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Your March 3rd Briefing

We are so back.

The world has run out of cholera vaccines as outbreaks continue to occur throughout the world. This is due to all cholera vaccines coming from a single vaccine manufacturer, EuBiologics in South Korea, who has limited production capacity. Other companies are projected to enter the market soon, and hopefully by 2025 things will be largely back to normal.^S^

A broad coalition of EU lawmakers have called for a ban on all Russian energy, including gas, presumably as secret communist agents to accelerate the collapse of the EU.^E^

Increasing numbers of Arabs and Muslims are planning to vote for Donald Trump out of spite due to Biden’s fervent licking of the blood and mud on Netanyahu’s jackboots.^MEE^ From the Red Clarion: The Democrats Have Nothing Left To Offer You.

After many protests in the UK particularly over Gaza, Prime Minister Sunak has ordered a crackdown on protestors which would essentially make any act that isn’t sitting silently in a public field a criminal offence. A human rights campaign group is suing the government due to this.^NC^

AMLO proposed a package of 20 constitutional reforms in early Februrary, which is unlikely to survive congressional pushback but nonetheless represents the government’s latest attempt to reorient away from neoliberalism. Canada is also quite angry at AMLO, as Canadian companies have interests in 70% of Mexican mining operations, and AMLO wishes to grant property rights over Mexico’s energy and mining assets to all Mexican citizens.^MR^

Libertarian President Milei has stated his intention to implement reforms by decree due to the democratically elected parliament opposing him.^MP^

Algeria hosted leaders from 13 countries in Algiers, including Russia, Iran, Qatar, and Venezuela, in order to co-ordinate on natural gas investments. Algeria is the second largest supplier of natural gas to Europe, after Norway. However, despite aggressive plans to expand production up to 2030, infrastructure is limiting the amount of gas that can actually be supplied - and domestic needs from a growing population also need to be balanced.^AN^

Ghana has passed an anti-LGBTQIA+ bill which makes same-sex relationships, sexual activity, and public displays of affection illegal. People who support or fund related activities could face up to a decade in prison. This has faced international comdemnation from several countries, and the UN has called it "profoundly disturbing".^AN^

UN peacekeepers have begun withdrawing from the DRC, in which 12,000 troops have been located since 1999, with the government accusing the UN of not doing their goddamn jobs, which does seem like a fairly accurate view of how things have gone in practice.^RT^

At least 25 million Sudanese are suffering from hunger or malnutrition as the war continues to decimate the country. Less than 4% of the $2.7 billion in assistance that Sudan needs has been provided by donors so far this year, and last year, last than half was funded.^MEE^

Russia's Rosatom has received applications from several African countries for the construction of new nuclear power plants, such as South Africa, which has expressed interest in a floating NPP. An Egyptian NPP is under construction and Ghana, Kenya, Morocco, Tunisia, and Uganda also want them.^BNE^

Chinese company Transsion, with its three brands of Tecno, Infinix and iTel, have 48% of the African market share and are expanding into other markets, and experienced large growth in 2023 in both Africa and the Middle East, surpassing Samsung. This is due to a combination of relatively low prices, better marketing, and producing camera phones which work better with darker skin tones.^SCMP^

China has warned New Zealand not to harm its own security interests after it expressed interest in an AUKUS security partnership on cyberwarfare, AI, and hypersonic weapons.^SCMP^

The US has approved a $75 million weapons package to Taiwan which involves the Link 16 communications system - which completes Taiwan as the final link of the “transnational coalition kill chain”, giving Taiwan access to the jam-resistant tactical data network for co-ordinating NATO weapons systems that can be linked with countries like Japan, Australia, South Korea, and the US.^GPE^

The Biden administration has announced that they’re launching a probe into Chinese smart cars to protect the American car industry, with all the usual “Xi Jinping himself is spying on you through the car cameras and hidden microphones and, uh, kills a Ughyur every time you brake, or something.”.^RT^

