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'Plan B' for Ukraine: Calls for concessions to Russia are growing in both Kiev and the West, but are they realistic?

Snow Z
© Anatolil Stepanov/AFP
An increasing number of voices are acknowledging that the conflict won't end on Vladimir Zelensky's terms...

We are hearing more and more suggestions that Kiev should get ready for a compromise peace. In particular, there are mountings calls to cede territory to Russia.

Two things have changed in both the West and Ukraine: First, there are now growing demands for a "plan B," as the former Ukrainian Prime Minister Yulia Timoshenko calls it, and, more importantly, the taboo on talking about this need is gone.

Given Ukraine's difficult and dangerous - not to mention that things could quickly get much worse - military, financial, and political situation, these calls are no surprise. The real question is not why this is happening, but what it may mean for the future: Do these calls signal a real readiness to make peace? And if so on what terms? And is it a realistic prospect?

Star of David

Netanyahu 'in real trouble,' IDF can't control Gaza - analyst

Benji
© Maya Alleruzzo/APIsraeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu
Netanyahu's political future may depend on a second Trump presidency, says one observer.

Political analyst Elijah Magnier joined Sputnik's Political Misfits program Monday to discuss Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu's declining political fortunes as the country pulls troops from northern Gaza.

In a discussion with host John Kiriakou, the journalist said:
"Netanyahu is in real trouble today. First, he is attacked by his coalition in the government... the finance minister [Bezalel] Smotrich and the security minister [Itamar] Ben-Gvir warned him if he stopped the attack on Gaza, saying that they want the [Israeli] settlers to return to Gaza after they were asked to leave in 2005 by Prime Minister Ariel Sharon.

"This objective contradicts with the American announcement that the Palestinians will go nowhere and will remain in Gaza, and any ethnic cleansing is not permitted, which means that the coalition and Netanyahu's government is not going to hold."
The Biden administration has largely defended Netanyahu's military operation in Gaza, which has killed 1% of the enclave's population over the previous months. Both Biden and US Secretary of State Antony Blinken have a long history of strong support for Israel.

Bullseye

US intel fears Hezbollah may defeat Israel with expanded weaponry, capabilities

bombing
© Mohammad ZaatariIsraeli attack on Southern Lebanon
An act of aggression in Lebanon could further damage Israel's reputation as it faces charges of genocide in The Hague this week.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has signaled in recent days that he plans to launch a war on Hezbollah across Israel's northern border, but the United States is afraid the country is biting off more than it can chew.

That's according to reports in US media over the weekend as US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrives in the Middle East to meet with leaders in the region.

One report read:
"US officials are concerned that Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu may see an expanded fight in Lebanon as key to his political survival amid domestic criticism of his government's failure to prevent Hamas's Oct. 7 attack. In private conversations, the [Biden] administration has warned Israel against a significant escalation in Lebanon."

Sherlock

Medvedev: Germany could face its own 'Maidan' due to budget shortfall from funding Ukraine war

protest
© Frank Hoensch / Getty Images
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz risks being forced out of office by mass protests, former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev has claimed. A week-long nationwide strike was launched in the EU's leading economy on Monday.

Farmers in Germany say the government's decision to cut diesel subsidies and tax breaks for the agriculture sector will force many of them out of business. Berlin's budgetary shortages are a direct result of spending "astronomical amounts" on Ukraine, Medvedev, who currently serves as deputy chair of Russia's Security Council, argued in a post on X (formerly Twitter).

"Subsidies have been ended, and astronomical amounts spent on Ukraine are still growing. And Germany is the main funder," Medvedev wrote. "If this goes on, banderovtsy will export their proven weapon, the maidan, to Berlin."

Officials in Moscow, meanwhile, are "following [the events] with malicious interest," Medvedev added.

Extinguisher

Macron's latest prime minister is France's youngest - and first OPENLY gay - leader

Popular former education minister, 34, will work with president on government shakeup; his late father was Jewish
gabriel attal macron
Gabriel Attal was named Tuesday as France's youngest-ever prime minister, as President Emmanuel Macron seeks a fresh start for the rest of his term amid growing political pressure from the far right.

Macron's office announced the appointment in a statement. Attal, 34, rose to prominence as the government spokesman and education minister. He is France's first openly gay prime minister.

Attal's late father, Yves Attal, was Jewish.

His predecessor Elisabeth Borne resigned Monday following recent political turmoil over an immigration law that strengthens the government's ability to deport foreigners.

Macron - who was France's youngest-ever president when he came to power in 2017 — is to work with Attal to name a new government in the coming days, though some key ministers are expected to continue in their posts.

Comment: Attal seems to consider himself Jewish. From the Jewish Telegraph Agency:
France's newest prime minister is getting attention for the two firsts he brings to the job: Gabriel Attal, at 34, is the country's youngest ever prime minister, and its first to be openly gay.

He says another facet of his identity also shapes him: His late father's Jewishness.

