RUNNING UPDATES ON THE CONFLICT IN UKRAINE - 07.04.2024
Including geopolitical issues affecting the balance of power in the ongoing end game war to establish our common future, a closely monitored prison planet or tolerance for diverse modes of governance.
THE ROAD TO THE ULTIMATE CONCLUSION OF WORLD WAR III RUNS THROUGH HERE.
*** RUSSIAN GREATEST OFFENSIVE IS ON - COUNTDOWN STARTED ***
“Ukraine. What is the truth...?
Why won’t western media tell both sides…?”
VIRTUALLY UNREPORTED ATROCITY IN LUGANSK, 2nd JUNE 2014
A lot has been said about atrocities in the western media claimed to have been perpetrated by the Russians, for example at Bucha and Mariupol among others. These assertions are conveyed on the say so of the Ukrainian authorities. How willing though are western news broadcasters to convey atrocities attributed to the Ukrainians? The following will I think provide the answer.
If anyone wonders if they are receiving accurate coverage of the conflict in Ukraine I would suggest watching the video below of an event which occurred on the 2nd of June 2014 and ask themselves if they recall hearing about it on any mainstream media news channel at the time.
The video is harrowing to watch. The bodies (five women and three men) are real. Yet across western media there was only one single news report that occurred a day later. This was from CNN and occurred only because a CNN team happened to be nearby at the time of the atrocity and so the network could hardly ignore it as all others so obviously did.
The video below shows the unvarnished truth that was not considered newsworthy in western mainstream news.
THE SINGLE WESTERN MSM REPORT ON THE LUGANSK ATROCITY, 3rd JUNE 2014
The video at the CNN link below is the crime scene sanitised by CNN, though played straight with honest reporting on the scene not playing things to Kiev’s tune.
(There was a time early in the war in the Donbass when CNN were not afraid to contradict the Ukrainian regime in Kiev.) Watch, because it's the first and last time you will see this.
5 women and 3 men died, all civilians.
Air attack on pro-Russian separatists in Luhansk kills 8, stuns residents.
COLLECTIVE WEST-UKRAINE <-> RUSSIA
Declassified Docs Reveal Explicit NATO Pledge Not to Meddle in Russia's Neighbourhood.
The Western bloc has a long record of promises to Russia made and broken, from a commitment not to expand east, to a pledge to support the 2015 Minsk peace deal to end the Ukrainian crisis. Now, a new set of records reveals that NATO vowed not to meddle in Russia’s backyard – a commitment broken in subsequent decades through color revolutions.
The US National Security Archive dropped a fresh trove of documents this week on previously classified conversations between senior Russian officials and their US and NATO counterparts in the period between 1992 and 1995, detailing what at the time seemed like rosy prospects for cooperation, and featuring a key pledge related to the internal affairs of the new post-Soviet republics.
A transcript of a meeting between then-chairman of the Russian parliament Ruslan Khasbulatov and NATO secretary general Manfred Woerner dated February 25, 1992, exactly two months after Mikhail Gorbachev declared the USSR defunct and resigned from office, features an unmistakably blunt commitment by Woerner that the alliance will not meddle in the internal political affairs of Russia and other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
“We would like Russia and all other members of the Commonwealth of Independent States to join the Council for Cooperation [under NATO, ed.],” Woerner said during his conversation with Khasbulatov in Moscow.
“From what I hear, -and you yourself talked about this – that some people still doubt our intentions. I would like to state here very clearly that we need stability, or some kind of stabilizing element for peace. We are not going to interfere in Russia’s internal affairs, as well as the internal affairs of other sovereign member states of the CIS. We would like to establish [the] most friendly relations with all the former Soviet republics. This will suit our common interests and as such we will be able to provide more lasting stability. We will all be better off as a result,” the NATO chief assured.
