In a video message announcing the decision on June 21, the head of Crimea, Sergey Aksenov, urged “everyone to stay calm and trust only official sources of information”, adding that he would update residents on “further decisions in connection with the situation in the fuel market”.

The head of Sevastopol announced on the same day that in order to conserve fuel, businesses, including grocery stores, would operate at reduced hours, and street lights would not be turned on.

The “temporary suspension” of fuel supplies comes almost a month after restrictions on the sale of AI-95 and AI-92 gasoline were introduced in Crimea. At the end of May, several gas station chains began selling fuel only to customers with government-issued coupons. Authorities stopped issuing coupons in the first week of June, and also placed a temporary ban on all cash sales of gasoline.

On June 6, Sevastopol implemented a QR code system to enforce a fuel ration of 20 liters per week for residents. However, delays in fuel supplies meant that even residents with digital ration cards were sometimes left with empty tanks.

Ukrainian drone and missile attacks on fuel trucks, oil refineries, bridges, and other infrastructure critical to Crimea have made it increasingly difficult to supply the peninsula with gasoline.

Crimea’s fuel shortage coincides with rising gasoline prices—and in some regions, restrictions on purchases—in mainland Russia. On June 22 the Saratov Region announced that from June 23-30 motorists will be prohibited from purchasing more than 30 liters of gasoline. On the same day, Irkutsk Region governor Igor Kobzev said that some gas stations had suspended sales and that the region would need to prioritize fuel for emergency services, public transport, utilities, and agricultural machinery.

In Vladimir, governor Alexander Avdeev called on residents to stop using private vehicles when possible. The head of the region blamed rising gasoline prices on panic buying and speculation triggered by temporary problems with fuel deliveries.

“The calmer the reaction of residents to temporary difficulties, the faster it will be possible to return the situation to normal,” he said on Monday.

While the availability of fuel remains precarious in parts of Russia, Moscow continues supplying NATO states with crude oil via the Druzhba pipeline, which runs through Ukraine.

Russia’s oil exports to Hungary and Slovakia returned to “normal levels” of 165,000 barrels per day ​in May, according to Reuters.

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In a document summarizing the results of the two-day summit, the bloc reaffirmed its commitment to the “BRICS spirit of mutual respect and understanding, equality, solidarity, openness, inclusiveness, and consensus”.

Conspicuously absent from the 63-point statement is any mention of the fact that the United States and Israel have assassinated Tehran’s senior leadership and killed scores of civilians as part of an ongoing war against member-state Iran.

India, which currently chairs BRICS, said on Friday that “there were differing views among some members” on this matter. The United Arab Emirates, which hosts US military bases that have been targeted by Iranian strikes, reportedly blocked language condemning the US-Israel attack on Iran from appearing in the document.

On the first day of the summit, Iranian foreign minister Abbas Araghch said Tehran was a “victim of illegal expansionism and warmongering” and urged BRICS to take a firm stand against “Western hegemony and the sense of impunity that the US believes it is entitled to”.

On Wednesday, at a separate gathering of BRICS representatives in Brazil, Iran’s deputy foreign minister, Kazem Gharibabadi, “urged BRICS members to confront unilateralism and hold aggressors accountable for illegal strikes against member states,” Mehr News reported.

While the statement published on Friday doesn’t include any language about the war being waged against Iran, BRICS foreign ministers were all in agreement on the need to “strengthen international climate action”, and praised the “deepening of cooperation in [WHO-led] global health initiatives”, as evidenced by the WHO Pandemic Agreement.

Ladies and gentlemen, I give you: BRICS.

Not the Goldman Sachs-coined acronym we need, but probably the Goldman Sachs-coined acronym we deserve.

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Moscow has very clear protocols for responding to these types of attacks: Russian state media publishes a comment from Scott Ritter about how it’s not a big deal and Ukraine is about to collapse anyway.

For example, when Ukraine began using US-supplied ATACMS missiles in 2024, Ritter proclaimed that “there [was] no magic weapon” that could prevent a decisive Russian victory.

