This year really is just gonna be us swinging from election to election, I suppose. I feel Lenin's beaming red eyes on me.
Up next on our electoral tour is Portugal. The current government - a coalition of the center-left Socialists and the center-right Social Democrats - has been mired in corruption scandals, resulting in a general election being called a mere two years after the last one. The fascist and vaguely populist Chega party has gained significant support over the last two years due to the economic hardships. Yesterday, the Social Democrats secured a narrow win of 79 seats compared to the Socialists' 77. Chega, in third place at 48, would appear to be the best candidate for a coalition, though the leader of the Social Democrats has said that they would refuse a coalition with them due to their xenophobic views. Regardless, the fascist surge is worrying, if expected.
Portugal's economy is going pretty badly even as European countries go, with little growth in productivity or investment over the last decade. The origins of this crisis date back to Portugal making the euro their national currency in the early 2000s, thus surrendering their ability to control their own currency, becoming reliant on investment from Germany and France, and suffering greatly in the 2012 European debt crisis. Unemployment and low wages spurred emigration; in 2013, the youth employment rate was about 40%; this has only come down to 25% recently and is increasing again. The government is heavily reliant on debt for public spending, with a debt-to-GDP ratio skyrocketing to over 100% in the two decades since the turn of the millennium. The capitalist sector is simply not profitable enough and hasn't been for 40 years, which is only a problem if you are a capitalist economy. For more on the Portuguese economy, check out Michael Roberts' recent analysis, from which I obtained a lot of this information.
Inside Portugal is the same story playing out across much of Europe. A failing center or center-left political party, unable to cope with the economic troubles of the last few years due to absolute obedience to neoliberal policies. A fascist party rising, but with no alternative economic plan, hoping that perhaps oppressing minorities and going after "wokeism" will make their God, The Economy, rain blessings down on them again.
The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.
The Country of the Week is Portugal! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.
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 daily-ish 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 (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
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.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
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.
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.
I'm sorry if it was posted last week but even in the western MSM they manage to prove literaly every pro-Russian armchair bullshiter on YT correct. But this is some amazing footage honestly. I think its easy to overlook given the actual BS article and the source as usual but watch the video instead.
UP FOR THE CHALLENGE I joined Ukrainian soldiers in Brit-made Challenger 2 tanks that blast Russian invaders from up to 4.5km away Skip to the section starting at 5:00.
I remember all these YTers were saying the western tanks are too heavy they wont work on the east due to the terrain and the bridges and dipshit UK tabloid proving everyone correct, in a training exercise.
They could have edited the footage, they could have made some excuse, but no actualy they end up with some barely useful reporting ngl, they talk about how the Ukrainians themselves admit its too heavy, underpowered and just keeps getting stuck.
The end result is just pathetic, almost a cartoon drawing, the tank ends up 1/4 or so buried and the crew decides the "best" use of their time is to waste the MG turret ammo practicing and then end up being rescued by another Challenger. I could say more about that "practice" too seems more like just something for troop morale, "here guys lets do something to pretend this isn't the most useless and embarrassing use of our time ever".
Key takeaway? The best use of a Challenger is to tow another Challenger when it eventually gets stuck in the mud.
Shooting live rounds with an AK over my buddies in a trench with one hand. "Training"
Oops I slipped
Anyone know where this eagle patch comes from?
glory to arstotzka
82nd brigade Facebook link
Thanks!
Right?? Are those training rounds or the real deal?
Those are real you can see the puff of dirt on the other side of the trench. Training rounds like blanks use a special adapter usually which that ak doesn’t have on.
Specifically, blanks don't produce as much recoil force and the gun relies on that force to cycle and load the next round. The adapter re-directs some of the gas allowing the blank to produce enough force to cycle the gun. Without a blank firing adapter blanks will often fail to cycle a semi-automatic of automatic weapon.
Man wtf is that optic set up? Never seen some stupid shit like that before lmfao
Kind of looks like a bulky night vision sight. I don't think it's necessarily in the wrong place.
Yeah could be a thermal or something like that too. Mainly it’s dumb because he’s tolerance stacking 3-4 different mounts and his optic is sitting probably 4-5 inches above the barrel.
Fair, fair. That height over bore, I hope he's not shooting at anything within a few hundred meters!
I can see how something like this can be done for “advanced” training by the most “elite forces,” but the fact that the guy is shooting a machine gun with one hand over his comrades is fucking insane. This is nothing but a bunch of pissed off, useless soldiers who have given up without admitting it.
That or they’re just trying to get out the service
How long was that tank stuck for?
Long enough for a drone operator to ruin its day if that ever happened in the field I think.
ukraine army would probably be better off with dodge challengers
NATO can't save them but the mighty Toyato Hilux might. If the Hilux didn't hate Fascists and instinctively break down when a Fascist gets behind the wheel
Shit do we not have a :hilux: emoji?
Sorry but the US only reserves those for the strongest of patriots
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
But everyone told me that mobility wasn't a big problem and you don't actually need tanks that can cross bridges and the T-72 is obsolete because it's so small with so little armor!
Given how effective modern anti-tank weapons are the video game concept of "break points" comes in. It doesn't matter if you have 100pts of armor or 0 pts of armor if every weapon on the field can pen 200pts of armor. All the armor and no armor have exactly the same amount of protection, so you might as well ditch the weight. I'm starting to get what armies are focusing on mobile gun systems and related concepts.