Trump’s bombing of the Houthis in Yemen only accomplished the loss of three F-18 jets at $67 million apiece, in addition to the nearly one billion total cost of moving two aircraft carrier battle groups off the Yemen coast for a few months. The US had its ass handed to it, so Trump withdrew the B-1 bombers at Diego Garcia and pulled our carriers back out. A total unmitigated embarrassment.
The man has never respected ANY signature, not even his own: On his marriage contracts, his employees' contracts [they had to sign a Non Disclosure Agreement], his work contractors [he stiffed most of them... Even his freaking LAWYERS, for crying out loud.
I appeal to the Leaders of the World, whomever they are, to promise to never sign ANYTHING with him.[they will for sure get rolled if they do, just like anyone who has ever signed any contract with him.
Leaders everywhere should get together and say they will not sign anything with the US until this madman is out of the White House [and, hopefully, in jail!]
"The man has never respected ANY signature, not even his own..."
Trump is basically the fully mask-off personification of American 'agreement capability' (to use a term favored by the Russians) - or lack thereof. It's in our DNA. I'm almost positive that the United States of America has abrogated, ignored, torn up, violated or otherwise taken a dump on far more treaties and promises than have ever been faithfully honored. Trump is the prototypical "Ugly American" and he's not shy about it. Give him that.
We have indeed. But you have to admit that this felon is in a class by itself in that department, by the sheer number. Looking at it another way, can you think of ONE signature he has respected?
Can't wait for any nuggets Ken digs up (or is leaked to) about the upcoming First Annual $200M Trump Birthday Bash Military Parade Extravaganza. Paid for out of all the money we saved through DOGE's ultra-successful purging of "waste, fraud and abuse."
I am old enough to remember the Soviet military parades. US coverage reported it as another example of the CCCP's insecurity & authoritarian control. The US did not have such parades because we were a democracy and had no need to show off weapons.
Yeah, the democracy crap was a facade--a well hidden one--but a military parade in the US is a repudiation of any shred of democracy.
Gonna go out, buy some weed & contemplate my navel.
How was Cadet Bone Spurs chosen to make a Graduation speech in front of our very best young West Point Cadets?
Maybe he demanded it, to look tough? He demands a lot of things these days... Many that look like extorsion from the outside: President Zelensky's rare earth minerals, a second hand plane from the Qataris... an acceptance of his tariffs by the rest of the world, and acceptance of his illegal acts regarding immigrants...
It is not going to end well for him and his family and his minions!
I had to read this article twice, and I still don’t get it. If its intent is to lament the passage of “soft power,” then I think it is a rare, indeed the only, instance I’m aware of in which Ken is off base. I’ll address that later, but first I want to delve a bit into that “colossal buildup of the United States Armed forces.”
Here is one stumbling point for me: “Yet behind the hyperbolic Trumpy talk, there is a colossal shift happening, most obviously here at home, along the southern border and in the war on immigration. The shift is also happening overseas, in ways hardly being discussed.” Just what is the “colossal shift” that is happening? For one thing this country has been on a trajectory for crossing the trillion dollar-plus threshold for at least some years now, if not decades. So what’s the big surprise (aside from the catch-your-breath shock at “trillion dollars” becoming commonplace as opposed to the long-accustomed “hundreds of billion.”
What’s the colossal shift? There’s the same seduction with expensive wizardry that doesn’t work (think F-35, which in its now shortened service life has recently seen the announcement of the development of its shamelessly eponymous F-47 successor, costing and promising God knows how much more, yet with operational readiness likely in direct inverse proportion due to software and other technological problems. As the saying goes, newer ain’t necessarily better.
The nuclear buildup was put on track by the Nobel Peace Prize winning Barak Obama, and the global (now even “out of this world” with the Space Command) foot print (bare knuckle-dragging print?) expanding – how much of a physical presence do we now have in the Middle East? - again nothing new.
There is even nothing new with the rhetoric, aside from being characteristically more brash and boastful under Trump, but what’s the substantive difference from his saying, “The military's job is to dominate any foe and annihilate any threat to America, anywhere, anytime in any place,” and Kamala Harris in her keynote address at the DNC last year in Chicago proclaiming, “As commander-in-chief, I will ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world”?
