NoW: UKRAINE UPDATED

 

The NEWS of Ukraine’s surprise “offensive” into the south-western Kursk region of Russia with troops pulled from several fronts reminds me of a video game I once played. The game consisted of driving around in various cool cars while taking in the digital sights. You could do that for quite a while, but if you started to commit crimes, from parking infractions to vehicular murder (so much fun!), the police would be on your tail. The more crimes you committed, the more cop cars piled on to put an end to your virtual rampage. That kind of reminds me of what’s happening now in the Ukraine-Russia conflict. The more Ukraine pokes the Russian bear, the greater its response.

One recent 'poke of the stick' is Ukraine's invasion into Russia in the Kursk region bordering Ukraine's Sumy oblast. There are conflicting reports on how serious the fighting has been. Some dismiss it as a publicity stunt to prove Ukraine's ability to continue the war (and thus continue to receive copious amounts of money and materiel). Another commentator, Gilbert Doctorow, suggests it’s more than a sideshow, with hard fighting between battle-hardened troops in a complex frontier battlefield. The mission goal for the invading AFU (Armed Forces of Ukraine)  may have been to capture the Kurst Nuclear Power Plant (NPP): To take and hold the nuclear complex, and use it as a bargaining chip for future negotiations, something more and more Western elites concede is inevitable.  Regardless of what they intended, Ukrainian troops didn’t get anywhere near the plant, but they managed to launch several small drones at the facility which were shot down. This action by Ukraine could have been serious had they hit their target because the Kursk NPP is an older design lacking protective “domes” to cover the reactor cores that newer facilities have. The reactors (one is still operating) have conventional roof structures, making them vulnerable to artillery or missile fire. Thus, a new “Chernobyl” crisis (albeit smaller) might have occurred had these structures been hit or damaged. [Note: On August 11, AFU drones hit a cooling tower at the Zaporizhzhia NPP that Russia captured in September 2022 as part of its "special military operation". The nuclear plant is located in the Zaporizhzhia oblast ("province") which was annexed by Russia along with the  Donetsk, Kherson and Luhansk oblasts. Ed.] In addition, on August 31 Ukraine launched drone attacks on power plants and oil depots inside Russia. This comes days after Russia launched a major missile and drone attack on Ukraine's power grid. 

 

THE FIGHTING in Kursk will probably continue for the next few weeks as Russia moves men and materiel into the region to crush the invading Ukrainian forces that number fifteen to twenty-thousand troops by some estimates. Like Zelensky's request to launch long-range munitions into Russia, the Kursk operation is there to provoke the Russians into acting with disproportionate force in order to lure NATO and the U.S. into the fray.*

 

But, in terms of negotiations—back channel or otherwise—the Ukrainian offensive into Russian territory may have put the kibosh on all that, with a real “red line” having been crossed. Putin and his FM, Sergey Lavrov, both said last week that there will be no further negotiations. And what that means for Ukraine, will become clear in the coming weeks and months. 

 

ON the eastern front-lines, in the Donbas region of Ukraine, the Russians are pushing forward and will soon take the rail and communications hub-city of Pokrovsk. After that it’s anybody’s guess because it looks like there is a major Russian offensive stirring. Will Putin advance to the Dnieper River and perhaps sweep the remaining Ukrainian coastline, up to and including the port-city of Odessa, and even linking up with the Russian enclave of Transnistria? Is it possible that Russia's ally, Belarus, will enter the fray and move on Kiev? Stay tuned.😲

 

AND IN CASE ANYONE THINKS crossing Russian red lines is a good thing, remember: Russia has the world’s largest store of nuclear warheads and is updating its “nuclear doctrine” that would take into consideration other threats to Russia coming from non-nuclear weaponry or assaults. In other words, a lowering of the threshold of when it will launch a nuclear strike if the country's security is threatened.  Do we seriously want Russia to lower the bar for when it will respond with a nuclear strike? Is that a good idea? Ratcheting up tensions between two nuclear superpowers is insane. MEANWHILE, the meat-puppet in the White House is promoting a pivot to China in terms of nuclear targeting protocols. Biden wants more of his missile batteries and other nuclear forces to have designated strike targets inside China (Chinese ICBM sites, military facilities, cities). However, such a move would come at the expense of removing some strike targets from Russia, robbing Peter to pay Paul, essentially. He will decrease, the number of American nuclear weapons stationed in Europe and increase their number in the Indo-Pacific. Washington will abide by the total number of deployed nuclear weapons allowed under the New-START arms limitation treaty; it will just shuffle some of them around to China. In response to this growing threat, China has announced it is increasing its nuclear arsenal with the goal of achieving parity with the United States and Russia by 2030, even surpassing them in the number of deployable weapons.  