The US has revealed that they have struck 230 targets in Yemen in response to their blockade; notably, the focus on big number rather than effect (HUNDREDS of sanctions on Russia!!!) is a tacit admission of the actual impotence of the attacks. In general, we’re seeing a rather uninspiring repeat of the propaganda that the US has used against Russia; that they’re running out of missiles, etc. ^NC^

It's getting harder to see settler colonialists as anything other than freakish abominable flesh constructs filled with nothing but malice and hatred.

https://www.radiohc.cu/en/noticias/internacionales/348473-irish-senate-votes-to-impose-sanctions-on-israel-prevent-us-weapons-from-crossing-its-airspace

Some positive news

Lula calls Bolsonaro a "coward" and mocks call for "amnesty"

In a harsh message to Bolsonaro, Lula said that his opponent was "cowardly" and didn't have the courage to carry out a coup d'état

Former President Jair Bolsonaro's (Liberal Party) request for amnesty for the coup plotters arrested on January 8 was mocked by President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva (Workers' Party). On Tuesday night (27 February), in an interview the president dismissed the possibility of the Executive branch taking the initiative for a measure that would benefit the imprisoned Bolsonaro supporters and called his opponent a "coward".

"Are you asking for amnesty? Do you want to erase the nonsense you've done? The nonsense is that he [Bolsonaro] chickened out, thought up the coup, didn't have the courage," Lula told journalist Kennedy Alencar.

The possibility of Lula's government proposing an "amnesty" to Congress was raised by Bolsonaro in an interview. But he admitted that this is a "very difficult" scenario. "I know that Parliament is the body that decides this issue, but if it comes from the Executive, it would be very welcome," he said.

That wasn't enough to convince Lula. The president pointed out that, for the "barbarities he has done", Bolsonaro should submit to the legal process to which every citizen is entitled in a democracy, including the "presumption of innocence" which, he repeated, he did not have during the Lava Jato process, in reference to the operation led by former judge and now senator Sergio Moro.

"First you'll be judged, you've committed a lot of barbarity. You will be judged, appreciated. You'll have your defense lawyer. I just want you to have the presumption of innocence that I didn't have. I want you to be able to say what you did and didn't do. It's your right, a right of democracy. And that's what I guarantee my best friend and my worst enemy: the right to a full defense," said Lula.

President Lula da Silva then went on to say that his opponent "chickened out" and didn't have the courage to carry out a coup d'état.

"Are you asking for amnesty? Do you want to erase the nonsense you've done? The nonsense is that he chickened out, thought up the coup, didn't have the courage. He left for the US in advance, thinking that it [the coup] would happen, that society would all leave terrified and he would come back anointed by the masses. And that's not what happened. What happened is that the institutions took responsibility for democracy and you are now in the process of being investigated," he said.

Finally, Lula also criticized Bolsonaro for the fact that the former president kept quiet during his statement to the Federal Police about an alleged criminal organization that was plotting a coup d'état in 2022.

Although he himself used the artifice in April 2019, at a hearing before the PF in Curitiba, where he was being held, as columnist Guilherme Amado, from Metrópoles, recalled.

"I know that when a guy is a coward, he doesn't talk. When the guy is a coward and goes to give evidence, his lawyer says: 'Don't say anything'. And I know that he went there and kept his mouth shut," said Lula.

"Because he talks nonsense all day long, when he was president it was morning, noon and night. Now in the process, he comes in all thin, not wanting to talk. So that's what's going to happen, he's going to be investigated, he's going to give evidence and one day he'll be tried. If he's innocent, he'll be innocent," he concluded.

Biden officials weigh giving Ukraine weapons without replacing U.S. stocks right away or waiting for Congress funds

Biden administration officials met Tuesday at the Pentagon to discuss ways to fill some of Ukraine’s urgent needs for artillery and ammunition quickly, including possibly drawing down U.S. stockpiles without replenishing them immediately or without waiting for more money from Congress, say two senior administration officials and a congressional official.