All right, I will concede a bit on the shift, though not a colossal one, in the unabashed blatancy of outright killing, rather than the more palatable “defending democracy,” “protecting our interests and those of our allies,” “keeping the peace” and other such horse s***. Yup, that’s progress, in the overall descent toward the new Dark Age.
Now for item #2, “soft power.” To begin, who would believe for a minute anything Joe Biden had to say on the topic? “Senator Credit Card” as Chris Hedges has described him, same guy who supported Dumbya’s excellent adventure in Iraq. Plus how could a guy with a 50-year political career at the core of The Empire possibly redirect the military-industrial-congressional-media-academia-think tank-national security state complex if he even wanted to? Nah, anything coming out his mouth concerning “soft power” was merely obligatory agitprop fog (of the warmongerers).
Coincidentally enough, the Boston Globe carried the obituary on May 12th of Joseph Nye (“I invented the concept of ‘soft power’ — the ability to get what one wants through attraction rather than coercion or payment,” he recalled in “A Life in the American Century,” his 2024 memoir.) For me the obituary contained enough inadvertent tip-offs – the Kennedy School at Harvard, premier networking and training ground for functionaries and courtiers of The Empire, where he taught and was dean, being one, and Hillary Clinton invoking the phrase in her 2009 confirmation hearings as secretary of state, “With smart power, diplomacy will be the vanguard of our foreign policy”, being another - to raise my suspicions that we’re looking at another propagandist for a “come see the softer side” of The Empire’s do-goodism in the vulnerable, exploitable parts of the world.
“Soft power” didn’t originate with Nye, it actually goes back to Kennan’s “Containment Policy” toward the Russian version of communism, which emphasized political and economic means, as well as by cultural and social example, to contain Russian communist expansionism. Paul Nitze expropriated and co-opted the containment theme but instead had Dean Acheson sack Kennan giving him free rein to redefine containment as through military means, and thus begin the massive and costly to this day arms buildup that Eisenhower warned us about in his 1961 “military-industrial complex” speech in 1961 and the preeminence of military might over diplomacy in The Empire’s foreign policy (see Viet Nam as an example).
As to “things like USAID, Voice of America, the Peace Corps, the Global Engagement Center, and other elements of American diplomacy, humanitarian assistance, nation building and democracy promotion”:
USAID has been a front for the CIA from the get-go, see “USAID: A history of front companies acting on behalf of the CIA” here http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/12659 and...
In brief, when it comes to soft power and other elements of American diplomacy, humanitarian assistance, nation building and democracy promotion, think Gen. Smedley Butler, USMC:
“I served in all commissioned ranks from second lieutenant to Major General. And during that period I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism. I suspected I was just part of the racket all the time. Now I am sure of it.”
Trump doesn’t signify any colossal shift in The Empire’s exercise of power, he’s just being characteristically boastful about it.
Sorry, Ken, this time you took a swing, and fouled off.
"The Pentagon is poised to shift its oversight of Greenland by putting it under U.S. Northern Command, a symbolic gesture that would more closely align the island territory with the U.S. as President Donald Trump continues to show interest in taking control over the Arctic landmass."
It's a characteristic of empires to boast and order and intimidate. Name one empire that has survived. As surely as human beings love power, they resist domination. This holds regardless of the level of military technology.
Not to say empires go down without a fight. They will use all means to retain power. We see this as intrusive use of tech to surveil everyone proceeds. The change in this regard in the first 25 years of this century are astounding. If tech allows something to be done, it will be done.
Modernity has humanity holding the tiger of technology by the tail. We get things that we enjoy like smartphones that only appear to give us freedom as behind the ease and convenience lie threats to our freedom, both those we know about and those we don't know about. Think of tech as the pied piper playing a tune that we follow irresistibly. Ironically, the emphasis is on deregulation and less government when regulation is the one and only thing that gives any protection from complete domination by wealth, but at the same time government intrusion increases. Remember Mick Jagger singing "gimme shelter"? There isn't any to be had from profit making.
Is there a way to stop this? I don't think so. Ignore reason, maximize your investments and, as advertising always tells us: enjoy! Trump, a man who shows no evidence of thinking deeply about anything, leads the way. He takes care of global warming easily by calling it a hoax; the ostrich way of facing the future. The American lifestyle demands it and we comply.
