The United States is on the brink of a war in Ukraine, and most of the country hasn't even noticed.
WASHINGTON — President Biden is considering deploying several thousand U.S. troops, as well as warships and aircraft, to NATO allies in the Baltics and Eastern Europe, an expansion of American military involvement amid mounting fears of a Russian incursion into Ukraine, according to administration officials.
The move would signal a major pivot for the Biden administration, which up until recently was taking a restrained stance on Ukraine, out of fear of provoking Russia into invading. But as President Vladimir V. Putin has ramped up his threatening actions toward Ukraine, and talks between American and Russian officials have failed to discourage him, the administration is now moving away from its do-not-provoke strategy.
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The discussions came as the State Department ordered all family members of U.S. embassy personnel in Kyiv to leave Ukraine, citing the threat of Russian military action, and authorized some embassy employees to depart as well, according to senior State Department officials who briefed reporters on Sunday.
As Russian troops entered Ukraine, the government in Kiev ordered the "emergency destruction" of pathogens including plague and anthrax at US-funded laboratories near the Russian border, the Ministry of Defense in Moscow claimed on Sunday. Earlier rumors that the Russian military was targeting US-run biolabs were written off as conspiracy theories, but the ministry has promised to back up its claims with documents.
"We have received documentation from employees of Ukrainian biolaboratories on the emergency destruction on February 24 of especially dangerous pathogens of plague, anthrax, tularemia, cholera and other deadly diseases," read a statement from the ministry.
Comment: More on the US backed bioweapon laboratory's dotted across the planet, here:
The United States drastically enhanced its shipments of lethal military aid and protective equipment to Ukraine as the prospect of a Russian invasion became more apparent and then a reality, according to a declassified accounting of transfers and sales reviewed by The Washington Post.
The list indicates that as early as December, the Pentagon was equipping Ukrainian fighters with arms and equipment useful for fighting in urban areas, including shotguns and specialized suits to safeguard soldiers handling unexploded ordnance. Over the past week, the Biden administration has increased such shipments, sending Stinger antiaircraft missile systems for the first time and further augmenting Kyiv's supply of antitank Javelin missiles and other ammunition.
Comment: Well, not too bad for the WaPo. Factual, minimal spin. How did this article get past Bezo's editors?
The food crisis is escalating: more countries are halting exports, but even as the EU converges a food crisis meeting, they refuse to relax restrictions on farmers. Similarly, the US is not waiving biofuel mandates even as grain prices explode. Christian explains that this crisis is needed to advance the agenda, and reiterates the priorities for your victory garden to insulate your family and community from this worldwide food crisis. Start growing today.
"The United States aids Ukraine and her people," Adam Schiff declared in January 2020, "so that we can fight Russia over there, and we don't have to fight Russia here."
Schiff made this statement during the opening of Donald Trump's first impeachment trial, where the Democratic Party's bid to ensure unimpeded US weapons sales to Ukraine was presented, and widely accepted, as a valiant defense of US democracy and national security.
Two years later, the US use of Ukraine to "fight Russia over there" has reached its logical end-game: illegally, murderously, and catastrophically, Russia has invaded Ukraine to end the fight.
Vladimir Putin made the comments during a visit to Aeroflot Aviation School near Moscow
Vladimir Putin has described Western sanctions on Russia as being "equivalent to declaring a war", insisting that his invasion of Ukraine was driven by a need to protect Russian speakers in the country.
Speaking to female flight attendants in comments broadcast on state television, the Russian president said Moscow wanted Ukraine to be "demilitarised", "de-nazified" and to have a neutral status.
He said: "These (sanctions) are methods of fighting against Russia.
"These sanctions that you can see are equivalent to declaring a war - but thankfully it has not come to an actual war but we understand what these threats are about."
He said that everything was going to plan in Ukraine, and that the Russian army would "fulfil its aims".
FILE PHOTO: Russian President Putin chairs a meeting with members of the Security Council outside Moscow Sat, March 5, 2022
The Kremlin said on Saturday that the West was behaving like a bandit by cutting economic relations over the conflict in Ukraine but that Russia was far too big to be isolated as the world was much larger than just the United States and Europe.
Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that the West was engaged in "economic banditry" against Russia and that Moscow would respond. He did not specify what response there would be but said it would be in line with Russian interests.
