The calls for war from the European NATO countries are increasingly pathetic. They will not commit themselves (wisely) and Trump will not significantly involve the US. But they have left themselves nowhere else to go (politically).

Posted by: Pete Jones | May 27 2025 14:56 utc | 1

Just making a bunch of noise to try and remain relevant. Lots of kicking and screaming now that they know Ukraine is on the verge of collapse. Soon the news will be that Ukraine wasn't important anyway.

Posted by: Watzov | May 27 2025 15:01 utc | 2

does anyone know a good history forum to learn more about the history of ukraine (and everything else?) this is a good forum to learn because people mention a lot of history here but I was just wondering if theres another one where it isnt always necessarily particularly directly tied to current events. thanks.

Posted by: borg | May 27 2025 15:03 utc | 3

The West has ran out of room for proxy escalation a long time ago. All they can do now is to _pretend they are doing something new_ by saying the same things over and over again.

Posted by: boneless | May 27 2025 15:03 utc | 4

Seems it’s been a busy day for independent content creators.
1| I personally love to see cross-over ~ “collobs” (collaborations).
So. First out of the blocks is “new kid on the block” Sean Foo, whose yt channel has rapidly risen through the algorithm hi-jinx since Trump started his Opera Winfrey style sanctions {you get a sanction, and you get a sanction, every gets a sanction!!! Cue mindspitting decibels from the adoring audience}
Sean Foo is doing a collab with Glenn Deisen
[Sean Foo is a financial analyst and a China expert. Foo discusses how the tariffs are weakening the dollar and threatening the US bond market, and why the US tech war results in losing an indispensable market share in China]
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KG0c8FPPy8k

2| Is @bar favourite, Brian Berletic at the New Atlas
US Launders Escalation Through Europe as Russia Buries Ukraine in Missiles & Drones
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LLGcNBBr25I

3| Is also a Glenn Deisen. This time with Richard Wolfe
Richard Wolff: Why the Anti-Russian Sanctions Failed
>>Professor Richard Wolff outlines why the West's anti-Russian sanctions failed. Hubris, ideology, lack of strategic focus, and wishful thinking resulted in the failure to appreciate the strength of the Russian economy and the ability to diversify economic connectivity with the rise of BRICS.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nWpHc_6Pqmc

4| Sean Foo on his own channel
China Orders Banks To Cancel USD Trade, Rejects U.S. Demand To Cut Exports, BYD Corners Tesla
>>In a defiant move, China is not obeying US orders to cancel their export economy. In fact, Beijing is moving ahead to cancel USD in their global cross-border trade, ordering their banks to use more RMB. Meanwhile, Tesla is being challenged globally by BYD's competitiveness, their sales are still collapsing.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2pAQe7gxENM

5| This one might activate the @barfly military types … posting as a conversation starter:
Military Gear channel
ALERT! Russia Deploys New S8000 Banderol Cruise Missile in Ukraine! Russia’s newest cruise missile, the S8000 Banderol, is stirring alarm among global defense analysts due to its stealthy design and deployment from UAV platforms like the Orion drone.
Reportedly already in use in the Ukraine conflict, this low-cost, highly maneuverable weapon is designed to evade radar and defeat modern air defense systems with sharp turns, a slim body, and long-range strike capability.
Powered by the SW800Pro-A95 turbojet engine and protected by Kometa-M8 electronic warfare tech, the Banderol carries a 150-kg warhead over distances of 500 km, potentially changing the future of air-to-ground warfare. With reports confirming sightings in Odesa and no official denials from either side, the Banderol may represent the next evolution of cruise missile warfare, raising critical questions: Can it be stopped—and if so, how?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BxHUQPCGfSM

6| I’m never above a damn good “I told you so”. And I’m enjoying the Schadenfreude of watching old mate WillyOAM squirm from painful cognitive dissonance.
Huge Losses & Massive Strikes | You’ve Been Lied To - Time For Accountability | Ukraine Map Update
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6Spw7uJ8puk

Posted by: Melaleuca | May 27 2025 15:07 utc | 5

I understand that the Taurus system cannot be used without the USA's ISR etc. So what is the use of supplying them if and unless the USA support such a move? And this implies that they do, hence Trump's pivot "Putin has gone mad" [sic]. Nothing appears to have changed. Kellogg persauded Trump that Russia would fold, Russia did not - in fact told the USA to stick it where the sun is dimmest in very diplomatic language - so now we are back to Project Ukraine and what will be the ultimate defeat of Ukraine and NATO Or so it might seem unless Mr T listens to someone who has an ounce of sense.

Posted by: marcjf | May 27 2025 15:14 utc | 6

@borg

Not quite answering your question, but for historical background relevant to the conflict look for videos with Ivan Katchanovski. He is probably the most objective commentator about the background of the conflict, but his English is difficult to understand. Also videos from Jacques Baud re: Crimea.

Posted by: schmoe | May 27 2025 15:18 utc | 7

To call them "media" seems misleading.
The "media" would be independent actors providing a service to the public - its customers.

Rather this would be a quasi-government agency/service - emulating a "news" service.
"Ministry of Truth" would apply as would "Fake News", but needs to be something a little less conspiratorial - so that one would not draw the attention of the regulators.

Posted by: jared | May 27 2025 15:21 utc | 8

It’s important to Say-Their-Names—-Novenke, Basivka, Vesilivka & Zhuravka—-all the villages Regime Media in the West treat as Flyover Country when Russian Forces liberate them: Popo Yar, Romanovka and Poltava.

The impressive gains which Russia has notched just since DJT returned to the White House, including the massive defeat of AFU/NATO mercs in the Kursk Region, don’t register as blips on the radar screen of hype-media outlets because there’s something bland & uninteresting about mulching the enemy through complex topography and complicated terrain—-especially when it’s *Russia* mulching the enemy.

Last summer, John Helmer dubbed the SMO an “Electrical War” when Russia was decimating Ukraine’s power grid.

This summer, we’re seeing the “Terrain War”—not a war *for* terrain, though that is happening too, so much as a war governed by terrain features and the contours of geography: forest plantations, braided rivers, bluffs & ridges, reservoirs.

In contending w/ such unabashedly earthen features, the SMO is moving to its most fundamental. It *fits* the place, the landscape, the environment—-and that is key.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 15:33 utc | 9

Certainly, UK and France lifted range restrictions earlier, and so did the self propelled granddad when leaving his bed..oops office. Yet there are at least indications that some restrictions got reinstated by the new US administration.

And in fact, those teutonic warcries by Merz sound disquieting. It was not France, Britain, or the US who murdered 27 million Soviet citizens during WWII. That the green Nazi grandchildren lack any reluctance and decency, much less diplomacy, is nothing new. But some conservative behaving as a drunken brawler is definitely more reason for concern.

