fueled by overwhelming manpower. Why? Upwards of 200,000 Ukrainian soldiers have deserted. They are voting against senseles war with their feet.
After squandering $185 billion of US treasure and a half million Ukrainian men, Biden wants more, more, more of both.
Biden could toss a trillion dollars and another half million young Ukrainian cannon fodder into the US proxy war without a prayer of victory on America’s terms.
But a worse fate awaits all of us. By allowing Ukraine to fire long range US missiles into Russia, Biden is risking nuclear war. If that occurs, all discussion about a squandered quarter trillion on weapons and another half million dead Ukrainian youth will be moot.
Mass desertions crippling Ukrainian army – AP
29 Nov 24 https://www.rt.com/russia/608398-ukraine-troops-desertion-ap/
Entire units are walking away as forcibly conscripted soldiers refuse to take orders, the news agency has reported,
Mass desertion is “starving” the Ukrainian Army and “crippling” Kiev’s battleplans, as troops flee in their tens of thousands, the Associated Press reported on Friday, citing two soldiers who went AWOL, as well as lawyers and a dozen officials, most of whom spoke on condition of anonymity.
“We have already squeezed the maximum out of our people,” an officer with the 72nd Brigade told the American news agency, explaining why the problem became so acute.
The Prosecutor General’s office lists more than 100,000 soldiers who have been charged over desertion, nearly half of whom quit this year alone, but the actual number is likely significantly higher, AP said. It may be as high as 200,000, one MP told the agency. In some cases, entire units have fled their frontline positions, it was told.
“If there’s no end term [to military service], it turns into a prison – it becomes psychologically hard to find reasons to defend this country,” said one of the deserters, who was named by AP. He was charged shortly after being interviewed.
Earlier this year, Kiev adopted sweeping military service reform, hoping it would bolster the rate of mandatory conscription. The US is now reportedly pushing the Ukrainian government to lower the minimum draft age to 18, down from 25.
Conscription is being brutally enforced by officers and their civilian helpers. One such official said handling his targets is like “dealing with a cornered rat,” The Telegraph newspaper reported earlier this week.
Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky signed a bill into law this week, which waives criminal responsibility for first-time deserters if they volunteer to go back and fight.
In July 2023, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that a shortage of manpower was the biggest problem facing the Ukrainian military, after a failed “counteroffensive” conducted against Russia earlier that year.
“Ukrainian units have suffered huge losses in their suicidal attacks. Tens of thousands of casualties,” he said during a Russian Security Council meeting.
“Despite constant raids, the never-ending waves of total mobilization in Ukrainian cities and villages, the current regime is finding that sending reinforcements to the front line becomes increasingly difficult,” he added. “The country’s mobilization reserve is being depleted.”
Zelensky has been consistently blaming a shortage of Western-donated weapons for Ukrainian setbacks on the battlefield. Meanwhile Russian officials have accused him of waging a war “to the last Ukrainian” on behalf of the US.
Mass Desertions Over Radiation Could End the War in Ukraine
CounterPunch, Barbara G. Ellis, November 29, 2024
NATO leaders have been dithering about Russia’s recent retaliation against Ukraine’s lofting one of Lockheed’s long-range missiles deep into its interior. Their emergency huddle was about Putin’s new multi-missile (“Oreshnik “) which traveled 10 times the speed of sound (range: 310-3,400 miles) to hit a former ICBM factory . So far, either side seems to have considered the one factor that could end their planet-destroying, nuclear game of chicken.
It’s the real possibility of monumental mutiny and desertions by those boots-on-the-ground that both sides count on to do the heavy lifting in WWIII.
Most soldiers may be willing to risk death by bullets and bombs, but not radiation exposure. Despite recent official assurances by U.S. war planners that nuclear weapons would be used only on battlefields, radiation drifts for thousands of miles. It ignores borders and body protections—as proved by Hiroshima in 1945 and the Chernobyl disaster of 1986.
Russian president Putin claimed Oreshnik’s speed makes NATO’s current defense systems powerless and said its production was imminent. But while the West’s missile designers set up a crash program to counter this latest escalation, these warhawks and their counterparts evidently still ignore the ever-expanding deserter numbers or silent mutinies abuilding in Ukraine and Russia. However, troops usually know military officials traditionally underestimate or conceal death rates lest it demoralize both them and the public to begin questioning the worth of continuing a war.
Current desertion rates in Russia by August were 18,000 and increasing daily, Newsweek reported. Russia’s death rate by September was said to be 71,000 by its independent media outlet Mediazona. The Economist in July put total casualties—dead/wounded/ captured—at between 462,000 and 728,000.
Small wonder then why Putin “borrowed” nearly 12,000 combat troops from North Korea in October for front-line duty. Equally, NATO members have promised troops as well. Many now on site as “advisors” for their equipment—tanks and munitions to aircraft—and infantry training.