“We want to see close cooperation between states in a Europe composed of sovereign democratic states. How can this be achieved? We want to build a Europe that will inhabit a new security environment from [the Urals] to the Atlantic. It will be a unified Euro-Atlantic community built on three pillars. The first is the Helsinki process, the second – the European Community [predecessor to the European Union, ed.], which will create a basis for a solid political future for our community, and the third pillar is NATO,” Woerner added.
A second document, dated March 8, 1994, and recording a conversation between senior Russian Duma leaders and Clinton Defense Secretary William Perry, offered clues of the extent of security concerns felt even by members of the liberal, highly pro-American Yeltsin government regarding US and NATO policy toward Russia. By that time, the Clinton administration had firmly committed to the expansion of the Western alliance in Eastern Europe in spite of fervent (but impotent) opposition by Yeltsin.
“As Chairman of the State Duma Committee on Defense, I am interested in a whole range of issues,” lawmaker Sergei Yushenkov was recorded as saying. “These include US military doctrine…NATO’s prospects in connection with the end of the Cold War, issues of our collaboration in peacekeeping actions, concrete approaches to the implementation of the Partnership for Peace program (which I consider a thin veil for NATO expansion), prospects for the ratification of START-2 and the implementation of START-1,” Yushenkov said.
Perry sought to soothe Russian lawmakers as best he could, assuring that the Partnership for Peace initiative was “aimed at cooperation of all countries in the interests of maintaining peace,” and that for Russia especially, it would facilitate “increasing openness and strengthening contacts between the armed forces of the two countries.”
Expressing concerns about the US and its allies’ move to inform the Russian side about its decisions in the then-raging Bosnian crisis in Yugoslavia “a bit too late,” then-Yeltsin ambassador to the US Vladimir Lukin suggested it would be “more natural for partners to consult each other and [try to] persuade each other regarding correctness of the proposed solutions, and only then to move on to joint implementation.”
Secretary Perry blew off Lukin’s apprehensions, assuring that he had “wanted to inform the Russian side about the proposed solution even before discussing it with NATO,” and that “President Bill Clinton tried to contact Boris Yeltsin by phone.”
“However, for reasons unknown to me, there was no communication for two days. I planned to call Pavel Grachev in the Russian Ministry of Defense on this issue but decided not to do this before the conversation between the two presidents. The loss of two days created misunderstanding,” Perry said, promising to correct this oversight in the future.
Responding to the lawmakers’ concerns regarding the perceived humiliation of Russia in the wake of the Soviet Union’s disintegration, and objections to the standardization of Russian weaponry with NATO’s under the Partnership for Peace program, Perry explained that “for the foreseeable future, the discussion is mainly about standardizing communications so that our armed forces can communicate with each other,” with “standardization of weapons a long-term perspective.”
Promises Broken
Details from the documents, and particularly NATO chief Woerner’s commitment not to interfere in the “internal affairs” of Russia and other CIS members, stands in stark contrast to what the Western bloc actually ended up doing.
From the early 2000s onward, Western state and NGO-sponsored color revolutions would rock half-a-dozen countries in the post-Soviet space. Failing in some countries (Belarus and Russia), color coups would succeed in others (Georgia, Kyrgyzstan, Ukraine), culminating in regional security crises, most notably the ongoing NATO-Russia proxy war now taking place in Ukraine.
Needless to say, the National Security Archive’s document dump is not the first NATO would cheat Moscow regarding matters of national and international security, with Secretary of State James Baker getting the ball rolling in 1990 by pledging to Gorbachev that the alliance would not move “one inch east” beyond a reunified Germany. A second pledge, made in 1991, featured a joint US, UK, French and German commitment to Moscow that NATO “will not expand beyond the Elbe” or incorporate former Warsaw Pact members like Poland.
After expansion commenced in 1999 and Russia presented with a fait accompli, NATO allies continued to deceive Moscow. When the February 2014 Ukraine coup sparked a civil conflict in the Donbass, Russia, Germany, France and Ukraine negotiated the Minsk Accords – a 2015 peace deal aimed at bringing the Donbass crisis to an end – promising the breakaway territories broad autonomy in exchange for reintegration into Ukraine.