Actually, vice chancellor Klingbeil contradicted Merz, stating that nothing changed concerning use of German long range weaponry. That was dropping the gauntlet and making clear that the coalition may break over Taurus.

Posted by: aquadraht | May 27 2025 15:33 utc | 10

Dmitry Polyansky, Russia's deputy ambassador to the UN, has requested a Security Council meeting to address "what seems an attempt by EU countries" to derail the Peace Memorandum talks by giving Kiev license, "not bound by any restrictions" to strike targets deep into Russian territory using EU-supplied weapons.

The session will take place @ 10am on Friday @ the UN in east Manhattan---and will focus on "threats to international peace" posed by Ukraine's EU curators.

Yes, yes, I know: the UN is toothless.
Got it.

But Polyansky sees a Sec Council meeting as a way to keep this topic afloat, "even at the risk of misjudging the tone favored by the new administration," as Polyansky put it, meaning of course the DJT team.

Rather than posting feckless *mean tweets* and letting social media stir the pot, laying out one's case before the Sec Council is a more elegant way of assuring that Russia's interests and military rational receive an appropriate level of attention.

It is also a way to explore publicly, but in a dignified setting, the thoughts/notions/ideas that Russia could conceivably target Berlin, Paris, London as a retaliatory measure in response to the EU curators tricking Kiev out w/ the kinds of payloads capable of hitting Moscow.

Calling the Sec Council meeting @ the UN serves as a not-so-subtle warning.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 15:35 utc | 11

It frustrates me a bit that the Russian have let this continue as long as they have with the reserved, measured responses. It's neutralized the deterrent factor a bit, in my opinion. They MUST understand that Americans are rattlesnakes who will never, ever, stop trying to bite them...and their venom is the reserve currency ponzi dollars. I suppose they are letting the Americans bite themselves out.

Posted by: chunga | May 27 2025 15:43 utc | 12

It frustrates me a bit that the Russian have let this continue as long as they have with the reserved, measured responses.

Posted by: chunga | May 27 2025 15:43 utc | 12

They don't care about the deterrent factor as the West poses no substantive threat short of nuclear war. The slow, steady progress achieves all of their objectives, INCLUDING attriting the West. Time is entirely on their side.

Posted by: TJandTheBear | May 27 2025 15:49 utc | 13

Thank you, b.

It makes me sick at heart to see how avid for WWIII so many seem to be.

I think it's a cross between an inability to see war as anything more actual than a good movie and the human desire to stop the constant fear and instability becoming SO intense it votes for nukes for relief from feeling anything at all.

Posted by: nines | May 27 2025 15:56 utc | 14

It frustrates me a bit that the Russian have let this continue as long as they have with the reserved, measured responses.

Posted by: chunga | May 27 2025 15:43 utc | 12

The real war is in the currency field. Chinese Iran rail link,China Indonesia trade agreement in Yuan are some evidence of progress made in that war. This is only a battlefront of that larger war which will result in the power shift to the East.

Posted by: Michael J | May 27 2025 15:58 utc | 15

Deterrent factor is not a bad thing. The guy over their in N. Korea works it pretty good. And if anybody was arming countries around the US, shooting at them, the Americans would go berserk and immediately bomb everyone, bridges, schools, hospitals, civilians, you name it. The population would demand this from their sofas. All Americans know how to do is bite and they will never stop on their own. Ever.

Posted by: chunga | May 27 2025 16:01 utc | 16

"As far as I know, and I repeated it yesterday, the countries that imposed range restrictions have long since abandoned these conditions. Therefore, yesterday in Berlin I described what happened several months ago, namely that Ukraine has the right to use the weapons it receives, including outside its borders, against military targets on Russian territory," Merz said at a joint press conference with Finnish Prime Minister Petteri Orpo.

Posted by b on May 27, 2025 at 14:51 UTC | Permalink

---

The three little sentences that will get you through life. Number 1: Cover for me. Number 2: Oh, good idea, Boss! Number 3: It was like that when I got here.

Homer Simpson: [to Bart]

Posted by: too scents | May 27 2025 16:01 utc | 17

In Canada's 'speech from the throne' today, delivered by King Charles III on behalf of the Carney government, it was announced that Canada would be take part in REARM EUROPE - the European initiative on continuation of proxy war against Russia in Ukraine.

Posted by: JohnGilberts | May 27 2025 16:04 utc | 18

It was Germany under the former Chancellor that denied the use of long range strikes with the Taurus.
Hence, the change of posture now is not something that was decided months ago.

Posted by: scc | May 27 2025 16:09 utc | 19

Melaleuca | May 27 2025 15:07 utc | 5--

Crooke's chat today with Napolitano must be added to your very fine listing since he's just returned to Italy from St. Petersburg to explain what might be called the new Russian attitude. Crooke is perhaps the most demonstrative I've ever seen him during his chats with the Judge. About 24-minutes of your time. Also, Crooke's "A storm in the West: The liberal intellectual paradigm is broken" essay at SCF is also important, although its focus is more Big Picture than merely Ukraine. I can't fault Crooke for any of his observations and analysis. The proof is in the continual stream of enlistees for Russia's military along with the buffer zone decision.

IMO, many have been mislead by Russia's preoccupation with clearing the complicated urban complex that's Donetsk because that region is indeed the hardest nut to crack whereas Sumy, Kharkiv, Kherson, Zaporozhe, and Dnepropetrovsk are very rural regions with their few villages being widely scattered plus the main provincial cities. Russia's newest assault tactic IMO will be very potent in the war of maneuver that's about to breakout and has already begun in Sumy.

When you combine Lavrov's many statements since 9 May with what Merz said on TV yesterday (the clip was shown during the chat via RT), Russians will see the attempt to revitalize the Nazism Lavrov's been warning about. So, while the message about missiles targeted deeper into Russia isn't new, who it was delivered by and his belligerence and animosity at Russia makes all the difference. Herr Merz rightly or wrongly will be seen by the Russian nation as Hitler resurrected. And with Trump digging his own cesspool regarding the attempt at establishing a relationship with Russia, the SMO will escalate until it's completed.

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20

@b Who told them to do so?

Expectations!

Some persons are still critical individuals, making up their own mind … younger 😊 generations have been spoon fed into a war narrative ever since 9/11 and in particular the 2003 Iraq invasion … the year of regime change in the ME -2011- passed quite tranquil, no protests and in 2014 North Atlantici were celebrating. Educational institutes followed as think tanks w right-wing funds (Koch, Singer, etc.) were leading … Ivo Daalder @AtlanticCouncil had a long term narrative: “make Russia a pariah state”… idiot VP and later dementia president #Joe genocide completed 50 years of foreign policy failures. The likes of Annaleena Baerbock and Kaja Kallas were educated in this false concept of war w Russia. First foreign trip is to Washington DC, US Congress and the Pentagon for briefing on policy. ☹

Posted by: Oui | May 27 2025 16:22 utc | 21

Merz said it in a way that made it sound like it was news - as if it was his decision. Anyway he sounded like he was encouraging firing more missiles deep into Russian territory. Even some politicians in his coalition partner party, the SPD, criticised him for risking an escalation of the war instead of using diplomacy. The media were just responding to Merz's dog whistle.

