Listen to a reading of this article:

In an appearance on the MSNBC show Velshi, The Modern War Institute’s John Spencer explicitly advocated direct US military conflict with Russia due to allegations of war crimes in the Ukrainian city of Bucha.

“I’m ready to commit at this moment — unlike I was before this day — to put people in direct contact with Russia, to stop Russia,” Spencer said. “Call it peacekeeping. Call it what you will. We have to do more than provide weapons. And by ‘we,’ I mean the United States. Yes, we’ll do it as a coalition with lots of other people, but we are the example. So put boots on the ground, send weapons directly at Russia.”

Notice the bizarre verbal gymnastics being used by Spencer to obfuscate the fact that he is advocating a hot war with a nuclear superpower: “put people in direct contact with Russia,” “send weapons directly at Russia”. Who talks like that? He’s calling for the US military to fire upon the Russian military, he’s just saying it really weird.

To be clear this isn’t just some arms industry-funded think tanker saying this; The Modern War Institute is part of the Department of Military Instruction for the United States Military Academy, which is operated directly by the Pentagon.

Asked by the show’s host Ali Velshi what he thought of warnings that direct military confrontation with Russia could lead to nuclear war, Spencer said, “It is a huge risk, I understand that. But today is different.”

Velshi himself was much more to the point than his guest, both online and on social media.

“We are past the point of sanctions and strongly-worded condemnations and the seizing of oligarchs’ megayachts,” Velshi told his MSNBC audience. “If this is not the kind of moment that the United Nations and NATO and the UN and the G-20 and the Council of Europe and the G-7 were made for, what was the point of these alliances if not to stop this? The world cannot sit by as Vladimir Putin continues this reign of terror.”

“The turning point for the west and NATO will come when the sun rises over Kyiv on Sunday, and the war crimes against civilian non-combatants becomes visible to all,” Velshi said on Twitter over the weekend. “There is no more time for prevarication. If ‘never again’ means anything, then this is the time to act.”

Asked what specifically he meant by this, Velshi clarified that he was advocating “Direct military involvement.”

“Lines have been crossed and war crimes have been committed by Putin that make direct military intervention something NATO now must seriously consider,” Velshi added.

When I called Velshi a fucking lunatic for expressing these views (to my mind the only sane response to such madness), he argued that going to war with Russia for Ukraine would not necessarily lead to nuclear war, claiming that “A no fly zone is not so different from the endless supply of weaponry the west is sending in to Ukraine.”

These are not sane or acceptable things for mainstream pundits to be telling people. Directly attacking the Russian military would indeed risk unleashing a chain of rapid escalations that could easily lead to full-scale nuclear war; there would be far too many small, moving parts for this to be anywhere remotely close to predictable or controllable. A no-fly zone over Ukraine would immediately put NATO powers in direct hot war with Russia, which is in fact completely different from shipping weapons to Ukrainian forces.

The fact that a nuclear superpower cannot be regarded in the same way as a nation without nukes has been basic, common sense orthodoxy for all major powers since Stalin got the bomb. This is not some kind of advanced esoteric understanding that you can only grasp if you’ve been studying this stuff for years; as far as I know children are still learning about the history of nuclear weapons and Mutually Assured Destruction in grade school. This isn’t something you should have to explain to grown adults, much less influential mainstream news media pundits.

But it’s becoming more and more common. The line that we’re already in World War 3 and need to begin acting accordingly is showing up more and more often. The idea that NATO powers might be able to get away with attacking the Russian military in Ukraine without sparking a nuclear exchange is fast becoming its own genre of western foreign policy punditry, and that trend looks to accelerate with the latest (arguably pretty dubious) claims of Russian atrocities in this war.

Already we’ve got Velshi’s cries for World War 3 joined by the likes of Human Rights Foundation Chairman Garry Kasparov, who apparently spent so long training to beat a machine that he turned into one:

 

Image

You’ve also got opinion makers in outlets like The New York Times telling people that “The United States and NATO should be less deferential to Mr. Putin’s attempt to wield the threat of nuclear weapons — not only for the sake of supporting Ukraine but also to ensure global geopolitical stability in the future.”

There’s also the galling White House press conferences in which ambitious reporters aggressively demand to know why the Biden administration isn’t doing more to escalate against Russia, as clear an illustration as you could ask for of the fact that the mainstream press are only allowed to be pushy and confrontational with US government officials when they’re demanding more bloodshed.

As we’ve discussed previously, even if these increasingly loud calls for hot war between nuclear superpowers don’t immediately succeed, what they do is push the Overton window of mainstream discourse all the way over toward the most warmongering extreme possible so that calls for more escalation seem moderate and calls for de-escalation look like extremist apologia for Vladimir Putin. In the very best-case scenario they leave people far more open to consenting to far more nuclear brinkmanship than any thinking person should ever consent to.

This is not okay. It is not okay for them to do this to us. It is not okay for them to normalize the idea of escalations that could easily end humankind. That is the most insane position that any person could possibly take. More insane than Nazism, or any other extremist ideology you could think of. Supporting actions that may lead to human extinction makes these people enemies of our entire species.

Ukraine is still accepting foreign volunteers. If these omnicidal war sluts are so horny for “direct military involvement” against Russia, I wish they would just get on a plane and go do it themselves without trying to drag all of humanity into it with them.

You want direct military involvement? Fine. Go do it yourself. Be the direct military involvement you want to see in the world.

__________________________

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166 responses to “Pundits Who Advocate Hot War With Russia Are Enemies Of Humanity”

  1. That news segment looked like two hostage videos calling for war at the same time.

  2. Thank you ,Caitlin, for calling this so clearly — and with the degree of anger it deserves. I’m expressing my anger by making a generous donation to you and then trying to figure out how I can break through the sound barrier to let these purveyors of war know how fed up we the people are with the crimes committed in our name and the dangers their blathering and lying for war put us in. How Dare They! How do we reach them? You’re doing a darn good job and for that I’m most grateful.

  3. Fools rush in where Angels fear to tread. Velshi is an emotional idiot. Give him an M-16, dress him in camo and air-drop him into the Russian lines if he wants war. Seriously. Take the man.

  4. Mike McDonnell Avatar
    Mike McDonnell

    We are getting a lesson in the Fermi Paradox. I hope we can learn the lesson instead of being just another example, but I have less hope every day.

  5. This time the powers that be don’t want a “cold war”. Like kids with a new toy that goes bang, they want to play war. The Joint Chiefs, still mad as hatters, revived the doctrine of winnable nuclear war in the new Great Power Conflict doctrine of 2019. Peace-prize house servant Obomber had already authorized a $1.5 trillion nuclear modernization program. The Chiefs risk the future of civilization on their crackpot theory that there is a difference between tactical and strategic nuclear weapons, that the former, half the size of the Hiroshima bomb or less, can be used against enemy forces on the battlefield without retaliation on the attacker’s homeland by the strategic nukes, a hundred or more times more powerful. But Putin had drawn a red line there earlier this year, and the madmen, like the overgrown schoolyard bullies they are, are itching to call his bluff. The Russian leader warned that a nuclear strike of any size anywhere will be immediately answered by nuclear strikes not only on the missile launch site but on the cities where the decision to launch was given.
    *
    Two weeks ago a modern Russian Borei-class stealth submarine was reported to have appeared quite near US territorial waters. Her approach was undetected until the boat surfaced, specifically as a warning statement. She carries a nominal complement of sixteen Bulava missiles, each equipped with ten nuclear warheads, giving this single vessel the capacity to obliterate much of the United States. With the Akula-class boats, there are at least ten such submarines operating invisibly near both US coastlines right now.
    *
    And this threat won’t go away when Ukraine surrenders. Biden has spoken of continuing the existential provocation of Russia by installing nuclear-armed missiles in Poland and elsewhere in Europe. With China and India, Russia is launching the economic initiative that is the only way to end US imperialism. When hungry Americans are rioting in the streets, our oligarchs may finally be distracted from their mad obsession to rule the world. It would certainly be a delicious irony if we one day welcome Russian troops to fight alongside us, the way our forefathers welcomed the Royal Marines of mother England’s mortal enemy, France, in our first War of Independence.

  6. As if Russia gives a fvck what they say !

    Russia are bringing down the entire Rothschilds Kharzarian Mafia monetary system on behalf of the BELT road !

