Iran's recently been causing some hubbub in South America. Back in early February, Panama allowed Iranian naval ships to sail through the Panama Canal so long as they abided by international norms, an act which has angered the United States. And more recently, Iranian warships were allowed to dock in Brazil - despite pressure on Lula from both Israel and the United States - with Ted Cruz making some rather lackluster threats.


Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.

Here is the archive of important pieces of analysis from throughout the war that we've collected.

March 6th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.

March 7th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.

March 8th's update is here on the site and here in the comments.

March 10th's update is here in the comments.

I'm gonna be researching and writing up an effortpost on rare earth elements and how China owned the West in that field over the weekend so no update on Saturday.

I'd also like to bring to your attention another effortpost I've put on the site, by @ComradeRat, in response to a question about early Marxist thinkers and terminology, like "historical materialism" and "scientific socialism", and who exactly invented these terms and were they misused by others later on, etc.

Links and Stuff

American anti-war rally on March 18th by left groups!

Want to contribute?

RSS Feed

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists

Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict

Add to the above list if you can, thank you.


Resources For Understanding The War Beyond The Bulletins


Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. I recommend their map more than the channel at this point, as an increasing subscriber count has greatly diminished their quality.

Moon of Alabama, which tends to have decent analysis. Avoid the comment section.

Understanding War and the Saker: neo-conservative sources but their reporting of the war (so far) seems to line up with reality better than most liberal sources. Beware of chuddery.

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 journalist reporting in the warzone.

Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.


Telegram Channels

Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.

Pro-Russian

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 still quite reactionary in terms of gender and sexuality and race, so beware). 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 ~ Another 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's army.

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

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.


Last week's discussion post.


  • Kieselguhr [none/use name]
    ·
    edit-2
    2 years ago

    So every lib and their mother criticised Seymour Hersh for using anonymous sources claiming (in detail) that the US blew up the Nord Stream pipelines.

    Coincidentally just a couple of weeks later NYT comes out with an article citing anonymous US intelligence sources (trust me bro), that it was actually pro-ukrainian quasi-amateurs did it. No details or followups or anything. This supposed to be the preeminent newspaper on the planet.

    Did I get this right?

    So it definitely wasn't Russia, as every reasonable person already knew, and now they want to feed us that some random pro-ukrainians did it without US intelligence involvement?! :doubt:

    If we lived in a normal timeline this would be on the frontpage of every newspaper in Europe. But then again in a normal timeline none of this would have happened.

    European politicians are jumping to no conclusions regarding new allegations of Ukrainian involvement in pipeline sabotage.

    A senior EU diplomat also warned "against the danger of falling into the trap of Russian narratives."

    :joker-shopping:

      • Shoegazer [he/him]
        ·
        2 years ago

        The only explanation is that the Russians did it. But they're stupid, so they probably dropped a grenade and it accidentally blew up! :soypoint-1:

    • nat_turner_overdrive [he/him]
      ·
      2 years ago

      If I were a liberal EU politician and I believed this story I would be asking hard questions about how bad Norway is at protecting their national waters if some upstart Ukrainian volunteers can get in, bomb critical German infrastructure, and get out, without Norway knowing anything about it for half a year until sources in the US told them.

      If that's not going on it's definitely because they all know this is bullshit.

    • MolotovHalfEmpty [he/him]
      ·
      edit-2
      2 years ago

      At least in Germany, the politicians pushing that pro-US line have made their beds and fully bought so that's not the issue. It definitely opens a lot of space for others to attack them (mostly from the right given how shit a lot of the left parties have been on this / how infiltrated they are) and gain ground though.

      I think the real difference is that everyone I know in Germany is fucking pissed since the Hersh stuff came out. It's actually gotten some serious play there and most people know it makes sense, they just weren't ready to be the only people suggesting it. I'm not claiming that the people I know are representative of Germany obviously, but it is literally everyone I know including the ones that are hopeless libs who were very pro-NATO.

      I'd be curious to hear any German comrade's takes to see if it tracks with them too.

      • eddies [he/him]
        ·
        edit-2
        2 years ago

        with the earthquakes and how bad it makes everyone look it hasnt gotten much play yet. might change with this new vbersoin of the story and how ludicrous it is but dont hold your breath.

        we are married to the US now, so there wont be any significant transatlantic changes, but it will be interesting if this will be the exit ramp for further unconditional support of ukraine.

        it's not like they cared what 'the people' want before so why would they start now. economic programs to soften the energy crisis are in effect now and that seems to have been sufficient to keep the peace so to speak.

        • SeventyTwoTrillion [he/him]
          hexagon
          ·
          edit-2
          2 years ago

          but it will be interesting if this will be the exit ramp for further unconditional support of ukraine.

          Funny you should say that; I've heard it said that Macron and Scholz are considering giving Ukraine an ultimatum in the autumn that they won't continue supplying weaponry unless serious efforts are made towards negotiations. Not sure if it's actually gonna happen though.

          Of course, with all the articles we've been getting about German generals saying that the German army is now so depleted that it wouldn't last a week in a conflict, one wonders if that's just the face-saving excuse.

          Does also make one wonder if Scholz's visit to Biden was related to that. But I also don't think Scholz has or will ever have the backbone to defy his hawkish politicians like Baerbock, let alone the United States.

          • eddies [he/him]
            ·
            edit-2
            2 years ago

            https://www.german-foreign-policy.com/news/detail/9182

            not sure about the site but checks out superficially

            bitching about how bad the german military is has long tradition, more funds pls uwu

            on scholzes backbone, he has none of course but his job is to perserve the german economy and as such he will do what his superiours from across the pond tell him. same goes for the greens and everyone in any german government for that matter.

          • Shoegazer [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Of course, with all the articles we’ve been getting about German generals saying that the German army is now so depleted that it wouldn’t last a week in a conflict, one wonders if that’s just the face-saving excuse.

            There's not a single chance that any of these countries would sacrifice their own defense capabilities for Ukraine lol. If they truly believe that Russia is a threat and doubt Ukrain will win, they would be bolstering their own defenses instead of throwing a hail mary. But it seems like the europeans really love exporting their defense to the US, so maybe there's a kernel of truth to this.

          • eddies [he/him]
            ·
            2 years ago

            Mercouris picked up on the same thing. maybe the US really wants this to be over until the runup to the election. curious.

      • Alaskaball [comrade/them]MA
        ·
        2 years ago

        Well if you look to see what our resident neoliberal sandbagger in denial, it's a whole nothingburger from Hersh and the voices in his head and we should take the US "independent" media with their state provided talking points at 100% face value.

        • ItsPequod [he/him]
          ·
          2 years ago

          Funny how they only seem to turn up once in a while, mostly when the Russians are on the backfoot