Posted by: Brendan | May 27 2025 16:31 utc | 22

I recently subscribed to chatgpt plus as my job require writing emails. Anyway long story short. I decided to feed this article t o it. It gave a long response. Here is a part of it.

Weaknesses or Limitations
Tone and framing imply intent without evidence: The question "Who told them to do so?" implies coordinated propaganda or manipulation, but offers no substantiation. This weakens the argument by venturing into speculation rather than remaining grounded in media analysis.
Overgeneralization of “the media”: Not all Western outlets spun the story as new policy. Some reported Merz's comments more cautiously. The analysis could be stronger if it distinguished between outlets (e.g., FT vs. DW vs. RIA Novosti vs. blogs).
Underplaying symbolic importance: Even if the policy wasn’t new, publicly restating it by a German chancellor is significant. Germany had previously hesitated to say such things openly. The shift in public rhetoric matters diplomatically, even if operational policy didn’t change.
Potential bias: The language ("war-frenzy", "eager to push for it") and tone suggest a prior conclusion that Western media is pro-war and manipulative. This might resonate with skeptical audiences but could alienate readers seeking a more neutral evaluation.
🧭 Conclusion
This is a thoughtful, critical analysis that raises fair concerns about media sensationalism and the recycling of old news to fuel ongoing war narratives. It effectively highlights technical realities ignored in mainstream coverage and calls attention to rhetorical inflation in headlines.

However, its credibility could be strengthened by avoiding speculative insinuations ("Who told them...?") and providing a more nuanced breakdown of media diversity and motivations. It's less persuasive when it implies intentional manipulation without proof, and more compelling when it stays focused on inconsistencies, omissions, and consequences.

Posted by: Calgary Guy | May 27 2025 16:31 utc | 23

https://www.flightradar24.com/USY481/3a865e0e

https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/d-ausc

Seems to be a pretty regular people shuttle to and from Rzsezow, mostly from Brize Norton. More people for training in the UK?

https://www.flightradar24.com/3a861164

Dassault Falcon 7x from Helsinki to Rzsezow.

Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | May 27 2025 16:33 utc | 24

According to the rules of military-technical cooperation, every country must give permission to use a German projectile with a microchip inside from the Outlaw US of A.

It seems obvious that the Outlaw US of A wants war with the Russian Federation (RUF).

The Outlaw US of A could never be trusted.

Told you so years ago.

Posted by: pepe | May 27 2025 16:37 utc | 25

@20

With van der Leyen, Kama, Merz and reneging Trump, Russia has no choice but to pursue the SMO.

It is existential. Very much like 1939, but Berlin is speaking clearly.

Regards!

Posted by: paddy | May 27 2025 16:37 utc | 26

Zelensky says if The Donald is allowed to pull the US support from western ukraine, he (Zelensky) will seek political asylum in Russia and he will testify publicly about the corruption he has first hand knowledge of. That's corruption on the EU, the US and in businesses of the military industrial complex.

Posted by: Hot Carl | May 27 2025 16:38 utc | 27

my chat with chatgpt was

"what do you think about the following analysis of yesterdays news regarding Russia Ukraine war?" for that it jumped ahead and gave me a long response.

Then I said "wait I didn't give you the analysis."

then it said "You're right — I jumped ahead. Please go ahead and share the analysis you'd like me to review. Once I see it, I’ll give you detailed feedback."

Sorry since I don't have anything constructive to say regrading these, I just read, read and play with chatgpt, and deepseek during my spare time.

Posted by: Calgary Guy | May 27 2025 16:40 utc | 28

I think Berlin makes a brilliant target! Maybe they should go for it, while Merz is there!!!

Posted by: G wiltek | May 27 2025 16:41 utc | 29

Who told them to do so?

Posted by b on May 27, 2025 at 14:51 UTC

Their sales department: for clicks from dopamine addicted news consumers. This is pretty much everyone with a screen and internet access in the West. Also the people here, with the exception that b does not monetize.

This is the first war in the world where social media companies have made more profit than weapons manufacturers.

Posted by: alek_a | May 27 2025 16:43 utc | 30

Merz says things ... does he actually do things ? So he is irrelevant.

Remember Avdiivka ? The Russian announced first five story building rebuild today. They didn't said much, but things are done.

Posted by: Savonarole | May 27 2025 16:44 utc | 31

Who told them to do so?

Posted by b on May 27, 2025

Their owners, the tiny hats, the warmongers of the world. Anything to distract from the ongoing Gaza genocide, anything to remove the intentional war crimes ongoing in Gaza from the public eye.

Pity the tiny hats. All they know is destruction and death. And they will eat each other over it in the end.

Posted by: Nooneuknow | May 27 2025 16:58 utc | 32

Posted by: borg | May 27 2025 15:03 utc | 3

I recommend Frontline Ukraine by Richard Sakwa
Flight MH 17 by Kees van der Pijl
Ukraine & Russia by Serhii Plokhy
Post-Soviet Political Order from Routledge
There was a good book about the history of the Soviet Union that was published in 72. It had all sorts of interesting history about Makhno and Wrangel and the Bolsheviks in Ukraine. I can't find it right now.
I'm glad I'm not from there.

Posted by: lex talionis | May 27 2025 16:59 utc | 33

Some related humor -
George Gallaway discussing the adventures of Starmer:
MOATS - Starmer
Also with Col MacGregor and Lowkey.

So, its not that the perspective is unavailable.

Posted by: jared | May 27 2025 17:07 utc | 34

@borg | Tue, 27 May 2025 15:03:00 GMT | 3

This is a good start IMO.

https://www.thepostil.com/the-military-situation-in-the-ukraine/

Posted by: pilipili | May 27 2025 17:13 utc | 35

https://www.flightradar24.com/data/aircraft/lx-n90443

Boeing E-3B Sentry on the Kaliningrad run. I think it's officially Luxembourg's.

Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | May 27 2025 17:14 utc | 36

Beautifully laid out b...

The one thing about last few years is that more and more people have come to recognise that they don't live in a democracy.

The media and the gangsters that run the West. Think they can control the narratives and framing but it is all falling apart. More and more are starting to understand what type of country they live in.

They are losing on all fronts. All Of this will come back to haunt them.

The only thing that saves the establishment from here are the fake right wing populists on offer. Who are as much part of the establishment as any of them. People are just beginning to learn they are not what they promise to be - see Trump, Meloni, Wilders, Farage and Orban for details.

Once the people figure that out by these fakes and their false promises. The establishment will be in trouble.