For seven years, the crisis was left a frozen state, with Kiev refusing to implement the peace deal. After Russia kicked off its military operation in 2022, every signatory to the Minsk Accords besides Russia admitted that Ukraine never planned to implement the peace agreement, and that it was just a ploy to give Kiev time to rearm its forces and prepare to resolve the Donbass issue by force.
Declassified Docs Reveal Explicit NATO Pledge Not to Meddle in Russia's Neighbourhood.
The Bloom | Retreat From Bohdanivka. The Collapse Of Netailove's Defense. Military Summary 2024.04.7
ALEXANDER MERCOURIS of THE DURAN: Rus Fighting Inside, Outflanking Chasov Yar; France Threats Rus Enter Ukr, Rus Says No; Lavrov China.
ALEX CHRISTOFOROU of THE DURAN: Medvedev, no hiding for Macron. WSJ; Macron gets tough with Putin. Elensky needs 25 Patriots.
Putin 'Wins' NATO Nation; Russia-Friendly Leader Is New President Of Slovakia.
LARRY JOHNSON (EX-CIA): Russia has Crushed Ukraine's Army and Defeated NATO.
EMIL COSMAN: German manufacturing plunges. Russian sanctions consequence? Germany's economy to collapse?
International military snowfield drills open in Russia.
Over The Next 2 Years, Ukraine May Lose Another 20% Of Its Territory. Military Summary For 2024.04.7
GARLAND NIXON: THE BEAST REAWAKENS - REICH 3.1 - EMPIRE OF IMBECILES.
LARRY JOHNSON (EX-CIA): Israel-Gaza & Ukraine.
DANNY HAIPHONG - SCOTT RITTER: IRAN PREPARES RESPONSE TO ISRAEL STRIKE | SCOTT RITTER ON THE IDF'S DESPERATION | UKRAINE IS DONE.
The Russia-Ukraine CONFLICT takes a SHARP TURN.
USA’s LATEST PAWNS against Russia.
DANIEL DAVIS: GLOBAL WAR UPDATE.
The Aussie Cossack Show with Councillor Adrian McRae.
Russia and Ukraine must talk – EU state’s leader.
The West should support Kiev, but also “think about how the conflict could end,” Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer has said.
The Ukraine conflict can only be resolved if Russia is present at the negotiating table, Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer has said.
In an interview with the French daily Le Figaro on Friday, the chancellor reiterated that the West should continue to be in “full solidarity” with Kiev and support it in its fight against Russia. However, Nehammer said “it is also important to think about how the conflict could end.”
The Austrian leader noted that when he went to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin in April 2022, several weeks into the conflict, Moscow and Kiev were still engaged in direct talks.
”This is no longer the case today, because Russia shows no desire to negotiate. But without the Russian Federation there will be no peace,” he said, adding that the situation remains difficult. “But the resumption of a dialogue, when the day comes, is a necessity,” he stressed.
Moscow and Kiev held several rounds of talks early on in the conflict, which revolved around Ukrainian neutrality. While the negotiations initially made some headway, Kiev later walked away. Moscow has claimed that the peace process was derailed by then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson, who advised Ukraine to keep fighting, which Johnson has denied.
Read more: China’s Ukraine peace proposal most ‘reasonable’ – Lavrov
Russia also maintains that it is open to new talks with Kiev. However, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky signed a decree banning all negotiations with the current leadership in Moscow after four former Ukrainian territories voted overwhelmingly in favor of joining Russia in autumn 2022.
Meanwhile, Nehammer has said he has some disagreements regarding support for Ukraine with French President Emmanuel Macron, who recently stated that he cannot rule out the possibility of putting NATO troops on the ground in the embattled country.
