https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-50573069

Bellingcat did incredibly detailed analysis of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. I hate to see him (them?) discredit himself with Syrian Gas Attack hoax. It’s getting clearer that the Syrian gas attacks were a false flag trying to get the US into another Middle East war.

Bellingcat’s article (2017):

Based on the diagram on of an M4000 chemical bomb, as published by representatives of the Russian Federation, as well as the many similarities it has with bomb in the April 2013 video, it is clear that bomb featured in the April 2013 video is an M4000 chemical bomb.

The debris recovered from the Al-Lataminah March 30, 2017 Sarin attack matches perfectly to the features of the bomb in the April 2013 video, and the diagram published by the Russian Federation of an M4000 chemical bomb. Therefore, it is certain the M4000 chemical bomb was used in the March 30, 2017 attack in Al-Lataminah.

The filler cap documented in the crater at Khan Sheikhoun is consistent with a M4000 chemical bomb, and the damage seen on the large piece of metal is consistent with damage seen on unexploded examples of M4000 chemical bombs shown above. Therefore, it is possible to state it is likely the bomb used in Khan Sheikhoun was an M4000 chemical bomb, although there remains the possibility that it could be the remains of another type of Syrian chemical bomb.

https://www.bellingcat.com/news/mena/2019/09/24/the-first-images-of-the-type-of-chemical-bomb-used-in-syrias-sarin-attacks/

Tim Pool’s criticism:

A Newsweek reporter recently resigned over suppression of revelations about the gas attack hoax. Reporter is slandered as “conspiracy theorist”.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/10/burisma-holdings-paid-joe-biden-900000-for-lobbying-activities-ukrainian-mp/

Zelenski has distanced himself from Kolomoiski, according to this pundit.

I’m bullish on Ukraine.

Lviv Railway station dismantles recently constructed chapel, and returns sculpture gift from Donetsk.

Drug lab busted in Lviv.

Lviv Mayor required to pay 1 M uah (about $40k) for some election-related thing. The corrupt prosecutor was asking 50 M ($200k). It was a black Friday discount.

Lviv Mayor says mafia is trying to take over the city. A journalist channeled the mayor do name them, which Andri regards as silly because it’s obvious.

Andri jokingly says that mafiosos who deal black market cigarettes and alcohol do not exist..

Finally, something from Uke Tube which isn’t Marxist nonsense.

A bit of idealism and faith in government. “Ukraine is trying to establish the most fair and representative system of government.” Can you point to someone in Ukraininan politics and clearly say “This person is pursuing fairness.” And of course: “Ukraine is diverse, Ukraine is diverse, Ukraine is diverse.”

Though he studied only briefly in Canada, his discussion seems permeated by a naive, uniquely Canadian perspective that government is good and getting better and SHOULD be heavily involved in all societal affairs. In other words, high-trust, western society is the norm, and all deviations elsewhere in the world are temporary anomalies.

Nevertheless, it seems like this young scholar is doing useful work attempting to map the origins of political legitimacy in modern Ukraine. Seems to make accurate an interesting observations about several things:

* Ukraine’s tendency towards factionalism.

* Ukraine’s distant and inexperienced elites.

* Russia’s culture of hyper centralization and it’s tension with Ukrainians greater tendency toward regionalism and individualism.

He concludes, unambitiously, that these factors cause inevitable turbulence in Ukraine’s political scene.

Lysiak Rudnytsky’s prescience: Ukraine’s political turbulence and trauma of a “non-historical” nation is available from Forum for Ukrainian Studies.

https://ukrainian-studies.ca/2019/11/21/lysiak-rudnytskys-prescience-ukraines-political-turbulence-and-trauma-of-a-non-historical-nation/

* So, first she sees people risking their lives on Maidan, and then she suggests that poor Ukrainians are too low on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs to care about big issues. Is that not a contradiction?

* I suspect she is like most academics – a coward with above-average intelligence. Her reaction to Maidan, after finally deciding to go look at it was this: “Suddenly, I understood that I didn’t have anything to lose in that situation. My life was not at stake.”

Of course. Because it’s all about her. Most people on Maidan did not have to risk their lives. They chose to.

* Ukrainians should abandon Bandera and adopt some non-controversial hero, like an artist or a musician. . . . because, I suppose, that the important thing during a war is to be non-controversial. To me, this seems like the typical disdain that cowards exhibit toward courage.

* She includes the lie about Trump-Russia in her book, even though it was never true, and Clinton’s ties to Russia were much deeper and meaning – $500k speaking fee, the Uranium One deal, Clinton’s campaign manager owning shares of a Russian energy company.

Initial impression aside, I would like to give the book a fair shake and perhaps review it on my channel.

According to counter intelligence in Latvia around $4 million was obtained by Burisma Holdings Limited which was then transferred to Hunter Biden and Devon Archer –

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2019/11/huge-exclusive-bombshell-documents-released-by-ukrainian-general-prosecutors-office-reveal-millions-funneled-to-hunter-biden-and-the-john-kerry-family/

ROMNEY, PELOSI, KERRY, and BIDEN, all have children working for Ukrainian Oil and Gas exploration companies . . . .

Obama’s famous “flexibility after the election” line to Putin on the hot mic, never really got into the details of what that agreement was for. As we all know, the Crimean annexation was in 2014, two years after the mic incident. I also find it VERY interesting, that all of these politicians involved with their children on the boards of these companies, are all ‘anti-Russia’ in words, but never in action.

. . . .