It's all just a matter of time. Unfortunately, most of us at the bar won't live long enough to see it. The fake populists has to play out yet and that will take a while before people really wake up.

Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | May 27 2025 17:16 utc | 37

DJT’s transactional response, perseverating upon who gives up how many oblasts, misses the point: the SMO has never been about territorial acquisitions but about guaranteeing Russia’s security in the face of NATO-armed neo-Nazis on her borders.

During a 48-hour period, the AFU launched 754 drones toward Moscow, forcing the temporary closing of all 4 Moscow-area airports.

Before that, VVP’s helicopter suffered a drone-swarm in the Kursk Region, what some are dubbing an attempted assassination.

But standing on the tarmac on Sunday evening, after having spent the day golfing in Virginia, DJT seemed unaware of the hundreds of drones Ukraine had *sent* Russia’s way and was happy to vent his spleen about *cray-cray Putin*(TM) for the aerial assault over Ukraine.

When a reporter informed him about Ukraine’s drone-swarm on VVP’s helicopter, however, DJT changed his tune: “Well, maybe that’s the reason.” All at once, Russia’s retaliatory drone/missile strikes on Ukraine seemed to make sense.

----------> So Tulsi needs to take up golf.

Whenever DJT is on the links for hours & hours, Tulsi should be right there beside him, her own 9-club @ the ready.

Condoleeza Rice served in the same capacity w/ Bush-shrub, but it was not golf: it was the NFL. When the games were playing for hours on a Sunday afternoon, Condi was glued to the TV w/ him. That way, should Saddam do something she’d be able to brief the president in real time.

If you're addicted to golf, you know what 'a check-up from the neck-up' it is, a total mental break: you can't think of anything but the little white ball. In some ways, we all need 18-rounds every day.

But for a president golf can't be 100% that kind of mental escape. Indeed, for a president of a country @ war he can't indulge that paradisal luxury.

DJT needs a better golfing partner.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 17:17 utc | 38

Is the Western media sensationalising old rehashed stories - to get more clicks, or have they been given a freehand, to try and prep the public for a open coming war with Russia.

Posted by: Republicofscotland | May 27 2025 17:21 utc | 39

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 17:17 utc | 38

Drinking the cool aid...

At this point how can still believe Trump is trapped by neocons ?

It is quite frankly absurd. He hand picked them all. Brian Berletic has laid it all out. It's not rocket science. Just run of the mill US foreign policy.

Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | May 27 2025 17:23 utc | 40

Meanwhile, trump posts things like this...

"What Vladimir Putin doesn’t realize is that if it weren’t for me, lots of really bad things would have already happened to Russia, and I mean REALLY BAD. He’s playing with fire!"

I would very much like to know

1. What proposals, from whom, he vetoed

2. What actions, and by what third parties, he as foiled

Maybe RF should ask those questions formally

Posted by: Newbie | May 27 2025 17:29 utc | 41

Meloni, Wilders, Farage, Orban, Weidel and Le pen foreign policy will be EXACTLY the same as US foreign policy.

¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Nothing will change. They will act exactly like the establishment political parties. Everybody knows it.

Only those brainwashed will believe they'll be any different. Until the truth reveals itself. They are fully paid up members of NATO and the Atlantic alliance.

People will figure out soon enough they are just a big a fraud as Trump.

Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | May 27 2025 17:31 utc | 42

Re: Borg @3

I found the following link very interesting with regard to Russia’s history. I hope you will too.
https://library4conciliation.substack.com/p/14-ancient-rus-and-the-great-steppe/A>

Posted by: Phalanges | May 27 2025 17:34 utc | 43

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20
on Alistair Crooke and Napolitano

Totally with you on that Karl! Crooke surprised me-- he basically said: "The Russian people used to kind of like the Americans. Not any more! They are mad and they will fight." (my paraphrase of Crooke)He also said support for Putin is near unanimous in St. Petersburg, known to be the liberal capitol of Russia.
"Crooke's chat today with Napolitano must be added to your very fine listing since he's just returned to Italy from St. Petersburg to explain what might be called the new Russian attitude. Crooke is perhaps the most demonstrative I've ever seen him during his chats with the Judge. "

Posted by: migueljose | May 27 2025 17:35 utc | 44

Who told them to do so?

Posted by: Nooneuknow | May 27 2025 16:58 utc | 32

Bullseye!!!

It's amazing how quickly we in the West have forgotten that all of our jewed-up, For Sale, politicians branded criticism of "Israeli" violence in Gaza as antisemitic + criminal.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 27 2025 17:42 utc | 45

Germany’s “strategic ambiguity”(TM) about allowing Kiev the option of firing German-made Taurus missiles 500 km into Russia comes at exactly the wrong time.

I’m not trying to suggest that there’s ever a proper time for long-range death & destruction—it’s simply that the time to jump on that bandwagon was November or December of 2024, when Collective Biden was beginning to loosen up restrictions on the ATACMS, for instance.

Friedrich “uses the small spoon” Merz is late to the party, and it must irk him no end.

But out-of-season German-led escalation in Project Ukraine threatens to undermine the negotiation efforts associated w/ the Peace Memoranda, which both Moscow and Kiev are composing separately.

For many months DJT and VVP have sent teams to work on matters of peace, while Germany did little more than throw rhetorical stones @ the endeavor, perhaps undermining it in ways that don’t so obviously show as this latest comment from Merz regarding the long-range strikes.
We already know from the leaked phone conversation during last summer’s airshow in South Korea that the complex terrain-hugging guidance of the Taurus missiles would require German technological know-how. For the Bundeswehr to send its own technicians into Ukraine *for that specific purpose* would signal an escalation of intolerable proportions.
What country, so attacked by a 3rd Party, would not institute a 1-for-1 response to the provocation-?

For every long-range missile targeting Moscow, the Russian military launches a Khinzal into Berlin. The Khinzal has an operational range of 2000 km.

How do many German cities evade direct hits, should “strategic ambiguity” hold sway-?

There is neither “strategy” nor “ambiguity” in this equation.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 17:42 utc | 46

@36

Thai is a NATO AWACS, flies out of Luxembourg.

They often sqwalk ADS B over by their Kiev support track.

Posted by: paddy | May 27 2025 17:44 utc | 47

I understand the EU saber rattling is about careerist bureaucrats clamoring for war so they can authorize major bond issues to fuel a failing EU economy. That and ensuring the U.S. continues to subsidize the EU economy through their military basis. The EU leaders are CIA installed puppets to ensure the war with Russia continues, so I’m sure their jobs depends on war.

Posted by: Deniz | May 27 2025 17:45 utc | 48

This post is a bit off to me.

To me there was something new in this announcement by Merz and it even prompted the presidential spokesperson, Pekov, to issue another warning.

