Bulletins and News Discussion from October 14th to October 20th, 2024 - Paper Tigers
Bulletins and News Discussion from October 14th to October 20th, 2024 - Paper Tigers
Image is a frame taken from this video of Iranian missiles raining down on Israel without interception due to a weak and depleted air defense system after a year of war and genocide.
Mao, 1956:
Now U.S. imperialism is quite powerful, but in reality it isn't. It is very weak politically because it is divorced from the masses of the people and is disliked by everybody and by the American people too. In appearance it is very powerful but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of, it is a paper tiger. Outwardly a tiger, it is made of paper, unable to withstand the wind and the rain. I believe the United States is nothing but a paper tiger.
When we say U.S. imperialism is a paper tiger, we are speaking in terms of strategy. Regarding it as a whole, we must despise it. But regarding each part, we must take it seriously. It has claws and fangs. We have to destroy it piecemeal. For instance, if it has ten fangs, knock off one the first time, and there will be nine left, knock off another, and there will be eight left. When all the fangs are gone, it will still have claws. If we deal with it step by step and in earnest, we will certainly succeed in the end.
Strategically, we must utterly despise U.S. imperialism. Tactically, we must take it seriously. In struggling against it, we must take each battle, each encounter, seriously. At present, the United States is powerful, but when looked at in a broader perspective, as a whole and from a long-term viewpoint, it has no popular support, its policies are disliked by the people, because it oppresses and exploits them. For this reason, the tiger is doomed. Therefore, it is nothing to be afraid of and can be despised. But today the United States still has strength, turning out more than 100 million tons of steel a year and hitting out everywhere. That is why we must continue to wage struggles against it, fight it with all our might and wrest one position after another from it. And that takes time.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
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Incredible, even the US Congress now admits that Australia will probably not get the AUKUS submarines. And they propose an alternative that achieves the feat of being even far worse than AUKUS (which was already a terrible deal).
In a new report (which you can find here: crsreports.congress.gov/prod…) the US Congressional Research Service admits that the country's industrial base is very far from achieving the target of building 2.33 submarines per year needed to build replacement submarines for those sold to Australia: in fact the rate is currently only "1.2 to 1.4".
Given this, they actually propose to just forgo the sale of submarines entirely (!) and go for an alternative approach where the US deploys US submarines manned by the US Navy to Australia instead: "up to eight additional Virginia-class SSNs would be built, and instead of three to five of them being sold to Australia, these additional boats would instead be retained in U.S. Navy service and operated out of Australia."
But since they don't want to miss out on the Australian money meant for the subs, they conveniently propose that Australia instead spends it on other US military products: "Australia, instead of using funds to purchase, build, operate, and maintain its own SSNs, would instead invest those funds in other military capabilities—such as, for example, long-range anti-ship missiles, drones, loitering munitions, B-21 long-range bombers, or other long-range strike aircraft".
All this for the purpose of "performing military missions for both Australia and the United States".
So essentially, from Australia's standpoint, the new deal would mean:
- Zero control over the submarines operated on its territory since it'd all be manned by the U.S. Navy
- Australia still spends a similar eyewatering amount of money ($368 billion) on US military equipment that is mostly "long-range": "long-range anti-ship missiles", "B-21 long-range bombers", "long-range strike aircraft". Meaning by definition not used for the defense of Australia but undoubtedly to attack China. Which is pretty clear: China is mentioned 44 times in the document...
- This US military equipment is to be used, as per the document, to "perform military missions for both Australia and the United States" which is extremely unusual: militaries normally don't perform missions FOR another military. Allied countries might perform missions alongside each other or in support of each other, but not explicitly "for" each other.
How could Australia possibly justify such a deal to its public? AUKUS was already, according to former Australian PM Paul Keating the “worst deal in all history” because it'd "turn Australia into the 51st state of the United States", but this new proposal would strip away even the illusion of Australian sovereignty.
https://nitter.poast.org/RnaudBertrand/status/1847162340829262239
The US's insistence on Cold War 2.0 isn't just insanely stupid and insanely dangerous - it's already becoming insanely expensive and not just for the US.
Australia still spends a similar eyewatering amount of money ($368 billion) on US military equipment that... by definition [is] not used for the defense of Australia but undoubtedly to attack China. [...] AUKUS was already, according to former Australian PM Paul Keating the “worst deal in all history” because it'd "turn Australia into the 51st state of the United States", but this new proposal would strip away even the illusion of Australian sovereignty.
“How could Australia possibly justify such a deal to its public?”
Well they didn’t really even justify AUKUS to the public, just announced it one day with bipartisan support
it was a joke that brazil would get nuclear subs before australia because it was kinda true (big headstart) but now its insanely true
Workshopping here:
AUSHUCKS
AUCUCKS
Didn't haz already make canzcuck a thing
absolutely seething rn.Inb4 the frogs do absolutely nothing but submit to the US
Critical support to comrade Bait N Switch.
AUKUS is an expensive terrible deal for Australia, but it's structured so they get a very large figure across the life of program but the actual annual costs are comparatively low.
The "spending the same amount of money for other US equipment" is completely silly because only the initial $9 billion is budgeted for, and the actual costs will far exceed the large figure anyway (of course they're banking on that misunderstanding to justify the commitment)