  7. looks like one, sounds like one and hence is one.

    kasparov, no word can describe what he is. A machine? Too kind and outright offensive to useful things!

  8. “If this is not the kind of moment that the United Nations and NATO and the UN and the G-20 and the Council of Europe and the G-7 were made for, what was the point of these alliances if not to stop this?”

    Well, gosh, I always understood that the point of all those alliances was to ensure continued US global hegemony. And that creates violence rather than stopping it.

    Some people would argue that the “United Nations” (“and the UN” ?) is not an “alliance,” but an international body whose purpose is to prevent war, not to authorize unilateral aggression initiated by a member state. But I agree that if we judge by the recent behaviour of UN leadership, it does seem to have become yet another tool of hegemony.

    1. I loved your last (self-published) novella, “Don’t Mention Russia”. Grishamesque.

      1. all of your posts are self published “don’t mention the biolabs, don’t mention the goal of regime change in Russia”. The US and NATO could end this today, but they don’t.

  9. New report coming out of Fox News that Kasparov and Nancy Pelosi have been practicing sex magick for decades to overthrow the Christ current in Putin with something demonic and liberal. The Cthulhu-crazed Neocon shitlibs seeded Nazi viruses in Ukraine to force Russia to mount a peaceful invasion. The CIA news channels in USA (all the news channels except Fox) broadcast 24 hour deep-fake videos of aggressive war to bring up Russophobic hysteria to required level for triggering nukes – the liberal-Cthulhu galactic orgasm, the end of humanity. Praise the ancient ones! Hail Eris and Nancy Pelosi, demonic Devilmother, black jism-queen, progressive, Bride of Satan.

    1. If you’ve any notions of a career in satire, I’d advise you to stick with your current job.

    2. I’ll never take job advice from a CIA employee like yourself, Greg.

      1. You should take his advice . . .
        Really !!

      2. And neither will I ever take advice from someone who puts two exclamation marks after the word “really”.

    3. I’m not a regular here, though I do read nearly all of Caitlin’s pieces. But after reading through the comments on this piece, I understand that people really don’t take this seriously. You’ll be accusing one another of being trolls up until the second your hair gets fried off.

      What part of “Mutually Assured Destruction” don’t you understand? And if you do understand it, how can you not understand that if it happens, it will only be because of the kind of stupid slip-up, the kind of simple human failure, that are all too common?

      1. You’re right about that, at least – that it’s a perilous situation. You’re wrong about everything else. You’re wrong about the paths to defusing it. Before Putin invaded Ukraine, everyone from Edward Snowden to Glenn Greenwald to Tucker Carlson (not to mention the circle that boost and retweet Caitlin) denied there would be an invasion. They said the warnings about an invasion were warmongering liberal hysteria. The implication was that Russia had no real requirement to invade, and so wouldn’t invade. Certainly the implication wasn’t that Russia was being forced to invade – since Russia *wouldn’t* invade. They seemed so certain. Funny how their narrative has changed.
        The only one who can end this and de-escalate is Putin. Only Putin can bring us back from the nuclear brink. Biden has said from the outset that a direct military response to Russia is off the table. And he has stuck by that despite the dangerous and stupid calls for escalation from a handful of idiots. The focus should be on getting Putin to de-escalate militarily. Not by appeasement, and not by military response.

        1. Biden won’t rule out a first strike by US nuclear forces, you “antiwar activist”.

          “everyone from Edward Snowden to Glenn Greenwald to Tucker Carlson (not to mention the circle that boost and retweet Caitlin) denied there would be an invasion. ”

          dunno about Carlson but Greenwald didn’t. keep lying.

        2. Snowden admitted on Twitter that he was wrong to pour scorn on the warnings of an invasion. Tucker Carlson admitted on his Fox News show that he was wrong about it. Matt Taibbi and others also admitted they’d been wrong about pooh-poohing the idea of a military invasion. Greenwald? He just deleted a bunch of pre-Feb 27 tweets, to save face. But the evidence is there, in screen captures, RTs of Michael Tracey posts, etc, etc. See also: https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2022/03/tucker-carlson-glenn-greenwald-coping-russia-ukraine-wrong-wrong-wrong.html

          1. Do you know that the explosion #’s registered in the Donbass from Ukrainian shelling (of mostly civilian locations) rose from about 100/day on Feb 15 up to an average of 1400/day from Feb. 18-22? This offensive (and fatal) escalation was accompanied by a massive Ukrainian military build up along the LDNR line of contact. Plus Russia was completely stonewalled on its diplomatic efforts to have their stated security imperatives dealt with. This information helps any sentient person understand how things might have changed at that time. Quite possibly you’re not in that social cohort.

          2. i think even putin was wrong. only team-biden was right.

        3. “The focus should be on getting Putin to de-escalate militarily. Not by appeasement, and not by military response.”

          By appeasement I assume you mean ceding to the demands Russia has stated very clearly are a redline for Russia’s State security.

          So then, if you rule out ceding to Russia’s stated red-line conditions, and you rule out military response (as we should), what is left?
          Please tell us, what focus apart from the above two that you’ve ruled out can get Putin to ‘de-escalate’ militarily? Seriously, what is this other thing that can work?

  10. I keep hearing on my local South Florida news programs that, after “fleeing” from Kiev, the Russians left behind enormous numbers of dead Ukies, many tortured and buried in mass graves. They allege there is considerable evidence that should lead to Putin’s personal conviction on war crimes charges, a promise that Lord Biden underscored once again today even after his own administration backpeddled on his incendiary characterisation of President Putin.
    ~
    All this seems hard to reconcile with Russia’s deliberate go-slow campaign meant to spare both lives and infrastructure. In contrast, the Ukro-Nazis are outspoken warmongers and purveyors of racial hatred such I have never heard since Hitler. They started this entire conflict with their widespread oppression of ethnic Russians who have been living inside “Ukraine” since it was Novorussiya back in the 1700’s.
    ~
    Why should anyone but brainwashed mostly Russophobic Americans too lazy to enquire after truth rather than their official “conventional wisdom” believe any narrative other than that all the dead bodies represent Russians who were victimised by the froathing Ukie murderers. Just panning an alleged scene of wanton atrocity victims with a wide angle camera does nothing to identify the dead, ascertain who they were and who actually tortured and killed them. Based on the rhetoric emanating from each camp, simple logic tells me these are most likely Russian victims of Ukie war crimes. Putin promised to capture, prosecute and punish war criminals the day he sent his troops over the border. I take him at his word that this will come to pass and I venture to say most of the war criminals are likely to be Ukro-Nazis, in spite of America’ best efforts to protect those bastards.

    1. You’re so right. Putin is the one upholding international law. He’s so careful not to hurt anyone. He instructed his forces to go easy and use cotton wool as bullets. Meanwhile, Nazi Ukraine, a country full of fascist torturers, who are also employed by the CIA to bring about nuclear holocaust, is the real evil. Thank Christ that the truth is coming out of the Kremlin. Thanks for relaying that truth at length, “Realist”.

      1. Robyn, that is the closest yet you’ve been to being right. The cotton wool bullets is incorrect, but otherwise, pretty well spot on. Well done!

  11. NATO/US planned the shitlib rapture, nuclear holocaust, since before 2007, when they enlisted Kasparov for end-days war-gaming scenarios with JR “Bob” Dobbs. The liberal media is now one with DEEP STATE intel agencies, raising Russophobia to fever pitch, for this purpose. Russia hasn”t fired missiles or sent in tanks – that’s a mirage, a NATO psyop, designed to bring about hysteria, to start the final radioactive rapture. Putin is innocent, he just wants peace, and to defend humanity from US liberal war insanity and cancel culture. The liberal end game is harvesting billions of nuked souls for Cthulhu. Kasparov has been a disciple of Cthulhu for decades – his “chess brain” is really all tentacles.

    1. Friend, you really should sit down by yourself, away from your computer, and think about how serious this situation really is.

    2. How can I not take serious advice from someone who trolls on Caitlin Johnston’s blog with the name “Gene Poole”. But you’re right – the situation is deadly serious, which is why you need to wake up to yourself.

      1. you’re still lying, Robyn. say it, the parties most responsible for this war are NATO and the US, followed by Russia. it’s not hard, unless you’re paid to say otherwise.

