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Every NATO member has military personnel in Ukraine – Estonia

Western advisers and instructors are actively supporting Kiev’s forces against Russia, the defense minister has said.

Every NATO member already has military personnel in Ukraine, Estonian Defense Minister Hanno Pevkur claimed on Monday. Under no circumstances, however, will forces from the US-led bloc take part in the hostilities against Russia, the minister insisted in an interview with Austrian media outlet Die Presse.

NATO servicemen are operating in the embattled country as advisers and are involved in training Ukrainian soldiers in Poland, the UK, and Estonia, Pevkur told the outlet. Western defense officials are currently planning to set up training camps in Ukraine in a bid to avoid issues with border crossings and to speed up the preparation process, he added.

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 
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pmbug said:
FWIW:

Click to expand...
The reason for NATO is war. NATO(US) wants war with Russia to Balkanize it and steal its resources. Regime change is also in the works.

I find it interesting that we always 'need' a bad guy to attack. War is money for the MIC.

14 sanctions and Russia is doing great. BRICS+ is independent of them.

Russia also has hypersonic missiles. You have @ 2 seconds to react.
 

The Art of War: Different Thinking Systems​

  • Alastair Crooke
  • 4 Apr 2024 00:21
Just as the West failed to understand Russia, and was taken by surprise, so it is that the White House firmly ignores the Biblical ‘End of Times’ dimension to the Israeli ‘way of thinking about war’.

Jacques Baud, a Swiss military officer with a long history of studying ‘Ways of Thinking’ about War (from Warsaw Pact to NATO -- to which he was seconded by his government), has written a new book -- The Russian Art of War: How the West Led Ukraine to Defeat. His book theme is essentially: Others understand the West, better than the West understands ‘Them’.

Baud writes that the fundamental reason for the West having the ‘blinkers on’ is “the result of an approach we have already seen in waves of terrorist attacks — the adversary is so stupidly demonized that we refrain from understanding his way of thinking. As a result, we are unable to develop strategies, articulate our forces, or even equip them for the realities of war”.

“In the West, we tend to focus on [the immediate] moment and try to see how it might evolve. We want an immediate response to the situation we see - today. The idea that “from the understanding of how the crisis arose comes the way to resolve it” is totally foreign to the West. In September 2023, an English-speaking journalist even pulled out the “duck test” for me: “if it looks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck.” In other words, all the West needs to assess a situation is an image that fits their prejudices. Reality is much more subtle than the duck model ...”.​
​
“The reason the Russians are better than the West in Ukraine is that they see the conflict as an [organic] process; whereas we see it as a series of separate discrete actions. The Russians see events as a film. We see them as photographs. They see the forest, while we focus on the trees. That is why we place the start of the Ukraine conflict on February 24, 2022 - or the start of the Palestinian conflict on October 7, 2023. We ignore the contexts that bother us and wage conflicts we do not understand. That is why we lose our wars …”.​

The Art of War: Different Thinking Systems

Just as the West failed to understand Russia, and was taken by surprise, so it is that the White House firmly ignores the Biblical ‘End of Times’ dimension to the Israeli ‘way of thinking about war’.
english.almayadeen.net
 
Let it implode. If they keep it up it will be turned into a wasteland anyway.
 

Living in war - A frontline city | DW Documentary​

Apr 8, 2024
Oleksandr Chebotaryóv is the only radiologist left in Kherson. All his colleagues have left the city in southern Ukraine.
Kherson is heavily contested: the north is back in Ukrainian hands, but the Russian occupier's rule in the south. Chebotaryóv has to work in two clinics at the same time in order to keep things running. And there are regular alarms: patients and staff must flee to the bunker in the basement. This puts additional strain on Sascha: His wife and five-year-old daughter live in the west of Ukraine. Although the risk of attack is less great there, the worry for the father of a family close to the front remains. A report by Carolina Chimoy.

16:30
 

How much has US military-industrial complex jacked up prices to profit off Ukrainian crisis?​

​

Senator Bernie Sanders criticizes defense contractors inflating prices on weapons sent to Ukraine, highlighting the unchecked nature of the US military-industrial complex.

