Ukraine: US Lies, Provocation, Broken Promises, Fake News

[Anthea]

Protesters demand end to NATO

Thousands protest the US involvement in Ukraine and demand NATO's dissolution during the Rage Against War Machine rally in Washington D.C.

Protesters against the war in Ukraine descended on Washington, DC on Sunday, demanding that the US stop sending weapons to Kiev, disband NATO, and join China and Russia in creating a multi-polar world, among other things.

A thousand people attended the Rage Against the War Machine rally, which included former State Department speakers, politicians, journalists, and activists. Former Senators Ron Paul (R-TX) and Dennis Kucinich (D-OH), as well as former Representative Tulsi Gabbard (D-HI), headlined the event, calling for anti-war unity.

“I know some people, who wouldn’t show up to this peace rally, this anti-war rally, because of some of the speakers they had lined up on stage,” Jimmy Dore, a comedian and popular podcast host said on stage.

“I get what they are saying ‘hey, I want to stop a nuclear war, but not with those people' […] The people who won’t be attending today never had any intention of doing so. If it wasn’t one of the speakers, it would have been the weather. It would have been because they have more important things to do than survive. They will be at home watching CNN not cover this all day.”

“We basically shifted from Afghanistan to Ukraine and it needs to be stopped. Too many people are dying,” Tara Reade, a former Senate aide, author, actress, and producer of The Kim Iversen Show told Sputnik at the rally. “The enemy is the military-industrial complex and a very corrupt regime, the Biden regime.”

Although official estimates of rally attendees have not yet been made public, it appeared that there were between 1,000 and 3,000 people there.

“I’m here for the cause of avoiding nuclear war,” one protester from the Libertarian Party of Pennsylvania who held a "Drop Acid, Not Nukes" sign told Sputnik.

'Stop the war, negotiate peace'

The demonstration took place in front of the Lincoln Memorial, and participants marched to the White House to present President Biden with a list of ten demands, including a stop to funding for Ukraine, peace talks with Russia, and the dissolution of NATO.

Retired US Army colonel and former State Department official, Mary Ann Wright told Sputnik at the event that as a result of the US' wars, millions of people are either killed, wounded, their homes are destroyed, or are refugees, stressing that it is wrong and that the American people must pressure the membes of Congress to say "no more weapons, but negotiatie."

'US leads the world in making enemies'

Garland Nixon, a veteran radio and TV political analyst who hosts The Critical Hour on Radio Sputnik, and Sputnik correspondent Wyatt Reed both spoke at the event.

The military-industrial complex was the topic of the speakers. "Our nation used to lead the world in producing steel, cars, and ships," said Kucinich, the former mayor of Cleveland who was a vocal opponent of the Iraq war while in office.

“Now, we lead the world in making enemies, confusing defense with offense. Arming ourselves to the teeth, spending trillions of dollars to advance an aggressive empire through the promotion of war. But the wars, my dear friends, have come home.”

Last month, Former US President Donald Trump said on January 27 that he could have influenced a cessation of the war in Ukraine within 24 hours by negotiation if he were still president, adding that the war would not have happened if he were still in his position.

"If I were president, the Russia/Ukraine war would never have happened, but even now, if president, I would be able to negotiate an end to this horrible and rapidly escalating war within 24 hours," Trump said on the Truth Social platform.

Just a day earlier, Trump called out current US President Joe Biden's decision to transfer 31 M1A1 Abrams tanks to Ukraine because he believes it may instigate a reaction by Russia to deploy nuclear weapons - warning that it could lead to a World War III, stating on Truth Social:

"FIRST COME THE TANKS, THEN COME THE NUKES.

Get this crazy war ended, NOW. So easy to do!"

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... t-war-mach

Solution is easy:

1) because Ukraine did not abide with the terms of the Minsk agreement (that the UN passed into international law) and have been attacking the innocent people of Donbass for 9 years, the people of Donbass voted to break free from Ukraine. Kiev has to let them go.

2) the world has to come to terms with the fact that, the people of Donbass do not want to be governed by their oppressors

3) the world should support Russia due to the fact that US and NATO made an agreement with Russia not to move any closer to Russian borders, NATO broke that agreement

4) the Nazi organizations should be banned in Ukraine, as should all the Nazi celebrations

[Anthea]

Kiev's treatment of minorities

Ukraine has stripped the language rights of more than 150,000 Hungarians living on its territory

The Council of Europe will release a report this summer on Ukraine’s alleged discrimination against ethnic Hungarians and Romanians living on its territory, Hungary’s Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto announced on Wednesday. Hungarian inhabitants of the Transcarpathia region have lost the right to education in their language and have been forcibly drafted into Kiev’s military.

In a post on Facebook, Szijjarto said that the Council of Europe’s Venice Commission – which scrutinizes constitutional law and democratic reforms – will give its opinion on the matter in July.

Shame nobody took any notice when Kiev took away the language rights of ethnic Russians living in Donbass

“When war broke out next door, we decided not to mention the case of violations of rights against national communities,” Szijjarto wrote. “Unfortunately, in Ukraine, a new law was recently adopted, which further restricts minority rights.”

Szijjarto was referring to a law passed in December which mandated that the Ukrainian language be used in most aspects of daily and public life, including in schools. Previous language laws passed by Kiev were criticized by the Venice Commission for failing to safeguard minorities’ linguistic rights, and the latest legislation has been condemned by human rights organizations.

Around 156,000 ethnic Hungarians live in Ukraine, most of them in the region of Transcarpathia. Once a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, this region fell under Soviet control after World War II and remained in Kiev’s hands when the Ukrainian SSR became modern Ukraine after the fall of the USSR. Ukraine is also home to around 150,000 ethnic Romanians and more than 250,000 Moldovans, and Bucharest has joined Budapest in demanding that the language law be revised.

The Ukrainian government’s forcible drafting of Transcarpathian Hungarians into military service has further inflamed tensions between Budapest and Kiev. As videos surfaced last month showing Ukrainian troops press-ganging recruits into service, Szijjarto condemned the “brutal” nature of the draft.

