Now in our second week of the conflict, we have seen continuing damage to both Israel and Iran, as well as direct US intervention which nonetheless seems to have caused limited damage to Fordow and little damage to Iran’s nuclear program. Regime change seems more elusive than ever, as even Iranians previously critical of the government now rally around it as they are attacked by two rabid imperialists at once. And Iran’s government is tentatively considering a withdrawal, or at minimum a reconsideration, of their membership to the IAEA and the NPT. And, of course, the Strait of Hormuz is still a tool in their arsenal.
A day or so on from the strike on Fordow, we have so far seen basically no change in strategy from the Iranian military as they continue to strike Israel with small barrages of missiles. Military analysts argue furiously - is this a deliberate strategy of steady attrition on Israel, or indicative of immense material constraints on Iran? Are the hits by Israel on real targets, or are they decoys? Does Iran wish to develop a nuke, or are they still hesitating? Will Iran and Yemen strike at US warships and bases in response to the attack, or will they merely continue striking only Israel?
And perhaps most importantly - will this conflict end diplomatically due to a lack of appetite for an extended war (to wit: not a peace but a 20 year armistice) or with Israel forced into major concessions including an end to their genocide? Or even with a total military/societal collapse of either side?
Last week’s thread is here. The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel’s destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
This whole thing goes to show how North Korea is the only non great power sovereign state and only communist states can be trusted to manuever these situations against imperialism.
The DPRK didnt want to be a chinese satelite state or allow significant Chinese influence, had no delusions regarding the west and wanted to chart its own geopolitical course secure from imperialism. So they built the fucking bomb. Even when China in peak post deng pre xi, WTO and West good mode was pissing and crying for them not to , even when they along with Putin’s dumbass joined in the sanctions. Even under the most vicious pressure from the country that had already genocided them. With literally no allies in the entire world. They put their heads down, suffered and persevered but they did it. They didnt have 5% of their population being SK agents with ATGMs hidden in their asses to sabotage them or a political sphere and elite dreaming about sending their kids to harvard and having swiss bank accounts. You guessed it, probably because they were communists.
They would have even done it even if the US carpet bombed them again and hundreds of thosuands were dying and did so without any guarantee that china would actualy help them in that situation despite having a paper somewhere saying they would. They would have turned Seoul into a parking lot with artillery until the last 30.000 people in Pyongyang bunkers and tunnels had a nuke button
And now they are reaping the benefits. Yes most of the world still shuning them and yes they under more pressure and attack than any country other than cuba can imagine. But the geopolitical events and changes created a situation where they can exercise their sovereigty and militarism to upgrade their technologies and energy access from co-benificial ties with russia and China also gives less of a shit to follow a bunch of sanctions they have been following ,and also doesnt want to be left behind in the russia-dprk bromance. And the future looks like more of that.
If they had a fraction of the brainworms iran had they would either be a smoking crater or a chinese dengifying vassal with its teeth taken out which doesnt sound that bad if you dont care about sovereignty between different socialist experiments and nations but whatever
Something I really got from Losurdo’s Stalin book was just how much danger from internal sabotage the ongoing revolution of the USSR was in before the Great Terror. Stalin may have been a bit too paranoid but not really by much. And what we can see in Lebanon and Syria and what Israel tried to do in Iran, your enemies WILL activate these subversive elements eventually and if they have enough juice they WILL destroy your country.
Would anyone blame the IRGC if they do a Stalin-style purge of their country? Can we really not see how your enemies will cry about human rights and free speech, because you refuse to allow the people who would destroy your country to live?
I think I understand Stalin a little bit better today than I did 2 weeks ago.
If IRGC purged those people they’d also purge communists. They’d purge women’s rights types who just want the freedom to not cover their hair. They would receive spectacular backlash among a young population that doesn’t like these backwards reactionary rules and create the forces that would destroy Iran for the imperialists because it would be so unpopular. They need to give up the religious hardline stuff and then purge the people who remain who push for western style democracy. But even they are just ill informed and not necessarily bad people, they murdered the communists who might have educated them with class consciousness.
The Islamic Republic doesn’t have the legitimacy to carry out such purges. Their regime is too interested in stability and supporting the interests of its own bourgeoisie and so they’ll be unable to defend themselves, even when such a course of action has widespread public support. They don’t care enough about the Islamic Republic to commit to the enormous costs of defending their state. Somehow these guys lived through the revolution and the Iran-Iraq War and they’re unwilling to sacrifice, even when it means personal doom for many of the leadership. They’re convinced they’re walking a careful strategic line, but they’re letting history slip through their fingers. If they had been strong and decisive in this crisis they would have secured their rule for a century, but with their weakness it’s hard to see it lasting a generation.
You’ve said exactly what was on my mind. At any point, either during the arduous march famine in the 90s post ussr or the phony nuclear negotiations with Clinton, the WPK could have bent the knee and liberalized, striking down Kim Ill Sung and socialism. They held firm in their own sovereignty and now they are in the strongest position they had ever been.
Death to liberalism, study Juche.
“We will eat grass, even go hungry, but we will have our own nuclear bomb.” - Pakistan PM Bhutto