      2. So, troll, you’re still rolling out the moronic line that it isn’t Russia waging a war. And calling anyone who questions your troll playbook a liar.

  12. This is not a war. This is a setup by US oil company mobsters strong arming Europe mostly Germany into buying US oil And gas.

  13. In the beginning, I divided the conflict into four stages each lasting between a week or two and finishing under the best circumstances by April but more likely May. As predicted, the military part of the campaign was really over in the first week thanks to the RF’s strategic thrust through and behind the UAF forces in Donbas, achievement of air supremacy and destruction of a significant proportion of the UAF’s equipment and weaponry. The RF then had mobility, flexibility and opportunity while controlling supply lines and tying up UAF forces in Western Ukraine. At this point, the RF feels confident enough of victory in the DPR to withdraw some (not all ) forces from Western Ukraine for use finishing off the UAF in Donbas and for domination of the Ukraine east of the Dniepr. Predictably, the Ukie fascists are responding with intensified propaganda as the Japanese did in the last days of WWII — and with atrocities and false flags. Bucha is just a poorly stage managed MH117, with too many obvious plotholes. Rest assured there will be war crimes trials soon enough– but not run by tbe Evil Empire. https://julianmacfarlane.medium.com/putin-bucha-tells-the-story-b2a74548c54c

  14. You have NO idea how deep the rabbit hole is !
    The Rothschilds owned CERN ‘ particle collider ‘ is modifying the weather using Nikola Tesla’s discoveries !

    I mean your microwave oven is also a paricle collider that HEATS your food !

    CERN uses Radio Frequency ‘cavities ‘ that can accelerate frequency at close to light speed !

    Just look at the countries involved in the development of CERN !

    Do you see the ZIO/US arch enemies on the list – Russia – China – Iran ???

    Of course NOT – they are the target and CERN is used to cause biblical floods and drought – tornado’s – EVERYTHING by heating up the Ionosphere over ‘targeted’ areas !

    CERN is based just outside of Geneva in Switzerland, on the border with France.

    CERN was founded in 1954 and has 22 member states. CERN is home to half of the worlds particle physicists, so there is great work taking place by a many scientists all working together on nuclear research from different countries. These countries are:

    Austria.
    Belgium.
    Bulgaria.
    Czech Republic.
    Denmark.
    Finland.
    France.
    Germany.
    Greece.
    Hungary.
    Israel.
    Italy.
    Netherlands.
    Norway.
    Poland.
    Portugal.
    Romania.
    Slovakia.
    Spain.
    Sweden.
    Switzerland.
    United Kingdom.

  15. Amazing the BS they have fed the proles over the years !

    If carbon emissions were actually affecting the climate – well – the earth would be cooling NOT warming !

    The suns penetration would be less effective !

    As for the oceans warming – how can the sun penetrate the depths of the oceans ??

    Russia has been probing the depths of the oceans for decades – they found a miniscule rise in ocean temperature which they attribute to a slight increase in temperature of the earths molten core !

    EVERYTHING is complete BS now !

    1. Climate is something we have yet to fully understand, I grant you, but who can deny that we’ve been polluting and plundering nature with reckless abandon? Just take a look at insect populations. When I was a boy, you’d have to constantly scrape the bugs off the windshield when you took a road trip. No more. And without the bugs, other living things are in deep trouble, are they not? I could go on, but you either get this or you don’t.

  16. One possible answer to how Velshi could say what he does – the only large emotions he has must be just about himself – and those must be Lilliputian or so ego-corrupted coming from such a small cold mind. Any sane person who cares about other people, what is great in all the arts, honest politics, the true magnificence of religion when it is honest, the great humans that have added so much, the great beauty that nature can have, the wonderful, advances and concepts of science, especially when they are used rightly, the taste of so many foods, and so many other people and things in this vast and delicate world of ours – would be horrified to risk this whole world for something we do not even know is true coming from such lying bastards that report the news for those propaganda outlets called the mainstream media.

  17. It is scary that people like Velshi are listened to by some sane people. Hopefully, columns like this one will stop the normalization of the insanity of nuclear war. In any case, I am still having difficulty thinking about what Velshi said. What a mas-murdering Fkg moron.

  18. Nancy Pelosi scheduled Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, well prior to 2014. This was exposed in the Glenn Greenwald story about Hunter Biden’s Satanic laptop, which The Intercept censored. The conspiracy goes beyond the US Deep State. Every American liberal is already microchipped and committed to ending the world in a nuclear holocaust. It’s the SHITLIB RAPTURE. Russophobia was just a cover. In truth Putin is our savior, along with the easter bunny, who is alien in origin.

    1. lol the New York Times admitted the laptop was real. you need to update your propaganda. keep pushing war propaganda.

      1. Unlike you, troll, I’m against all war. I don’t make exceptions for your employer.

        1. suuuurrreee you are. now say you are against the war NATO and the US have been waging against Russia. cmon you can do it. you pretend to be evenhanded, but you’re lying. prove me wrong.

        2. How much do they pay you, troll? I’ve seen you policing Russia-critical comments on other forums using the same repetitive playbook. You might want to vary your handle more as you move about in different forums. I condemn any military action taken by NATO and Russia, both. Yet all you do is make pathetic excuses for your employer as you justify his war crimes and attack his critics from your troll hive.

          1. you wont say it. you’re a liar. cmon china said that NATO and the US bear most of the responsibility for this war, with Russia bearing its share. China is anti war. you aren’t. can you say what China said? i bet you can’t.

          2. Deny you’re a troll, troll. Your playbook is transparent & amusing, your apologies for warmongers pathetic & sickening.

            1. because the poster is lying.

        3. “Unlike you, troll, I’m against all war.”

          If that is true why do you so steadfastly defend those who are fundamentally causing it by assiduously ignoring their ongoing role in this current conflict?

          1. I “steadfastly defend” nobody, imbecile. Not Russia, not NATO/US. They’re both stuffed with warmongers and war criminals. Russia is conducting war crime RIGHT NOW. Why don’t you oppose that?

            1. You can gesticulate all you like, yet the salient facts remain the same. Nations either submit to US hegemony or they fight back. Very, very few choose the latter option. After at least 8 years of persistent and explicitly framed diplomacy Russia has decided it has no choice but to take the former.

              Given ALL of the relevant circumstances, what should Russia do instead?
              FACT: Russia is NOT going to do nothing in the face of this ongoing assault.

              If you can’t recognise those basic principles, and you can’t provide examples of material alternative options for Russia considerate of those principles, then your antagonism toward Russia is simply babble. Maybe you’re really stupid. It’s possible. Your bland, hyperbolic repetition provides some evidence of that.

            2. so is the US and NATO, right now. biolabs, manipulating the Ukrainians to sacrifice themselves, using them as human shields to effect regime change in Russia.

  19. Love how these guys are always advocating for someone else to put their life on the line. I hear they’re handing out weapons in Kiev. Maybe Ali, John, and Gary should head to the front of the line….. yeah, I didn’t think so.

    Chickenhawks!

  20. Ted Christian Avatar
    Ted Christian

    I agree with Scott Ritter that the Bucha victims were probably collaborators killed by the Ukrainians, but let’s go straight to the horse shit biscuit- the US body count in the Middle East is in the pointless millions and still climbing and nobody important has ever given a shit, but we’re supposed to roll the dice on WW III because of 300 dead people, or the approximate number killed in a single shelter in Baghdad. JFC. Besides being astonishingly ridiculous, you have to wonder if these people really are just too bat shit crazy to realize that a full scale nuclear war will stop their paychecks.

    My idle conspiracy musing is that the nuclear genie is coming out of the bottle in the Middle East, particularly with Iran, and Israel needs a nuclear sea change. They need nukes reintroduced into active warfare, and it needs to be done by somebody besides them. I think they’re setting up Putin to use at least tactical nukes, which will free up the Israelis to nuke Iran, or credibly threaten to. Israel isn’t going to let go of nuclear hegemony, and there seems no other way to keep it than an all or nothing play like this. I think they equate loss of nuclear hegemony with their destruction, not implausibly, and are willing to risk the destruction of everyone else to prevent it.

