My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.
preamble
Aside from the virtually daily Iranian strikes on the Oman route, the main threat that the US is facing in this newest phase of the war is logistics. With Bahrain and the UAE unsafe, the closest safest port in the theater is Diego Garcia, which is over 2000 miles away. Either the aircraft carriers would have to go to Diego Garcia to restock, which would be even less planes and missiles available should hostilities restart suddenly, or goods have to be shuttled to the aircraft carriers from Diego Garcia. This latter option appears to be too much for the US to handle, with widespread reports of dwindling supplies and morale on the USS Abraham Lincoln (and, to a lesser extent, the USS George HW Bush). These reports have culminated in the USS George Washington being sent from the Pacific to replace the Lincoln, which was the sole aircraft carrier in that whole theater. There are six more carriers in maintenance, leaving two carriers left that could even hypothetically be called upon should the USS George HW Bush need replacement; both are currently undergoing training, and of these two, the USS Theodore Roosevelt might be available soon; perhaps even as soon as September. I’m unsure whether the Roosevelt will be sent to the Pacific to replace the Washington, or if it’ll be sent to the Middle East to replace the Bush. Nonetheless, that the situation has deteriorated to the point where we can speculate on how very limited naval vessels are going to be distributed is yet one more indication among many of the decline of US naval power. The symbolism was too much for me to ignore, hence the title: the last aircraft carrier in the Pacific being forced to leave, and not under military pressure in some hypothetical war against China, but to try and relieve logistical burdens elsewhere in a war of the US’s own making.
This joins Trump’s statements that the US will only be taking a very limited part in the South Korean military exercises. This is nominally because of the “great ties” the US shares with the DPRK, but this is an embarrassingly transparent face-saving statement. The DPRK is an increasingly major potential threat to South Korea, a major regional power and economy, but are also helping Russia with both manpower and materiel and getting military experience and data on their missiles’ effectiveness in return.
The US’s Under Secretary of War, Elbridge Colby, recently visited the Philippines. There, he gave a speech that promised to continue the construction of a defensive network that would deny China the possibility of militarily advancing through the Pacific by stationing US forces inside friendly countries. This is the NATO approach: our mere presence will deter the enemy because they would not want to start a direct war with us, and in exchange, you have to hand over billions upon billions of dollars. Colby gave the Philippines that most backhanded of compliments, the “model ally”, and stated that the US was “definitely not disengaging from Asia”. My “We aren’t pivoting away from Asia” shirt has people asking a lot of questions that are already answered by my shirt.
If you’re a US-friendly country in the Pacific and possess even the slightest sense of self-preservation, you are surely feeling nervous. The US is moving its aircraft carrier out of the theater. Overseas, you’ve seen how Iran - a very strong regional country, to be sure, but not as powerful as the industrial juggernaut and nuclear superpower that is China - has nonetheless crippled several undefendable US bases, has exhausted a very large amount of American air defense missiles, is holding the global economy hostage, and the US can seemingly do nothing to stop them. You have to be looking at your own US bases, likely expensive and unpopular, and all the money you’re handing over to the US, and glancing at how the Gulf states are bickering of being betrayed by their ally who promised them protection and immediately retreated. You have to be looking at your economy and its dependence on China. You have to be looking at Ukraine, and the unenviable state of destruction it has been driven to as a puppet of the US. You have to be looking at China itself, and how its military is rapidly developing in all fields, and how it’s even catching up on microchip development. In all, you have to be really hoping that China is serious that they only plan a peaceful reunification with Taiwan, and that the US will not do something incredibly, stupidly reckless in their decline.
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists’ 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.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
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.
Interesting press statement from DPRK. It says that the US and its vassals are the source of geopolitical crisis in Middle East, Europe, and Korean Peninsula.
It says that Ukraine and Zelensky are lying about additional DPRK troops being deployed to Russia. It clarifies that previous deployment of DPRK troops to Russia were legal under UN law.
It says that DPRK doesn’t care that Trump is downsizing the Ulchi Freedom Shield US-ROK military exercises because the drills are provocative in nature and should not exist at all.
