$400 Million DOE Bailout for “SMRs” at Palisades
Multiple reactors on the tiny 432-acre site also introduce the risk of domino-effect multiple meltdowns
Holtec’s inexperience exacerbates these synergistic old and new reactor risks. Holtec still has no NRC-approved SMR-300 design certification, has never built a reactor, nor operated one, nor repaired and restarted one, let alone a reactor as perpetually problem-plagued as the 60-year old Palisades zombie.
DECEMBER 3, 2025, by Kevin Kamps
regarding the announcement by the U.S. Department of Energy, Holtec International, and Michigan Governor Gretchen Whitmer of a $400 million federal bailout for “Small Modular Reactor” deployments at the Palisades nuclear power plant in Covert Township, Van Buren County, southwest Michigan.
Holtec’s uncertified and untested so-called ‘Small Modular Reactor’ design, the SMR-300, is not small. At 300 megawatts-electric (MW-e) each, the additional 600 MW-e would nearly double the nuclear megawattage at Palisades, given the unprecedented zombie restart of the 800 MW-e, six decade old reactor there. The zombie reactor was designed in the mid-1960s, and ground was broken on construction in 1967, with the learn-as-we-go dangerous design and fabrication flaws at the nuclear lemon baked in, still putting us in peril to the present day.
Just look at the harm smaller infamous 67 MW-e Michigan reactors have caused in the past. At Fermi Unit 1 on the Lake Erie shore in Monroe County, “we almost lost Detroit” when the plutonium breeder reactor had a partial core meltdown on October 5, 1966. John G. Fuller wrote an iconic book about it by that title in 1975. And Gil Scott-Heron wrote a haunting song about it in 1977, two years before he joined Musicians United for Safe Energy (MUSE) in response to the 1979 Three Mile Island Unit 2 meltdown, the worst reactor disaster in U.S. history — thus far anyway.
And at Big Rock Point — Palisades’ sibling reactor — near Charlevoix on the northwest Lower Peninsula’s Lake Michigan shore, the 67 MW-e experimental reactor shockingly released more than 3 million Curies of hazardous ionizing radioactivity into the environment, from supposedly ‘routine operations’ from 1962 to 1997. In the 1970s, local family practitioner, medical doctor Gerald Drake, and University of Michigan trained statistician Martha Drake, documented statistically significant spina bifida in the immediate area downwind. There is also anecdotal evidence of widespread thyroid pathology as well. This is similar to Palisades, where 50 cases of diagnosed thyroid cancer have been alleged by part-time residents of the small, 120-year old Palisades Park Country Club resort community, where there should not be a single such case of this exceedingly rare disease made infamous by Chornobyl and Fukushima.
Given the damage done by 67 MW-e reactors in Michigan in the past, just imagine what havoc could be wreaked by two 300 MW-e reactors — each 4.5 times larger — at Palisades going forward.
Increased breakdown phase risks at the 60-year old zombie reactor, and break-in phase risks at the two SMR-300 new builds, are a recipe for disaster at Palisades.
Palisades has a long list of breakdown phase risks. From the worst neutron-embrittled reactor pressure vessel in the country or perhaps even the entire world, to severely degraded steam generator tubes, a reactor lid that needed replacement two decades ago, lack of fire protection, calcium silicate containment insulation that would dissolve into sludge with the viscosity of Elmer’s Glue blocking emergency core cooling water flow, the worst operating experience in industry with control rod drive mechanism seal leaks from 1972 to 2022, etc., the Palisades zombie reactor has multiple pathways to reactor core meltdown, which would unleash catastrophic amounts of hazardous ionizing radioactivity into the environment, on the beach of Lake Michigan, drinking water supply for 16 million people along its shores, and more than 40 million people downstream and downwind, up the food chain, and down the generations throughout the Great Lakes region.
Chornobyl in Ukraine in 1986, and Three Mile Island-2 in Pennsylvania in 1979, are examples of brand new reactors causing catastrophes. Through design and construction flaws, and operator inexperience, Holtec’s SMR-300s will introduce increased break-in phase risks at the Palisades nuclear power plant, located on the Great Lakes shoreline. The Great Lakes comprise 21% of the planet’s, 84% of North America’s, and 95% of the United States’ surface fresh water.
Multiple reactors on the tiny 432-acre site also introduce the risk of domino-effect multiple meltdowns, as happened at Fukushima Daiichi, Japan in March 2011.
A 1982 U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) study the agency unsuccessfully tried to suppress reported that a Palisades meltdown would cause a thousand acute radiation poisoning deaths, 7,000 radiation injuries, 10,000 latent cancer fatalities, and $52 billion in property damage. Adjusting for inflation alone, property damage would now exceed $168 billion. And since populations have increased around Palisades in the past 43 years, casualty figures would be significantly worse, as more people now live in harm’s way.
Holtec’s inexperience exacerbates these synergistic old and new reactor risks. Holtec still has no NRC-approved SMR-300 design certification, has never built a reactor, nor operated one, nor repaired and restarted one, let alone a reactor as perpetually problem-plagued as the 60-year old Palisades zombie. Holtec’s incompetence and corruption has been on full display in just the past several weeks, including a leak of large amounts of ultra-toxic hydrazine into Lake Michigan, the unprecedented fall by a worker into the radioactive reactor cavity, and evidence of potential alcohol consumption and/or drug impairment, including in the protected area, and by a supervisor. Despite all this, NRC has rubber stamped weakened work hour limitations, meaning overworked employees will be more fatigued, as Holtec races to restart the zombie reactor, in order to hold its announced Initial Public Offering, hoping to raise another $10 billion in private investment, for SMR-300 deployment across the country and around the world, with Palisades as the dangerously dubious prototype to be followed.
Speaking of money, Holtec has, thus far, been awarded $3.52 billion (with a B!) in public funding at Palisades alone. But it has requested another $12 billion (with a B!) more. These bailouts significantly impact the pocketbooks of hard working Americans — state and federal taxpayers, as well as electric ratepayers. Palisades represents a wealth redistribution scheme, from the American people to Holtec, compliments of Governor Whitmer, the Michigan state legislature, Congress, President Biden, and now President Trump. Abe Lincoln described the ideal of government as “of, by, and for the people.” At Palisades, government seems to be of, by, and for an inexperienced, incompetent, careless, corrupt and greed-driven corporation, playing radioactive Russian roulette, carrying out a large-scale nuclear experiment, with Great Lakes residents as the unwitting Guinea pigs.”
Ukraine’s Energoatom, Holtec International, and the US retreat from fighting corruption abroad
very little about the relationship between Trump’s Washington and Zelenskyy’s Kyiv might be considered ordinary.
President Zelensky moved to dismantle the safeguards meant to protect Ukraine’s institutions from corruption,
Bulletin, By Matt Smith | December 3, 2025,
In 2012, FBI agents stationed themselves in a Trump Tower apartment to wire up a senior official of FIFA, soccer’s world governing body, to record conversations that would become evidence for anti-bribery prosecutions. In 2018, Justice Department officials seized the yacht Equanimity in an operation aimed at returning stolen assets to Malaysia. In 2023, the United States sent a veteran US prosecutor to Kyiv to strengthen Ukraine’s anti-corruption agencies, which America had earlier helped establish.
In a functioning international order, we might see this type of global collaboration in the wake of a recent investigative piece I wrote for the Bulletin about a US company, Holtec International, that has had substantial dealings with a state-owned nuclear company now under investigation in Ukraine.
In more normal times, the government of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy might request assistance under the US-Ukraine Treaty on Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters. The FBI established a liaison office at the headquarters of the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine (aka NABU) in 2017, under a memorandum of understanding to cooperate on “investigations related to money laundering, international asset recovery, and Ukrainian high-level officials’ bribery and corruption.” These are word–for–word what investigators are now pursuing in Ukraine’s nuclear power agency.
A professionalized Justice Department could respond to a formal Ukrainian request by issuing subpoenas seeking information from US firms that might be relevant to the Ukrainian probe.
But we are no longer in anything like normal times.
Here’s the context: NABU—an agency the United States helped create and train—is investigating an alleged $100 million corruption scheme inside Energoatom, the governmental body that oversees nuclear energy and spent fuel storage in Ukraine. This scandal has consumed Zelenskyy’s inner circle and led to the resignation of his chief deputy and lead peace negotiator.
Holtec International, a Florida company that established an office in Kyiv in 2007, became a prime contractor and subcontractor for Energoatom on complex, multi-year spent nuclear fuel storage projects.
Holtec executives met repeatedly with Energoatom leadership. They navigated Ukraine’s procurement systems. They hired local subcontractors. They managed complex, multi-year construction projects in a business environment that Ukrainian prosecutors now say has been compromised. Holtec has files that could matter: Ukrainian invoices, compliance checks, email communications, and management logs.
In response to my inquiry about whether the company had heard from the Justice Department regarding Ukraine, Holtec issued a statement saying it witnessed no corruption: “Our operations center in Kyiv, Holtec Ukraine, has worked with our client, Energoatom, to provide safe storage systems and technology to ensure the spent fuel in Ukraine is stored safely and protected from external threats. At no time have we had any interactions that would have led us to believe in any impropriety with our work and contracts.”
As with any such company statement, this one merits checking. Holtec email communications might show whether American executives interacted with the officials now under investigation. Compliance audits might reveal whether the company flagged irregularities. Payment records might reveal inflated costs prosecutors have identified elsewhere. Internal management logs might document which Ukrainian officials controlled access to Holtec’s projects and whether those officials match the outside “shadow managers” prosecutors have identified as having gained control of Energoatom and then having demanded bribes from contractors.