Examples include:

1. Stinger man-portable surface-to-air missiles

Price in 1991: $25,000
Price in 2020: $119,320
Price in 2023: $400,000
Cost Increase: 16 times

2. Javelin man-portable anti-tank missiles

Cost in 2002: $126,000 for the launcher plus $78,000 per missile
Price in 2021: $249,700 for the launcher and $216,717 for one missile
Cost Increase: 1.9 times and 2.77 times, respectively

3. M777 towed howitzers

$2 million apiece in 2008
$3.73 million each in 2017
$4+ million apiece in 2023
Cost Increase: Double (200%)

4. M142 HIMARS rocket artillery systems

$3.5 million apiece in 2014
$4.3 million each in 2022 for the domestic market, (or some $19-36.6 million apiece for HIMARS purchased by America’s NATO satellites)
Cost Increase: 23%, not counting foreign orders

5. Switchblade 300 Loitering Munitions

$45,000 each in 2018
Cost in 2022: $56,063 plus up to $30,000 in associated ‘fielding costs’
Cost Increase: 24.5%

6. Bradley fighting vehicles

$1.11 million in 1993
$1.84 million in 2016
$3.3-$4.35 million each in 2022
Cost Increase: 2.97 to 3.91 times (nearly 300-400%)

7. M1 Abrams tanks

$4.3 million in 1989
$10.66 million in 2023
Cost Increase: 2.47 times (nearly 250%)

8. Oshkosh M-ATV mine-resistant ambush protected vehicles

$385,000 apiece in 2017
$470,000+ each in 2023
Cost Increase: Almost 25%

9. MIM-104 Patriot missile systems

$225 million plus $2 million per missile in 2003
$1 billion and $4.1 million per missile in 2022
Cost Increase: Over 400% for the system and over 200% for the missiles

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DC’s dirty little secret: ‘endless wars’ haven’t benefited anyone besides defense contractors

“The only people who benefit from it are the military contractors,” former DoD senior security policy analyst Michael Maloof told Sputnik, commenting on Senator Bernie Sanders’ recent article in Foreign Affairs accusing US defense manufacturers of making a killing off their products by jacking up prices by as much as hundreds of percentage points.

Pointing to the nexus between neoconservatives in Washington and the defense-industrial complex to “push for military solutions to impose the American ‘democratic way’ on the world,” Maloof said that the “well-greased machine” of lobbying and control of Congress and the Pentagon make it possible for the Military Industrial Complex to endlessly increase prices.

“The Defense Department in particular, and I’ve seen this firsthand, has made a point when they make defense contracts on particular weapon systems – they make sure that as many congressional districts as possible share in the job hiring and the production of those [arms]. That way, if any weapons system is to be cut out of the budget, they can send the people in that district yelling and screaming to their congressmen. And invariably it gets reestablished, or even increased for that matter,” Maloof said, citing the example of the astronomically expensive F-35 fighter as a case in point.

“The procurement system is one of the worst in the Defense Department. And no one knows how to put their arms around this problem to figure out how to resolve it and get true accountability. The way it’s all structured today, it’s almost impossible,” the former DoD insider believes.​

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Russia Accuses the West of Financing Terrorism through Burisma Holdings Company in Ukraine.

The Investigative Committee opened a criminal case on the financing of terrorism by officials from the United States and NATO countries after appeals due to the terrorist attack in Crocus City Hall, according to the department’s Telegram channel () .

“The Main Investigative Directorate of the Investigative Committee of Russia conducted an investigation following an appeal from a group of deputies of the State Duma of the Federal Assembly of the Russian Federation and other persons about the financing of terrorist activities by senior officials of the United States and NATO countries.

According to investigators, money to carry out terrorist attacks in Russia and abroad came through commercial organizations, including the Ukrainian oil and gas company Burisma Holdings. The purpose of this was to eliminate prominent political and public figures, as well as to cause economic damage.