In the meeting, officials discussed various ways the Pentagon could resupply critical artillery and ammunition that Ukraine is expected to run out of soon, even while the White House’s request for new funding from Congress remains stalled, the officials said. No decisions have been made, according to the officials.

The discussions reflect growing alarm in the administration that Ukraine is poised to run out of key weaponry in the next few weeks, including 155 mm artillery rounds and air defense munitions.

yes please give away US stockpiles of weapons

In other news, Biden is just lying about inflation now

[Oppose renaming article Al-Rashid humanitarian aid incident → Al-Rashid massacre] absolutely no one has cited anything that shows this is commonly called a massacre. I searched up the incident and found these results: [1], [2], [3], [4], [5]. 2 of those sources don't even say "massacre" once, the other three only attribute it to Hamas, Fatah, and Qatar. Meanwhile, the term incident is used in all sources multiple times, unattributed. No one bothered to look at and use the sources on this. Absolutely no arguments on policy whatsoever. Wikipedia is supposed to function on policy, not on opinions devoid of policy.

Wikipedia brain is terminal. Wikipedia policy of going purely on "trusted sources" (i.e. Western sources) instead of "original research" (describing what you can plainly see) is harmful.

Marc Lamont Hill is in a Twitter Space right now debating some DNCbot about whether it's correct/OK to call Joe Biden "Genocide Joe", and I am extremely tempted to join as an "expert" on that nickname.

Nikolai I. Ryzhkov, the last premier of the council of ministers of the Soviet Union has just passed away today.

As a man who made many rightist mistakes and later lived in the world that resulted from those mistakes, he lived the rest of his life working with the KPRF to undo the damage that was wrought by Glasnost, Perestroika, and the fascist wave that overtook many of the former Warsaw pact nations.

Houthis say they have a suprise tool that they will talk about later.

Europe running out of materials to make war supplies, blames China.

Here I was under the impression the superior Europeans didn't want Chinese cotton because it's all harvested by muslim slaves that are being ruthlessly oppressed by the soulless Chinese communists.

Glorious cope from the garden as the continually find out the results of their fucking around in years past.

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/europe/article/3253928/europe-battles-gunpowder-shortage-supply-shells-ukraines-defence-against-russia

"Israel" has done another aid massacre https://www.aljazeera.com/news/liveblog/2024/3/3/israels-war-on-gaza-live-every-minute-counts-as-hunger-kills-in-gaza

The ethical response would be to [redacted]

The Transnistria Russia merger thing is real lol.

Heads up, there's photos of some Palestinian man who got ran over by an IOF bulldozer all over Twitter. And it's super gory. So gory that it didn't even register as human viscera when I first saw it.

Of course Brandon walked back the Monday ceasefire thing.

What Aaron Bushnell Did in the Military (Ken Klippenstein)

shot a Palestinian carrying a bag of flour after a crowd gathered to recieve aid. (Cw graphic)

I can't shake the feeling that if Swedish unions lose the conflict with Tesla, it will have a domino effect on labor in the EU. It would be a huge symbolic victory for Capital, showing that big multinationals now have the power to weather the strikes and deny collective bargaining so long as they don't mind bleeding money for a while. The silver lining would be that it could lead to a renaissance for labor organizing and active participation as contradictions deepen, but that may also be wishful thinking on my part, times being what they are.

I've been so depressed about the ME and the looming nothingness I haven't been able to play video games to escapism in a week.it's like I want to vidya game to escapism, but I can't.

Went down a wikipedia rabbit hole and found out there is a town named after Alexei Stakhanov.