Ukrainian desertions have now become legendary, along with increasing populations of neighboring Romania, Poland, and Germany. The Kyiv Post just reported some 60,000 alone are facing criminal charges of desertion since the war’s start in 2022. Thousands of others have not been caught nor wooed or forced back to the ranks. The Eurasian Review also noted Ukrainians on the 629-mile frontline were poorly armed and often out of ammunition. It commented:
frontline were poorly armed and often out of ammunition. It commented:
“Ukraine’s military is now ‘Outgunned and Outnumbered’, struggling with low morale and high rate of desertions….This prolonged war nearing three years have near decimated many Ukrainian infantry battalions, making the situation grim on the battle limes. Reinforcements are few and difficult to be created, leaving soldiers exhausted, demoralized and desert [ing].”
Not to mention the 44,000 draft-age Ukainian males who by August had slipped through border-police lines of other nations. The Wall Street Journal says 15,000 fled to mountainous Romania in particular……………………………………………………………………………………………………………
……………………………………So when presidents Putin and Biden and NATO leaders assume those “boots-on-the-ground” will mindlessly obey orders to escalate the Russo-Ukrainian war from super-sonic missiles to nuclear warheads, they better think about the U.S. mutiny in Vietnam. It has furnished lessons and tools for all soldiers for all time so instead of “Do or die,” perhaps an overwhelming number will demand to know “Why?” https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/11/29/mass-desertions-over-radiation-could-end-the-war-in-ukraine/?fbclid=IwY2xjawG41V5leHRuA2FlbQIxMQABHcNhNoDwHnDD3OtHWQAgtAw4hnfdNGoSyFdDjYMiBciYjUiG08c1VGHdhw_aem__n-ZgkUj1nxhHZoxRJiKgg
Ukraine has lost almost 500,000 troops – Economist
29 Nov 24 https://www.rt.com/russia/608307-ukraine-losses-estimates-economist/
Vladimir Zelensky previously claimed that only some 31,000 Ukrainian servicemen had been killed.
Up to half a million Ukrainian troops have been killed or wounded in the ongoing conflict with Russia, according to new estimates provided by The Economist, which cited leaked intelligence reports, official statements and open sources.
In an article published on Tuesday, the outlet noted that it is difficult to calculate Kiev’s actual losses, given that Ukrainian officials and their allies are “reluctant to provide estimates.”
Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky claimed in February that only 31,000 troops had been killed since the conflict with Russia escalated in 2022. He refused to reveal how many had been wounded, arguing it would let Moscow know “how many people are left on the battlefield.”
However, The Economist noted that according to US officials, Kiev’s total casualty figure currently stands at more than 308,000 soldiers. According to the outlet’s analysis of other sources, the figure could be closer to half a million troops, of which “at least” 60,000-100,000 are believed to have been killed.
“Perhaps a further 400,000 are too injured to fight on,” the magazine wrote.
The Economist also cited the UALosses website, which tracks and catalogues the names and ages of the dead. According to its data, Ukraine has lost at least 60,435 troops, or more than 0.5% of its pre-war population of men of fighting age.
While the data from UALosses is not comprehensive and not all soldiers’ ages are known, The Economist suggested that the actual number of those killed in the fighting is higher and the amount of servicemen who are too injured to fight is even greater.
“Assuming that six to eight Ukrainian soldiers are severely wounded for every one who is killed in battle, nearly one in 20 men of fighting age is dead or too wounded to fight on,” the outlet estimated.
Earlier this year, the Russian Defense Ministry claimed that Ukraine’s military losses since February 2022 had reached almost 500,000, without specifying how many had been killed or injured.
According to the latest information from the ministry, Kiev has also lost over 35,000 servicemen since August in its incursion into Russia’s Kursk Region.
In June, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that his country’s personnel losses in the conflict were a fraction of those on the Ukrainian side, suggesting that the ratio of casualties was approximately one to five.
White House Pressing Ukraine To Draft 18-Year-Olds for War
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan recently hinted that the US was pressuring Ukraine to expand conscription, saying Ukraine’s biggest problem in the war was the lack of manpower.
The pressure from the US comes as polling shows the majority of Ukrainians want peace talks to end the war,
by Dave DeCamp November 27, 2024 , https://news.antiwar.com/2024/11/27/white-house-pressing-ukraine-to-draft-18-year-olds-for-war/
The White House is pressuring Ukraine to increase the size of its military by lowering the minimum age of conscription from 25 to 18, The Associated Press reported on Wednesday.
A senior Biden administration official said the outgoing administration wants Ukraine to start drafting 18-year-olds to expand the current pool of fighting-age males. The pressure from the US comes as polling shows the majority of Ukrainians want peace talks with Russia to end the war.
National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan recently hinted that the US was pressuring Ukraine to expand conscription, saying Ukraine’s biggest problem in the war was the lack of manpower.
“Our view has been that there’s not one weapon system that makes a difference in this battle. It’s about manpower, and Ukraine needs to do more, in our view, to firm up its lines in terms of the number of forces it has on the front lines,” Sullivan said on PBS News Hour last week.
Last month, Serhiy Leshchenko, an aide to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, said Ukraine was under pressure from US politicians to lower the conscription age. “American politicians from both parties are putting pressure on President Zelensky to explain why there is no mobilization of those aged 18 to 25 in Ukraine,” he said.
