Puppet MastersS


Russian Flag

Scott Ritter: We are witnessing the bittersweet birth of a new Russia

Scott Ritter
RT
Sat, 09 Mar 2024 22:07 UTC
RItterSaldo
© Scott RitterScott Ritter with Kherson region governor Vladimir Saldo
Tucker Carlson's confused exasperation over Russian President Vladmir Putin's extemporaneous history lesson at the start of their landmark February interview (which has been watched more than a billion times), underscored one realty. For a Western audience, the question of the historical bona fides of Russia's claim of sovereign interest in territories located on the left (eastern) bank of the Dnieper River, currently claimed by Ukraine, is confusing to the point of incomprehension.

Vladimir Putin, however, did not manufacture his history lesson from thin air. Anyone who has followed the speeches and writings of the Russian president over the years would have found his comments to Carlson quite familiar, echoing both in tone and content previous statements made concerning both the viability of the Ukrainian state from an historic perspective, and the historical ties between what Putin has called Novorossiya (New Russia) and the Russian nation.
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No Entry

Biden warns Netanyahu that Rafah invasion is 'red line'


Yahoo News
Sat, 09 Mar 2024 11:02 UTC
Biden
© Peter Zay/Anadolu/Getty ImagesUS President Joe Biden speaks at campaign event in Atlanta, Georgia, expressing willingness to return to Israel
President Joe Biden has said he believes Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu is "hurting Israel more than helping Israel" in how he is approaching its war against Hamas in Gaza.

The US leader expressed support for Israel's right to pursue Hamas after the October 7 attack, but said of Mr Netanyahu that "he must pay more attention to the innocent lives being lost as a consequence of the actions taken".

Mr Biden has for months warned that Israel risks losing international support over mounting civilian casualties in Gaza, and the latest remarks in an interview with MSNBC's Jonathan Capehart on Saturday pointed to the increasingly strained relationship between the two leaders.

Mr Biden said of the death toll in Gaza, "It's contrary to what Israel stands for. And I think it's a big mistake."


Comment: Perception management. Israel has no qualms eliminating Palestinians.


Mr Biden said a potential Israeli invasion of the Gaza city of Rafah, where more than 1.3 million Palestinians are sheltering, is "a red line" for him, but said he would not cut off weapons like the Iron Dome missile interceptors which protect the Israeli civilian populace from rocket attacks in the region.

Comment: So how's that going for Biden?
Steven Cook, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, said Biden had miscalculated with his early unstinting support for Israel.

Biden underestimated how Israel would "frame the conflict in terms of an existential struggle, which means he has actually limited influence over them."

Cook said that while Biden has come under fire from the left, he is beginning to face criticism from Israel supporters who believe he is tilting too far to the Palestinians.

"It's really a lose-lose situation for the president. It'll have to be entirely up to him and his political people to decide which constituency he wants to upset more."


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Star of David

Netanyahu hits back at Biden's criticism: Policies are supported by 'overwhelming majority' of Israelis

Sarah Fortinsky
The Hill
Sun, 10 Mar 2024 03:49 UTC
Neti
© UnknownIsraeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in a Sunday interview fired back at President Biden's suggestion that his policies were only hurting Israel.

Netanyahu said in an interview with Politico:
"I don't know exactly what the president meant, but if he meant by that that I'm pursuing private policies against the majority, the wish of the majority of Israelis, and that this is hurting the interests of Israel, then he's wrong on both counts."
Netanyahu said he thinks the majority of Israelis supports the operation in Gaza to destroy what's remaining of Hamas — the U.S.-designated terrorist organization that governs the Gaza Strip. Hamas killed 1,200 Israelis in the Oct. 7 massacre and took about 250 hostages.

Netanyahu has since led an operation in Gaza to root out Hamas and to rescue the hostages, killing more than 30,000 estimated Palestinians, according to the Hamas-run health ministry in Gaza.

Netanyahu said:
"These are not my private policies only. They're policies supported by the overwhelming majority of the Israelis. They support the action that we're taking to destroy the remaining terrorist battalions of Hamas.