    1. Scott Ritter makes a lot of sense, one of the few highly knowledgeable people who is willing and capable of cutting through the lies and confusion to get to the truth.
      Yesterday I watched Gonzalo Lira’s video (https://youtu.be/O0qcv4bYPlo) about the massacre having been staged, and had the same thought about collaborators as many of the dead had the white armband on that signified friendly civilians (don’t shoot!).

  21. When rich people say “we should do something” what they really mean is “you should do something”. Like the antivaxxers, they don’t care about the deaths of the people they are talking to.

    1. When do you ask Elon Musk for that IQ upgrade that will allow you to understand that 1/ being anti Covid experimental mRNA gene therapy is not being an antivaxxer and 2/ most of the people who catch and/or die of Covid these days have been fully vaxxed?

      1. As soon as you write something that is actually true.

        1. Well, you couldn’t get truer than that if you tried. Keep up with the news amigo!

          1. Still waiting.

    2. John, using ‘anti-vaxxer’ as a pejorative is the new Godwin’s law.

      Get over using it as a blunt cudgel or be increasingly ridiculed on forums that have any moral substance.

  22. Harry S Nydick Avatar
    Harry S Nydick

    When it comes to the nuclear destruction of humanity, it appears as though these idiots are well-committed to beating climate change to the punch. By their views, apparently, nuclear annihilation would be a swift end with, on the whole immediate deaths that would obfuscate all the years and years of suffering climate change excesses.
    They seem to be no less culpable and mot less rational that the multi-billionaires whose thought process says, why worry about anything; just keep making money, since its better to die rich and powerful that otherwise. Whether we call them psychopaths or sociopaths (the latter being a sub-category of the former) matters little.
    In this case, whether Velshi, Spenser, Kasparov (he apparently being fooled at least as much, by American lies, as is the majority of the U.S. public), or any of the others, their view of the facts is considerably distorted. First, NATO (as a puppet of the U.S.) has broken its word, covertly at least 6 times, with regard to promises made in 2014, not to add countries further west of Germany. Second, following a U.S. coup, that installed Zelensky to do our bidding, the Ukraine has been a defacto member of NATO – strike two. Third, if we look the original reasons for NATO’s existence, they are no longer truly valid. It should – and likely would – be disbanded if not for the U.S. empire that wishes to weaken Russia and China in one fell swoop.
    Well, if you have a sick mind, their approach would likely be total destruction, but a good plan doesn’t kill the planner as well.
    Russia’s main insistence was to prevent the possibility of nuclear missiles residing on its border and pointed at it, as well as the return of Russians, who are the majority, is two areas ceded to the Ukraine. Personally, that seems like quite a reasonable insistence to me. So, when the U.S., operating as Ukraine, answered those Russian requests with a resounding ‘Fuck you,’ Russia’s response seems entirely the more reasonable of the two,’ to wit, ‘If you back me into a corner, you leave me no choice but to come out fighting).
    Maybe Putin is really a mad man, but certainly no greater a one that the U.S. insanity-driven representatives who threaten our existence.
    My philosophy, in contrast to theirs is my favorite line from John Lennon’s Imagine: “Imagine all the people sharing all the world.” In a broader scope, you might say that I am a lover, not a fighter, and proud of my position.

    1. On the bright side, nuclear apocalypse would be such a climate change that there wouldn’t be anybody left to freak out about climate change afterwards. Except of course Keith Richards :o)

      1. why is that a bright side?

        1. Because all the morons who today are unable to see the wood for the trees, are brain dead, and removing them from the World Gene pool would be an excellent idea. Plus it would give the planet a chance to remedy the mess humanity has made of it. Bring it on, I say.

  23. From ISR flights to a no-fly zone is but a step.
    http://dxczjjuegupb.cloudfront.net/wp-content/uploads/2022/04/word-image-14.jpeg
    From a no-fly zone to the total annihilation of life is also, but a step.

    1. Jackson Hinkle interviews Col. Douglas MacGregor.
      https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DtH_yvZ4djo
      I miss the Overton Window. It gave my life some clarity. But what can you do? It’s gone and I have to stumble on.
      Mr. Hinkle continues to impress. The only important question left unasked in this interview, is what would it entail to set up a no-fly zone over Ukraine. We are almost 40 days into this operation and still, to this day, it is unclear to me whether every military airbase in the greater Moscow vicinity would have to be obliterated.
      To take one for instance. Another obvious unanswered question, is how many missile strikes might it take before we could fly around over Ukraine with impunity?. Certainly it would take more than several thousand, but how many more? Which begs the question, do we even have enough missiles to accomplish the task?
      Which begs another, what would happen if we run out of missiles before we get the job done? Would we then be forced to switch to ordanance that actually packs some “war winning” punch?
      And so on.
      Hey, YouTubeLeft, get on this, will ya? Who gives a fuck about Oscar slaps. We humans are on the precipice of Armegeddon, so start doing what you are theoretically there to do, and ask some extinction relevant questions.

      1. Team Enjeti and Ball are starting to figure it out.
        https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JefYRUn92as
        Autarky. The nation-state is self-sufficient. What an incredible fucking concept. Instead of being of completely at the whims of whatever, when a crisis hits, you’re nation-state will be ok. It will survive.
        And when there is no crisis, well, your nation-state might even thrive. I mean, check out how autarkic China is doing. Not only have they added 6 or 700 million people to their middle-class, their goal is to eliminate poverty altogether, and not only in China, but for an nation that signs up for the Belt and Road.
        Imagine that. Elimating poverty instead of creating it. My, my.
        Russia’s central bank now works for Russia, the same way all of China’s mega-banks work for China, and yes, the treasonous neo-liberals in Russia are getting pushed out.
        Is this represents a “brain drain” for Russia, well, I could only say I wish as an American my country would brain drain the entire Beltway Complex.
        Food, energy, banking. Kindergarten economics.

        1. Have to dig deep to find useful value in that linked video. Despite identifying plainly evident tears in the Western narrative the two talking heads then do their level best to stitch those holes back up with gossamer threads of delusory imagination.
          Exhibit 1 – Putin is losing the war in Ukraine, but winning in Russia due to the effect of the sanctions. Thus the sanction ‘blowback’ is its effect in cementing Putin’s ‘despotic regime’. No, the sanctions blowback is indeed poised to tear the living arse out of Western ponzi economies.
          Dribbling idiots on 6-figure salaries.

  24. Anyone who thinks Putin is to blame wants the planet to fry in a nuclear holocaust. The two things are precisely equivalent. Only Hillary Clinton and George Soros can end this – via their dementia-riddled puppet, Joe Biden, and his son’s Satanic laptop. Pizzagate was real; Glenn Greenwald is the second coming.

    1. That’s where you get from dumb to irrelevant. What’s Glenn Greenwald got to do with it?

    2. Robyn, it seems apparent that your repeated heavy-handed attempts at satire seek to fill the vacuum of fact and logic you bring to the discussion.

  25. THe ‘reign of terror ‘ is on the Rothschilds owned $US and the Rothschilds owned EURO !

    Believe me – Putin has the Rothschilds absolutely terrified !

  26. Human nature has in it a capacity for both good and bad. Which of these seeds grow depends on the environment that people are in, and most of all people respond to visual stimuli.
    Go figure it out now. If you surround people with real or images of war and human suffering, what are you asking them to respond to and how?
    The war propaganda exploits human nature to perpetuate war and its crimes, and to perpetuate human suffering.
    Have not heard the US officials asking for peace in Ukraine, and in fact they offered to kidnap Zelensky so he would not negotiate with Russia.
    We have seen the images of Syria where the US and NATO “intervened”, the cities in ruins. Apparently this is what can be expected in Ukraine as well.
    I do not read or watch news anymore, but tell you what, Microsoft would not let me remove MSN news from my new computer, and they will not let me deinstall Microsoft Edge either, just so they can keep pushing their violent and untrue news to me.
    Microsoft recruiter asked me to apply for a job there. I checked it out: First get COVID vaccines, then work to improve Lockheed Martin’s productivity, or work on US Army contract.
    The entire US economy and technology are in the service of violence.

