I have to admit that I am feeling pretty frustrated today. Last week, there was so much optimism that we could finally see peace, but now “war fever” has returned with a vengeance. The situation in the Middle East threatens to spiral out of control, there is a very real possibility that the U.S. military could soon be conducting operations in Mexico and Venezuela, and it appears that our last chance for peace with Russia could be going up in smoke. I was writing about a coming war with Russia many years before it became fashionable, and I continue to warn in the strongest terms possible about what will happen if we do not reverse course. But of course world leaders do not listen to people like us, and they continue to make decisions that could drag us into the unthinkable.
Last night, the Russians absolutely pummeled Ukraine with drone and missile strikes. One of the targets that was hit was an American-owned manufacturing facility…
In its overnight attacks, Russia launched a total of 574 strike drones and 40 missiles on Ukraine, President Volodymyr Zelensky said Thursday, hitting as far west as the city of Lviv.
Missiles also struck an American-owned manufacturing company, Flex Ltd., in the western region of Zakarpattia, in an attack that injured at least 19 people, Ukrainian officials said. Flex is a American-Singaporean company that provides electronics manufacturing services and is headquartered in Austin, Texas.
“Overnight, Russian missiles attacked one of the largest American investments in Ukraine – Flex – an active member of the American Chamber of Commerce,” said Andy Hunder, president of the American Chamber of Commerce in Ukraine. “Russia continues to destroy and humiliate US businesses in Ukraine, targeting companies that invest and trade on the US stock markets.”
I am very displeased that the Russians chose to target a U.S.-owned business, because they should have known that this would really upset the Trump administration.
Whoever authorized this attack is not thinking rationally, because it threatens to further derail the peace process.
Of course the Ukrainians are going to try to squeeze as much out of this incident as they possibly can…
“It was an ordinary civilian enterprise, an American investment,” Zelensky wrote. “They produced such familiar household items as coffee machines. And this is also a target for the Russians. Very telling.”
Russian forces “delivered this strike as if nothing had changed at all,” he said. “There is still no signal from Moscow that they are really going to go into meaningful negotiations to end this war.”
I think that it is a valid point that if the Russians were truly serious about peace they would not have done this.
Now President Trump is steaming mad, and he just posted an extremely ominous warning on his Truth Social account…
It is very hard, if not impossible, to win a war without attacking an invaders country. It’s like a great team in sports that has a fantastic defense, but is not allowed to play offense. There is no chance of winning! It is like that with Ukraine and Russia. Crooked and grossly incompetent Joe Biden would not let Ukraine FIGHT BACK, only DEFEND. How did that work out? Regardless, this is a war that would have NEVER happened if I were President – ZERO CHANCE. Interesting times ahead!!!
What in the world does that mean?
Is Trump going to allow the Ukrainians to use long-range missiles provided by the U.S. to hit targets deep inside Russian territory?
If so, how will the Russians respond when long-range missiles provided by the U.S. start hitting Moscow?
Everyone needs to calm down and think very carefully about their next moves.
At the Trump-Putin summit in Alaska, it really did seem like talks were moving in the right direction.
But since that time, both sides have hardened their positions.
Ukraine is demanding that any peace agreement must allow large numbers of European troops on Ukrainian soil in order to prevent the Russians from attacking again. But Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov just warned that European troops on Ukrainian soil would be “absolutely unacceptable for Russia” and that trying to arrange security guarantees without Russia’s approval is a “road to nowhere”…
Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov followed up comments dismissing Europe’s bid to arrange security guarantees for Ukraine as utopian and a “road to nowhere” with fresh remarks on Thursday that may amount to a fresh bid to slow or derail peace talks by introducing new demands.
While President Trump had revealed on Monday that “President Putin agreed that Russia would accept security guarantees for Ukraine”, it was never made clear what it was Putin had signalled his consent to and now Russia is finessing its conditions in public. Lavrov said today that any foreign military deployment to Ukraine — the very core of what European nations have in mind for Ukrainian security guarantees — would be “absolutely unacceptable for Russia”.
The Russians are determined to keep NATO completely out of Ukraine.
That has never changed.
So why do western leaders keep talking about sending troops to Ukraine as part of any peace agreement?
And the Russians are also demanding that Ukraine must hand over the remaining portions of the Donbas that Russia has not conquered yet…
Vladimir Putin is demanding that Ukraine give up all of the eastern Donbas region, renounce ambitions to join NATO, remain neutral and keep Western troops out of the country, three sources familiar with top-level Kremlin thinking told Reuters.
For the Ukrainians, handing over the rest of the Donbas is a non-starter…
President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has repeatedly dismissed the idea of withdrawing from internationally recognised Ukrainian land as part of a deal, and has said the industrial Donbas region serves as a fortress holding back Russian advances deeper into Ukraine.
“If we’re talking about simply withdrawing from the east, we cannot do that,” he told reporters in comments released by Kyiv on Thursday. “It is a matter of our country’s survival, involving the strongest defensive lines.”
So the fighting will continue.
And if long-range missiles start hitting Moscow and other Russian cities, the war will greatly escalate.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military is preparing to conduct military operations against Mexican drug cartels inside Mexican territory…
Now, NORTHCOM has tasked its subordinate Special Operations Command (called SOCNORTH) to undertake “operational preparation of the battlespace” inside Mexico to set the stage for future military operations, and to prepare cartel-related “target packages” for potential strikes and “direct action” attacks on the ground against high-value individuals, compounds, and supply chain targets associated in particular with the Sinaloa Cartel and the Jalisco New Generation Cartel. Direct attacks could also involve air and drone strikes.
“Direct action” is a term special operations forces use to describe small-scale offensive operations carried out by Army Green Berets, Navy SEALs, or Marine Corps raiders. Think of the airstrikes on Iran this summer as a kind of direct action, against a discrete target with a “strategic” or national purpose.
The Mexican government has already told us that it will not give us permission to do this.
But preparations are going ahead anyway.
And it also appears that we are getting dangerously close to war with Venezuela…
The White House confirmed 3 warships and 4,000 marines are being deployed toward Venezuela. When asked about the possibility of boots on the ground, officials said the President is ready to use every element of American power to stop drugs from flooding into the US and hold those responsible accountable.
“The Maduro regime is not a legitimate government—it is a narco-terror cartel,” the statement added.
On top of everything else, Israel’s new offensive in Gaza has now begun…
Israel launched strikes on Gaza City overnight as it moved forward with a new offensive in the Palestinian enclave despite international condemnation and mounting domestic protests.
Explosions rocked neighborhoods in the city on Thursday, after Israel said its military had entered the first stages of a planned assault that includes calling up 60,000 reservists. The operation has sent civilians fleeing once again, intensifying fears about the starvation crisis unfolding in the territory.
Israel also carried out strikes on Khan Younis, in southern Gaza, and Deir al-Balah in the center of the territory on Thursday. Video from Deir al-Balah showed people running away from a large plume of smoke.
As I discussed yesterday, nobody can deny that we are in a time of “wars and rumors of wars”.
In a world that is absolutely teeming with weapons of mass destruction, flirting with an apocalypse is not wise.
We are literally dancing on the brink of disaster, and it won’t take much to push us over the edge.
Read the full article here