"The majority of Israelis understand that if we don't do this, what we'll have is a repetition of the October 7th massacre, which is bad for Israel, bad for the Palestinians, bad for the future of peace in the Middle East."
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Big Bomb

The 'ammo-gap': Russia producing three times more shells than NATO


RT
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 20:07 UTC
putin russian weapons factory
© Sputnik / Russian Presidential Press OfficeRussian President Vladimir Putin visits the Shcheglovsky Val machine building plant, a subsidiary of KBP Instrument Design Bureau, in Tula, Russia.
Vladimir Putin has transformed the economy faster than the US and its allies could, the news network was told

Russia is producing three times more artillery shells than Kiev's military sponsors, CNN reported on Monday, citing Western intelligence estimates.

At the current rate, defense plants in Russia can churn out roughly three million munitions per year, compared to the 1.2 million that the US and its allies in the EU can make and provide to Kiev over the same period, the news network was told.

With artillery proving crucial for the large-scale positional warfare of the Ukraine conflict, Moscow is "mounting a significant advantage on the battlefield," one NATO source said. Russia has "put everything they have in the game," the senior European intelligence official told CNN. "Their war machine works in full gear."

Comment: Brian Berletic of New Atlas is a numbers wonk, and has been reporting about this almost since the SMO started.

Russia's 'command and control', 'excess capacity' industrial complex has been mocked by the free-market West since forever. BUT when she is in need, that complex, paired with the country's immense natural resources and friendly trade partners, can turn on a dime to produce whatever Mother Russia requires, while the West's private MIC enterprises waste time squabbling about 'return on investment'.



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Stop

Trump has plan to end Ukraine conflict - Orban


RT
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 11:31 UTC
DTrump
© Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images/fileFormer US President Donald Trump
The "detailed" scheme involves cutting Kiev off from US aid, the Hungarian PM said...

Donald Trump intends to end the Ukraine conflict, if reelected as US president, and has a "detailed plan" to do so, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban told local media, after meeting the presumed Republican nominee.

The former US leader repeatedly claimed on his campaign trail that, if he had remained in the White House for a second term, there would be no hostilities between Moscow and Kiev. If voted back in, he promises to end the conflict "in 24 hours" by applying pressure on stakeholders.

Orban, who spoke with Trump at the Mar-a-Lago estate in Florida on Friday, did not explain how exactly the American would do that, but said that cutting the flow of US aid was a crucial part of the plan.
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Recycle

Scrap heap next? Britain's flagship aircraft carrier catches fire en route for repairs


RT
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 19:54 UTC
HMS Queen Elizabeth
The blaze was the latest in a long line of malfunctions to befall the HMS Queen Elizabeth

Britain's HMS Queen Elizabeth has caught fire while docked in Scotland to unload ammunition prior to having its propeller shaft repaired. The propeller issue had caused the £3 billion ($3.85 billion) warship to miss NATO's largest exercise in decades last month.

The blaze broke out while the carrier was docked at Glenmallan on Friday night, a Royal Navy spokesperson said on Saturday. "A minor, isolated fire on HMS Queen Elizabeth was quickly brought under control and extinguished," the spokesman told the UK Defence Journal.

The HMS Queen Elizabeth was unloading ammunition at the time of the incident. From there, it is due to head to the port of Rosyth to undergo repairs to its starboard propeller shaft coupling.

Comment: The British navy like the whole Western leadership is full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.

See also:

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Yoda

Best of the Web: Why the US is trying to imprison Assange: Report from inside the Court

Richard Medhurst
Al Mayadeen
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 19:20 UTC
julian assange
© Al Mayadeen English; Illustrated by A. MakkiThe prospect of the United States- a foreign government- imposing its laws on British soil to snatch a foreign journalist should scare anyone who is serious about press freedoms
Richard Medhurst is a British journalist who has covered Julian Assange's extradition case from inside the court since 2020. In this article, he explains what took place in the latest hearings, why the United States is trying to extradite the WikiLeaks founder, and why everyone should care.

Julian Assange is an Australian journalist in the United Kingdom, and the founder of WikiLeaks. He published documents that were given to him by a US soldier called Chelsea Manning, which showed US war crimes in Iraq, Afghanistan, and much more.