    1. Try this to uninstall microsoft edge INNA – it works 🙂

      1. Thanks, I was really frustrated that the whole family could not erase MSN from my screen for an hour of trying.

  27. Truer words have never been spoken. Sometimes it gets so difficult to live on the same planet as assholes and dick swingers! In the old days, this kind of dudes were barflies. You used to hear them pontificate about everything under the sun until the owner said. “OK Jack, you’ve had enough!” and sent them packing or they cornered themselves in a “if I was the president of the United States, I wouldn’t know what to do…”

    When a barfly says he wouldn’t know what to do if he was president of the United States, the situation is fucked up beyond repair.

    Now they’ve put screens in bars so that people can watch football – which makes more money for 1/ the bartenders who sell more drinks as fans get stressed, 2/ the screen manufacturers and operators, 3/ the football managers, leagues and players.

    And the warmongering barflies are also now on screens because it makes more money for the corporrupt TV channels whose conception of journalistic ethos consists in never letting the truth get in the way of a sensational story that will make a killing with viewers, clickers and sponsors.

    It’s the service society.

    And there sure is an audience for that bullying stance! The kind who’s never been able to grow a pair and used to boast in bars before that “I ain’t afraid of him you know! I’ll say Robert, you’re a piece of shit and if I ever see you again, I’ll break your neck!”

    Of course he never tells Robert personally because he’s 5.8 ft and Robert 6.3 ft and a famous law of physics says that when 6.3 ft people talk, 5.8 ft people listen unless they’re Bruce Lee or Jacky Chang.

    I second your motion that these warmongering screenflies should be sent to the “theatres of operations” by express delivery. Of course we don’t seem to know for sure if there’s been massacres in Ukraine or who dunnit if there were any but I read the other day that captagon has made its way into the Ukronazi ranks.

    https://www.republicworld.com/world-news/russia-ukraine-crisis/donetsk-troops-discover-labs-developing-combat-drugs-for-ukrainian-nationalists-report-articleshow.html

    It’s plausible because it’s an amphetamine originally developed by the mafia in neighbouring Romania and exported to the Middle-East where Daesh made an extensive use of it. It has been considered a factor in the atrocities they committed, like chain-beheading people, for it makes one insensitive to pain, both one’s own and the one inflicted on others.

    The funny thing is that, like Obélix in the Astérix comic books, some of these screenflies don’t even have to take captagon to feel that way – at least as far as the pain inflicted on others is concerned -, having apparently fallen into the pot when they were babies. Then again, it could be cocaine…

  28. “You want direct military involvement? Fine. Go do it yourself. Be the direct military involvement you want to see in the world.” What parent would ask for direct military involvement if it were their own kids sent to shoot or be shot at? I think only people without their own skin in the war that would want this conflict to go on – or somebody who is making money on this conflict (or covering up their budget deficit).

    1. I don’t get it MSM says Ukraine is winning and driving back the Rus. Someone is BSing me! Why is there any need for escalation?

    2. Carolyn L Zaremba Avatar
      Carolyn L Zaremba

      The only problem with your assumption is that plenty of parents supported the military draft during the Vietnam War, even when it came to having their sons come home in boxes. Not all of them, by any means, but there were some who considered the sacrifice “heroic”. The arms manufacturers laugh all the way to the bank, always have.

  29. These maniacs want to kill life on Earth over a fake news, psyop “massacre” supposedly done by Russians. Evidence shows that the “massacre” may not have happened at all, and what killing there was, was done by Ukrainian neo-Nazis in their military against people who wanted peace.

    1. How dare people be opposed to Putin’s humanitarian mission to rescue Ukraine. Anyone who blames Putin is escalating a false flag into a nuclear holocaust. The dementia-riddled Biden is the real mastermind behind this. Unless he’s a puppet of Nancy Pelosi, the Satanist baby-eater.

      1. pretzelattack Avatar
        pretzelattack

        so you’re ok with nazis killing Russian sympathizers and passing the murders off as Russian atrocities. is there anything they could go that you would not accept?

        1. Nope, not okay with that.
          And not okay with Putin’s war crimes.
          And not okay with your false dichotomies.

          1. Talking about war crimes, what about the US killing ten innocent civilians (seven children) with a drone on their last days in Kabul (ending a list numbering thousands), is that a war crime? Is any court dealing with that? And Yemen? And Fallujah? And Abu Ghraib? And Guantanamo? Give us a break!

          2. “Whatabout whatabout whatabout…”
            Read my other comments – I’ve been constantly saying that Bush, Blair and co. are war criminals. But so is Putin. Don’t buy the false dichotomies or the adolescent whataboutism.

            1. we’ll have to convict bush, blair and co. first before we can convict putin, and of course all have a right to defend themselves against the accusations.

            2. And so what? War criminals like Bush and Blair walk away scot free, So does Putin. Case closed.

    2. Easy now you know fighters no in uniforms are called spies, so a shot is expected for spying. When Russian troops stayed for humanitarian reasons unna the spies snuck in to harm them. It is in Geneva convention what to do to spies, so not some illegal killings.

      1. What’s that Kafkayan crap? How do you know someone who’s not in uniform is a fighter? You can’t. So in your world, everybody who’s not in uniform is a spy and so you’ve got to shoot everybody that’s not in uniform because they’re spies on top of everybody who’s in uniform because they’re soldiers and shove the concept of civilians down the drain? Hear the siren? See these two guys in white suits coming out of that van? It’s for you!

      2. Tiddda you know the UkroNazi bio labs a good thing, a cure for Covid! Vaccine one shot only and hundred percent effective! Ha! Works on children.

    3. Carolyn L Zaremba Avatar
      Carolyn L Zaremba

      I have heard the same thing, that the Azov killers have faked the whole thing undoubtedly because they already know that the American mass media will swallow it whole and scream for more weapons to be sent to Ukraine. The arms manufacturers will make their usual bundle on the corpses of Ukrainian citizens and keep their eyes on their stock portfolios. And members of Congress will do the same.

  30. @GarryCasparov – If it does not walk like Human Rights, or does not talk like Human Rights, it ain’t Human Rights. Human Rights are Universal and they do not ask for more lives to be sacrificed in their honor.

  31. A bunch of people I’ve never heard of and a former chess champion are using the language of escalation. Yes, pretty stupid. At the outset, Biden said military action against Russia was off the table, and he’s sticking to that.

    Putin could end this conflict – and the possibility of nuclear escalation – right now. Putin is the only one engaged in military action (with the obvious exception of Ukrainians defending themselves). Putin could end it now.

    1. biden can also end it now, imo. and i guess you live closer to him and, as he’s such a sane, reasonable humanitarian, you’ll have a lot more success convincing him, not?

      1. Biden can’t end anything except his incomplete sentences – he’s riddled with dementia. Putin can end the Russian invasion.

      2. that is ‘team biden’, of course.

        1. And what about Zelensky, can he end anything or is he just capable of going to the Knesset to ask them to stop the new Holocaust and round European parliaments asking their Nato members to intervene directly or send him nuclear weapons to exterminate all them fucking Russians?

          1. Carolyn L Zaremba Avatar
            Carolyn L Zaremba

            Zelensky goes to the Grammys to ask the audience to support his fascist government. I mean. The Grammys??

            1. sean penn tried to get him to the oscars, i heard.

          2. if zelensky doesn’t do as he’s told, he dies (slowly), imo. it offers great propaganda opportunities and an excellent next escalatory step.

    2. “Putin could end this conflict – and the possibility of nuclear escalation – right now. …. Putin could end it now.”

      Putin has clearly defined the terms of ceasefire. The fighting could stop as soon as these very concise and simple terms are met in accordance with verifiable measures.
      1) Do you know what these terms are?
      2) Specifically how/why could they deemed unreasonable?
      3) Why is ‘The West’ so opposed to a neutral Ukraine?
      4) Why is ‘The West’ not deemed to be prolonging the war by denying these terms that seek to curtail ‘The West’s’ own aggressions?

  32. Television continues to be a Weapon of Mass Destruction.

    The ruling class gets what it wants EVERY SINGLE TIME because television shapes public emotions like silly putty.

    To watch television is to participate in a cult. You walk into a windowless building, you listen attentively as trusted guest speakers inveigh against ‘the evil one”…and by the end of the day, you obey, regardless of what is asked of you.

    In matters domestic, television trains us to think the worst of our neighbors, and to hide ourselves away in our domiciles. In matters foreign, television trains us to think the worst of people we will never know, and to join the parade calling for death and destruction to “the evil one.”