"As you understand, there must be a corresponding response to economic banditry," Peskov said.
"This does not mean Russia is isolated," Peskov told reporters. "The world is too big for Europe and America to isolate a country, and even more so a country as big as Russia. There are many more countries in the world."
The BBC, CNN, ABC News, CBS News, and Bloomberg have suspended operations in Russia after President Vladimir Putin enacted a law that makes the deliberate spread of disinformation punishable by up to 15 years in prison.
After the anti-fake news law was approved on Friday, CNN said it would "stop broadcasting in Russia while we continue to evaluate the situation and our next steps moving forward."
Bloomberg - the news agency founded and owned by US billionaire Michael Bloomberg - similarly said it would "temporarily suspend the work of its journalists inside Russia" and accused Moscow of criminalizing "independent reporting." The New York-based outlet claimed that the crackdown on disinformation would make it "impossible to continue any semblance of normal journalism inside the country."
Like Bloomberg, the UK state-funded BBC argued that the law "appears to criminalize the process of independent journalism," and announced that its Russian-language coverage would continue only from outside Russia.
Spokespersons for ABC and CBS News announced that the networks would not broadcast from Russia while they "assess the situation," with ABC News calling the legislation a "censorship law."
The Washington Post responded to the introduction of the new law by removing authors' names and other data from their Russia-originated publications.
Comment: Unmentioned by these outlets is that deliberately lying is one of their core principles. As for the law, Moscow is defending it on the premise that an information war is being waged against Russia. Critics warn it could be used to silence people telling the truth about the war. That's always the case with censorship laws, so it remains to be seen what kind of cases end up being prosecuted. Given that the law specifies "deliberate" lying, presumably that means unintentionally saying the "wrong" things will not apply. We'll see.
The U.S. has also announced its oil and gas sanctions plan against Russia.
After being asked by a reporter how Western countries could "beat Putin" when they pay Russia "up to $700 million a day in oil, gas, and coal," and whether the US would consider implementing energy sanctions, Blinken said that while "nothing is off the table," sanctions are supposed to "have maximum impact on Russia and Putin while minimizing harm to us and our allies and partners."
There is no strategic interest in reducing the global supply of energy
The secretary of state explained that the "immediate effect" of energy sanctions against Russia would be to "raise prices at the pump for Americans" and "pad Russian profits with rising prices."
Since Joe Biden's inauguration last year, gas prices in the US have continued to rise. While the president acknowledged in November that gas prices were "too high," he blamed Russia and OPEC for their "refusal" to increase production and help bring down prices for Americans.
Though Blinken rejected direct export sanctions, at least for now, he said the White House had "a strong interest" in "degrading Russia's status as a leading energy supplier" and claimed it was currently working to wipe out the West's "dependence on Russian energy."
Peskov responded that the approach of the US, EU, UK, NATO, etc. will not work, because Russia is too big to isolate. "The world is too big for Europe and America to isolate any country, especially one as big as Russia. And in the world, as you know, there are many more countries that have a much more balanced, sometimes more reasonable attitude towards the dynamics of the development of international relations," Peskov said.
Alexander Rubinstein & Max Blumenthal The Gray Zone Fri, 04 Mar 2022 12:00 UTC
Zelensky awards Right Sector commander Dmytro Kotsyubaylo the “Hero of Ukraine” award
While Western media deploys Volodymyr Zelensky's Jewish heritage to refute accusations of Nazi influence in Ukraine, the president has ceded to neo-Nazi forces and now depends on them as front-line fighters.
Back in October 2019, as the war in eastern Ukraine dragged on, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky traveled to Zolote, a town situated firmly in the "gray zone" of Donbas, where over 14,000 had been killed, mostly on the pro-Russian side. There, the president encountered the hardened veterans of extreme right paramilitary units keeping up the fight against separatists just a few miles away.
Elected on a platform of de-escalation of hostilities with Russia, Zelensky was determined to enforce the so-called Steinmeier Formula conceived by then-German Foreign Minister Walter Steinmeier, which called for elections in the Russian-speaking regions of Donetsk and Lugansk.
The Russian Ministry of Defense announced on Saturday that offensive operations in Ukraine would resume from 18:00 Moscow time "due to the unwillingness of the Ukrainian side to influence the nationalists or extend the ceasefire."
