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Declassified papers reveal extent of US military aid to Ukraine – media
Washington has gone to great lengths to prepare Kiev “to wage a hybrid war
against Russia,” a major US news outlet has said
© AFP / Sergei Supinsky
The US has drastically increased its shipments of lethal aid to Ukraine since late last year, including weapons and gear for urban combat, the Washington Post reported on Saturday, after viewing declassified accounting for transfers and sales.
According to the Pentagon's paperwork, from as early as December Washington had been actively equipping the Kiev government with shotguns, special suits for explosive ordnance disposal and other items useful for combat in urban areas – that's more than two months before the Russian invasion occurred.
And over the past week the deliveries of American arms to Ukraine intensified further, with Kiev getting Stinger anti-aircraft missile systems for the first time and boosting its arsenal of anti-tank Javelin missiles, among other things.
The list has illustrated the great extent to which the Biden administration “sought to prepare the Ukrainian military to wage a hybrid war against Russia,” the Washington Post added.
The delivery of weapons to Kiev is “a continuous process. We are always, always looking at what Ukraine needs, and we've been doing this for years now,” according to an unnamed high-ranking US defense official cited by the paper.
After the Russian incursion, “we have just accelerated our process of identifying requirements and accelerated our consultations as well with the Ukrainians, talking to them daily, as opposed to periodic meetings that we did before this crisis,” he explained.
Some $240 million out of the $350 million in lethal aid that had been approved in late February has already been supplied to Ukraine, according to a senior defense official.
This adds to around $200 million in military assistance that Washington greenlighted for Ukraine in late December, sending M141 single-shot shoulder-launched rocket launchers, M500 shotguns, Mk-19 grenade launchers, M134 miniguns and other gear to the country.
The donation of hundreds of millions of dollars of military-industrial inventory to Ukraine is the whole point of this exercise. Of course, the government pays the military-industrial complex full price for these mercenary toys, which comes from taxpayers' pockets, and is part of the Great Reset - which is a massive shift of wealth from the middle class to the wealthy, in effect, eliminating the middle class.
The demonization of Russia has already resulted in many billions of dollars of inventory moving to European countries. NATO and Washington are responsible for that. Also, NATO's hyperbole about Russian threats to European countries was beginning to sound a little flat, so they needed confirmation that their lies were actually true. Unfortunately, Putin was goaded into providing that proof.
Moscow launched what it called a “special operation” in Ukraine last Thursday, saying that it was needed to stop the “genocide” in the Republics of Donetsk and Lugansk, which broke away from Kiev in 2014.
According to the Russian side, the aim of the operation is to “denazify” and “demilitarize” the Ukrainian government, not to occupy the neighboring country.
Kiev has denied Moscow's justification for the incursion, claiming that an unprovoked war has been waged against it and rallying for international support.
Unprovoked! It has been provoked for 14 years since NATO announced that it intended to embrace Ukraine and Georgia - violating the post-soviet agreement not to expand eastward, and putting Russia's borders under immediate threat.
It had also asked the US to impose a no-fly zone above Ukraine on numerous occasions, but the Biden administration has been reluctant to fulfill the request, which would require NATO to target Russian warplanes over the country, potentially leading to a major war in Europe.
Biden is now encouraging European countries to send fighter jets to Ukraine. Each fighter jet that needs replacing is many tens of millions of dollars to the US oligarchs.
It seemed like a good idea at the time....
Tony Blair thought invading Iraq was 'the right thing to do'
The former UK prime minister said leaders making big decisions must follow their ‘instinct’
Former British Prime Minister Tony Blair has again defended his decision to invade Afghanistan and Iraq post-9/11, by saying he thought it was the “right thing” to do at the time.
Speaking to the Archbishop of Canterbury, Justin Welby, on the BBC on Sunday, Blair said geopolitics is “very complex,” more complicated than people want to believe as they “search for simplicity.”
“People often say over Iraq or Afghanistan that I took the wrong decision,” Blair said, adding that he had to do what he “thought was the right thing” at the time.
On the “really big decisions,” Blair said leaders have to follow their “own instinct” but that they must also “be prepared to acknowledge when you've got things wrong.”
He explained that after the 9/11 terrorist attacks in New York and Washington he decided that the UK had “to be with America in this moment” and to respond to any issues related to chemical, biological or nuclear weapons with “a strong, strong stand.”
And, yet, there were no biological, nuclear, or chemical weapons! Your instincts were completely wrong because you had no compulsion to learn the truth. Typical Labour (liberal) ideology is, 'the ends justify the means, even when they don't'.
Blair is unlikely to find understanding among many of his compatriots. A recent petition, which called for the former PM to be held accountable for “war crimes” and to strip him of his knighthood, has been signed by more than a million people. The petition reads that Blair was “personally responsible for causing the death of countless innocent civilian lives and servicemen in various conflicts.”
This Chilcot inquiry, published in 2016, found there was no intelligence to back up Blair's pretext for launching the war in Iraq; that the late Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein had weapons of mass destruction. It also concluded that Blair had knowingly exaggerated the threat posed by Saddam Hussein when making the case to MPs and the public for military action.