Zelensky signed a mobilization bill into law back in April that lowered the conscription age from 27 to 25. A few weeks before the mobilization bill became law, Zelensky received a visit from US Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who complained that not enough young Ukrainian med were being sent to the frontline.
“I would hope that those eligible to serve in the Ukrainian military would join. I can’t believe it’s at 27,” Graham said. “You’re in a fight for your life, so you should be serving — not at 25 or 27. We need more people in the line.”
The Biden administration’s push for Ukraine to draft younger men comes as it is doing everything it can to escalate the proxy war before President-elect Donald Trump is inaugurated on January 20. President Biden is seeking another $24 billion to spend on the conflict even though it’s clear there’s no path to a Ukrainian military victory.
Transfer of nukes to Kiev would be viewed as attack on Russia – Medvedev
Rt.com 26 Nov 24
The former president’s warning follows reports that discussions have been held in the US about Ukraine obtaining a nuclear arsenal .
Moscow will consider any threat of nuclear arms being supplied to Ukraine by the US as preparation for a direct war with Russia, former president Dmitry Medvedev has warned. The actual transfer of nuclear weapons would be tantamount to an attack on the country under Russia’s new nuclear doctrine, he added.
In a Telegram post on Tuesday, Medvedev referenced a recent report in the New York Times. In a piece bylined by four of its journalists, the NYT claimed that US and EU officials are “discussing deterrence as a security guarantee” for Ukraine, claiming a conversation is underway to consider giving Ukraine nuclear weapons.
US politicians and journalists are seriously discussing the consequences of providing Kiev with nuclear weapons, said Medvedev, who serves as the deputy chair of the Russian Security Council…………………………………………………………………………………………………… more https://www.rt.com/russia/608212-medvedev-nukes-transfer-ukraine/
Biden seeking extra $24bn for Kiev – Politico
https://www.rt.com/news/608270-biden-ukraine-aid-politico/ 27 Nov 24
The “long-shot” funding request was reportedly sent to Congress on Monday
Outgoing US President Joe Biden has quietly asked Congress to allocate an additional $24 billion in Ukraine-related spending, according to a report by Politico on Tuesday.
The funding pitch includes $16 billion to backfill US stocks depleted by deliveries of weapons to Kiev and $8 billion to pay US arms producers for contracts in support of the Ukrainian military, the news outlet said, calling Biden’s bid a “long shot”.
The report is based on a document produced by the White House Office of Management and Budget, which was sent to lawmakers on Monday, according to Politico’s sources on Capitol Hill.
The Biden administration previously vowed to spend every dollar already approved for Ukraine before the president leaves office on January 20. Last week, he also wrote off some $4.7 billion in forgivable loans given to Kiev. The money was part of a tranche approved by Congress in April, with $9.4 billion provided as a “loan” to appease lawmakers, who opposed continued funding of the Ukraine conflict.
President-elect Donald Trump claimed during the election campaign that he would end the Ukraine conflict in 24 hours if voters grant him a new term in office. Some of his allies have accused the “lame duck” Biden of trying to corner the next administration into a continued conflict with Russia.
Republican Senator Mike Lee reacted negatively to the new funding request from the White House, especially as it came days after Biden’s unilateral move on the loan.
”Congress must not give him a free gift to further sabotage President Trump’s peace negotiations on the way out the door. Any Biden funding demands should be DOA,” he wrote on X.
Elon Musk, a key Trump supporter, who will lead an effort to reduce government waste in the incoming administration, has called the request “not ok” and said the money would be “funding the forever war,” if lawmakers authorize the spending.
G7 finalizing $50 billion loan to Ukraine – Washington
https://www.rt.com/business/608251-us-g7-ukraine-loan-russia/ 26 Nov 24
The loan will be secured from Russia’s sovereign assets, frozen by the West, the US Secretary of State has said
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has said that the Group of Seven (G7) is actively working on finalizing a multi-billion-dollar loan package for Ukraine from Russian sovereign assets frozen by the West.
Speaking at a press briefing following the G7 meeting in Italy, Blinken voiced the group’s commitment to ensuring that Kiev has sufficient funds and munitions to continue fighting “effectively” in 2025 or to engage in any potential negotiations with Moscow from a position of strength.
“In our support for Ukraine, we are finalizing getting out the door the $50 billion that has been secured on the basis of the Russian sovereign assets that are frozen,” Blinken stated.
The US and its allies froze an estimated $300 billion in assets belonging to the Russian central bank following the escalation of the Ukraine conflict in February 2022. In June, the G7 members pledged a $50 billion loan for Kiev, which will be repaid using Moscow’s money.
The bulk of the frozen funds, around €197 billion ($206 billion), are being held at Euroclear. The Brussels-based clearinghouse has estimated that the impounded Russian assets generated €5.15 billion ($5.4 billion) in interest in the first three quarters of this fiscal year.
Outgoing US President Joe Biden announced in October the “historic decision” to provide $20 billion in loans to Ukraine that will be paid back with the interest earned from immobilized Russian sovereign assets.
Kiev’s Western backers have been trying to accelerate work on allocating the funds amid concerns that US President-elect Donald Trump could cut aid for Ukraine. During his campaign, he repeatedly vowed to scale back assistance for the country if elected.