Ukraine renamed the city 'Kadiivka' in 2016, and refers to the city by this name, however Ukraine has not controlled the city since early 2014.[2][3][4]

Lol

NSFW/L CW MURDER

rams two Palestinian teens riding a bike. One ethno-fascist gets out and murders one of the teens point blank in the back of the head.

when is the icj meant to meet again in regards to South Africa-Israel? i recall the ICJ said a month from that point in late Jan.

sure are a lot of layoffs happening, huh

I'm sure the economy is fine

Was looking at some of the “no party affiliation” candidates in CA senate primary election. I came across a questionnaire that Laura Garza filled out for the OC Register (link). It first mentions she was “Former vice presidential candidate on Socialist Workers Party ticket in 1996”. I’m thinking hmmm… that’s sounds kinda Trot-y, but maybe not. Let’s see what her positions are. First question was about Palestine, “israel”, Ukraine, and Russia… and this was the response:

I defend Israel’s right to exist as a refuge for Jews and condemn the Jew-hating pogrom organized by Hamas with the backing of the Iranian regime. The capitalist regime in Tehran and the reactionary forces it backs in Hamas, Hezbollah and Islamic Jihad are enemies not only of Jews but of working people of all nationalities. So long as capitalism exists, in times of crisis, the rulers will turn to scapegoating Jews to smash the working class as they did in Nazi Germany. The fight for workers’ power and socialism is the only solution to end the anti-working class poison of Jew-hatred.

I stand with the people of Ukraine in their battle for independence and sovereignty over all of Ukraine and against Moscow’s reactionary invasion.

I don’t support the policies of the U.S. capitalist class and their military, which is used worldwide to defend U.S. profits and imperialist domination, not the interests of working people here or elsewhere. I am for the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Korea, the Middle East and Europe. I defend the Cuban Revolution and call for an end to the U.S. embargo on Cuba, which is used to suffocate the Cuban population for their decision to reject living under Washington’s boot.

What a fascinating mix of leftist language and absolute dogshit, sprinkled with some good takes (but also ones that even normal libs support, like ending the blockade on Cuba). Honestly, her takes on “israel” sounds like what an actual neo-Nazi would come up with if they were trying to make a caricature of a leftist.

If anybody wants a good source to follow what's going on in Sudan, then I've been using the Sudan War Monitor substack.

Also, I want to briefly re-state my incandescent hatred for journalists. The audacity of journalists - the people who are, hypothetically, meant to keep the population informed of what's going on - calling what's going on in Sudan the "forgotten war"... my brothers in christ, it wouldn't be forgotten if you fucking talked about it.

From that FT article:

With no let-up in the war, the stalled diplomatic process must be urgently revived. Two developments provide the tiniest crumbs of hope. Last month, Sudan’s warring factions participated in secret talks in Bahrain, a sign that even the deluded generals may realise that neither side can win. And the US, better late than never, is about to appoint a special envoy, widely trailed as Tom Perriello, a former Democratic congressman. He needs strong White House backing to be effective.

There are no good solutions to the deep-seated crisis in Sudan, which threatens to become another Somalia. The hope — if it can be called that — is that the genie of war can somehow be put back in its bottle.

"Which threatens to become another Somalia?" I am going to go insane.

A great comment from @Frank@hexbear.net a few months ago:

I would like to object to the term "random act of piracy". Somali piracy has a long history tied in to geopolitics. It's a fascinating history; After the collapse of the Somali government back in the 80s there was no coast guard or navy to police Somali waters. Foreign fishing vessels entered somali waters and essentially strip mined the fisheries, leaving the somali fishing industry devastated. At the same time foreign firms began dumping toxic waste in to Somali waters. The first pirates were semi-organized militias trying to protect Somali waters from these foreign depredations. The militias quickly realized that seizing ships and crews for ransom was a profitable way to bring in hard currency in a region where the economy was devastated.

Pirate raids by Somalis have always been incredibly dangerous, with a terrifying death rate for the raiders, but for a long time there were no other real prospects and income from ransoms provided one of the few sources of hard currency for coastal Somalia.

International forces, of course, made no attempt to aid Somalis in keeping those pirating fish and dumping waste out of Somali waters, but were quick to respond militarily to Somali piracy. Such is geopolitics.

Also, Biden re-sent hundreds of troops to Somalia when Trump withdrew them.

The Axis of Asymmetry takes on the 'rules-based order'

Foreword:

World War III is here, playing out asymmetrically in military, financial, and institutional battlefields, and the fight is an existential one. The western Hegemon, in truth, is at war against international law, and only 'kinetic military action' can bring it to heel.

by Pepe Escobar at The Cradle.

