back in my map era, we’re ukrainemaxxing right now
Declarations of the imminent doom of Ukraine are a news megathread specialty, and this is not what I am doing here - mostly because I’m convinced that whenever we do so, the war extends another three months to spite us. Ukraine has been in an essentially apocalyptic crisis for over a year now after the failure of the 2023 counteroffensive, unable to make any substantial progress and resigned to merely being a persistent nuisance (and arms market!) as NATO fights to the last Ukrainian. In this context, predicting a terminal point is difficult, as things seem to always be going so badly that it’s hard to understand how and why they fight on. In every way, Ukraine is a truly shattered country, barely held together by the sheer combined force of Western hegemony. And that hegemony is weakening.
I therefore won’t be giving any predictions of a timeframe for a Ukrainian defeat, but the coming presidency of Trump is a big question mark for the conflict. Trump has talked about how he wishes for the war to end and for a deal to be made with Putin, but Trump also tends to change his mind on an issue at least three or four times before actually making a decision, simply adopting the position of who talked to him last. And, of course, his ability to end the war might be curtailed by a military-industrial complex (and various intelligence agencies) that want to keep the money flowing.
The alignment of the US election with the accelerating rate of Russian gains is pretty interesting, with talk of both escalation and de-escalation coinciding - the former from Biden, and the latter from Trump. Russia very recently performed perhaps the single largest aerial attack of Ukraine of the entire war, striking targets across the whole country with missiles and drones from various platforms. In response, the US is talking about allowing Ukraine to hit long-range targets in Russia (but the strategic value of this, at this point, seems pretty minimal).
Additionally, Russia has made genuine progress in terms of land acquisition. We aren’t talking about endless and meaningless battles over empty fields anymore. Some of the big Ukrainian strongholds that we’ve been spending the last couple years speculating over - Chasiv Yar, Kupiansk, Orikhiv - are now being approached and entered by Russian forces. The map is actually changing now, though it’s hard to tell as Ukraine is so goddamn big.
Attrition has finally paid off for Russia. An entire generation of Ukrainians has been fed into the meat grinder. Recovery will take, at minimum, decades - more realistically, the country might be permanently ruined, until that global communist revolution comes around at least. And they could have just made a fucking deal a month into the war.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel’s destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Betting pool
- Russia strikes a Polish supply depot near the Ukrainian border
- Decapitation strike that kills Zelenskyy
- Houthis get a carrier killer
- Cuba gets the bomb again
- atmospheric nuke test
- “did I say a red line? It’s more of a red guideline.”
Iran could also get the bomb, and/or North Korea could get a miniaturised version of the bomb for use in their Short Range Ballistic Missiles (SRBMs) and for MIRV warheads for their new ICBM with over 15 000km range.
I think Ansar Allah/The Houthis getting advanced anti ship supersonic cruise missiles is the most likely option, Hezbollah got 12 of them at one stage.
It’s a very symmetrical response but it would piss of the Saudi’s
Ukraine just hit a military installation in Bryansk with ATACMS missiles in the early hours of this morning, five intercepted but one got through according to the Russian MOD. Putin has also signed Russia’s updated nuclear doctrine into law, allowing for a nuclear response to a large scale non nuclear attack by a non nuclear state, aided by a nuclear state.
Russian MoD statement:
Translation of Russian MoD statement
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Tonight at 3.25 a.m. the enemy struck a facility on the territory of the Bryansk region with six ballistic missiles.
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According to confirmed information, American-made ATACMS operational-tactical ballistic missiles were used.
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As a result of an anti-missile battle by S-400 SAMs and Pantsir SAMs, five missiles were shot down and one was damaged.
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Its fragments fell on the technical territory of a military facility in the Bryansk region, causing a fire, which was promptly extinguished.
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There were no casualties or damage.
Russian Ministry of Defence
The statement appears in contradiction with the latest video from the area, showing a clear explosion. It seems as if the damaged missile got through for a direct hit. Or there were some secondary explosions from debris. Either way, there is clear damage done should the footage be legitimate.