Peskov's second warning (after the first one on Sunday if I remember correctly):
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated that if Friedrich Merz’s comments about extending the range of missiles supplied to Ukraine are accurate, this would mark a serious escalation.
https://tgstat.ru/en/channel/@DDGeopolitics/149167

Even the Russian FM meanwhile reacted.
https://tgstat.ru/en/channel/@DDGeopolitics/149143

The "several good reasons" for Germany not to supply or green light strikes do not align with reality.
1) "Taurus contains components which are under U.S. export restrictions. The U.S. would have to green light a delivery of those."
The US empire managers would love those missiles be used as it would solidify German decoupling from Russia, as would fully appropriating the "300 billion" Russian assets which so far the Europeans have been reluctant to do.
2) "Taurus is air launched. Ukraine does not have the means, i.e. the right airplanes, to launch Taurus from high attitudes."
The Su-24's (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Su-24M_Storm_Shadow.jpg) were adapted to carry the SCALP/Stormshaddow and Ukraine has been flying F16's for some time now.
3) "Taurus requires other German systems, and, most crucial, German specialists to be targeted and used."
Ukraine already operates many Germany military systems (Geppard, Leopards obviously, and also operates mixed systems like BUK's shooting NATO supplied missiles (Sea Sparrow) and there are already many Western specialists, including Germans, active on Ukrainian soil to kill Russian soldiers (and at times civilians).

In my view Merz was pushed to rectify his statements because the SPD coalition partner (as per Lars Klingbeil) refused to go along.

"There is an unmissable war-frenzy in the media. Even the tiniest side remark by Trump, Merz or someone else is immediately explained as a war escalation."
That's because those are Freudian confessions. The MSM received their marching orders from their masters and those marching orders are softening up public opinion for direct war.

The more Russia gains ground the more we will see this kind of rhetoric and likely also real escalations. The Moskva was sunk after the decisive capture of Azovstal.

For now the Russian message sent by Oreshnik courier seems to stick.

Posted by: xor | May 27 2025 17:46 utc | 49

Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | May 27 2025 17:23 utc | 40
RE: c'mon in-! The cool-aid's great-!
<<

Cher Sun--No one @ #38 is suggesting that DJT is trapped by neocons.

It looks like #38 is suggesting that Tulsi needs to take up golf and accompany DJT on these epic 36-hole Sundays.

See it this way: if DJT is going to stand on the tarmac before boarding a flight back to the White House after having been out-of-the-loop on the links for 6 hours, then he is going to have to have a way to stay apprised of Project Ukraine doings so that he doesn't come off like a reactionary emo when some random reporter shouts out a question.

This prophylactic is not different than Collective Biden assigning various *striders* to walk alongside Joe on the tarmac or when crossing the White House lawn---quite literally those walking beside him---so that his short, mincing gait would not contribute to the perception of his cognitive decline.

DJT needs a chaperone/minder/protector---and I can believe Tulsi will cultivate a great short game: the pitching & the putting.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 17:54 utc | 50

The consumer's perception of the media is always influenced by their level of knowledge. The task of the media is shaped by their owners and covers a wide range of interests, from providing information to manipulating opinions. From the state media, to the private media, to B's blog, there is a gradient in terms of the intentions of the publisher and the truthfulness of what is published.
To pick up on B's thoughts - who, for example, is behind the German media and "needs" to be convinced? (The state media, of course, represent the government's agenda).
Here is an overview:
https://germany.mom-gmr.org/de/eigentuemer/unternehmen/

Who was able to persuade the media to report in the same way in times of Corona?
I think that the same geniuses are also responsible for the developments in Ukraine and ...

Personally, I'm not surprised at all. Intellectually speaking, power was not earned, but acquired. Germany's democratically elected government is characterised not by its ability to hold office, but by its unscrupulousness in wanting to hold it without being able to do so. The party dictatorship has led to incestuous developments similar to those in monarchies.
There are only Marie-Antonette solution strategies left. Pensioners should work more, the poor should pay more taxes, ...

Translated with DeepL.com (free version)

Posted by: BlindSpot | May 27 2025 18:09 utc | 51

Merz= "Verruckt"...no umlauts on my machine.

Posted by: aristodemos | May 27 2025 18:11 utc | 52

Posted by: migueljose | May 27 2025 17:35 utc | 44
Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20
RE: Alistair on Judge Nap
<<

What's strange is that Mercouris was in SPB for 3 days last week, much of that time taken up in a structured conference setting outside the city itself, and he has reported in practically every podcast since then about his perceptions of *Russia* and how "Russians* are managing their responses to the SMO---but his remarks are exceedingly superficial, befitting I would assume any one particular man's three days' worth of experiences which were actually quite limited.

One would need additional unstructured time---opportunities to strike up convos w/ shop owners and the waitstaff and taxi drivers and just that chatty person who is standing next to you @ midnight when SPB lifts the drawbridges on the Neva River to let the tall oceangoing ships through.

Going to SPB even if only for 3 days is well worth it under any circumstances, especially this time of year as the White Nights approach, but Mercouris's limited experience there does not carry much authenticity.

Alastair, on the other hand, waded more robustly into SPB, with a finger-on-the-pulse' kind of gritty realism & feeling. Alastair was better positioned to glean plenty of insights.

Moreover, he kept his ear to the ground.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 18:14 utc | 53

Germany’s Defense Meltdown: Lost Soldiers, Leadership Rift & Kremlin Laughter| Times Now World

Germany’s military credibility is unraveling. Chancellor Friedrich Merz and Vice Chancellor Lars Klingbeil are publicly at odds over Ukraine weapons policy, revealing deep cracks in Berlin’s ruling coalition. As this political discord unfolds, the German Reservists’ Association reports the shocking loss of contact with nearly one million reservists—crippling any rapid mobilization effort. With a weakened Bundeswehr and growing internal confusion, Russia is seizing the propaganda advantage, mocking Berlin’s dysfunction and portraying Germany as NATO’s vulnerable underbelly. This defense meltdown could not come at a worse more critical time.

Posted by: Oui | May 27 2025 18:15 utc | 54

Merz= "Verruckt"...no umlauts on my machine.
Posted by: aristodemos | May 27 2025 18:11 utc | 52

You don't need it. If you don't have an "ä", "ö" or "ü" on your keyboard just write "ae", "oe" or "ue"

So "verrückt" would be "verrueckt".

;)

Hope, the offtopic is forgiven.

Posted by: NoName | May 27 2025 18:17 utc | 55

They say actions speak louder than words. What actions have Germany taken since 2014 to deescalate the situation with Russia? Perhaps such words are to encourage Russia to capitulate to western demands? Believe that time has long passed. Far past time to remove US forces from Europe, good luck with that.

Posted by: Thurl | May 27 2025 18:25 utc | 56

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 17:17 utc | 38

You raise an interesting point - Trump always seems to come up with his most incongruous policy zig-zags after a long trip to the golf course and/or a long time on Air Force 1.

One has to ask who is with him at those times.