Should the Council of Europe fail to resolve Hungary’s grievances, Szijjarto wrote in a separate Facebook post that Budapest will take its case to the European Court of Human Rights – itself a body of the council – as a “last resort.”

https://shoah.org.uk/kievs-treatment-of ... estigated/

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US support to not infinite

Citing an anonymous US official, the news agency said that "the administration has told the Ukrainian government that US resources are not infinite"

Reuters reported on Wednesday that the US administration warned the Kiev government that reserves for supporting Ukraine in its conflict with Russia are not infinite.

Citing an anonymous US official, the news agency said that "the administration has told the Ukrainian government that US resources are not infinite".

"Everybody understands that this has to end at some point. And we all would like to see it end sooner rather than later," the source told Reuters.

White House National Security Council spokesperson Adrienne Watson told the news agency that Americans are very much aware of what is at stake with regard to the possibility of cutting assistance to Ukraine and that the conflict was a matter of "freedom and independence" for Ukrainians.

"Americans' support for Ukraine is reflected in strong bipartisan support Ukraine assistance has received in both houses of Congress."

On February 20, US President Joe Biden made a surprise visit to Kiev during which he announced a new $450 million military aid package that Ukraine would be receiving soon.

The new military support entails a shipment of artillery ammunition, anti-tank systems, and air surveillance radars.

The President underlined that his trip's objective is to prove that his administration is still adamant on supporting Ukraine.

Yesterday, Biden held a speech at the Warsaw Royal castle and affirmed the US and the collective West "will not waver" in their support of Ukraine.

"One year ago, the world was bracing for the fall of Kiev," Biden said before his audience. "I can report: Kiev stands strong. Kiev stands proud. It stands tall and, most important, it stands free."

"Democracies of the world will stand guard over freedom today, tomorrow, and forever," Biden added, noting that the US and its allies will "have Ukraine's back."

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... e:-reuters

[Anthea]

A spark for de-globalization

The important aspect of this conflict is that Russian endurance would ease the transition towards a multipolar world, in which the right for one to develop at its own pace will be granted against the diktat of western values

It has been a year since the conflict in Ukraine broke out. By now, it is clear that western sanctions on Russia failed to reach their desired outcome. Instead, they backfired in the most anticipated way: a full-blown energy crisis that derailed into a cost-of-living crisis. But the conflict has had ramifications beyond measure upon the rest of the globe.

Not only have trends of de-dollarization emerge in several parts of the world, but there has also been a clear shift from the dominance of the neoliberal worldview. De- neo-liberalization accompanied de-globalization. A maturing process of multi-polarization is now underway.

The conflict in Ukraine may have not been a direct precursor to such trends but it surely has been a spark for long-standing global contradictions. Tensions with regards to the primacy of the dollar and the prevalence of neoliberal western view go way back.

In point of fact, the West has traditionally relied on sanctions as the concrete expression of these contradictions. Such is the case of many countries, especially Cuba and the DPRK, both of whom managed to pull through sanctions via state targeted policies and methods of self-reliance.

Less secure countries experienced direct military interventions such as in Iraq and Libya whose former leaders attempted to substitute the dollar with other currencies. (Iraq wanted to set up an oil burse with other countries to trade independently from the petrodollar)

Neoliberalism and its wonders

Globalization and neoliberalism may be used interchangeably. These terms however are not exactly the same. Whereas globalization involves the method of integrating the world through trade and information, neoliberalism entails the envelope ideology of de-reproducing labor.

As an ideology, neoliberalism has for long branded itself as an essential cornerstone of freedom and democracy. Its proponents have relentlessly advocated for lifting trade barriers, the dollarization of financial channels, and open and unregulated capital accounts. Together, these guarantee the flow of wealth from the periphery to the center.

With its armada of international financial institutions, its military alliances and selective humanitarian organizations, the West has sought to expand economic and military dominance across much of the world - up to Russia's borders where the conflict is currently taking place.

The synergy between the Western military and monetary institutions were of particular relevance to the consolidation of the dollar supremacy. Yet, they required that they be legitimized on the basis of dubious success stories such as the Asian miracle of the Golden Boys of Africa.

Evidently, neoliberalism has also subdued the real economy to finance. It has increased the scale of social dispossession and exploitation at unprecedented scales. It has generated a hierarchy between the waste-generator consumer over the value-making producer.

It has facilitated the looting of natural resources and surpluses in former colonies by weakening the developing state at the expense of private wealth accumulation.

It homogenized comprador classes across the Global South and it created oppressive financial instruments such as the Third-World debt to ensure that the process of resource extraction and usurpation stays put in much of the Global South. Where subjugation by diplomacy fails, militarism enforces compliance to non-compliant countries.

An unexpected 'boom'

One thing the West failed to anticipate was the rise of China. China's boom came as a surprise to many: the once peasant-like nation had suddenly become a competing power on the global stage. And worse, it had achieved an unmatched level of development without the recourse to neoliberal policies.

China did not reject globalization but it refused neoliberalization as a benchmark for growth and social development. It managed to raise the standard of living of its entire population as well as that of other nations through investment projects by internalizing surplus and enabling social productivity to unfold.

The "China threat" narrative has always existed since the onset of communism in China but has recently surfaced as a matter of national security concern since Obama introduced his "pivot to Asia" doctrine.

The policy essentially identified China as being a strategic foe to US hegemony in the East Asian region and called for the US to 'pivot' away from the Middle East to China by concentrating US forces on the encirclement of China.

It also involved an increase in the US' diplomatic and military ties with China's neighbors, and the establishment of military bases across the pacific. Then came Donald Trump with his republican protectionist agenda, calling for jobs to be returned and industries be relocated to the US from China.

Trump set up tariffs and trade barriers and accused China of stealing intellectual property copyrights and unfairly manipulating its currency in a bid to boost its own defense capabilities. The Trump administration was undoubtedly the turning point at which the de-globalization kicked in.

So contrary to what many believe, the Ukraine conflict is far from being a precursor to the process of de-globalization. Rather, it was the outcome of a slow and gradual coming to awareness that globalization had not really paid off for the United States (since China rose).

While not reversing the neoliberal ideology, the US had reversed globalization by highlighting the importance of strengthening the US' domestic economy. Europe's energy dependency to Russia was also a triggering point for de-globalization.

Europe is a peculiar case because it does not realize that the US is not so much of an ally. Its working class is acting as a mercenary to the world financial class war against Russia by arming Ukraine.