It says that Kim Jong Un has good memories and feelings about his personal relationship with Trump. However, Trump has not changed the US’s hostile policies to DPRK
https://hexbear.net/post/9337537
https://archive.is/3gb2V (KCNA)
e/ fixed a typo
https://xcancel.com/morris_que14/status/2089106534118605094
South Korea proposes talks to officially end war with North, per BBC
> US withdraws last aircraft carrier from East Asia
> Peace spontaneously breaks out
Does this mean that mandatory conscription can be lifted? Since it serves no purpose other than to give the US a standing army of colonized soldiers?
This is probably some political calculus to try to manipulate Trump on some level. The capitalist owners of South Korea need the constant threat of war to sustain their own legitimacy.
And then the Korean chuds can let go of the argument that gender roles are valid due to conscription.
Lee Jae Myung suggested a “multi-layered security system” to avoid flare-ups along the countries’ de-facto border, known as the demilitarised zone (DMZ), and offered to discuss practical ways of halting Pyongyang’s nuclear ambitions.
yeah i don’t know if this is going anywhere
Calling them nuclear ambitions at this point is some hilarious cope. Those are nuclear facts, man. Their first test was 20 fuckin years ago
“Im like North Korea, I no longer have nuclear ambitions, I have nuclear facts”better watch your fuckin’ step or you’ll see nuclear acts
the Slightly Less Demilitarised Zone, next to the Demilitarised Zone?
Also Iran has just once again validated NK having nuclear weapons. These puppets in Seoul are gormless- at least one can take comfort that samsung subsidiary is a moribund society destined to be reunited with the better system up north.
Will they “establish peace” or is this just a ruse like the MOU? There are material contradictions in regards to the Korean Peninsula that cannot be resolved with a simple treaty and lipservice to the same failed frameworks.
The South cannot accept the nuclear weapons in the North. The North cannot accept weakening deterrence to the South. This is ignoring the historical element where the South materially benefitted from the genocide of the North.
JDPON Don strikes again
A sunshine policy 2 would be nice, but the north will never give up their nukes. This gesture extends to where talks of denuclearization is unnecessary, and no further.
The DPRK cannot accept this after having designated the south as the “most hostile state”. So this is politicking and managing risk from the DPRK at a moment of weakness more than anything. Including politicking against the US by making moves to mend fences with the US enemy the DPRK despite Trump’s attitude of “I don’t care, I love those guys” occupied southern Korea knows that the US doesn’t want to lose it as a vassal and wants hostility there against the DPRK.
At most with continued perseverance the DPRK might re-build a road on the border or two, open a thing or two and make some showy gestures but this isn’t going to change the hostility and danger they feel from the US occupied south.
I thought they already did that during Trump 1.
Being a Dem fundraiser/consultant is a really sweet gig. $390 million raised, of that $20 million went to actual candidates. Most of the “Fundraising” line item is just consultants paying money to their own companies or to their friends.
if i’m reading this right, they’re using 63% of the money they take in in to ask for more money?
This is also how most non profits work
Yes, but most of their fundraising is just sending emails to lists they’ve gathered over the years, most of those are people who donated to some Dem org or candidate in the past, so they don’t even do a lot of work to get the email lists. They are mostly just funneling money to their own private companies for “outreach” or “fundraising”.
whole country is just scams on scams lol, one day amerikkka won’t even be able to do imperialism because scams took over the MIC
I mean, are we not there already?
The US still has hardware from the 1950s-1980s. They first need to burn through a little bit more than that until they can’t do much of anything.
I mean, they’re still using the M2 machine gun which was invented during World War 1
This is because it is the shark of HMGs
TBF there is nothing wrong with the M2 and they made a fuckton of those during WW2.
I will never forgive Bernie for giving all these ghouls my number.
I never donated shit and they still spam me
Spin up a shell PAC to ask for money. Get a bunch End2End/Stop2End messages. Spin up a new shell PAC to ask again. Repeat.
It’s a big grift and you ain’t in it!
Like they say, ya gotta spend money to beg for money
I’m gonna start a cash4gold type grift but for the democratic party. I’m an innovator.
