Its members’ pledge of €140 billion divided between the rest of this year and the next disincentivizes Russia to cease hostilities even once it obtains full control of Donbass since it now knows for certain that NATO will exploit the lull in fighting to rearm Ukraine before Kiev resumes hostilities.
Great analytical insight. The Trump Administration should sign up for a subscription to your substack. You have more logic than a cast of thousands running the American government.
The Trump administration and Andrew operate in entirely different moral spheres. If Trump must kill half the people on the planet to maintain his power, then he will do it without a second thought, as long as he personally does not suffer
All Ukrainians should be very upset with the west after this war ends.
The world should be upset after the true losses come out.
Well, all except the military industries and politicians.
The politicians and their media's next strategy at war's end - Continue to call everything Russian Disinformation and then to just forget the whole thing.
There was great anticipation for a step up and possible proactive action from the Kremlin recently but it appears there is more juice to be squeezed from the secret Ankara agreement and it seems the Kremlin still places hope of a positive agreement from a perpetual forever stated enemy, plus VVP continues to respond in a mirror like fashion of responses to the upgraded attacks against Russia and her trade activities world wide.
How long can VVP turn a blind eye to a death by a thousand cuts in a false hope I believe of an agreement with the treacherous US and Europe.
If so minions of who the imperialists or the oligarchs in Russia or the corporations of the west, but is that not then the same thing as you were suggesting they aren't, the Russian populace experience the same result whichever nomenclature is attached.
The world could find itself with a situation analogous to the one in Korea, where there has been a shaky armistice for three quarters of a century. Will Ukraine acquire nuclear weapons? One way or another, the arms manufacturers will grow even more wealthy and powerful…
Russia doesn't want its own geosynchronous satellites attacked. It will also impair Russian ISR in general, because any low-orbit attack on a satellite (where Starlink is) will cause a wide dispersion of the debris field. That will hurt Russia more than anyone, because that debris field will overlap sites used for Russian rocket launches (space program, higher-orbit spy satellites, ICBMs and some hypersonic missiles). Even small pieces of debris will destroy a rocket at 11,000 km/h - 7,000 mph (the speed a rocket is traveling by the time it hits geosynchronous orbit).
I'm not sure that using an EMP to fry Starlink's electronics would create more of a hazard than their satellites's inevitable eventual decent, but you make a good point about the risk to Russian satellites. Perhaps if the pulse could be directed...
Meanwhile, here's a quote for you, do take to heart while looking on other aspects of the warring insanity:
.....................
Even the first small fleet of 28 military satellites, launched into orbit in 1968, ushered in a worldwide pandemic of influenza. The direct radiation is only part of the problem. Satellites have a profound effect [...] because they are already in the earth's magnetosphere. Unlike radiation from earthly towers [...] greatly attenuated by the time it reaches outer space, radiation from satellites works its full force on the magnetosphere, and is demodulated and amplified there by mechanisms that are poorly understood.
The other reason the engineering perspective fails [believing life is unaffected due to distancing] is more fundamental: it perpetuates the error that our ancestors made in 1800, the terrible decision to treat electricity as a foreign element, a strange beast that operates outside the laws of nature. We acknowledge the existence of electricity only to the extent that it does work for us; otherwise we pretend it is not there. We ignored the warning, issued in 1748 by Jean Morin, that harnessing electricity is tampering with life. We pretend, contrary to all scientific evidence, that there is a safe level of exposure, and that if the authorities only set the safety standards low enough, we can have our radar stations and computer screens and cell phones and not suffer the consequences. We forget the admonitions of Ross Adey, the grandfather of bioelectromagnetics and of atmosphere scientist Neil Cherry, that we are electrically tuned to the world around us and that the safe level of exposure to radiowaves is zero.
- the late A Firstenberg, Invisible Rainbow, 2016, which by now is said to have sold incl I think in translation >100K copies
I like the work of Arthur Firstenberg, and was aware of the flu-like symptoms which accompanied the growth in satellite numbers. I myself suffer from electro-sensitivity, and have had to switch our power off at the master switch when I am particularly sensitive. I have installed a Faraday cage canopy around my bed, and this seems to help...
Amazingly, in some cases, some functional adapatability ensues. Arthur F for instance wrote importantly about the 1st recorded instance of CCD - coinciding with the 1st major radio transmissions starting on the Isle of Wight, England, way back when with Marconi, I think. Eventually bees tho' were able to put up with it. I suspect in such cases diminished if functional.