Earlier this month, Ukrainian leader Vladimir Zelensky demanded that all of the immobilized $300 billion in Russian sovereign assets be given to Kiev.
Moscow has repeatedly denounced the asset freeze as “theft” and warned that tapping into these funds would be illegal and set a dangerous precedent.
Last week, Russian Finance Minister Anton Siluanov promised to initiate retaliatory measures mirroring the West’s actions. He said Russia had also frozen the resources of Western investors, Western financial market participants and companies, adding that “the income from these assets will also be used.”
The International Monetary Fund has repeatedly warned that any decisions regarding the seizure of frozen Russian assets should be backed with “sufficient legal support,” noting that without this, the move could undermine trust in the Western financial system
Trump’s Cabinet Picks Aren’t Looking Good For Peace In Ukraine
Caitlin Johnstone, Nov 25, 2024, https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/trumps-cabinet-picks-arent-looking?utm_source=post-email-title&publication_id=82124&post_id=152120142&utm_campaign=email-post-title&isFreemail=true&r=1ise1&triedRedirect=true&utm_medium=email
Conventional wisdom about the outgoing Biden administration’s reckless escalations in Ukraine these past few days is that things will cool down once Donald Trump takes office, but Trump’s cabinet picks aren’t really selling this idea.
While Trump did campaign on ending the war in Ukraine, the president elect has given multiple cabinet appointments to strategists who say that the way to achieve that peace is to substantially escalate aggressions against Russia. Michael Tracey has been doing a great job compiling footage of Trump’s recent cabinet picks advocating extreme measures which happen to be in perfect alignment with the nuclear brinkmanship of the demented outgoing president and his handlers.
Sebastian Gorka, who Trump has named as his next senior director for counterterrorism, is on record saying that Trump has told him he plans on saying to Putin, “You will negotiate now or the aid that we have given to Ukraine thus far will look like peanuts.”
Mike Waltz, who Trump has selected as his next national security advisor, promotes a similar vision. Waltz says Russia can be pressured to come to the negotiating table via increased energy sanctions combined with “taking the handcuffs off of the long-range weapons we provided Ukraine.” Biden has since removed those very “handcuffs” by authorizing Kyiv to use US-supplied long-range missiles to attack Russia.
If it seems like these remarks from Trump’s incoming administration work very nicely with the actions of the outgoing administration, then you may find it interesting that Waltz just told Fox News Sunday that the two administrations are working “hand in glove” as the presidency changes over.
“Jake Sullivan and I have had discussions, we’ve met,” Waltz said. “For our adversaries out there that think this is a time of opportunity, that they can play one administration off the other — they are wrong. We are hand in glove. We are one team with the United States in this transition.”
This would seem to be an oblique reference to Russia specifically, since that’s the only US adversary with any hope that the incoming administration might be a bit less hawkish toward it than the outgoing one, and since years of mass media coverage went into spinning narratives about Trump being a pawn of Vladimir Putin.
But Trump was never a pawn of Vladimir Putin. Contrary to the narratives of both Democrat-aligned punditry and Republican-aligned punditry while he was in office, Trump spent his entire term ramping up cold war aggressions against Russia which helped pave the way to the war and brinkmanship we are seeing in Ukraine today. Tracey recently shared an audio clip of Gorka on X Spaces back in January 2023 exuberantly boasting about the way Trump ordered the US military to kill hundreds of Russian mercenaries in Syria in 2018. Putin himself cited the Trump administration’s withdrawal from the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty in 2019 when defending his decision to hit Ukraine with a new type of intermediate-range missile the other day in response to its use of US- and UK-supplied long-range missiles to strike inside Russia.
Other cabinet appointments who have taken extremely hawkish positions on Russia include secretary of state nominee Marco Rubio, secretary of defense nominee Pete Hegseth, CIA director nominee John Ratcliffe, and National Security Council appointee Doug Burgum. But it’s those comments from Waltz and Gorka which I find most concerning, because they explicitly refer to escalatory strategies that Trump might employ once he takes office.
This all comes out as we get news that US and European officials recently discussed providing nuclear weapons to Ukraine under the gamble that Putin will not escalate against the west before Trump takes office. The more aligned the Trump administration’s posture toward Russia appears to be with that of the Biden administration, the less safe a gamble this appears to be.
It seems likely that the Trump administration will end the Ukraine proxy war at some point down the road in order to reallocate those resources toward preparation for war with Iran and/or China. But it is not at all clear that this will happen soon enough before soaring escalations spin out of control into the single worst-case scenario that could possibly unfold on this planet.
White House finally confirms greenlight for deep Russia strikes
https://www.rt.com/news/608194-us-admits-russia-strikes/ 25 Nov 24
Ukraine can use ATACMS to strike in the vicinity of Kursk Region, John Kirby has said
Washington on Monday officially confirmed a well-flagged policy change allowing Ukraine to strike inside Russia using US-supplied ATACMS missiles.
Numerous international officials have spoken about the change in stance over the past week. While US President Joe Biden and his administration remained silent, Kiev fired a volley of ATACMS projectiles at Russia’s Bryansk Region last Monday.