The chancellor noted that while he and Macron believe in the need to support Ukraine and that Moscow and Kiev should eventually engage in diplomacy, they are at odds over the way to achieve this.
”I am in favor of the precautionary principle. The French president is a supporter of the principle of deterrence,” Nehammer said, acknowledging that some elements of this approach are “convincing” given what he called Russia’s “aggressiveness.”
“However, I also think that we must apply the precautionary principle to avoid an uncontrollable escalation,” he added.
In a rare phone call earlier this week, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu warned his French counterpart, Sebastien Lecornu, that Paris would only “create problems for itself” if it decides to send troops to Ukraine.
Russia and Ukraine must talk – EU state’s leader.
ISRAEL-PALESTINE-IRAN-SYRIA-IRAQ-LEBANON-YEMEN-DPRK-TAIWAN
ABBY MARTIN: Abby Martin on Gaza, Ukraine & Working at Russia Today | Ash Sarkar meets Abby Martin.
ALEX CHRISTOFOROU & ALEXANDER MERCOURIS of THE DURAN: Biden calls Netanyahu. Biden calls Xi Jinping.
LARRY JOHNSON (EX-CIA): Israel-Gaza & Ukraine.
DANIEL DAVIS: GLOBAL WAR UPDATE.
DANNY HAIPHONG - SCOTT RITTER: IRAN PREPARES RESPONSE TO ISRAEL STRIKE | SCOTT RITTER ON THE IDF'S DESPERATION | UKRAINE IS DONE.
RICHARD MEDHURST: Gaza War Update: Latest Statistics and Figures.
Destroying al-Shifa means ripping the heart out of the health system in Gaza - WHO.
EMIL COSMAN: US military in High ALERT. World War 3 ready. US cancels Elections? If Iran smacks Israel, US obeys.
On The BRINK Of WW3?! Israel BRAZEN Attack On Iranian Consulate Sounds Alarms.
USA
KIM IVERSEN: The Deep State Has Run Amok: This CIA Whistleblower's Career Was Ruined By Government Corruption.
Americans skipping meals to cope with rising costs – poll.
A new survey has found that half of US homeowners and renters are struggling to afford their housing payments.
Half of Americans are struggling to afford their rising housing costs, and the financial squeeze is so severe for many that over one in five skip meals to get by, a new poll has revealed.
The survey, commissioned by Seattle-based real estate brokerage Redfin and released on Friday, showed that 50% of US homeowners and renters have had difficulties making their housing payments. Many respondents said they had to make sacrifices to cope with inflationary pressures. For instance, 22% reported that they had skipped meals, 21% sold some of their belongings, and a combined 37% either worked extra hours or took on additional jobs.
“Housing has become so financially burdensome in America that some families can no longer afford other essentials, including food and medical care, and have been forced to make major sacrifices, work overtime and ask others for money so they can cover their monthly costs,” said Redfin’s economic research chief, Chen Zhao.
Read more: Biden’s approval rating drops to all-time low
Home prices and rents have risen sharply in many US cities, and mortgage rates remain elevated after reaching a 23-year high last October. Redfin said the typical US household income is about $30,000 a year lower than the level needed to afford a median-priced home.
Nearly 35% of poll respondents said they were taking fewer vacations, or none at all, to keep up with their housing payments. About 18% borrowed money from friends and family or dipped into their retirement savings. For 16%, the cash crunch was so difficult that they had to delay or forgo needed medical care.
The US inflation rate rose to the highest level in more than 40 years in June 2022, prompting the Federal Reserve to boost interest rates in an attempt to tame prices. The pace of inflation has slowed since then, but price growth rose to 3.2% from a year earlier in February, higher than economists expected. The increase dimmed hopes that the US central bank will soon begin pushing interest rates lower.
READ MORE: Most US adults have given up on ‘American dream’ – poll
Many young Americans have had to give up their apartments and move back in with their parents. A Harris/Bloomberg poll last September found that 45% of 18- to 29-year-olds are living at home with their parents or other relatives, the highest level since the 1940s. Most of those had moved back home within the past two years.