“We are looking at the beginning of the collapse [in Ukraine],” TASS quoted Ritter as saying two years ago.

But something was different about this Flamingo strike…something was off.

The intern imprisoned in TASS’ basement and forced against his will to watch “Judging Freedom” in search of juicy Ritter soundbites, found… nothing. Not one soothing or even slightly reassuring word from Scott Ritter about a Ukrainian (British, really) cruise missile hitting a critically important defense enterprise situated 1300 km from the Ukrainian border. Unthinkable! the intern thought to himself. The intern knew that when his editors found out they would chain him to his computer and force him to watch Colonel MacGregor interviews. He lowered his head, a single tear trickling down his cheek.

Yes, it’s difficult to believe, but in a sharp departure from his weekly forecasts about Moscow’s soon-to-be total victory in Ukraine, Scott Ritter wrote, two days after the attack on the Votkinsk Machine Building Plant, that Kiev was “develop[ing] the military capacity to strike Russia’s strategic interior in an effort to pressure Russia into ending the conflict on terms less than those previously set forth by President Putin”.

He continued:

If the Russian-Ukrainian conflict ends on such terms, then Russia will have conceded the very thing it said was a red line back in December 2021—the deployment of NATO-affiliated intermediate-range missiles on the soil of Ukraine.

It will represent a strategic defeat for Russia in every sense of the term.

What does Ritter mean by all this?

In December 2021, Moscow presented a list of security demands to NATO, including a prohibition on the “deployment of medium- and shorter-range ground-based missiles in areas from which they are capable of hitting targets on the territory of other Participants”.

This was not a polite request to NATO, but an ultimatum. The Russian government warned of “military-technical measures” should the trans-Atlantic alliance reject the proposed treaty (spoiler alert: NATO rejected the treaty). Russia launched its “special military operation” to “demilitarize” Ukraine two months later, in February 2022.

Ritter actually understated the importance of the missile deployment issue for Moscow: it was much more than just a “red line”. A red line triggers a response when crossed. (Not in the Not-War, of course. But we’ll return to this topic later.)

Among other objectives, the SMO was supposed to preempt the possibility of NATO deploying missiles in Ukraine. Unfortunately, after more than four years of appalling Slav-culling, the SMO has achieved the total opposite result. The missiles that have been deployed in Ukraine are not just “capable” of hitting targets inside Russia, but are in fact hitting targets inside Russia.

Naturally, it would be rather unfortunate if the SMO ultimately achieves what it was supposed to prevent. Currently we are heading in this direction. This is what Scott Ritter means when he writes ominously of “strategic failure” in Ukraine.

In fairness, “demilitarization” is an ongoing process—one that might take another 4+ years of thorough and methodical snail offensives. The battle for tiny hamlets in preparation for a frontal assault on Ukraine’s Fortress Belt in Donetsk Oblast (located 70 km from Donetsk city—only a short walk to Zelensky’s HQ in Kiev) remains fluid and highly dynamic. Advances of several hundred meters could occur at any moment.

Also, let’s not forget that nearly three months have passed since Ritter warned that continuing to allow Ukraine to lob cruise missiles at Russia could lead to strategic defeat for Moscow. A lot can change in three months. We need a more up-to-date SITREP.

Gazeta.ru reported on May 5:

In Chuvashia, a Ukrainian Armed Forces attack killed two people, and the number of injured rose to 34. Twenty-eight apartment buildings were damaged in the city, and one business was also hit. A state of emergency was declared in the republic. The Investigative Committee has opened a terrorism investigation. Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy claimed that Flamingo cruise missiles were used in the attack on Chuvashia.

Hours later, the Russian government confirmed that Chuvashia—located approximately 1200 km from the Ukrainian border—had been targeted by cruise missiles.