“They are able to use ATACMS to defend themselves in an immediate-need basis,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby told reporters at a White House briefing on Monday.
“We did change the guidance and gave them guidance that they can use them to strike these particular types of targets,” Kirby said, referring to the Ukrainian attacks “in and around Kursk.”
The US and its allies have provided increasingly powerful weapons systems to Kiev since 2022, while maintaining that it does not make them a party to the Russia-Ukraine conflict.
In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that Ukraine’s use of long-range weapons would change the character of the hostilities and make NATO a direct participant. He explained that weapons such as the ATACMS or the UK-supplied Storm Shadow cannot be deployed by Kiev’s forces without the participation of NATO military personnel.
Moscow’s response came last Thursday, when a brand-new hypersonic ballistic missile, the Oreshnik, was used against the Yuzhmash military-industrial complex in Dnepropetrovsk. Putin called it a “combat test” of the new weapon and said such tests would continue depending on circumstances.
Report: US and European Officials Discussed Giving Ukraine Nuclear Weapons
Western officials are less concerned that Russian President Vladimir Putin will escalate the conflict before Donald Trump takes office
by Kyle Anzalone November 22, 2024, https://news.antiwar.com/2024/11/22/report-us-and-european-officials-discussed-giving-ukraine-nuclear-weapons/
According to the New York Times, US and European officials have discussed a range of options they believe will deter Russia from taking more Ukrainian territory, including providing Kiev with nuclear weapons. The outlet reports that Western officials believe the Kremlin will not significantly escalate the war before Donald Trump is sworn in as President in January.
Following the election of Trump earlier this month, the US and its NATO allies began taking steps to rush weapons to Ukraine and give Kiev the ability to strike targets inside Russian territory with long-range weapons.
American officials who were briefed on the intelligence community’s assessments told the Times that weapons will not alter the challenging situation that Kiev is currently facing. “US spy agencies have assessed that speeding up the provisions of weapons, ammunition and matériel for Ukraine will do little to change the course of the war in the short term,” the Times reports.
Desperate to bolster Ukraine’s standing in the war before the transition of power on January 20, the Biden administration is looking at a range of serious escalations. “US and European officials are discussing deterrence as a possible security guarantee for Ukraine, such as stockpiling a conventional arsenal sufficient to strike a punishing blow if Russia violates a cease-fire.” The article continues, “Several officials even suggested that Mr. Biden could return nuclear weapons to Ukraine that were taken from it after the fall of the Soviet Union.”
According to some officials who spoke with the Times, the administration believes that Russian President Vladimir Putin won’t significantly escalate the war until Trump returns to the Oval Office.
“But the escalation risk of allowing Ukraine to strike Russia with US-supplied weaponry has diminished with the election of Mr. Trump,” adding,” Biden administration officials believe, calculating that Putin of Russia knows he has to wait only two months for the new administration.”
That assessment is based on the belief that Trump and his incoming Director of National Intelligence, Tulsi Gabbard, will take a more favorable stance on Russia. However, Trump proved to be a Russia-hawk during his first administration by ramping up sanctions on Moscow, providing lethal arms to Ukraine, and expelling a large number of Russian diplomats from the US.
In September, Putin said he preferred Vice President Kamala Harris to win the White House. “Trump has imposed as many sanctions on Russia as any president has ever imposed before, and if Harris is doing well, perhaps she will refrain from such actions,” he explained.
Much of the American political class has cast Trump and Gabbard as agents of Russia. However, extensive investigations into Trump’s ties to the Kremlin have come up empty. Additionally, the Times reported last week that there was no evidence Gabbard was in any way an asset of Putin.
Kyle Anzalone is the opinion editor of Antiwar.com, news editor of the Libertarian Institute, and co-host of Conflicts of Interest.
UK Sees Privatization ‘Opportunities’ in Ukraine War
A recent project update from the Foreign Office is explicit about the goals. It states these should see “the invasion not only as a crisis, but also as an opportunity”
privatisation ……..can create private monopolies, reduce accountability to government and overcharge the public.
British aid is being used to open up Ukraine’s wrecked economy to foreign investors and enhance trade with the UK.
DECLASSIFIED UK, MARK CURTIS, November 21, 2024
Amid the devastating war in Ukraine, British economic aid to the country is focused on promoting pro-private sector reforms and on pressing the government to open up its economy to foreign investors.
Recently-published Foreign Office documents on its flagship aid project in Ukraine, which supports privatisation, note that the war provides “opportunities” for Ukraine delivering on “some hugely important reforms”.
The government in Kyiv has in recent months been responding positively to these calls. Last month, president Volodymyr Zelensky signed a new law expanding the privatisation of state-owned banks in the country.
It follows the Ukrainian government’s announcement in July of its ‘Large-Scale Privatisation 2024’ programme that is intended to drive foreign investment into the country and raise money for Ukraine’s struggling national budget, not least to fight Russia.
Large assets slated for privatisation currently include the country’s biggest producer of titanium ore, a leading producer of concrete products and a mining and processing plant.
Ukraine envisaged privatising the country’s roughly 3,500 state-owned enterprises in a law of 2018, which said foreign citizens and companies could become owners.