At the brink of collapse?

Europe's economies were partly beaten down as they emerged from the pandemic, and the conflict in Ukraine added up to worsening the situation in a way that has triggered a bloc-wide energy crisis. The EU central bank (ECB) resorted to monetary contraction by raising the interest rate and damaging living standards at a time of business cycle downturn.

Unlike the US dollar, the Euro does not bear upon the value of other currencies in the market. It remains low despite rate hikes, making the cost of dollar-priced energy even more significant.

Since the onset of the Ukraine conflict, the EU said it seeks to adopt new alternatives to Russian gas, yet the lack or absence of other options make it difficult to reach this target. Knowing the EU is struggling to shift to a net-zero economy, the US has outwardly refused to take down its green subsidy program, and instead encouraged EU countries to blow up their gas lifeline by cutting ties with Russia or from buying Russian gas from China.

It is obvious that European financial class put primacy in the power game with China and Russia at the expense of a Western working class led willingly to its demise for the many a time over the last century. It so appears that thanks to Western Marxism, the Western working classes have adopted once more the ideology of its capital class.

Following a series of price caps aimed at choking Russia's energy market, Russia recently decided to cut oil production by 500,000 barrels per day in March. Some interpreted this as Russia having trouble selling its oil and refined products. The reality however is far from this.

The move is aimed at curbing inflation while increasing deficit spending. On the flip side, the latest forecast from the European Commission shows that the EU economy is set to avoid the technical recession that was anticipated this year, when de facto Germany entered into recession.

The role of the conflict in Ukraine in this process of de-globalization has precisely been to resituate the global balance of power, the cornerstone for wealth accumulation.

Obvious signs of a shift have been noticeable in the Global South, particularly in Africa where several countries have defied western sanctions and chose to align with Russia.

But the important aspect of this conflict is that Russian endurance would ease the transition towards a multipolar world, in which the right for one to develop at its own pace will be granted against the diktat of western values.

A Russian victory would likewise inevitably highlight the decline of the American empire since China will have gains to reap from the western displacement of Central Asia and Eurasia.

Likewise, with de-dollarization on the rise, less dollars are beginning to circulate on the global market. For an empire that accumulates more wealth as it becomes more indebted, the prospects are grim. Soon it may not be able to print dollars and grow richer at will.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... balization

[Anthea]

UN resolution on Ukraine

Western-backed Ukraine receives substantial support in a non-binding vote in which 141 of the 193 UN members voted in favor, seven against, and 32 abstained, including China and India

The United Nations overwhelmingly voted Thursday to demand that Russia withdraw its troops from Ukraine "immediately" and "unconditionally", marking the one-year anniversary of the Ukraine war with a call for a "just and enduring" peace.

Ukraine broke the UN recognized Minsk agreements granting the Donbass an amount of autonomy and must stop it's 9 year war on Donbas

Russia permitted Donbass to join the Russian Federation as protection from Kiev attacks, however Kiev continues it's attacks on the innocent civilians on Donbass even though it is now legally part of the Russian Federation

Ukraine should immediately release from prison, all the members of the legally elected opposition party and all religious leaders and nuns

The West's backed Ukraine received substantial support in a non-binding vote in which 141 of the 193 UN members voted in favor, seven against, and 32 abstained, including China and India.

On the eve of the first anniversary of the war, support for Kiev remained mostly unchanged from last October, when 143 countries voted to condemn Russia's special military operation.

It also demanded "that the Russian Federation immediately, completely and unconditionally withdraw all of its military forces from the territory of Ukraine within its internationally recognized borders," and called "for a cessation of hostilities."

On its part, Russia strongly dismissed the resolution, with its UN representative Vasily Nebenzya calling Ukraine "neo-Nazi" and accusing the West of sacrificing the country and the developing world in their desire to beat Russia.

"They are ready to plunge the entire world into the abyss of war" to maintain their own "hegemony", Nebenzya said.

Before the vote, China's deputy envoy to the United Nations, Dai Bing, took a neutral stance, urging both sides to stop fighting and join in peace talks.

"We support Russia and Ukraine moving towards each other, resuming direct dialogue as soon as possible, bringing their legitimate concerns into the negotiation, setting out feasible options, putting an early end to the crisis, and giving peace a chance," he said.

Any settlement, he stressed, should give "due regard to ... the reasonable security concerns of all countries, thereby properly addressing their legitimate security aspirations."

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... ops-from-u

[Anthea]

EU push Kiev to peace talks

French and German politicians advised Ukrainian President Zelensky to take peace negotiations into consideration, a new report by the Wall Street Journal reports

Germany, France, and Britain to push Kiev to begin peace talks with Russia later this year, WSJ quoted officials from the three nations as saying, as some of Kiev's Western partners have growing reservations about its capacity to take control of the lands that seceded to Russia.

This week, UK Prime Minister Rishi Sunak outlined a framework for an agreement that would provide Ukraine with considerably more access to advanced military equipment, weapons, and ammunition to allegedly protect itself once the war is over. He stated that the concept should be included on the agenda of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization's annual summit in July.

On the one-year anniversary of the Ukraine-Russia war, Paris and Berlin backed the proposal and all three governments see it as a way to improve Ukrainian confidence, and offer the Ukrainian government an incentive to begin talks with Moscow, WSJ cited French, German, and British officials as saying.

Just to remind people that France and Germany were two of the countries that signed the Minsk agreements calling for a ceasefire and granting Donbass a certain amount of autonomy

Both countries failed in their duties as co-signatories and allowed the Kiev government to continue it's attacks on the people of Donbass for NINE years and in so doing are responsible for the deaths of THOUSANDS of civilians in Donbass

I suspect France and Germany are calling for peace now because they realize the truth about their part in the destruction of the Donbass is starting to come out

The officials were cautious to emphasize that the decision on when and under what conditions to begin peace negotiations is entirely up to Ukraine, as per the report.

Sunak said on Friday that the West should provide Ukraine with weapons that would give it a "decisive advantage" on the battlefield, such as warplanes.