This is the best I can offer.This investigation was originally developed for The New York Times, where it underwent eight months of editing, multiple rounds of fact-checking, and independent replication of the underlying methodology. The piece had a scheduled publication date when requests for comment were sent. It was only after the Times reached out to the subjects of the investigation for routine comment that the Elias Law Group, representing the DCCC and DSCC, sent a cease-and-desist letter demanding the paper not publish. Although the paper’s fact-checkers and legal department later cleared the piece before sending out a second round of requests for comment, the Times ultimately decided to kill the piece.
The piece was subsequently slated for publication at The Bulwark, where it underwent additional fact-checking, data verification, and legal review. When requests for comment were sent to the subjects of the investigation, lawyers representing the Progressive Turnout Project and Mothership Strategies likewise responded with legal letters demanding that the article not run. From there, publication was repeatedly delayed. The piece cleared successive rounds of legal review. When I asked for a committed publication date after months of delay, The Bulwark conditioned publication on my accepting an extensive rewrite prepared by its editors that, in my assessment, removed key empirical findings without explanation, introduced claims contradicted by the data and fact-checking record, and presented the subjects’ legal defenses as my own conclusions. When I declined to publish under those terms, the piece was released back to me.
death to bourgeois media
seems like this link has a tracking tag on the end, might want to consider removing that
In case you were inclined to believe imperialist mouthpieces like CNN about the US controlling the Strait of Hormuz, their data is false and the article is misleading. @MenchOsint on xcancel:
CNN published an article full of fake data to make it look like the U.S. “controls” the Strait of Hormuz.
They claim US Navy ships are in Hormuz.False. They’re in the Gulf of Oman.
They even claim that according to Kpler more than 80% of vessel transits through the Strait of Hormuz over the past two weeks have taken the US-backed Omani corridor.
They literally made this up. Not even Kpler claimed this number.
The reality is the opposite, 80% of transit is done via Iran-designated corridor.
https://xcancel.com/MenchOsint/status/2089952517421400278
Western media will do whatever it takes to hide the reality of Iran’s advantage.
Interview with a ukrainian sociologist about the current class dynamics within ukraine, and the geopolitical future of ukraine. It’s pretty grim.
Because of this, Ukraine is becoming some sort of “function-state,” [Ed. note: the function being to act as a bulwark against Russia] existing not to represent the citizens living on its territory, but to serve European elites’ security. For it to fulfill this function, it doesn’t matter much how well the people living in Ukraine are doing. It doesn’t matter whether they have human rights or not.
Let’s also note that Ukraine is becoming depopulated. The most recent UN forecast says Ukraine’s population will drop to 15 million by the end of the century, down from 52 million after the Soviet Union’s disintegration in 1991 – a decline of some 70%. But even this might be enough for Ukraine to fulfill its function toward Europe, because what matters is the army, the necessary infrastructure and civilian sectors to serve the army, and employees for American corporations to extract resources from Ukrainian soil. Nothing more is necessary to fulfill the role they see for Ukraine.
Gary Indiana hasn’t had power for more than a week
Haven’t seen anyone talking about this. Real “one day a bridge collapsed, and no one came to fix it" dying empire hours
The second Filton trial against activists that attacked Elbit’s Filton factory concluded today.
Second jury refuses to convict the 8 activists this trial was targeting
Also while I’m here, RCG are the best ML group in the UK right now. While they’re not officially organising as a party right now they’ve basically got all the same lines as PSL. Very good people.
spoiler
Supporters of Fight Racism! Fight Imperialism! were among the crowd gathered outside the Old Bailey Central Criminal Court on 19 August to hear the verdicts in the second trial of activists charged in connection with the August 2024 raid on the British factory of Israeli weapons manufacturer Elbit Systems.
After an eight-week trial and following nearly 40 hours of deliberation, none of the defendants present at the court hearing were convicted of any criminal offence. This is a huge victory for the pro-Palestine movement and shows once again that the British government’s virulently pro-Zionist stance over the last three years of genocide has completely failed to persuade the public that solidarity with Palestine is a crime.