    If we must all die to avenge Putin’s crimes, television cult members of America say: sign me up!

    1. It’s definitely a Weapon of Mass Delusion…

    2. Carolyn L Zaremba Avatar
      Carolyn L Zaremba

      This is precisely why I got rid of my television ten years ago. It’s bad enough reading mainstream press on line. But to have that poison in your living room is insane.

    3. Dems like to rant that Fox is the problem; Repubs that CNN/MSNBC are the problem. All MSM is the problem at this point. And it’s everywhere.

      My workplace installed a big ole flat screen with Roku in the break room. Yesterday while warming up lunch watched a couple minutes of “Russian atrocities in Bucha” ranting. I wanted to turn it off, but a couple co-workers were watching with rapt attention. Falling straight down the propaganda rabbit hole carefully built for them. Sad.

  33. Velshi and the rest of the deluded idiotic western press are not grasping a basic fact .Russia has already declared and is enforcing a “no fly zone” over the Ukraine. They will enforce it against the US if the US were insane enough to transgress into the war zone, which covers all of the Ukraine. There’s no need to speculate about how “risky” this “might” be.. the Russians have spelled it out,. The other Big problem twats like Velshi fail to grasp is that NATO wont do any better than Ukraine is doing against Russian AF. NATO isn’t butting in, NOT because they don’t want to shoot down Russian planes but because they don’t want Russia to start shooting down their planes.. Russia is presently conducting a limited operation for limited goals Pentagon experts have confirmed this and attempted to explain this ( see Newsweek, and various press releases) to the incompetents in the political and intelligence spheres.

  34. https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/justifying-war-escalation?s=w
    Is it time for false flag attacks to justify escalation of US involvement in Ukraine, or is the video-selfie of torturing captured Russians to Death by a Ukrainian soldier in need of some bad press against the Russians? (Yes, there are further potential explanations.)

    In this video Ukrainian forces show videos of dead civilians by the roadside in a town of Bucha, which they just recaptured from Russian forces, civilians with white armbands, and say the Russians killed them. The Ukrainian soldiers asserting this war crime wear blue arm bands, which signify support for Ukrainian armed forces. Guess what white arm bands mean.

    This is supposed to hit the Western news Monday April 4.

    https://southfront.org/afu-crimes-in-bucha-kiev-region-false-flag-propaganda-attack-against-russia-revealed-photos-video/

    https://www.bitchute.com/video/6ZHPL2pTuadJ/

  35. Top Chess Players are being pressured to either not say anything, support charities helping Ukrainians or be hawkish against Russia. Grandmaster Sergey Karjakin was made an example of what would occur if they fell out of line. Karjakin is Pro-Invasion of Ukraine, but this shows who is and who isn’t allowed to be Pro-War:

    “Many people ask if I regret my public support of the special operation? After all, I have already lost invitations to Western tournaments and may lose an invitation to the candidates tournament.”

    “My answer is simple. I am on the side of Russia and my President. No matter what happens, I will support my country in any situation without thinking for a second!”
    https://twitter.com/SergeyKaryakin/status/1502029166497124353?s=20&t=ohj4ZHz_bKS83TjaDhmAOA

    “With the first day of spring. Russian spring.”
    https://twitter.com/SergeyKaryakin/status/1498598855520264197?s=20&t=ohj4ZHz_bKS83TjaDhmAOA

    Though that’s not all he says, he is saying forbidden critiques of the US Empire:

    “19 years ago today, the US and UK invaded Iraq.

    Over a million killed.

    Millions more made refugees.

    Worse birth defects and cancer rates than Hiroshima.

    One of the biggest crimes of this century.

    Yet no calls for sanctions. And the war criminals responsible are walking free.”
    https://twitter.com/sahouraxo/status/1505570157606969349?s=20&t=ohj4ZHz_bKS83TjaDhmAOA

    Also a Russian translation of Primo Radical’s tweet:

    “Day 1: ‘There are no Nazis and no biolabs.’

    Day 5: ‘Maybe there’s a few Nazis.’

    Day 10: ‘Okay, yeah, there’s a ton of Nazis. But they’re good Nazis. And still no biolabs.’

    Day 15: ‘Okay, maybe there are a few harmless biolabs.’

    Day 20: ‘What’s your problem with Nazi biolabs?’”
    https://twitter.com/moscester/status/1502600754527637505?s=20&t=ohj4ZHz_bKS83TjaDhmAOA

    https://twitter.com/SergeyKaryakin/status/1497836073342361602?s=20&t=pHjY-qPfNio2AgO6mxTaSg

    https://twitter.com/SergeyKaryakin/status/1497835661319184384?s=20&t=OSTs77s0MK-aFkT4VEruiw

    Sources:
    https://indianexpress.com/article/explained/grandmaster-sergey-karjakin-fide-ban-russia-ukraine-war-7831619/

    https://www.theguardian.com/sport/2022/mar/21/sergey-karjakin-banned-chess-fide-russia-invasion-ukraine

    https://www.rt.com/sport/552460-kremlin-reacts-sergey-karjakin-ban/

    https://www.chess.com/news/view/sergey-karjakin-banned-for-6-months

    https://www.fide.com/news/1650

    1. So surprise day 30 Russian troops find biolabs to eliminate hazard, but are booby tracked many of them leak and kill people nearby there are dead bodies must have Russian genocide committed! Such lies!

  36. The UN Security Council meeting today about Bucha will be interesting. The Russians have contrary evidence. Meanwhile US military is flying planeloads of “personel” into Chișinău, Moldova. I suspect the big confrontation will be around Odessa.

  37. I guess any sane person would agree with you and most of us realise that Garry Kasparov is a nutter but is there any actual evidence for war crimes committed by Russia?

    1. What? You’re asking for real evidence? How dare you, sir. Please do not upset the tenuous emotional state of the americans whose sanity depends on believing that Russia is a super villain that only the League of Justice can defeat, gloriously of course.

  38. A False Flag escalation may be the object of whomever set up the release of this particular array of evidently constructed events.

    However it may also be, in part or wholly, a shit-storm fabricated to obscure the recent dire spate of Ukraine war-crime ‘selfie’ videos shot and and telegrammed by the Ukrainian military themselves. This has created a PR own goal of such monumental proportions the it has directly lead to Zelensky prohibiting rank and file from releasing combat-related footage.

    Here’s a useful summary of the situation:
    http://thesaker.is/sitrep-operation-z-4/

  39. BB Benderhaus Avatar
    BB Benderhaus

    Historically Ukraine is a new nation. That area has changed hands and been renamed alot. To act like another restructuring would be blasphemy is ludicrous. Russia will retake eastern ukraine and it will become part of russia more or less. A smaller neutral Ukraine will emerge. Driving a stake through Europe trying to stop this is futile and a waste of infrastrucure and human life. Neocons are everywhere in all countries. They would set the world on fire if allowed to have their way. Bill Gates and his ilk are closet neocons supporting this effort to cleanse the world of people. Make no mistake whenever anyone promotes the Great Reset, they are advocating war.

  40. mary Wildfire Avatar
    mary Wildfire

    “Won’t necessarily lead to nuclear war.’ Oh fine then, If escalation MIGHT not lead to a nuclear war which likely would lead to human extinction (and the desolation of Earth, a whole lot of other species as well) then bombs ahead. Poor Caitlin, calling this “insane,” such an inadequate word. I think part of the reason this gets a hearing is that decades of TV ,video games, cartoons and VR games have left a lot of people fuzzy on the difference between all that and REALITY. Like, if it it does lead to a nuclear war and the end of humanity, is there a button they can push to restart?
    But it’s insane that these weapons even exist. A perfect illustration of how different intelligence, knowledge and wisdom are. The huge amount of the first two, along with cooperation, needed to invent and produce a nuclear weapon, and the equally extreme LACK of wisdom to go ahead and do so–and then make thousands more…and then, in the current age, Obama talking about eliminating nuclear weapons but as president, allocating a TRillion dollars to creating a NEW generation of them. And not being bundled out of the White House in a strait jacket. And of course, this was not one of the places his successor differed (except to add another .7 trillion) Nor Trump’s successor. I wonder sometimes if the truth is, 95% of the nuclear weapons are duds, existing as counters to someone else’s, and the new version being a plan to send enormous amounts of money to weaponsmakers without actually producing any more real bombs.