What is Ukraine smoking. It seems theyre happy to get nuked for daddy Amerikkka. And Zelensky and the ruling class that he represents are complete traitors to Ukrainians.
This has been part of Zelensky’s five and ten point plans for a while. He really is that delusional.
True he’s out of his mind.
And I’m sure That NATO membership is in the mail
Why does America want Russia to use nukes so badly?
Losing New York under a Trump admin will really fire up the base
Hopefully that entire DPRK military sized NYPD budget went towards missile defense
fuck
i was just about to go to bed and all, hope i wake up lol
Remember to fill your water bottle before going to bed
done <3
and 
wrote the theory, 
and 
do the praxis.I’m seriously concerned, but this is really funny
As I learnt a long time ago, if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry.
Also technically
did both the theory and praxis, he wrote a book about bombing Russian oil and gas pipelines, and then he actually did it with regards to Nordstream.I am also very worried to be honest.
When Waterkloof Air Force Base and Makhado Air Force Base eventually get nuked during the eventual nuclear exchange, I’m going to enjoy seeing the nuclear hellfire live before my painful and hellish death. Maybe I’ll just watch up close from the hillsides so I’ll die instantly, seems like the best way to go.
In all seriousness though, this is very worrying.
Biden’s going to get us all nuked.I think the most interesting part of this is that the S400s have grossly underperformed.
A single S400 battery should have taken down every single one of these. Letting one through is a huge embarrassment and a bad sign that the S400 might underperform expectations.
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Let’s see if this Russian redline was a bluff or not
I have a question: how many red lines did Russia lay out that eventually got violated?
deleted by creator
US congressmen calls to sanction Ben Gravir and Smotrich
also grovels for Pissreal’s right to genocide “defend itself yadda hostages yadda”I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
The NYT has leaked a story by accidentally CC’ing Electronic Intifada.
Apparently, they killed a “visual investigation” into the recent Israeli hooligans in the Netherlands, presumably because it would go against their narrative of anti-Semitism at the event. Keep in mind that it was the Times that recently claimed a video of Israeli fans attacking a Dutch citizen was the opposite.
Seems like the nyt journalist whose story got squashed definitely leaked it on purpose, right?
transphobia mention
As much as I like Norm Finklestein on Palestine, he is such a boomer when it comes to wokeism or trans people.
What redneck hillbilly cares about trans people having access to puberty blockers? Dems didn’t campaign on that. If you ask hillbillies if they support puberty blockers, they’ll 100% say “what’s that?”
And whenever Norm talks about Palestine he will meticulously talk about his sources, UN, HRW etc. But he just says that puberty blockers are bad for you is backed by “overwhelming evidence” with no sources. Biology isn’t his field.
And I don’t agree that Trump can’t be a fascist strongman dictator because Supreme Court will prevent that and because US has no “left”.
It is true, US has no significant left wing opposition, however, fascism wasn’t just about fighting the leftists, it also meant othering of minorities and directing the public anger towards them.
it also meant othering of minorities and directing the public anger towards them.
to divert them from the extremely militant leftist movement
I think he has a point that capital doesn’t really NEED fascism because the center doesn’t need violence to repress workers. Biden calls off the strike, threatens to call the national guard and the strike is off. They don’t need paramilitary thugs to mantain the capital order
This is what always happens with liberals who happen to have good takes on things that liberals typically have bad takes on.
IMO he’s just an old fart. He’s never been a liberal, he started his career as a Maoist and has always defended the Soviet Union, the PFLP, and other official bad guys. I wish he could apply dialectical materialism to gender as well as he can to mostly everything else, but he’s too stuck in the past.
They compensate elsewhere?