(I just brought this kind of thing up with a local beekeeper I get hive products from (esp propolis, pollen), and still in discussion among his colleagues about huge %s winter bee losses, almost no one attributes to other than things like proximate cause, eg mites, and their apparent own adaptability to enable withstanding miticide treatments, he mentioned a recent study of hive loss playing into apparently only the theory of area chemical effects on bees, study showing that hives way out in the woods suffered less, but of course the study was not controlled for e-exposures...; ditto eg with bat disappearances - incl where we live, altho' we did witness a comeback of sorts after some years for a few yr seeing one pair at least regularly, but which this yr so far have not been in evidence following govt-subsidized insane deployment of 4 new cell towers rather nearby... - where the proximate blamable is a fungus but which has always been around, what hasn't has been loss of their food, ie it's concomitant with airborne insect disappearances..and on and on... and there are studies on bees and other insects demonstrating harm, i could cite a few).
But i consider such "adaptation" at least among humans a variety of amputation, sometimes of faculties unsuspected of even existing. (See again Arthur on tinnitus.)
But I think it is good to shun the prevalent term 'electro(hyper)sensitivity', since all biology is electrical and what would not "sense" e-perversity? That term also can evoke at least in English a sense of pitiability, weakness, when one's body is only acting as it should, probably after greater ("safe") exposures over time than most, maybe coupled with less robust defences (which who knows may also be attributable in the last century-plus to e-disturbance in turn!).
Rather, if a related tag must be used, I say albeit with acknowledgement of the prevalent term, "electroreactive". Since Russian affairs are a primary focus on this 'stack, it is not misplaced to mention that Russian researchers have long seen the e-pollution situation & standards quite differently from Western ones. Public exposure standards are lower, if still unprotective, and i suspect of minimal enforcement. I was in touch once with a Russian Academy scientist asking about an old '70s study on microwave-induced tinnitus, and mentioned to him how the Russian approach to sci seemed refreshingly more independent than Western in this field, whereupon he said that it only used to be so...In Russia the old term (from US mid-19th c. Dr Beard, 'neurasthenia') might still be in use.
Btw our dwelling, around 2009 in Toronto, once a near enough set of antennae went up, and again where we live now which we retired to in part for once being a kind of refuge, both are shielded with insect screen, bringing perverse e-penetration way down to tolerable levels. Apart from AF's important volume, there is quite a vast lit out there I can recommend classic sources and more recent if of interest.
I would tend to disagree: NATO is committed to spend money for Ukraine during two years, and to invest on arms on an undetermined period « to maintain combat dominance ».
But there is no such NATO dominance at all for the Time. NATO is lagging behind on more or less all domains. To develop and produce superior arms would take 10-15 years. Not to mention the lack of rare earths and tungstene. And the lack of finance, whatever the 5% of budget target. And the déficience of manufacturing for scale production. And the many élections which Will take place.
More importantly, European countries armed forces are lilliputian. Again, it would take 5 -10 years to increase quantity and quality of armed forces to required level ! Look : Germany contacted 150 000 Young citizens to become member of armed réserves, only 950 agreed in 6 months, so a draft law would have to votes next year, and would contribute to the defeat of any party supporting it at next élection!
The shield wall—always that old, quintessentially Western shield wall. Invented in Pericles' time with the phalanx, so that Greek peasants could fight against Persian professionals who were individually far better and more numerous. Revolutionized by the Romans with the maniple, which dominated the West for five centuries, adopted by the Saxons and Scandinavians, then brought up to date by the Swiss, the Germans, and the Spanish in the 16th century. Brought to the genius of the line by the Dutch and the Swedes. This shield-wall mentality, embedded in Western DNA, is its primary strength. Victory and honor go to the one who holds his place in it, even at the cost of sacrifice. Shame and disaster to the one who breaks it through cowardice, selfishness, or corruption. For 2,600 years, any member of the wall can cut the throat of his neighbor if he so much as seems to waver or starts looting before the signal. The Western wall has held and still holds. At the cost of unimaginable sacrifices. The BRICS wall has crumbled like a watered-down custard, undone by selfishness, corruption, and pettiness. So, having absorbed the shock, the Western wall begins to advance. Russia has not failed. Valiant, it remains alone on the field after the Chinese, Indians, and Brazilians fled like big, cowardly, selfish, and greedy turkeys. Honor to Russia—it remains standing alone. And Iran. To the impossible, no one is bound. China and India are the main ones responsible for what risks turning into a disaster. May they pay the price.
Your conclusion may well be right but I am not sure the present Western shield wall you mention has anything to do with a continuous 2,600years of bloc mentality.
The evil forces controlling the anglo-zionist empire of today are a specific power structure. Russia will soon have to realise that it will be destroyed if it doesn't destroy these evil forces first.