The process stalled as a result of coronavirus and then Russia’s invasion in February 2022. But hundreds of smaller-scale enterprises are now being privatised, bringing in revenues of UAH 9.6bn (£181m) in the past two years.
“The resumption of privatisation amid the full-scale war is an important step, which is already yielding results,” Ukraine’s economy minister Yulia Svyrydenko said last month.
Another law enacted in June 2023 allows large-scale assets to be sold to foreigners or Ukrainians during the current martial law regime.
‘Good governance’
Britain’s main economic aid project in Ukraine runs from 2022-25 and is called the Good Governance Fund. One of its aims is to ensure that “Ukraine adopts and implements economic reforms that create a more inclusive economy, enhancing trade opportunities with the UK”.
A recent project update from the Foreign Office is explicit about the goals. It states these should see “the invasion not only as a crisis, but also as an opportunity”…………………………………………………………………
Advancing privatisation
One key strand of the Good Governance Fund project is direct support to privatisation in Ukraine.
This involves a seven-year sub-programme called SOERA (State-owned enterprises reform activity in Ukraine), which is funded by USAID with the UK Foreign Office as a junior partner.
SOERA works to “advance privatization of selected SOEs [state-owned enterprises], and develop a strategic management model for SOEs remaining in state ownership.”
UK documents note the programme has already “prepared the groundwork” for privatisation, a key plank of which is to change Ukraine’s legislation. ………………………………………………………………
Declassified made a freedom of information request asking the Foreign Office to provide the briefing notes for then foreign secretary James Cleverly for the conference. It replied saying the request was “too broad”.
“The UK is hoping to reap benefits for UK firms from Ukraine’s reconstruction”, observes a report on British aid to Ukraine earlier this year by the aid watchdog, ICAI.
Conditionality
Britain’s privatisation agenda in Ukraine is part of a wider push by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund (IMF), which routinely promote privatisation in low income countries, often as a condition of providing aid.
Zelensky’s recent announcement on state-owned banks is based on World Bank recommendations and gives international donors a role in selecting financial advisers for the sales.
……………………………………….Rustem Umyerov, the head of the State Property Fund, which presides over Ukraine’s privatisation strategy, said in July that “international partners support the start of large-scale privatization and are ready to facilitate pitches to the business communities in their countries.”
……Foreign investment in rebuilding Ukraine’s economy is being coordinated by the world’s largest asset manager, Blackrock.
…………………privatisation ……..can create private monopolies, reduce accountability to government and overcharge the public.
The key goal for Western states supposedly ‘aiding’ Ukraine’s privatisation process is to find access to new markets, and to bring Ukraine into their commercial orbit, fully detaching it from their rival, Russia.
A sign that the Ukrainian public needs persuading about this Western-backed privatisation is that the US/UK’s SOERA project includes a public relations dimension. One of its goals is to “assist the government in strategic communications to enhance reforms”. https://www.declassifieduk.org/uk-sees-privatisation-opportunities-in-ukraine-war/
Report: Ukraine Fires British Storm Shadow Missiles Into Russia
The US closed its embassy in Kyiv citing ‘specific information of a potential significant air attack,’ signaling the US expects a Russian escalation
by Dave DeCamp November 20, 2024, https://news.antiwar.com/2024/11/20/report-ukraine-fires-british-storm-shadow-missiles-into-russia/
Ukraine fired at least 10 British-provided Storm Shadow missiles into Russia’s Kursk Oblast, The Wall Street Journal and several other media outlets reported on Wednesday.
Ukraine has used the Storm Shadow missiles, which have a range of up to 155 miles, in strikes on Crimea, but Wednesday’s attack, which targeted the Kursk Oblast, marks the first time Ukrainian forces fired them into the Russian mainland, another major escalation of the proxy war. So far, Russia hasn’t confirmed the use of Storm Shadows.
The US and the UK reportedly authorized Ukraine’s use of the Storm Shadows in strikes on Russian territory after President Biden gave the green light for Ukraine to use the ATACMS, US-made missiles with a range of about 190 miles. Ukraine launched ATACMS into Russia for the first time on Tuesday.
Both the Storm Shadows and ATACMS require intelligence from Western countries for Ukraine to fire them, meaning the US and NATO are now directly supporting long-range strikes on Russian territory. Earlier this year, a German military leak revealed British soldiers are “on the ground” in Ukraine helping Ukrainian forces fire Storm Shadows.
Moscow has made clear that NATO-supported long-range strikes inside Russia risk nuclear war. On Tuesday, in response to Biden authorizing the ATACMS strikes, Russian President Vladimir Putin formally updated Russia’s nuclear doctrine, which now considers an attack by a non-nuclear armed state that’s supported by a nuclear-armed power as a joint attack.
The US said on Wednesday that it was closing down its embassy in the Ukrainian capital of Kyiv, citing “specific information of a potential significant air attack,” signaling Washington is expecting Russia to escalate in response to the long-range strikes. Several other countries, including Italy and Greece, followed the US lead and shuttered their embassies.
While the long-range strikes risk nuclear escalation, US officials have admitted the capability is not expected to alter the course of the war. Ukraine only has a limited supply of the ATACMS and Storm Shadows.