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
Wonder if we’ll see more H5N1s than usual with the uptick in holiday turkeys coming soon
biden pardons a sick turkey, contracts bird flu
user squarecoats1 on twitter has made a map with all of the contractors and subcontractors in the US involved in many of the weapons and materiel being used in the genocide, including hellfire missiles and F35s. there’s a lot of nitty gritty details in here, nearly 700 locations on the map, tracking who makes even the smallest parts of some of this stuff. they have also included a spreadsheet with the raw data that users can pore through since the site where they uploaded the map only allows 1000 visitors per month. pretty interesting
Missing Puerto Rico which has Lockheed Martin, Honeywell, Northrop Grumman, RTX, Boeing, Pratt and Whitney, etc.
Why does PR have like a thousand arms manufacturers? Cheapest labor inside the US where the locals are US citizens. Other unincorporated territories didn’t get the Jones act. Any sensitive work that requires clearance winds up incentivizes to operate in PR for the extreme wage difference, it’s the periphery within the core.
This is super useful
Cinia, the Finnish state operator of the 1,200km C-Lion1 fibre optic cable between Helsinki in Finland and Rostock in Germany, said it had been cut early on Monday morning in the Baltic Sea close to Sweden and was almost certainly the result of an “external force”.
If you didn’t want to lose stuff underwater you shouldn’t have named your city Helsinki
External to what? External to the cable?
My vote is inexplicable alien contact event from beyond our comprehensible reality - The Zone, but underwater.
Or literally anything that reduces their liability.
The cable just did that I call it “the no comically large scissors theory”
Who would commit such act of sabotage in Nato sea? I know, must be those evil russians.
spoiler
Does anyone following the Myanmar civil war know anything that contradict this news about how China has detained one of the Myanmar ethnic force’s leader to force them into talks with the current junta (as well as cutting off access to water, electricty to ethnic forces) ?
It seems objectively bad and goes against their supposed non-interference policy.
The editor-in-chief of this magazine is a known anti-China ghoul. Safe to take this news with an ocean full of salt until you see something reputable corroborating it
Definitely would not trust this outlet. Just some quick Googling and MHT Corporation seems really sus too
Open hexbear
see map
Feb 2022Article
The president-elect’s approach raises questions about the implications of utilizing military personnel in several activities, particularly in the context of immigration enforcement.
In a significant development regarding immigration policy, President-elect Donald Trump confirmed on Monday that his controversial plan for mass deportations of undocumented immigrants will involve a national emergency declaration and the mobilization of military resources. This announcement has sparked intense debate and concern among various sectors of the American public, as well as human rights organizations.
In an early-morning post on social media, Trump responded affirmatively to a conservative activist who claimed to have heard reports about the potential use of military forces in deportation efforts. Trump’s succinct reply—“TRUE!!!”—has fueled speculation about the extent of his administration’s plans to address illegal immigration, a central theme of his campaign.
The president-elect’s approach raises questions about the implications of utilizing military personnel in domestic law enforcement activities, particularly in the context of immigration enforcement. As Trump prepares to take office, he is also focusing on his Cabinet selections, with more announcements expected in the coming days. His earlier choices have faced significant scrutiny and backlash.
The prospect of deploying military forces for mass deportations has alarmed many advocates for immigrant rights, who argue that such actions could lead to widespread fear and instability within communities. They contend that using the military in this capacity could violate civil liberties and undermine the rule of law. Additionally, there are concerns about the potential for increased tensions between immigrant communities and law enforcement agencies.
As the nation grapples with these developments, it remains to be seen how Trump’s administration will navigate the complex landscape of immigration policy and what impact these decisions will have on millions of undocumented immigrants living in the United States.
That would be something. I think in normal circunstances the government probably doesn’t actually have the capacity to actually deport as many people as year as a “mass deportation” implies, and it probably differs state by state. The US can only really deport x people a year
I guess if they REALLY mobilize, use the army and whatever else the emergency declaration allows for in theory they could do it…but this is the type of shit that politicizes the army and generals probably don’t want.
Trump’s succinct reply—“TRUE!!!”—has fueled speculation about the extent of his administration’s plans to address illegal immigration, a central theme of his campaign.
Is this the boomerang coming around?