The Axis of Asymmetry is in full swing. These are the state and non-state actors employing asymmetrical moves on the global chessboard to sideline the US-led western rules-based order. And its vanguard is the Yemeni resistance movement Ansarallah. Ansarallah is absolutely relentless. They have downed a $30 million MQ-9 Reaper drone with just a $10k indigenous missile. They are the first in the Global South ever to use anti-ship ballistic missiles against Israel-bound and/or -protecting commercial and US Navy ships. For all practical purposes, Ansarallah is at war with no less than the US Navy. Ansarallah has captured one of the US Navy's ultra-sophisticated autonomous underwater vehicles (AUV), the $1.3 million Remus 600, a torpedo-shaped underwater drone able to carry a massive payload of sensors. Next stop: reverse engineering in Iran? The Global South eagerly awaits, ready to pay in currencies bypassing the US dollar.

All of the above – a maritime 21st-century remix of the Ho Chi Minh trail during the Vietnam War – spells out that the Hegemon may not even qualify as a paper tiger, but rather as a paper leech.

Lula tells it as the Global South sees it

Into the Big Picture – linked to the relentless ongoing genocide perpetrated by Israel in Gaza – steps a true leader of the Global South, Brazil’s President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva. Lula spoke in the name of Brazil, Latin America, Africa, BRICS 10, and the overwhelming majority of the Global South when he cut to the chase and defined the Gaza tragedy for what it is: a genocide. No wonder the Zionist tentacles across the Global North – plus its Global South vassals – went bonkers. The genocidals in Tel Aviv declared Lula as persona non grata in Israel. Yet Lula did not assassinate 29,000+ Palestinians – the overwhelming majority of whom were women and children. History will be unforgiving: it’s the genocidals that will eventually be judged as personae non grata to all of humanity.

What Lula said represented BRICS 10 in action: this was obviously cleared before with Moscow, Beijing, Tehran, and, of course, the African Union. Lula spoke in Addis Ababa, and Ethiopia is now a BRICS 10 member. The Brazilian president was extremely smart in timing his Gaza fact-check to be on the table during the G20 meeting of Foreign Ministers in Rio. Way beyond BRICS 10, what’s happening in Gaza is a consensus among the non-Western G20 partners – who are actually a majority. No one, though, should expect any serious follow-up inside a divided G20. The heart of the matter remains in the facts on the ground.

Yemen’s fight for “our people” in Gaza is a matter of humanistic, moral, and religious solidarity – these are foundational tenets of the rising eastern "civilizational" powers, both domestically and in international affairs. This convergence of principles has now created a direct link – extrapolating to the moral and spiritual spheres – between the Axis of Resistance in West Asia and the Slavic Axis of Resistance in Donbass. Extreme attention should be paid to the timescale. The Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR) forces and Russia have spent two hard-fought years in Novorossiya just to arrive at the stage where it becomes clear – based on the battlefield and cumulative facts on the ground – that “negotiations” mean only the terms of Kiev’s surrender.

In contrast, the job of the Axis of Resistance in West Asia has not even started. It’s fair to argue that its strength and full sovereign involvement have not been deployed yet (think Hezbollah and Iran). Hezbollah Secretary-General Hassan Nasrallah, with his proverbial subtlety, has hinted there’s, in fact, nothing to negotiate on Palestine. And if there would be a return to any borders, these would be the 1948 borders. The Axis of Resistance understands that the whole Zionist Project is unlawful and immoral. But the question remains how to throw it, in practice, into the dustbin of History? Possible – avowedly optimistic – scenarios ahead would include Hezbollah taking possession of the Galilee as a step toward the eventual retaking of the Israeli-occupied Golan Heights. Yet the fact remains that even a united Palestine does not have the military capability to reconquer stolen Palestinian lands.