“The job of the U.S. Armed Forces is,” Trump remarked, “to spread democracy to everybody around the world at the point of a gun.”
Taken at face value, this is an absurdity. "Govern yourselves, or we'll kill you!" What sense does that make? You can't coerce someone into making free choices!
But coming from Trump, who has not the first idea of what democracy is or why it's valuable, it's worse than an absurdity. What he means is, we're going to force you to serve our interests, but we're going to _call_ that "spreading democracy".
One wonders whether the defeat to Ansar Allah has any role in this kind of talk. Oops, I meant in "THE HOUTHIS SURRENDER"... Still, I'm not seeing much in the way of re-militarization and the current state of affairs is not great. Now the US has depleted most of its ammo in Ukraine, Yemen and Gaza, what major strides will be made - nay, are even on the current drawing board - to make the US remotely capable of fighting a peer or near peer military just to a draw?
Meanwhile Ukraine, likely with heavy MI6, CIA, French or German help has attempted to escalate yet again in the past 12 hours by striking Russia's strategic (nuclear) bomber fleet at multiple air bases (and throw in a couple of terror attacks on railways to boot). The smoke has mostly cleared and the damage was MUCH lighter than trumpeted in the western MSM - I'm seeing just 3-4 planes damaged now, but the message was received. Those bombers were sitting out on the open tarmac specifically to be in compliance with START. During war time, inspections are limited or paused and the treaty requires signees to place their strategic bomber fleets out in the open so they can be seen by satellite. This is worrisome for a couple reasons: 1) Given that NATO is pulling the strings, what reason does Russia have to abide by these treaties anymore? and 2) It's an obvious attempt to poke and prod Russia's strategic capabilities (again, nuclear "defenses") for a future....what, exactly? I think I know the answer.
And in typical Trump style, the current Ukraine-NATO-Russia negotiations have turned into a shell game. Now you see it, now you don’t. Trump had a Nobel Peace Prize in his hands, What did he do? Took a giant dump on it, that's what. And who exactly speaks for those supporting Ukraine now?
Zelensky? No. Trump? Now you see him, now you don’t. Is Graham now his spokesman? Cotton? Hegseth? The already translucent American cloak of invisibility in Ukraine is becoming too transparent.
You're wrong. And if I didn't include this disclaimer, I'm adding it now - *During war time (between signee and a non-signee) and/or when inspections could or would not be performed. The treaty includes provisions for on-site inspections and notifications to verify compliance with the numerical limits and other treaty obligations.
I can find the text of the actual treaty if you want but...
"The START Treaty, signed in 2010 and extended by Biden and Putin up until February 4, 2026, contains provisions for the verification of strategic offensive weapons, including heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments. The treaty mandates that these bombers be based at locations visible to national technical means of verification, such as satellite imagery, to allow monitoring by the other party, analysts report."
Let me summarize clearly, for anyone who wanders in here: the claim that the START treaty required Russia to leave its bombers out on the tarmac, instead of in hangars, is categorically false Russian propaganda. Follow the link in my previous comment, and see for example the Annex on Inspection Activities, Part Seven, Section 3, paragraph 6 (bottom of p. 76), which specifically anticipates bombers being stored in hangars. That possibility is also mentioned in passing in other places, such as the second paragraph of p. 12.
The Intellinews story is Russian propaganda and is false. I had never heard of Intellinews before; I wouldn't be at all surprised if it turned out to be an FSB operation.
"Tom" attempted to rescue the claim by conditioning the restriction on the presence of ongoing hostilities. I haven't read every word of the treaty and can't claim for certain that such language is not in there somewhere, but I seriously doubt it, and anyway the burden of proof is clearly on "Tom" at this point. I won't waste more of my time looking.
This was an unusual case. Most online debates about Ukraine get tangled up in questions that are either value judgments (which side would Ukraine be better off aligning with?), hypotheticals (what would have happened if NATO had refused Poland and the Baltics accession?), future events (how will the war end?), or issues whose facts are known to someone but which we as Internet keyboard warriors cannot directly verify (how many planes were put out of commission by Operation Spider's Web?). In this case, the Kremlin made the mistake of lying about something that can be directly verified, albeit with some effort, by reading the text of the treaty. In doing so, they have shown me, at least, that the volume, relentlessness, and influence of their propaganda is even greater than I had realized.