The situation has not improved since Ritter penned “The Flamingo Effect” on February 22. If anything, the threat of long-range Ukrainian (NATO) missile attacks has become part of the new normal in Russia, alongside mobile internet shutdowns and “falling drone debris” somehow capable of turning oil refineries into ash.

Speaking of “drone debris”…

Although the Flamingo represents “a tangible demonstration that the deep Russian rear is no longer invulnerable” (source: Russian Z-patriot news portal Military Review), the low-accuracy, relatively high-cost missile does not currently represent the greatest threat to “mainland” Russia: this dubious distinction goes to drones. Russia is being swarmed with drones.

Drones are hitting Belgorod. They’re hitting Kursk. They’re hitting Crimea.

They’re blowing up ports, refineries, and critical infrastructure from the Baltic to the Black Seas. From Ust-Luga to Novorossiysk. The oil refinery in Tuapse was hit multiple times, resulting in a days-long inferno that caused oil to rain from the sky. Samara, Rostov-on-Don, Yaroslavl….PERM (which also reported “oil rain” after being attacked).

As I type this article, at this very moment, Perm is bracing for another drone attack.

What to do? Ritter explored this prickly conundrum three months ago:

Russia is at a crossroads.

In the short term, Russia needs to find a solution to the Flamingo threat to Votkinsk and other strategic defense industries located in the Ural regions that are now under threat of attack (a solid rocket motor production facility in Perm, for example). Given the role played by Europe in designing, funding, and manufacturing the Flamingo, a response limited to striking targets inside Ukraine would achieve no fundamental change.

Missiles would still be built, and these missiles would continue to be launched at strategic targets deep inside Russia.

If Europe is not deterred once and for all from delivering this kind of military assistance to Ukraine, then Russia will be at risk of dying a death by a thousand cuts.

Ritter then insinuates that the Russian government is considering the use of tactical nukes. It’s not exactly clear if he thinks tactical nukes might be used against Ukraine, or its European sponsors, or both.

Instead of nuking Europe, Russia resumed oil supplies to NATO states via the Druzhba pipeline in April.

Ritter was close. At least he got the “Europe” part right?

Ritter wants you to believe that Moscow, which provided NATO with gas from a pumping station in Kursk Oblast OCCUPIED BY THE UKRAINIAN MILITARY, would all of a sudden decide to NUKE Europe.

He’s honestly just the inverse of the clowns on CNN: both scream about how Putin wants to nuke all the gay people. NO! Putin wants to give the gay people gas. As much gas as they want, and at a generous discount! THIS IS FACT.

I feel obliged to mention that Ritter’s 4-year grift-narrative about the Brilliant War of Attrition That Has Murdered Hundreds of Thousands of Ordinary Slavs For No Good Reason Whatsoever makes absolutely zero sense if Ritter is now acknowledging that the long-term threat posed by Ukraine’s rapidly developing military capabilities means Moscow might need to drop a tactical nuke on London if it wants to avoid “dying to a death of a thousand cuts”.

The longer the war goes on, the better—right?

Four more years.

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In March 2025 your former Novgorod village correspondent began keeping a journal that was checked for grammatical and orthographical errors by Irina as part of a short-lived attempt to improve our caveman Russian. The following text is our best attempt at a word-for-word translation of a journal entry written on May 11, 2025.

On May 9 I went to the village social club with Katya, Tanya, and Vera Mikhailovna. The party soon turned into farce. Within 10 minutes, everyone was drunk, yelling “Hooray!”, and taking pictures near the eternal flame (a light bulb). Then Sergei Petrovich, who was already drunk, fell in love with Tanya.

“She’s so beautiful. Does she have a husband?” — he asked. [Tanya was half his age and married with children, which he knew perfectly well.]

Then when everyone was really drunk and still yelling “Hooray”, an elderly woman arrived. I forget her name. She was the one that sold the house to Katya. In autumn, her son had died in Ukraine.

She gave a speech: “Yes, you can celebrate today, but there is still work to be done. There is still fascism in Ukraine. We have to defeat the vipers! If I were young I would go fight!” — she said to the roomful of drunk people.