Yes, the wall is neither an end in itself nor the origin of evil. It is merely a means, a tool, a weapon. But it is the invention and the very hallmark of the Western mentality. It can serve any purpose, ideology, or madness—federated peoples seeking to preserve their sovereignty, democracies, monarchies, empires, religions, megalomaniacal delusions, the most bestial greed. The wall is not a political system; it is a tactical device. Today, it serves a satanic perversion. Yesterday, it served greedy colonial rot. No one claims it was ever virtuous. On the contrary, its effectiveness enabled it to conquer the world. And given what is happening, it is quite possible that it will continue to dominate. Not because it is the strongest. But because its adversaries are still in the mindset of the horde."
If we learned nothing else during the GFC, we learned that the rulers of the West will do whatever it takes when there is something they want, and Russian dithering, indecision and incompetence have convinced them that they can end Russia once and for all.
The most funny is that Ritter himself, in may 2022 predicted exactly what is happening now. I remember that article very well. Because of that article, he was crucified by all the AMC.
You’re last paragraph is probably accurate except the part about Russia preparing for an endless war. Current events on the ground suggest otherwise. Zelensky purging his defense leadership again, speaking behind bullet proof glass, while thousands march in protest in the streets of Kyiv. Ukraine admittedly is running out of air defense systems while Russia is relentlessly bombing its key ports, weapons production warehouses and facilities, energy plants, rail hubs, grain vessels in the Sea of Azov and gas stations. Russia is closing in on complete control of the Donbas. As Putin and Lavrov stated, the days of negotiations are over. Time to win on the battlefield.
The persistently applied insanity of Ursula and the unmitigated genius of Kaja Kallas and their hidden supervisors carried the day. May ALL with an ounce of sanity left in their minds revolt against this situation in Europe. If you wish you can call me ‘misogynistic’ but I still believe these two clowns should be chained to the dishwashers in their kitchens.
Great analytical insight. The Trump Administration should sign up for a subscription to your substack. You have more logic than a cast of thousands running the American government.
The Trump administration and Andrew operate in entirely different moral spheres. If Trump must kill half the people on the planet to maintain his power, then he will do it without a second thought, as long as he personally does not suffer
Thank you!
Great report.
All Ukrainians should be very upset with the west after this war ends.
The world should be upset after the true losses come out.
Well, all except the military industries and politicians.
The politicians and their media's next strategy at war's end - Continue to call everything Russian Disinformation and then to just forget the whole thing.
Most will forget...
Humans are herd animals.
There was great anticipation for a step up and possible proactive action from the Kremlin recently but it appears there is more juice to be squeezed from the secret Ankara agreement and it seems the Kremlin still places hope of a positive agreement from a perpetual forever stated enemy, plus VVP continues to respond in a mirror like fashion of responses to the upgraded attacks against Russia and her trade activities world wide.
How long can VVP turn a blind eye to a death by a thousand cuts in a false hope I believe of an agreement with the treacherous US and Europe.
They are not traitors, they are minions
If so minions of who the imperialists or the oligarchs in Russia or the corporations of the west, but is that not then the same thing as you were suggesting they aren't, the Russian populace experience the same result whichever nomenclature is attached.
Alas
I wholeheartedly concur Darras, sadly.
The world could find itself with a situation analogous to the one in Korea, where there has been a shaky armistice for three quarters of a century. Will Ukraine acquire nuclear weapons? One way or another, the arms manufacturers will grow even more wealthy and powerful…
Da kann ich als Westdeutscher nur hoffen, dass Russland uns von der NATO befreit!
I still wonder why Russia hasn't fried Starlinnk...
Russia doesn't want its own geosynchronous satellites attacked. It will also impair Russian ISR in general, because any low-orbit attack on a satellite (where Starlink is) will cause a wide dispersion of the debris field. That will hurt Russia more than anyone, because that debris field will overlap sites used for Russian rocket launches (space program, higher-orbit spy satellites, ICBMs and some hypersonic missiles). Even small pieces of debris will destroy a rocket at 11,000 km/h - 7,000 mph (the speed a rocket is traveling by the time it hits geosynchronous orbit).
I'm not sure that using an EMP to fry Starlink's electronics would create more of a hazard than their satellites's inevitable eventual decent, but you make a good point about the risk to Russian satellites. Perhaps if the pulse could be directed...
Glonass, it's 30 satellites. Starlink, it's 10000....
Russia, it's 3-400 satellites. NATO, it's 12000
Meanwhile, here's a quote for you, do take to heart while looking on other aspects of the warring insanity:
.....................
