Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited. by Victoria Nikiforova
[RIA] Ukrainian air defense fired foreign missiles at the Russian Il-76 transport aircraft. The plane crashed, killing everyone on board. This is not just another bloody, senseless terrorist attack that will not delay the collapse of the Kyiv regime for a second.
This time the leadership of the former Ukrainian SSR has surpassed itself. The IL was flying on a humanitarian mission. There were 65 Ukrainian prisoners of war on board. These were Ukrainian Armed Forces soldiers who were exchanged back to their homeland. The cynicism of the situation is difficult to imagine.
People who fought for Kyiv are returning home to their families. Yes, they are our opponents, but we are honest in observing the laws and customs of war: we treated them and fed them. They lived with us in human conditions. And so they were lucky to get on the exchange list. The relatives were notified - their wives and children were waiting for them at home.
But the plane was shot down by an air defense system of the Ukrainian Armed Forces, and the newspaper "Ukrainian Pravda" cheerfully reported on this victory. How is this in the style of the Kyiv Nazis: kill their citizens, their defenders - and boast about it.
Now the publication is rapidly deleting links, but the Internet remembers everything. The British Guardian noted the boastful publication of the Ukrainian media.
It is unlikely that the wives, mothers and children of the dead prisoners missed this article. Their emotions, of course, are difficult to imagine. At first they let their relatives go to war, then they trembled for their fate, and finally they were able to calm down: Russian captivity is much better than a senseless death somewhere on the outskirts of Krynki. And then luck struck: their captors should be returned to Ukraine.
But here they are killed in broad daylight in front of the whole world by their own authorities - even the Hitler regime did not stoop to this, by the way.
There is nothing fundamentally new in this terrorist attack. The Kiev regime has not hidden for a long time that the population under its jurisdiction is simply cannon fodder, which is cheaply exchanged for dollars for Zelensky and co. Throwing your soldiers to certain death near Artemovsk or Marinka - wasn’t this the same mass murder of your citizens?
Or take this surreal epic with Krynki, a supporter of the Ukrainian Armed Forces on the left bank of the Dnieper. The Russian army grinds down Ukrainian fighters there day after day, but the command sends more and more unfortunates there. The footage of them crossing the Dnieper makes your blood run cold: in their little boats, they are clearly an easy target for our artillery. But they keep sending them there and sending them. For what?
In turn, the Wesseushniks, feeling that they are being betrayed by their own command, hide behind civilians, in fact taking them hostage - this is a classic practice of terrorists. The ruins of Mariupol are clear evidence that the Ukrainian military treats their compatriots as enemies.
Zelensky and Zaluzhny need this mass bloodshed like air: they monetize it. Then Zelensky’s relatives will buy another villa near the warm sea. His wife will go shopping in London. And the wives of the Ukrainian military who died senselessly today - what do they think about this bloody lottery?
They should especially thank the American and German patrons of Kyiv for this tragedy. Il-76 was shot down by foreign air defense. State Duma Speaker Vyacheslav Volodin has already suggested that deputies turn to the German Bundestag and the US Congress. Did you promise to support the Ukrainians there? But you kill them. You have unleashed such a terrorist regime on Square that, unable to reach the Russians, it attacks its own. All this hell was financed by you, it seemed to you that this was a “successful investment”.
Well, look how the people you deceived die. It will be especially useful for American and European taxpayers to learn about this story. Some of them sincerely believe that they are helping a “free democratic” Ukraine. Well, this is what this assistance actually looks like - it looks much more like sponsoring terrorism.
I don’t think that the attack on Il-76 was some kind of “tragic mistake”. The Russian transport aircraft is a famous and valuable aircraft; knocking it down is a great success. Russian pilots are the highest professionals, and there is a real hunt for them. That is, from a military point of view it was a very expensive goal.
And prisoners - what are prisoners? The Kyiv regime hates such people. At the front, a VSE officer who plans to surrender can easily be shot by his own commander. So why should they feel sorry for those whom they consider traitors? Only Russia will feel sorry for them : the second plane with the prisoners managed to turn around in time after the attack on the Il-76 and returned safely to the airfield.