    1. Hey, it’s not CERTAIN human annihilation. So, there’s that.

  41. I’ve never heard of John Spencer or the ‘Modern War Institute’. And while, no doubt, there are some people calling for a “hot war” with Russia, it’s not many, and they aren’t influential. Biden emphasised military action against Russia was off the table from the outset, echoed by other NATO countries. Nobody wants this to escalate into WWIII. Putin can end it whenever he wants. To repeat: Putin can end it right now.

    1. scary, isn’t it?

    2. Carolyn L Zaremba Avatar
      Carolyn L Zaremba

      So can NATO end it right now. But the U.S. and Germany and other NATO countrie are pouring weapons into Ukraine because they DO NOT WANT TO END IT NOW. How much clearer does it need to be?

      1. Only Putin can end the invasion. NATO could stop helping Ukraine defend itself. Not the same as ending Putin’s invasion.

        Totally unrelated, war criminal Tony Blair said Saddam Hussein could end the US/UK bombing of Iraq in 2003, by acceding to Bush’s demands. SADDAM COULD END IT NOW, BUT HE CONTINUES RESISTING OUR SHOCK & AWE PUMMELLING.

        1. there were no wmd in iraq.

        2. SADDAM COULD END IT NOW BY NOT HAVING WMDS. IT’S NOT UP TO THE ALLIES TO STOP THE BOMBING. IT’S IN SADDAM’S HANDS. – Tony Blair

    3. People are in denial. They want the catharsis of vilifying Russia, they want the US to ‘do something’ about Ukraine, but they, for whatever reason, will not connect the dots that their collective behavior tracks a straight line to a nuclear war. It’s a refusal to confront a very dangerous reality.

  42. Third-Eye Roll Avatar
    Third-Eye Roll

    As usual, it’s the U.S. banging the war drums loudest. I agree with you, Caitlin, that the warmongers should go fight the war — I think those who push for war should be shackled and dumped in enemy territory in every conflict.

    1. “it’s the U.S. banging the war drums loudest”. What pathetic nonsense. The total reverse of reality. The US invaded Iraq in 2003 – a war crime that killed hundreds of thousands of civilians. Bush & Blair are war criminals.

      This time it’s Russia invading. Putin isn’t just banging war drums, he’s invading, he’s conducting war. Right now. As Chomsky said, this is a war crime and Putin is a war ciminal.

      1. pretzelattack Avatar
        pretzelattack

        and those war criminals received not even a semblance of a penalty, which is why they and their successors are playing the same game today. and you still pretend an Iraq which posed no security threat to the US is equivalent to a US puppet state.

        1. The Ukrainian people – their free will, their fight, their choices – aren’t real to you. It’s all just gross propaganda to you. You should check out the various polls and votes in Ukraine since 2014.

          1. and check out the 5 billion investment to give the ukrainian people their free will, their fight, their choices and their love for the free market.
            zelensky got 73% of the vote because he promised to implement the minsk agreements.

            1. “zelensky got 73% of the vote because he promised to implement the minsk agreements”

              Indeed, and then he very particularly did not do that.
              Understanding why he didn’t provides very sound input to understanding the current conflict beyond the facile ‘Putin is an evil war criminal’ trope being extruded for ingestion like mother’s milk to the hapless masses.

          2. You left out the ethnic Russian people in Ukraine, mostly in the east. What about their free will? The US installed Ukrainian government treats them like dog sh_t, a marginalized minority. I guess they don’t count.

      2. Scott Ritter would beg to differ with you. The US has instigated this war since at least 2014. Learn the actual history, which is admittedly quite complicated. Yes, Putin is culpable, and should have to pay a heavy price for all this, but the US is absolutely far more culpable. It always is, in these war-related circumstances, certainly over the past 75 years.

        1. Chomsky called it right – Russia’s brutal invasion is a war crime; Putin is a war criminal. Most people on here can’t face that reality.

          1. I’ve been reading Chomsky for over 40 years and agree with him 95% of the time. He’s also saying we face two extinction events: global warming, climate collapse/chaos, and nuclear war. Do you want to risk species-ending nuclear war just to stick it to Putin? I doubt Chomsky does. He’s very old but he’s not insane.

            1. The only American interests in Ukraine are geopolitical, and by geopolitical we mean oligarchic. So how do opinion makers conceal this fact? They conceal it by arranging for false flag atrocities, which cut through the fog of geopolitics and create an immediate moral imperative for us to side with the victims.

              Television is useless for analyzing things like history, structures, militarization, global finance and hegemony. What it’s really good at is stage-crafting violence, and shaping our emotional response to that. Whether it’s CNN or Netflix, our conditioned reaction of stories of violence can be counted on to mobilize America’s self-righteous fury, EVERY SINGLE TIME.

              Look! Listen! React! Television is made for false flag operations…

          2. Nobody wants to risk nuclear war (except, apparently for a former chess champion & a bunch of people I’ve never heard of).

            It’s a moronic false dichotomy. Correctly assigning blame to Putin doesn’t equate to wanting escalation.

            1. wrongly assigning blame to putin equates to wanting escalation.

            2. Robyn stated: ” Correctly assigning blame to Putin doesn’t equate to wanting escalation.”

              Actually it does because the grossly distorted field of vision required to conjure such narrowly targeted blame deflects attention from the real cause of the conflict, and thereby its real solution.

          3. Robyn, I don’t know where you are based, but if you are from the USA, no American has any right at all to call Putin or anyone else a war criminal. You have to face that reality.

          4. Sorry, but that’s moronic. Bush and Blair are war criminals. Putin is a war criminal. It has nothing to do with “rights” you arrogantly grant people based merely on their nationality.

            1. This is to grossly simplify the causes and effects of actions not related to Putin and Russia.

              Ukraine’s handling of Donbass suffers from much of what you claim the attacking pretzel is guilty of.

              They even, much like Putin now, resorted to violence to quell the wishes of the people of Donbass, expressed in the referendums.

              Referendums that wanted autonomy, not total independence, and against Putin’s recommendations.

              And the west decided to stoke this fire and ignore what was going on.

              The drums of war have been rumbling for almost 8 years, but many decided they didn’t want to hear them.

              Yes, Putin is responsible for this war, that much is true.

              But it didn’t just surprisingly spring out of the ground for no apparent reason.

              People have been dying and suffering for years now.

              1. “Yes, Putin is responsible for this war, that much is true.”

                Yes, he gave the executive orders to commence this current specific phase of conflict. However:

                1) Why is it any more than convenient to ascribe 24/02/22 as the start of the ‘war’?

                2) Given ALL of the relevant circumstances, what options did Putin otherwise have?

                The credibility of the initially quoted statement requires a lucid and factually accountable response to these matters.

                1. I agrre.

                  And media and the west continues to ignore these things.

                  I just mean that he ordered it.

                  1. If the start date of ‘the war’ is correctly calibrated then it becomes clear that Putin did
                    not start it. He gave orders to commence this necessary manouvre
                    that is intended to be the beginning of the end of that greater scale of relentless conflict imposed upon Russia.

          5. Robyn, give it a break. You’re like the vigilante standing outside the courthouse, screaming for the death penalty. No one disagrees here that Putin is guilty as charged, that the invasion was a war crime. It’s just that, unlike you, we don’t think that planetary execution is the appropriate sentencing for his crime…

            1. “No one disagrees here that Putin is guilty as charged, that the invasion was a war crime.”

              Do you make a habit of speaking for others without their consultation or consent? Perhaps a job in US foreign policy awaits you?

              Read this account of the complexity of this question that you have answered so simply in accord with the dominant narrative:
              https://scheerpost.com/2022/04/01/russia-ukraine-the-law-of-war-crime-of-aggression/

          6. Er, Mark – if you think people here generally agree Putin is guilty of war crimes, you’ve been badly misreading. You’ve also been misreading my posts (my serious ones) if you think I favor planetary “execution”.