READ MORE: Why Americans have little to smile about these days
AFRICA
Zimbabwe Introduces New Gold Backed Currency To Tackle Inflation.
Macron to say France and allies could have stopped Rwanda genocide in 1994.
NON-ENGLISH NEWS
ВСУ Вышли Из Богдановки | ВС РФ Рассекли Оборону ВСУ Западнее Авдеевки. Военные Сводки За 07.04.2024
UKR-Rückzug aus Bohdanivka | Katastrophale Situation in Terny. Military Summary 07.04.2024
LIU SIVAYA: BRILLANTE JUGADA DE IRÁN: ESTADOS UNIDOS SE PLIEGA ANTE EL NUEVO HEGEMÓN EN EL ORIENTE MEDIO.
MAPPING CHANNEL UPDATES
Battlefield Earth Another Step Towards World War.
The Bloom | Retreat From Bohdanivka. The Collapse Of Netailove's Defense. Military Summary 2024.04.7
Over The Next 2 Years, Ukraine May Lose Another 20% Of Its Territory. Military Summary For 2024.04.7
[ SITREP ] Russia advanced further at Berdychi and Novomykhailivka; Ukr retake west of Staromaiorske.
[ SITREP ] RUSSIAN BEAR MARCHES ON~!!! Ukraine successfully win Round 1 of Battle of Krasnohorivka.
VICTORY BELONGS TO RUSSIA: IT IS ONLY A MATTER OF TIME
Each day that passes makes a conclusive Russian victory in the Donbass and beyond more certain. As Russia bolsters her forces, and weaponry, those of Ukraine decrease. Russian forces gain ready access to rest and recuperation as troop numbers increase. The increasingly exhausted and demoralised Ukrainian troops have an ever decreasing prospect of such respite. This situation is likely to bring them to complete breakdown as Russia unleashes the firepower of the more modern and advanced weaponry that is arriving with the newly mobilised Russian troops.
The various Ukrainian offensives are now weak when confronted by the reinforced Russian lines. A few futile efforts achieve quite miserable results before fire reigns down on the Ukrainian troops and they are forced back to their starting positions.
And now, all this being said, we have arrived at the wet, and later, freezing conditions where these pathetic Ukrainian forces will be subject to myriad forms of abject misery with death and injury all around them while they lie sodden or frozen, abandoned to their fate by Kiev.
The pitiable young and old of Ukraine have been frogmarched to their deaths as cannon-fodder while the bestial elites of the collective West urge their "president" to add more to their number there at the gates of Hell and their doom. We must feel for the majority of them as they are not the Nazis we revile, in most part they are decent men, fathers, sons, brothers, husband and uncles, who no doubt saw through the coup of 2014 for what it was. But sadly, their fate seems sealed.
Nothing will stop Russia now. Every factor favours them. Victory will be Russia's. In Donbass and beyond and in due course across the world.
Victory belongs to Russia: It is now only a matter of time.
UPDATES TO BE ADDED HERE AS AND WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE OVER THE NEXT 24 HOURS.
UPDATES TO BE ADDED HERE AS AND WHEN THEY BECOME AVAILABLE OVER THE NEXT 24 HOURS.
DIPLOMACY DIED… BUT THERE ARE NO WESTERN ADULTS LEFT TO GRIEVE OVER IT
The world appears to be run by petulant children these days. The screaming taking place has become the most prevalent means of communication, and plain speaking in a calm and cogent manner appears to have become a lost art, at least among the vast majority of western politicians.
What could have caused this apparent atrophying of western political brain power? Do these kindergarten tyrants throwing their weight and toys around have any concept of how such tirades can end? The spanking that takes place will be by their constituents, those who are looking on aghast at their antics. We must hope so at least, and before the body bags start arriving in bulk.
