Canberra is losing its strategic autonomy due to its security pact with the US and UK, former Prime Minister Paul Keating has said.

The US is surrounding Australia with military bases under the AUKUS pact, which undermines the country's sovereignty and makes it a legitimate target for China.

In an interview with ABC on Thursday, Keating, who served as prime minister between 1991 and 1996, voiced strong skepticism about whether his country benefits from being a member of AUKUS - a landmark security partnership between Australia, UK, and the US, which was announced in 2021. The pact, which has been condemned by China, focuses on helping Australia acquire nuclear-powered submarines.

Keating argued that by allowing the US to "displace our military" and surround the country with bases, Canberra is essentially giving up its right to determine its foreign and defense policy. Australia will "completely lose" its strategic autonomy as a result, he claimed.

"So AUKUS is really about, in American terms, the military control of Australia. The government of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese is "likely to turn Australia into the 51st state of the United States."

Kiev has lost nearly 1,000 soldiers and over 100 armored vehicles over the past several days, Russia's Defense Ministry has said.

Russian forces continue to inflict heavy losses on Ukrainian troops that crossed the border into Kursk Region earlier this week, the Defense Ministry in Moscow reported on Friday, providing an estimate of Kiev's casualties in the incursion.

According to the ministry, Ukraine has lost up to 945 soldiers as well as 102 armored vehicles, including 12 tanks and 17 armored personnel carriers. The figures include more than 280 troops and 27 armored vehicles destroyed over the past 24 hours in areas bordering Kursk Region, Moscow added.

The report also stated that Russian airstrikes have recently destroyed five Stryker armored personnel carriers as well as a Ukrainian military column that consisted of a tank, four APCs, and a Kozak combat vehicle.

The ministry added that the operation to repel and destroy Ukraine's forces in the region continues, and that the Russian military, aided by airstrikes and artillery fire, has prevented Kiev's attempts to conduct raids deep into Russian territory in Kursk Region.

A senior Biden administration official says Iran has no right to attack Israel militarily following the assassination of Hamas leader Ismail Haniyeh in Tehran, which was widely attributed to Israel.

"There's absolutely no legitimate basis whatsoever for Iran to launch a military attack against Israel, which it continues to threaten," the senior official says in a briefing with reporters.

"There's been a sense out there that somehow, Iran now has the right to attack Israel militarily, and we completely reject that logic," he adds.

Fellow Kremlin footsoldiers and sturdy Russophiles stand ready to be whopped by the Liberal Order's new queen bee, Kamala Harris, should the worst come to worst. One way or another, four-fifths of humanity will weep or rejoice over the next U.S. presidential election. Here's the latest.

Seriously, how many of you out there realize, like POLITICO's Eva Hartog, that the army of Putin numbers in the billions? The ever-Russophobic former Moscow Times editor claims anyone who is against the current U.S. Vice President becoming commander-in-chief is a Kremlin minion. The latest from POLITICO EU, "Russia's new punching bag: Kamala Harris," assures us all the Russians are not only coming, but they're already here!

Few Earthlings Want Harris

Yes, POLITICO has gone hog wild over the Democratic Party's chosen Hillary Clinton "mini-me." The Western media is all in line with Hartog in proclaiming that Putin's "army of propagandists is rolling out its full racist and sexist arsenal" against a U.S. vice president who cannot create a lucid commentary on anything. Of the 7.951 billion humans on Earth, how many have not seen and heard Harris fumble and stumble words and thoughts as if she's smoked a whole bag of "Ghost Train Haze" weed?

As you may know already, potheads are notorious for lacking what anyone would consider standard logic. Reading Hartog's latest hate spew and the similarity to Kamala Harris' lingo spaghetti, I am thinking that half of the 1.3 billion liberal lunatics in Europe and North America must be smoking something. Take this genius comment about the Kremlin lying low and letting us useful minions take our cues as a perfect example.

"But its foot soldiers in the Russian-language disinformation sphere have more than made up for that."

You get it, right? Vladimir Putin's footsoldiers of world domination are brainwashing Russians to be Russian! Now, there's a strategy. Wage a proxy and PR war on a people, and then use every human resource to convince the victims of Russophobia they are disliked by the Soros and Rothschild types and ultra-liberal snake people. Sure, this is what "we," the people who think Biden or Kamala Harris (or Michelle Obama) are abominations to any hope of peace and prosperity in our time. Moving on...