Attal's mother raised him and his siblings in her Russian Orthodox Christian faith. But his father, the film producer Yves Attal, was Jewish, born in Paris to Tunisian Jewish and European Jewish parents.

"My father said to me, 'Perhaps you're Orthodox but you'll feel Jewish all your life, mainly because you'll suffer antisemitism because of your name'," Attal told Liberation in 2019. Attal is a common North African Jewish name and would be recognized as such in France, where there are large populations of Tunisian and Algerian Jews.
Oh boy...


Eiffel Tower

Gabriel Attal appointed youngest French PM as Macron tries to revive popularity

Gabriel Attal
© Stéphanie Lecocq/ReutersGabriel Attal has been referred to as a ‘baby Macron’ in terms of his ambition, strong media presence and centrist politics.
Attal, 34, rose in opinion polls during his time as education minister and may improve ruling party's chances in EU elections

Emmanuel Macron has appointed France's youngest prime minister in modern times, Gabriel Attal, as he seeks to reinvigorate a difficult second term as president and limit any possible gains for the far right in the forthcoming European elections in June.

Attal, 34, who was serving as education minister, has been referred to as a "baby Macron" in terms of his ambition, strong media presence and centrist politics, and is considered the best-known and most recognisable face of the close circle of young politicians around the president.

During his five months defending a hard line on authority and secularism as education minister - including banning girls in state schools from wearing abayas and experimenting with introducing school uniform - Attal had shot up the opinion polls as the most popular minister in government.

Comment: Let's hope "Baby Macron" doesn't take too much after his mentor. The people of France have suffered enough!

See also:


Bad Guys

Latvia to host NATO patrol aircraft, Sweden's military to be deployed to region for 'integration'

NATO latvia
As of this Tuesday, Latvia will be gradually taking over the hosting of NATO's Baltic Air Policing Mission as renovation works take place at Estonia's Amari Air Base, the press office of the Latvian Defense Ministry informed LETA.

German Armed Forces soldiers and military aircraft will soon arrive in Latvia to start test flights. From March 1, the National Armed Forces' (NAF) Air Base in Lielvarde will host the mission on a rotational basis for nine months.

Since 2004, the air policing mission has been operating from Siauliai Air Base in Lithuania, and since 2014 the support mission is operating also from Amari Air Base in Estonia. This is the first time that Latvia takes over as the mission's host nation.


Comment: Notably, both just happen to be on Russia's border.


Comment: DefenseIndustry.eu reports:
Swedish Armed Forces to be deployed in Latvia amid NATO integration

In anticipation of its NATO membership, Swedish Armed Forces announced plans to contribute army units to Latvia as part of NATO's enhanced Forward Presence (eFP) concept. The FLF initiative involves multinational battle groups stationed in eight Eastern European countries, aimed at deterring potential Russian aggression against the West and NATO.

The mission in Latvia, led by a Danish division staff, will see Sweden and Denmark alternating responsibilities for setting up a battalion as part of a brigade based outside Riga. The Danish and Swedish troop contributions will rotate every six months. The Swedish component will consist of a mechanized battalion, starting as early as 2025.

While stationed in Latvia, the Swedish forces plan to continue training in a multinational context with other divisions, focusing primarily on deterrence.


Correction: Belligerence.


Although there is no formal government decision yet on the contribution, the army is actively planning for the mission.

"This will be one of the army's most visible initial contributions to NATO's collective defence, a task we take very seriously," said Major General Jonny Lindfors, the Chief of the Army. "The ability to provide military support outside our borders is crucial for our future role in NATO, just as the ability to receive military support in Sweden is."

The South Scanian Regiment (P 7) is designated as the first unit to be deployed following Sweden's NATO membership, with approximately 600 personnel involved.

"We have started planning for this mission, and assuming a decision is made, we are ready to fulfill the task," stated Colonel Lennart Wideström, commander of P 7.

NATO enhanced Forward Presence (eFP) forces are present in eight Eastern European countries, including Bulgaria, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, and Hungary. These battle groups vary in size and troop composition, adapted to specific geographic conditions in each host country. Sweden's contribution in Latvia will be led by a Danish division commander and will primarily involve personnel from the 71st battalion.
As international analysts have commented, the proxy war in Ukraine has exposed NATO to be a rather ineffective and deteriorating - albeit lawless and destructive - American-run outfit which is fast losing any influence it had in the world:


Eagle

Best of the Web: The Great Taking exposes the financial end game

the great taking
One of the very best exposés of the covert, very well-hidden, bellicose attempts to rob all of humanity - barring the miniscule number of psychotic individuals comprising the inimical opposition - of their material possessions and their 'immaterial' freedom, was published fairly recently. It is accurately titled The Great Taking (2023), and was written by David Webb, one of the most courageous and finance-savvy authors I have ever come across. He introduces the book on p. 1 in uncompromising terms:
What is this book about? It is about the taking of collateral, all of it, the end game of this globally synchronous debt accumulation super cycle. This is being executed by long-planned, intelligent design, the audacity and scope of which is difficult for the mind to encompass. Included are all financial assets, all money on deposit at banks, all stocks and bonds, and hence, all underlying property of all public corporations, including all inventories, plant and equipment, land, mineral deposits, inventions and intellectual property. Privately owned personal and real property financed with any amount of debt will be similarly taken, as will the assets of privately owned businesses, which have been financed with debt. If even partially successful, this will be the greatest conquest and subjugation in world history.