The nuclear genie is out of the bottle and is stirring up tricks all around us. Let the good times roll!😱

 

PART of the 'problem' for America is that it is limited by a treaty (those damn treaties!) to 1550 deployable (i.e. armed) ICBMs, "gravity" bombs and SLBM missiles it can have ready to launch. The same goes for Russia. Both countries signed and ratified the New-Start treaty (Strategic Arms Reduction treaty) in 2010, and it’s due to be renewed in 2026. The U.S. currently has 5044 warheads in its arsenal; Russia has 5580. New-Start is the last nuclear treaty¹ still in force that has kept a lid on (mostly) the expansion and proliferation of nuclear weapons for decades. Will it be renewed? And will further treaties be inked to limit the development of other nuclear weapons' technologies that 'lower the bar' for their deployment and use? Under a Harris or Trump administration it seems unlikely.

 

FURTHERMORE, the United States has recently announced it will install upgraded nuclear gravity-bombs tricked out with “glide bomb” technology in several European bull's eye states. Germany, along with Italy, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Turkey, already host American B-61 nuclear gravity bombs. The "glide" hardware update extends the bombs' range of operation and improves their accuracy. In a further move, the Sholtz government, in its utter fecklessness, has just concluded an agreement to host American "Tomahawk" cruise missiles and still-in-development "Dark Eagle" hyper-sonic missiles  in 2026. Such missiles had been banned  under the Intermediate Nuclear Forces (INF) treaty, that the U.S. walked away from in 2019. Now they'll be back, slapping their host countries with big, fat bull's eyes for hungry Russian nukes.🧿

 

    "Fat Man" gravity-bomb. Nagasaki. 8/9/45. 21kt.

IT SHOULD be noted that last year and in January of this year the U.S. made overtures to Russia to begin talks on renewing New-Start. Moscow declined Washington's offer, stating that a comprehensive discussion around European security must be held in conjunction with any nuclear arms treaty, and those discussions must take into account Russia's genuine security concerns. I assume the U.S. plan to return cruise missiles to Europe (banned under the defunct INF treaty) are the result of this stand-off. It's another example of how the Ukraine War is making the world less safe. We need dialogue, not more bombs!

 

Q: "Russia, in a nuclear war, whether for a first-launch strike or a retaliatory one, what is the first thing you should do?"

A: "Turn all countries hosting U.S. nukes or having their own nuclear arsenals into ashtrays."

 

We may be at the start of a new arms race, this time a three-way match between Russia, the U.S., and China. (Provided we make it that far!) And to ratchet up tensions even more, the Biden administration may give Ukraine permission to fire munitions and missiles deep into Russian territory. While some commentators argue that Ukraine should be allowed to strike into Russia; they are at war, after all, others suggest such pin-prick strikes will not change the trajectory of the Ukraine conflict which is decidedly in Russia’s favour. And studies have shown that aerial bombardments tend to strengthen, not weaken, the resolve of a besieged population.

BUT will Russia come to see such attacks as an existential threat? Recall earlier this year when the AFU (Armed Forces of Ukraine) launched drone attacks on two of Russia’s early warning radar stations, damaging one array. Will Ukraine provoke Russia with such rash actions? 

 

    Battle of Kursk, 1943

AND for the historically-challenged, we note that Kursk was the setting for the largest tank battle in history during WWII. Needless to say, the arrival, in early August this year, of German tanks and armored vehicles once more on Russian soil hasn't gone down well with Russians who recall 1943’s Battle of Kursk. And the Russian people have very long memories.

 

👉A final point to consider: One of the pie-in-the-sky goals for Western elites and militaries was to have Ukraine inflict such damage on Russia that, along with sanctions, would cause Putin to lose his grip on power and Russia to become destabilized and more easily balkanized and asset-stripped by foreign interests and assorted carpetbaggers. But, I think if we look rationally at the current state of affairs in that bloody, years-long conflict, it's possible that Ukraine will be the one that is balkanized. Neighbouring countries—Poland, Hungary, Romania and Slovakia all have historical claims of one sort or another to parts of Ukraine. It may be that Russia works out deals with these countries to take over and control those parts that Russia does not wish to govern. Who knows?

 

👉IT IS TIME for cooler heads to prevail lest we find ourselves on a path we hadn't chosen, moved by forces we'd not considered, and all of us arriving at a place we had never dreamed possible.