The Bulletin’s investigation, published November 20, did not find evidence that Holtec was involved in Ukrainian misconduct. In fact, subpoenaing Holtec’s records would neither require nor imply allegations of corporate wrongdoing; such subpoenas require only the recognition that a US entity could possess evidence material to a foreign corruption prosecution. The legal mechanisms for seeking Holtec’s records exist. The precedents for doing so are well-established. Such a procedure has previously been seen as an ordinary step.
But very little about the relationship between Trump’s Washington and Zelenskyy’s Kyiv might be considered ordinary.
Since Trump took office in January, his administration has pursued a quiet dismantling of America’s ability to provide this kind of aid. On February 5, Attorney General Pam Bondi formally disbanded Task Force KleptoCapture, the unit established after the Russian invasion of Ukraine and dedicated to seizing assets of Russian oligarchs. Five days later, President Donald Trump signed Executive Order 14209, explicitly “pausing” enforcement of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act—the very statute that authorizes investigations into potential bribery of foreign officials by US companies.
Deregulation even extended to tools of crime, as Russia increasingly relies on cryptocurrency to bypass sanctions. The Justice Department has turned away from prosecuting digital asset violations while the US established a “Strategic Bitcoin Reserve,” giving legitimacy to a cryptocurrency known as a key sanctions-evasion tool.
Scores of federal prosecutors have left Justice as colleagues were fired for perceived political slights. Trump’s highest-priority prosecutions—i.e., the politicized ones—are pursued by unqualified loyalists who have ended up, in many matters, embarrassing a once-storied agency.
The diminished US interest in corruption prosecution has had foreseeable consequences in Kyiv. Concurrent with the shift in Washington, President Zelensky moved to dismantle the safeguards meant to protect Ukraine’s institutions from corruption, signing legislation in July to strip NABU of independence. Ukrainians took to the streets. Most reports about international pressure to restore NABU’s status concerned European countries that sprang to the defense of the anti-corruption agency America helped build. The United States recently rotated a new FBI liaison to the NABU offices as part of the cooperation agreement. The Ukrainian press said a recent meeting concerned the Energoatom bribery case.
Typically, the next steps might seem clear. But nobody involved seems to be operating in a typical way.
The Justice Department press office did not respond to questions asking whether Holtec’s files sit in Florida, untouched. https://thebulletin.org/2025/12/ukraines-energoatom-holtec-international-and-the-us-retreat-from-fighting-corruption-abroad/?utm_source=ActiveCampaign&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Ukraine%20s%20Energoatom%2C%20Holtec%20International%2C%20and%20the%20US%20retreat%20from%20fighting%20corruption%20abroad&utm_campaign=20251201%20Monday%20Newsletter%20%28Copy%29
First strike on small, unarmed boat off Venezuela, not second, makes Trump and Hegseth war criminals.
Walt Zlotow West Suburban Peace Coalition Glen Ellyn IL , 3 Dac 25, substack.com/@waltzlotow
Some sensible US congresspersons, government officials, pundits and others are furious over reports Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth ordered a second strike on a mysterious little boat off Venezuela September 1 that killed 2 hapless souls clinging to the US inflicted wreckage.
They correctly point out that bombing survivors of a wrecked boat is against the Pentagon’s own Law of War Manual. “Persons who have been rendered unconscious or otherwise incapacitated by wounds, sickness, or shipwreck, such that they are no longer capable of fighting, out of combat. “It would be dishonorable and inhumane to make them the object of attack.”
Hegseth initially denied there was a second bombing killing the survivors, invoking the Trumpian charge “fake news.” Under intense criticism Pete pivoted admitting it happened but only after he’d left the room following the first strike, giving him plausible deniability. Then, despicably, he blamed the fatal order on Adm. Frank M. Bradley, the commander of US Special Operations Command. Hegseth didn’t condemn Bradley for ordering the second strike. He praised him saying he’s “got his back.”
The second strike on survivors upset congressional Republicans and Democrats enough to consider investigating it as a possible war crime. What that implies is that the 22 boats sunk, killing over 80 unidentified soles is OK as long as the US does not bomb survivors clinging to the wreckage of America’s dastardly war crimes. That first boat obliterated September 1 was a war crime repeated 21 times in 3 months,
Hegseth, Trump and every officer involved in these strikes are war criminals. Every serviceman ordered to commit these dastardly crimes should refuse those orders. Recently 6 morally centered congresspersons publicly implored all service members to do just that, no doubt with the illegal Trump/Hegseth boat obliterations in mind. Trump’s response? Maybe these congresspersons should be executed.
Focusing on the murder of survivors clinging to wreckage detracts from the monumental war crimes Trump commits nearly every day of his presidency.
By providing the bombs that have killed over 100,000 Palestinians in Gaza, bombing Somalia over 100 times this year, bombing imaginary Iranian nuclear sites, and most recently sending 22 small unarmed boats with 83 innocents down to Davy Jones Locker, Trump and Hegseth deserve indictment and prosecution for directing the most murderous administration in America’s 250 years.
Towards a transparent and responsible management of radioactive waste
Ottawa, December 4, 2025, www.ccnr.org/release_radwaste_transport_2025.pdf
Bloc Québécois spokesperson for the Environment and Climate Change, Patrick Bonin, held a press conference on December 2 on Parliament Hill in Ottawa, alongside Lance Haymond, Chief of the Kebaowek First Nation, Lisa Robinson, Chief of the Wolf Lake First Nation, and representatives of several environmental and anti-radioactive-pollution groups to co-sign a letter along with more than 80 environmental associations, elected officials, trade unions, and First Nations representatives in Ontario, Quebec and the Rest of Canada, calling for a moratorium on the transport of radioactive waste over public roads and bridges to the Chalk River site located beside the Ottawa River. [See the letter in English and French at www.ccnr.org/letter_e_f_2025.pdf ]
The signatories are calling on the federal government to ban, among other things, all imports of radioactive waste from other countries, including disused medical sources, expired tritium light sources, and irradiated nuclear fuel.
They are also calling on the Minister of Environment and Climate Change to conduct a strategic assessment of the transport of high-level and intermediate-level radioactive waste on public roads.
Quotes:
Ginette Charbonneau, spokesperson for the Coalition Against Radioactive Pollution, deplores the fact that “it is irresponsible to transport all radioactive waste under federal jurisdiction to Chalk River. It is doubly dangerous to transport the waste twice: once for temporary storage at Chalk River and a second time to its final destination.”
Gordon Edwards, Ph.D., president of the Nuclear Watchdog Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, states that “The Age of Nuclear Waste is just beginning. It’s time to stop and think. First, we must stop moving the waste. This only increases the costs and the risks without solving the problem. Second, we must think of the need for three things – justfiication, notification, and consultation – before moving any of this dangerous human-made cancer-causing material over public roads and bridges.”
Jean-Pierre Finet of the Regroupement des organismes environnementaux en énergie (Alliance of Environmental Organizations on Energy) states, “We wholeheartedly support the call for a moratorium on the transport and importation of waste and the request for a strategic environmental assessment. We believe that Chalk River must cease to be our government’s nuclear waste dump.”“
“In 2017, Ottawa residents were denied a regional environmental impact assessment of radioactive wastes accumulating alongside the Ottawa River. Given all the proposed waste transfers underway and yet to be implemented, a strategic assessment is more urgent than ever,” explains Dr. Ole Hendrickson of the Ottawa River Institute.
“The government is willing to accept unacceptable risks, to silence affected nations, and to operate without any transparency or accountability,” says Lance Haymond, Chief of the Kebaowek First Nation. “We have learned long ago: Silence is Consent. We will not be silent.”
Lisa Robinson, Chief of the Wolf Lake First Nation, Canada, says, “We are all calling on Canada to do better with the nuclear situation in storage and transportation, and we call on all Canadian to insist on complete accountability for the tens of billions of dollars of public money that is being spent by those hired to manage these indestructible radioactive wastes.”
Contacts :
English
Gordon Edwards, Canadian Coalition for Nuclear Responsibility, Montreal
– ccnr@web.ca 514-839-7214
Ole Hendrickson, Concerned Citizens of Renfrew County and Area, Ottawa
– oleqhendrickson@gmail.com 613-735-4876
Brennain Lloyd, Northwatch, We the Nuclear Free North, North Bay, Ontario
– brennain@onlink.net 705-493-9650
French/English
Ginette Charbonneau Ralliement contre la pollution radioactive Oka (Québec)
– ginettech@hotmail.ca 514=246-6439
Jean-Pierre Finet, Regroupement des organismes environnementaux en énergie, Montréal
– pierre.finet@gmail.com 514-515-1957
Eva Schacherl, Council of Canadians – Ottawa
– evaschacherl@gmail.com 613-316-9450
Article: Transferts de déchets radioactifs à Chalk River | Le Bloc québécois reçoit de
nombreux appuis et ravive son appel à un moratoire | La Presse
Watch the press conference : Le Bloc demande un moratoire sur le transport de matières nucléaires | À la une | CPAC.ca
Link to the letter:letter_e_f_2025.pdf
Signatories of the letter…………………………………………………………………….
Russia Dangles Business Ties To U.S. at Europe’s Expense. Kremlin pitched White House on investments and industry to end war – today’s Wall Street Journal
American and Russian business leaders were quietly anticipating that Witkoff and Dmitriev would deliver, positioning their companies to profit from peace.