'Ukraine's losses will become unbearable'
Nobody ever mentions Donbass nine years of losses

The report argued that the public rhetoric, however, masks deepening private doubts among politicians in the United Kingdom, France, and Germany that Ukraine will be able to "expel Russians from eastern Ukraine and Crimea", and a belief that the West can only help sustain the war effort for so long, especially if the conflict settles into a stalemate, WSJ cited the three officials as saying.

“We keep repeating that Russia mustn’t win, but what does that mean? If the war goes on for long enough with this intensity, Ukraine’s losses will become unbearable,” a senior French official said as quoted by WSJ. “And no one believes they will be able to retrieve Crimea.”

That rhetoric contrasts significantly with public comments made this week by US President Joe Biden and other Western leaders, who urged for unity in the face of what they called "Russian aggression". None of them discussed the possibility of Kiev starting negotiations with Moscow in the near future.

When the three Presidents met in Paris earlier this month, French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz reportedly told Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky that he needed to start thinking about peace talks with Moscow, according to persons familiar with the conversation.

Macron provided a more somber message over dinner at the Élysée Palace the sources said, telling Zelensky that even fierce adversaries like France and Germany had to make peace after World War II.

According to the same sources as quoted by WSJ, Macron informed Zelensky that he had been a superb battle leader, but that he would eventually have to transition into political statesmanship and make difficult judgments.

'Ukraine can start thinking about another outcome'

Gen. Petr Pavel, Pesident-elect of the Czech Republic and a former NATO commander, stated at the Munich conference, “We may end up in a situation where liberating some parts of Ukrainian territory may deliver more loss of lives than will be bearable by society…There might be a point when Ukrainians can start thinking about another outcome.”

France and Germany have indicated that they will not be providing new types of weapons to Ukraine in the next weeks while the war continues. While Britain is teaching Ukrainian pilots to fly jet fighters, authorities claim this is part of a longer-term strategy.

US Secretary of State Antony Blinken also said in Munich last week that the war must end in what he described as "a durable peace", “That means making sure that Ukraine has the capacity to deter aggression and, if necessary, to effectively defend against it.”

“We have to be thinking—and we are—about what the postwar future looks like to ensure that we have security and stability for Ukrainians and security and stability in Europe,” he added.

The report argued that any NATO member might, in principle, veto the proposal from the United Kingdom, France, and Germany, but the organization functions on consensus and such an effort would not even be debated at a summit unless it had widespread support within the alliance.

The offer falls short of Ukraine's request for complete NATO membership. Yet, a more limited agreement might be a step in the right way as long as it is part of a process that will result in membership at some time in the future, as per Ukraine's deputy foreign minister, Andriy Melnyk.

“We would like to have security guarantees on the path to NATO,” Zelensky stated in a press conference on Friday.

The proposed agreement would not contain any commitment to the post-NATO military in Ukraine, according to officials from the three countries as quoted by WSJ.

It would also not provide Kiev with so-called Article 5 protection, which mandates all members to come to another's aid if it is attacked and begs for help. They claimed, however, that it would provide Ukraine with the military wherewithal to deter any future "Russian aggression".

While the specific terms have not been finalized, several of these officials have stated that Ukraine might gain access to a wide range of NATO standard weapon systems and integrate its armed forces more snugly into the Western defense industry supply chain.

So far, Central European officials have only marginally considered the suggestion, but they are generally reluctant to sign off on any long-term NATO status for Ukraine that falls short of full membership in the alliance, the report concluded.

https://english.almayadeen.net/news/pol ... over-losse

[Anthea]

Ruble rises EU economies crumble

Russia is doing most of the winning and Ukraine is doing much of the losing.

American leaders promised Russian leaders that NATO would not expand one inch east toward the Russian borders after the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union

THEY LIED

Since the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, NATO, in tandem with the European Union, has marched steadily toward Russia’s borders, and now many of the ex-Soviet satellite states are now de facto EU and NATO members with American/NATO nuclear bases now within strike range of Russian cities and military infrastructure, and the Kremlin is literally only a few minutes away from a NATO missile attack.

As part of this encroachment policy, each country that borders the Russian Federation is a geopolitical target for American/NATO/EU recruitment.

If they can hoodwink the populations of the targeted states with promises of a land of milk and honey within the European Union and if compliant state establishments and political leaders encourage a Yes vote for accession into the NATO-dominated EU, then another piece of the jigsaw puzzle of a new Russophobic Europe is complete.

If, however, the targeted state, Ukraine in this case, does not toe the line of American client states, then unpopular coups are the orders of the day.

Witness Maidan Square in 2014, the fascist stormtroopers of American imperialism, lead the violent murderous insurrection of a western-financed and armed coup and voilà, as the French might say, a country opposed to joining NATO and the EU whose leaders had planned that Ukraine would remain a neutral sovereign state were forced to flee for their lives from the fascist lynch mob; and Ukraine became a de facto fascist armed camp whose political policies where being dictated by the democratic party leaders in DC and not the undemocratic, unelected coup leaders in Kiev.

The fascists now in charge in Ukraine began the systematic repression of the Russian language, Russian culture, and the Russian-speaking peoples of Crimea and Donbass; political opposition was banned and the military occupation of Lugansk and Donetsk began.

The seeds of Ukraine's implosion may have been sown during the Second World War when many Ukrainian fascists joined the German army and committed heinous war crimes against their fellow Ukrainians, including Jews, communists, socialists, and those they considered racially impure.

Those seeds were then watered, nurtured, and harvested by the imperialist hegemonic West in 2014.

The result? Two breakaway Ukrainian Republics of Lugansk and Donetsk are now members of the Russian Federation. Crimea is now also a part of the Russian Federation, we have witnessed the deaths of over 14,000 Eastern Ukrainians murdered by their own government between 2014 and 2022, two broken agreements Minsk I and Minsk II, the duplicitous clown of a President in Kiev, and a stumbling, bumbling, mumbling forgetful clown of a President in Washington. Both intend to fight Russia to the last 16-year-old Ukrainian boy or girl.

As part of the American/NATO strategy to put boots on the ground, planes in the air, and nuclear missiles within a few minutes reach of Moscow, their brinkmanship has led us to the cusp of a global engulfment with potential nuclear escalation.

The West's combined greed, coupled with its need to remain the dominant World superpower, backed by American military superiority, has created a false sense of invincibility and a level of brinkmanship that defies logic.

