Authoritarian Violence

  

Contents   (in key-word terms -- search page for key-work chosen)

autocracy 

Carroll

China

G-20

India

Iran

Middle East

misinformation

naval

Starlink

tanks   -- hardware --  doctrine  --  funding  --  snipers - Isreal

territory   -- Ukraine, South China Sea,  Sahel of Africa,  Kosovo,  Azerbaijan,   Israel,    US, -- Syria/Iran -- Myanmar

terrorism

well-being

2024sep24    US violence crime down in 2023. 

Crime surged during the coronavirus pandemic, with homicides increasing nearly 30% in 2020 over the previous year — the largest one-year jump since the FBI began keeping records. The rise defied easy explanation, though experts said possible contributors included the massive disruption of the pandemic, gun violence, worries about the economy and intense stress.    Violent crime has become a focal point in the 2024 presidential race, with former President Donald Trump recently claiming that crime is “through the roof” under President Joe Biden’s administration. Even with the 2020 pandemic surge, violent crime is down dramatically from the 1990s.  https://link.apnews.com/view/65afc88a6b314058d10bcf9flxemm.d6yn/24da32d4

2024sep23    WWIII — middle east.  

2024aug19    Kursk ‘buffer zone’.         For the first time, Zelensky on Sunday stated the strategic ambitions of the operation, saying, “It is now our primary task in defensive operations overall: to destroy as much Russian war potential as possible and conduct maximum counteroffensive actions.”    Those include “creating a buffer zone on the aggressor’s territory,” the president said in his latest address.    “Everything that inflicts losses on the Russian army, Russian state, their military-industrial complex, and their economy helps prevent the war from expanding and brings us closer to a just end to this aggression,” Zelensky said.  https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/18/europe/zelensky-kursk-incursion-second-bridge-intl/index.html

2024july20..       Trump shooter.      Barring a breakthrough in the investigation, Crooks appears poised to join a string of high-profile attackers with no discernible ideological driver, or with influences from a mixed bag of beliefs. That outcome is frustrating for a nation struggling to make sense of the event, analysts say, but it fits into a pattern of bloody episodes that defy categorization along a traditional left-right spectrum.        Investigators haven’t produced evidence showing an ideological motive that meets official definitions of terrorism, Byman and other analysts say. Authorities typically explore other theories, too, including mental illness or a quest for notoriety. The lack of conclusive findings has been difficult to accept for many Trump supporters, who have embraced the idea that he was targeted by an enemy of the MAGA movement — a claim repeated this week by speakers at the Republican National Convention in Milwaukee.        “It’s very unsatisfying, psychologically, to say, ‘Stuff happens and we don’t know why,” Byman said, adding that without a motive, “people fill the void with their own conspiracy theories that increase polarization and decrease trust in institutions.”.   Attacks without clear motivation aren’t unusual and have increased, researchers say, in part as a reflection of the ideologies that swirl together on social media and gaming platforms, creating a toxic soup of grievances with no cohesive political agenda.  https://www.blogger.com/blog/page/edit/5061034831056916264/2045802923092214984

A full public assessment of Trump’s injuries is necessary, for both the former president’s own health and the clarity it can provide for voters about the recovery of the man who could become president of the United States once again. The concern is that gunshot blasts near the head can cause injuries that aren’t immediately noticeable, such as bleeding in or on the brain, damage to the inner ear or even psychological trauma. As a trauma neurosurgeon, I have seen how a thorough evaluation after any kind of gunshot wound can provide a complete picture and lead to a speedier recovery.   https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/18/health/dr-sanjay-gupta-analysis-trump/index.html

2024july07..       Rafa crossing.      The 9-mile-long borderland separating the Gaza Strip from Egypt was once a bustling commercial crossing for goods and people—and, Israel says, arms and supplies for Hamas. Today, after weeks of fighting, it is a wasteland of rubble, reports WSJ’s Dov Lieber, who was among a group of journalists who saw the aftermath Wednesday on a trip organized by Israel’s military. The journalists were kept close to the soldiers, but traveled in open military vehicles and walked around part of Rafah. Israel’s military says it has killed more than 900 militants in Rafah; Gaza’s health authorities don’t have an estimate of civilian deaths during the fighting there.  https://10point.cmail19.com/t/d-e-edyttdy-djydktlltk-r/

2024jun25.    Ukraine EU.      

t2024jun20.    Trump movie.    2024jun20.    Trump movie.    The Shocking Figure Blocking the Movie About Rapist Trump.        Dan Snyder is preventing distribution of a Donald Trump biopic, which does not portray the former president in a flattering light.        According to an exclusive report from the Daily Beast, Dan Snyder, the former owner of the Washington Commanders (previously the Redskins), is working overtime to prevent the release of The Apprentice, a film that depicts Donald Trump as a sexual abuser.    Sources told Variety that Snyder is a friend of Trump’s and donated $1.1 million to his inaugural committee, and another $100,000 to his campaign in 2016. Now, Snyder has accidentally funded a film that could very likely hurt Trump’s image, and his chance at reelection, should it be released before November.    The Apprentice depicts the former president raping his first wife, Ivana. During her 1989 divorce case, Ivana claimed that Trump raped her, but she later refuted her own allegations ahead of the 2016 presidential election and said that the two were the “best of friends.” The film also portrays Trump cheating on his wife, doing hard drugs, and getting plastic surgery.    Snyder was initially willing to fund the film through its production company Kinematics, which is run by his son-in-law Mark Rappaport, because he thought it would be a flattering portrayal of the former president—but what he got was something else entirely. Snyder was reportedly “furious” when he first saw the film last month, according to Axios.  https://newrepublic.com/post/182887/dan-snyder-role-blocking-rapist-trump-movie        Add this to the Trump NY convictions fo defamation and multiple felonies.          Deviance freedom from the norm has gotten so much that democracy cannot contain the abuses sooner -- advice ?: "patience my man" -- but so far discouraging (personally unloved / threatened) -- action ?: find counter-intuitive self-betterment encouragement.  The visualization of a better self-future fends off the discouragement (self-love).

2024jun16.    Biden      ‘Cheapfake’ Biden videos enrapture right-wing media, but deeply mislead.        The Republican National Committee posts a clipped video. Then the New York Post, the Telegraph and other pro-Trump outlets follow suit with the same deceptive framing.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/06/14/cheapfake-biden-videos-enrapture-right-wing-media-deeply-mislead/

2024jun13.    Alito      Alito’s vision of nearly tyrannical religious intolerance does not seem to correspond to the reality of a country where three-quarters of Americans claim one religious affiliation or another, where a vast majority of those identify as Christian, and where profession of religious belief is, in most places, a de facto requirement for public office.    Still, there is a fundamental conflict in this country. But it’s not the one Alito imagines. Instead, it is a conflict between those who hope to preserve and expand American democracy and those who aim to suffocate it.    There is Trump, of course, who is running his third campaign for the White House as an unabashed authoritarian. He has promised revenge and retribution for every effort, as halting as it has been, to hold him accountable for his criminal behavior, up to and including his effort to overturn the results of the last presidential election. And he is backed by a cadre of apparatchiks ready and eager to impose their autocratic vision on the entire country.     Among the most radical is Russ Vought, who served as budget chief under Trump in a tenure that culminated in an attempt to strip Civil Service protections from tens of thousands of federal employees so that Trump could replace them with loyalists. In a second term, Vought hopes to follow through and stock the federal bureaucracy with, as Beth Reinhard reports for The Washington Post, “hard-core disciples who would wage culture wars on abortion and immigration.”    Convinced that the United States is in a “post-constitutional” moment where he and like-minded ideologues must subvert the political order so that they can save it, Vought wants to revive the president’s power to “impound” congressional appropriations, a strategy that was outlawed by Congress in the wake of the Nixon administration. He also, like Trump, wants to use the Insurrection Act to suppress protest and domestic opposition with the military. Vought sees a future of Anglo-Protestant supremacy under the “original” Constitution.    In states where Republicans have gerrymandered themselves into nearly impenetrable legislative majorities, they have also taken steps to try to close the paths the broad public might use to see its views honored in government. In Arizona, for instance, Republicans have, as the news site Bolts put it, “placed a measure on the November ballot that would severely restrict direct democracy in Arizona by imposing strict geographic requirements on where organizers must gather signatures.”    This is in response to an initiative that, if successful, will write abortion rights into Arizona state law, circumventing the anti-abortion Republican-led State Legislature. Republicans in other states have made similar efforts to restrict direct democracy in the face of publics that aren’t aligned with the most doctrinaire conservative ideologues.    The effort to turn the national government against American democracy is mirrored, at the state level, by the effort to narrow the avenues of political dissent and electoral competition.    In states where Republicans have gerrymandered themselves into nearly impenetrable legislative majorities, they have also taken steps to try to close the paths the broad public might use to see its views honored in government. In Arizona, for instance, Republicans have, as the news site Bolts put it, “placed a measure on the November ballot that would severely restrict direct democracy in Arizona by imposing strict geographic requirements on where organizers must gather signatures.”    In states where Republicans have gerrymandered themselves into nearly impenetrable legislative majorities, they have also taken steps to try to close the paths the broad public might use to see its views honored in government. In Arizona, for instance, Republicans have, as the news site Bolts put it, “placed a measure on the November ballot that would severely restrict direct democracy in Arizona by imposing strict geographic requirements on where organizers must gather signatures.”    This is in response to an initiative that, if successful, will write abortion rights into Arizona state law, circumventing the anti-abortion Republican-led State Legislature. Republicans in other states have made similar efforts to restrict direct democracy in the face of publics that aren’t aligned with the most doctrinaire conservative ideologues.    This is in response to an initiative that, if successful, will write abortion rights into Arizona state law, circumventing the anti-abortion Republican-led State Legislature. Republicans in other states have made similar efforts to restrict direct democracy in the face of publics that aren’t aligned with the most doctrinaire conservative ideologues.    The Texas Republican Party has gone a step further than Arizona’s, or any other, in its hostility to democracy. Last month, delegates to the state party convention approved a platform that would effectively require a kind of electoral college for statewide elections. To win the governor’s mansion, a candidate would need to carry a majority of the Texas’ 254 counties. Democrats, concentrated in the state’s major cities, could never win, no matter the majority they scored at the polls. Republicans, who dominate the state’s vast rural expanse, would govern in perpetuity.    Conservative Republicans, who have embraced “stop the steal” and are already casting doubt on any outcome short of a Trump victory in November, do not accept the legitimacy of their Democratic opponents. They believe that they, and they alone, have the right to govern. And they are working, from the bottom up and the top down, to limit as much as possible the right of the people to choose their leaders.    Justice Alito has his hands in this effort from his perch on the Supreme Court. (Just a few weeks ago he wrote the majority opinion upholding a de facto racial gerrymander in South Carolina.) And so again, he is right. There are irreconcilable conflicts and “differences on fundamental things that really can’t be compromised.” And the most fundamental thing on which there cannot be compromise is the question of American democracy. Will the Republic stand, or will we fall into a future of minority rule?  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/14/opinion/samuel-alito-comments-recording.html

2024may17.    Ukraine.     https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/dynamic/render?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20240604&instance_id=125314&isViewInBrowser=true&nl=the-morning&paid_regi=1&productCode=NN&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=168636&te=1&uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2Faf1f94e1-d22e-5ac0-8e4a-5a4497dcdd27&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024may17.    Middle East.     On Wednesday night, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, the Israeli military spokesman, declined to explicitly confirm that Israeli forces had uncovered cross-border tunnels in the corridor. But an Israeli military official, who briefed reporters Wednesday on condition of anonymity to comply with military protocol, said that troops had identified at least 20 tunnels running from Gaza into Egypt.    One of the tunnel networks in the area — an entrance to which lay 100 yards from the Rafah crossing — sprawled for nearly a mile underground, including a room intended as a hide-out for militants, Admiral Hagari said. Israeli forces demolished the tunnel complex with explosives, he added.    The Israeli military official said “tactical control” did not mean that Israeli forces were present at every point along the Philadelphi Corridor. But he said it meant that Israel could effectively disrupt Hamas’s supply lines, which pass through the border zone. Israeli troops, he indicated, were working to begin dismantling the tunnel network in the Rafah area.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/05/30/world/middleeast/egypt-gaza-corridor-israel.html?campaign_id=301&emc=edit_ypgu_20240531&instance_id=125056&nl=your-places%3A-global-update&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=168375&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024may17.    Middle East.     Israeli troops are fortifying a strategic corridor that carves Gaza in two, building bases, taking over civilian structures and razing homes, according to satellite imagery and other visual evidence — an effort that military analysts and Israeli experts say is part of a large-scale project to reshape the Strip and entrench the Israeli military presence there.    The Netzarim Corridor is a four-mile-long road just south of Gaza City that runs from east to west, stretching from the Israeli border to the Mediterranean Sea.        Three forward operating bases have been established in the corridor since March, satellite imagery examined by The Washington Post shows, providing clues about Israel’s plans. At the sea, the road meets a new, seven-acre unloading point for a floating pier, an American project to bring more aid into Gaza.        Israel insists it does not intend to permanently reoccupy Gaza, which its troops controlled for 38 years until withdrawing in 2005. But the construction of roads, outposts and buffer zones in recent months points to an expanding role for Israel’s military as alternative visions for postwar Gaza falter.    Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has released few concrete plans for the “day after” — a source of frustration for his generals and for Washington — but has repeatedly vowed to maintain “indefinite” security control over the enclave. In addition to conducting future raids from outside, Israeli troops may need to “be inside” Gaza to ensure the demilitarization of Hamas ...  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/05/17/gaza-israel-netzarim-corridor-war-hamas/

