Image is allegedly of the note Trump wrote while editing a speech while on the way back from the G20 summit.
The top Russian-Chinese agent, Donald Trump, has decided that the pace of dedollarization and the decline of American financial hegemony is going too slowly. He has therefore decided to put tariffs on everybody; from America’s largest trading partners to uninhabited islands. In the process, he is trying to create an autarkic America. Jokes aside, interpretation and analysis of this has ranged across a wide spectrum. I think we can broadly agree that the most idiotic are the “true believers”; those that actually believe Trump’s every word, and that this will somehow bring back American manufacturing and whatever other inane promises he has made.
However, there is a much more interesting debate. The first camp are those who believe Trump is acting as an inadvertent accelerationist due to his lack of understanding about how the world economy and dollar hegemony functions (and that this will subsequently ensure that countries flock to China instead). The second camp are those who believe that Trump does know what he’s doing, at least to a certain extent, and that the effective result of this period of madness will be countries kowtowing to the United States; renegotiating trade deals to be even more in favor of the US in order to get tariffs reduced. There’s even a yet more cynical camp who believes that in fact, this entire trade war is just theater for further national wealth redistributions from poor to rich; that all these monumental international trade wars are more of a sideshow. To quote the linked article: “[…] out of the mountain of tariffs that threaten to turn into a global trade war will emerge the mouse of further tax cuts.”
I’m not embarrassed to admit that I have absolutely no idea which one of these is the closest model to reality. We’re in new economic and political ground, and even if the tariffs are quickly renegotiated and/or dropped, the impacts will continue to reverberate around the world for years. I’m sure we’ll debate this for months to come here, though!
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel’s destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
For the first time in 27 nights, it seems as if there will be no US air or missile strikes on Yemen. Hopefully this holds, and would be very good news for tonight.
Update: it did not hold, US airstrikes against Yemen continue.
This comes as the USS Carl Vinson Aircraft Carrier and it’s Strike Group has entered the area of operations in the Middle East/South West Asia today. The Carl Vinson carries F-35C 5th generation carrier launched stealth fighter jets, in addition to it’s F/A-18E/F strike fighters and EA-18G Growler Electronic Warfare (EW) and Suppression of Enemy Air Defense (SEAD) aircraft. This aircraft carrier will likely operate closer to the Persian Gulf, to the east of Yemen. The F-35Cs are a new capabilitiy that the USS Harry Truman does not have or possess.
In addition to this, a squadron of USAF F-15E strike fighters (along with mid air refueling aircraft) have made the trip to Jordan from the UK, to join the F-35As and A-10Cs already there. There are also F-35As in Saudi Arabia, and 6 B-2 Spirit stealth bombers in Diego Garcia. As well as the additional Patriot and THAAD air defence system battalions and batteries that have been transported to the region over the past week. There could also be assets we don’t even know about in the region of course, but I won’t speculate on that.
In his latest one hour televised speech, Abdulmalik Al-Houthi (the leader of the Ansar Allah/Houthi movement) mentioned the United States 69 times (and before I get trolled, no I’m not joking, that’s the actual number). The speech was defiant and mocking of the United States, as expected, but a clear departure to a more aggressive rhetoric and tone, from what I can tell from translations. So the conflict is heating up, despite today’s pause. Will a new Ansar Allah air defence system, missile or drone be revealed, as rumoured? No statements from the Yemeni Armed Forces as of yet on this, or the reported failed ballistic missile launches or weapons tests over the past few days (with the wreckage of one on video).
And obviously there’s Iran. Can a US and Israeli war with Iran even be avoided at this point, and if so, what does that mean for Iran and Yemen? The negotiations in Oman this Saturday don’t look highly promising. Negotiating under the current cold war conditions is almost impossible unless Iran is expected to capitulate on key issues like uranium enrichment levels and nuclear weapons, and potentially the disarmament of Hezbollah and the popular mobilisation forces in Iraq.
Very interesting. I saw these claims on Telegram yesterday, but initially refrained from posting them due to skepticism:
https://t.me/Middle_East_Spectator/17198
https://t.me/Middle_East_Spectator/17199
Going to be honest Middle East Spectator is a channel with links to Iran and North Korea by their own admission (they posted leaked documents from the US Space Force from North Korean sources, and posted the initial leaked documents on the Israeli attack on Iran preparations likely from Iranian sources), so as a source of information they’re not exactly neutral. I don’t think the pause is because of that (if it lasts longer and US ships start transiting through Yemeni waters then we’ll know it is ), I think it’s about regrouping and assessing.
I think they live in Iran too, or at least they’re Iranian in the diaspora. They usually talk about events in Iran like they’re in the country.
Yeah I agree there, definitely an Iranian linked channel or run by someone in Iran.
Would/can Iran send more serious air deterrence to Yemen to demonstrate what would happen to the US over their airspace?
Yemen already has some Iranian air defences according to intercepted arms shipments, such as the Sayyad 2C anti aircraft missile (Iranian equivalent of the US SM-2, made from Iranian SM-1s).
The US and Israel won’t be entering Iranian airspace deeply or at all for the initial attacks, unless they’re overly confident in their stealth capabilities (unlikely in my view). They’ll be using guided standoff weapons to hit above ground and minimally protected targets, not the deeply underground facilities, that would be later. The challenge for Iranian air defences would be intercepting these standoff weapons, such as stealth JASSM cruise missiles and Israeli air launched ballistic missiles, and not US and Israeli warplanes outside of their reach. One B-2 can carry 16 JASSM cruise missiles. One B-52 can carry 20. So six B-2s is 96 JASSM cruise missiles. Add four B-52s from the UK, and that’s 176 JASSMs from 10 bombers, with the B-2s getting closer for stealth standoff strikes. And then there’s going to be all kinds of standoff weapons launched from fighter jets, such as SLAM-ER cruise missiles, further JASSMs, AARGM-ER anti radiation missiles, ROCKS anti radiation air launched ballistic missiles, and Golden Horizon air launched ballistic missiles. Electromagnetic decoy missiles such as the MALD, along with electronic warfare from EA-18G Growlers would also be deployed. So hundreds of guided stand off munitions at once under electronic warfare conditions.
The question then becomes can Iran withstand such an attack or minimise the impact and shoot down most of the incoming missiles under these conditions. The answer is no, not even the best air defence in the world can do that, so the Iranians invested in missiles and drones as deterrence, and will respond asymmetrically with them if attacked.
This comment from an ex Iranian air force pilot outlines how it would play out, and I mostly agree, except for the political commentary