Free Republic

The Biden administration has greenlit the use of American long-range strike systems by Ukraine to launch attacks deep into Russia. This puts the entire planet in a “shockingly” dangerous situation, says former DoD analyst and US Air Force Lieutenant Colonel Karen Kwiatkowski. President Biden has knowingly or unwittingly brought the risk of a world-ending nuclear conflict much, much closer after listening to “neoconservative advisors who really don’t have a lot of perspective on the nuclear dangers that they’re walking into” instead of military specialists and okaying Ukraine’s use of NATO weapons to strike the Russian hinterland, Kwiatkowski told Sputnik. “The...

Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, has warned of “nuclear escalation” in response to Nato governments stepping up support for Ukraine, with France suggesting troops could be deployed by member nations to Ukraine in just days. Mr Lavrov told Russian state media on Thursday that planned tactical nuclear exercises with Belarus should “sensitise” Ukraine’s allies to the risk of “catastrophic consequences of further advancement on the ladder of nuclear escalation”. link msn link away

Over the last few weeks, a Russian blitz has claimed more than a dozen villages in northeast Ukraine, near the country’s second-largest city. This summer, Russia will likely continue its offensive push... Russia’s ability to carry out these attacks is in some ways surprising. War is expensive...Yet Moscow has managed to keep paying for its war machine.... to China, the benefits of a Russian victory in Ukraine may outweigh the costs. Among those benefits: The war has entangled the U.S. and its allies in a faraway conflict, straining the U.S. military’s ammunition stockpiles. It has made Russia, a big military...

The US floating pier allegedly used to provide relief supplies to Gaza civilians has partially washed away, and two boats used to service it have been washed ashore. According to reports, the Army was temporarily relocating the floating pier to the Israeli port of Ashdod because of heavy wave action. During the move, a segment of the pier came free, and the boats sent to retrieve it went aground,The waves carried it to the Israeli shores of Ashdod.

ran buried President Ebrahim Raisi on Thursday, wrapping up a days-long funeral process that began shortly after his death on Sunday in a helicopter crash. After a bit of dithering, the regime decided to proclaim Raisi a “martyr” and treat him like a religious icon, holding a procession through several cities and burying him in a tomb at the revered Imam Reza Shrine in Mashhad, the city of Raisi’s birth. The regime’s choice of burial site provoked some anger in Iran, as his lavish funeral irritated citizens suffering through a terrible economy because of his policies. Iranians tired of living...

PORTLAND, Ore. (KATU) — A Portland burn nurse returned home on Saturday after a 17-day mission treating patients in Southern Gaza. Monica Johnston said she first heard of the opportunity to provide medical help to civilians in Gaza last year through the organization Palestinian-American Medical Association. "I hear the word ‘help,’ and my ears perk up," she told KATU on Monday, adding that her experience in the burn unit of Legacy Emanuel Medical Center led to "an absolute need to be there." Johnston arrived in Gaza on May 1, planning to stay 13 days. She worked in the European General...

A fascinating video that draws all of the parts of the India/China/Regional disputes into focus, and the consequences of each outcome.

The IDF has succeeded in evacuating around 950,000 Palestinian civilians in only two weeks since May 6, the military revealed on Monday. In addition, around 30-40% of Rafah is now under IDF control, not merely a small portion of the eastern sector, and about 60-70% of Rafah has been completely evacuated. The remaining Rafah civilians, estimated at around 300,000-400,000, are almost all near the Gaza coast Tel al-Sultan area. This is despite US predictions that the civilian population could not be evacuated without a huge death count or without leaving around four months to do so. Of those evacuated, the...

I appeared on Russia Today over the weekend because it is important to show the Russian people that the West is not all hateful Neocons. However, the forecasts are NEVER my personal opinion. That is why so many governments turn to us. I do not tell them only what they want to hear. Ukraine has lost. Our computer has flat-lined on its future warning: if the Ukrainian people still want to have anything left, they better dump Zelensky NOW and seek peace as he promised to get elected. Peace is ONLY attainable when there is communication. Even Estonia is courting...

Many Ukrainians see Volodymyr Zelensky as a dictator who has betrayed his own country for a handful of silver. From tomorrow, May 20th, Zelensky’s presidential term is formally at an end—but no new elections will be held as long as Ukraine is under martial law because he would be overwhelmingly voted out. He preaches that Ukraine is fighting for freedom and then denies them the right to vote on his policies – so much for freedom and democracy. Zelensky has no incentive for peace at this point in time. Zelensjy won the election, which some say was rigged, promising PEACE...