Blair did, however, admit that he “may have been wrong” about Iraq and Afghanistan, saying leaders don’t always know “how things are going to unfold” when they make a big decision.
Commenting on the war in Ukraine, Blair said it was “massively contrary” to UK interests, “to have a country, an independent sovereign country on the doorstep of Europe, essentially invaded and taken over.”
Precisely the argument Russia makes for invading Ukraine!
Moscow has claimed its recent invasion of Ukraine was needed to “demilitarize” and “denazify” the country, to protect the Donbass region and to defend Russia’s own security amid NATO’s expansion eastward.
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Macgregor: Zelensky Is No Hero, He's A Puppet That Is
Putting His Own Population At Unnecessary Risk
Posted By Ian Schwartz
On Date March 5, 2022
Ret Col. Douglas Macgregor said a neutral Ukraine would be good for us and good for Ukraine as it would create a buffer both sides want in an interview on Fox Business with host Stuart Varney. Macgregor called Zelensky a "puppet" and said he is "dragging this out" and using civilians as a shield by sending armed forces into populated areas.
"Surprisingly little damage, frankly. Much less damage than we inflicted on Iraq when we went into it in '91 and again in 2003," Macgregor said of Russia's shelling of Ukrainian cities. "Mr. Zelensky, I think, is postponing the inevitable in the hopes that we are going to rescue him, and we are not coming. President Biden has made that very clear."
"Zelensky is a puppet, and he is putting huge numbers of his own population at unnecessary risk," Macgregor said. "Quite frankly, most of what comes out of Ukraine is debunked as lies within 24-48 hours. The notions of taking and retaking airfields, all of this is nonsense. It hasn't happened."
"He's not a hero? Standing up for himself and his own people, you don't think he's a hero?" an incredulous Varney asked.
"No, I do not," Macgregor chuckled. "I don't see anything heroic about the man. And I think the most heroic thing he can do right now is to come to terms with reality. Neutralize Ukraine. This is not a bad thing. A neutral Ukraine would be good for us as well as for Russia. It would create the buffer that, frankly, both sides want. But he's, I think, being told to hang on and try to drag this out, which is tragic for the people that have to live through this."
"I am inclined to disagree with you, Colonel, but, you know, we'll see how this works out," Varney replied.
STUART VARNEY: Putin attacks a nuclear power plant. What's the strategy behind that? Is it just to intimidate innocent civilians?.
DOUG MACGREGOR: The strategy was not to attack any power plants or the power grid. The Russians have very carefully avoided interrupting any power. No damage to communications, no damage to any of the things that are essential like the water supply.
What you're seeing is that the Russians have now driven what is left of the Ukrainian forces who are taking refuge in population centers, cities because they have no mobility, no air defense, no air cover, no logistical infrastructure. They are now mingling with the population much as we've seen in the Middle East whenever we drove the Islamists out of business, they ran into cities, used people as shields, the civilian population, and tried to avoid being annihilated. And I think that's essentially what's happening today with the population being used by the Ukrainian forces to avoid destruction.
STUART VARNEY: Do you think Putin will pull what I would call a Grozny?
DOUG MACGREGOR: No.
STUART VARNEY: Grozny was the capital of a breakaway republic. He flattened out when the civilians resisted. Is he going to flatten Ukraine?
DOUG MACGREGOR: No, absolutely not. In fact, he's worked hard to capture most of it intact. Surprisingly little damage, frankly, Stuart. Much less damage than we inflicted on Iraq when we went into it in '91 and again in 2003.
No, I think they're just surrounding the Ukrainian forces, and they are annihilating them. And this is inevitable. And Mr. Zelensky, I think, is postponing the inevitable in the hopes that we are going to rescue him, and we are not coming. President Biden has made that very clear.
STUART VARNEY: Do you think the end is in sight?
DOUG MACGREGOR: Well, the end of this phase is still a few days away. The first five days Russian forces, I think, frankly, were too gentle. They've now corrected that. So I would say another ten days this should be completely over. But the question is, what is it that Zelensky is going to do.
The Russians have made it very clear what they want is a neutral Ukraine. This could have ended days ago if he accepted that, and then they could adjust the borders. But the eastern part of Ukraine is firmly in Russian hands. Again, the Russians are not seizing territory, they're destroying Ukrainian forces. That's their focus.
STUART VARNEY: Colonel, it sounds like you don't approve of Zelensky's stand.
DOUG MACGREGOR: Oh, I think Zelensky is a puppet, and he is putting huge numbers of his own population at unnecessary risk. And, quite frankly, most of what comes out of Ukraine is debunked as lies within 24-48 hours. The notions of taking and retaking airfields, all of this is nonsense. It hasn't happened.
STUART VARNEY: He's not a hero? Standing up for himself and his own people, you don't think he's a hero?
DOUG MACGREGOR: No, I do not. I don't see anything heroic about the man. And I think the most heroic thing he can do right now is to come to terms with reality. Neutralize Ukraine. This is not a bad thing. A neutral Ukraine would be good for us as well as for Russia. It would create the buffer that, frankly, both sides want. But he's, I think, being told to hang on and try to drag this out, which is tragic for the people that have to live through this.
STUART VARNEY: I am inclined to disagree with you, Colonel, but, you know, we'll see how this works out.
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