Diplomacy used to be the primary tool with which to calm tempers within and build bridges among two opposing sides. It has been used down the ages as a logical step by those who were able to perceive the outcomes most likely to emerge if things carried on as they were. Those with a heart that was not embroiled in the emotional turmoil exhibited by those they sought to bring together, were vital. Without them no war would ever have ended. Where are such people now? They are very much notable by their absence.
You may have heard talk of a ‘Forever War’ since the events of 9/11. I believe the clue to why diplomacy has died can be found in that short phrase. This is a war without recourse to diplomacy. A war where bridges are only burned, not built between opposing sides. It’s a war the protagonists who use this phrase do not envisage ever ending. They puff out their chests before beating them as warriors ready to smite every foe and exercise zero mercy in doing so. They are not minded to forgive, forget or ever, even for the slightest moment attempt to understand the motivation of their foes. They are to killed, defeated, undermined, humiliated, eliminated, destroyed… but heaven forfend they should ever be understood.
Diplomacy died and was speedily consigned for immediate and unrecoverable cremation in the hours after 9/11. It was conceived to be an unquestionable truth by those making the decision that it was no longer required and that further, it would only be a time-wasting barrier to attaining an urgently required outcome. That outcome was the destruction of every potential enemy of the USA and its allies out there. No quarter was to be given to those savages all tarred by the same brush. If you did not accept the USA as the leader of the free world and get yourself bowed quickly down to it, you were as bad as those who acted against it on 9/11.
As I have commented upon in previous texts Vladimir Putin quickly fell into the above category. This was in Munich in February of 2007 when he addressed the devotees of the above policy and stated boldly and baldly that Russia would be doing no bowing. You will find no hatchet jobs calling him all the names that are now very familiar in press or media between the year 2000 when he became president and his speech in 2007. In that year, from February of that year he became a marked man high, if not in the highest position of the list of those targetted. It was unconscionable for those at the top of the western political tree in that conference hall to hear Putin speak of the regime change wars the USA and its allies had engaged in, in negative terms. It was clear to them then and there that he had to go.
There was to be no diplomacy after 9/11. This is one reason why Trump was so very unwelcome as U.S. president from 2016 right to the end of his term. He attempted to revive the art of diplomacy. He met with Putin who most of the rest of the world considered to be a reincarnated Hitler by that point. He met with Kim Jong Un of North Korea. Here was someone who wasn’t on the bus that all others within the political hierarchy of the USA and its allies had climbed onto with alacrity immediately after 9/11. Why was he talking with their enemies instead of using the what by then was the standard mode of address, hectoring them as malignant devils?
In regard to the Middle East currently and in Ukraine also we see the same post-9/11 ‘no diplomacy’ playbook in operation. The Israeli government is using every possible weapon against the Palestinian people of Gaza. The USA can clearly be seen avoiding any suggestion that diplomacy should play any part. Perhaps one or two statements made as a kind of self-protective theatre may be mistaken for diplomacy but in reality none is truly being advocated or engaged in. The case in Ukraine is even worse and presents an even greater potential for escalation than that in Gaza. Escalation after escalation is order of the day, pushing things harder and harder toward an ever more destructive war, doubling down toward an unachievable goal of Ukrainian “victory”. No diplomacy exists and this seems to suit most of the western powers just fine. With the exception of Hungary and Slovakia only more war seems to fit the bill.
And so we who are mere bystanders watch as the political kindergarten kids attempt to knock lumps out of each other with no teachers or social workers in sight. No school bell rings. No adult enters the fray to separate the brawling tots intent on delivering a final blow to their peers. The headmaster/headmistress resigned as it became clear the place was ungovernable. No parents arrive to scold their offspring into being better behaved. Instead these mewling, screaming, kicking, scratching minors remain in a fight to the death within the kindergarten from Hell. The art of diplomacy has well and truly died and been given a very indecent burial. And it appears there is not a single adult left in the western world to grieve over the fact.