From instigating a regime change coup in 2014 to being signatories of the internationally recognized Minsk I and Minsk II accords, the West, including the leaders in Berlin, Paris, and Kiev, has blatantly lied, by signing Agreements they had no intention of implementing.

They have now stated publicly that those accords were simply used to misdirect Moscow of their true intentions, which included the reorganization and rearmament of the Ukraine fascist-led forces, including the reoccupation and possible attendant massacres in the now independent republics of Lugansk, Donetsk, and Crimea.

The Russian special military operation to denazify Ukraine began In February 2022.

Its sole purpose was to defend the new republics from a fascist-led pogrom and the possible massacre and brutal repression of local Russian-speaking citizens, many of whom have memories of the German/Ukrainian brutal nazi occupation and war crimes committed against them by the Ukraine Banderite fascists in 1941.

America started this war with its fascist-led coup in 2014.

Many people refused to live under an unelected fascist junta, and they resisted.

The threatened Ukrainian invasion, reoccupation, and possible massacre of civilians in the breakaway republics forced Moscow to intervene to protect the populace. An intervention that was 8 years late.

Russia believed Germany and France when they said they would guarantee Kiev would comply with the Minsk Agreements.

They lied, and Russia was deceived. Kiev was rearmed, and the Russian Federation was given no choice but to conceive of a plan to defend innocents from slaughter.

The outcome is a de facto NATO-American-Russian war in Eastern Ukraine.

The sanctions imposed by the West have backfired.

Germany is being deindustrialized.

The collective Western imperialist countries, the empires of old, are heading into a recession.

The rest of the Global South, Asia, Africa, and others who account for 87% of the world's population are now focusing on a multipolar world order, where respect, tolerance, acceptance, and mutually compatible interests combine to the benefit of all parties.

Economic growth can be achieved through sustainable partnerships.

Countries that believe in observing international law are coming together to form a new world order.

The threat of mutual nuclear destruction is being replaced with the promise of mutual cooperation.

Uncle (Joe) Biden and the Democratic Party's war on Russia have spectacularly backfired.

Mishandled and misjudged from the very start, the dream of balkanizing Russia for the benefit of American and European capital has failed.

The hope of fragmenting the Russian Federation for profit and plunder is over.

American hegemony is failing.

It is only in writing this piece that I now realize the true hope that lies before us.

Hope in humanity, hope in a better more equal world, and hope for future generations born into a more progressive tolerant multi-polar world.

I have visited Donetsk and Lugansk and have many friends there.

Russia has won the war both within and without Ukraine on the political, ethical, and military battlefields.

What we must all do now is demand Zelensky's departure. After all, he was elected on a mandate of seeking peace with the people of Eastern Ukraine not to butcher them.

A negotiated comprehensive peace deal must be concluded, although going by the sad shenanigans of the West how could Russia possibly believe anything Kiev and others might sign?

I am content to let others describe the depth of the war and how it has progressed on the battlefield.

I see the bigger prize. Global peace secured by mutual honorable advocates for multipolarism.

We are witnessing the end of Western imperialist hegemony, which invades and destroys its targeted enemies, causing millions of deaths, displacements, and refugees

Hasn't the poor of the world been occupied, exploited, and mistreated enough?

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Kiev blow up dam

Soldiers for the Ukrainian armed forces blew up a dam near Bakhmut, also known as Artyomovsk, in a bid to slow down the Russian offensive and force civilians to leave the besieged city, an adviser to the head of the Donetsk People's Republic, Igor Kimakovsky, said Saturday

"The dam was blown up, and the resulting torrent of water flowed toward Artyomovsk. They are likely trying to halt our offensive. Maybe they want to try and cut off our assault units from the rear to slow down munition supply,"

According to the advisor, the move could also mean that Ukrainians were preparing to abandon the city to the Russian forces and were getting "desperate."

"They told civilians to evacuate… Their goal is to make living conditions unbearable. They do not care about the people; they only care about destroying the city so that it would be economically unfeasible for us to rebuild," Denis Pushilin's advisor added.

Ukrainian Deputy Prime Minister Irna Vereshchuk urged last week all residents of Bakhmut to evacuate from the city immediately. "I appeal to the civilians who are still in Bakhmut. If you are adequate, law-abiding, and patriotic citizens, you must evacuate immediately," she wrote on Telegram.

The official declared that up to 6,000 people were still present in the city that was taken over by Russian forces, adding that staying could "expose them to danger...second, you are creating additional problems and risks for all those people who are trying to help you (the military, the national police, volunteers). Third, you prevent our defense and security forces from working normally in the city. Because they have to be concerned about your safety all the time. Therefore, I once again urge you to evacuate immediately."

Russian forces gained ground in the northern part of the strategic city of Bakhmut and blocked three out of four routes supplying Ukrainian troops since early February.

Days earlier, White House National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby warned that the city of Bakhmut may fall to Wagner forces, but it will not have a strategic bearing on the war as a whole.

Kirby acknowledged the recent advances made by Wagner in Bakhmut but noted that it was still uncertain whether the city would fall.

The remarks on the status of Bakhmut came as he responded to a question about the US encouraging Ukraine to redirect their efforts and resources elsewhere rather than exhausting them on a losing battle.

Further Russian advances

The Yagodnoye community to the north of Artyomovsk (called Bakhmut in Ukraine) has been completely taken over by Russian forces, Yevgeny Prigozhin, the founder of the Wagner private military company said on Saturday.

Artyomovsk was the original Russian name but when Kiev started banning everything Russian, culture, language etc they also changed place names and Artyomovsk became Bakhmut (similar to Turkey's treatment of Kurds and Kurdish place names)

"On February 25, the assault units of the Wagner PMC completely captured the populated locality of Yagodnoye north of Bakhmut," the Telegram channel of Prigozhin’s press service quoted him as saying.

Furthermore, Prigozhin's press service also published a photo of Wagner fighters in front of the settlement’s entry sign. Yagodnoye is adjacent to Artyomovsk’s northern suburbs.

This comes after a US mercenary fighting on the frontlines against the Russian armed forces said the Bakhmut frontlines were highly gruesome, comparing it to a meat grinder, as Russia pushes against Kiev's forces in the city for which battles have been taking place for months.