"Not a single civilian was able to leave Mariupol and Volnovakha along the humanitarian corridors. The nationalist battalions took advantage of the ceasefire to strengthen their positions," the statement said.
At the request of the Ukrainian side, a ceasefire was called in the area around the cities of Mariupol and Volnovakha, with a complete halt in hostilities imposed to ensure the evacuation of the civilian population.
"Not a single civilian could get out along the designated humanitarian corridors. The population of these cities is held by Ukrainian nationalists as a 'human shield'," however, the Russian Defense Ministry said.
Ukrainian officials halted the evacuation, accusing Russia of continued shelling despite its promises it would ensure safe passage.
Comment: According to the DPR, only 17 people managed to leave Mariupol. One of Ukraine's negotiators, Denis Kireev, was reportedly executed by the Ukrainian SBU "during an attempt to arrest him" for treason. We wouldn't be surprised if more such "executions" take place in the future. The Ukrainian extremists are quite vocal of their intentions for anyone pro-peace. As Yarosh said of Zelensky: "Zelensky said in his inaugural speech that he was ready to lose ratings, popularity, position... No, he would lose his life. He will hang on some tree on Khreshchatyk- if he betrays Ukraine and those people who died in the Revolution and the War." Betraying Ukraine would be abiding by the Minsk agreements.
Some statements from Putin: Any attempt to impose a no-fly zone over Ukraine will be seen by Russia as an act of war. No martial law yet, and hopefully not in the future. By its current actions, Ukraine is putting its future statehood into question. Speaking of the background to the incursion, he said: "Listen, people in the Donbass are not stray dogs. Between 13,000 and 14,000 people have been killed over the years. More than 500 children have been killed or crippled. And what's especially intolerable is that the so-called 'civilized' West preferred not to notice it during those eight years." He expanded:
Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Saturday that he chose to attack Ukraine beyond the borders of the Donetsk and Lugansk People's Republics (DPR and LPR) to prevent the West from "endlessly" supplying "nationalists and radicals" with various resources, such as weapons and money. He added that the Russian forces were "practically done" destroying Ukrainian military sites, such as air defenses and weapons depots.
The president stated that he had ordered Russian troops to invade Ukraine last week in order to neutralize the "real threat" coming from Kiev and NATO. Moscow has long protested the Western military infrastructure along its borders and Ukraine's aspirations to join the US-led bloc.
"They began to say more actively that they will admit [Ukraine] to NATO. What will this lead to? All other members of the alliance must back Ukraine in the case of a military conflict," Putin said. "They will [attack] Crimea, and we will be forced to go to war with NATO. Do you understand the consequences?" The president stated that he wanted Ukraine to become a neutral country.
According to the Kremlin, Russia has no intention of partitioning the country. Rather, they want to free Ukraine of neo-Nazi ideology (which is held by numerous official and unofficial militias who have fought against the Donbass for the past 8 years).
Over in the U.S., Secretary of State Blinken had this to say:
"We'll always look for opportunities for diplomacy and for dialogue. It depends entirely on President [Vladimir] Putin and on Russia," he said.
According to Blinken, if Moscow shows "any signs of being willing to engage in meaningful diplomacy, of course we'll engage."
"We look to our Ukrainian partners, too. They are talking to the Russians, but that's not producing anything," he added.
He is unlikely to acknowledge the fact that the U.S. doesn't negotiate, it issues demands with no concessions.
Col. Macgregor continues to speak sense on Western media:
Ukraine's government has launched a website to recruit foreign mercenaries - an "international legion" of adventurers and war tourists.
Comment: More on the US backed bioweapon laboratory's dotted across the planet, here:
- Russia prevents Washington from unleashing biological warfare
- When RussiaGate goes truly viral - bioweapons development targeting Russia?
- Did COVID-19 escape Fort Detrick vaccine trial? Evidence that virus originated in US bioweapons lab
- Bill Gates renews warnings over 'small pox terror' threat, FDA approved drug in May for disease that was 'eradicated' in 1980
Also check out SOTT radio's: The Truth Perspective: Interview with Dilyana Gaytandzhieva: Pentagon Biological Warfare And Arms Trafficking to Terrorists