Even the first small fleet of 28 military satellites, launched into orbit in 1968, ushered in a worldwide pandemic of influenza. The direct radiation is only part of the problem. Satellites have a profound effect [...] because they are already in the earth's magnetosphere. Unlike radiation from earthly towers [...] greatly attenuated by the time it reaches outer space, radiation from satellites works its full force on the magnetosphere, and is demodulated and amplified there by mechanisms that are poorly understood.
The other reason the engineering perspective fails [believing life is unaffected due to distancing] is more fundamental: it perpetuates the error that our ancestors made in 1800, the terrible decision to treat electricity as a foreign element, a strange beast that operates outside the laws of nature. We acknowledge the existence of electricity only to the extent that it does work for us; otherwise we pretend it is not there. We ignored the warning, issued in 1748 by Jean Morin, that harnessing electricity is tampering with life. We pretend, contrary to all scientific evidence, that there is a safe level of exposure, and that if the authorities only set the safety standards low enough, we can have our radar stations and computer screens and cell phones and not suffer the consequences. We forget the admonitions of Ross Adey, the grandfather of bioelectromagnetics and of atmosphere scientist Neil Cherry, that we are electrically tuned to the world around us and that the safe level of exposure to radiowaves is zero.
- the late A Firstenberg, Invisible Rainbow, 2016, which by now is said to have sold incl I think in translation >100K copies
....................
I like the work of Arthur Firstenberg, and was aware of the flu-like symptoms which accompanied the growth in satellite numbers. I myself suffer from electro-sensitivity, and have had to switch our power off at the master switch when I am particularly sensitive. I have installed a Faraday cage canopy around my bed, and this seems to help...
Well, all such emitters are suspect.
Amazingly, in some cases, some functional adapatability ensues. Arthur F for instance wrote importantly about the 1st recorded instance of CCD - coinciding with the 1st major radio transmissions starting on the Isle of Wight, England, way back when with Marconi, I think. Eventually bees tho' were able to put up with it. I suspect in such cases diminished if functional.
(I just brought this kind of thing up with a local beekeeper I get hive products from (esp propolis, pollen), and still in discussion among his colleagues about huge %s winter bee losses, almost no one attributes to other than things like proximate cause, eg mites, and their apparent own adaptability to enable withstanding miticide treatments, he mentioned a recent study of hive loss playing into apparently only the theory of area chemical effects on bees, study showing that hives way out in the woods suffered less, but of course the study was not controlled for e-exposures...; ditto eg with bat disappearances - incl where we live, altho' we did witness a comeback of sorts after some years for a few yr seeing one pair at least regularly, but which this yr so far have not been in evidence following govt-subsidized insane deployment of 4 new cell towers rather nearby... - where the proximate blamable is a fungus but which has always been around, what hasn't has been loss of their food, ie it's concomitant with airborne insect disappearances..and on and on... and there are studies on bees and other insects demonstrating harm, i could cite a few).
But i consider such "adaptation" at least among humans a variety of amputation, sometimes of faculties unsuspected of even existing. (See again Arthur on tinnitus.)
But I think it is good to shun the prevalent term 'electro(hyper)sensitivity', since all biology is electrical and what would not "sense" e-perversity? That term also can evoke at least in English a sense of pitiability, weakness, when one's body is only acting as it should, probably after greater ("safe") exposures over time than most, maybe coupled with less robust defences (which who knows may also be attributable in the last century-plus to e-disturbance in turn!).
Rather, if a related tag must be used, I say albeit with acknowledgement of the prevalent term, "electroreactive". Since Russian affairs are a primary focus on this 'stack, it is not misplaced to mention that Russian researchers have long seen the e-pollution situation & standards quite differently from Western ones. Public exposure standards are lower, if still unprotective, and i suspect of minimal enforcement. I was in touch once with a Russian Academy scientist asking about an old '70s study on microwave-induced tinnitus, and mentioned to him how the Russian approach to sci seemed refreshingly more independent than Western in this field, whereupon he said that it only used to be so...In Russia the old term (from US mid-19th c. Dr Beard, 'neurasthenia') might still be in use.
Btw our dwelling, around 2009 in Toronto, once a near enough set of antennae went up, and again where we live now which we retired to in part for once being a kind of refuge, both are shielded with insect screen, bringing perverse e-penetration way down to tolerable levels. Apart from AF's important volume, there is quite a vast lit out there I can recommend classic sources and more recent if of interest.
I would tend to disagree: NATO is committed to spend money for Ukraine during two years, and to invest on arms on an undetermined period « to maintain combat dominance ».