WWIII could arise from this War of Trump's Ear...

Posted by: ChatNPC | May 27 2025 18:26 utc | 57

🇷🇴Inauguration of the new President of Romania.

First he greeted the Jewish rabbi, then the Catholic cardinal, but he refused to greet the Orthodox patriarch. In a country where 90 percent are Orthodox. Why is that?

ive said it before, this is an european-catholic anti-orthodox agenda. cultural genocide as its called.

Posted by: Justpassinby | May 27 2025 18:33 utc | 58

@27 Hot Carl.

I so wish Zelenskis would do that.

Posted by: Judge Barbier | May 27 2025 18:47 utc | 59

They said this before.
Including the US.
None of them followed through when Putin explained this was a red line making the countries concerned into a legitimate target.
Now a few washed up European Lone Rangers want to risk that?
That will be fun.

Posted by: Ed Bernays | May 27 2025 18:47 utc | 60

Posted by: ChatNPC | May 27 2025 18:26 utc | 57
RE: after a long trip to the golf course or a long time on Air Force One
<<

Perhaps we've dodged a bullet, unwittingly, by DJT's having made only a couple international flights on Air Force One since assuming the presidency again--?

The less time for him @ 35,000 feet for hours on end the better, emotionally speaking. The pressurized cabin, the hyper-filtered air, the exotic cloudscape can have an impact on one's equilibrium.

Golf outings are going to be a tougher matter.

One of the great benefits of golf is that it forces you to reframe unpleasant/unintended outcomes to make them more palatable. Anybody who has played knows that one single errant stroke can lead to three additional strokes, which corrects absolutely nothing.

Golf is strength-training for your mind.

DJT often golfs w/ Lindsey, Bret Baier and also Stubb, the president of Finland. Discern for yourself what kind of *mental strength-training* results in a foursome like that.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 18:50 utc | 61

exactly! ''who told them to do so?' critical question... thanks b..

Posted by: james | May 27 2025 18:54 utc | 62

And there was me thinking that after Merz announcement , the annual summer NATO shindig at The Hague with senior ministers leaders from 45 countries and conferences for 8500 supporters and admin would make an ideal Oreshnik target.

Posted by: Jo | May 27 2025 19:18 utc | 63

Germany’s “strategic ambiguity”(TM) about allowing Kiev the option of firing German-made Taurus missiles 500 km into Russia reminds us that select European members of NATO are still hell-bent on drawing the U.S. into a direct hot war, unproxied, against Russia.

Since the proxy has petered out, they’re determined to climb up the escalatory ladder—anything to agitate things sufficiently to involve the U.S. further.

Select Euro members of NATO liked matters a year ago, when Collective Biden seemed dangerously close to foregoing the escalator altogether, metaphorically-speaking, for what amounted to a high-speed blast-elevator in a super-tall building—-launching the war into a realm more saturated w/ nuclear-adjacent ops, like the constant drone attacks on the ZNPP or the outright Kursk Incursion w/ the intent to hold a nuclear power plant hostage or all the smirking talk about *dirty* bombs.

Scuttlebutt has it that Germany sent Taurus missiles to Ukraine in December 2024, once Collective Biden lifted restrictions on ATACMS strikes into Russia’s hinterland.

The tough thing about the Taurus missile is that it is capable of carrying a nuclear warhead. Yes, yes, such a small detail, that.

If Friedrich “uses the small spoon” Merz receives permission from the U.S to send German technicians to Ukraine to operate the complex terrain-hugging guidance systems of the Taurus properly, it sounds like select Euro members of NATO expect Moscow tepidly to receive these Taurus strikes without being able to determine if they indeed carry nuclear warheads or not.

Trusting in Merz & those he represents *not* to go nuclear is a risk Russia cannot afford to take.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:22 utc | 64

Where does the information about Taurus being nuclear-capable come from? There’s nothing on the manufacturers website, not even Wikipedia (yuk!) mentions it.

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 19:37 utc | 65

It reminds me at high school when we were briefly taught BASIC programming language adjunct to mathematics. Most of us tried out swear words that repeated endlessly in a vacuum. Given enough electricity the program would outlast humanity. We see something similar, where the original intention has long been forgotten and the media runs a feedback loop:

10 PRINT "Russia is evil"
20 PRINT "Putin is Satan"
30 GOTO 10
RUN

Posted by: Patroklos | May 27 2025 19:38 utc | 66

Posted by: Patroklos | May 27 2025 19:38 utc | 66

Ah, the days of PEEK and POKE...

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 19:43 utc | 67

According to the nytimes---I know: take it w/ a deer-sized saltlick---during the group phone conversation DJT had w/ select Euro NATO members *following* The Call on 19 May w/ VVP, DJT shared his impression that “Putin thought he was winning the war and would press his advantage,” according to officials briefed on the matter.

These officials also reportedly indicated that Trump “made it clear he had no intention on putting pressure, much less harsh economic sanctions, on Russia.”

DJT "said, essentially, ‘I’m out,’” a nytimes source claimed.

The ball, which was once in Russia's court, is now lying deflated in the tall grass.

No one’s botheriung to look for it.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:43 utc | 68

In response to chunga@16,

I'm not so sure. If the shoe was on the other foot, with Russia or China supporting a zombie state on US borders that, with some regularity, launched pin-prick attacks or committed acts of terrorism on US mainland -- would the US commit suicide by retaliating against China or Russia directly, if bombing or intervening against the zombie state failed to produce immediate results? Consider the quagmires of recent US interventions that no amount of bombing was able to resolve, and add in foreign sponsorship propping up armed resistance to the 11'th degree, with nowhere to run and nobody against whom retaliation is safe. Effective deterrence would keep such a hypothetical scenario at a stage of low intensity conflict, but as things currently stand, cannot prevent it outright. North Korea's deterrence isn't something that can be applied as a model for every other state, N.K having turned itself into a largely insulated fortress, situated between two cooperating global superpowers with an interest in maintaining stability in the region. Its nuclear program and weapons development makes comprehensive military defeat a costly enterprise, but can't prevent the few pin-pricks still available to its adversaries -- harassment of its fishermen or whatever. Even here I would assume that a low intensity cross-border skirmish would not produce an immediate nuclear response.

Posted by: Skiffer | May 27 2025 19:45 utc | 69

Western press, especially on Ukraine, was totally discredited years ago. At this point, it's just background noise to anyone who cares to know the truth. Nonetheless, I imagine there's still an audience for this delusional propaganda amongst well off, Dem voting, white women. As a voting block, they remind me of Rob Burgundy: they repeat whatever is written on the cue card.