We are now living within a hybrid war conducted almost entirely by deception, and thus designed to achieve war aims with little energy input. It is a war of conquest directed not against other nation states but against all of humanity.

Comment: Researchers like Whitney Webb and Catherine Austin Fitts (among many others) have been warning of just such a plan for several years now; each from their own areas of specialty and expertise. And now David Webb has added his own insights and knowledge of these monstrous plans, and has done an excellent job of rounding out a picture that we ignore at the risk of our well being.

See the documentary:




Bullseye

Genocide in Gaza cannot rationally or legally be refuted

palestinian children
I am writing to flag a truly important document that should be widely circulated and read carefully by anyone interested in the ongoing Gaza War.

Specifically, I am referring to the 84-page "application" that South Africa filed with the International Court of Justice (ICJ) on 29 December 2023, accusing Israel of committing genocide against the Palestinians in Gaza.1 It maintains that Israel's actions since the war began on 7 October 2023 "are intended to bring about the destruction of a substantial part of the Palestinian national, racial and ethnic ... group in the Gaza Strip." (1) That charge fits clearly under the definition of genocide in the Geneva Convention, to which Israel is a signatory.2

The application is a superb description of what Israel is doing in Gaza. It is comprehensive, well-written, well-argued, and thoroughly documented. The application has three main components.

First, it describes in detail the horrors that the IDF has inflicted on the Palestinians since 7 October 2023 and explains why much more death and destruction is in store for them.

Second, the application provides a substantial body of evidence showing that Israeli leaders have genocidal intent toward the Palestinians. (59-69) Indeed, the comments of Israeli leaders - all scrupulously documented - are shocking. One is reminded of how the Nazis talked about dealing with Jews when reading how Israelis in "positions of the highest responsibility" talk about dealing with the Palestinians. (59) In essence, the document argues that Israel's actions in Gaza, combined with its leaders' statements of intent, make it clear that Israeli policy is "calculated to bring about the physical destruction of Palestinians in Gaza." (39)

Sherlock

Poland covered up for Nord Stream attackers - WSJ

Nord Stream sabotage
© AFP / Danish DefenseOne of four gas leaks at one of the damaged Nord Stream gas pipelines in the Baltic Sea, September 29, 2022
Polish officials have withheld evidence and attempted to stall an international probe into the bombing of the Nord Stream gas pipelines, making investigators "suspicious of Warsaw's role and motives," the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday.

The Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2 gas lines - which linked Russia with Germany through the Baltic Sea - were destroyed in a series of explosions near the Danish island of Bornholm in September 2022. A joint inquiry by Germany, Denmark, and Sweden is ongoing, with investigators theorizing that a Ukrainian team rented a yacht in Germany from a Polish company, which they used to transport explosives to the blast sites.

When these alleged leads were chaned (sic) in Poland, investigators were stonewalled by government officials and law enforcement agents, the Journal reported, citing sources within the investigation.

Comment: While it is possible, that someone in Poland knows more than can publicly be admitted, so probably does someone in Germany, Denmark, and Sweden. But, alright, imagine that there was a yacht involved and that it was connected to Poland, what next? How to get explosives from the little boat and have it properly planted at several locations at a depth of around 70 to 80 meters below the surface, and later have it detonated at a suitable time. Yes, no kidding: Surprise! Norway-Poland gas pipeline opens on same day Nord Stream pipelines attacked

Considering how proud the Polish Government is of being Polish, it is unlikely to be happy with the article in the Wall Street Journal. In the defence of the pride and independence of the Polish Government, there is a strong NATO-US military presence in the country. On the map below, you will find the Island Bornholm in the upper left corner of the image, just below the T, as if pointing to the general area of the crime.

US and NATO presence in Poland
© SputnikUS Military and NATO presence in Poland
Maybe finding something to stick on Poland is the closest the European US allies can do to push the case around. Those who organized the sabotage, very likely made it so complex, and professional, that there will be enough trails to keep those lower level investigators that are allowed to look at the case busy. Germany, Sweden and Denmark are not in a hurry, they want to go green anyway, deindustrialize to meet the CO2 emission targets, and to match the colour trend, pay greenbacks for the expensive US LNG.

See also Biden's attack on Nord Stream pipelines was aimed at Germany - Seymour Hersh which has a very long list of links relating to the Nord Stream sabotage including what went before and what came after.