2 Dec 2025 By Drew Hinshaw, Benoit Faucon , Rebecca Ballhaus , Thomas Grove and Joe Parkinson
Three powerful businessmen— two Americans and a Russian—hunched over a laptop in Miami Beach, ostensibly to draw up a plan to end Russia’s long and deadly war with Ukraine.
But the full scope of their project went much further, according to people familiar with the talks. They were privately charting a path to bring Russia’s $2 trillion economy in from the cold—with American businesses first in line to beat European competitors to the dividends.
At his waterfront estate, billionaire developer-turned-special envoy Steve Witkoff was hosting Kirill Dmitriev, head of Russia’s sovereign-wealth fund and Vladimir Putin’s handpicked negotiator, who had largely shaped the document they were revising on the screen. Jared Kushner, the president’s son-in-law, had arrived from his nearby home on an island known as the “Billionaire Bunker.”
Dmitriev was pushing a plan for U.S. companies to tap the roughly $300 billion of Russian central bank assets, frozen in Europe, for U.S.-Russian investment projects and a U.S.-led reconstruction of Ukraine. U.S. and Russian companies could join to exploit the vast mineral wealth in the Arctic. There were no limits to what two longtime adversaries could achieve, Dmitriev had argued: Their rival space industries, which raced one another during the Cold War, could even pursue a joint mission to Mars with Elon Musk’s SpaceX.
For the Kremlin, the Miami talks were the culmination of a strategy, hatched before Trump’s inauguration, to bypass the traditional U.S. national security apparatus and convince the administration to view Russia not as a military threat but as a land of bountiful opportunity, according to Western security officials. By dangling multibillion-dollar rareearth and energy deals, Moscow could reshape the economic map of Europe—while driving a wedge between America and its traditional allies.
Dmitriev, a Goldman Sachs alumnus, had found receptive partners in Witkoff—Trump’s longtime golfing partner—and Kushner, whose investment fund, Affinity Partners, drew billion-dollar investments from the Arab monarchies whose conflict with Israel he had helped mediate.
The two businessmen shared President Trump’s longheld approach to geopolitics. If generations of diplomats viewed the post-Soviet challenges of Eastern Europe as a Gordian knot to be painstakingly unraveled, the president envisioned an easy fix: The borders matter less than the business. In the 1980s, he had offered to personally negotiate a swift end to the Cold War while building what he told Soviet diplomats would be a Trump Tower across the street from the Kremlin, with their Communist regime as a business partner.
“Russia has so many vast resources, vast expanses of land,” Witkoff told The Wall Street Journal, describing at length his hopes that Russia, Ukraine and America would all become business partners. “If we do all that, and everybody’s prospering and they’re all a part of it, and there’s upside for everybody, that’s going to naturally be a bulwark against future conflicts there. Because everybody’s thriving.”
Red lines
When a version of the 28point plan leaked earlier this month, it drew immediate protests. Leaders in Europe and Ukraine complained it reflected mostly Russian talking points and bulldozed through nearly all of Kyiv’s red lines. They weren’t assuaged even after administration officials assured them that the plan wasn’t set in stone, worried that Russia— after violently redrawing European borders—was being rewarded with commercial opportunities.
As Western leaders convened to digest the plan, Poland’s prime minister Donald Tusk offered a pithy summary: “We know this is not about peace. It’s about business.”
For many in the Trump White House, that blurring of business and geopolitics is a feature, not a bug. Key presidential advisers see an opportunity for American investors to snap up lucrative deals in a new postwar Russia and become the commercial guarantors of peace. In conversations with Witkoff and Kushner, Russia has been clear it would prefer U.S. businesses to step in, not rivals from European states whose leaders have “talked a lot of trash” about the peace efforts, one of these people said: “It’s Trump’s ‘Art of the Deal’ to say, ‘Look, I’m settling this thing and there’s huge economic benefits for doing that for America, right?’” A question for history will be whether Putin entertained this approach in the interest of ending the war, or as a ploy to pacify the U.S. while prolonging a conflict he believes is his place in history to slowly, ineluctably win.
Trusted friends
One sign that he may be serious is that some of his mosttrusted friends, sanctioned billionaires from his St. Petersburg hometown—Gennady Timchenko, Yuri Kovalchuk and the Rotenberg brothers, Boris and Arkady—have sent representatives to quietly meet American companies to explore rare-earth mining and energy deals, according to people familiar with the meetings and European security officials. That includes reviving the giant Nord Stream pipeline, sabotaged by Ukrainian tactical divers, and under European Union sanctions.
Earlier this year, Exxon Mobil met with Russia’s biggest state energy company, Rosneft, to discuss returning to the massive Sakhalin gas project if Moscow and Washington gave the green light.
Elsewhere, a cast of businessmen close to the Trump administration have been looking to position themselves as new economic links between the U.S. and Russia.
Gentry Beach, a college friend of Donald Trump Jr. and campaign donor to his father, has been in talks to acquire a stake in a Russian Arctic gas project if it is released from sanctions. Another Trump donor, Stephen P. Lynch, paid $600,000 this year to a lobbyist close to Trump Jr. who is helping him seek a Treasury Department license to buy the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from a Russian state-owned company.
There is no evidence that Witkoff, the White House or Kushner are briefed on these efforts or coordinating them. A person familiar with Witkoff’s thinking said the envoy is confident that any settlement with Russia would benefit America broadly, not just a handful of investors.
Witkoff, who hasn’t traveled to Ukraine this year, is set to visit Russia for the sixth time this week and will again meet Putin. He insisted he isn’t playing favorites. “Ukrainians have fought heroically for their independence,” said Witkoff, who has tried to inspire Ukrainian officials with the idea of soldiers disarming to earn Silicon Valley-scale salaries operating American built AI data centers. “It is now time to consolidate what they have achieved through diplomacy,” he said.
‘Both sides’
“The Trump administration has gathered input from both the Ukrainians and Russians to formulate a peace deal that can stop the killing and bring this war to a close,” said White House spokesperson Anna Kelly. “As the President said, his national security team has made great progress over the past week, and the agreement will continue to be fine-tuned following conversations with officials from both sides.”
As Witkoff pursued talks with Dmitriev over nine months, some agencies inside the Trump administration had a limited view of his dealings with Moscow.
In the lead-up to an August summit in Alaska between Trump and Putin, Witkoff and Dmitriev discussed a prisoner exchange that would have been the largest bilateral swap in their countries’ history. The Central Intelligence Agency, which traditionally manages prisoner trades with Russia, wasn’t fully briefed on that proposed exchange. Nor was the State Department’s office for unjustly imprisoned Americans. The CIA didn’t return requests for comment. The State Department referred questions to the White House.
Career officials overseeing sanctions at the Treasury Department have at times learned details of Witkoff’s meetings with Moscow from their British counterparts.
In the days after Alaska, a European intelligence agency distributed a hard-copy report in a manila envelope to some of the continent’s most senior national security officials, who were shocked by the contents: Inside were details of the commercial and economic plans the Trump administration had been pursuing with Russia, including jointly mining rare earths in the Arctic.
Witkoff has worked closely with Vice President JD Vance and Secretary of State Marco Rubio. But the special envoy for Ukraine, former Lt. Gen. Keith Kellogg, has all but been frozen out of serious talks, and said he is leaving.
To understand the administration’s Russia negotiations, The Wall Street Journal spoke to dozens of officials, diplomats, and former and current intelligence officers from the U.S., Russia and Europe, and American lobbyists and investors close to the administration.
The picture that emerges is a remarkable story of business leaders working outside the traditional lines of diplomacy to cement a peace agreement with business deals.
‘ We keep on knocking at the door and coming up with ideas.’
Witkoff was just weeks into his new job as President Trump’s Russia and Ukraine negotiator when his office asked the Treasury Department for help allowing a sanctioned Russian businessman to visit Washington.
Kirill Dmitriev, an investment banker with degrees from Harvard and Stanford, spoke Witkoff’s preferred language: business. He had invited Witkoff to Moscow in February and escorted him into a three-hour meeting with Putin to discuss the Ukraine war. But Dmitriev was persona non grata in the U.S, blocked by the Treasury in 2022 for his role leading his country’s Sovereign Wealth Fund, which it called a “slush fund for Vladimir Putin.”
Trump had told Witkoff he wanted the war to end and the administration was willing to take the risk of welcoming Putin’s emissary to Washington. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent had questions about the unique request, but ultimately signed off.
Dmitriev arrived at the White House on April 2 and presented a list of multibilliondollar business projects the two governments could pursue together. At one point, Secretary of State Marco Rubio told Dmitriev that Putin needed to demonstrate he was serious about peace. But Dmitriev felt his businesslike rapport was breaking through. “We can transition i n v e s t m e n t trust into a political role,” he said in an unpublished interview that month.
In April, Dmitriev welcomed Witkoff to the St. Petersburg presidential library for another three-hour meeting with Putin. Witkoff took his own notes, relying on a Kremlin translator, then briefed the White House from the U.S. Embassy. That same month, European national security advisers planned to meet Witkoff in London to integrate him into their peace process. But he was busy with his other portfolio— negotiating a cease-fire in Gaza—and couldn’t make it. Afterward, one European official asked Witkoff to start speaking with allies over the secure fixed line Europe’s heads of state use to conduct sensitive diplomatic conversations. Witkoff demurred, as he traveled too much to use the cumbersome system.
Dmitriev and Witkoff meanwhile were chatting regularly by phone about increasingly ambitious proposals. The U.S. and Russia were discussing major agreements on oil-andgas exploration and Arctic transportation, Dmitriev told the Journal. “We believe that the U.S. and Russia can cooperate basically on everything in the Arctic,” he said. “If a solution is found in Ukraine, U.S. economic cooperation can be a foundation for our relationship going forward.”