So the questions posed by the overwhelming majority of the Global South that stands with Lula may be: Who else, apart from Ansarallah, Hezbollah, Hashd al-Shaabi, will join the Axis of Asymmetry in the fight for Palestine? Who would be willing to come to the Holy Land and die? (After all, in Donbass, it’s only Russians and Russophones who are dying for historically Russian lands) And that brings us to the way towards the endgame: only a West Asian Special Military Operation (SMO), to the bitter end, will settle the Palestinian tragedy. A translation of what happens across the Slavic Axis of Resistance: “Those who refuse to negotiate with Lavrov, deal with Shoigu.”

The menu, the table, and the guests

That out-of-his-depth closet neocon, Secretary of State Tony Blinken, let the cat out of the bag when he actually defined his much cherished “rules-based international order”: “If you're not on the table, you are on the menu.” Following his own hegemonic logic, it’s clear that Russia and the US/NATO are on the table while Ukraine is on the menu. What about the Red Sea? The Houthis defending Palestine against US–UK–Israel are clearly on the table, while Western vassals supporting Israel in a maritime way are clearly on the menu. And that’s the problem: the Hegemon – or, in Chinese scholarly terminology, “the crusaders” – have lost the power to place the name cards on the table. The main reason for this authority collapse is the build-up of serious international meetings sponsored by the Russia–China strategic partnership during the past two years since the start of the SMO. It’s all about sequential planning, with long-term targets clearly outlined. Only civilizational states can do that – not plutocratic neoliberal casinos.

Negotiating with the Hegemon is impossible because the Hegemon itself prevents negotiations (see the serial blocking of ceasefire resolutions at the UN). Additionally, the Hegemon excels in instrumentalizing its client elites across the Global South via threats or kompromat: see the hysterical reaction of Brazilian mainstream media to Lula’s verdict on Gaza. What Russia is showing the Global South, two years after the start of the SMO, is that the only path to teach a lesson to the Hegemon has to be kinetic, or “military-technical.” The problem is no nation-state can compare to nuclear/hypersonic/military superpower Russia, in which 7.5 percent of the government’s budget is dedicated to military production. Russia is and will remain on a permanent war footing until Hegemon’s elites come to their senses – and that may never happen.

Meanwhile, West Asia's Axis of Resistance is watching and learning, day after day. It’s always crucial to keep in mind that for all the resistance movements across the Global South – and that also includes, for instance, West Africans against French neo-colonialism – the geopolitical fault lines could not be starker. It's a matter of the collective West versus Islam; the collective West versus Russia; and sooner rather than later, a substantial part of the West, even reluctantly, versus China. The fact is we are already immersed in a World War that is both existential and civilizational. As we stand at the crossroads, there is a bifurcation: either escalation towards overt “kinetic military action,” or a multiplication of Hybrid Wars across several latitudes.

So it’s up to the Axis of Asymmetry, cool, calm, and collected, to forge the underground corridors, passages, and trails capable of undermining and subverting the US-led, unipolar, rules-based international order.

another retired Polish general going off, happens quite often actually

Poland Daily 24 - Polish General Said Deporting Ukrainians from Poland Would Help on the Frontline… But Would It Really? [06/02/2024]

General Skrzypczak proposed that the Polish government take a drastic measure to support Kyiv by deporting all Ukrainian men residing in Poland back to their homeland. He believes this action would strengthen Ukraine’s defense capabilities. “The Polish government should assist Kyiv in the deportation of Ukrainians living abroad. We need to reach out to Ukrainian citizens who are living abroad to address this issue. This initiative should be directed towards the governments in Warsaw, Paris, Prague, and wherever else they may be residing. These governments should help Kyiv in carrying out the deportations,” Skrzypczak stated during a TOK FM radio interview on January 23.

My newest discovery in the saga of George Galloway, Rishi Sunak and Sky News is a strange one.

The video Sky News posted. This one. I've just discovered through a friend that Sky News have set it to be blocked in Russia.

They don't block their other content in Russia.

Only this video.

Very strange and curious behaviour. I have no idea what they're thinking.