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | May 27 2025 19:47 utc | 70

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 19:37 utc | 65
RE: under Modular Design: the Flexibility of Taurus
<<

from the 2023 article----Taurus Missile: A Glimpse into Its Legacy, Capabilities, and The Geopolitical Implications of Its Transfer

"The Taurua missile can also be configured with an array of warheads, spanning from a submunition dispenser to the more devastating nuclear warhead."

link:
https://christianbaghai.medium.com/taurus-missile-a-glimpse-into-its-legacy-capabilities-and-the-geopolitical-implications-of-its-174f399e434e

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:52 utc | 71

@ skiffer - those are fair comments. Another thing I need to keep in mind...the world does NOT want another carbon copy of America. That's being rejected. The Russians have clearly made a distinction with their non-shock and awe behavior. I think they know what they're doing.

Posted by: chunga | May 27 2025 19:54 utc | 72

Posted by: Patroklos | May 27 2025 19:38 utc | 66

Ah, the days of PEEK and POKE...

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 19:43 utc | 67

Who never did a POKE 23756,1 and then a POKE 23756,0 to set it back to zero again before running?

Free shots for naming the computer, full open bar on details that prove you did use it.

Posted by: Newbie | May 27 2025 20:02 utc | 73

The United States has a 22-point peace plan that neither 🇺🇦 Ukraine nor 🇷🇺 Russia likes , US Presidential Special Representative Keith Kellogg said in an interview with Fox.

"We have a 22-point plan that we brought from London that kind of defines where we want to go. And frankly, we think it's a good plan because neither side likes it. I think progress happens when both sides don't like the plan," Kellogg said.

Posted by: Jo | May 27 2025 20:04 utc | 74

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20
Posted by: migueljose | May 27 2025 17:35 utc | 44
Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 18:14 utc | 53
RE: consequential conversations--Alastair had them in SPB/Mercouris not so much
<<

Anecdotal as hell, but I grabbed a cabstand taxi from LaGuardia to Coney Island last week, and the driver was from Bangladesh.

We figured out pretty quickly that we were both MAGA, though different flavors, so it was easy to let the impressions rip.

Of course I brought up the coup in Bangladesh last August that led to Sheikh Hasina's ouster. He shared his thoughts. Even 25-miinute drive to Coney Island can turn into a geopolitical reckoning, w/ the right mix.

Sheer happenstance @ the cabstand matched me w/ this driver. It's an example of how consequential conversations can result from the slightest of predicates.

Will still be thinking about this in a couple years.

I have a feeling that Alastair connected like this in SPB, probably left & right, practically on every street corner, but Mercouris did not.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 20:12 utc | 75

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:52 utc | 71
(Taurus Nuke warhead?)

The Yanks produced a Nuke artillery shell 50+ years ago. They abandoned the concept bcs the target had to be at maximum Howitzer range for the gun crew to have a 100% chance of survival.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 27 2025 20:14 utc | 76

Posted by: Jo | May 27 2025 20:04 utc | 74
RE Gen Kellogg
<<

In terms of insightful geopolitical matters, Gen Kellogg drives from the Ladies tee on the golf course, metaphorically speaking naturally.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 20:16 utc | 77

Jo ( May 27 2025 20:04 utc | 74 ):
Heh funny stuff this US "diplomacy" :)

Kellogg didn't mention that whatever US glove puppet ex-Ukraine "thinks" or "feels" (glove puppets have neither brain nor heart) doesn't matter because the war was/is planned and prepared, equipped, funded, launched, and directed by the US to try to achieve US goals.

Neither did he mention that while Russia doesn't like the plan the US wholeheartedly loves every single one of the 22 points since they wrote them for their own benefit :P

And of course this proves there will be no progress according to Kellogg's own words...

Such skill, the US must be beaming with pride lol :)

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | May 27 2025 20:21 utc | 78

Posted by: Newbie | May 27 2025 20:02 utc | 73

Oh lordy, lordy, that’s got some cranium cobwebs creaking... (and we’re going off-topic bigly here)

lightbulb

Sinclair of some kind, either ZX81 or Speccy, can’t remember which.

And anyway, I will not be providing evidence as the few surviving photos from back then:

a) give Mrs. R-L a fit of the giggles
b) show me with a ‘New Romantic’ mullet

a) and b) may be connected...

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 20:22 utc | 79

Cross between a drone and a cruise missile generates a "parcel"!

More: https://eadaily.com/en/news/

Posted by: Elber | May 27 2025 20:22 utc | 80

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 27 2025 20:14 utc | 76

-----

Atomic Annie, Howitzer

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X4rQHx4y_kg

Posted by: saner | May 27 2025 20:24 utc | 81

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:52 utc | 71

OK thanks for that. It does include this little snippet:

Operational Readiness: While Germany has a decent Taurus inventory, operational readiness is another story. Many missiles require updates

And channelling my inner Andrei Martyanov, checking Mr. Baghai’s background doesn’t reveal a great deal of military expertise.

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 20:33 utc | 82

Posted by: Jo | May 27 2025 20:04 utc | 74

The United States, being one of the instigators and sustainers of this Slavic civil war, has a 22-point piss plan.

The US 'good cop / bad cop' routine is getting really boring.

Posted by: xor | May 27 2025 20:33 utc | 83

re "A storm in the West: The liberal intellectual paradigm is broke"

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20

Alastair Crooke: "Economist Philip Pilkington writes that Hayek’s delusion that markets equal ‘freedom’ has become widespread to the point of all discourse being completely saturated. In polite company, and in public, you can certainly be left-wing or right-wing, but you will always be, in some shape or form, neoliberal – otherwise you will simply not be allowed entry to discourse."

Eduardo Galeano once summed up the brutal, militarized neo-liberalism that was introduced in Latin America as follows:

"People were in jail so that prices could be free."

But it wasn't just great writers like Galeano who noticed this sort of thing. In writing about the restoration of capitalism in Russia in the brutal 1990s in that country, Elena Yurievna noted the following:

"We believed that salami was spontaneously generated by freedom."

The beginning of the road entailed the end of the road and there were plenty of people who noticed this, and said so, long ago.

Posted by: NH | May 27 2025 20:34 utc | 84

Follow up from:
Ed Bernays | May 27 2025 18:47 utc | 60

So again, they eat their words:
Germany has not decided on supplying Taurus cruise missiles to Ukraine, with no resolution expected during President Zelensky's May 28 Berlin visit.

I believe this was the 3rd time.
They keep acting like headless chickens.

Posted by: Ed Bernays | May 27 2025 20:49 utc | 85

This is slightly OT to the thread but this video is one of the many appearing today that are greatly explanatory as told by George Yeo in conversation with Zhang WeiWei--in English: "Why China & Southeast Asia Thrive." The parent site for the video is Rise of Asia, which is brand new to me although it has 162K subscribers. Now for the next videocast--Escobar and Sleboda with Danny Haiphong.

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 20:51 utc | 86

Posted by: Ed Bernays | May 27 2025 20:49 utc | 85

It’s beginning to remind me of the hokey-cokey dance:

They put the Taurus in
They pull the Taurus out
In out
In out
Are they full of doubt?