I've looked through the main treaty, Part Five of the Protocol (starts on p. 108), and the Annex on Inspection Activities, and what I found clearly contradicts your linked article (which doesn't mention your "in wartime" proviso), nor did I see any special provisions regarding wartime. See esp. p. 75ff of the Annex.
If you want to convince me it's there, I'll need a page number. Meanwhile, I'll assume that information published by a former START inspector is authoritative.
"Damaged" means nothing. They intentionally put rubber tires on the wings for multiple reasons, one of which is that the tires will catch fire and let off profusive smoke to fool the enemy into thinking more damage has been done than what really has. Latest official Russian statements have it down to 3-7 planes with real damage. Point is, the attack - if it was (almost certainly) aided by direct US or NATO intelligence - is potentially a terrible thing for all of us.
1) The western media and Ukrainian government ALWAYS overstate the extent of damage and casualties to Russia. The Russians know what really happened in such events. What their media (including state affiliated) reports should also be taken with a grain of salt, but not a boulder of salt like US/UK MSM. See: Today's reports about the "blowing up" of the Crimean bridge. Yeah, nice photos and videos, but they don't tell you that most if not all of the explosives hit pre-designed/implemented protection measures like dolphins (no, not the marine mammal) and screening and not the massive bridge columns themselves. All that fire and smoke tells a great story in the press and among western warmongers, but it's not what it appears to be. Where there's smoke there's fire, but there isn't always smoke and fire WHERE it would need to be to indicate guilt - or successful attacks.
2) They didn't accept it. The Russians launched a wave of ballistic and other missile attacks at Ukrainian targets including joint western + Ukrainian facilities. Needless to say the western MSM will report them as attacks on civilians.
Yes, the success of the Biden administration was a shining jewel in the philosophy of the collective globalism of the WEF and the EU, huh, Ken? Lamenting the open borders; welcome all cultures, regardless of purpose or agenda? Have you seen what’s happing in Europe with their open borders? How well the EU policy of strength in the diversity of all cultures is working out?
Sorry, Ken, I may have unfairly taken your article as a veiled criticism of the Trump administration, as your support of the failure of the status quo in D.C.
Trump’s bombing of the Houthis in Yemen only accomplished the loss of three F-18 jets at $67 million apiece, in addition to the nearly one billion total cost of moving two aircraft carrier battle groups off the Yemen coast for a few months. The US had its ass handed to it, so Trump withdrew the B-1 bombers at Diego Garcia and pulled our carriers back out. A total unmitigated embarrassment.
When you lose trust..........you lose trust. Who the hell is going to do business with the USA.
Look at the 'tourism' figures in the last few weeks.
Boycott USA
The man has never respected ANY signature, not even his own: On his marriage contracts, his employees' contracts [they had to sign a Non Disclosure Agreement], his work contractors [he stiffed most of them... Even his freaking LAWYERS, for crying out loud.
I appeal to the Leaders of the World, whomever they are, to promise to never sign ANYTHING with him.[they will for sure get rolled if they do, just like anyone who has ever signed any contract with him.
Leaders everywhere should get together and say they will not sign anything with the US until this madman is out of the White House [and, hopefully, in jail!]
"The man has never respected ANY signature, not even his own..."
Trump is basically the fully mask-off personification of American 'agreement capability' (to use a term favored by the Russians) - or lack thereof. It's in our DNA. I'm almost positive that the United States of America has abrogated, ignored, torn up, violated or otherwise taken a dump on far more treaties and promises than have ever been faithfully honored. Trump is the prototypical "Ugly American" and he's not shy about it. Give him that.
We have indeed. But you have to admit that this felon is in a class by itself in that department, by the sheer number. Looking at it another way, can you think of ONE signature he has respected?
Hmm. let me rephrase that. Perhaps with Putin...
Well. This is the 2nd madman?
"Look at the 'tourism' figures in the last few weeks."
But MAGA says that's "FAKE NEWS"!!!