2024apr19.    India.     Hindu nationalism, once a fringe ideology in India, is now mainstream. Nobody has done more to advance this cause than Prime Minister Narendra Modi, one of India’s most beloved and polarizing political leaders.        And no entity has had more influence on his political philosophy and ambitions than a paramilitary, right-wing group founded nearly a century ago and known as the RSS.    “We never imagined that we would get power in such a way,” said Ambalal Koshti, 76, who says he first brought Modi into the political wing of the Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh in the late 1960s in their home state, Gujarat.    Modi was a teenager. Like other young men — and even boys — who joined, he would learn to march in formation, fight, meditate and protect their Hindu homeland.    A few decades earlier, while Mahatma Gandhi preached Hindu-Muslim unity, the RSS advocated for transforming India — by force, if necessary — into a Hindu nation. (A former RSS worker would fire three bullets into Gandhi’s chest in 1948, killing him months after India gained independence.)    Modi’s spiritual and political upbringing from the RSS is the driving force, experts say, in everything he’s done as prime minister over the past 10 years, a period that has seen India become a global power and the world’s fifth-largest economy.    At the same time, his rule has seen brazen attacks against minorities — particularly Muslims — from hate speech to lynchings. India’s democracy, critics say, is faltering as the press, political opponents and courts face growing threats. And Modi has increasingly blurred the line between religion and state.  https://apnews.com/article/india-election-narendra-modi-hindu-nationalism-rss-79c30c8ae750a9c037d86b9e2c1b640c?user_email=9a18118e64ac886183a1f61de74720d43b1343700b8a12e015ddf73957378e06&utm_medium=Morning_Wire&utm_source=Sailthru_AP&utm_campaign=Morning%20Wire_19%20Apr_2024&utm_term=Morning%20Wire%20Subscribers. 

2024apr12.     Iran.    

For years, Iran has been the outsider.    Predominantly Persian-speaking in a region where most people speak Arabic, overwhelmingly Shiite where most are Sunni, it has been crippled by Western sanctions meant to make it a pariah.    Yet Iran has succeeded in projecting its military power across a large swath of the Middle East. Its reach equals — if not eclipses — that of traditional power centers like Egypt and Saudi Arabia.    And now, spurred by the war in the Gaza Strip, armed groups that Iran has fostered over the past 45 years have mobilized simultaneously toward similar goals: diminishing Israeli power and confronting Israel’s closest ally, the United States.    Iran has tried to capitalize on its outsider position by seeking out disempowered Shiite populations and offering to train and arm them, and by working with the sympathetic government of Syria.    The shadow war between Israel and Iran broke into the open this week, when Israel struck an Iranian Embassy compound in Syria and killed seven Iranian commanders, ...  https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2024/04/06/world/middleeast/iran-hamas-hezbollah-houthis-iraq.html?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20240412&instance_id=119972&nl=the-morning&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=163271&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024mar18.     terrorism.    Trump in 2016 said that if he were denied the presidential nomination at the GOP convention, “I think you’d have riots.”
Trump in November 2020 responded to an adverse ruling by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court by saying it would “induce violence in the streets.” (Trump later expanded, saying, “Bad things will happen, and bad things lead to other type things. It’s a very dangerous thing for our country.”)
Trump warned last March of “potential death & destruction” if he were charged by the Manhattan district attorney. He also mocked those who urged his supporters to stay peaceful, saying, “OUR COUNTRY IS BEING DESTROYED, AS THEY TELL US TO BE PEACEFUL!”Trump warned in August, after the search of his Mar-a-Lago estate, that “terrible things are going to happen.” He later promoted a comment from Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) that there would be “riots in the streets” if Trump were charged.
Trump in January warned of “bedlam in the country” if the criminal charges against him succeeded. Days earlier, he targeted efforts to remove him from the ballot using the 14th Amendment, saying: “Because if we don’t [get treated fairly], our country’s in big, big trouble. Does everybody understand what I’m saying? I think so.”  https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65f8a45011664804f41b3d26&linknum=2&linktot=50

July 2017: During a speech to law enforcement officers in Long Island, New York, Trump seemingly encouraged police officers to be rough with people they were arresting, per ABC News. "Please don't be too nice," he told the audience.
August 2017: In the aftermath of the white nationalist rally in Charlottesville, Virginia, Trump failed to unequivocally condemn the violence and said "many sides" were to blame, failing to distinguish between those who participated in the "Unite the Right" rally and those who showed up in opposition to it.
October 2018: While speaking at a Montana campaign rally, Trump publicly praised Montana's then-Rep. Greg Gianforte (R) — the state's current governor — for previously assaulting a reporter. "Any guy that can do a body slam, he is my type!" Trump said.
October 2019: A New York Times report outlined various strategies Trump had allegedly deliberated to keep migrants away from the U.S. southern border, including a water-filled trench with snakes or alligators and shooting migrants in the legs to slow them down.
May 2020: Trump used violent rhetoric when referring to protests in Minneapolis in the wake of George Floyd’s killing, tweeting, "when the looting starts, the shooting starts." The phrase has a racist history going back to police brutality against Black Americans in the 1960s, per the New York Times.
June 2020: Trump threatened to use the U.S. military to quell Black Lives Matter protests across the country. "If a city or state refuses to take the actions necessary to defend the life and property of their residents, then I will deploy the United States military and quickly solve the problem for them," Trump said.
August 2020: Trump expressed interest in sending the National Guard to Portland, Oregon, to confront protesters, per Vox. "We could fix Portland in, I would say, 45 minutes," Trump said.

September 2020: Trump lauded law enforcement officers for killing Michael Forest Reinoehl, a self-described Antifa member suspected of killing a right-wing activist the previous month. "That’s the way it has to be. There has to be retribution," Vox reported.

September 2020: When offered the chance to unequivocally condemn white supremacist violence during the first presidential debate, Trump failed to do so, instead telling the far-right Proud Boys that they should "stand back and stand by."

January 2021: At a rally preceding the Jan. 6 Capitol riot, Trump repeated false claims that the 2020 election had been stolen and told supporters that "we're going to walk down to the Capitol," adding that "you'll never take back our country with weakness."  https://www.axios.com/2022/05/02/trump-call-violence-presidency?utm_campaign=wp_the_5_minute_fix&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_fix

Trump again nods toward violence by his supporters — and maybe something bigger.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2019/03/14/trump-again-nods-toward-violence-by-his-supporters-maybe-something-bigger/?utm_campaign=wp_the_5_minute_fix&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_fix

2024mar05.     territory.    A Russian patrol ship has been damaged after being attacked by sea drones in the Black Sea, according to Ukrainian intelligence.    The Sergei Kotov, which was launched in 2021, was allegedly hit in the early hours of Tuesday morning.    Ukraine's military intelligence service said the Black Sea fleet ship suffered damage to the stern as well as right and left sides.    The Kremlin is yet to comment.    Ukrainian intelligence official Andrii Yusov told the RFERL broadcaster the attack had killed and injured sailors on board.    The Sergei Kotov is one of four patrol ships completed for the Russian Navy's Project 22160. According to Ukraine, the vessel played a part in the attack on Snake Island on the first day of the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, along with the Moskva cruiser.    The Moskva was sunk by Ukraine in 2022.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68477318

2024mar05.     territory.    Germany is the second-biggest supplier of military aid to Ukraine after the United States and is further stepping up support this year. But German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has refused to send the Taurus missiles. Last week, he said sending the missiles would pose a risk of his country becoming directly involved in the war.    “German soldiers must at no point and in no place be linked to targets this system reaches,” he said last week.   Some members of the conservative opposition, and even some in his socially liberal three-party coalition, want to send the missiles to Ukraine. But the idea is not popular with the public.    German media have suggested that by not allowing the Taurus weapons to be sent to Ukraine the unpopular chancellor was trying to distinguish himself domestically as “Friedenskanzler” or “peace chancellor” ahead of June elections to the European Parliament.  https://apnews.com/article/germany-russia-taurus-missiles-4ff5e559c887448fc3ecd9e2e6f58812

2024mar03.     India.    “(T)he future of the Indian republic looks considerably less rosy than the vision promised by Modi and his acolytes,” Guha writes. “His government has not assuaged—indeed, it has actively worked to intensify—conflicts along lines of both religion and region, which will further fray the country’s social fabric. … Far from becoming the Vishwa Guru, or ‘teacher to the world’—as Modi’s boosters claim—India is altogether more likely to remain what it is today: a middling power with a vibrant entrepreneurial culture and mostly fair elections alongside malfunctioning public institutions and persisting cleavages of religion, gender, caste, and region. The façade of triumph and power that Modi has erected obscures a more fundamental truth: that a principal source of India’s survival as a democratic country, and of its recent economic success, has been its political and cultural pluralism, precisely those qualities that the prime minister and his party now seek to extinguish.”    While Modi towers over India’s politics, that’s due in part to a  weak and fragmented opposition. The Economist writes that Modi’s BJP party is not nearly as popular in India’s south, where Islam gained ground more peacefully. To become more competitive there, the magazine writes, Modi’s BJP likely will need to “moderate its Hindutva (Hindu-nationalist) message, restrain its promotion of Hindi, put more weight on economic development and advance more moderate successors to Mr Modi than his coterie of headbangers.”  https://view.newsletters.cnn.com/messages/1709472873839fd4cf6207953/raw?utm_term=1709472873839fd4cf6207953&utm_source=cnn_Fareed%27s+Global+Briefing%2C+March+3%2C+2024&utm_medium=email&bt_ee=lI67BaVO07%2Bjb4XCIWL%2BS2FgAmoppFBAH5NfTzP0boz7ttPCNqHAT1G1DgUfQ4%2FS&bt_ts=1709472873847

2024feb29.     Middle East.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-68387864

2024feb29.     Middle East.   https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65e013da1f025b70d7c47a0f&linknum=2&linktot=51

2024feb23.    autocracy.    https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2024/02/23/maps-strikes-second-anniversary-war-ukraine-russia/?utm_campaign=wp_politics_am&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_politics&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3cd7b78%2F65d88b6808db5278d49ded28%2F598b051fae7e8a68162a1429%2F27%2F55%2F65d88b6808db5278d49ded28

2024feb23.    autocracy.    To many European leaders and U.S. officials, the value of backing Ukraine is priceless. A fledgling democracy must not be snuffed out by autocratic bully, they argue. And that bully in the Kremlin — Russian President Vladimir Putin — must not be allowed to rewrite the rules of the road and dismiss Ukraine’s rights as a sovereign nation, redraw borders and flout international law.    The war in Ukraine, President Biden argued a month after Russia launched its invasion, is “a battle between democracy and autocracy, between liberty and repression, between a rules-based order and one governed by brute force.”    That rhetoric has not faded almost two years later, with Ukraine’s leaders and backers championing Kyiv as a bulwark for the free world against a tyrannical menace that knows no bounds. If “Ukraine is left alone, Russia will destroy us,” Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky told dignitaries at the Munich Security Conference last weekend, warning that “there is no one for whom the ongoing war in Europe does not pose a threat.”  https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65d82838f3ee5f6816ee9324&linknum=2&linktot=58 

2024feb15.    autocracy.    Speaking to Russian TV in an on-camera interview on Wednesday, Mr Putin said Mr Biden's leadership would be better for Russia because he was a "more experienced person, he is predictable, he is a politician of the old formation".    He dismissed questions about Mr Biden's age and mental health, and said when they had last met in 2021, he had not noticed anything peculiar.    "Even then [three years ago] people were saying that he was incompetent, but I did not see anything of this sort," he said.    "Yes, he kept looking at his papers, but to be honest I kept doing the same. So there was nothing peculiar."    Mr Putin clarified that Russia would work with anyone who "gains the trust of the American public" and wins the presidency.    It wasn't all glowing feedback for Mr Biden, however: Mr Putin described the US president's condemnation of the war in Ukraine as "extremely harmful and erroneous".    In the lead-up to the 2016 US election, Mr Trump had suggested he and Mr Putin would "get along very well".  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-68302071        Putin ready to cut his losses and settle for Donbas and Crimea ?        The Pentagon puts the Russian death toll at about 60,000, with the wounded three or four times that, totaling roughly 300,000 casualties, said a U.S. official speaking on the condition of anonymity.    One senior Russian official estimated that amputees represented more than half of those seriously wounded.    The New York Times interviewed five wounded Russian soldiers and the relatives of others to learn more about what happens to the vast numbers of injured, coming home to inconsistent treatment and little discussion of them.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/15/world/europe/russia-invasion-casualties-wounded.html