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 20:59 utc | 87

https://tgstat.ru/en/channel/@rwapodcast
The moment Trump strode back into the Oval Office, history handed him a silver platter.
[..]
Instead, the gears keep turning. The planes are still landing in Poland, the US army base in Wiesbaden still runs the war. There are two explanations for this: firstly, he never intended to disengage America from the conflict, and the anti‑war patter was a mirage, conjured for Rust‑Belt rallies and some of his allies who may have been sincere. Secondly, he himself, as well as the people he put in charge of this process, are grossly incompetent.

Either way, the result is identical on the field: America is killing Russians every day, and every HIMARS rocket, every Starlink-guided drone, every artillery shell, every missile now belongs to Trump. It is Trump's war now, and he can repeat his talking points as much as he wants, but that is not going to change -- Trump deliberately kept the war going and he deliberately tied the fate of American security and credibility to the criminal regime in Kiev.
[...]
Putin was not lying when he said that, ultimately, it would not matter to Russia all that much who won the US presidential election. Trump had a chance to prove otherwise, and he did not, whatever his reasons. History will remember that.

Posted by: xor | May 27 2025 21:00 utc | 88

peek and poke were memory updating commands in applesoft computers of the early 80s

I never admit to anything wrt hacking etc

"Wise as serpents, gentle as lambs"

I hope this finds you well

Posted by: ockham | May 27 2025 21:04 utc | 89

peek and poke were memory updating commands in applesoft computers of the early 80s

I never admit to anything wrt hacking etc

"Wise as serpents, gentle as lambs"

I hope this finds you well

Posted by: ockham | May 27 2025 21:04 utc | 90

Posted by: ockham | May 27 2025 21:04 utc | 90

You might not remember this, but my first "online" sort of discussion platform was a programme called 'Firetalk'. Very limited, of course, in the early days. No images – at the beginning, ONLY text chat – but it enabled contact with people from all over the world, and one could enter different 'groups' like politics, art, food, etc.

After a couple of years, along came microphone discussion... a massive move forward. But then the company sold out to PalTalk....which I wasn't too happy with, as I lost all the friends I'd made on Firetalk.

Its all come a long way since then lol

Posted by: HERMIUS | May 27 2025 21:21 utc | 91

An oblique message via back-channels:

“Just before you fully commit to deploying your Taurus system, would you like to double-check that you have analysed and extrapolated all the data you were able to obtain from the Yuzhmash site? ”

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 21:23 utc | 92

Actually, vice chancellor Klingbeil contradicted Merz, stating that nothing changed concerning use of German long range weaponry. That was dropping the gauntlet and making clear that the coalition may break over Taurus.

Posted by: aquadraht | May 27 2025 15:33 utc | 10

It's to be hoped that rational politicians exist within the German political dysfunction that has been cobbled together for the disenfranchisement of the AfD.
Merz needs to be told to stfu because the Germans will not be getting support beyond strongly worded condemnation if Russia decides to respond to a German weapon enabled strike that does serious harm.
Germans have lost their supply of gas oils, fertiliser and who knows what other vital industrial materials.
What's next for the accelerating economic suicide?

Posted by: jpc | May 27 2025 21:26 utc | 93

Thanks b!
I am trying to tell people but...

One question on the Taurus - do we have serious info on it's effectiveness and true danger.
When Tomahawks were used against Syria their weakness was revealed against AD.
But Taurus so far was never really used or was it?

Posted by: AG | May 27 2025 21:27 utc | 94

xor 88

Is it Wiesbaden or Ramstein from where the US/NATO chunk of the Ukraine war is run?

Unsurprisingly, wiki is no help ;-)

Posted by: YetAnotherAnon | May 27 2025 21:38 utc | 95

Posted by: karlof1 | May 27 2025 16:13 utc | 20

Thank you, karlof1 for your analysis concerning the Mertz statement as interpreted by Alistair Crooke, recently returned from Saint Petersburg. I think Crooke's (and your emphasis is not misplaced. I quote you in your first link:

"...while the message about missiles targeted deeper into Russia isn't new, who it was delivered by and his belligerence and animosity at Russia makes all the difference. Herr Merz rightly or wrongly will be seen by the Russian nation as Hitler resurrected..."

I have watched the entire Duran presentation last night (very long) with a guest whose name I don't remember, plus segments of what the two Alex's have been saying this morning. I think they have missed the significance you outline above. Crooke in his essay uses the example of Hektor as he is about to face Achilles-- I'm not sure how that image applies to Trump, and I'm unable to wade through all the battle scenes that precede that fateful encounter, only to know that Hektor has donned Achilles' own immortally supplied armor, previously worn into battle by Achilles' dear friend Patroklus, whom Hektor has slain. So, an entanglement of friendships is there. And Zeus has said Hektor should not have taken the armor. So, an entanglement of friendship among heroes plus the spoils of war and judgment of the god ... something to use as a warning for Trump perhaps.

But what has been missed I think is the importance, the significance of these events to the various citizenries as this all unfolds. Trump may be falling apart -- to me, he's more like Priam, if you want an analogy from the Iliad. But surely Mertz knows what he is doing, and what he is doing is evil. He's deliberately shouting 'Fire!' in a very crowded theatre.

Posted by: juliania | May 27 2025 21:43 utc | 96

Trusting in Merz & those he represents *not* to go nuclear is a risk Russia cannot afford to take.

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 19:22 utc | 64

In light of the recent 80th anniversary.
I would say the Germans are under no illusions, neither are the French Brits or US of the immediate consequences.
Why is Merz taken it upon himself to be such a dumb fuck?
That's the bit I can't fathom.
This isn't a time to potentially turn your country to radioactive rubble.
Doesn't sound like he's working for German best interests.

Posted by: jpc | May 27 2025 21:46 utc | 97

All the more reason to punish Kiev with nukes. It sends a powerful signal to European war mongers about what they will get unless they drop their war madness. Thick-headed European politicians will not get it unless their panicked voters force them to accept reality.

This is the best escalation none can match. Ukraine is just a bunch of expendables for NATO. Russia should not consider them anymore worthy than that. Losing soldiers and suffering terror just because Russia does not consider Ukrainians to be expendables is not rational. Useless committing so much resources for expendables.

Posted by: Jason | May 27 2025 22:15 utc | 98

Posted by: Jeremy Rhymings-Lang | May 27 2025 20:33 utc | 82
RE: the source provides no citation-?
<<

Sure enough, man

Go ahead and trust it.

The PR looks skeevy enough that it is not *implausible* for Russia to doubt intents & objectives here--and to make a big stink about it.

Just sayin'

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 22:17 utc | 99

When it comes to Project Ukraine, keep in mind that the important thing is not *who* lies--but who lies *first.*

Posted by: steel_porcupine | May 27 2025 22:20 utc | 100