The crew members of the deceased Il-76 showed outstanding courage and skill, managing to take the plane away from the populated area. Their courage and sacrifice is another difficult step towards our victory. They are heroes.
But what can we say about the Ukrainian military - victims of the terrorist attack? Their death is terrible in its absolute senselessness. These are Russian people, confused by the Kyiv maniacs and killed by them. Their death is a clear metaphor for the fate of all of Ukraine.
Direct Translation via Google Translate. Edited by Georgy Bovt
[REGNUM] A landslide victory in the second consecutive GOP presidential primary (in New Hampshire) is already leading many to talk about the likelihood of Donald Trump returning to the White House. Accordingly, America’s partners and adversaries are beginning to imagine scenarios called “Trump 2.0.”
Simply put: what's in it for us?
Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov, like other representatives of this department earlier, said that Trump’s return to the presidency is unlikely to affect Russian-American relations, because the American authorities ignored a huge number of goodwill gestures from Vladimir Putin. There is nothing new in this reaction, however. This is approximately the standard reaction from Moscow to all sorts of presidential elections in America recently: they say, we don’t care.
At the same time, this traditional “we don’t care” is, of course, not without diplomatic cunning, since Russian-American relations throughout the post-Soviet period, and even before, were personalized to the limit and depended to a huge extent on how Personal relations between the leaders of the two countries will develop. Let's say, at one time, Vladimir Putin and George W. Bush had good relations at first, which had a beneficial effect on interstate ties. Although now in Moscow they say that Bush deceived us too.
But the relationship between Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin did not work out from the very beginning - from the moment it became known that the American president openly spoke out against the return of Vladimir Putin to the Kremlin and in favor of a second term for then-President Medvedev.
Apparently—we may someday learn about this in more detail—the meeting in Geneva in June 2021 between Putin and Biden did not go well either. This was an attempt to prevent a military conflict already brewing in Ukraine. And who knows, if Donald Trump had been in Biden’s place, perhaps history would have turned out differently. But Biden, especially considering the history of his son Hunter’s business relations with the Ukrainian company Burisma, as well as Biden’s supervision as vice president of all Ukrainian issues, has developed its own credit history, which may have had a decisive influence on how it later behaved America in the last weeks before the start of the North American War.
From the experience of the Trump presidency, it seemed that, purely on a personal level, it was relatively easier for Putin to deal with Trump than with his predecessor Obama, and for Trump and Putin too. In addition, historically it has been the case that Soviet and then Russian leaders have traditionally found it easier to deal with Republican presidents than with Democratic presidents. First of all, because the Republicans were less inclined to impose their extensive humanitarian agenda on Moscow, including the topic of human rights in the American sense.
However, it was during the reign of the Trump administration - and more precisely, after the coup in Ukraine and the annexation of Crimea in 2014 - that relations between Russia and the United States became less and less dependent on the relations between the two leaders; they, like an asphalt roller, rolled downhill. There were more and more differences and contradictions, and there was less and less desire for compromises at the expense, as it was believed in both capitals, of damage to their own national interests. In addition, the impulsive Trump,
...what some call impulsive others call decisive...
who periodically expressed some wishes regarding the need to improve relations with Moscow, acted in an almost complete absence of requests at the level of the US political class to improve relations with Russia. It is no coincidence that it was during his reign that Congress passed a special law that limited the White House’s ability to lift sanctions from Russia without legislative permission.
But at first, Trump’s rise to power and his unexpected victory over Hillary Clinton caused real applause in the State Duma. Now, of course, those applauding deputies would watch these footage with shame. And his reign ended with a rather harsh statement from the same Russian Foreign Ministry, when the Trump administration was accused of “systematically and purposefully engaged in the destruction of treaty regimes” and wanted to “achieve unilateral advantages for the United States in the military-strategic sphere by pushing through unilateral conditions that infringe on Russia’s interests.”
At the same time, the Foreign Ministry expressed hope (and this is also a standard reaction to the arrival of any new US administration) that the Biden team would take a more constructive position. Moscow, just a few minutes before the 46th President of the United States took office, proposed to the new administration to extend the START-3 Treaty. The same one that expired in February 2021, which Trump finally refused to extend. Another thing is that now, already under Biden, the START-3 Treaty looks more dead than alive, and the prospects for negotiations on a new agreement on strategic arms control are more than vague. In this sense, the Biden administration is fully following the legacy of the Trump administration.