2024feb13.    territory.    Ukraine and its allies face off against America’s tribal politics.        After the Senate voted in favor of a military aid package for U.S. allies that included $60 billion for Ukraine early Tuesday, all eyes are now on House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.). Once mostly known (if at all) for his unusual legal history in support of creationism, Johnson was propelled to a position of power over a war of geopolitical importance amid a very chaotic — and very American — period of political instability.    Johnson now holds a lot of global power in his hands — and he is willing to use it. The speaker has already preemptively said he would block the Senate bill from the floor, pointing toward a lack of progress on U.S. border security issues. “America deserves better than the Senate’s status quo,” Johnson said in a statement Monday.    Ukraine and its allies are watching cautiously and treading carefully. In a video message released Tuesday, President Volodymyr Zelensky praised the Senate vote and offered a message to the House. “We hope for principled support,” Zelensky said. “And we believe that America will continue to be a leader.”    British Foreign Secretary David Cameron joined the calls Wednesday, appealing to the shared history of World War II and the U.S.-U.K. fight against the Islamic State. “As Congress debates and votes on this funding package for Ukraine, I am going to drop all diplomatic niceties. I urge Congress to pass it,” the former prime minister wrote for the Hill. “We must all ask ourselves — who is watching?” he added, pointing not only to Moscow, but also Beijing and Tehran.    But the most anxious watchers of the House speaker are on Ukraine’s battlefields, where shortages of all kinds are already profoundly felt. There, the debates are watched via Telegram channels in trenches and tanks.  https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65cd9ccfde49445958517e50&linknum=2&linktot=71

2024feb13.    territory.    Ukraine claims it has now disabled a third of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet after its military intelligence said it sank another Russian warship in a sea drone attack off the coast of Crimea on Wednesday.    Russia’s landing ship Caesar Kunikov was attacked with “MAGURA” V5 drones that punctured “critical holes” on its left side before sinking, the Ukrainian military intelligence agency said on Telegram.    “Ukraine has disabled a third of the Russian Black Sea Fleet during the large-scale invasion,” the country’s armed forces told CNN after Wednesday’s attack.    That aligns with Ukrainian claims last week that they had disabled about 33% of Russia’s warships, amounting to 24 disabled ships and one submarine. The landing ship Caesar Kunikov would be the 25th disabled ship, according to Ukraine’s count.  https://www.cnn.com/2024/02/14/europe/ukraine-says-russian-warship-caesar-kunikov-destroyed-black-sea-intl-hnk/index.html

2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.     2024feb13.    autocracy.    https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/2024/02/09/hearing-loss-republicans/

2024feb13.     autocracy.     https://mailchi.mp/usafacts/why-is-the-average-us-household-size-shrinking-564076?e=6bda99e89e

2024feb13.     autocracy.     During his term, Biden reinvigorated the transatlantic alliance, assuring European counterparts about U.S. commitments to their security while coordinating a robust, collective effort to support Kyiv. European diplomats in Washington barely disguise their confidence and trust in the Biden administration, and their apprehensions of what may come should Trump defeat him in November.    But on the other key battlefront in the global conversation, Biden has unsettled myriad political elites with his perceived complicity in Israel’s relentless war against Hamas in Gaza. The Israeli campaign, which has killed more than 27,000 Palestinians, many of whom were children, took another deadly turn Monday with the expansion of operations in Rafah, a southern city along the territory’s border with Egypt that’s now hosting more than a million cornered Gazan refugees.    Biden is reportedly frustrated by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s uncompromising approach to the conflict. But has resisted internal pressure from aides and Democratic allies to do more to restrain the Israeli campaign — which came after militant group Hamas’s invasion on southern Israel on Oct. 7 — let alone condition future military aid to the Jewish state.    “Biden, who aides say has a visceral attachment to the Jewish state, has tended to view the prime minister and the state of Israel as one and the same, according to several people familiar with his thinking, and has struggled with the idea of criticizing a sitting prime minister, particularly during a time of war,” my colleagues reported.    Even Europe’s top diplomat offered a thinly-veiled rebuke of Biden’s muddled stance.  https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65cafe7e3b7ab413cd743005&linknum=2&linktot=60        However, the stance is not muddled.  To eliminate Hamas, civilians whom are used as purposeful direct shelter are the price of elimination -- that's on Hamas.

2024feb12.     China.     525 million.        The projected size of China’s population by the end of the century, researchers estimate. That’s a precipitous drop from today’s 1.4 billion people. Beijing miscalculated its way to a baby bust with its one-child policy. The sometimes brutal enforcement and decades of propaganda about the benefits of a small family created a hard-to-change mindset, while the traditional preference for sons meant many couples who could have only one child preferred a boy. Now the number of women of childbearing age is shrinking quickly and not all of those who can have kids want to.  https://www.wsj.com/world/china/china-population-births-economy-one-child-c5b95901

2024feb09.     territory.     The crossings into Finland are the latest iteration of the deadly border politics that have played out since 2021, when Belarus, a veritable satrapy of Moscow, offered entry to thousands of migrants, allowing them to cross to Poland. Many ended up trapped between the two countries, beaten by border guards, who forced them back and forth over the border.    This is not the first time an influx has reached the country — there were surges in 2015 and 2016, when over a million people made their way to Europe, mostly fleeing war in Syria and ending up in Germany. But since then, the border has gone mostly quiet.    Finnish officials say that, counter to a past understanding between the two countries, Russia is now letting people without Finnish visas through its checkpoints.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/10/world/europe/finland-election-russia.html?campaign_id=301&emc=edit_ypgu_20240210&instance_id=114871&nl=your-places:-global-update&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=157878&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024feb09.   territory.     Republican senators are still trying to decide what amendments, if any, the conference can rally around to garner more votes for the package. The large number of Republican backers who favored considering the legislation suggests the bill may be on track to get 60 votes.    Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) said the Senate would stay in session until “the job is done.”    House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) has signaled the bill would face a tough road in the House, where many Republicans have drawn a hard line on no more Ukraine funding. He said this week he prefers to deal with the national security priorities “independently and separately,” meaning Israel and Ukraine aid would not be bundled together.  https://draft.blogger.com/blog/page/edit/5061034831056916264/2045802923092214984

2024feb09.   territory.     When the Senate passed $40 billion of aid for Ukraine in May 2022, only 11 Republicans opposed it. Yesterday, 31 opposed it.        Trump’s influence was especially apparent when he helped to sink a bipartisan border security deal less than 48 hours after it was released this week. Only four Republicans voted for it, including the two who wrote it (Lankford and Sen. Susan Collins (Maine), who wrote the appropriations sections). Trump’s loyal ally Stephen Miller, the architect of his harsh border security policies while in office, is just one of the many in Trump’s corner who strongly criticized the border bill.     While Trump hasn’t weighed in specifically on the current Ukraine and Israel aid bill, he has vocally opposed sending aid to Ukraine.     The former president’s grip on House Republicans has been much stronger than in the Senate. The most fervent pro-Trump House members are also the most opposed to Ukraine aid, even threatening to oust House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-La.) if he brings it up.     The Trump loyalty test is also central to the Senate’s MAGA wing’s discontent with McConnell, who has no relationship with the former president and is at odds with Trump on a number of issues, especially Ukraine. The pro-Trump, anti-McConnell wing of the party is openly trying to defy him, putting pressure on the fate of Ukraine aide, the future of the party and McConnell’s leadership.   https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2024/02/09/trumpification-senate-gop/?utm_campaign=wp_politics_am&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_politics&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3caf710%2F65c60cbd3f5c0a7705c4b766%2F598b051fae7e8a68162a1429%2F17%2F58%2F65c60cbd3f5c0a7705c4b766

2024feb09.   autocracy.     Why MAGA Loves Russia and Hates Ukraine.        There are still millions of Republicans who want to support Ukraine. But if the past eight years have taught us anything, it’s that in any clash between traditional Republicans and MAGA, traditional Republicans typically surrender. And so it is here. At the beginning of the war, only 9 percent of Republicans believed the United States was supplying too much aid to Ukraine. Now that number is a plurality of 48 percent. MAGA is once again dragging the G.O.P. into its bespoke reality, and the consequences could be catastrophic for Ukraine, Europe and the future of American security.          ...  if you’re stumped by the notion that Ukraine is a villain, you may need reminding of a conspiracy theory that is now largely forgotten but was prevalent on the right at the time of Donald Trump’s first impeachment. In his infamous conversation with Zelensky — the one that triggered the impeachment — Trump asked Zelensky about a “CrowdStrike” server allegedly being held in Ukraine.https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/08/opinion/why-maga-loves-russia-and-hates-ukraine.html

2024feb02.   Iran.    https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=65bc7b32f188e64e9932127d&linknum=2&linktot=68

2024feb01.   Middle East.    While U.S. officials say there has been no policy change, the fact the State Department is even considering such options signals a shift in thinking within the Biden administration on possible Palestinian statehood recognition, which is highly sensitive both internationally and domestically.    For decades, U.S. policy has been to oppose the recognition of Palestine as a state both bilaterally and in UN institutions and to stress Palestinian statehood should only be achieved through direct negotiations between Israel and the Palestinian Authority.   Efforts to  find a diplomatic way out of the war in Gaza has opened the door for rethinking a lot of old U.S. paradigms and policies, a senior U.S. official said.    The Biden administration is linking possible normalization between Israel and Saudi Arabia to the creation of a pathway for the establishment of a Palestinian state as part of its post-war strategy. This initiative is based on the administration's efforts prior to Oct. 7 to negotiate a mega-deal with Saudi Arabia that included a peace agreement between the kingdom and Israel.  https://www.axios.com/2024/01/31/palestine-statehood-biden-israel-gaza-war

2024jan31.   territory.    

2024jan23.   Middle East.    Tuesday, a significant setback that could add to mounting calls for a cease-fire.    Hours later, the military announced that ground forces had encircled the southern city of Khan Younis, Gaza’s second largest. That marked a major advance, but it was unclear how much closer it would bring Israel to defeating Hamas or freeing Israeli hostages — two central war aims that have proved increasingly elusive — as cease-fire talks appear to be gathering pace.    Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu mourned the soldiers, who died when the blast from a rocket-propelled grenade triggered explosives they were laying. But he vowed to press ahead until “absolute victory,” even as Israelis are increasingly divided over whether it’s possible to both crush Hamas and free scores of captives.  https://apnews.com/article/israel-hamas-war-news-01-23-2024-6f6e893b6dfa05ddf5a81ecb67b72d05

2024jan22.   Middle East.    https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/dynamic/render?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20240122&instance_id=113142&nl=the-morning&paid_regi=1&productCode=NN&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=155973&te=1&uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2Fefeca069-55db-5c7f-bf4d-c19be837994b&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024jan19.   tanks.   Oleksandr Kamyshin, Ukraine’s minister for strategic industries, said on Thursday that an “asymmetrical war” was underway. He claimed responsibility for an attack that targeted an oil storage facility in St. Petersburg on Thursday, which he said involved a domestically produced drone that flew 1,250 kilometers, or about 775 miles.    “I’m sure we will see more and more things happening this year,” Mr. Kamyshin said during a panel discussion at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.    While the St. Petersburg attack did not appear to cause serious damage, images of the Klintsy oil depot showed an extensive fire raging among several tanks. The Russian state news agency TASS said the fire covered an area of around 1,000 square meters, or about 10,700 square feet, and that four gasoline tanks were burning.    Mr. Bogomaz, the Russian governor, said in a social media post that more than 140 firefighters were trying to extinguish the blaze.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/19/world/europe/ukraine-russia-oil-drone-attack.html?campaign_id=301&emc=edit_ypgu_20240119&instance_id=112968&nl=your-places%3A-global-update&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=155796&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2024jan19.   naval.   While laser weaponry might sound like something from science fiction the US Navy has already installed systems on several destroyers.    However, missiles rather than lasers have been used to shoot down drones during the current conflict with Houthis in the Red Sea.    Missiles can be far more expensive than the drones they destroy, with some costing millions of pounds compared to a few thousand.  https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-68031257

2024jan18.   Carroll.   https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/18/nyregion/trump-trial-e-jean-carroll.html

Because the two civil lawsuits can be hard to distinguish, they are sometimes referred to in court papers as Carroll I (the 2019 lawsuit) and Carroll II (the 2022 suit).    Carroll I became mired in appeals after Mr. Trump argued he could not be sued as a sitting president. Carroll II, which was able to move forward because it centered on statements Mr. Trump had made when he was no longer in office, went to trial last spring.    In May, jurors awarded Ms. Carroll a little more than $2 million for sexual abuse. They also awarded her $3 million in damages for defamation.    This week, after the appeals of Carroll I ended, the trial finally began. Judge Lewis A. Kaplan, who has presided over both cases, ruled that the defamation finding in May would carry over to the new trial.    “This trial will not be a ‘do over’ of the previous trial,” Judge Kaplan wrote on Jan. 9.    In September, he ruled that even though the jury found that Mr. Trump had assaulted Ms. Carroll only with his fingers, her rape claim was “substantially true under common modern parlance.”    He thus limited the trial that began Tuesday to one issue — what damages, if any, Mr. Trump must pay Ms. Carroll for defaming her in 2019.        This still doesn't sound right.        “So your reputation in many ways is better today, isn’t it?” Ms. Habba asked.    “My status was lowered,” Ms. Carroll said. “I’m partaking in this trial to bring my old reputation and status back.”    Mr. Trump, who came to court for the first two days of trial, was not present Thursday because he was at the funeral of his mother-in-law in Florida. The trial is expected to last at least through Monday.    Ms. Carroll is seeking at least $10 million in compensatory damages from Mr. Trump, the amount her lawyers said would make up for the damage to her reputation. She is also seeking an unspecified amount of punitive damages, which are meant to punish Mr. Trump and deter him from making comments about her in the future.