Into position
American and Russian business leaders were quietly anticipating that Witkoff and Dmitriev would deliver, positioning their companies to profit from peace.
Exxon, billionaire investor Todd Boehly and others have explored buying assets owned by Lukoil, Russia’s second-largest oil producer. The U.S. sanctioned Lukoil in October to increase pressure on Moscow, prompting the company to put its overseas assets up for sale. Elliott Investment Management eyed buying a stake in a pipeline that carries Russian natural gas into Europe.
More recently, Kremlin–linked businessmen Timchenko, Kovalchuk and the Rotenbergs have been offering U.S. counterparts gas concessions in the Sea of Okhotsk, as well as potentially four other locations, according to a European security official and a person familiar with the talks. Russia has also mentioned rare-earth mining opportunities near the massive nickel mines of Norilsk and in as many as six other Siberian locations that are still unexploited, these people said.
Beach, Trump Jr.’s college friend, was in talks to acquire 9.9% of an Arctic LNG project with Novatek, Russia’s secondlargest natural gas producer— which is partly owned by Timchenko — if the U.S. and U.K. remove sanctions on it, according to drafts of contracts reviewed by the Journal.
In a statement, Beach said that partnering with Novatek would “strongly benefit any company committed to advancing American energy leadership,” and that his company, America First Global, “actively seeks investment opportunities that strengthen American interests around the world.” He said he “has never worked with Steve Witkoff” but is “extremely grateful” for the efforts Witkoff and others are making to end the war in Ukraine. Trump Jr. has told people he isn’t doing business with Beach.Lynch, the Miami-based investor, had been asking the U.S. government to allow him to bid on the sabotaged Nord Stream Pipeline 2 if it came up for auction in a Swiss bankruptcy proceeding. Lynch, who in 2022 was given a license by Treasury to complete the acquisition of the Swiss subsidiary of Russia’s Sberbank, had been seeking a license for the pipeline since the Biden administration, but in April dialed up his lobbying efforts by hiring Ches McDowell, a friend of Trump Jr. He would pay Mc-Dowell’s firm $600,000 over the next six months. Lynch’s representatives reached out to Witkoff for a meeting.
The road to Miami
On Aug. 6, Witkoff flew to Moscow, at Putin’s invitation, for a meeting prepared only a few days in advance. Dmitriev walked him through Zaryadye Park overlooking the Moskva River, then escorted him to the Kremlin for another three-hour session with Russia’s leader. Putin mentioned wanting to meet with Trump personally. He gave Witkoff a medal, the Order of Lenin, to pass to a CIA deputy director whose mentally unwell son was killed fighting for Russia in Ukraine.
The next day, Witkoff dialed into a videoconference with officials and heads of state from top European allies, and explained the outlines of what he understood to be Putin’s offer. If Ukraine would surrender the remaining roughly 20% of Donetsk province that Russia had failed to conquer, Moscow would forfeit its claim to Zaporizhzhia and Kherson provinces. The European officials were confused. Did Putin mean he would withdraw his troops from Zaporizhzhia and Kherson, as Witkoff was suggesting? Or, more likely, was Putin merely promising to not conquer the thousands of square miles of those two provinces that, after years of bloody fighting, remained in Ukrainian hands? Either way, Ukraine was skeptical about the value of a promise from Putin.
Witkoff wanted to strike while the iron was hot and hold a summit without delay. Dmitriev was optimistic Witkoff had taken Russia’s sensitivities on board: “We believe Steve Witkoff and the Trump team are doing a great job to understand the Russian position to end the conflict,” he told the Journal, a few days before.
Failed summit
The Aug. 15 summit fell apart almost as soon as it began. Witkoff, Rubio, and Trump arrived on Air Force One, meeting Putin, his longtime adviser Yuri Ushakov, and Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov. Putin launched into a 1,000-year history lecture on the unity of the Russian and Ukrainian people. The two sides canceled a lunch and an afternoon session where they were meant to check through their other issues, like the exchange of prisoners. Witkoff left uncertain where things stood, but hopeful talks would accelerate soon.
In October, President Zelensky flew to Washington, hoping to secure long-range, U.S.made Tomahawk cruise missiles. His military wanted to cripple Russian refineries, pushing Moscow to negotiate on better terms. By the time Zelensky arrived, Trump had spoken to Putin and decided not to offer the Tomahawks. Witkoff encouraged Ukrainian officials to try another tack: They should ask Trump for a 10-year tariff exemption. It would supercharge their economy, he said. “I’m in the deal settlement business. That’s why I’m here,” he told the Journal. “We keep on knocking at the door and coming up with ideas.”
The New Officer Class: How Silicon Valley Executives Were Sworn Directly into the Heart of the U.S. Army
These officers are now positioned to advise the Army on its technological future – defining requirements and strategy – while their own companies compete for, and hold, massive contracts to fulfill those very needs. This grants Palantir, Meta, and OpenAI an unparalleled level of insider influence, effectively allowing them to shape the market they dominate.
A strategic analysis of Detachment 201 and the unprecedented fusion of corporate and military power
1 December 2025 Andrew Klein, https://theaimn.net/the-new-officer-class-how-silicon-valley-executives-were-sworn-directly-into-the-heart-of-the-u-s-army/
In a move that formalises the military-industrial complex for the digital age, the U.S. Army has quietly sworn a group of powerful tech executives directly into its ranks as high-ranking officers. The creation of “Detachment 201,” a new reserve unit, and the direct commissioning of leaders from Palantir, Meta, and OpenAI to the rank of Lieutenant Colonel, marks a fundamental shift in how national security is conceived and who wields influence within the Pentagon. This is not a consulting agreement; it is a structural integration that blurs the line between corporate profit and national interest, with profound implications for the future of war, artificial intelligence, and democratic oversight.
The Who and What of Detachment 201
Established in June 2025, Detachment 201 – its name a reference to the HTTP “201 Created” status code – is designed to embed Silicon Valley’s innovation culture directly into the Army’s procurement and strategic planning processes. The executives, appointed as part of the “Executive Innovation Corps,” were chosen for their specific corporate expertise.
The following details the key figures and their corporate ties:
Name, Corporate Role, Notable Corporate-Military Ties
- Shyam Sankar Chief Technology Officer (CTO) of Palantir Palantir holds a $759 million Army AI contract; Sankar was a key recruiter for the unit.
- Andrew “Boz” Bosworth CTO of Meta Meta has partnered with defence contractor Anduril on augmented reality products for soldiers.
- Kevin Weil Chief Product Officer of OpenAI OpenAI holds a $200 million contract with the Pentagon for “frontier AI” for national security.
- Bob McGrew Former OpenAI research lead; advisor to Thinking Machines Lab Brings deep expertise in advanced AI models to strategic military projects .
The conditions of their service are notably different from those of a traditional military officer:
- Rank: Directly commissioned as Lieutenant Colonel (O-5).
- Training: No standard basic training required, though they must pass physical fitness tests and marksmanship training.
- Service Commitment: A minimal commitment of 120 hours per year, with the option to perform duties remotely.
- Stated Role: To provide high-level advice on “broader conceptual things” like talent management and applying technology to make the force “leaner, smarter, and more lethal.”
The Implications: A Web of Influence and Control
This initiative is far more than a symbolic gesture. It creates a series of structural conflicts and strategic shifts that demand public scrutiny.
The Blurring of Corporate and National Interest
The Army has stated that “firewalls” are in place to prevent conflicts of interest. However, this claim is difficult to reconcile with the reality of the appointments. These officers are now positioned to advise the Army on its technological future – defining requirements and strategy – while their own companies compete for, and hold, massive contracts to fulfill those very needs. This grants Palantir, Meta, and OpenAI an unparalleled level of insider influence, effectively allowing them to shape the market they dominate.
The Accelerated Militarisation of AI
The explicit goal is to leverage these companies’ expertise to increase the “lethality” of the force. This partnership accelerates the integration of AI into warfare, from AI-powered battlefield management systems to technologies for “soldier optimisation.” The ethical consequences are already visible: OpenAI has loosened its previous policies against military work to pursue government contracts, demonstrating how the pursuit of profit and patriotism can jointly override earlier ethical commitments.
The Architecture of “Silent” Algorithmic Control
This partnership has been framed as an act of “silent patriotism,” where service is rendered through code and algorithms. This embeds a new form of control within national security. When the power of frontier AI is combined with the vast surveillance and data analysis capabilities of companies like Meta and Palantir, it creates an infrastructure for social and battlefield control that is both pervasive and difficult to scrutinise. The executives, now in uniform, become the architects of this system.
A “Cosplay” Command and its Cultural Cost
The appointments have been criticised as “cosplay” and have raised concerns about a two-tiered military system. The image of wealthy tech elites receiving high rank without the traditional burdens and sacrifices of military service is deeply demoralising to career soldiers. It risks cementing a public perception of a privileged and unaccountable tech elite wielding undue power, both in the commercial and military spheres.
Conclusion: An Unaccountable Fusion
Detachment 201 is not a temporary experiment. An Army spokesperson stated this is being done “ahead of wartime so that we can prepare and deter,” a clear signal that this is a long-term preparatory move for a perceived future conflict. It represents the culmination of the military-industrial complex, evolving into a tech-military complex where the same companies that influence public discourse and social life are also directly shaping the tools of war.
This fusion occurs with minimal public debate and oversight, creating a self-reinforcing loop of influence, procurement, and strategy that operates largely in the shadows. The question is no longer if Silicon Valley will shape the future of warfare, but whether anyone outside of this new officer class will have a say in how it is done.