The United States want to extradite Assange from the UK to America, and put him on trial for publishing these classified documents. They are threatening him with 175 years in prison.

The reason this case is so serious is because it essentially makes journalism illegal.
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Jet3

NATO states will break F-16 pledge to Ukraine - NYT


RT
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 14:36 UTC
FILE PHOTO: A Royal Norwegian Air Force fighter jet in the air.
© AFP / Jan LanghaugFILE PHOTO: A Royal Norwegian Air Force fighter jet in the air.
Kiev will only receive six out of the 45 fighter jets promised by the end of spring, the paper reports

NATO member states will not be able to fulfill their pledge to send 45 F-16s to Ukraine, as the bloc's drive to provide Kiev with US-designed fighter jets is marred by "confusion and chaos," the New York Times has reported.

The administration of US President Joe Biden allowed America's European allies to arm the Ukrainian military with fourth generation F-16 aircraft last spring, with Denmark, the Netherlands, Norway, and Belgium jointly vowing to supply 45 planes.

However, only the Danish authorities have so far announced a timeline for the arrival of the jets in Ukraine, the NYT said in an article on Monday. Copenhagen says Kiev will receive six F16s in late spring, with another 13 coming later in the year and in 2025.

Comment:
These planes are not invincible in any way:
Indian military confirms to press that IAF MiG-21 shot down Pakistani F-16
Yemeni Houthis claim downing of Moroccan F16 jet
Apart from the Ukrainian pilots not being ready in large numbers to take over the donated planes, what hides behind "confusion and chaos"? Is it real, an excuse, or both?

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SOTT Logo Radio

SOTT Focus: NewsReal: End of Empire: Angry Biden, Divider-in-Chief & Macron's Grande Armée to 'Defeat' Russia?


Sott.net
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 17:57 UTC
biden state union macron russia newsreal
© Sott.net
Biden's aggressive, hopped-up 'State of the Union' speech inadvertently revealed the state of the American union: fatally fractured. With 10 million migrants pouring into the US during his term, in service of stuffing the ballot boxes and packing the military, this desperate 'Late Rome' attempt to maintain the political status quo in perpetuity is destined to fail.

The unanimous self-delusion two years ago that Ukraine was going to 'defeat' Russia has given way to bitter acknowledgment that Russia is going to win... 'unless we do something fast!' In the meantime waves of drone-strikes are daily targeting Russian cities, and Russian counter-strikes are picking off the best war machines the West has 'gifted' Ukraine.

Macron is STILL talking about 'doing a Napoleon', this week speculating - to the Polish foreign minister's delight - that French troops could soon be in Odessa, and meeting Moldova's PM to 'guarantee their security', fully aware that there are TWO pro-Russian regions within tiny Moldova that would welcome entry into the EU/NATO about as much as Donbass Russians.

Final topics in this week's NewsReal: Texas governor Gregg Abbott's suspicions about the Smokehouse Creek wildfire (the largest-ever in that state), the comprehensive defeat of government proposals to 'equalize' Ireland's constitution, and the revolution in Haiti being falsely portrayed as 'cannibal gang warfare'.


Running Time: 01:51:54

Download: MP3 — 76.8 MB

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Light Sabers

Iran, Russia, China start joint naval exercise in northern Indian Ocean


PressTV
Mon, 11 Mar 2024 15:42 UTC
Dena destroyer iran navy
© TasnimIran’s domestically designed and manufactured Dena destroyer
Naval forces from the Islamic Republic of Iran, Russia and China will start a combined naval exercise in the northern tip of the Indian Ocean, where various divisions of their militaries will conduct large-scale maritime maneuvers.

The main stage of the naval war game, dubbed Maritime Security Belt 2024, will kick off on Tuesday.

The naval and airborne units of the Islamic Republic of Iran Navy, together with their Chinese and Russian counterparts, will participate in the joint naval drills. Naval delegations from Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, Oman, Pakistan and South Africa have taken part as observers in the exercises.

The Maritime Security Belt 2024 naval drills are meant to beef up security and its fundamentals in the region, enhance multilateral cooperation among the participating countries, and to demonstrate the goodwill and ability of the participants to jointly safeguard global peace and maritime security.

Comment: See also:

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