2024jan18.   Gaza.    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67888794

Israel says war in Gaza expected to continue throughout 2024.         A multi-national force would take charge of rebuilding the territory after the widespread destruction caused by Israeli bombing. Neighboring Egypt would also have an unspecified role to play under the plan. But the document adds that Palestinians would be responsible for running the territory.  "Gaza residents are Palestinian, therefore Palestinian bodies will be in charge, with the condition that there will be no hostile actions or threats against the State of Israel," Mr Gallant said.  The plan was not discussed in any detail in the cabinet meeting and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has not publicly commented on it. The meeting is reported to have broken up amid acrimony with some ministers angrily objecting to names put forward for an investigation into the events surrounding the 7 October attack by Hamas.  Talk of the "day after" in Gaza has led to deep disagreement in Israel.  Some far right-wing members of Mr Netanyahu's government have said that Palestinian citizens should be encouraged to leave Gaza for exile, with the reestablishment of Jewish settlements in the territory - controversial proposals that have been rejected as "extremist" and "unworkable" by other countries in the region and by some of Israel's allies.

2024jan17.   territory.    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-67999465

2024jan16.   autocracy.    Trump’s Opponents Made Iowa Easy for Him.        Donald Trump’s victory in the Iowa caucuses was resounding enough to make the race for the Republican nomination look essentially finished at the start. But it wasn’t resounding enough to remove the sense that it could have been otherwise, that yet again his opposition within the Republican Party made things ridiculously easy for his candidacy.    Trump is essentially running an incumbent’s campaign, presenting himself as the default leader of the party, declining to debate, rolling up endorsements. But his opposition combined, it appears, for reasonably close to 50 percent of the caucus vote. And for a normal incumbent, losing almost half the vote in an early state would be a sign of danger, weakness, disarray.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/16/opinion/trump-iowa-desantis-haley.html

The Israeli military has been surprised by the extent, depth and quality of the tunnel network beneath Gaza.    One tunnel in Gaza was wide enough for a top Hamas official to drive a car inside. Another stretched nearly three football fields long and was hidden beneath a hospital. Under the house of a senior Hamas commander, the Israeli military found a spiral staircase leading to a tunnel approximately seven stories deep.    These details and new information about the tunnels, some made public by the Israeli military and documented by video and photographs, underscore why the tunnels were considered a major threat to the Israeli military in Gaza even before the war started.    But Israeli officials and soldiers who have since been in the tunnels — as well as current and former American officials with experience in the region — say the scope, depth and quality of the tunnels built by Hamas have astonished them. Even some of the machinery that Hamas used to build the tunnels, observed in captured videos, has surprised the Israeli military.    The Israeli military now believes there are far more tunnels under Gaza.    In December, the network was assessed to be an estimated 250 miles. Senior Israeli defense officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters, are currently estimating the network is between 350 and 450 miles — extraordinary figures for a territory that at its longest point is only 25 miles. Two of the officials also assessed there are close to 5,700 separate shafts leading down to the tunnels.  https://www.nytimes.com/2024/01/16/us/politics/israel-gaza-tunnels.html

Israel Will End ‘Intensive’ Phase of War Soon, Defense Minister Says.        Yoav Gallant gave the highest-level outline of a shift in the war and urged discussions of what comes next for Gaza.  https://www.nytimes.com/live/2024/01/16/world/israel-hamas-news

What Donald Trump’s case teaches us: Litigation takes forever.  https://thehill.com/opinion/judiciary/4173250-what-donald-trumps-case-teaches-us-litigation-takes-forever/        Under the current system, Trump’s lawsuits will outlive him as a kind of zombie tribute to his litigiousness. For him and others, the court system is a decision-avoidance system.    Yet we can change this for future generations. By transitioning from formalist lawsuits to humanist lawsuits, we can stop burying problems under procedural mountains, and instead shine a light on that precious object that was once at the center of the American dream — justice for all.         A US system flaw?  Or, there is no better way?  Thus, live with it, and within it as eventual "justice for all".

Opening statements begin in E. Jean Carroll defamation trial.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2024/01/16/e-jean-carroll-trump-trial/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_most

3:40 p.m. EST    Trump has left the courthouse, according to a senior Trump adviser. The former president left before opening arguments began and is slated to hold an event at 5 p.m. this afternoon in Atkinson, N.H.        Jury selection wrapped up about 1:45 p.m., and opening statements were expected after an hour-long lunch break.        11:06 a.m. EST    “The court determined in a previous decision that Mr. Trump is liable for defamation,” Judge Lewis A. Kaplan told prospective jurors. “For purposes of this trial it has been determined already that Mr. Trump did sexually assault Ms. Carroll, that he knew when he made theses statements about Ms. Carroll … that they were false or with reckless disregard … ”

From the 1970s until he was elected president in 2016, Donald Trump and his businesses were involved in over 4,000 legal cases in U.S. federal and state courts, including battles with casino patrons, million-dollar real estate lawsuits, personal defamation lawsuits, and over 100 business tax disputes.  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Personal_and_business_legal_affairs_of_Donald_Trump#:~:text=From%20the%201970s%20until%20he,over%20100%20business%20tax%20disputes.

2024jan11.   naval.    

2023dec29.   Ukraine.    As Russian troops took the town of Mariinka, Ukraine’s military posted a note Thursday claiming Russian casualties have hit 356,670 dead or wounded, since Russia launched its all-out war on Ukraine in February 2022.    Additionally, Ukraine claimed some 1,700 tanks and armored vehicles had been destroyed, along with 329 military jets and 23 warships.  https://themessenger.com/news/russian-casualties-losses-soldiers-killed-tanks-destroyed-ukraine-war?utm_campaign=body&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_source=messenger-morning

2023dec26.   naval.   ...  satellite imagery from 24 December shows a ship at port in Feodosiya that appears to be the same length as the Novocherkassk - a landing ship designed to transport troops, weapons and cargo to shore.        Tuesday's attack on Feodosiya is not the first time that the Novocherkassk has been targeted by Ukrainian forces.    In March 2022, Ukraine's defence ministry reported that the ship had been damaged in an attack on the occupied Ukrainian port of Berdyansk in which another amphibious assault ship, the Saratov, was sunk.         After a missile strike on the headquarters of the Black Sea fleet in Sevastopol last September, satellite images showed that the Russian navy had moved much of its Black Sea fleet away from Crimea to the Russian Black Sea port of Novorossiysk.    The dominance of the Russian navy has been diminished to an extent as result of such attacks, but this year has seen Moscow keep hold of the territory it occupies, despite a Ukrainian counteroffensive.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67821515

2023dec18.   autocracy.   If the presidential election were held today, Donald Trump could very well win it. Polling from several organizations shows him gaining ground on Joe Biden, winning five of six swing states and drawing the support of about 20 percent of Black and roughly 40 percent of Hispanic voters in those states.        In a different spirit, some on the right also take Mr. Trump’s success as a sign that Americans are open to more radical forms of politics. After Mr. Trump’s win in 2016, the Russian philosopher Aleksandr Dugin crowed that the American people had “started the revolution” against political liberalism itself. Richard Spencer declared himself and his fellow white nationalists “the new Trumpian vanguard.”    But both sides consistently misread Mr. Trump’s success. He isn’t edging ahead of Mr. Biden in swing states because Americans are eager to submit to authoritarianism, and he isn’t attracting the backing of significant numbers of Black and Hispanic voters because they support white supremacy. His success is not a sign that America is prepared to embrace the ideas of the extreme right. Mr. Trump enjoys enduring support because he is perceived by many voters — often with good reason — as a pragmatic if unpredictable kind of moderate.        Such characterizations may baffle Mr. Trump’s detractors. But even his most provocative comments since leaving the White House — that he would be a “dictator” for the first day of his second term; that Mark Milley, the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, deserves to be executed for “a treasonous act” — likely matter less to many voters than how he governed while in office. Inured to his braggadocio, they see him now as he was then: less an ideological warrior than a flexible-minded businessman who favors negotiation and compromise.        Mr. Trump’s moderation can be easy to miss, because he is not a stylistic centrist — the sort who calls for bipartisan budget-cutting and a return to civility. His moderation is closer to that of Richard Nixon, who combined a combative personality and pronounced resentments with a nose for political reality and a willingness to negotiate with his ideological opposites. Mr. Nixon, an ardent anti-Communist, displayed his pragmatism most memorably by going to China. But his pragmatic nature was evident also in his acceptance of the New Deal order, which many conservatives continue to reject.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/18/opinion/trump-election-2024.html

2023dec16.   autocracy.   Congress this week approved a measure aimed at preventing any U.S. president from unilaterally withdrawing the United States from NATO without congressional approval. Passage came amid long-standing concerns that Donald Trump may try to exit the alliance if he returns to office.    The provision was included in the National Defense Authorization Act, an annual bill detailing defense policy, which was passed by the House on Thursday and is awaiting the signature of President Biden.    Under the measure, advocated by Sens. Tim Kaine (D-Va.) and Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), the president would be prohibited from withdrawing from NATO without the approval of two-thirds of the Senate or separate legislation passed by Congress.    Kaine and Rubio had tried to advance similar measures since 2021. Passage of the defense policy bill this week marked the first time the House had embraced the tactic.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/12/16/congress-nato-exit-trump/?utm_campaign=wp_evening_edition&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_evening

2023dec16.   autocracy.   The U.S. Army intends to remove a Confederate memorial from Arlington National Cemetery next week as part of its ongoing work to rid Defense Department property of divisive rebel imagery, defying dozens of congressional Republicans who have vociferously protested the move.       It portrays, according to the cemetery’s website, a “mythologized vision of the Confederacy, including highly sanitized depictions of slavery.”    This month, 44 Republican lawmakers cautioned Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin, the first African American to hold the post, that the Pentagon would overstep its authority by removing the memorial, and they demanded that all efforts to do so stop until Congress works through next year’s appropriations bill. The memorial “commemorates reconciliation and national unity,” not the Confederacy per se, the group led by Rep. Andrew S. Clyde (Ga.) claimed.    The Army, which operates Arlington Cemetery, informed lawmakers Friday that it would proceed with the monument’s removal, officials told The Washington Post, because it was required by the end of the year to comply with a law to identify and remove assets that commemorate the Confederacy. A congressional commission had previously decided the memorial met the criteria for removal. The task will cost $3 million.        The Army is coordinating with the state of Virginia and the Advisory Council on Historic Preservation, a federal agency, for its relocation.   “We want to make sure that it is situated within an appropriate historical context,” a senior Army official said.    Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin (R) is disappointed by the monument’s removal, said Macaulay Porter, a spokesperson. Youngkin plans to relocate it New Market Battlefield State Park, which would be a “fitting backdrop” for the memorial, Porter said. The site is about 100 miles west of Arlington. It is unclear when that process would happen, but Army officials said the memorial will be moved to a storage facility for some time.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/12/16/confederate-memorial-arlington-cemetery/?utm_campaign=wp_evening_edition&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_evening