In total, 25 people have been charged in relation to the action at Elbit’s Filton factory, just outside Bristol. From their arrests in 2024-5 they were all remanded in custody, with repeated bail applications rejected, until 4 February 2026 when a jury at Woolwich Crown Court failed to convict the first six to go on trial, despite having been arrested inside the factory, where they livestreamed themselves destroying drones and technical equipment. At the subsequent retrial, two activists were acquitted on all charges, while three were found guilty by the jury on a single count of criminal damage, and the remaining defendant was convicted on that charge and one of grievous bodily harm without intent. In a vicious act of retribution for both their principled activism and their earlier victories, Judge Jeremy Johnson sentenced the four, using a niche power under the Sentencing Act 2020 which allows non-terrorism offences (in this case, criminal damage) to be labelled as having a ‘terrorism connection’, opening the door to draconian prison sentences and lengthy post-sentence periods of heavily monitored ‘supervision’ subject to complex conditions. This is all despite the fact that the Filton raid took place nearly a year prior to Palestine Action being proscribed under the Terrorism Act in July 2025.
While the first trial focused on what took place inside the factory, the aim of the Crown Prosecution Service at the second trial was to convict eight activists who it claimed had planned and supported the action from outside. This gambit failed spectacularly.
FRFI spoke to Yulia, who was arrested in November 2024, held for 15 months on remand and spuriously tried as an organiser, although her barrister told the court that the CPS has had so little evidence against her that ‘perhaps she should be called the invisible coordinator’. She told us:
‘I think that first of all – we see that despite the power imbalance between us and the bourgeois state we are still winning. We always knew that there is a political will amongst the general public to not convict activists motivated by humanitarian concern. The question arises – what is the CPS intending to do? Have a retrial each time they don’t get the result they hope for and waste millions of pounds of public money for the sake of some criminal damage convictions and protecting the interests of a foreign private company?’
A further hearing will now take place on 14 September to determine whether the second group of Filton activists will now face a retrial. This is the same date that FRFI comrade Sarah Cotte will be back in court for her own retrial, following a jury’s failure to convict her on charges under Section 12 of the Terrorism Act for ‘encouraging support for a proscribed organisation’. Like Sarah, Hanin Barghouti and Majid Freeman face retrials after juries failed to convict them under Section 12. Like the latest group of Filton defendants, the Moog 4, among others, are due to be retried, having not been convicted of direct action, despite having been arrested on site and in the act. Although the state through the CPS continues to be determined to retry activists until it obtains the punitive verdicts it craves, it is abundantly clear that juries have little appetite for sending political activists who stand with oppressed people against occupation and genocide to prison. Small wonder then, that the Labour government is hellbent on restricting access to jury trials.
There is something that really boils my blood about Israelis doing this shit whilst we have to sit in the UK hearing about how evil our immigrants are for daring to try and live quiet lives without being executed in the street.
Theyve had a massive presence in India for decades, with whole towns putting all their signage in Hebrew just to cater to Israelis.
Winning friends everywhere they go
I wonder how far this will go before they start getting redacted the second people realize who these shitheads are when they start doing this stuff.
White House officials have reportedly communicated to political allies that they are shifting their strategy, going from “hammer Iran ASAP” to “strangle them” over time.
Today marks day 171 of the Iran War.
The Iran war is approaching a Friedman Unit.
The Friedman Unit, or simply Friedman, is a tongue-in-cheek neologism. One Friedman Unit is equal to six months, specifically the “next six months”, a period repeatedly declared by New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman to be the most critical of the then-ongoing Iraq War even though such pronouncements extended back over two and a half years.
Iran just launched anti-ship missiles at the SoH from Bandar Jask. It looks like they are currently launching either one or two attacks per day. No doubt in my mind that they could do more if they wanted. Bandar Jask is not the usual Iranian launch location for firing at the SoH. A US F-35A is also signaling an emergency over the UAE.
This is the third hit on that specific refinery.
Army will shut down a unit in Europe focused on learning drone warfare
Sure why not why would that be important
Alex Jones’ Texan Sandy Hook payment has been reduced to 6 million dollars.
https://apnews.com/article/alex-jones-infowars-newtown-b7866ab5ef652bbc7307ae55b09937ce
He’s appealing to have the rest thrown out too. He will not be paying shit.
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