Perhaps Moscow’s initial calculation was that Biden was not as impulsive a politician as Trump, he was older and would supposedly avoid making sharp decisions. In addition, he is remembered from Soviet times, when, as an influential senator, he took a completely dovish position on foreign policy issues.
As for Trump, if he does win his rematch, then purely stylistically he is a much sharper politician than grandfather Biden, and in the current geopolitical situation, heated to the limit by the military conflict in Ukraine, it remains to be seen what is best for Moscow : “half-asleep” Biden or sharp, impulsive Trump, who can take rather unpredictable actions.
Suffice it to recall how in 2018 Trump made an impulsive decision to expel 60 Russian diplomats in response to the Skripal poisonings in Salisbury. As the American press later wrote, the decisive role was played by the future director of the CIA, Gina Haspel (then she was deputy director), who showed the president photographs of children and birds allegedly injured by the poisonous Novichok. And then she whispered the right words about expulsion into my ear. Trump later even admitted that he got excited, but did not correct his mistake.
US ELECTIONS COULD TRIGGER THE COLLAPSE OF THE GLOBAL LIBERAL SYSTEM
Utter nonsense now the conventional wisdom in Russia and the EU. They said similar things the first time The Donald was elected, only to discover that the system did not collapse, and then he did not call in the US military to keep himself in office.
In general, it was under Trump that the most massive mutual expulsions of diplomats and closures of consulates in Russia and the United States took place. After the start of the NWO, Russia and America limited themselves to only isolated expulsions: there was simply no one left to expel. In fact, under his rule, in this regard, a decision was prepared by the US Embassy in Moscow (already under Biden) to completely stop issuing visas to Russians (from May 2021).
No less impulsive was Trump’s decision in the spring of 2018 to launch missile and bomb attacks on government forces in Syria, allegedly in response to the use of chemical weapons by the Bashar al-Assad regime, which has never been reliably proven. There were also threats against Moscow then. In response to Russian warnings to shoot down American missiles, especially those fired at Russian military bases in this country, Trump then wrote: “Russia promises to shoot down any missiles fired at Syria. Get ready, Russia, they will arrive, so beautiful, new and “smart”!” Also, it was under Trump that the only direct clash between American troops in Syria and a detachment of the Wagner PMC took place so far.
It was during the period of the Trump administration that the United States began to impose very serious economic sanctions against Russia, and the list of sanctioned persons belonging to the highest, including Russian, leadership sharply expanded. The Obama administration, although it formally responded to the annexation of Crimea in 2014, did not allow itself such harshness. Finally, it was Trump who, in the last months of his reign, decided to begin supplying Ukraine with American weapons, these were Javelin anti-tank guided missiles. In Ukraine, they believe that they greatly helped the Ukrainian Armed Forces in the first months of the military conflict, when other Western countries had not yet started supplying weapons to Kyiv.
By analogy, Trump may decide, say, to sharply increase the supply of Patriot air defense systems, of which Ukraine currently has only two systems. While the United States alone has 1,200 such systems in service, and 16 other countries also have them. Recently, representatives of the Ukrainian military command stated that the country needs only 50 complexes to cover critical targets. True, they are quite expensive - together with ammunition, more than 1 billion dollars apiece (400 million for the launcher and another 690 million for the missiles themselves).
Trump is first and foremost a businessman at heart, accustomed to negotiating from a position of strength, with pressure, often resorting to ultimatums. But if in business relations ultimatums, as a rule, do not lead to death, then in relations between states everything can be much more dramatic. He has already said several times that he is ready to resolve the Ukrainian conflict in almost 24 hours. It's hard to imagine how he can do this. Calling Zelensky and saying that either you sit down at the negotiating table with Putin, or I am depriving you of all support, and then calls Moscow and says: either you sit down with Zelensky at the negotiating table, or I give Zelensky all the weapons that he has. USA? Well, that's an option.
However, no good options are visible for Moscow in connection with the upcoming presidential elections in America in November 2024. Because the point here is not about people, but about the fact that Russia’s confrontation with the West and especially with the United States has long gone beyond the boundaries of interpersonal relations.