2023dec14.   territory.   The European Union on Thursday agreed to open membership talks with Ukraine, an important sign of support at a moment when battlefield progress has stalled and U.S. commitment to continued funding for the war has wavered.     Full E.U. membership for Ukraine is realistically many years away, and E.U. leaders gathered in Brussels were still debating an aid package for Kyiv worth more than $50 billion, money seen as critical for Ukraine to keep fighting.    But it was nonetheless a historic moment for Ukraine, which has pushed for years to join the bloc to bind it closer to its allies in Europe, bolster its economy and give its citizens the right to live, work and travel freely across the continent.    The E.U. also agreed Thursday to open accession negotiations with Moldova, a neighbor of Ukraine that has similarly sought to strengthen ties with the bloc as it comes under pressure from Russia.        On the eve of the summit, the European Commission announced it was unlocking more than $10 billion for Hungary that it had frozen in a novel effort to get member countries to abide by democratic principles. The commission said Wednesday that Hungary had now met conditions related to judicial independence.        On Thursday, Olga Stefanishyna, Ukrainian deputy prime minister for European and Euro-Atlantic integration, called out Orban and his antics. European Council decisions on Ukraine “are a piece of a much bigger puzzle,” she wrote in a post on X. “The stakes are too high to have someone play with it.”    Ultimately, Hungary did not get in the way of the Ukraine membership decision, which required unanimity. But Orban symbolically left the room at E.U. headquarters.        Ukrainian official stressed that their country has worked hard to meet criteria for E.U. membership. But joining the E.U. typically takes many years. The political and legal systems of prospective members are scrutinized and slowly brought into compliance with E.U. rules.    Several countries, including Serbia, Montenegro, North Macedonia, Albania and Bosnia, have been in membership talks for years. Turkey applied to join in 1987 and officially remains a candidate, in theory, though it has effectively given up its push.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/12/14/ukraine-eu-summit-orban/?utm_campaign=wp_evening_edition&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_evening

2023dec13.   territory.   In early November, 50 Georgian opposition MPs addressed Nato and EU member states calling for a unified stance against Russia's plan to establish a permanent naval base in the breakaway Georgian region of Abkhazia.    The Kremlin's plans have raised fears that the base could drag EU-hopeful Georgia into Russia's war in Ukraine and harm Tbilisi's own plans for a port on the Black Sea.    "We unanimously and firmly condemn Russia's occupation, militarisation and other actions aimed at annexation of the occupied regions of Georgia, a new expression of which is the opening of a permanent Russian naval base in Ochamchire port," read the MPs' statement.    Weeks earlier Abkhazia's de facto leader, Aslan Bzhania, had confirmed an agreement had been signed with the Kremlin on a permanent naval base in the Black Sea port of Ochamchire.    Abkhazia is internationally recognised as part of Georgia, but it has been under the control of Russian and separatist forces since the 1990s.    Georgia's foreign ministry has condemned Russia's plan as "a gross violation of the sovereignty and territorial integrity of Georgia", although authorities in Tbilisi have played down the significance of the permanent naval base, describing it as not an imminent threat.    "Even if they start constructing the base in Ochamchire, it will take them at least three years," Nikoloz Samkharadze, the head of Georgia's Foreign Relations Committee told the BBC. "We are concentrated on imminent threats, and not on threats that might come in the future."    He says the government is more focused on Georgian citizens being killed or kidnapped by Russian forces near the line of occupation that separates Georgia from its breakaway territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia.    "We do not observe any moves to start construction in Ochamchire."  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-67625450

2023dec12.   territory.   https: //www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/12/12/zelensky-congress-ukraine-aid/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_most

2023dec10.   terrorism.   Hamas leader Yahya Sinwar spent decades studying Israel's psyche. He is staking his life on what he learned.    Sinwar is holding hostage 138 Israelis, including soldiers, betting he can force the release of thousands of Palestinian prisoners and establish a permanent cease-fire. “He understands that Israel will pay a heavy price,” said Yuval Bitton, who spent time with Sinwar as the former head of the Israel Prison Service’s intelligence division. “He understands this is our weak spot​.” (🔐read for free) First, though, Hamas has to survive Israel’s powerful and deadly counterattack. If Hamas has miscalculated, Sinwar could be overseeing the destruction in Gaza of the U.S.-designated terrorist group—and lose his own life.  https://www.wsj.com/world/middle-east/hamas-yahya-sinwar-israel-palestinian-hostages-6407dc41?st=tymy74yozjcbgse&mod=djemwhatsnews

2023dec03.   territory.   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/12/02/world/europe/ukrainian-military-dnipro-river-battle.html?campaign_id=301&emc=edit_ypgu_20231202&instance_id=109181&nl=your-places%3A-global-update&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=151576&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2023dec02.   territory.   Analysis: US sets clearer red lines for Israel as ceasefire ends.        If Israel kills as many in south Gaza as the north, Biden will have to decide whether he can keep giving Israel as much support.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67579364 

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/12/02/world/israel-hamas-war-gaza-news

2023nov30.   misinformation.   Meta no longer receives notifications of global influence campaigns from the Biden administration, halting a prolonged partnership between the federal government and the world’s largest social media company, senior security officials said Wednesday. Federal agencies have also stopped communicating about political disinformation with Pinterest, according to the company.    The developments underscore the far-reaching impact of a conservative legal campaign against initiatives established to avoid a repeat of the 2016 election, when Russia manipulated social media in an attempt to sow chaos and swing the vote for Donald Trump.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2023/11/30/biden-foreign-disinformation-social-media-election-interference/?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wp_news_alert_revere&location=alert

The data sets used by the researchers were provided by Facebook, Twitter and Google and covered several years up to mid-2017, when the social media companies cracked down on the known Russian accounts. The report, which also analyzed data separately provided to House Intelligence Committee members, contains no information on more recent political moments, such as November’s midterm elections.    “What is clear is that all of the messaging clearly sought to benefit the Republican Party — and specifically Donald Trump,” the report says. “Trump is mentioned most in campaigns targeting conservatives and right-wing voters, where the messaging encouraged these groups to support his campaign. The main groups that could challenge Trump were then provided messaging that sought to confuse, distract and ultimately discourage members from voting.”    The report offers the latest evidence that Russian agents sought to help Trump win the White House. Democrats and Republicans on the panel previously studied the U.S. intelligence community’s 2017 finding that Moscow aimed to assist Trump, and in July, they said investigators had come to the correct conclusion. Despite their work, some Republicans on Capitol Hill continue to doubt the nature of Russia’s interference in the last presidential election.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2018/12/16/new-report-russian-disinformation-prepared-senate-shows-operations-scale-sweep/

2023nov30.   terrorism.    https://www.usatoday.com/story/graphics/2023/11/29/us-counterterrorism-efforts-78-countries-data/71566920007/

2023nov22.    territory-Gaza.    https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=655d8cf85df9b300b0256e5a&linknum=5&linktot=71&linknum=5&linktot=71

2023nov19.    territory-Ukraine.    The war is approaching the end of its second year, and Ukraine’s military needs more manpower to sustain a bloody war of attrition against Russia, a country with more than three times the population of Ukraine.    In a recent essay, Ukraine’s top military commander, Valery Zaluzhny acknowledged that training and recruiting troops was becoming a serious challenge.    “The prolonged nature of the war, limited opportunities for the rotation of soldiers on the line of contact, gaps in legislation that seem to legally evade mobilization, significantly reduce the motivation of citizens to serve with the military,” he said.  https://www.cnn.com/2023/11/19/europe/ukraine-difficulties-in-military-recruitment-intl/index.html

2023nov16.    territory-Finland.    Finland, a country of some 5.6 million, shares an 830-mile-long border with Russia — and also a combative history. The two countries have fought numerous wars through the centuries, and Finland has strong memories of the 1939 “Winter War” and World War II. It beat back the Soviets but lost territory and adopted form of neutrality in the face of the threat from the Soviet Union.    Russia’s invasion of Ukraine raised fears in Finland that it could be one of Moscow’s next targets. Its government cast aside decades of military nonalignment and quickly moved to join NATO, a step that Russia described as “clearly hostile.”    But even before the invasion, the issue of migrants was a sore point between Helsinki and Moscow. In late 2015 and early 2016, Finland experienced a surge of migrants seeking asylum crossing the Russian border, most of them from third countries. Then, too, Finnish officials suspected Moscow.    “The impression that someone is organizing and regulating things on the Russian side is probably true,” Finland’s foreign minister, Timo Soini, told the country’s state broadcaster at the time. “It is quite obvious that activity like this is a managed effort.”    Other E.U. members also have accused Russia of directing migrants into European countries. Poland has said that Belarus, a key Russian ally, lured migrants from the Middle East and Africa with flights and visas, and then pushed them into Poland to destabilize the country and gain diplomatic leverage. Warsaw said Moscow was behind the flow — allegations Moscow denied.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/16/world/europe/finland-russia-border.html?campaign_id=301&emc=edit_ypgu_20231116&instance_id=107895&nl=your-places%3A-global-update&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=150236&te=1&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4

2023nov14.    territory-Gaza.    Hamas has lost control of the Gaza Strip it has ruled for 16 years, according to Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant. Civilians are looting Hamas bases, indicating a loss of faith in the government.        Israeli Defence Minister Yoav Gallant stated that terrorists are fleeing southward from Gaza, suggesting a loss of control by Hamas.        The situation in Gaza has reached a point where Hamas has lost control, terrorists are fleeing southward, and civilians are looting Hamas bases, reflecting a significant change in the region's dynamics.  https://ground.news/article/after-16-years-hamas-has-lost-control-of-gaza-israel-defence-minister?utm_source=smerconish-newsletter&utm_medium=email

2023nov05.    territory.    The military-installed president of Myanmar has warned that the country is in danger of breaking apart if the government cannot control fighting which has broken out in Shan State.    Former General Myint Swe, who was appointed after a coup in 2021, was speaking at an emergency meeting held by the ruling military council to address a series of co-ordinated attacks by anti-military insurgents which have inflicted serious losses on the armed forces.    Three ethnic insurgent armies in Shan State, supported by other armed groups opposing the government, have overrun dozens of military posts, and captured border crossings and the roads carrying most of the overland trade with China.    It is the most serious setback suffered by the junta since it seized power in February 2021. After two-and-half years of battling the armed uprising it provoked with its disastrous coup, the military is looking weak, and possibly beatable.        What makes this attack even more significant is that it marks the first time that the well-armed insurgents operating in Shan State have explicitly aligned themselves and their military operations with the wider campaign to overthrow the junta and restore democratic rule.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-67305690

2023nov05.    territory.    U.S. forces strike an Iranian weapons facility in Syria amid unyielding attacks on American troops.        The operation, in response to the repeated targeting of U.S. military positions, marked the latest use of force as President Biden looks to halt attacks against American troops and prevent the war in Gaza from metastasizing into a larger conflict. Separately, the Pentagon acknowledged Wednesday that one of its surveillance drones had been shot down off the coast of Yemen.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/11/08/us-strikes-iranian-facility-syria/?utm_source=alert&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=wp_news_alert_revere&location=alert

2023nov05.    territory.    The European Union’s executive arm recommended on Wednesday that the bloc open membership talks with Ukraine, an encouraging step for the government in Kyiv in what remains a long and arduous joining process.    The recommendation from the executive, the European Commission, comes with the caveat that Ukraine must take steps to address corruption, protect minorities and limit the power of oligarchs.    The final decision on opening the talks rests with the leaders of the 27 E.U. member nations, and they are expected to discuss the question at a summit meeting next month, potentially clearing the way for the start of detailed negotiations.   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/08/world/europe/ukraine-eu-membership.html