On Way Out, Reckless Biden Allows Deep Russia Strikes
Biden staked his legacy on Ukraine. He was involved in the 2014 coup, in allegedly shady practices there with his son and then in provoking Russia to invade in 2022. He foolishly believed he would prevail in bringing down Putin with an economic, information and proxy ground war. [See: Biden Confirms Why the US Needed This War]
All three are now decisively lost as the U.S. — still under Biden — prepares for the end game. Biden’s only face saver is for Ukraine to get back some of its lost territory by trading for it with Russian territory it seized in Kursk this summer.
November 17, 2024 By Joe Lauria, Consortium News, https://consortiumnews.com/2024/11/17/on-way-out-reckless-biden-allows-deep-russia-strikes/
With his party decisively beat at the polls, the rejected president is gambling with regional security to preserve his ‘legacy’ and to saddle the incoming president, who wants to end the war, with a major new crisis, writes Joe Lauria.
As a parting shot to incoming U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, the defeated Joe Biden has defied the Pentagon by risking European and U.S. security with his decision announced Sunday to allow Ukraine to fire U.S. long-range missiles into Russian territory.
Just two months ago, in September, Biden had bowed to the realists in the Pentagon to oppose allowing long-range British Storm Shadow missiles from being fired by Ukraine deep into Russia out of fear it would lead to a direct NATO-Russia military confrontation with all that that entails.
Putin warned at the time in that British soldiers on the ground in Ukraine launching the British missiles into Russia with U.S. geostrategic support “will mean that NATO countries — the United States and European countries — are at war with Russia. And if this is the case, then, bearing in mind the change in the essence of the conflict, we will make appropriate decisions in response to the threats that will be posed to us.”
That was a clear warning that British and U.S. targets could be hit. Biden thus wisely backed off.
It was the second time that Biden had sided with the Pentagon against the neocons in his administration when it came to avoiding direct war with Russia.
The first time was in March 2022 when his neocon Secretary of State Antony Blinken stepped out of line to announce that the U.S. would give NATO-member Poland a “green light” to send Mig-29 fighter jets to Ukraine to enforce a no-fly zone against Russian aircraft.
Members of Congress and the media then piled the pressure on Biden to approve it until cooler heads at the U.S. Defense Department, the greatest purveyor of violence in history, stepped in to stop it.
Biden ultimately sided with the Pentagon, and he couldn’t be more explicit why. He opposed a NATO no-fly zone over Ukraine fighting Russian aircraft, he said, because “that’s called World War III, okay? Let’s get it straight here, guys. We will not fight the third world war in Ukraine.”
U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin at the time backed him up, saying:
“President Biden’s been clear that U.S. troops won’t fight Russia in Ukraine, and if you establish a no-fly zone, certainly in order to enforce that no-fly zone, you’ll have to engage Russian aircraft. And again, that would put us at war with Russia.”
But now Biden has reversed himself on his sensible positions and is defying the Pentagon to roll the dice that Russia’s warnings, repeated on Monday by Putin’s spokesman, won’t lead to nuclear conflict.
While he previously would not even authorize British long-range missile attacks into Russia in September, let alone U.S. ATACMS, on Sunday he authorized the ATACMS, risking Russia taking direct action against U.S. targets.
So what changed Biden’s addled mind?
An Undemocratic Democratic System
First, the undemocratic U.S. electoral system gave Biden the opportunity. His party was voted out of office on Nov. 5, but though the demos rejected Democrats in the White House they get to hang on in power for another 11 weeks, enough time to do considerable mischief to tie up the incoming administration that the people chose. (In a parliamentary system the new prime minister takes office on the next day and names the new cabinet well in advance of the election).
After one-term president George H.W. Bush lost to Bill Clinton in the 1992 election, Bush used those 11 weeks to invade Somalia, saddling Clinton with a foreign policy crisis that would bog him down and distract him from his agenda.
What’s happening now is something similar. Biden wants to undermine Trump’s effort to end the Ukraine war. The incoming vice president has floated the idea of Russia holding on to territory it has won in exchange for peace.
Biden staked his legacy on Ukraine. He was involved in the 2014 coup, in allegedly shady practices there with his son and then in provoking Russia to invade in 2022. He foolishly believed he would prevail in bringing down Putin with an economic, information and proxy ground war. [See: Biden Confirms Why the US Needed This War]
All three are now decisively lost as the U.S. — still under Biden — prepares for the end game. Biden’s only face saver is for Ukraine to get back some of its lost territory by trading for it with Russian territory it seized in Kursk this summer.
So he is authorizing U.S. soldiers to operate ATACMS missiles from Ukraine to beat back a 50,000-man Russian force seeking to take back all of that Russian territory. Part of that force, according to the Pentagon spokesman, is a contingent of at least 10,000 North Korean troops invited by Moscow, thus operating legally on pre-war Russian territory.
Yet the presence of these North Koreans has sent the Biden administration and its allied media into paroxysms of near insanity. The New York Times reported on Sunday:
“Officials said Mr. Biden was persuaded to make the change in part by the sheer audacity of Russia’s decision to throw North Korean troops at Ukrainian lines. He was also swayed, they said, by concerns that the Russian assault force would be able to overwhelm Ukrainian troops in Kursk if they were not allowed to defend themselves with long-range weapons.”