Former US Marine Troy Offenbecker underlined to ABC News that the life expectancy of Ukrainian soldiers on the city's frontlines was only about four hours, with a major offensive still expected from Russia.

Offenbecker underlined that he was not sure how long Kiev's forces would be able to hold the city, adding that the expected offensive had already kicked off and that attacks from Russians have been "nonstop" in Bakhmut, with artillery raining down upon it "all day and night".

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Nord Stream blast terrorist act

Hungary considers that the Nord Stream gas pipeline blast that took place on September 27, 2022, should be regarded as a terrorist attack as it is the first time a major European sensitive infrastructure is targeted in such a way

"Well, whatever happened at the Nord Stream pipeline, it is really scandalous. Because this is basically the first time when such a major European critical infrastructure was attacked - by whoever, but it was attacked. And such kind of an attack must be considered as a terrorist attack basically," Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto told RIA Novosti in an interview.

American investigative journalist and Pulitzer Prize winner Seymour Hersh said earlier this month that in June 2022, US Navy divers, operating under the cover of a widely publicized mid-summer NATO exercise known as BALTOPS 22, planted the remotely triggered explosives that, three months later, destroyed three of the four Nord Stream pipelines, according to a source with direct knowledge of the operational planning.

Hersh described the operation as "very covert", noting that the planning phase of the sabotage operation was “kept pretty separate” from the decision-makers. “In other words, the president only learned [that] ‘we can do it’,” Hersh said then.

Hungary's top diplomat also added that Budapest supports a comprehensive investigation into the explosion and believes that the United Nations should take part in it and offer a framework for the process.

"And we support a comprehensive, deep, structured and detailed investigation of what has happened. Regardless of who is initiating that, we do support all kinds of investigations, which bring the hope that we will come to know, who committed that and why," he said.

"I think in such kind of issue, the United Nations definitely should have a role. Why? Because the United Nations has not been created as an integration for like-minded countries. The United Nations has been created to serve as a platform for countries to talk to each other, who even consider each other as enemies. …I think the UN should give framework for such kind of an investigation. I think UN could be a good platform for such an investigation," he added.

The UN provides a platform where even enemies can engage in discussions, which deems it [UN] more responsible to "play a bigger role" when great security challenges are present, the Foreign Minister said.

"When it comes to this whole challenging security environment, I do believe that UN should play a bigger role here. Because UN is basically kind of last resort, where everybody is being represented, where any kind of discussion can take place, because everybody is here. And under the UN umbrella, even enemies could and should talk to each other. So I do believe that UN should really play its role because currently this is not the case," he further added.

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Anti-NATO protests Belgium and France

Thousands of demonstrators in Brussels on Sunday called for a ceasefire between Russia and Ukraine and for a peaceful solution to the Ukrainian crisis

The demonstrators demanded negotiations to reach a peaceful solution to the crisis, as the head of the General Labour Confederation of Belgium, "this is the only way forward."

"Let's stop the fire ... Let the politicians settle the diplomatic affairs, the people want peace, bread," demonstrator Yvyes Eckman said.

"Everywhere in the world when you take sanctions it is always the people who pay," considered another demonstrator, Isabelle Minnon.

Anti-NATO protests in France for second week

The French capital Paris and other locations across the country saw multiple mass protests against France’s NATO membership and its continued support of Kiev on Sunday.

For the second consecutive weekend, people took to the streets in protests organized by the right-wing Les Patriotes party, led by Florian Philippot, who personally attended the rally in Paris.

Philippot said Sunday's event, dubbed "National March for Peace", saw more people participating compared to last week when some 10,000 showed up for a rally in Paris. According to the French politician, smaller-scale anti-NATO protests were held at some 30 other locations across France as well.

Protesters marched through the streets of Paris, carrying a large banner reading “For Peace". The marchers called for the withdrawal of France from both the US-led NATO and from the EU and urged a halt to supplying Ukraine with weaponry. The protesters also took a swing at the incumbent French President Emmanuel Macron, chanting “Macron get out!”

Following the march, the protesters held a rally led by Philippot, who was filmed defacing NATO and EU flags alongside his supporters.

A couple of days ago, German officials and protesters accused German Chancellor Olaf Scholz of drowning the nation deeper into the Ukrainian-Russia conflict during a "Peace Rally" attended by thousands of Germans in Berlin and called for by the left-wing Die Linke party.

Protesters urged the German government to play a constructive role in ending the war in Ukraine rather than fueling it with the continued weapons supply to Kiev.

More than 50,000 people attended the "Peace Rally" where several held banners that read "Make Peace, Without Weapons" and "Diplomacy Instead of Arms Deliveries."

Some protesters also laid flowers on the wreck of a Russian T-72 tank placed in front of the Russian embassy in Berlin in a provocative move by German and Ukrainian activists in collaboration with the Ukrainian Defense Ministry.

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South Korea refuses to send Ukraine Arms

A South Korean Defense Ministry spokesperson on Monday affirmed that South Korea will not go back on its refusal to supply weapons to Ukraine after the Ukrainian Ambassador continued to press Seoul for lethal aid

Ukrainian Ambassador to South Korea Dmytro Ponomarenko reiterated on Monday that Kiev hoped Seoul would find a way to send weapons to Ukraine without delay to bolster its "counteroffensive" capabilities.

"The South Korean government remains steadfast in its resolve not to provide Ukraine with lethal weapons," the spokesperson told a news briefing, adding that South Korea has been sending humanitarian assistance to Ukraine and contributing to its reconstruction efforts.

The Defense Ministry spokesperson said he would not comment on a suggestion made by Ukrainian presidential advisor Mykhailo Podolyak to South Korean media last week that consultations on arms deliveries were already underway.

In late January, NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg urged South Korea to "step up" military support for Ukraine, advising Seoul to reconsider its policy of not sending weapons to countries in conflict.

In a visit to Seoul, Stoltenberg met with top South Korean officials and urged Seoul to do more to assist Kiev, saying there was an "urgent need for more munitions."

Commenting on the matter, Kim Tong Myong, a researcher of the Society for International Politics Study in the DPRK (North Korea), warned in an article published by the Korean Central News Agency (KCNA) that Stoltenberg "will likely exert pressure on Japan and South Korea to force these countries to provide military aid to Ukraine."