The Commander of the Russian Armed Forces in Syria arrived at the Russian Base in the Qamishli Airbase to meet representatives of the Syrian Democratic Forces (SDF) and the Syrian government, sources told Al Mayadeen Friday.

The meeting is meant to end heightened tensions in the Syrian cities of al-Hasakah and Qamishli in northeastern Syria.

This comes after SDF forces sieged several areas controlled by the Syrian Arab Army in northeastern Syria, where the majority of the region is under the control of the US-backed SDF, except for a few strategic enclaves.

Vice President Kamala Harris' campaign quietly edited Democratic Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz's biography on Thursday to remove a reference to him as a "retired command sergeant major."

Walz has fallen under scrutiny from Republicans for referring to himself as a retired command sergeant major when, in reality, he was only conditionally promoted to the rank but failed to perform the training necessary to permanently obtain it before retiring as a master sergeant in 2005, according to a statement provided by the Minnesota National Guard to Just the News on Wednesday. Harris' website referred to Walz as a "retired command sergeant major" until at least Thursday morning, according to an archived copy of the page, but has since clarified its description to note that he once served as command sergeant major without stating that he retired as one.

"There's some perversion that's happened in our country in the last several years."

— Candidate Kamala Harris

You might well wonder: how does the Democratic Party rank and file sustain such fervor for the wrecking crew of Harris & Walz conjured up with zero input from the Party's demos? Just plopped onstage as by the old MGM studio heads casting a pair of iffy contract players in a "B" movie musical called Our Pronouns Are Cash and Carry.

So far, Harris and Walz levitate in fake polls on gusts of idiot wind from the Party's unofficial public relations team of the The New York Times / MSNBC / CNN / NPR media matrix. But it's already obvious that Veep Kamala Harris' brain is just a laugh generator triggered by anything that sounds like an idea from the material world: the economy? Hee-haw. . . Ukraine? Bwa-ha-ha-ha-ha. . . The border? Tee-hee. . . Transitioning minor children? Yuk-yuk-yukity-yuk. . . The Middle East? Cackle cackle. . . .

You are well aware, I'm sure, that the veep has yet to be exposed to a single unscripted interchange with anyone outside her promotional circle. It's been kind of neat trick to behold, like watching a barking terrier walk around the stage on its hind legs — but after a while the audience might be thinking, What else can you show me?

The Ukrainian military has lost more than 115,000 servicemen in the conflict with Moscow over the past two months, Russian Security Council Secretary Sergey Shoigu has claimed.

Some 3,000 units of equipment and more than 3,000 cars operated by Kiev's troops have also been destroyed since June 14, he told journalists on Tuesday.

During the same period, the Russian military was able to capture 420 square kilometers (162 square miles) of territory from the Ukrainian forces, added Shoigu, who was Russia's defense minister until a government reshuffle in May.

The US and British armed forces have carried out strikes on the Yemeni port city of Hodeidah, controlled by Houthi rebels from the Ansar Allah movement, Houthi-run Al-Masirah TV said.

It said at least two airstrikes had been carried out on the Al-Jabanah neighborhood in the coastal part of the city. The TV channel did not give any information about the aftermath of the attack, including possible casualties or destruction.

Following the escalation of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict in the Gaza Strip, the group said they would strike Israeli territory and prevent ships affiliated with that country from passing through the Red Sea and the Bab al-Mandab Strait until the operation in the Palestinian enclave ended. The Houthis have attacked dozens of civilian ships in the Red Sea and the Gulf of Aden since November 2023.

US Central Command (CENTCOM) announced Thursday the arrival of F-22 fighter jets to its area of responsibility as tensions run high in the Middle East.

CENTCOM said the F-22 raptors are "part of U.S. force posture changes in the region to mitigate the possibility of regional escalation by Iran or its proxies."

Tensions are running high in the Middle East following the July 31 assassination of Hamas political chief Ismail Haniyeh in the Iranian capital Tehran and Israel's assassination of senior Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in Beirut.


Hamas and Iran have accused Israel of carrying out Haniyeh's assassination, while Tel Aviv has not confirmed or denied responsibility.