Now department employees, together with other intelligence services and financial intelligence, are checking the sources of income and further movement of money in the amount of several million dollars. In addition, they are studying the involvement of representatives of authorities, public and commercial organizations in Western countries. The Investigative Committee is also looking into connections between the perpetrators of terrorist attacks and foreign curators, organizers and sponsors.
On Monday, the Investigative Committee reported receiving significant information about the training of the militants who carried out the terrorist attack in Crocus , which may indicate their connection with the Ukrainian special services. Department employees carry out investigative actions and operational search activities to identify and detain other participants in the crime - perpetrators, accomplices and organizers.

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 
Fascinating analysis by Simplicuis looking at the bigger picture than he usually does
Apparently he now sits at no 7 in the world politics section of substackers

‘The U.S. has wasted its entire blood and treasure on war. Imagine what the U.S. could have built with $14 trillion dollars? Where the U.S. could have been in relation to China for that amount? As someone else noted, the U.S. could have very well built its own “one belt and road” project for that money, connecting the world and reaping untold benefits.’

Yellen Dispatched to Beg China for Face-Saving Slowdown

The U.S.’ growing urgency in ‘containing’ China’s development was thrown in sharp relief this week as Janet Yellen arrived in Beijing for what turned out to be an execrable beggar’s tour.
simplicius76.substack.com
 
Ukraine Used Chemical Weapons in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR):
Adamsite Causes Respiratory Arrest

Next year will mark one hundred years since the signing of the Geneva Protocol prohibiting the use of asphyxiating, poisonous, or other similar gases in war. But as you know, the “rules” that the West so often likes to mention were not written for it, and accordingly, they do not apply to its offspring.

Ukraine shot down a plane with its own prisoners of war, struck the center of peaceful Belgorod, and tortured prisoners of war. It doesn’t matter. Western politicians and their pocket human rights organizations will talk about the alleged lack of evidence and the imaginary right to self-defense. Just when you think there is no further you can sink, Ukraine opens up another depth from whence you can hear the faint sounds of distant voices.... The Kiev regime began to use chemical weapons against Russian soldiers.

A case of the use of chemical weapons was recorded in the Kleshcheevka region of the DPR, TASS (https://tass-ru.turbopages.org/tass.ru/s/armiya-i-opk/20495917) was told in the law enforcement agencies of the Russian Federation. According to the agency's interlocutor, it is possible that the Ukrainian Army used adamsite. A substance that, when exploded, produces a light yellow or green cloud. Adamsite attacks a person's upper respiratory tract, causing a slow heart rate, increased blood pressure, and sudden cessation of breathing.

It is noteworthy that the toxic substance was first synthesized at the height of the First World War in Germany. Chemical weapons were used during the First World War, the Russian Civil War (when the British invaded Murmansk and Arkhangelsk), and during the Vietnam War.

InfoDefenseENGLISH
(https://t.me/infodefENGLAND)📱 InfoDefense (https://t.me/InfoDefAll)

 
Russian forces find coordinates of DPR churches at former Ukrainian positions in Avdeyevka

It was possible to establish that the Ukrainian servicemen were tasked with hitting Orthodox sites in the region aide to the head of the Donetsk People's Republic Igor Kimakovsky said.

"Russian forces found several phones belonging to dead Ukrainian servicemen at the former artillery positions of the Ukrainian armed formations. Some phones were restored. It turned out that there were recorded coordinates of targets, which, as it turned out, included churches in Donetsk, Makeyevka, Yasinovataya and surrounding settlements. The coordinates were in a special program that is actively used by the Ukrainian military," Kimakovsky said.

In addition, according to the aide, it was possible to establish that the Ukrainian servicemen were tasked with hitting Orthodox sites in the region. "I will not reveal all the details, but this process has overseas curators, similar to the way it was in Syria."