"It is a matter of time that the military hardware of South Korea and Japan flowing into NATO are seen in the Ukrainian battlefield," Kim considered, pointing out that the NATO chief will use the "theory of threat from China" in order to pressure the two countries.

It is noteworthy that South Korea is a growing global arms exporter, having recently won contracts to sell hundreds of tanks to European countries, including NATO member Poland. However, South Korean law prohibits the transfer of weapons to countries in active conflict.

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Mali cooperation with Russia

Malian transitional Prime Minister, Choguel Kokalla Maiga, pointed out that the supply of Russian military equipment to Mali made it possible to reverse the situation with terrorism in the country, and now the militants are afraid

"For the Malians, it is not the quantity that matters, but the result. Today we can confirm that fear has moved to the other camp. Terrorists no longer cause fear in Malians. On the contrary, the Malian army causes fear among terrorists, this is important. Cooperation [with Russia in the military sphere] will continue," Maiga told Sputnik in an interview.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov confirmed that Russia sent a large batch of aircraft to Mali on January 19, adding that military cooperation this year witnessed a new development.

The Malian Prime Minister further affirmed that Mali will continue military cooperation with Russia, indicating that the country is satisfied with Russian military equipment.

"At the moment we are completely satisfied, and, as I said, this cooperation will continue," Maiga said.

In a related context, Maiga revealed that Mali expects to present to the UN Security Council evidence of France's support for armed groups.

"The day we reveal the evidence, we will see who is muddying the waters. All those who do not want us to provide evidence understand that the accusations against us have no basis," Maiga underlined.

According to the Malian Prime Minister, Mali will keep this evidence to itself for as long as it deems it necessary.

It is noteworthy that in mid-October, during a speech delivered at a United Nations Security Council briefing on Mali in New York, Malian Foreign Minister Abdoulaye Diop accused France of violating Malian airspace and delivering weapons to militants that have been crippling the country for the past decade, which France denied.

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Greece refuses to arm Kiev

Athens will not supply Kiev with S-300 air defense missile systems, despite the United States' urging requests, as this would result in weakening Greece's defense, Greek Defense Minister Nikolaos Panagiotopoulos said in an interview

Panagiotopoulos added that US State Secretary Antony Blinken requested Athens to send Ukraine military equipment, including air defense supplies, during his trip to Greece earlier this week.

Washington has long asked Greece to provide military aid to Ukraine. "But we said that we could not grant this request because we could in no way provide any assistance by weakening our defenses. S-300s are where they are. They were bought and arrived in Greece for certain reasons, and as long as these reasons exist, we are not going to agree to any weakening of our defense system," Panagiotopoulos said.

The S-300 air defense missile systems in Greece were acquired from Cyprus.

The Greek defense minister highlighted the difficulty of the technical maintenance of these systems, which applies to Russian or Soviet-produced weapon systems.

The defense head added, "We gave 20 infantry fighting vehicles we have to Ukraine in exchange with the Germans, we received more modern and, therefore, more suitable for our needs German-made armored vehicles. There are 20 more to give. In any case, it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain these systems."

Greece obtained a great number of Soviet and Russian-made weapons of different sorts back in the 1990s. The US has been urging Greece to replace the Russian-made weapons with US-made ones, appealing to the notion that they are both NATO members.

Russian military commander Muradov commented a few months back about the decision saying, "Such a move by Athens would be not only a senseless demonstration of hostility towards Russia but also a risky step towards its own national interests, which the Greek public is already loudly declaring."

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Kiev forces have big Nazi problem

A former US soldier that served in the Ukrainian armed forces admits to having seen atrocities and massive signs of nazism festering within Kiev's forces

John McIntyre, having spent a year among the ranks of Kiev's armed forces, said that he "had to leave", adding that he "thought I was going to be killed. My family got me $300 to get to Chisinău, then I went to Istanbul and then to Moscow."

The US soldier who previously served in Fort Bliss, Texas, for two years, escaped from Ukraine into Russia after crossing into Moldova, though he did not reveal when he made himself known to Moscow.

"When I came, I was really surprised. Everybody had tattoos and Nazi symbolism," McIntyre revealed, confessing that he did not believe ultra-right ideology was "that big of a problem" for Ukraine until he experienced the situation first-hand.

Furthermore, he said he had to conceal his own anti-fascist and Communist views so as not to draw too much attention from Ukrainian soldiers, highlighting how some Western mercenaries told him that "the Russians aren't the Nazis, we are the Nazis."

McIntyre asserted that he felt "compromised" after discussing the war crimes committed by the Ukrainian forces with someone, saying he planned on defecting into Russia once he "gathered enough intelligence" despite knowing that whistleblowers are treated worse than spies.

"Anybody who confesses or is known to be about to confess is shot in the back of the head," he said. "A lot of people go missing… including foreigners."

The former US soldier admitted that Ukrainian soldiers habitually use civilians as human shields, adding that he knew people who executed prisoners of war.

"It's funny to them. It's hatred. They hate the Russian people, they want to kill them, they want to genocide them," he told RT.

He concluded by wondering how the West was supporting "these guys" and wanted them to join NATO, "and they can't even follow Geneva conventions."

The Azov and Aidar battalions - two of the most prominent neo-Nazi parties that have been accused of greasing bullets with pig fat to shoot Muslims - have been active on the ground in disenfranchised areas in eastern Ukraine before the said area joined Russia by popular referendum earlier this year. The battalions are official bodies within the Ukrainian military.

The US Congress passed in June a resolution intended to block US military funding to the Ukrainian army, essentially blocking such training and weaponry from reaching the hands of the Azov battalion in particular.

Congressmen John Conyers Jr. and Ted Yoho contended that the battalion has been a "source of controversy" since it was allowed to exist.

Despite there being various reports about Nazism within the Ukrainian armed forces, the Pentagon lobbied the House Defense Appropriations Committee to remove the amendment backed by Conyers and Yoho, arguing that such funding was already prohibited under another law.

The battalion's symbol is the neo-Nazi Wolfsangel, a black swastika against a yellow background.

Moreover, the Anti-Defamation League (ADL), an international Jewish NGO, refused to condemn the Pentagon's honoring of a veteran of the Azov Battalion who dons Nazi-inspired tattoos.