[Telegraph] Battery-powered electric vehicles will only ever capture 30pc of global market share, the chairman of Toyota has predicted, raising concerns about consumers’ willingness to align with net zero goals.
Akio Toyoda said that traditional fuel-burning cars, as well as hybrids and hydrogen fuel cell vehicles would make up the rest of the market.
The grandson of the founder of the world’s largest car manufacturer said shifting towards electric vehicles is not the answer when a billion people in the world are living without electricity.
He told a business event this month that limiting consumer choices and ability to travel by making expensive cars is not the answer.
He said: "Customers — not regulations or politics — should make that decision."
He added: "Engines will surely remain."
Toyota has, for decades, banged the drum for hydrogen power, pouring money and resources into fuelling its cars with the fuel cells.
It has lagged behind in battery technology for years, mistrusting lithium-ion chemistry and hoping the world would adopt its hybrid petrol-electric technology as an eco standard.
Electric vehicles are expected to secure 23.5pc of global market share by 2025, according to EVvolumes.com.
#4
Well, the Grumman LLV's (and Ford-Utilimasters) are cr*p in the snow and ice because they're a rear wheel drive vehicle with very little weight over the rear axles (unless it's around Christmas or something).
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
01/25/2024 7:17 Comments ||
Top||
#5
"Customers — not regulations or politics — should make that decision."
[Remix] Although the global media used all its weapons of opinion to make the "peasant war" that shook Germany seem nonexistent, the world was still treated to dramatic images of the mass farmers’ demonstrations through the new era of social media.
"No fuel, no food, no future" — that is the slogan most often used by German farmers, obviously in English because it was the only way to get mass exposure of their current plight.
However, you’d be forgiven for missing the protests raging across Germany — and in many other countries this past week, including Romania and France — due to the mainstream media’s apparent disinterest in the farming revolution, with producers seemingly given particularly strict instructions on what to, and what not to report.
The existence of protests unfolding throughout Europe appeared to be under some form of media embargo. Perhaps it might be worth considering why.
It is true in general, but in post-WWII Europe in particular, which was in a rather dire situation, it has proven true many times over that food supply is perhaps an even more delicate and important strategic sector than heavy industry. Although in macro statistics, which give a false picture, agriculture’s share could be only a few percent, or even "negligible," it is not only not negligible, but it turns out to be more important than anything imaginable.
The great peasant wars of the 15th and 16th centuries were fought for exactly the same reasons as today. In that century and a half, in addition to literally "pulling the rug out from under the peasantry," the average peasant’s daily working hours doubled, and the income he received for those hours was cut in half. It is understandable (though not excusable) that the brutal cruelty of the somewhat frustrated peasant masses knew no bounds. Nor, indeed, did the reprisals that followed.
"You'll own nothing and you'll be happy" is a phrase originating in a 2016 video by the World Economic Forum, summarising an essay written by Danish politician Ida Auken. The phrase has been used by critics who accuse the WEF of desiring restrictions on ownership of private property. Wikipedia
I'm still betting on her grabbing the VP slot, then a take over in 2025 as Joe B. has undeniable issues. The only arms the kommies support are Big Mike's
[SlayNews] Details have begun to emerge of a secret plot by former First Lady Michelle Obama and the Democrat establishment to replace President Joe Biden ahead of the critical 2024 election.
Obama has reportedly already surveyed major Democrat donors about her potential candidacy.
In 2022, she also allegedly told a gathering of CEOs in New York City that she was running in 2024.
According to the New York Post, citing “credible sources few have access to and usually not meant for the noses of the media,” Obama is positioning herself to replace Biden and run against President Donald Trump.
[Daily Mail, where America gets its news] Iran is now a 'legitimate target' for missile strikes, a top Israeli minister has said, as fears grow of an all-out war between the countries.
Israel's economy minister, Nir Barkat, told The Telegraph that Palestinians from the West Bank would never be permitted to work in the country again and imported foreign workers would take their place.
He also argued that the war against Hamas has not been aggressive enough.
A message to all those trying to hold Bibi back: if you don’t let Israel to finish the job now, while you still have some influence, once Bibi is gone your influence will be nil.