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 

The Polish President Revealed That Foreign Companies Own Most Of Ukraine's Industrial Agriculture​

BY TYLER DURDEN
THURSDAY, APR 18, 2024 - 12:00 AM
Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

The Oakland Institute published a detailed report in February 2023 titled “War and Theft: The Takeover of Ukraine’s Agricultural Land”, which exposed how foreign firms have clandestinely taken control of a significant share of Ukrainian farmland by exploiting a liberal law in collusion with local oligarchs. Their findings made waves around the world at the time but eventually receded from the public’s attention over half a year later once Western outlets like the USA Today misleadingly “fact-checked” it.

They took advantage of social media users conflating indirect ownership through stakes with direct control to discredit the institution’s report, after which it largely faded from the general discourse. Few could have expected that it would be none other than Polish President Andrzej Duda who just breathed new life into it during his interview with Lithuanian National Radio and Television. He was explaining Poland’s problem with Ukrainian agricultural imports when he dropped the following bombshell:
Duda represents what’s widely considered to be one of the most pro-American and anti-Russian governments at any time in history so he can’t credibly be accused of “pushing Kremlin propaganda”.

He therefore wouldn’t have confirmed the dramatic claim of majority-foreign ownership of Ukraine’s industrial agriculture, albeit indirectly through stakes in national companies that exploit a liberal law in collusion with local oligarchs, if he didn’t have the facts provided to him by Polish experts to back it up.

This development should prompt a resurgence of interest in prior reports on this subject such as USAID’s about how “Private Sector on the Frontlines of Land Reform to Unlock Ukraine’s Investment Potential”. Thomas Fazi’s detailed report for UnHeard back in July 2023 about how “The capitalists are circling over Ukraine: The war is creating massive profit opportunities” is also insightful. Most relevant, however, is what Zelensky told the World Economic Forum in Davos in May 2022. In his words:

“We offer a special - historically significant - model of reconstruction. When each of the partner countries or partner cities or partner companies will have the opportunity - historical one - to take patronage over a particular region of Ukraine, city, community or industry. Britain, Denmark, the European Union and other leading international actors have already chosen a specific direction for patronage in reconstruction.”​

more

The Polish President Revealed That Foreign Companies Own Most Of Ukraine's Industrial Agriculture | ZeroHedge

ZeroHedge - On a long enough timeline, the survival rate for everyone drops to zero
www.zerohedge.com
 
Ukraine turns from sovereign country into Western protectorate, Hungarian PM says

Viktor Orban noted that there should be a buffer zone between NATO and Russia and Ukraine could serve as one.

"Ukraine is not any more a sovereign state. Ukraine is now just a protectorate of the West. So, without getting the money and the weapons from the European Union and the United States, Ukraine as a state would cease to exist," he said, addressing the National Conservatism Conference in Brussels.

Orban added that there should be a buffer zone between NATO and Russia and Ukraine could serve as one. The Hungarian prime minister pointed out that Russia had repeatedly stated it would not tolerate the North Atlantic Alliance’s expansion towards its borders.

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 

US weighs sending additional military advisers to Ukraine as Russia gains momentum​

The U.S. is considering sending additional military advisers to the embassy in Kyiv, the latest show of American commitment to Ukraine as Russia appears to be gaining momentum in the two-year conflict.

The advisers would not be in a combat role, but rather would advise and support the Ukrainian government and military, according to Pentagon spokesperson Maj. Gen. Pat Ryder.

“Throughout this conflict, the DOD has reviewed and adjusted our presence in-country, as security conditions have evolved. Currently, we are considering sending several additional advisers to augment the Office of Defense Cooperation (ODC) at the Embassy,” Ryder said in a statement to POLITICO, noting that “personnel are subject to the same travel restrictions as all embassy employees.

The ODC “performs a variety of advisory and support missions (non-combat), and while it is staffed exclusively by DOD personnel, it is embedded within the U.S. Embassy, under Chief of Mission authority like the rest of the Embassy,” Ryder added.

Ryder declined to discuss specific numbers of personnel “for operational security and force protection reasons.”

The additional troops will support logistics and oversight efforts for the weapons the U.S. is sending Ukraine, according to four U.S. officials and a person familiar with the plans, who were granted anonymity to speak about a sensitive topic.