2023nov05.    well-being.    The cannon blasts were strong enough to hurl a 100-pound round 15 miles, and each unleashed a shock wave that shot through the crew members’ bodies, vibrating bone, punching lungs and hearts, and whipping at cruise-missile speeds through the most delicate organ of all, the brain.    More than a year after Marines started experiencing problems, the Marine Corps leadership tried to piece together what was happening by ordering a study of one of the hardest-hit units, Fox Battery, 2nd Battalion, 10th Marines.    The research was limited to reviewing the troops’ medical records. No Marines were examined or interviewed. Even so, the report, published in 2019, made a startling finding: The gun crews were being hurt by their own weapons.        ... in case after case, the military treated the crews’ combat injuries as routine psychiatric disorders, if they treated them at all. Troops were told they had attention deficit disorder or depression. Many were given potent psychotropic drugs that made it hard to function and failed to provide much relief.    Others who started acting strangely after the deployments were simply dismissed as problems, punished for misconduct and forced out of the military in punitive ways that cut them off from the veterans’ health care benefits that they now desperately need.       Firing weapons is as fundamental to military service as tackling is to football. And research has started to reveal that, as with hits in football, repeated blast exposure from firing heavy weapons like cannons, mortars, shoulder-fired rockets and even large-caliber machine guns may cause irreparable injury to the brain. It is a sprawling problem that the military is just starting to come to grips with.        There is currently no brain scan or blood test that can detect the minute injuries, Dr. Perl said; the damage can be seen only under microscopes once a service member has died. So there is no definitive way to tell whether a living person is injured. Even if there were, there is no therapy to fix it.        Islamic State fighters overran vast swaths of Syria and Iraq in 2014, taking over some of the region’s largest cities and using their self-proclaimed caliphate to organize attacks on civilian targets across the region and beyond. American military planners knew they needed to confront the Islamic State, but also knew that the American public was weary of long wars in the Middle East.    Artillery offered a lot of bang with hardly any U.S. boots on the ground. A battery with four howitzers and about 100 troops could deliver a torrent of fire, day or night, in any weather. But keeping the troop count to a bare minimum meant there would be no relief shifts. Each battery would have to do the work of many.       Alpha battery troops set up their big guns in March 2017 in a dirt field in Syria within sight of the enemy-controlled city of Raqqa and almost immediately started firing. They rarely stopped for the next two months.        Night and day they hurled rounds, using some of the military’s most sophisticated cannons, M777A2 howitzers. The 35-foot-long guns had modern, precisely designed titanium parts and a digital targeting system, but when it came to protecting the crew the design had changed little in a century. Gun crews still worked within arm’s reach of the barrel and fired the gun by pulling a simple cord.    The resulting blast was several times louder than a jet taking off, and unleashed a shock wave that hit the crews like a kick to the chest. Ears rang, bones shivered, vision blurred as eyeballs momentarily compressed, and a ripple shot through every neuron in the brain like a whipcrack.       The relentless firing was being driven by a small, top-secret Army Delta Force group called Task Force 9. President Donald J. Trump had given the task force broad authority to use heavy firepower, and the task force applied it with savage enthusiasm, often bending the rules to hit not just enemy positions, but also mosques, schools, dams and power plants.       During Operation Desert Storm in 1991, artillery crews fired an average of 70 rounds during the entire six-week campaign, said John Grenier, a historian at the Army’s Field Artillery School. During the initial months of the invasion of Iraq in 2003, crews fired an average of 260 rounds. In Syria, each gun in Alpha battery shot more than 1,100 rounds in two months — most of them using high-powered charges that produce the strongest shock waves. Some guns in Fox battery, which replaced Alpha, fired about 10,000 rounds each.        The symptoms were telltale signs of concussion, but also what anyone might feel after a string of stressful 20-hour workdays in the desert, sleeping in foxholes and eating rations from plastic pouches. Medics came around daily to check on the crews but never intervened. And Marines trained to endure didn’t complain.        Traumatic brain injuries can have profound effects on parts of the body that are nowhere near the skull, because the damage can cause communication with other organs to malfunction. Dozens of the young veterans interviewed by The Times said they now had elevated, irregular heartbeats and persistent, painful problems with their digestion.       The Defense Department has spent more than a billion dollars in the last decade to research traumatic brain injury, but it still knows very little about what might have happened to the artillery crews. Nearly all of the research has focused on big explosions from roadside bombs and other enemy attacks, not the blast waves from the routine firing of weapons.       Mice instinctively build nests, and researchers use the quality of their nests as a benchmark of well-being. The blasted mice built only ramshackle nests, often leaving them unfinished.    In later experiments, blasted mice were put through mazes. They made more wrong turns than healthy mice, and sometimes froze, refusing to explore the mazes at all.    The team then dissected the animals’ brains. At first they found almost no damage.    “Everything looked fine until we looked at a nano scale,” Dr. Gu said.    Under an electron microscope, a ravaged neural landscape came into focus. Sheaths of myelin, vital for insulating the biological wiring of the brain, hung in tatters. In key parts of the brain that control emotion and executive function, large numbers of mitochondria — the tiny powerhouses that provide energy for each cell — were dead.    https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/05/us/us-army-marines-artillery-isis-pentagon.html

2023nov05.    tanks.   https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2023/10/07/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-maps.html   

Israel captured Gaza from Egypt during the Arab-Israeli War of 1967 and established 21 Jewish settlements there. But in 2005, the Israeli government dismantled those settlements, evacuated their residents to Israel, and handed the territory to the Palestinian Authority.    Hamas forced out the authority two years later, leading Israel and Egypt to impose a blockade on the strip that has been in place for the past 16 years.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/05/world/middleeast/israel-egypt-gaza.html

With no money, identity documents or even phones, thousands of Palestinian workers trudged through a gate between Israel and Gaza — ending weeks in wartime custody and possibly drawing to a close a rare economic point of contact between the two sides.    In tattered clothes, the men passing through the Kerem Shalom crossing on Friday were among 10,000 Gazan workers ordered deported after spending weeks in Israeli prisons. Some still wore plastic tags around their wrists with numbers from their detention.    An estimated 7,000 other Gazans remain stuck outside of the enclave, stripped of their Israeli work permits and temporarily sheltered by Palestinians in the occupied West Bank, Wael Abu Omar, a border official in Gaza, said on Saturday.        ... within days of Hamas’s Oct. 7 rampage through southern Israel — in which militants killed more than 1,400 Israelis and took more than 230 hostages — Israeli authorities canceled all work permits and erased them from the phone app that Palestinians from Gaza used to prove their legal standing.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/11/04/gaza-israel-workers-expelled/

2023oct24.    territory.   With Israel bent on crushing Iran’s ally Hamas, Tehran must decide whether it and the proxy militias it arms and trains will live up to its fiery rhetoric. [v diplomacy]    For more than four decades, Iran’s rulers have pledged to destroy Israel. The supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, rarely appears in public without wearing a black-and-white checkered Palestinian kaffiyeh.  [v Maga cap]     Iranian military commanders gloat over training and arming groups across the region  [AK47s in US]  that are enemies of Israel, including Hezbollah and Hamas. And when Hamas conducted the Oct. 7 terror attack on Israel that killed 1,400 people, Iranian officials praised it as a momentous achievement, shattering the Jewish state’s sense of security.  [Maine's mental illness ploy failed even with advance notice.]  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/01/world/middleeast/iran-israel-hamas.html

2023oct24.    autocracy.   DERRY, N.H.— Donald Trump has attacked judges and prosecutors as "thugs" and psychopaths, called for shoplifters to be shot, suggested now-retired Gen. Mark Milley could be executed for treason, and joked about last year's violent assault of Rep. Nancy Pelosi's (D., Calif.) husband.  https://www.wsj.com/politics/elections/trumps-incendiary-rhetoric-costs-him-in-courtroom-risks-votes-in-2024-94645c21?mod=djemwhatsnews        With some wars stagnated, others have broadened the WW3 front(s) -- Ukraine, Middle East, Indo-Pacific, US House -- Harv has refocused the "World War 3" blog-page as "Authoritarian Coalition Violence."  The US system leads the world fight with autocracy.  And Harv is optimistic as he sees/listens US democratic action -- Fed, Justice, ...

2023oct03.    territory.   Serbia says it has reduced army presence near Kosovo after US expressed concern over troop buildup.  https://apnews.com/article/serbia-kosovo-army-troops-crisis-buildup-banjska-86e06ff6cc52cb214d789e595540d552

2023sep30.    tanks.   The flag, atop a Russian-occupied building in southern Ukraine, was just over a mile away. If a Russian soldier appeared, it would take roughly four seconds for the sniper’s large-caliber bullet to reach the man’s chest.    “They move around in the morning and in the evening,” said Bart, the leader of the four-man sniper team.    They had arrived in darkness after navigating pitch-black roads, crammed into a pickup truck with its lights off. With hurried steps on broken glass, they set up their rifles at their position, known as a “hide.”   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/10/01/world/europe/ukraine-snipers-russia.html

2023sep30.    tanks.   Following the passage of the continuing resolution, a bipartisan group of Senate leadership members, led by Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), issued a statement vowing that they will ensure the United States will continue “to provide critical and sustained security and economic support for Ukraine.”    “We welcome today’s agreement to avoid a harmful and unnecessary shutdown of the federal government,” the senators said in the statement.    The Senate will, “in the coming weeks,” work on legislation to continue funding the war effort in Ukraine. “We support Ukraine’s efforts to defend its sovereignty against [Vladimir] Putin’s brazen aggression, and we join a strong bipartisan majority of our colleagues in this essential work,” the senators said.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2023/09/30/government-shutdown-updates/#link-6OTBNZMH7VFAHHXNMFDVSVDMU4  

2023sep24.    tanks.   The technological revolution on Ukrainian battlefields is reshaping modern warfare.    Drones are omnipresent, and new integrated battle-management systems that provide imaging and locations in real time all the way down to the squad level have made targeting almost instantaneous. The element of surprise is gone; gaining ground in armored assaults is harder. These combat-zone changes are calling into question the feasibility of some basic concepts of U.S. military doctrine.  https://whatsnews.cmail19.com/t/d-e-vijdhx-iudygtktd-r/

2023sep24.    territory.   The world’s most brazen maritime militarization is gaining muscle in waters through which one-third of global ocean trade passes. Here, on underwater reefs that are known as the Dangerous Ground, the Chinese People’s Liberation Army, or P.L.A., has fortified an archipelago of forward operating bases that have branded these waters as China’s despite having no international legal grounding. China’s coast guard, navy and a fleet of fishing trawlers harnessed into a militia are confronting other vessels, civilian and military alike.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/23/world/asia/china-sea-philippines-us.html

2023sep24.    territory.   Emmanuel Macron has said France will withdraw its ambassador and end all military cooperation with Niger following a coup.    "France has decided to withdraw its ambassador. In the next hours our ambassador and several diplomats will return to France," the president said.    He added that military cooperation was "over" and French troops would leave in "the months to come".    A military junta seized Niger on July 26, deposing President Mohamed Bazoum.    The decision follows months of animosity and protests against the French presence in the country, with regular demonstrations in the capital Niamy.    The move deals a hammer blow to France's counter-terrorism operations in the Sahel and France's influence in the region, but Mr Macron said France would "not be held hostage by the putschists", speaking to France's TF1 and France 2 television stations.    There are around 1,500 French soldiers in Niger.    The French president said that he still regarded Mr Bazoum, currently held prisoner by the coup leaders, as the country's "sole legitimate authority" and had informed him of his decision. He described the deposed president as a "hostage".    "He was targeted by this coup d'etat because he was carrying out courageous reforms and because there was a largely ethnic settling of scores and a lot of political cowardice," he said.    Niger's military leaders told French ambassador Sylvain Itte he had to leave the country after they overthrew Mr Bazoum on July 26.    However, a 48-hour ultimatum for him to leave, issued in August, passed with him still in place as the French government refused to comply, or to recognise the military regime as legitimate.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66907517  

2023sep24.    territory.   Kosovo declared independence in 2008 but Serbia - along with Belgrade's key allies China and Russia - does not recognise it.    Many Serbs consider it the birthplace of their nation. But of the 1.8 million people living in Kosovo, 92% are ethnic Albanians and only 6% are ethnic Serbs.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66905091        Niger is a key part of the African region known as the Sahel - a belt of land that stretches from the Atlantic Ocean to the Red Sea. The area is plagued by jihadists and beset by military regimes.    Western nations had looked to Niger as a bulwark against further disorder and spreading Russian influence in the region. But that turned out to be short-lived.  

 https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-66339528 

2023sep24.    territory.   Azerbaijan's military has paraded heavy weapons captured in Nagorno-Karabakh, amid warnings thousands of [fleeing] civilians are without shelter after the surrender of Armenian separatists.    Tanks, guns and RPGs were among the haul shown to the BBC, in the first access given to journalists since separatists agreed to disarm this week.    Ethnic Armenian leaders say thousands [fleeing] are without food or shelter.    Only one aid delivery of 70 tonnes of food has been allowed through.    The convoy from the International Red Cross was the first to reach the disputed territory since Azerbaijan captured it in a lightning operation five days ago. Russia says it has also delivered aid, but it is not known how much.     Nagorno-Karabakh - a mountainous region in the South Caucasus - is recognised internationally as part of Azerbaijan but large areas of it have been controlled by ethnic Armenians for three decades.    On Saturday, Armenia urged the UN to send a mission to monitor the rights of ethnic Armenians in Nagorno-Karabakh, arguing that their very existence was now under threat.    Azerbaijan denies the accusation, saying it wants to reintegrate the region's ethnic Armenian residents as equal citizens of the country.    At least 200 ethnic Armenians died, including 10 civilians, as Azerbaijan's army swept into the enclave earlier this week.    Now, displaced from villages and separated from relatives, several thousand people were sleeping in tents or the open air near the airport in the main city Stepanakert, known as Khankendi by Azerbaijan, Karabakh officials said.    The airport is also near a base for Russian peacekeepers, five of whom were killed during the fighting.    On Saturday Azerbaijan said it was working with Russian peacekeepers in Nagorno-Karabakh to disarm ethnic Armenian forces - one of its key demands in return for a ceasefire.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66901759