Can't wait for any nuggets Ken digs up (or is leaked to) about the upcoming First Annual $200M Trump Birthday Bash Military Parade Extravaganza. Paid for out of all the money we saved through DOGE's ultra-successful purging of "waste, fraud and abuse."
I am old enough to remember the Soviet military parades. US coverage reported it as another example of the CCCP's insecurity & authoritarian control. The US did not have such parades because we were a democracy and had no need to show off weapons.
Yeah, the democracy crap was a facade--a well hidden one--but a military parade in the US is a repudiation of any shred of democracy.
Gonna go out, buy some weed & contemplate my navel.
Alternative suggestions are welcome
sounds to me like u've got it figured out. Stick with "plan-A"! ☮️
Actually, lee, Democracy is what put Trump in the White House!
I wouldn't call it democracy, but whatever. Biden was Weimar Germany. And now....
So let me get this straight, Lee, you're drawing an analogy that the Republicans are the Nazi's, and Donald Trump is Hitler?
How was Cadet Bone Spurs chosen to make a Graduation speech in front of our very best young West Point Cadets?
Maybe he demanded it, to look tough? He demands a lot of things these days... Many that look like extorsion from the outside: President Zelensky's rare earth minerals, a second hand plane from the Qataris... an acceptance of his tariffs by the rest of the world, and acceptance of his illegal acts regarding immigrants...
It is not going to end well for him and his family and his minions!
I had to read this article twice, and I still don’t get it. If its intent is to lament the passage of “soft power,” then I think it is a rare, indeed the only, instance I’m aware of in which Ken is off base. I’ll address that later, but first I want to delve a bit into that “colossal buildup of the United States Armed forces.”
Here is one stumbling point for me: “Yet behind the hyperbolic Trumpy talk, there is a colossal shift happening, most obviously here at home, along the southern border and in the war on immigration. The shift is also happening overseas, in ways hardly being discussed.” Just what is the “colossal shift” that is happening? For one thing this country has been on a trajectory for crossing the trillion dollar-plus threshold for at least some years now, if not decades. So what’s the big surprise (aside from the catch-your-breath shock at “trillion dollars” becoming commonplace as opposed to the long-accustomed “hundreds of billion.”
What’s the colossal shift? There’s the same seduction with expensive wizardry that doesn’t work (think F-35, which in its now shortened service life has recently seen the announcement of the development of its shamelessly eponymous F-47 successor, costing and promising God knows how much more, yet with operational readiness likely in direct inverse proportion due to software and other technological problems. As the saying goes, newer ain’t necessarily better.
The nuclear buildup was put on track by the Nobel Peace Prize winning Barak Obama, and the global (now even “out of this world” with the Space Command) foot print (bare knuckle-dragging print?) expanding – how much of a physical presence do we now have in the Middle East? - again nothing new.
There is even nothing new with the rhetoric, aside from being characteristically more brash and boastful under Trump, but what’s the substantive difference from his saying, “The military's job is to dominate any foe and annihilate any threat to America, anywhere, anytime in any place,” and Kamala Harris in her keynote address at the DNC last year in Chicago proclaiming, “As commander-in-chief, I will ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world”?
All right, I will concede a bit on the shift, though not a colossal one, in the unabashed blatancy of outright killing, rather than the more palatable “defending democracy,” “protecting our interests and those of our allies,” “keeping the peace” and other such horse s***. Yup, that’s progress, in the overall descent toward the new Dark Age.
Now for item #2, “soft power.” To begin, who would believe for a minute anything Joe Biden had to say on the topic? “Senator Credit Card” as Chris Hedges has described him, same guy who supported Dumbya’s excellent adventure in Iraq. Plus how could a guy with a 50-year political career at the core of The Empire possibly redirect the military-industrial-congressional-media-academia-think tank-national security state complex if he even wanted to? Nah, anything coming out his mouth concerning “soft power” was merely obligatory agitprop fog (of the warmongerers).