More:

 

Ukraine is Heading Towards TOTAL COLLAPSE | Scott Ritter​

36
 
The Naked Truth
Sometimes People Don't Want To Hear The Truth Because They Don't Want Their Illusions Destroyed

 

Exclusive-Ukraine poised to send $20 billion rework proposal to bondholders by early May, sources say​

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Ukraine is poised to send international bondholders a proposed plan to restructure its $20 billion in debt by early May, two sources familiar with the situation said.

Time is of the essence for Ukraine to secure a debt rework agreement before a two-year payment freeze agreed with holders of its outstanding international bonds ends in August.

The freeze was struck after Russia's invasion of the country in February 2022 hit its economy hard.

Sharing a proposal with its bondholders is set to mark the starting point for formal talks, including holding detailed discussions and the exchange of privileged information.

One of the sources said Ukraine's government hoped to reach the outlines of an agreement in June at the latest.

Ukraine's finance ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment on Sunday. The sources declined to be named due to the sensitivity of the issue.

The war-torn economy has been sounding out major investors since late 2023 over plans to restructure its international debt and the possibility of raising fresh financing, as previously reported by Reuters. But so far discussions have been held only informally.

More:

 

" You'll lose it," but you hold on.

These words characterize the current state of the Armed Forces of Ukraine

The problem with recruiting reserves and rotation is so huge that they are not only raking out all the remaining men, but also the women have begun to be raked in full swing.

Here is a list of women who are already in captivity and have declared their desire to be exchanged. Those who are lucky.

Again. These are only women. Only those who are in captivity. Only those who agreed to the exchange.

Do you catch the scale of the Bandera genocide of the population of the former Ukraine?

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 
"winning"

The new commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine plans to dismiss brigade commanders.​

The Commander-in-Chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine (AFU), Alexander Syrsky , announced personnel purges, accusing some brigade commanders of incompetence. He wrote about this in his telegram channel, mentioning that he was conducting an inspection on the eastern front.

Syrsky noted that in three days he understood why some brigades manage to hold back attacks and hold positions, while others, with similar composition and weapons, do not. He believes that this depends on the brigade commander, his level of training and ability to make informed decisions.

“In some cases, when the commander does not control the situation, and his actions and commands directly create a threat to the life and health of his subordinates, I am forced to make personnel decisions,” wrote the new commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine.

On February 29, Syrsky also announced this problem. He reported on the difficult situation in the Avdeevka and Zaporozhye directions and noted that the commanders had identified miscalculations in assessing the situation.

t.me/ForeignAgentIntel

 
️ Ban on Russian LNG will hit Europeans hard in the wallet without shaking Russia, says expert

"This will lead to higher prices for gas, electricity, heating in winter and, in general, it will increase inflation," an expert from the Financial University under the Government of the Russian Federation told Sputnik Africa.

However, Europe has failed to control inflation, which has been skyrocketing since 2022, Igor Yushkov recalled, commenting on the possible introduction of a full embargo on Russian LNG in the upcoming 14th sanctions package.

"At the level of consumers, businesses and ordinary people, there is a realization that anti-Russian sanctions cost too much and don't pay off, don't work. Russia does not change the goals and direction of its foreign policy, while they pay more and more," the academic explained.

The analyst noted that European political elites were more independent during the Cold War and were able to defend their right to buy Russian energy. These massive imports helped build the "European prosperity" whose future is now in doubt.

For Yushkov, the "quality of political leadership" is currently deteriorating against the backdrop of the "decline of nationalist political elites" sidelined by the EU.

The expert also pointed out that Europe no longer has much to offer the world in terms of new ideas and cheap labor.

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️The Russian military has struck a convoy carrying Western weapons and military equipment, according to Russia's MoD

More key points from the Russian Defense Ministry's daily report on the special military operation:

The country's air defense shot down 193 Ukrainian drones, two Olkha multiple launch rocket system projectiles, and three Hammer guided bombs within 24 hours;

Ukrainian troops lost up to 1,005 servicemen in all areas of the frontline;

Russian units improved their frontline positions.

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