2023sep23.    territory.   The commander said that Ukrainian infantry passed the final line “two to three weeks ago,” but the vehicles have only recently been able to move through. He said that “the front line has also moved further back behind the dragon’s teeth,” but this has taken place “more slowly.”    “You just have to understand that there is a saturation of antitank mines and a saturation of enemy forces, it’s just colossal,” the air assault forces commander said. “In the direction of Robotyne and Verbove, there’s a constant incoming traffic of assault troops.”    Analysts at the Washington-based Institute for the Study of War said in a report on Thursday that geolocated photos indicated that “armored vehicles are operating beyond the final line of the Russian defensive layer,” but they were “not yet prepared to assess that Ukrainian forces have broken fully through” Russian defenses.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/09/23/ukraine-breach-verbove-zaporizhzhia/?utm_campaign=wp_evening_edition&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_evening  

2023sep23.    naval.   Ukraine said Saturday its bold strike on Russia’s Black Sea Fleet headquarters in the Crimean city of Sevastopol had left dozens dead and wounded “including senior leadership.”    The attack on Friday is perhaps the most dramatic example yet of the confidence with which Ukraine is going after Russian facilities in occupied Crimea – and shows the vulnerability of critically important infrastructure on the peninsula.    In a statement on Telegram, Ukraine’s Special Operations Forces said a special op dubbed “Crab Trap” was timed to strike while senior members of Russia’s Navy were meeting, and that the attack left dozens of dead and wounded “including the senior leadership of the fleet.”  https://www.cnn.com/2023/09/23/europe/special-ops-black-sea-strike-dozens-dead-intl-hnk/index.html

2023sep23.    tanks.   Europe Made a Bold Pledge of Ammunition for Ukraine. Now Comes the Hard Part.        After 30 years of atrophy, experts say, Europe’s shrunken military industry will struggle to provide the Ukrainians with a million artillery shells by March.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/23/world/europe/eu-ukraine-war-ammunition.html

2023sep22.    territory.   Ukrainian forces breached the main Russian defensive line in the southeast of the country with armored vehicles.        It’s a significant milestone in the 3½-month counteroffensive aimed at splitting up the occupying army. The Russians are hammering the area with artillery and launching counterattacks, and the Ukrainians are taking heavy casualties. A firm foothold could let Kyiv drive more armored vehicles through the gap and punch into less heavily fortified areas. Stateside, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky met with House leaders and all 100 senators in private meetings on Capitol Hill to make his case for more U.S. assistance. He faces some Republicans’ concerns about what they call President Biden’s “open-ended commitment” to Kyiv.  https://whatsnews.cmail20.com/t/d-e-vilkjil-iudygtktd-r/

2023sep20.    territory.   Azerbaijan and Armenia first went to war in the early 1990s after the fall of the Soviet Union. Then in 2020 Azerbaijan recaptured areas in and around Nagorno-Karabakh before a truce was agreed and monitored by Russian peacekeepers.    Ethnic Armenians in Karabakh appealed on Tuesday for a ceasefire and for talks to start. But it was clear from the Azerbaijani ultimatum that Baku's aim was to complete its conquest of the mountainous enclave.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66851975   

2023sep18.    territory.   Last month, Ukrainians finally made modest but meaningful gains. They pierced Russia’s first line of defense in the southeast and recaptured small towns along the way. They are now pursuing two main routes, one through the recaptured village of Robotyne and another that could eventually lead to the Russian-controlled coastal city of Berdiansk. Either course could help achieve Ukraine’s main goal of dividing Russian forces.    The gains exemplify the often grinding pace of war. Working through minefields without major casualties and wearing down Russia’s defenses with artillery simply takes time. It looked like very little happened for months because the battle lines stayed the same. But now Ukraine has advanced, and could quickly make more progress.  https://messaging-custom-newsletters.nytimes.com/template/oakv2?campaign_id=9&emc=edit_nn_20230918&instance_id=103022&nl=the-morning&productCode=NN&regi_id=91739846&segment_id=145035&te=1&uri=nyt%3A%2F%2Fnewsletter%2F32c7c055-290b-5474-8500-85cecf20e3ab&user_id=c169c5df23b5bd14a95e704d648953e4  

2023sep14.  naval.   Russia had an advantage in the Black Sea from the start. Prior to 2014, both countries maintained naval fleets in Crimea under a treaty signed in the 1990s. When Russian President Vladimir Putin’s forces annexed the Crimean Peninsula in 2014, they also took over about 75 percent of Ukraine’s fleet, leaving it reliant on what’s known as a “mosquito fleet” of mostly small patrol boats to defend its southern coast.  https://themessenger.com/news/ukraine-and-russia-in-high-stakes-battle-for-the-black-sea?utm_campaign=body&utm_medium=newsletter&utm_source=messenger-morning

2023sep13.  naval.   Moscow’s rare acknowledgment of a successful Ukrainian attack in Crimea came only after local residents posted images of explosions and raging fires at the Sevmorzavod shipyard on social media. Mikhail Razvozhaev, the Russian-backed governor of Crimea, later shared a photo that appeared to show the port side of a large landing ship on fire, though the full extent the damage was not clear.   https://www.nytimes.com/2023/09/12/world/europe/sevastopol-explosion-black-sea-ukraine.html

2023sep09.  G-20.   The paragraph on the war in Ukraine has clues on how the consensus was reached. "We note with deep concern the immense human suffering and the adverse impact of wars and conflicts around the world," says the first line.    It doesn't blame Russia for the war. Instead, it notes the human suffering caused by the war. Now that's language that both Moscow and the West can not only agree on but also interpret in a way that suits their respective stands.          The agreement urges all nations to follow the UN Charter and "refrain from the threat or use of force to seek territorial acquisition against the territorial integrity and sovereignty or political independence of any state"        ...  a line further adds that "the use or threat of use of nuclear weapons is inadmissible". Experts say this can be seen as an indirect reference to Russia.  https://www.bbc.com/news/live/world-66724117

2023sep08.  Starlink.   Although he had readily supported Ukraine, he believed it was reckless for Ukraine to launch an attack on Crimea, which Russia had annexed in 2014. He had just spoken to the Russian ambassador to the United States. (In later conversations with a few other people, he seemed to imply that he had spoken directly to President Vladimir Putin, but to me he said his communications had gone through the ambassador.) The ambassador had explicitly told him that a Ukrainian attack on Crimea would lead to a nuclear response. Musk explained to me in great detail, as I stood behind the bleachers, the Russian laws and doctrines that decreed such a response.        Allowing the use of Starlink for the attack, he concluded, could be a disaster for the world. So he secretly told his engineers to turn off coverage within 100 kilometers of the Crimean coast. As a result, when the Ukrainian drone subs got near the Russian fleet in Sevastopol, they lost connectivity and washed ashore harmlessly.    When the Ukrainian military noticed that Starlink was disabled in and around Crimea, Musk got frantic calls and texts asking him to turn the coverage back on. Fedorov, the deputy prime minister who had originally enlisted his help, secretly shared with him the details of how the drone subs were crucial to their fight for freedom.        Musk replied that the design of the drones was impressive, but he refused to turn the coverage for Crimea back on, arguing that Ukraine “is now going too far and inviting strategic defeat.” He discussed the situation with President Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, and chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, Gen. Mark A. Milley, explaining to them that he did not wish Starlink to be used for offensive purposes. He also called the Russian ambassador to assure him that Starlink was being used for defensive purposes only. “If the Ukrainian attacks had succeeded in sinking the Russian fleet, it would have been like a mini Pearl Harbor and led to a major escalation,” Musk says. “We did not want to be a part of that.”        “SpaceX’s out of pocket cost to enable and support Starlink in Ukraine is ~$80M so far,” he wrote in response to Zelensky’s question. “Our support for Russia is $0. Obviously, we are pro Ukraine.” But then he added, “Trying to retake Crimea will cause massive death, probably fail and risk nuclear war. This would be terrible for Ukraine and Earth.”    In early October, Musk extended his restrictions on the use of Starlink for offensive operations by disabling some of its coverage in the Russian-controlled regions of southern and eastern Ukraine. This resulted in another flurry of calls and highlighted the outsize role that Starlink was playing. Neither Ukraine nor the United States had been able to find any other communication systems that could match Starlink or fend off attacks from Russian hackers. Feeling unappreciated, he suggested that SpaceX was no longer willing to bear some of the financial burden.        Other companies, including big and profitable defense contractors, were charging billions to supply weapons to Ukraine, so it seemed unfair that Starlink, which was not yet profitable, should do it for free.    SpaceX would continue to provide another six months of free service to the terminals that were being used for humanitarian purposes, but it would no longer provide free service to ones used by the military; the Pentagon should pay for that. An agreement was struck that the Pentagon would pay SpaceX $145 million to cover the service.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2023/09/07/elon-musk-starlink-ukraine-russia-invasion/?utm_campaign=wp_news_alert_revere_trending_now&utm_medium=email&utm_source=alert&location=alert

2023sep07.  territory.   Russian occupation officials are holding municipal and regional elections this week in four regions of Ukraine that Moscow has annexed, even as Ukrainian forces claw back territory in some of those areas in a grueling counteroffensive.    The voting is seen by Kyiv and its international allies as a fraudulent attempt by Moscow to tighten its grip on the territories it has illegally claimed in the south and east of Ukraine.    Voting began last week and runs until Sunday in the four partially occupied regions: Donetsk, Luhansk, Kherson and Zaporizhzhia. Together with Crimea, which Russia annexed in 2014, they make up about one-fifth of Ukrainian territory.  https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/09/07/world/russia-ukraine-news

2023sep07.  tanks.   The 120mm uranium tank rounds - included in $175m of US military equipment for Ukraine - are for M1 Abrams tanks due to be delivered to Ukraine later this year.    The rounds are made of depleted uranium, a waste product from the process of enriching naturally occurring uranium for nuclear fuel or weapons. It cannot generate a nuclear reaction and is considered "considerably less radioactive than natural uranium", according to the International Atomic Energy Agency.    Depleted uranium can be used to reinforce armour-plating on tanks but is favoured for weapons because of its extreme density and ability to pierce conventional tank armour.    These types of shells sharpen on impact, which further increases their ability to bore through armour, and they ignite after contact.    Russia also reacted angrily when the UK announced in March it was sending depleted uranium shells to Ukraine for its Challenger 2 tanks.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66736869?zephr-modal-register

2023sep01.  The foreign minister added that those criticizing the speed of Ukraine’s counteroffensive should consider the soldiers fighting at the heart of it.    “How does it feel when you come back from your mission and you take back your phone, you open it, and you start reading all the smart people saying how slow you are and that you're not doing well enough?” Kuleba said. “You just lost two of your buddies. You were almost killed. You crawled one kilometer on your belly demining the field. You sacrificed yourself - you took the damn Russian trench in a fierce fight. And then you read someone saying ‘Oh guys, you're too slow’?”   https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-09-01-23/index.html

2023sep01.  "We are working from the territory of Russia," Mr Budanov told the War Zone website on Thursday, without saying what type or quantity of drones were used.    He said the drones targeted the tops of the aircraft - the location of the fuel tanks and a critical section of the wing spar.        Ukrainian officials are generally tight-lipped about attacks inside Russia, says BBC World Affairs correspondent Paul Adams. But it seems that as the campaign gathers pace, officials in Kyiv are more willing to claim them as part of the country's war effort.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66682503

2023aug30.  

counteroffensive path

2023aug30.  RIGA, Latvia — Drone strikes overnight hit at least six Russian cities, including Pskov, more than 370 miles from Ukraine, where an attack on the military and civilian airport destroyed two Il-76 cargo planes and damaged four others, according to Baza, a Russian media outlet with links to the country’s law enforcement.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/08/30/russia-pskov-ukraine-drone-strikes/

2023aug26.  The attack on Monday was the second strike against a Russian air base housing powerful hardware in just three days.        Ukrainian media reported that attacks on Russian bases over the past few days have destroyed several aircraft including two bombers, citing unnamed Ukrainian defense intelligence officials.    According to the Washington-based think tank the Institute for the Study of War (ISW), several Russian military bloggers claimed that Ukrainian forces used a small and relatively inexpensive quadcopter drone to conduct the attack and criticized the Russian Ministry of Defense for not storing the aircraft in hangars where they would have been protected.    The ISW added that while damage to or destruction of two Tu-22M3 bombers is not going to have a major military effect, the reaction by Russian military bloggers shows “such deep attacks support larger Ukrainian efforts to degrade Russian morale.”  https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/22/europe/ukraine-strike-russian-air-base-supersonic-warplanes-intl/?dicbo=v2-E6Sz5z1&hpt=ob_blogfooterold

Ukrainian attacks in the area are part of Kyiv’s effort to push down to the Sea of Azov.    The area is a major target for Ukraine as pushing deep into the territory would mean breaking Russia’s land-bridge between annexed Crimea and eastern Donetsk.    The ISW previously said even marginal gains by Ukraine in this area are significant.    “The Ukrainian forces’ ability to advance to the outskirts of Robotyne – which Russian forces have dedicated significant effort, time, and resources to defend – remains significant even if Ukrainian gains are limited at this time,” the ISW said.    At the same time, Kyiv has been increasing attacks on Crimea.  https://www.cnn.com/2023/08/25/europe/ukraine-offensive-robotyne-intl/?dicbo=v2-du9K78v&hpt=ob_blogfooterold        See 2023may08 post.

