I know the Rambo title card is a hoax.
The COTW was chosen in the wake of the aborted sequel to the attempted assassination of Trump being performed by a guy who is VERY enthusiastic about Ukraine, to the point of trying to sneak Afghan soldiers into Ukraine by setting up a house in Pakistan to house them and then further transport them. He also apparently offered to send thousands of Afghan soldiers to Haiti to help them combat gang violence. Whomst among us doesn't have the numbers of thousands of Afghan soldiers on speed-dial. Do you reckon there's a group chat?
Anyway, while there is still no official recognition of the Taliban's government by any country, China has taken a different course than the late USSR and the US - forming economic in-roads, rather than trying their own invasion. This has been a big boon for the struggling country, with various mines and oil and agriculture deals helping keep things barely afloat. A total disintegration of the social fabric of Afghanistan is not in the interest of any of the powers that border it - China, Pakistan, and Iran, with Russia not too far away - so an interesting dynamic of helping-without-official-recognition has been established. I wonder who will be the first country to fully recognize them?
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 Afghanistan! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Please check out the HexAtlas!
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 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.
the normalization of gun violence in the US is crazy. 14 year olds with AR-15s shooting up their schools. Presidential candidates dodging bullets every few weeks.
And it’s all so dang normal now that they will barely last a news cycle.
It's weird to imagine that there were people who were once shocked at the Challenger Explosion, or cried at JFK's assassination. If anything, Trump dodging a bullet a month provides reassurance: even the orange cheeto himself gets to partake.
This new assassination is going to stick more than the last among the chuds, because the assassin is a Kamala voting NAFO never Trump Republican obsessed with Ukraine defeating Putler. He’s a walking stereotype and a lot easier to villify
Yeah the previous assassin was hard to really vilify. He was a shut in gen Z kid with no online footprint, that tried to headshot the former president while wearing a gun YouTuber's merchandise. An absurd situation, but a hard character for conservative media to make a narrative about. Also he died during the shooting.
The second assassin as you said is a walking stereotype, with a worldview brainwashed by the US liberal media, that wrote a near 300 page book about the war in Ukraine, assassinating world leaders and nuking Russia. Who spent his free time trying to recruit soldiers for the Ukrainian foreign legion and even went to Ukraine. He also survived and had a large online footprint. He's a character that's super easy for conservative media to write stories about, and every court appearance presents a new opportunity to do so.
The conspiracy types will definitely find some angle on this as well.
Not hard to see the angle, this guy reeks of CIA groomed assassin
Thought he was a Haley supporter. Some of them actually went to Kamala? I figured they all just went back to Trump after she dropped out because they tend not to have actual principles lol
I believe he’s of that never trump neoconservative centrist flavor. He’s a lifelong warmonger Republican who got disillusioned by Trump not starting a war with Russia, heavily buying into the Russiagate Cold War narratives.
He wanted Vivek / Haley in the GOP primary (anyone other than Trump). When that failed he supports Harris. He also supported Biden in 2020.
Honestly this guy reeks like deep state, or he’s LARPing being CIA because he’s so brainwashed. A random ass roofer from North Carolina tries to become a recruiter of afghan mercenaries for Ukrainian foreign legion? Appears in Azov commercials and in Maidan? Loves wars and wants more? Writes a book, gets TV interviews with multiple channels & gets interviews with congress people in DC?
Comrade it feels like you're prematurely dismissing the astronomical level of political brain worms the typical American has going on. And I would agree this guy is at an above average level too
i think he is the 'average american'
incoherent, brain cooked in the sun, manipulated by media and 3 letter agencies, steered at acceptable enemies and weapon crimes overlooked
Haley
Harris
It's always been this way. People just forgot. In the 60s and 70s it was bombs, and the lynchings go all the way back.
At any rate, this is America at it's lowest ebb of violence possibly since it was created.