Coincidentally enough, the Boston Globe carried the obituary on May 12th of Joseph Nye (“I invented the concept of ‘soft power’ — the ability to get what one wants through attraction rather than coercion or payment,” he recalled in “A Life in the American Century,” his 2024 memoir.) For me the obituary contained enough inadvertent tip-offs – the Kennedy School at Harvard, premier networking and training ground for functionaries and courtiers of The Empire, where he taught and was dean, being one, and Hillary Clinton invoking the phrase in her 2009 confirmation hearings as secretary of state, “With smart power, diplomacy will be the vanguard of our foreign policy”, being another - to raise my suspicions that we’re looking at another propagandist for a “come see the softer side” of The Empire’s do-goodism in the vulnerable, exploitable parts of the world.
“Soft power” didn’t originate with Nye, it actually goes back to Kennan’s “Containment Policy” toward the Russian version of communism, which emphasized political and economic means, as well as by cultural and social example, to contain Russian communist expansionism. Paul Nitze expropriated and co-opted the containment theme but instead had Dean Acheson sack Kennan giving him free rein to redefine containment as through military means, and thus begin the massive and costly to this day arms buildup that Eisenhower warned us about in his 1961 “military-industrial complex” speech in 1961 and the preeminence of military might over diplomacy in The Empire’s foreign policy (see Viet Nam as an example).
As to “things like USAID, Voice of America, the Peace Corps, the Global Engagement Center, and other elements of American diplomacy, humanitarian assistance, nation building and democracy promotion”:
USAID has been a front for the CIA from the get-go, see “USAID: A history of front companies acting on behalf of the CIA” here http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/12659 and...
https://www.counterpunch.org/2025/02/16/what-we-dont-talk-about-when-we-talk-about-usaid/ [might be behind a paywall, but Counterpunch is worth the more-than-modest few bucks in support] and...
... from someone in Africa who’s been on the receiving end of USAID “assistance,” see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5mFSRb5dUOM
Voice of America’s ties with the CIA (as well as the agency’s other links to the media) can be seen here https://www.carlbernstein.com/the-cia-and-the-media-rolling-stone-10-20-1977 and here…
https://www.muckrock.com/news/archives/2017/jun/30/cia-us-and-soviet-propaganda/
The Peace Corps may be the sole US government aid agency remarkably clear of CIA and other intelligence agency involvement https://www.history.com/articles/8-little-known-facts-about-the-peace-corps and here...
https://content.time.com/time/specials/packages/printout/0,29239,2094254_2094247_2094275,00.html
The Institute for Global Engagement is a faith-based organization more interested in American evangelism in foreign policy than it is in providing any meaningful aid https://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Institute_for_Global_Engagement and here...
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15570274.2019.1608652#d1e101
In brief, when it comes to soft power and other elements of American diplomacy, humanitarian assistance, nation building and democracy promotion, think Gen. Smedley Butler, USMC:
“I served in all commissioned ranks from second lieutenant to Major General. And during that period I spent most of my time being a high-class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and for the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer for capitalism. I suspected I was just part of the racket all the time. Now I am sure of it.”
Trump doesn’t signify any colossal shift in The Empire’s exercise of power, he’s just being characteristically boastful about it.
Sorry, Ken, this time you took a swing, and fouled off.
There is an interesting update from Politico here https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/02/pentagon-greenland-northern-command-00381223 which begins with:
"The Pentagon is poised to shift its oversight of Greenland by putting it under U.S. Northern Command, a symbolic gesture that would more closely align the island territory with the U.S. as President Donald Trump continues to show interest in taking control over the Arctic landmass."
It's a characteristic of empires to boast and order and intimidate. Name one empire that has survived. As surely as human beings love power, they resist domination. This holds regardless of the level of military technology.
Not to say empires go down without a fight. They will use all means to retain power. We see this as intrusive use of tech to surveil everyone proceeds. The change in this regard in the first 25 years of this century are astounding. If tech allows something to be done, it will be done.
Modernity has humanity holding the tiger of technology by the tail. We get things that we enjoy like smartphones that only appear to give us freedom as behind the ease and convenience lie threats to our freedom, both those we know about and those we don't know about. Think of tech as the pied piper playing a tune that we follow irresistibly. Ironically, the emphasis is on deregulation and less government when regulation is the one and only thing that gives any protection from complete domination by wealth, but at the same time government intrusion increases. Remember Mick Jagger singing "gimme shelter"? There isn't any to be had from profit making.