 

Cheers, Jake.___________________________________

 

* Hey, isn’t that the same trick  Netanyahu is using  by attacking Iranian consulates and Hezbollah forces in southern Lebanon? The Israeli PM wants to drag the U.S. into a conflict with Iran by hook or by crook. It’s like both Netanyahu and Zelensky are using the same playbook.

 

1. A nice timeline of the twists and turns nuclear weapons' treaties have taken, from the Kennedy-Khrushchev Test Ban Treaty of 1963, through to the cancellation of the penultimate treaty, the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty (INF) in 2018, is found here.

 

💀 Does anyone feel safer with the latest generation of nuclear weapons, from nuclear-tipped hyper-sonic missiles, "stealth" missiles, "tactical" or "theatre" nuclear weapons; "glide bombs", "suitcase" nukes, and I've probably left out a few. Not to mention the problem of nuclear proliferation, with more nations (like Saudi Arabia and Iran, for example) debating whether they should join the nuclear 'club', currently composed of nine members and counting. 

 

Q: "Do you feel safe? Snug as a bug in a rug?"

A: "No! Give me the Cold War anytime!"

 

  

 

RANT: WELCOME TO THE FUTURE

 

BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU DRIVE—This may be more common than I realize, but recently I was offered a 10% discount on my auto insurance with CAA (Canadian Automotive Association) the other day. I have a CAA membership for free towing, etc., in case I whiplash into a ditch this winter or my battery loses its spark and needs a boost. (Don’t we all!) But here’s the catch: to get the discount I would have to install a “black box” in my car or load a special app onto my smartphone to monitor my driving habits—my speed, braking, turning, whatever. And, if I practiced safe driving techniques, my insurance premiums would be gauged accordingly. Wowser! But because I sometimes like to drive with my eyes closed and run red lights, I declined the offer. As well, I assume distances and destinations, etc., will be tagged by GPS, so that would mean I’d have to give up closing-time at “The Silver Tassel”, my local strip club. So that piece of tech is not for me.

 

BUT, I WONDER how long it will be until all cars come with built-in monitoring systems and automatic insurance premium adjustments?

Or, say that your wife is pregnant and her water just broke, and the two of you make a mad dash to the car to drive to the hospital. You lock and load and prepare to peal out of there when sensors in your car detect your elevated heart rate and blood pressure (from gripping the steering wheel so hard) and the AI in the black box decides that the use of your vehicle is “not currently available” and shuts down the engine. Well, doggies, welcome to our brave new world.  

I MENTIONED some time ago that the city where I live is changing their lakeshore parking permit system to get rid of parking tags that used to dangle behind the rear-view mirror. Now, parking cops scan license plates to check if your car has a valid permit. In the summer, it gets crowded as out-of-townees vie for parking spots with residents and no doubt there will be a few tow-aways for those who haven’t registered their cars with the city’s parking system. But dollars to doughnuts, those scanners will eventually flag dead-beat drivers who toss their speeding tickets into the glove box and forget about them, or perhaps things like over-due property taxes or unpaid fees, alimony even, or taxes, etc., perhaps generating an automatic fine for the driver, (and deducted automatically by the system’s AI from your bank account—“Thank you for your payment”), or a tow-away, or vehicle confiscation, based on the collated information.

This type of automatic monitoring and tagging of our comings and goings is an incremental step—but it is a step—towards what some call a “social credit score” system. Not China’s state driven AI assault on citizen privacy and autonomy, but with our capitalistic brand on things, with corporations and governments large and small acting in lockstep because they’re after the same thing—data harvested from the likes of you and me, and we have no idea just how much of ourselves is being hoovered up by the machinery of state and private enterprise, and ultimately for their benefit, of course.

 

BIG BROTHER IS WAKING and his gaze into the public and private lives of each and every one of us may soon become all encompassing.

 

"If we accept the bedrock premise of a free society, that government is its servant and not its master, then it is up to the state, always, to ask the citizens’ permission before it intrudes on their liberty, and to prove its necessity: it is never the citizen’s obligation to show why he may remain unmolested. That spirit is lamentably absent from the Court’s reasoning." https://nationalpost.com/opinion/andrew-coyne-supreme-court-twists-the-charter-of-rights-in-its-haste-to-limit-free-speech

 

 

Cheers, 

Jake.______________________________________

 

 

NoW: GAZA CONT’D

 