An email dated November 9 sent by the ADL to The Grayzone, an investigative journalist website, stressed that it does not view the Azov as the "far-right group it once was."

Founded by Andriy Biletsky, who vowed to “lead the white races of the world in a final crusade…against Semite-led Untermenschen,” the group is a pack of neo-Nazis working with the US-backed Ukrainian military.

It used to be condemned and labeled with Nazism all over it by Western media and the human rights industry - until the war in Ukraine in February 2022. Azov became the Ukrainian military’s defense of Mariupol, and Western media became suddenly inspired to rebrand Azov as a "misunderstood freedom fighter" and use the Kremlin as the anti-thesis.

The ADL seemed to turn a blind eye when Azov used civilians as human shields and executed those who tried to escape. Back in March, the ADL recognized the unit in a report it published, that white nationalists view Azov “as a pathway to the creation of a National Socialist state in Ukraine.”

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Azov receiving US arms

The United States is embroiled in yet another controversy, unable to verify whether the Azov Battalion was receiving arms from Washington in Ukraine

Soldiers of the Ukrainian 3rd Army Assault Brigade of the Special Operations Forces (SSO) "Azov", formerly known as the Azov Battalion, near their armored US-made and supplied Humvee vehicle

The United States appears to have a trend when it comes to the Ukraine war, as it seldom seems to know where the arms and aid it is sending Kiev are going, with various reports coming out from Washington about the White House and the Pentagon not knowing how their arms and monetary aid are being utilized.

Despite countless visual evidence suggesting the opposite, Under Secretary of Defense for Policy Colin Kahl said during a congressional hearing on Tuesday that the United States is not aware of whether the Azov Battalion has access to American arms provided to Ukraine.

"Not that I'm aware of," Kahl said when asked if the Azov Battalion is getting access to US weapons.

Additionally, Kahl refused to discuss in an unclassified setting whether CIA personnel were operating in Ukraine and providing training to the Ukrainians.

He did, however, say that the only US Defense Department personnel in Ukraine are located at the US embassy in Kiev.

It is worth noting that in November, the Biden administration said it was scurrying to track down the approximately $20 billion in military aid it sent to Ukraine

The Biden administration is running into major obstacles tracking the aid sent from Washington to Kiev, which has amounted to tens of billions of dollars since the start of the Ukraine war, resorting to blockchain technology and Ukrainian personnel to help them track the aid flowing into their country, a State Department cable obtained by Politico said in mid-December 2022.

Meanwhile, the Biden administration was mulling utilizing a certain unnamed US firm by February to implement a three-year initiative that would help with oversight regarding the aid making it into Ukraine, Politico said, citing a "sensitive but unclassified" document.

The cable, sent out from the US embassy in Kiev back in September, details what the United States is going through in terms of oversight as it tries and watch where its money is going as they abide by the restrictions and limits on the number of officials they can have in the field as well as the security measures prohibiting them from moving flexibly.

Republicans were warning of impending audits after they take over the House in January.

House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has previously stated that Ukraine would not receive a "blank check". The purpose of the audit was meant to track how the funds are being delivered and exactly where - as prior suspicions point to many shipped arms ending up on the black market.

Controversial Republican Marjorie Taylor Greene, who announced the audit decision, promised to "hold our government accountable", as other colleagues such as Rep. Jason Crow echoed to The Washington Post: "The taxpayers deserve to know that investment is going where it's intended to go," adding: "In any war, there can be missteps and misallocation of supplies."

Former President Donald Trump slammed Washington's generous hand-over of cash and weapons to Ukraine: The US, according to Trump, has too many problems of its own to hand money and weapons to Ukraine for its conflict with Russia, insisting that if anything it's Europe that should be providing more help to Kiev given that they're more affected by the situation.

This itself comes after reports from US media said that as Washington and its western allies continue to pump weapons into Kiev, maintenance of the armaments is increasingly becoming a headache.

The aforementioned cable also talked about how crises such as the one in Ukraine can turn into a fiasco that Washington just throws money at until it becomes an over-expensive hassle that the cash allocated to cannot be tracked precisely due to the ensuing chaos and the corruption that the governments taking the money are notorious for, such as Ukraine and Afghanistan.

Moreover, in addition to burdening the US with requests for aid, Ukraine is selling weapons it acquired from its allies on the black market due to the Kiev forces' limited ability to use them because of their lack of training, logistical challenges, and the diminishing size of the Ukrainian armed force, according to former senior Pentagon adviser Karen Kwiatkowski.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu previously said the arms supplied by the West to Ukraine were ending up on the black market and spreading across West Asia. This validates the Pentagon's concerns, as sensitive technology being sent to Ukraine would not be the best for the US in the long term.

Why train Ukrainians on F-16s?

Kahl said that it made no sense to begin training Ukrainians on F-16 fighter jets given that they may never receive the system.

“Since we haven’t made the decision to provide F-16s… it doesn’t make sense to start to train them on a system they may never get,” Kahl said during a House Armed Services Committee hearing.

US President Joe Biden told reporters in late January that the US would not be sending F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine, which Ukraine's leaders have said are at the top of their latest weapons wish list.

This comes despite a group of US military officials quietly lobbying for sending F-16s to Ukraine, Politico reported, citing three anonymous sources familiar with the matter.

According to the newspaper, the campaign for F-16s to Ukraine is gaining momentum in the Pentagon, while Kiev is bracing for a planned offensive this spring.
US production base weaknesses revealed by war

Washington's involvement in the Ukraine war revealed the weakness of its defense industrial base's ability to produce adequate amounts of munitions.

"I think what the Ukraine conflict showed is that, frankly, our defense industrial base was not at the level it needed to be to generate munitions," Kahl told a House Armed Services Committee.

A US Army Chief of Staff Gen. James McConville underlined in September that the US needed to replenish and upgrade its stocks of military equipment.

"We need to replenish our stocks and we need to replenish our weapons systems," McConville said during an interview at the Defense News Conference. "When we do replace them, we want to replace them with new equipment."

US military acquisition executives are working closely with the defense industrial base to project the sorts of items the Pentagon may need, McConville added.

The US is also investing to make sure it can provide Ukraine with the munitions they need, Kahl added.

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