Is there a way to stop this? I don't think so. Ignore reason, maximize your investments and, as advertising always tells us: enjoy! Trump, a man who shows no evidence of thinking deeply about anything, leads the way. He takes care of global warming easily by calling it a hoax; the ostrich way of facing the future. The American lifestyle demands it and we comply.
Interesting read.
Nary a murmur of Hunter’s hawg. What a loser. Eyes on the prize, Mr. President.
“The job of the U.S. Armed Forces is,” Trump remarked, “to spread democracy to everybody around the world at the point of a gun.”
Taken at face value, this is an absurdity. "Govern yourselves, or we'll kill you!" What sense does that make? You can't coerce someone into making free choices!
But coming from Trump, who has not the first idea of what democracy is or why it's valuable, it's worse than an absurdity. What he means is, we're going to force you to serve our interests, but we're going to _call_ that "spreading democracy".
One wonders whether the defeat to Ansar Allah has any role in this kind of talk. Oops, I meant in "THE HOUTHIS SURRENDER"... Still, I'm not seeing much in the way of re-militarization and the current state of affairs is not great. Now the US has depleted most of its ammo in Ukraine, Yemen and Gaza, what major strides will be made - nay, are even on the current drawing board - to make the US remotely capable of fighting a peer or near peer military just to a draw?
https://unherd.com/2025/05/americas-military-humiliation/
Meanwhile Ukraine, likely with heavy MI6, CIA, French or German help has attempted to escalate yet again in the past 12 hours by striking Russia's strategic (nuclear) bomber fleet at multiple air bases (and throw in a couple of terror attacks on railways to boot). The smoke has mostly cleared and the damage was MUCH lighter than trumpeted in the western MSM - I'm seeing just 3-4 planes damaged now, but the message was received. Those bombers were sitting out on the open tarmac specifically to be in compliance with START. During war time, inspections are limited or paused and the treaty requires signees to place their strategic bomber fleets out in the open so they can be seen by satellite. This is worrisome for a couple reasons: 1) Given that NATO is pulling the strings, what reason does Russia have to abide by these treaties anymore? and 2) It's an obvious attempt to poke and prod Russia's strategic capabilities (again, nuclear "defenses") for a future....what, exactly? I think I know the answer.
And in typical Trump style, the current Ukraine-NATO-Russia negotiations have turned into a shell game. Now you see it, now you don’t. Trump had a Nobel Peace Prize in his hands, What did he do? Took a giant dump on it, that's what. And who exactly speaks for those supporting Ukraine now?
Zelensky? No. Trump? Now you see him, now you don’t. Is Graham now his spokesman? Cotton? Hegseth? The already translucent American cloak of invisibility in Ukraine is becoming too transparent.
I have now learned that the START treaty never required strategic bombers to be stored in the open. That claim is false.
You're wrong. And if I didn't include this disclaimer, I'm adding it now - *During war time (between signee and a non-signee) and/or when inspections could or would not be performed. The treaty includes provisions for on-site inspections and notifications to verify compliance with the numerical limits and other treaty obligations.
https://www.intellinews.com/start-missile-treaty-exposed-russia-s-nuclear-bombers-to-ukrainian-drone-attack-384158/?source=russia
I can find the text of the actual treaty if you want but...
"The START Treaty, signed in 2010 and extended by Biden and Putin up until February 4, 2026, contains provisions for the verification of strategic offensive weapons, including heavy bombers equipped for nuclear armaments. The treaty mandates that these bombers be based at locations visible to national technical means of verification, such as satellite imagery, to allow monitoring by the other party, analysts report."
Crickets. As I expected. I called your bluff.
Let me summarize clearly, for anyone who wanders in here: the claim that the START treaty required Russia to leave its bombers out on the tarmac, instead of in hangars, is categorically false Russian propaganda. Follow the link in my previous comment, and see for example the Annex on Inspection Activities, Part Seven, Section 3, paragraph 6 (bottom of p. 76), which specifically anticipates bombers being stored in hangars. That possibility is also mentioned in passing in other places, such as the second paragraph of p. 12.
The Intellinews story is Russian propaganda and is false. I had never heard of Intellinews before; I wouldn't be at all surprised if it turned out to be an FSB operation.