DID ANYONE WATCHING the DNC (Democratic National Convention) last week not cringe as Joe (“I’m still here!”) Biden addressed party delegates and received his pro forma tongue bath at the close of Day 1 festivities in Chicago? Did he not remind you of your cranky grandad, annoyed with all the relatives hanging around his house at Christmas or Thanksgiving, or whichever family gathering you find most painful? Quick! Someone, get the President a cup of hot cocoa! On a more serious note: Biden did acknowledge the crowds chanting outside the ironically named “United Center” protesting the President’s limp-wristed Gaza-Israel initiatives. The protestors gathered, non-ironically, demanding a permanent ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza war; that IDF troops withdraw from the Gaza Strip, and for an immediate flow of food and medical supplies into the enclave to address the humanitarian disaster occurring there.* He said: “’Those protesters out in the street, they have a point…A lot of innocent people are being killed on both sides….’” And that was it. He then pivoted to his favourite talking point (Ukraine) and the need to free Americans held by Russia. Not a word about how he would force Israel to stop bombing Gaza to rubble (he’s not); or how he’s going to stop the spread of polio and infectious diseases from spreading there because Israel bombed the water and sewage infrastructure (a war crime, but nah-uh, it’s not happening); or how he’s going to demand that Israel open the borders fully to allow in desperately needed humanitarian aid (also nope), or how he’s going to stop Israel from instigating a regional conflict with Hezbollah and even Iran (ditto nada); or how he’s going to withhold political cover for Israel at the UN Security Council and instead support resolutions condemning the rogue state’s genocidal rampage against the Palestinian people, and finally how he’s halting, forthwith, all military and financial support to the out-of-control, nuclear weapons-possessing apartheid state until they immediately accept a permanent ceasefire (Nah, he’s not gonna do that; not, not and more not).

 

SO, IT WAS A NIGHT of cringey television viewing, meanwhile tens of thousands of Palestinian men, women and children have been butchered, and a doddering incompetent in the White House refuses to put the brake on Israel’s genocide by denying them the weapons, money and political support without which these committed Zionists cannot reach their goal of making the lands “from the river to the sea” an exclusively Jewish state, with the Palestinians dead, gone or subjugated by military force.

👉WE ARE STILL WAITING for a retaliatory strike from Iran in wake of the assassination of a high-ranking Hamas official killed in Tehran August 1 and for the killing of a Hezbollah militia leader in Beirut, a day earlier. Both assassinations are believed to have been carried out by Israel. Tehran and Hezbollah may be holding fire to see if the most recent ceasefire negotiation can be made acceptable to both Israel and Hamas, and end the bloodshed in the Palestinian enclave. But time is running out.¹

 

👉And after nearly four years of presiding over an American clusterfuk of his own making around just about every foreign and domestic policy initiative you can name, the old duffer says: “I’m more optimistic about the future than I was when I was elected as a 29-year-old United States senator.” Heck, I’d be optimistic about the future, as well, if all I needed to worry about was which flavour of ice cream my care staff was bringing me. (Butterscotch Ripple!)

 

    Lock the liquor cabinet when she's near the nuclear codes!

👉And world of wonders! Last Thursday, Kamala Harris officially became the Democrat’s candidate for president. With her middle-of-the-road, cream-puff VP pick, Minnesota Governor Tim Walz, and with hundreds of millions of dollars in campaign donations, she might just pull it off. Her policies toward Israel and Gaza are unlikely to differ much from Joe Biden’s. Similarly, Trump remains a full-throated supporter of Israel no matter what. So, whoever wins the White House, it seems everyone is simpatico with dying Gazans just so long as the all-powerful AIPAC (American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee) lobby and Benjamin  Netanyauh  are happy.

 

Cheers, Jake.______________________________________

* When all this is over, I think we can expect to find that perhaps 250,000 Gazans, maybe more, have died from Israeli bombs and bullets and artillery shells, and from infectious diseases, the lack of medical care, and most wickedly, famine and starvation.  A genocide occurring right before our eyes, in broad daylight. Imagine that!

 

1. And for those who say that Hamas fighters started this latest conflict on October 7 by massacring 1200 Israels, I would say that, yes, Israelis in kibbutzim surrounding Gaza were killed, but many were army reservists and active duty soldiers. In addition, an unknown number of Israelis were killed by IDF helicopter guns and missiles. That line of burned out cars headed back into the Gazan enclave carrying kidnapped Israelis that we all saw on our screens last October wasn't caused by the light arms weapons used by the Hamas fighters. They were destroyed by Israeli helicopter gunships. And those pictures of Israeli homes destroyed by what could only have been from tank fire, strongly suggests that Israeli soldiers were acting under the Hannibal Directive.

 

👉One commentator characterized the Hamas attacks of October 7 as a "prison break." Others have referred to the Gaza Strip as the world's largest open air prison."