“Kill Them All” Controversy Explodes: Denied Order, War-Crime Alarms and a White House Scramble to Throw Others Under the Bus
By: Joshua Scheer, 2 Dec 25, https://scheerpost.com/2025/12/02/kill-them-all-controversy-explodes-denied-order-war-crime-alarms-and-a-white-house-scramble-to-throw-others-under-the-bus/
He has a lot of things to do?! Are you kidding me? This is what a leader of the Department of War looks like? Shirking his responsibility and trying to get out of what amounted to a war crime. Needless to say, what a way to throw someone under the bus to save your own skin. He did say he approved of the action, so …
Also, to respond to Pete H. about “fake stories” and that we’re attacking heroes — no, SIR, we are after you. You are not a hero; you are a fool who, like many before you, has been given a position that you dismiss.
More from him here: “It was exploded in fire or smoke. You can’t see anything,” the Pentagon head said. “You got digital … this is called the fog of war.”
The fog of war does not protect this, Pete, and ultimately it won’t protect you or your boss for your release of drug kingpins and the murder of “drug-running” fishermen.
Here is Pete at the Cabinet meeting today:
As reported by The Hill, Rep. Jason Crow (D-Colo.) said, “This administration has a long history of asking people to do things that are reckless or lawless, and then throwing them under the bus and shifting blame. And there’s no doubt that that seems to be what’s happening here.”
With my congressman Ted Lieu adding: “I served on active duty as a JAG [judge advocate general] for four years, and then an additional 21 years in the reserves, and let me be very clear: Killing shipwrecked survivors is a war crime.”
No doubt that’s what’s happening. Jason Crow is one of the Democrats who asked members of the armed forces not to follow illegal orders — and now we know why. For more on that read Soldiers Must Disobey Unlawful Orders Under Trump — It’s Their Legal Duty, by Marjorie Cohn. Discussing things like the My Lai Massacre and such.
Here is former Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall on MSNBC, first noting that there was a report — denied by the White House — of a verbal order to “kill them all.” He went on to say this is a “textbook example of a war crime,” adding that after WWII, the U.S put on trial and executed a U-boat commander for similar actions, and that the treatment of shipwrecked sailors is clearly laid out in the manual. Here is that show:
I end with this, from a previously unreported 2016 video reported by CNN, with Pete Hegseth saying that the U.S. military “won’t follow unlawful orders from their commander in chief,” and describing the refusal of illegal commands as part of the military’s ethos and standards.
Of course, his tone has changed quite a bit, hasn’t it? Please stand up, Pete, and leave. Here is that whole video. It’s long but maybe a good way to see how he has morphed over the years. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8eUE4OQ2QV0
A line crossed, a standard shattered
3 December 2025 Michael Taylor, https://theaimn.net/a-line-crossed-a-standard-shattered/
In the stark, unforgiving waters of the Caribbean, the United States crossed a line from which it will be difficult to return.
That line was crossed with two chilling words allegedly spoken by Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth – “kill everybody” – followed by the deliberate execution of two unarmed survivors clinging to the wreckage of a suspected narcotics vessel they had just been fired upon.
This was not tough policy.
It was not “self-defence,” as the White House claimed in a statement so threadbare it insulted the intelligence of the nation and the world.
By every moral and legal standard the United States once professed to champion, it was a summary execution.
It was murder.
Let us dismantle the fiction immediately. “Self-defense” implies an imminent threat. A person clinging to splintered wood in open water, after their vessel has been destroyed, presents no such threat. They are combatants rendered hors de combat – out of combat. The Law of Armed Conflict, the Rules of Engagement drilled into every service member, and the fundamental tenets of humanity all scream the same command: you do not fire on the helpless. This was not a split-second decision in a hot firefight; it was a deliberate order from the highest level of the Pentagon to kill defenseless individuals.
Secretary Hegseth, a figure whose previous commentary has often glorified a cartoonish, hyper-aggressive vision of American power, seems to have mistaken the U.S. military for a personal vengeance squad. The mission was interdiction. By all accounts, it was successful – the boat was stopped. The suspects were in the water. At that point, the lawful options are clear: capture and detain, or if logistically impossible, leave them to be retrieved by their own forces or coastal authorities. The one unthinkable, illegal option is to become judge, jury, and executioner from an office in the Pentagon.
The damage here is catastrophic, and it unfolds in layers.
First, it is a deep moral stain. It announces to the world that under this administration, America has abandoned the principle that even its enemies possess an inherent dignity and a right to surrender. America has done the very thing they have historically accused rogue states and terrorists of doing.
Second, it is a tactical and strategic disaster. Every potential adversary, from naval militias to guerrilla forces, now has a potent new recruitment pitch: “The Americans will show you no mercy. They will kill you even if you surrender. Fight to the death.” It endangers every U.S. service member in future engagements, stripping them of the legal and ethical shield that the rules of war are meant to provide.
Third, it shreds the credibility of the U.S. military as a professional institution. The military chain of command exists precisely to prevent such barbarism. The fact that this order was reportedly given, and reportedly followed, suggests a terrifying corrosion of legal and ethical training. Who transmitted the order? Who pulled the trigger? They, too, bear responsibility, but the paramount guilt lies with the Secretary who allegedly issued a manifestly unlawful command.
If talk in Washington is correct, this is not a scandal about policy differences; it is about the crime of murder. Secretary Hegseth is unfit for his office and must be immediately relieved of duty. Furthermore, a full, independent criminal investigation – not an internal Pentagon review – must be convened. If the facts are as reported, he must be charged accordingly.
To do anything less is to become complicit. It is to declare that the United States now stands for the law of the sea only when it is convenient, and for the law of the jungle when it is not. America’s strength has never flowed from ruthlessness, but from their unwavering claim to a higher standard. That standard has not just been compromised; in those bloody waters, it was deliberately and fatally sunk. America must recover it, and that process begins with holding Pete Hegseth accountable to the fullest extent of the law.
No Quarter: The White House’s New ‘War’ Lets the President Kill First — and Pardon Drug Lords Later
December 2, 2025, By: Joshua Scheer, https://scheerpost.com/2025/12/02/no-quarter-the-white-houses-new-war-lets-the-president-kill-first-and-pardon-drug-lords-later/
With the president claiming that we are in an armed conflict with the cartels — and with the AP reporting from a memo it obtained from the administration — the bar is being set incredibly low so that any president can create an “enemy” out of anyone.
Here is some of what the memo said from the AP: “The President determined that the United States is in a non-international armed conflict with these designated terrorist organizations… The United States has now reached a critical point where we must use force in self-defense and defense of others against the ongoing attacks by these designated terrorist organizations.”
The AP also reported the backlash from a number of people, including Michael Schmitt, a former Air Force lawyer and professor emeritus at the U.S. Naval War College, with him saying, “I can’t imagine anyone, no matter what the circumstance, believing it is appropriate to kill people who are clinging to a boat in the water,” and Schmitt added, “That is clearly unlawful.” He also noted that “it has been clear for well over a century that you may not declare what’s called ‘no quarter’ — take no survivors, kill everyone.”
Because of this, right now in Washington the call is for a war-crimes investigation. With the hypocrisy on full display, no matter your political leanings, it is a joke that our President props up a narco-trafficking, unapologetic strongman and yet is willing to go to war with a country he disagrees with politically. The drug war is not needed — its cost, both human and financial, is obscene — and it is much cheaper and more humane to treat drugs as addiction and disease.
But drugs, in this case, are just a pretext for bombing your rivals and enemies. In 2015, we spent 25 billion on the war on drugs, and that was ten years ago; to keep our healthcare subsidies it would have cost 32 billion. This doesn’t seem like a real choice; we just love a good war.
One of those calling for investigation is Virginia Senator Tim Kaine saying on CBS Face the Nation Sunday, “If that reporting is true, it’s a clear violation of the DoD’s own laws of war, as well as international laws about the way you treat people who are in that circumstance,”
He also spoke about his time in Central America and asked the same important question: What’s this really about — the oil? He went on to discuss the hypocritical pardoning actual drug kingpins:
And, needless to say, the offensive duplicitous double standard on full display pardoning of drug kingpin Juan Orlando Hernández proves that this administration only cares about “armed conflicts” with its chosen enemies. It certainly doesn’t care about the threat posed by massive drug traffickers such as this man — whom they have now effectively allowed back into the business. As Hernández himself once said: “[Let’s] stuff the drugs right up the noses of the gringos.”
I will add here, but not diverge: Kaine brought up the fact that oil is a motivating factor. Here is a member of Congress explaining that point, as reported by Common Dreams:
US Rep. María Salazar (R-Fla.) said there were three reasons why “we need to go in” to the South American country. The first, she said, is that “Venezuela, for the American oil companies, will be a field day.”
Progressives on the Hill point out that we have heard this before regarding our invasion of Iraq, which at the time we were told would cost $50 billion and be paid for by oil profits — yet, as of a report from Harvard, it has become a $3 trillion war.
To swing back to today and the current war crimes the White House is standing by the strike. “Admiral Bradley worked well within his authority and the law to ensure the boat was destroyed and the threat to the United States of America was eliminated,” Press Secretary Karoline Leavitt said Monday.
“This administration has designated these narco-terrorists as foreign terrorist organizations,” she continued. “The president has the right to take them out if they are threatening the United States of America, if they are bringing illegal narcotics that are killing our citizens at a record rate, which is what they are doing.”
