Brian Berletic, November 05 2024
Israel’s most recent missile strikes on Iran reveal the limits to conventional Western military power in the Middle East, reflecting wider limits globally.
Israeli Strikes Demonstrates Limits of Western Military Might (archived)
Tag: Reuters
The US Dollar Can No Longer Threaten China and Russia
In 2022, the US kicked Russia out of the SWIFT system, causing significant losses for Russian businesses and ordinary citizens. Even Switzerland’s traditionally neutral banks joined this looting. The monopoly over the financial system and global currency once gave the U.S. and EU such capability, but at the 2024 BRICS summit, Western countries permanently lost this advantage.
Previously:
Russia outlines proposal for BRICS DLT cross border payment system
Pro-EU forces in Moldova claim victory in questionable vote + More
The tiny European state of Moldova is increasingly being drawn into the maelstrom of NATO’s war against Russia. On Monday, the US-allied government of Maia Sandu claimed victory in a referendum held the day before over whether the country should join the European Union. According to the Central Election Commission, 50.39 percent of voters supported and 49.61 percent opposed EU ascension. Slightly more than half of those eligible to cast a ballot did so.
The International Republican Institute is affiliated with the National Endowment for Democracy (NED). See my “front organizations” page regarding NED and Amnesty International.
Related:
06-10-2024 Daniel Runde and Thomas Bryja: Moldova’s Fate Is Tied to Ukraine’s: Now Is the Time for the West to “Go Big” on Moldova
Daniel F. Runde’s Support for Ukraine (CSIS):
Read More »[Updated] Moldova says ‘no’ in vote on joining EU: partial results
DW (Germany): Moldova says ‘no’ in vote on joining EU: partial results
They’ve been building up this election interference narrative for months.
Related:
B92 (Serbia): Moldova decided: Loud and clear – NO!
BBC: Moldova’s EU vote hangs in balance as president blames voter ‘fraud’
More information on just a few of the front organizations in Moldova:
Read More »China Exposed America’s New PRISM Program
On October 14, China’s National Computer Virus Emergency Response Center revealed that the U.S. has established seven monitoring stations across the country to intercept data transmitted through undersea cables in both the Atlantic and Pacific.
Related:
Inside the subsea cable firm secretly helping America take on China
Powell’s hit piece on “Media Unlocked”
Unlocking China’s “Media Unlocked” Propagandists
Recently, Media Unlocked unveiled its latest triumph–an interview with a former U.S. president’s brother, Neil Bush, whose George H.W. Bush Foundation For U.S.-China Relations has allegedly received millions of dollars from a group associated with CCP influence operations. Bush–apparently unconcerned that he was participating in Beijing’s propaganda campaign–helpfully sang the praise of China’s communist system, its electric vehicle industry and, incredibly, even announced that he was observing a “massive freedom movement” in today’s China.
Propagandists? Und das bist du nicht?
Now, let’s get into who’s funding the George H.W. Bush Foundation For U.S.-China Relations. Powell links to a Fox News article about its funding from the China–United States Exchange Foundation, based in Hong Kong. The Fox News article links to an Axios article (which is behind a paywall). Nowhere does Powell mention that the foundation also gets funding from the U.S. Department of State, The Rockefeller Foundation, etc.
Read More »US Keeps Missile System in Philippines as China Tensions Rise, Tests Wartime Deployment
MANILA (Reuters) – The United States has no immediate plans to withdraw a mid-range missile system deployed in the Philippines, despite Chinese demands, and is testing the feasibility of its use in a regional conflict, sources with knowledge of the matter said.
US Keeps Missile System in Philippines as China Tensions Rise, Tests Wartime Deployment
Previously:
Philippines aims to acquire Typhon missile launcher as regional arms race intensifies
U.S. military, on Tinder, says to swipe left on Iran-backed militants
The warning appeared online last week in Arabic beneath pictures of U.S. warplanes: “Do not take up arms against the United States or its partners,” it said, noting that America “will protect its partners in the face of threats from the Iranian regime and its proxies.”
U.S. military, on Tinder, says to swipe left on Iran-backed militants
Poorly trained recruits contribute to loss of Ukrainian territory on eastern front + The US Is Sending $125 Million in New Military Aid to Ukraine
KYIV, Ukraine (AP) — Some new Ukrainian soldiers refuse to fire at the enemy. Others, according to commanders and fellow fighters, struggle to assemble weapons or to coordinate basic combat movements. A few have even walked away from their posts, abandoning the battlefield altogether.
While Ukraine presses on with its incursion into Russia’s Kursk region, its troops are still losing precious ground along the country’s eastern front — a grim erosion that military commanders blame in part on poorly trained recruits drawn from a recent mobilization drive, as well as Russia’s clear superiority in ammunition and air power.
Poorly trained recruits contribute to loss of Ukrainian territory on eastern front, commanders say
Related:
Reuters: Russia and Ukraine report gains as some Ukrainians flee strategic city
But although the incursion is an embarrassment for Russia, Moscow’s forces have continued their gradual advances of the past few months against tired Ukrainian troops in eastern Ukraine worn down by 2-1/2 years of heavy fighting.
Moscow said its troops had taken control of the village of Mezhove in the Donetsk region of eastern Ukraine, and that they had beaten back an attempt by a Ukrainian force to infiltrate its border in a different region to Kyiv’s Aug. 6 incursion.
Ukrainian authorities say Russian troops are now just 10 km (six miles) outside Pokrovsk, an important transport hub in eastern Ukraine, and this week started evacuating elderly residents and children.
…
Moscow’s capture of Pokrovsk, which lies at an intersection of roads and a railway line, would give Russia options to advance in new directions and also cut supply routes used by the Ukrainian military in the Donetsk region.
WSJ: Ukraine Moves to Encircle Russian Troops in Kursk and Digs In for Long Fight
The incursion hasn’t, so far, shifted the dynamic on the war’s main battlefields in eastern Ukraine, where Russia is advancing in toward Pokrovsk, a key Ukrainian logistical hub, and Toretsk, a city on strategically important high ground.
The US Is Sending $125 Million in New Military Aid to Ukraine, Officials Say
Why Did Washington Memory-hole Gaza?
Suddenly a White House “priority”—getting aid to starving civilians—has vanished from the news cycle.
Ms. Cat’s Chronicles 
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