It is not like Biden doesn’t know the potentially grave consequences he is recklessly unleashing. He was already warned about the no-fly zone and said “that’s called World War III, okay?” He was then warned by the Pentagon against allowing the British missiles and acted like a responsible statesman.
But now, when it comes to his precious legacy, he doesn’t appear to give a damn about anything else. He was deprived of a second term (by traitors within his own party he no doubt thinks) and he will risk a NATO-Russia war to avoid the taint of utter defeat in Ukraine.
This is what he’s ignoring, according to the Times:
“Some of Mr. Biden’s advisers had seized on a recent U.S. intelligence assessment that warned that Mr. Putin could respond to the use of long-range ATACMS on Russian soil by directing the Russian military or its spy agencies to retaliate, potentially with lethal force, against the United States and its European allies.
The assessment warned of several possible Russian responses that included stepped-up acts of arson and sabotage targeting facilities in Europe, as well as potentially lethal attacks on U.S. and European military bases.”
Where it goes from there, nobody knows. Thanks, Joe.
High-Precision, Long-Range NATO Missiles Against Russia: Why Now?
Joe Quinn, Sott.net, Wed, 20 Nov 2024, https://www.sott.net/article/496207-High-Precision-Long-Range-NATO-Missiles-Against-Russia-Why-Now
Russia announced a change to its nuclear doctrine several months ago, where it can now respond with nuclear weapons to a non-nuclear attack on Russia by an enemy, either directly from enemy territory or from the territory of a third party. A notable caveat however is that such a response would only occur in the event that the attack “threatened the very existence of the Russian state”.
The changes were officially signed into law yesterday with the wording relevant to the conflict in Ukraine being “where the aggression creates a critical threat for the sovereignty and/or territorial integrity [of Belarus or the Russian Federation].
In this context, the Russians have also said that the use of nuclear weapons would also be permissible if an enemy attacked Russian forces in the context of the SMO in a way that definitively threatened the achievement of the objectives of the SMO.
In Sept. Putin said that NATO’s plan to allow Ukraine to use longer range Western precision weapons against Russian targets inside Russia would be evidence of direct NATO involvement in a war against Russia. And that Russia would respond appropriately.
Three days ago, “Biden” approved the use of longer range Western precision weapons against Russian targets inside Russia.
Two days ago, Ukraine fired 5 US-made longer range Western precision weapons (supersonic ATACMS ballistic missiles) at a military base 130kms into Southern Russia. According to the Russians, all 5 missiles were shot down, with one falling on the periphery of the missile base, starting a fire but doing no material or personnel damage.
While many have interpreted this attack as fulfilling the requirements for a Russian nuclear response, that is obviously not the case, for four reasons:
1) The attack did not, in any way, threaten the very existence of the Russian state
2) The attack did not, in any way, threaten the achievement of the objectives of the SMO.
3) The Biden admin has less than 2 months left in power.
4) Trump and his incoming team have made no secret of their intention to negotiate a near-future settlement to end the war in Ukraine.
What then, at this late stage, was the point in the ‘Biden’ admin authorizing the use of long range precision weapons against Russia and why do EU leaders continue to make repeated reference to EU citizens needing to prepare for a potential “war with Russia” and sending EU/NATO military forces to Ukraine, if there’s a reasonable chance of a peaceful settlement of the conflict under the Trump admin?
The problem is how any ‘settlement’ would play out.
First (see map) Russia will not settle for anything less than the four regions it has already incorporated into its territory (including the “demilitarization and denazification of Ukraine”). In addition, a demilitarized buffer zone (of some distance) would be necessary extending out from these regions and away from the Russian and Belarusian borders to the North.
NATO and EU nations would, undoubtedly, insist on militarily occupying (“peacekeepers”) the rest of Ukraine beyond these zones, but such a presence would create an uneasy, and potentially dangerous, peace for some time to come. Hence the talk of sending their military forces to Ukraine and possible/eventual ‘war with Russia’.
Of note in this respect is yesterday’s announcement that the ‘Biden’ admin will begin sending anti-personnel landmines to Ukraine to “blunt the advancement of Russian troops”. Interestingly, the mines are said to be “nonpersistent” design, meaning they become inactive within weeks of deployment. Why now? Russian troops have been advancing, in one form or another, for most of the war. Why would NATO/Ukraine want to deploy anti-personnel mines that last for only a few weeks?
Much like the use of precision long-range weapons, the use of “non-persistent” anti-personnel mines now is more likely to be part of a strategy for a negotiation settlement, than to effect any significant change on the current battlefield.
The point of authorizing (and using) both NATO long range precision weapons against Russia and anti-personnel mines now is in preparation for expected negotiations after Jan 6th.
By using these weapons and calling Russia’s ‘nuclear bluff’, (while also being careful not to push too far) NATO expects that Russia will be forced to accept them as a de facto (rather than theoretical) part of Ukraine/NATO’s arsenal against Russia, and thereby provide NATO with a more favorable basis for negotiations.
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