You can watch her whole press conference here:
Leavitt also said that Hegseth had discussions with members of Congress who were concerned about both the strike and the potential war-crime implications. However, he quickly pivoted to posting memes about the situation — one of which I’ve included below. Needless to say, this behavior is typical of this administration: do whatever they want, defend the action, try to calm people down, and then do whatever they want again.
This “leader” needs to be at a tribunal to answer for killing survivors of this attack — there’s not much more to say. It’s clear that $1 trillion for the military is far too much. We have to ask these questions because if we keep flooding the military with money, we have to justify it — and that justification can lead to actions like this, killing whomever is deemed an enemy. Honestly, we are living in 1984. We’ve been heading down this road for a while, but it has never been so clear.
I remember this quote from the show the west wing discussing war crimes and tribunals and such, “All wars are crimes“
Trump’s buried complicity in lost US proxy war against Russia.
Walt Zlotow, West Suburban Peace Coalition Glen Ellyn IL 2 Dec 25
Trump boasted he’d end the war destroying Ukraine in one day if re-elected. He claimed it was all Biden’s war that Trump had nothing to do with. If only Trump had been reelected in 2020, he claims, there would have been no war gutting Ukraine as a functioning state with tens of millions fled, dead, deserted, injured. The US wouldn’t have squandered over $180 billion to achieve this dubious Biden achievement.
Trump, like every world leader, gets to make history but not rewrite history. Joe Biden was president when Russia launched its Special Military Operation to liberate the Donbas Ukrainians from destruction by Kyiv and keep NATO missiles off Russia’s borders. Biden essentially triggered that totally unnecessary war now in the final stages of Ukraine’s collapse. Biden also sabotaged the peace deal nearly achieved two month in that would have ended the war with no new lost Ukrainian territory.
That will get Biden history’s everlasting condemnation. But Trump also deserves history’s condemnation for ramping up the conditions that led to war under successor Biden. During his first term from 2017 to 2021 Trump kept alive long standing US dream of bringing Ukraine into NATO, a red line Russia warned America not to cross for over a decade prior. Trump authorized repeated NATO military exercises in Ukraine, which effectively made Ukraine a de facto NATO member. Trump allowed new NATO bases in Poland and Romania, adding to Russian angst over NATO encroachment.
Trump reversed a sensible Obama policy of not arming the Kyiv government to complete its destruction of Donbas Ukrainian separatists. In his 4 years Trump oversaw a fourfold increase of Kyiv military might. Had Trump simply reversed senseless US expansion of NATO beginning under Bill Clinton in 1999, and forced Germany, France and UK to honor the Minsk Agreements granting regional autonomy to Donbas Ukrainians, Biden may not have had the conditions or momentum to provoke the February 2022 Russian invasion.
Trump pretends he’s the White Knight bringing peace to a Ukraine wrecked solely by Biden’s perfidy. He should own up to his first term complicity and make peace to atone for his own sins destroying Ukraine as well as those of Joe Biden.
Trump and Rubio’s Venezuela Play: Regime Change Under the Guise of the Drug War.
December 2, 2025, By: Joshua Scheer, https://scheerpost.com/2025/12/02/trump-and-rubios-venezuela-play-regime-change-under-the-guise-of-the-drug-war/
There is a running theme today, but it is vital to understand that what is happening in Venezuela is unacceptable. I have added reporting from Venezuelanalysis.com about the Venezuelan government, which has strongly condemned Donald Trump’s declaration that its airspace is “closed in its entirety,” calling the move a “colonialist threat” and an illegal, unjustified interference in national sovereignty. Caracas emphasized that it will not accept orders or threats from a foreign power.
For more on this war in Venezuela, I’m sharing this from The American Prospect, which discusses Rubio’s intentions in the country:
“But Rubio, long a proponent of Venezuelan regime change, didn’t want things to end there. Appeasing his home state’s exile ring is a rather parochial origin story for an international incursion, but it happens to be true.
Trump was reportedly not buying the pitch until Rubio related it to something the president’s terminally 1980s brain recognizes: the war on drugs. Vaporizing alleged drug boats through summary executions, including what appears to be a patently illegal order for a second strike, has a visceral appeal for Trump. The inconvenient problem is that almost no fentanyl is produced in Venezuela, but fortunately for Rubio, Trump doesn’t read past the first page of the briefing book — and also doesn’t read that page either.”
Adding to the situation on the ground, The Guardian reports that during a phone call with Maduro, Trump said: “You can save yourself and those closest to you, but you must leave the country now.” Trump reportedly made this statement to a leader he has branded a narco-terrorist and baselessly accused of emptying his country’s prisons to send its most violent criminals to the U.S.
Needless to say, the only way this seems to go away is to somehow appease the president maybe a bribe, he certainly appears to respond to that. Otherwise, we need to stop this charade, and we’ll keep posting stories about it until it’s over.
Trump’s Peace With NATO Reinforces Its Purpose: US-Led Global Hegemony
Trump’s hardball tactics have extorted greater allied cooperation and reasserted US domination over the organization.
By Jonathan Ng , Truthout. November 29, 2025, https://truthout.org/articles/trumps-peace-with-nato-reinforces-its-purpose-us-led-global-hegemony/?utm_source=Truthout&utm_campaign=d2f1ccd0ed-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2025_11_29_05_59&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_bbb541a1db-d2f1ccd0ed-650192793
This October, Secretary of War Pete Hegseth dominated the NATO ministerial meeting in Brussels, while pressuring Europeans to assume an even heavier share of the defense burden. Referring to his peers as “ministers of war,” Hegseth demanded that member states purchase additional U.S. arms for Ukraine. “All countries need to translate goals into guns,” he hammered home. “That’s all that matters: hard power.”
Following Hegseth’s lead, NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte is now directing a campaign to secure arms purchase commitments. Rutte emphasizes that he is “proud” of the alliance’s ongoing assistance to Ukraine, noting that Russia has “lost 1 million people — dead or seriously wounded.”
Hegseth’s strongarm tactics and fundraising drive showcase the power dynamics that underlie NATO policymaking. In recent years, the organization has portrayed itself as an alliance of democracies confronting unprovoked aggression in Ukraine and China’s meteoric rise. Yet fundamentally, NATO is a U.S.-dominated forum, rather than a symposium of equals — a reality that Rutte’s relentlessly patient handling of the Trump administration makes clear.
Since 1949, members have exploited the alliance to solidify American global leadership, coordinate interventionism, and contain rivals that challenge Western influence. Rather than promote peace, NATO continues to pose one of the greatest threats to international stability by fueling armed conflicts in Ukraine and across the world.
NATO’s Fascists
NATO often portrays itself as a principled alliance of democracies confronting authoritarian rivals. But historically, the organization has collaborated with far-right intellectuals and statesmen, in order to maintain its military-industrial edge and geopolitical power. Following World War II, U.S. officials protected Wernher von Braun and around 1,500 other Nazi scientists from prosecution, while integrating them into the alliance’s scientific establishment. Eventually, the German General Adolf Heusinger, whose men butchered Jews and tossed children into wells, became a senior NATO commander.
For decades, Spain’s fascist strongman, Francisco Franco, was also an essential alliance partner. Between 1951 and 1953, the United States negotiated the Pact of Madrid, securing access to Spanish military bases and turning the country into a staging ground for NATO operations.
During negotiations, Washington appeared outwardly critical of Franco, while assuring his blood-soaked regime that it prioritized cooperation — a balancing act that insiders labeled a “comedy.” Privately, the U.S. embassy dismissed moral reservations, suggesting that officials approach relations “from a practical, even selfish, point of view,” since collaboration “could pay dividends in our own interest.” After concluding the pact, U.S. authorities praised Spain, a country studded with mass graves, for its “defense of the free world.” And Spanish bases became NATO launchpads in the escalating Cold War.
That came at a cost. In 1966, one of the U.S. Strategic Air Command’s B-52 bombers crashed above Palomares, releasing four hydrogen bombs over the seaside town. Residents remember a scalding wind and enormous fireball bursting over the horizon. “We thought that it was the end of the world,” one explained. The U.S. government promised to clean up the radioactive waste, but instead left the region riddled with plutonium particles. For the Spanish left, Palomares was the victim of NATO, an organization increasingly inseparable from the Franco dictatorship.
Continue readingThe Big-Tech Warmongers’ American Dream
“The United States and its allies abroad should without delay commit to launching a new Manhattan Project in order to retain exclusive control of the most sophisticated forms of AI for the battlefield—the targeting systems and swarms of drones and robots that will become the most powerful weapons of the century.”
“the rise of the West wasn’t due to “the superiority of its ideas or values or religion… but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence.”
by beyondnuclearinternational, https://beyondnuclearinternational.org/2025/11/30/the-big-tech-warmongers-american-dream/
What they envisage would be a nightmare for the rest of us, writes William Hartung
Editor’s note: Since this article was first published on Common Dreams, Elon Musk is no longer wielding the metaphorical axe at DOGE, and DOGE has reportedly been disbanded, but the policies of cuts and purges continues.
Alex Karp, the CEO of the controversial military tech firm Palantir, is the coauthor of a new book, The Technological Republic: Hard Power, Soft Belief, and the Future of the West. In it, he calls for a renewed sense of national purpose and even greater cooperation between government and the tech sector. His book is, in fact, not just an account of how to spur technological innovation, but a distinctly ideological tract.