Barkat, who is the favourite to take over from Benjamin Netanyahu as head of the ruling Likud party, said Israel has the means to pursue the conflict and open up a new front with Lebanon.
Western leaders are already worried about the prospect of the conflict spreading to Iran and Lebanon.
[Ynet] Senior Jewish American jurist Prof. Alan Dershowitz, whose name came up as a potential candidate for representing Israel as a judge in the International Court of Justice at The Hague regarding South Africa's petition accusing Israel of "genocide" in Gaza, is not moved by the prosecution's arguments and made it clear that Israel should not act on any decision made in the tribunal.
"Israel should ignore whatever is said by the International Court of Justice," Dershowitz said Wednesday in an interview with Ynet. "It is not a real court. It's a court whose judges are picked by their countries, it reflects foreign policy, not rule of law, not judiciary. I think that Israel made a mistake in submitting to the jurisdiction of the court, Given that a large subgroup of Israelis are dumb - see "judicial protests" going to court was unavoidable. However, Bibi did manage to get some benefits. Aaron Barak, chosen as Israeli representative to the court, has been an ambassador of "international law" to Israel his entire career. And is fairly influential in certain circles. Now he'll be forced to denounce the ICJ, or be exposed as an useful idiot.
and it would make a mistake in complying with any ruling of the court. No chance of that, prof.
This is one of the most absurd abuses of the judicial process in modern history.
..."I think the Israeli lawyers have done a good job within the constraints of the International Court of Justice, but it's like arguing in front of a wall - their arguments will have no impact on the decision whatsoever. This is politics, it has nothing to do with the law. And I think that by arguing the law they legitimate an illegitimate court." Some Israelis need proof that "International" and "Nazi" are the same when it comes to Israel.
To summarize: A Kenguru court trying a case submiteed by a Claudine Gay nation.
[Bus Insider] Five minutes a day may be all it takes to add healthy years to your life, a longevity specialist says.
While some exciting discoveries in longevity involve complex science or cutting-edge tech, there's also evidence that simple everyday habits can help extend your life and improve your health, says Dr. Kien Vuu, a physician who specializes in antiaging and regenerative medicine.
"The good news is there are daily routines that can have a significant impact on how long we live," he told Business Insider.
Making simple, intentional changes to your routine — such as exercise, sleep, and mindfulness — can help improve your well-being in the short term and extend your life without taking up much time, Vuu says.
Continued on Page 47
[HotAir] The war that began on October 7 when Hamas invaded Israel has been almost universally described in the press as another bloody chapter in the Israel-Palestinian conflict. But that’s only half-true. Or rather, it is only one front of a much broader war—a war that pits Iran and its proxies against America and its allies. And a war that has already cost American lives.
...Most Americans vaguely know that there is trouble in the Middle East, but they likely do not know all of these details and surely do not know the names Christopher Chambers and Nathan Gage Ingram—the two Navy SEALs who perished this month in the Indian Ocean defending the freedom of maritime navigation in the region.
That’s because these stories have barely been covered and the Biden administration has sought to downplay these incidents and lower tensions with Iran, fearing the prospect of a regional war. Well, as long as it's their region.
All the Iranian immigrants here shouldn't care.
But some Americans know well the cost of Iran’s ongoing aggression against America. Just ask the Farr family of California.
On February 26, 2006, U.S. Army Specialist Clay Farr encountered a roadside bomb in Iraq. The right side of his body was shredded with shrapnel, his right hand was severed from his arm, and the top of his head was blown off. He died four hours later in a military hospital.
...Farr was killed by an Iranian weapon known as an explosively formed penetrator, or EFP. Sure, a shaped charge.
According to the Pentagon, Farr is one of 603 American service members Iran was responsible for killing during the Iraq War, largely through providing its militias with these deadly bombs capable of melting the armor of Humvee Since 1979
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[Telegraph] Battery-powered electric vehicles will only ever capture 30pc of global market share, the chairman of Toyota has predicted, raising concerns about consumers’ willingness to align with net zero goals.
[Remix] Although the global media used all its weapons of opinion to make the "peasant war" that shook Germany seem nonexistent, the world was still treated to dramatic images of the mass farmers’ demonstrations through the new era of social media.