But there is no such NATO dominance at all for the Time. NATO is lagging behind on more or less all domains. To develop and produce superior arms would take 10-15 years. Not to mention the lack of rare earths and tungstene. And the lack of finance, whatever the 5% of budget target. And the déficience of manufacturing for scale production. And the many élections which Will take place.
More importantly, European countries armed forces are lilliputian. Again, it would take 5 -10 years to increase quantity and quality of armed forces to required level ! Look : Germany contacted 150 000 Young citizens to become member of armed réserves, only 950 agreed in 6 months, so a draft law would have to votes next year, and would contribute to the defeat of any party supporting it at next élection!
The shield wall—always that old, quintessentially Western shield wall. Invented in Pericles' time with the phalanx, so that Greek peasants could fight against Persian professionals who were individually far better and more numerous. Revolutionized by the Romans with the maniple, which dominated the West for five centuries, adopted by the Saxons and Scandinavians, then brought up to date by the Swiss, the Germans, and the Spanish in the 16th century. Brought to the genius of the line by the Dutch and the Swedes. This shield-wall mentality, embedded in Western DNA, is its primary strength. Victory and honor go to the one who holds his place in it, even at the cost of sacrifice. Shame and disaster to the one who breaks it through cowardice, selfishness, or corruption. For 2,600 years, any member of the wall can cut the throat of his neighbor if he so much as seems to waver or starts looting before the signal. The Western wall has held and still holds. At the cost of unimaginable sacrifices. The BRICS wall has crumbled like a watered-down custard, undone by selfishness, corruption, and pettiness. So, having absorbed the shock, the Western wall begins to advance. Russia has not failed. Valiant, it remains alone on the field after the Chinese, Indians, and Brazilians fled like big, cowardly, selfish, and greedy turkeys. Honor to Russia—it remains standing alone. And Iran. To the impossible, no one is bound. China and India are the main ones responsible for what risks turning into a disaster. May they pay the price.
Your conclusion may well be right but I am not sure the present Western shield wall you mention has anything to do with a continuous 2,600years of bloc mentality.
The evil forces controlling the anglo-zionist empire of today are a specific power structure. Russia will soon have to realise that it will be destroyed if it doesn't destroy these evil forces first.
Yes, the wall is neither an end in itself nor the origin of evil. It is merely a means, a tool, a weapon. But it is the invention and the very hallmark of the Western mentality. It can serve any purpose, ideology, or madness—federated peoples seeking to preserve their sovereignty, democracies, monarchies, empires, religions, megalomaniacal delusions, the most bestial greed. The wall is not a political system; it is a tactical device. Today, it serves a satanic perversion. Yesterday, it served greedy colonial rot. No one claims it was ever virtuous. On the contrary, its effectiveness enabled it to conquer the world. And given what is happening, it is quite possible that it will continue to dominate. Not because it is the strongest. But because its adversaries are still in the mindset of the horde."
The result of Russian dithering and indecision.
If we learned nothing else during the GFC, we learned that the rulers of the West will do whatever it takes when there is something they want, and Russian dithering, indecision and incompetence have convinced them that they can end Russia once and for all.
Ritter lives in a fantasy world.
The most funny is that Ritter himself, in may 2022 predicted exactly what is happening now. I remember that article very well. Because of that article, he was crucified by all the AMC.
You’re last paragraph is probably accurate except the part about Russia preparing for an endless war. Current events on the ground suggest otherwise. Zelensky purging his defense leadership again, speaking behind bullet proof glass, while thousands march in protest in the streets of Kyiv. Ukraine admittedly is running out of air defense systems while Russia is relentlessly bombing its key ports, weapons production warehouses and facilities, energy plants, rail hubs, grain vessels in the Sea of Azov and gas stations. Russia is closing in on complete control of the Donbas. As Putin and Lavrov stated, the days of negotiations are over. Time to win on the battlefield.
Amen
NATO is western EUROPE & the USA. There are much bigger rganisations, BRICKS . NATO & USA, there is a much bigger world.
The persistently applied insanity of Ursula and the unmitigated genius of Kaja Kallas and their hidden supervisors carried the day. May ALL with an ounce of sanity left in their minds revolt against this situation in Europe. If you wish you can call me ‘misogynistic’ but I still believe these two clowns should be chained to the dishwashers in their kitchens.
You really think that those two dumb virago decide anything?
These are europeans. The dumbest, most authority trusting, rules following sheep on the planet.
Russia really needs to hurry up and win the war before Ukraine really solidifies itself as a de-facto member of NATO.
That ship sailed long ago.