Here’s a thought: The flexibility Obama was talking about was in regards to Putin wanting Crimea. The deal is, Obama makes it happen but will enrich the children of major players by inserting them into positions of companies that will benefit massively from the price of oil driving higher in the near term, and in the long term, have a steady supply of income for generations, as Ukrainian oil and gas is geographically one of the most profitable and lucrative areas outside of the Middle East. Where does Romney come into play? Romney knows his chances are slim, so he deliberately lets himself lose- his 47% comment that was recorded at an event is what everyone says undid his campaign. Surely he knows one of the 500 people in the audience could have been recording- but a secret camera in a plant was the one that did him in? No, that was orchestrated, and his benefit is his linneage getting financial security for generations.

Here’s my overall take: The hatred towards Russia is just a farce, a cover if you will, because they actually like Russia stirring up conflict when need be, made deals with Putin so that he gets Crimea and their families get rich. The corrupt Ukrainians themselves sold their own land and people to enrich themselves, allow the children of powerful Americans to become rich, by conceding to the Russians.

https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/ukraine-crimea-and-politicians-children-getting-on-the-board-of-oil-and-gas-companies/

Here’s Obama’s hot mic moment which is referenced in the article: “After my election I have more flexibility”.

For more awesome headlines, go to https://www.ubn.news/

Ukraine’s economy grew by 4.2% this summer y-o-y, indicating that the spring growth rate of 4.6% was not a fluke. First-quarter GDP growth was 2.5%, according to the State Statistics Service. The National Bank of Ukraine and the Economic Development Ministry recently upgraded their 2019 GDP forecasts to 3.5%. This would be triple the 1.1% forecast EU growth rate for 2019.

Through October, Ukrainian ports handled 20% more cargo than during the same 10 months last year, report the Sea Ports Authority. This is the biggest jump in six years and dwarfs last year’s increase of 2%. With bigger ships docking at Ukraine’s ports, the number of vessels was up only 2%, to 9,813.

Driving cargo to 130 million tons, grain exports were up 37%, to 44 million tons, and iron ore exports were up 33%, to 30.5 million tons. With dredging work complete at the nation’s five largest ports, the growth champions were: Pivdenyi (Yuzhne) +28% to 44 million tons; Mykolaiv + 20% to 27 million tons; Chernomorsk +23% to 21.1 million tons; and Odessa +19% to 20.7 million tons. On the Azov, Mariupol reversed a five-year decline and registered a 5.5% increase in cargo, to 5.3 million tons.

Author Victor Rud is past Chairman of the Ukrainian American Bar Association, and currently chairs its Committee on Foreign Affairs

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, George Schultz, William Perry and Sam Nunn argued for “a world without nuclear weapons, [as] dangers continue to mount.” Lamenting “a dangerous policy paralysis” among the US, its allies and Russia, they write that the road to denuclearization is through “re-engagement” with Russia, a “joint declaration,” and “dialogue,” all with a goal of reaching “stability”.

The authors’ respective positions as former Secretary of State, Secretary of Defense and Senator and Chair of the Armed Services Committee lend an implicit gravitas to their writing. But their writing does them no credit. They remain damningly silent about what happened to the largest country in Europe that also took their advice.

Following the fall of the USSR in 1991, Ukraine became the world’s third largest nuclear power (only after Russia and the US). Three years later Ukraine acceded to the very Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons (“NPT”) that the authors celebrate. Kyiv surrendered its nuclear arsenal (under American hectoring) to, yes, Russia: 176 ICBM’s armed with 1,240 nuclear warheads, 44 strategic bombers armed with 1081 nuclear-tipped cruise missiles, and an unspecified number of tactical nuclear warheads. Predictably enough, this also meant the implosion of Ukraine’s scientific-military-industrial complex that produced or maintained that arsenal, including the worlds’ largest ICBM plant. Never did anything even remotely resembling Ukraine’s surrender occur. Nor will it ever again.

Why?

In exchange for Ukraine’s denuclearization, the infamous 1994 “Memorandum on Security Assurances” (signed by Russia, the US, and the United Kingdom in Budapest) was intended to ensure Ukrainian sovereignty and national security. In early 2014, Russia (itself an NPT signatory and, bizarrely, the very recipient of Ukraine’s arsenal) nonetheless invaded, occupied and annexed Ukrainian territory, shattering its obligations under the Memorandum. Both from the standpoint of preventing any such violation by Russia in the first place (which was the entire purpose of the Memorandum) and from the standpoint of causing Russia’s withdrawal from Ukraine, America “policy” has failed. Ukraine’s human costs, alone, in the ensuing more than half a decade has been heinous–the disemboweling of children is a war crime. The costs to our own, and regional and global security, has been accelerating, and may easily expand beyond the monetary.

It can be argued that the Memorandum literally obligates the US only to enter into “consultations” with the other parties. Yet that hardly rises to an “assurance of security.” It manifestly was never the intention of the parties to hinge Ukraine’s denuclearization on Washington’s commitment to place a phone call to the UN in the event of a Russian invasion. Further, the Memorandum essentially restates the obligations already extant in the UN Charter and other international agreements of the parties. Regardless, given Russia’s breach there is nothing to keep Ukraine from withdrawing from the NPT and renewing its nuclear arsenal. Little wonder that the authors don’t mention this reality.

A year before invading Ukraine, Putin wrote in a New York Times Op-Ed: “[I]f you cannot count on international law, then you must find other ways to ensure your security. Thus, a growing number of countries seek to acquire weapons of mass destruction. This is logical: if you have the bomb, no one will touch you. We are left with talk of the need to strengthen non-proliferation, when in reality this is being eroded.”

https://foreignpolicyblogs.com/2019/04/23/op-ed-unreality-in-thinking-about-the-unthinkable/