"Tom" attempted to rescue the claim by conditioning the restriction on the presence of ongoing hostilities. I haven't read every word of the treaty and can't claim for certain that such language is not in there somewhere, but I seriously doubt it, and anyway the burden of proof is clearly on "Tom" at this point. I won't waste more of my time looking.
This was an unusual case. Most online debates about Ukraine get tangled up in questions that are either value judgments (which side would Ukraine be better off aligning with?), hypotheticals (what would have happened if NATO had refused Poland and the Baltics accession?), future events (how will the war end?), or issues whose facts are known to someone but which we as Internet keyboard warriors cannot directly verify (how many planes were put out of commission by Operation Spider's Web?). In this case, the Kremlin made the mistake of lying about something that can be directly verified, albeit with some effort, by reading the text of the treaty. In doing so, they have shown me, at least, that the volume, relentlessness, and influence of their propaganda is even greater than I had realized.
You should have taken your own suggestion and pulled up the text of the treaty: https://2009-2017.state.gov/t/avc/newstart/c44126.htm
I've looked through the main treaty, Part Five of the Protocol (starts on p. 108), and the Annex on Inspection Activities, and what I found clearly contradicts your linked article (which doesn't mention your "in wartime" proviso), nor did I see any special provisions regarding wartime. See esp. p. 75ff of the Annex.
If you want to convince me it's there, I'll need a page number. Meanwhile, I'll assume that information published by a former START inspector is authoritative.
The count of damaged planes is up to 13, and could increase further.
"Damaged" means nothing. They intentionally put rubber tires on the wings for multiple reasons, one of which is that the tires will catch fire and let off profusive smoke to fool the enemy into thinking more damage has been done than what really has. Latest official Russian statements have it down to 3-7 planes with real damage. Point is, the attack - if it was (almost certainly) aided by direct US or NATO intelligence - is potentially a terrible thing for all of us.
And, yet, the Russians accept this treatment. Are the only party in this circus that does not want WWIII?
Couple things to keep in mind:
1) The western media and Ukrainian government ALWAYS overstate the extent of damage and casualties to Russia. The Russians know what really happened in such events. What their media (including state affiliated) reports should also be taken with a grain of salt, but not a boulder of salt like US/UK MSM. See: Today's reports about the "blowing up" of the Crimean bridge. Yeah, nice photos and videos, but they don't tell you that most if not all of the explosives hit pre-designed/implemented protection measures like dolphins (no, not the marine mammal) and screening and not the massive bridge columns themselves. All that fire and smoke tells a great story in the press and among western warmongers, but it's not what it appears to be. Where there's smoke there's fire, but there isn't always smoke and fire WHERE it would need to be to indicate guilt - or successful attacks.
2) They didn't accept it. The Russians launched a wave of ballistic and other missile attacks at Ukrainian targets including joint western + Ukrainian facilities. Needless to say the western MSM will report them as attacks on civilians.
Yes, the success of the Biden administration was a shining jewel in the philosophy of the collective globalism of the WEF and the EU, huh, Ken? Lamenting the open borders; welcome all cultures, regardless of purpose or agenda? Have you seen what’s happing in Europe with their open borders? How well the EU policy of strength in the diversity of all cultures is working out?
Where did I say the Biden administration was a success??
Sorry, Ken, I may have unfairly taken your article as a veiled criticism of the Trump administration, as your support of the failure of the status quo in D.C.
My apologies 😊
Agree about MSM coverage, however even pods generally supportive of Russia wonder why no reaction. https://youtu.be/aoB8fUihexQ?feature=shared
Thanks for reporting on the substance. What I'm actually struck by is how close this is to the old Powell doctrine from the first Gulf War.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Powell_Doctrine
This could just as easily be a Trump quote:
''Our strategy to go after this army is very, very simple. First, we're going to cut it off, and then we're going to kill it."
https://www.upi.com/Archives/1991/01/23/Powell-Were-going-to-cut-it-off-kill-it/9990332341450/
Man, there's a LOT of TDS in these comments. Don't y'all have anything better to do?
Don't they/we have a recruiting problem?
ALL Dnjeper bridges should be destroyed