          7. Chomsky has declined into apparent idiocy since his refusal to understand the dire underpinnings of 9/11. It woulds be better to refer to more pertinently learned sources when asserting this event as a War Crime. This one needs close consideration:
            https://scheerpost.com/2022/04/01/russia-ukraine-the-law-of-war-crime-of-aggression/

            Crucially, the grounds claimed by Putin were developed by the very force(s) that his Nation is now fundamentally battling against; indeed Ukraine is a proxy. Historical fact demonstrates that these larger forces systemically employ these grounds to furnish their own expansion, including upon Russia. At the same time they declare the use of these grounds as illegitimate when used by those seeking to defend against that systemic expansion. This egregious distortion requires torrents of propaganda to uphold. You are just a byte in this torrent until you start parsing the full facts of the matter.

        2. VF, you said “Yes, Putin is culpable, and should have to pay a heavy price for all this,..”

          Two questions:
          1) when is it ok for a nation to act to secure its national sovereignty against systematic aggression and existential threat? Just outside it’s borders? Only on its own territory after its borders are effectively breached? Never?

          2) Who should determine this ‘heavy price’ given the demonstrably duplicitous and unprincipled character of the US imposed ‘Rules-Based order’ that Russia is fighting to contain in favour of an International Law-based system properly administered via the UN?

          1. Good questions. I have no influence over any of this, so my answers would be meaningless.
            I think Russia has every right to stop NATO from advancing to its borders, for what that’s worth. I think the US is responsible for nearly all the war crimes being committed, but *maybe* Putin shouldn’t have invaded Ukraine. But what do I know? What the hell does anyone really know when it comes to this shit. War itself is a crime, and threatening nuclear war is too unconscionable to even be talked about rationally. It’s the vilest insanity anyone could ever conjure up. Nuclear weapons should be abolished forever, which of course they won’t be. And Robyn here should be sent back to her DNC troll farm to receive her award as Doublespeaker of the Century.

            1. Hi. Sorry if my reply sounded aggressive. I was simply trying to parse out this common consensus that Putin is wrong in what he did. It seems to sit commonly within nearly all Western commentary, even amongst those who understand the matter is very complex.

              I did that by querying what, in the full scope of the circumstances, he might have done instead. This question must be answered alongside of any judgement that his action is ‘wrong’. A ‘wrong’ action necessarily implies a comparatively ‘right’ action. How can something be ‘wrong’ when no better alternative exists?

              Bearing in mind the very evident alternative of letting the NATO games of encroachment continue, Putin has stated very clearly on multiple occasions that ‘for Russians, a world without Russia is not worth living in’. His support numbers at present make it crystal clear that he is indeed talking as the Russian leader when he says that, and not as an unhinged demagogue. Anyone with a sliver of knowledge of Russian history will understand the viscerally real basis for that National feeling.

              The only question then is, who are the complete fucking idiots who do not understand the merit and the pending consequence of Putin’s existentially definitive statement? And for what objective(s) are they ignoring it? World domination? It’s not hard then to identify exactly where the war criminals sit. All prevarication away from that salient assessment is serving to prolong and threaten escalation of this war. It ain’t Putin doing that shit.

  43. Like many, I was surprised and disappointed when Russia attacked.
    However, and it’s a HUGE however, evidence is accumulating that she had no choice and that things would have ended up much worse, very quickly, had she not.
    There’s the undeniable fact that about 14,000 have died at Ukronaziusa hands since 2014, with not one inch of movement towards fulfilling the Minsk accords.
    Evidence that the Ukronaziusa were planning a massive assault on the Donbass themselves.
    The string of biolabs, of which we have heard only the beginning.
    The wholesale nazification of the entire Ukraine. Think of them as Salafist jihadis, western style, and the picture immediately becomes much clearer.
    The fortification of cities such as Kharkov and Mariupol by the CIA-trained, best equipped Ukronaziusa fighters Ukraine could produce.
    Need i continue?

    1. That’s right – Putin’s on a peace mission! He’s saving lives with missiles. It’s a humanitarian intervention.

      1. pretzelattack Avatar
        pretzelattack

        and now people in his administration are not emphasizing that. and the people that are are very influential. the US and NATO can end this whenever they want. to repeat, the US and NATO can end it right now.

        this engineered war is on the border of Russia. the US and NATO have no security interest in expanding and threatening Russia. If it were Russia putting weapons in Mexico, or Cuba, pointed at the US you would be singing a different tune.

        1. The tanks and missiles aren’t Russian. The bloodshed isn’t being inflicted by Russian forces. Putin is a liberal humanitarian interventionist. War really is peace, and this comments area isn’t well-used by troll farms.

          1. Putin committed a war crime going into Ukraine and anyone who doesn’t agree with nuclear escalation as a justifiable response is a Putin asset…and needs to be kicked off of all Silicon Valley platforms….

            1. Mark, is that satire or is your sanity coming apart?

          2. Er, nope. Correctly assigning blame to Putin is NOT EQUAL TO agreeing with nuclear escalation. Unless you’re a moron or a troll.

            1. You are blaming Putin for doing exactly what he said he would do if the serious issues put to the West regarding their ongoing encroachment upon Russian security were not genuinely addressed in accord with the precise and reasonable standards Russia also provided.
              The West did not have to keep unreasonably and unceasingly extending that encroachment. Why then are they not to blame for their failure to respond to peaceful guidelines?
              Furthermore, Russia could flatten Ukraine within days if it wished to, as per the US/NATO standard protocol of ‘bombing them to the Stone Age’ employed, indeed often openly declared, within ALL of the myriad deadly conflicts US/NATO has launched for no good reason.
              Russia has purposefully not done this. Lights, water, transport, etc., all remain intact outside of distinctly limited conflict zones. These urban conflict areas are only so afflicted because the Ukraine military has purposefully deployed into civilian areas. That strategic choice by the Ukraine military makes those civilian locations a military target.
              Please engage your brain rather than relying upon just your spinal cord for motivation.

          3. Robyn, have you seen the reports that define and illustrate the war-crime murders of around 15,000 ethnic Russians in the Donbass over 8 years by Ukrainian military?

            Have you seen the reports and the video footage of Russian POW’s being shot in the legs and groin, stabbed in the neck and eyes, and castrated by Ukrainian military?

            Have you seen the reports and footage of the Azov members holding Mariupol civilians hostage, prostrate on the floor, hands behind their head, while one of the Azov nazi’s plays tunes on the piano?

            Do you think this war and the events that comprise it started on Fe. 24, 2022?
            If you do, you’re not qualified to comment within the bounds of reality. You’re only qualified to amplify propaganda.

      2. When will we regain the capacity to see gray things, the predominant color in our world, as neither black nor white?

        1. I’m not entirey sure we’ve ever had that capacity.

          We do, however, suffer greatly under the tyranny of social media, where everyone MUST have an opinion, a very specific opinion, on just about everything.

          Add to that the severely lacking journalism we are currently suffering, and you can get yourself in a whole heap of trouble.

          This current climate of emotional escalation is not leading to good things, I can tell you that much.

          Question is, will our incompetent leaders manage to de-escalate before we stumble into WW3?

          I honestly doubt it.

  44. US military leveled Fallujah. ‘War can be messy.’

    US sells weapon to Saudis who bomb civilians in Yemen. ‘They are our ally.’

    Civilians dead in Bucha. ‘We are so outraged.’

    No mention from that so-called news organization that shortly after the Russians left, the city’s mayor said nothing about mass casualties. Or that Russia has asked the UN to do an investigation. The possibility that Ukrainian forces targeted Russian sympathizers is . . . not a possibility. Russia is bad. A global nuclear war will sure teach them a lesson.

  45. There is no more insightful definition of what a self-hating human being, truly is, than the following:

    “Pundits Who Advocate Hot War With Russia Are Enemies Of Humanity”

  46. I think we need to better understand the nature and ‘reality’ (or simulation) we are living in/through. Maybe we ought to restructure our programmed concepts of what and where ‘HELL’ really is. Maybe (sic) they lied to us with the quaint version that it is ‘somewhere else’ and you really don’t want to to go there, so if you are ‘good’ and ‘obedient’ to the controlling rich the worst won’t happen to YOU,
    because, folks, it looks like it has/is/will already has/is/will have already happened. is coming to a doorway near YOU.
    Onward and upward.
    Arriba y arriba. Anyway, Thanks, Caitlin. The selfish, greedy lunatics have the floor, for now.

  47. There’s not much use in talking about and exposing war crimes, Julian Assange tried it and look where it got him !

    1. Ah, but that was OUR war crimes. THEIR war crimes are different, especially when they didn’t happen.

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