There are 13,000 UNRWA employees in Gaza. We already know, thanks to the relentless investigations conducted by Hillel Neuer of UN Watch, that some of those UNRWA members joined Hamas operatives on October 7, taking part in the atrocities inflicted that day, joining in the fun of rape, torture, and murder of Israeli men, women, and children. Other UNRWA members in Gaza have subsequently expressed support for Hamas’ actions. UNRWA schools still use textbooks full of antisemitic passages. UNRWA’s European and American donors have repeatedly demanded that such material be excised from the schoolbooks; UNRWA solemnly promises that it will...

Hamas footage showing former hostages Ela and Dafna Elyakim while they were being held hostage in Gaza. (photo credit: IDF SPOKESPERSON'S UNIT) The IDF released footage soldiers found of former hostages Ela and Dafna Elyakim in Gaza on Sunday. The footage shows Ela, an eight-year-old resident of Nahal Oz, in a video seemingly filmed by Hamas asking for Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu to free her and noting that she was "being held hostage by Hamas." A banner of Hamas's al-Qassam Brigades was displayed behind Ela. Elyakim sisters released in November The Elyakim sisters were released as part of the hostage...

The United Nations confirmed Saturday that 800,000 Palestinians have left the town of Rafah, in southern Gaza, as Israel begins its attack on Hamas battalions there. Philippe Lazzarini, the commissioner-general of the controversial United Nations Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA), announced the number of evacuees — and warned of the risks they face. The number of evacuees far exceeds the estimates that were discussed in advance of the Israeli operation, which began on May 6, amid U.S. opposition. The Biden administration warned that an attack on Rafah could cause civilian casualties there.

On Friday’s “CNN News Central,” Rep. Jared Moskowitz (D-FL) stated that President Joe Biden’s threat to withhold certain weapons from Israel took pressure off Hamas and in doing so made it less likely to get a ceasefire deal, which makes it harder to get aid into Gaza and free the hostages. Moskowitz said that while he has issues with the House bill to force Biden to transfer weapons to Israel, the bill won’t become law anyway, so those concerns aren’t hugely relevant, and “my main purpose for voting for the bill is what I said earlier when the President decided...

Venezuela has moved “substantial quantities of [military] personnel and equipment to the border with Guyana amid its territorial dispute over the Essequibo region. The update comes from the Center for Strategic and International Studies in Washington D.C., *** The think tank talks about an expansion of a military base on Anacoco Island in the area, with new roads and a bridge getting built in the past few months. A local airport is also being expanded, CSIS also said, citing satellite imagery and social media posts According to the report’s authors, the activity could be preparation for a “manufactured crisis” before...

“Russia launches a division sized recon in force operation 20 kilometers North of Ukraine's second largest city, Kharkiv.…”

For a long time, the US Army assumed the US Air Force would protect it from enemy aircraft. Which is why, in the 1990s, the Army shuttered many of its short-range air-defence, or SHORAD, units. This process only accelerated during the counterinsurgency campaigns in Iraq and Afghanistan, where the Army was fighting an enemy with no aircraft. By the time Russia invaded Ukraine in 2014, the Army was down to just 300 or so aging Avenger air-defence vehicles, each firing infrared-guided Stinger missiles out to a distance of three miles. This to protect a million troops, if you count active...

It turns out that a Gaza based al-Qaeda affiliated group known as Jaysh al-Ummah has joined Hamas in the jihad against Israel. On December 8, Jaysh al-Ummah published a statement saying that its fighters had been clashing with the IDF in the north of the Gaza Strip and in Sheikh Radwan in Gaza City:Al-Qaeda is currently fighting in Gaza as Jaysh al-Ummah on the side of Hamas against the Zionists. A Jaysh al-Ummah-Statement from 8. December, 2023, announcing to have repelled the ‘Israeli’ army in fighting in the north of the Gaza Strip and in Sheikh Radwan in Gaza-City. https://t.co/g3o29r8OJG...

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) continued to attack Hamas terrorists in Rafah and throughout Gaza on Monday, which was Israel’s independence day, despite continued international criticism and caution from the White House. In a statement, the IDF said: IDF troops continue their operations against terror targets in the area of eastern Rafah and on the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing. IDF troops eliminated several armed terrorist cells in close-quarters encounters on the Gazan side of the Rafah crossing. In eastern Rafah, IDF troops eliminated a number of terrorists and located weapons. An IAF aircraft struck a terrorist cell that...

Last week we supposedly got “good news” on Social Security and Medicare, because the trust funds are in slightly better shape than a year ago. But here’s the rest of the picture. Interest payments on the ballooning national debt have now for the first time exceeded every other individual item in the budget except Social Security. Debt interest through the first seven months of this fiscal year has just topped $500 billion, reports the U.S. Treasury — about $4,000 for every household in the country. Repeat: This is just the interest. Think of the national debt as an interest-only mortgage....