2023aug22.  U.S. tells Americans to leave Belarus immediately.  https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/08/22/belarus-us-citizens-leave-embassy/?utm_campaign=wp_post_most&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_most

2023aug21.  The Netherlands will give 42 F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said, adding to 19 pledged by Denmark. Ukrainian pilots have begun training on the US-made jets, long-sought by Kyiv to counter Russian air superiority.  https://www.cnn.com/europe/live-news/russia-ukraine-war-news-08-21-23/h_b27d5b2afbcdba924b015bbb04be3c7f

2023july20.  A week and a half after Sweden secured an agreement to join NATO, whose expansion has angered the Kremlin, Belarus, a close Russian ally, said on Thursday that mercenaries from Russia’s Wagner group were training troops on the border with Poland, a member of the Western military     alliance.    And President Vladimir V. Putin traveled to the Russian city of Murmansk — which Russian news media pointedly noted is near the border of NATO’s newest member, Finland.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/20/world/europe/russia-ukraine-ports-mines.html?action=click&module=Well&pgtype=Homepage&section=World%20News

 2023july20.  Yevgeny Prigozhin, the man who led an unsuccessful putsch against erstwhile Russian strongman Vladimir Putin a few weeks ago, appears to be alive and well, back with many of his Wagner Group mercenaries in a tent camp in Belarus.    Two Telegram channels affiliated with the Wagner Group posted a video that seemingly shows Prigozhin addressing what is described as “several thousand fighters,” from the bits that can be seen in the darkness of the late evening or early morning. The voice and style of speaking are Prigozhin’s; his face is not visible, though his bald head and profile are.    If the man speaking in the video really is Prigozhin — and it looks like he is — and not a stand-in or deep-fake, then that alone is close to sensational. It would dispel the rumors of his political demise or physical death and would demonstrate that he and his comrades still think they matter, despite whatever measures the Kremlin appears to have adopted to circumscribe the Wagnerites. Prigozhin’s return may not herald a second putsch, but it certainly does nothing to suggest that the Putin regime is strong.  https://themessenger.com/opinion/in-belarus-prigozhin-vows-were-getting-ready

2023july12.   Biden Braces NATO for Long Conflict With Russia, Making Cold War Parallel.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/07/12/world/europe/biden-nato-lithuania-ukraine.html

2023july11.  Briefing at Nato Summit.

Sullivan in White House briefing summed summit expectations.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?529178-1/white-house-daily-briefing 

2023july10. 

2023july10.  (pic caption) Russian President Vladimir Putin dons his headphones at the NATO summit in Bucharest, Romania, in 2008.         The antecedents to the Russian invasion of Ukraine arguably lie in a NATO summit 15 years ago. Leaders at the 2008 meeting of the Western military alliance in the Romanian capital, Bucharest, failed to find unanimity on whether to grant membership to former Soviet republics Georgia and Ukraine.        The halfhearted gesture reflected division within the West at the time. On one side, you had the administration of President George W. Bush, deeply unpopular abroad after the ruinous war in Iraq and eking out its final year in office... 

 2023july09.  Harv lauds TALK v NO-TALK.  US and China make up 40% of the world economy.  Yellen from her ten hours of talk with new China economic team public briefing via video.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?529193-1/secretary-yellen-holds-closing-news-conference-beijing

 2023july08.   President Zelensky visits Snake Island as war enters 500th day.        Last year, Russia's flagship Moskva sailed to Snake Island within hours of the start of the war and ordered Ukrainian soldiers on the island to give themselves up.        Snake Island was seized and the Ukrainian soldiers were taken prisoner - but later exchanged for Russian captives.         Saturday's video comes after Mr Zelensky spent much of the week visiting European leaders as part of a diplomatic tour to ramp up support for Ukraine's Nato's membership.  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-66141701         18 April 2022.  Russia's flagship Black Sea missile cruiser, the Moskva, has sunk after being "seriously damaged".       US officials said two Ukrainian Neptune missiles had struck the vessel, killing an unknown number of sailors. The BBC has not been able to verify the claims. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-61103927

 2023july07.  

 

Stoltenberg describes the stronger four NATO blocks-of-countries that contain Russia and China -- North, Baltic, Middle East, and Indo-Pacific.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?529165-1/nato-secretary-general-holds-briefing-nato-summit

Sullivan in White House briefing referenced no-intention to enter World War Three.

https://www.c-span.org/video/?529178-1/white-house-daily-briefing 

 Kohn in Defense Department briefing.

 

https://www.c-span.org/video/?529180-1/defense-department-briefing 

 

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy was set to meet his Turkish counterpart Tayyip Erdogan in Istanbul on Friday for talks to extend a Black Sea shipping agreement that has allowed millions of tons of grain to reach world markets despite the Russian invasion.    More than 32 million metric tons of food have been exported from three Ukrainian ports on the Black Sea to 45 countries on three continents since the shipping deal was first negotiated last summer, stabilizing food prices worldwide, the UN said.    But the agreement is set to expire July 17, and Russia, angry over aspects of its implementation, has threatened to block its renewal. The Russian navy has controlled the Black Sea since President Vladimir Putin ordered the invasion of Ukraine in February 2022. https://themessenger.com/news/volodymyr-zelenskyy-heads-to-istanbul-to-save-critical-grain-deal

So far human conflicts haven’t spilled into attacking each others' satellites with missiles, but the technology exists: In November, 2021, the Russian military tested out its Nudol missile by blowing up a defunct satellite. The explosion created a cloud of thousands of fragments, many of them not trackable due to their size, traveling at thousands of miles per hour around the globe.   

In a study published last week in the journal Defence and Peace Economics, two economics professors at Spain’s University of Malaga calculated that should a war erupt where satellites are seen as legitimate targets and 250 of them are destroyed, the amount of debris would increase exponentially over the next five decades.    While the amount of total satellites would dip, the number would likely climb again as governments, militaries and corporations launch new satellites to replace those that were lost — but the fast-moving shards of metal and plastic zipping around the Earth from the initial explosions would soon begin eviscerating even those. The paper shows the amount of satellites in orbit would be down to almost zero within fifty years.  

https://themessenger.com/tech/destroying-just-250-satellites-would-make-orbit-totally-useless-in-40-years-study?utm_source=onsite&utm_medium=latest_news 

 

 2023jun27. The announcements appeared to be an effort to address one of the questions that has lingered since the weekend mutiny: the fate of Wagner’s heavily armed forces. Mr. Putin has said that all private armies fighting on behalf of Russia in Ukraine would have to come under the supervision of the Russian Defense Ministry by July 1, including members of Wagner.  https://www.nytimes.com/2023/06/27/world/europe/russia-prigozhin-wagner-charges.html

2023may14. The disconnect among NATO members — 15 years after the United States spearheaded a push to declare that Ukraine would eventually join the alliance — highlights the risks such steps could entail at a fraught moment in the West’s standoff with Russia. It also underscores the potential for longer-term challenges within NATO despite the cohesion that has characterized the alliance’s response to the war.       President Vladimir Putin has long cited NATO’s inclusion of former Soviet states, which has occurred incrementally since the end of the Cold War, as a threat to Russia’s security.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/national-security/2023/05/14/ukraine-nato-membership-vilnius-summit/?utm_campaign=wp_evening_edition&utm_medium=email&utm_source=newsletter&wpisrc=nl_evening&carta-url=https%3A%2F%2Fs2.washingtonpost.com%2Fcar-ln-tr%2F3a03852%2F64614bf15dfb5222c4b90484%2F598b051fae7e8a68162a1429%2F15%2F50%2F64614bf15dfb5222c4b90484 

2023may12.  The Institute for the Study of War also said Ukrainian forces had probably made gains of 2km in Bakhmut.   And the US-based think tank said the Russian defence ministry acknowledging "the Ukrainian counterattacks uncharacteristically quickly" - by denying them - indicated "increased panic".   Away from Bakhmut, the exiled mayor of Melitopol reported a large explosion on Friday morning in the centre of the city in south-eastern city, which has been occupied by Russia since the start of the war.   It's not known what caused the blast, but the Ukrainian air force made 14 strikes on Russian forces and military equipment on Thursday, Ukraine's armed forces said.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65567143

Yevgeniy Prigozhin, head of the mercenary group Wagner, a key element of the Russian assault on Bakhmut, said the Ukrainian operation was “in full swing” and its forces were attacking his flanks.

“Unfortunately, in some places they are successful,” Prigozhin said in an audio message posted to Telegram. “All the units that have received the necessary training, weapons, equipment, tanks, everything else — they are already fully engaged.”   Later Thursday, he said the attack was “shaping up according to the worst of the predicted scenarios.”   In an interview published by the BBC and European broadcasters on Thursday, Zelensky said the operation could proceed now “and be successful,” but it would result in “unacceptable” losses for Ukrainian forces.   He said he had enough troops and they were mentally prepared for the counteroffensive, but “not everything has arrived yet” and the army needs “some things.” He made similar comments to The Washington Post this month, saying Ukraine would launch the assault “as soon as the weapons that were agreed with our partners are filled.”   Prigozhin said Zelensky “was being deceptive.”

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/05/11/bakhmut-battle-zelensky-wagner/

2023may10. 

Ukrainian troops break through a Russian flank near Bakhmut, officials say.

https://www.nytimes.com/live/2023/05/10/world/russia-ukraine-news

2023may10. Kaliningrad: Russia fury as Poland body recommends renaming exclave.        Mikhail 

Kalinin was one of six Soviet Politburo signatories to the order to execute more than 21,000 Polish prisoners of war in the forests of Katyn and elsewhere in 1940.       Although the state committee's recommendation is not binding, it is expected that Polish state bodies will now refer to Kaliningrad as Królewiec. Poland's foreign ministry has issued a positive assessment of the name change.       Poland has also begun to fortify its border with the exclave following Russia's invasion of Ukraine.       Poland has erected a 5.5m-high steel fence along part of its border with Belarus after an increase in migrants crossing into Poland, Lithuania and Latvia from there.

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-65545636

2023may08. Harv curious: where the counteroffensive?

 

 2023may03. If Western estimates are approximately right — and Russia has suffered some 200,000 casualties, with more than 40,000 killed, since the start of its invasion last year — than that death toll would be about three times the number of soldiers the Soviet Union lost over a decade of war in Afghanistan.     According to a leaked U.S. intelligence document, U.S. officials estimated earlier this year that Ukraine had suffered between 124,500 to 131,000 casualties, including 15,500 to 17,500 killed in action. Between these Ukrainian and Russian losses, there hasn’t been two countries sustain such blows to manpower in a conflict since the Iran-Iraq war of the 1980s.     As for the toll on civilians, the U.N. human rights agency counted 23,375 casualties in Ukraine between the start of the invasion in February 2022 and Tuesday.

And yet, for all the weight of its brutality and violence, the war in Ukraine was not even the single deadliest conflict in the world last year. That grim title goes to the conflict that nominally ended last November in Ethiopia’s northern Tigray region. Since violence erupted two years before pitting Tigrayan rebels against both Ethiopian and Eritrean troops, 600,000 people may have died, according to numbers compiled by researchers at Ghent University and publicized by African Union envoy and former Nigerian president Olusegun Obasanjo earlier this year.

“The conflict in Ukraine has been called an ‘era-defining crisis,’ and its impact is being felt in nearly every corner of the globe,” Green said. “However, the conflict in Ethiopia is an active humanitarian catastrophe that is receiving little attention from the West.”

In March, Secretary of State Antony Blinken accused all sides — including the Ethiopian army, Eritrean troops, Tigrayan separatists and regional fighters from Amhara, a neighboring region to Tigray — of carrying out war crimes.

...while this human bloodbath happened, we chose not to watch.”

https://s2.washingtonpost.com/camp-rw/?trackId=598b051fae7e8a68162a1429&s=6451dde1a61bab12f74dd125&linknum=5&linktot=71&linknum=5&linktot=71