As a start, Karp roundly criticizes Silicon Valley’s focus on consumer-oriented products and events like video-sharing apps, online shopping, and social media platforms, which he dismisses as “the narrow and the trivial.” His focus instead is on what he likes to think of as innovative big-tech projects of greater social and political consequence. He argues, in fact, that Americans face “a moment of reckoning” in which we must decide “what is this country, and for what do we stand?” And in the process, he makes it all too clear just where he stands—in strong support of what can only be considered a new global technological arms race, fueled by close collaboration between government and industry, and designed to preserve America’s “fragile geopolitical advantage over our adversaries.”
Karp believes that applying American technological expertise to building next-generation weapons systems is not just a but the genuine path to national salvation, and he advocates a revival of the concept of “the West” as foundational for future freedom and collective identity. As Sophie Hurwitz of Mother Jones noted recently, Karp summarized this view in a letter to Palantir shareholders in which he claimed that the rise of the West wasn’t due to “the superiority of its ideas or values or religion… but rather by its superiority in applying organized violence.”
Count on one thing: Karp’s approach, if adopted, will yield billions of taxpayer dollars for Palantir and its militarized Silicon Valley cohorts in their search for AI weaponry that they see as the modern equivalent of nuclear weapons and the key to beating China, America’s current great power rival.
Militarism as a Unifying Force
Karp may be right that this country desperately needs a new national purpose, but his proposed solution is, to put it politely, dangerously misguided.
Ominously enough, one of his primary examples of a unifying initiative worth emulating is World War II’s Manhattan Project, which produced the first atomic bombs. He sees the building of those bombs as both a supreme technological achievement and a deep source of national pride, while conveniently ignoring their world-ending potential. And he proposes embarking on a comparable effort in the realm of emerging military technologies: “The United States and its allies abroad should without delay commit to launching a new Manhattan Project in order to retain exclusive control of the most sophisticated forms of AI for the battlefield—the targeting systems and swarms of drones and robots that will become the most powerful weapons of the century.”
And here’s a question he simply skips: How exactly will the United States and its allies “retain exclusive control” of whatever sophisticated new military technologies they develop? After all, his call for an American AI buildup echoes the views expressed by opponents of the international control of nuclear technology in the wake of the devastating atomic bombings of the Japanese cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki that ended World War II—the futile belief that the United States could maintain a permanent advantage that would cement its role as the world’s dominant military power.
Nearly 80 years later, we continue to live with an enormously costly nuclear arms race—nine countries now possess such weaponry—in which a devastating war has been avoided as much thanks to luck as design. Meanwhile, past predictions of permanent American nuclear superiority have proven to be wishful thinking. Similarly, there’s no reason to assume that predictions of permanent superiority in AI-driven weaponry will prove any more accurate or that our world will be any safer.
Technology Will Not Save Us
Karp’s views are in sync with his fellow Silicon Valley militarists, from Palantir founder Peter Thiel to Palmer Luckey of the up-and-coming military tech firm Anduril to America’s virtual co-president, SpaceX’s Elon Musk. All of them are convinced that, at some future moment, by supplanting old-school corporate weapons makers like Lockheed Martin and Northrop Grumman, they will usher in a golden age of American global primacy grounded in ever better technology. They see themselves as superior beings who can save this country and the world, if only the government—and ultimately, democracy itself—would get out of their way. Not surprisingly, their disdain for government does not extend to a refusal to accept billions and billions of dollars in federal contracts. Their anti-government ideology, of course, is part of what’s motivated Musk’s drive to try to dismantle significant parts of the federal government, allegedly in the name of “efficiency.”
An actual efficiency drive would involve a careful analysis of what works and what doesn’t, which programs are essential and which aren’t, not an across-the-board, sledgehammer approach of the kind recently used to destroy the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), to the detriment of millions of people around the world who depended on its programs for access to food, clean water, and healthcare, including measures to prevent the spread of HIV-AIDS. Internal agency memos released to the press earlier this month indicated that, absent USAID assistance, up to 166,000 children could die of malaria, 200,000 could be paralyzed with polio, and 1 million of them wouldn’t be treated for acute malnutrition. In addition to saving lives, USAID’s programs cast America’s image in the world in a far better light than does a narrow reliance on its sprawling military footprint and undue resort to threats of force as pillars of its foreign policy.
As a military proposition, the idea that swarms of drones and robotic systems will prove to be the new “miracle weapons,” ensuring American global dominance, contradicts a long history of such claims. From the “electronic battlefield” in Vietnam to former President Ronald Reagan’s quest for an impenetrable “Star Wars” shield against nuclear missiles to the Gulf War’s “Revolution in Military Affairs” (centered on networked warfare and supposedly precision-guided munitions), expressions of faith in advanced technology as the way to win wars and bolster American power globally have been misplaced. Either the technology didn’t work as advertised; adversaries came up with cheap, effective countermeasures; or the wars being fought were decided by factors like morale and knowledge of the local culture and terrain, not technological marvels. And count on this: AI weaponry will fare no better than those past “miracles.”
First of all, there is no guarantee that weapons based on immensely complex software won’t suffer catastrophic failure in actual war conditions, with the added risk, as military analyst Michael Klare has pointed out, of starting unnecessary conflicts or causing unintended mass slaughter.
Second, Karp’s dream of “exclusive control” of such systems by the U.S. and its allies is just that—a dream. China, for instance, has ample resources and technical talent to join an AI arms race, with uncertain results in terms of the global balance of power or the likelihood of a disastrous U.S.-China conflict.
Third, despite Pentagon pledges that there will always be a “human being in the loop” in the use of AI-driven weaponry, the drive to wipe out enemy targets as quickly as possible will create enormous pressure to let the software, not human operators, make the decisions. As Biden administration Air Force Secretary Frank Kendall put it, “If you have a human in the loop, you will lose.”
Automated weapons will pose tremendous risks of greater civilian casualties and, because such conflicts could be waged without putting large numbers of military personnel at risk, may only increase the incentive to resort to war, regardless of the consequences for civilian populations.
What Should America Stand For?
Technology is one thing. What it’s used for, and why, is another matter. And Karp’s vision of its role seems deeply immoral. The most damning real-world example of the values Karp seeks to promote can be seen in his unwavering support for Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza. Not only were Palantir’s systems used to accelerate the pace of the Israeli Defense Force’s murderous bombing campaign there, but Karp himself has been one of the most vocal supporters of the Israeli war effort. He went so far as to hold a Palantir board meeting in Israel just a few months into the Gaza war in an effort to goad other corporate leaders into publicly supporting Israel’s campaign of mass killing.
Are these really the values Americans want to embrace? And given his stance, is Karp in any position to lecture Americans on values and national priorities, much less how to defend them?
Despite the fact that his company is in the business of enabling devastating conflicts, his own twisted logic leads Karp to believe that Palantir and the military-tech sector are on the side of the angels. In May 2024, at the “AI Expo for National Competitiveness,” he said of the student-encampment movement for a cease-fire in Gaza, “The peace activists are war activists. We are the peace activists.”
Invasion of the Techno-Optimists
And, of course, Karp is anything but alone in promoting a new tech-driven arms race. Elon Musk, who has been empowered to take a sledgehammer to large parts of the U.S. government and vacuum up sensitive personal information about millions of Americans, is also a major supplier of military technology to the Pentagon. And Vice President JD Vance, Silicon Valley’s man in the White House, was employed, mentored, and financed by Palantir founder Peter Thiel before joining the Trump administration.
The grip of the military-tech sector on the Trump administration is virtually unprecedented in the annals of influence-peddling, beginning with Elon Musk’s investment of an unprecedented $277 million in support of electing Donald Trump and Republican candidates for Congress in 2024. His influence then carried over into the presidential transition period, when he was consulted about all manner of budgetary and organizational issues, while emerging tech gurus like Marc Andreessen of the venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz became involved in interviewing candidates for sensitive positions at the Pentagon. Today, the figure who is second-in-charge at the Pentagon, Stephen Feinberg of Cerberus Capital, has a long history of investing in military firms, including the emerging tech sector.
But by far the greatest form of influence is Musk’s wielding of the essentially self-created Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) to determine the fate of federal agencies, programs, and employees, despite the fact that he has neither been elected to any position, nor even confirmed by Congress, and that he now wields more power than all of Trump’s cabinet members combined.
As Alex Karp noted—no surprise here, of course—in a February 2025 call with Palantir investors, he’s a big fan of the DOGE, even if some people get hurt along the way: “We love disruption, and whatever’s good for America will be good for Americans and very good for Palantir. Disruption, at the end of the day, exposes things that aren’t working. There will be ups and downs. There’s a revolution. Some people are going to get their heads cut off. We’re expecting to see really unexpected things and to win.”
Even as Musk disrupts and destroys civilian government agencies, some critics of Pentagon overspending hold out hope that at least he will put his budget-cutting skills to work on that bloated agency. But so far the plan there is simply to shift money within the department, not reduce its near-trillion-dollar top line. And if anything is trimmed, it’s likely to involve reductions in civilian personnel, not lower spending on developing and building weaponry, which is where firms like Palantir make their money. Musk’s harsh critique of existing systems like Lockheed’s F-35 jet fighter—which he described as “the worst military value for money in history”—is counterbalanced by his desire to get the Pentagon to spend far more on drones and other systems based on emerging (particularly AI) technologies.
Of course, any ideas about ditching older weapons systems will run up against fierce resistance in Congress, where jobs, revenues, campaign contributions, and armies of well-connected lobbyists create a firewall against reducing spending on existing programs, whether they have a useful role to play or not. And whatever DOGE suggests, Congress will have the last word. Key players like Sen. Roger Wicker (R-Miss.) have already revived the Reaganite slogan of “peace through strength” to push for an increase of—no, this is not a misprint!—$150 billion in the Pentagon’s already staggering budget over the next four years.
What Should Our National Purpose Be?
Karp and his Silicon Valley colleagues are proposing a world in which government-subsidized military technology restores American global dominance and gives us a sense of renewed national purpose. It is, in fact, a remarkably impoverished vision of what the United States should stand for at this moment in history when non-military challenges like disease, climate change, racial and economic injustice, resurgent authoritarianism, and growing neofascist movements pose greater dangers than traditional military threats.
Technology has its place, but why not put our best technical minds to work creating affordable alternatives to fossil fuels, a public health system focused on the prevention of pandemics and other major outbreaks of disease, and an educational system that prepares students to be engaged citizens, not just cogs in an economic machine?
Reaching such goals would require reforming or even transforming our democracy—or what’s left of it—so that the input of the public actually made far more of a difference, and leadership served the public interest, not its own economic interests. In addition, government policy would no longer be distorted to meet the emotional needs of narcissistic demagogues, or to satisfy the desires of delusional tech moguls.
By all means, let’s unite around a common purpose. But that purpose shouldn’t be a supposedly more efficient way to build killing machines in the service of an outmoded quest for global dominance. Karp’s dream of a “technological republic” armed with his AI weaponry would be one long nightmare for the rest of us.
The architecture of a vassal: how US bases in Australia project power, not protection.
2 December 2025 Andrew Klein, https://theaimn.net/the-architecture-of-a-vassal-how-us-bases-in-australia-project-power-not-protection/
The strategic placement of key US and joint military facilities across Australia reveals a pattern not of national defence, but of integration into a global, offensively-oriented network for force projection and intelligence gathering. An analysis of their locations and functions demonstrates that these bases are designed to serve the strategic interests of a superpower, often at the expense of Australian sovereignty and security.
The Official Rationale: A Volatile Region and the Strategy of Denial
According to official Australian government assessments, the strategic environment is increasingly volatile, characterised by falling international cooperation, rising competition, and uncertainty about US reliability. In response, Australia’s National Defence Strategy: 2024 has adopted a “strategy of denial,” emphasising deterrence as its primary objective. This policy shift is used to justify initiatives such as:
- Acquiring nuclear-powered submarines through AUKUS.
- Upgrading and expanding northern military bases.
- Acquiring new long-range strike capabilities.
The public-facing logic is that longer-range weapons have overturned Australia’s geographic advantage, making the “sea-air gap” to the north a vulnerability. However, a closer examination of the specific facilities tells a different story.
Pine Gap: The Beating Heart of Global Surveillance
The Joint Defence Facility Pine Gap, near Alice Springs, is the most prominent example. Ostensibly a joint facility, it is a critical node in US global intelligence. Its functions extend far beyond any defensive mandate for Australia.
- Global Signals Intelligence: Pine Gap acts as a ground control and processing station for US geosynchronous signals intelligence (SIGINT) satellites. These satellites monitor a vast swath of the Eastern Hemisphere, collecting data including missile telemetry, anti-aircraft radar signals, and communications from mobile phones and microwave transmissions.
- Warfighting and Targeted Killing: Information from Pine Gap is not merely for analysis. It is used to geolocate targets for military action. The base has played a direct role in US drone strikes and has provided intelligence in conflicts from Vietnam and the Gulf War to the ongoing wars in Gaza. Experts testify that data downlinked at Pine Gap is passed to the US National Security Agency and then to allies like the Israel Defense Forces, potentially implicating Australia in international conflicts without public knowledge or parliamentary oversight.
- A History of Secrecy and Sovereignty Betrayed: The base’s history is marked by breaches of Australian sovereignty. During the 1973 Yom Kippur War, the US government placed Pine Gap on nuclear alert (DEFCON 3) without informing Australian Prime Minister Gough Whitlam. Whitlam’s subsequent consideration of closing the base was followed by his dramatic dismissal in 1975, an event that former CIA officers have linked to US fears over losing access to the facility.
Northern Bases: Launchpads for Power Projection
The network of bases across Australia’s north forms an arc designed for forward operations, not homeland defence.
- RAAF Base Tindal: This base in the Northern Territory is undergoing upgrades to host US B-52 strategic bombers. This transformation turns Australian territory into a forward operating location for long-range strike missions deep into Asia, fundamentally changing the nation’s role from a sovereign state to a launching pad for another power’s offensive operations.
- Marine Rotational Force – Darwin: The stationing of up to 2,500 US Marines in Darwin functions as a persistent force projection and logistics hub, enhancing the US ability to rapidly deploy forces into the Southeast Asian region.
- NW Cape (Harold E. Holt): The facility in Exmouth, Western Australia, hosts advanced space radar and telescopes for “space situational awareness.” This contributes to US space warfare and communications capabilities, a global mission with little direct relation to the defence of Australia’s population centres.
The True Cost: Compromised Sovereignty and Incurred Risk
This integration into a superpower’s military apparatus comes with severe, often unacknowledged, costs.
- The Loss of Sovereign Control: The operational control of these critical facilities is often ceded to the United States. At Pine Gap, the chief of the facility is a senior CIA officer, and certain sections, such as the NSA’s cryptology room, are off-limits to Australian personnel. This creates a situation where activities conducted on Australian soil are not fully known or controlled by the Australian government.
- Becoming a Nuclear Target: The critical importance of bases like Pine Gap to US global military dominance makes them high-priority targets in the event of a major conflict. By hosting these facilities, Australia voluntarily assumes the risk of being drawn into a nuclear exchange, a strategic decision made without public debate.
- Complicity in International Conflicts: As the protests and legal actions surrounding Pine Gap’s role in Gaza highlight, Australia faces legal and moral accusations of complicity in actions that may constitute war crimes or genocide. This places the nation in direct opposition to international law and global public opinion, all for the sake of an alliance that often prioritises US interests.
Conclusion: From Independent Ally to Integrated Base
The evidence is clear: the strategic network of US-linked bases in Australia is not primarily for the nation’s defence. It is the architecture of a vassal state, designed to service the global force projection and intelligence-gathering needs of a superpower. From the satellite surveillance of Pine Gap to the bomber forward deployment at Tindal, these facilities entangle Australia in conflicts far beyond its shores, compromise its sovereignty, and incur immense strategic risks. Until this fundamental reality is confronted, Australian defence policy will continue to serve an empire’s interests, not its own.
References…………………
Legal Experts Accuse Hegseth of ‘War Crimes, Murder, or Both’ After New Reporting on Boat Strike Order
Two Republican-controlled committees also said they were opening investigations into the defense secretary’s alleged order to “kill everybody” aboard a boat in the Caribbean in September—the first of nearly two dozen strikes.
Julia Conley, Nov 30, 2025
Former top military lawyers on Saturday said that new reporting on orders personally given by US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth in early September, when the military struck the first of nearly two dozen boats in the Caribbean, suggests Hegseth has committed “war crimes, murder, or both.”
The Former Judge Advocates General (JAGs) Working Group, which includes former officials who served as legal advisers for the military, issued a statement in response to the Washington Post‘s reporting on the September 2 attack on a boat in the Caribbean—the first strike on a vessel in an ongoing operation that the Trump administration has claimed is aimed at stopping drug trafficking.
The Post reported for the first time on the directive Hegseth gave to Special Operations commanders as intelligence analysts reported that their surveillance had confirmed the 11 people aboard the boat were carrying drugs to the US—an alleged crime that, in the past and in accordance with international law, would have prompted US agencies to intercept the vessel, confiscate any illegal substances that were found, and arrest those on board.
But as the Trump administration began its boat bombing campaign, the order Hegseth gave “was to kill everybody,” one of the intelligence analysts told the Post.
After the first missile strike, the officials realized that two of the passengers had survived the blast—prompting a Special Operations commander to initiate a second strike to comply with Hegseth’s order.
The Former JAGs Working Group, which was established in February in response to Hegseth’s firing of Army and Air Force JAGs, said that the dismissal of the military’s top legal advisers set the stage for the defense secretary’s order and the continued bombing of boats in the Caribbean and the eastern Pacific, which have now killed more than 80 people.
Hegseth’s “systematic dismantling of the military’s legal guardrails” led to the formation of the working group, pointed out the former JAGs. “Had those guardrails been in place, we are confident they would have prevented these crimes.”
The working group said Hegseth’s order to “kill everybody” could be understood in one of two ways—a demand for the US military to carry out a clear war crime, or for those involved in the operation to commit murder:
If the US military operation to interdict and destroy suspected narcotrafficking vessels is a “non-international armed conflict,” as the Trump administration suggests, orders to “kill everybody,” which can reasonably be regarded as an order to give “no quarter,” and to “double-tap” a target in order to kill survivors, are clearly illegal under international law. In short, they are war crimes.
If the US military operation is not an armed conflict of any kind, these orders to kill helpless civilians clinging to the wreckage of a vessel our military destroyed would subject everyone from [the defense secretary] down to the individual who pulled the trigger to prosecution under US law for murder.
The Post‘s reporting comes less than two weeks after NBC News revealed that Senior Judge Advocate General (JAG) Paul Meagher, a Marine colonel at US Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) in Miami, had spoken out against the plans to begin bombing boats in the Caribbean, specifically warning in August that the operations would make service members liable for extrajudicial killing.
Following the Post‘s report, Republican-controlled House and Senate committees said they were investigating the allegations regarding Hegseth’s order, which the defense secretary dismissed on Friday as “fabricated, inflammatory, and derogatory reporting……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………… https://www.commondreams.org/news/pete-hegseth-boat
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