The club got quiet. The drunk men had nothing to say. Then they ran up to her with a glass of cognac and invited her to drink.

Can you imagine? Her son died in a ditch in Kherson for nothing, and she wants others to do the same. Nobody in that room wanted to die in a trench in Ukraine. But everyone pretended that dying in a dirty hole in Ukraine was noble and honorable.

After that the woman left and everyone drank more.

Look! This is your Victory Day!

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Over the past several weeks, the Russian government has made a series of decisions so thoroughly perplexing that some Russians now believe they are witnessing a conscious and deliberate effort to detonate their country from within. (Probably your own government is behaving similarly. See? We aren’t so different after all. Why can’t we all just get along?)

Today I would like to share with you a sampling of Russian-language commentaries on this subject.

But first: Some brief background.

The first major event that is causing extreme trepidation within Russian society is the government’s campaign to block Telegram and limit and restrict internet access while forcing everyone to use Russia’s new FSB messenger, MAX. As part of this campaign, the Federal Service for Supervision of Communications, Information Technology, and Mass Media (Roskomnadzor) is also waging all-out war on VPNs, which have basically become mandatory if you want to use the internet in Russia.

Meanwhile, the entire country is experiencing periodic mobile internet outages. In some areas, mobile internet completely stopped working months ago. The government has created a “white list” of “approved” websites and apps that can be accessed during these outages. (They have reportedly even started testing this “white list” on home WiFi networks around Rostov-on-Don). The official explanation for these restrictions is that they are necessary to combat drone attacks. The last few weeks have seen some of the largest and most destructive drone attacks against Russia since the start of the SMO, so the official explanation might not be the most compelling one, as is so often the case.

Roskomnadzor is still a long way off from completely blocking Telegram (it typically works with a VPN), and the attack on “unapproved” web traffic has already resulted in some disastrous friendly fire incidents. For example, the government agency reportedly blocked IP addresses that are used to process bankcard payments, resulting in an hours-long shutdown of digital payment services in Moscow.

Then there is the Siberian Cow Slaughter.

To make a long (and ongoing) story short, authorities are killing the livestock of small farms in several regions of Siberia, purportedly to stop the spread of diseases (without bothering to test any of the animals before killing them). The farmers have been compensated with paltry sums that are only a fraction of the actual market value of their animals. Many are unable to purchase new animals and are now financially ruined.

When farmers began to share videos of their cows being slaughtered for no reason, authorities resorted to traditional terror and intimidation tactics.

When that didn’t work, the regional government claimed videos documenting the insane cow-slaughter were AI-generated fakes.

Meanwhile, the livestock of large and politically well-connected corporate farming operations in the area have remained untouched.

All of the above begs the question: Why is the Russian government doing all of these very destructive and foolish things?

Russian-language news outlets and Telegram channels have been sharing various theories that might help answer this question.

Let’s begin with a commentary published at the end of March by Channel Stalingrad, an excellent independent outlet edited by “like-minded individuals who reject the liberal capitalism imposed on Russia after the collapse of the USSR”:

Telegram is de facto blocked, Putin’s authorities make no secret of their plans to restrict internet access through a system of “whitelisted sites,” and mobile internet has begun to be shut down under the pretext of combating drones. Along with this, a bill has been introduced in the State Duma that would effectively ban criticism and accusations of anyone in the media until a guilty verdict is finalized. It has outraged even those completely loyal to the Kremlin.

This is a blow to everyone, especially those who make money online and on social media by promoting their goods and services. It also simply creates everyday inconvenience for absolutely all Russian citizens. But the Kremlin seems to have lost its mind. The reason is most likely their conviction in the firmness of their power and the silence of the people.

But it is impossible to ignore the fact that the “tsar’s” lawlessness has reached cosmic proportions. What is Vladimir Vladimirovich planning? What is he preparing his “vertical” for? Mobilization? War with NATO? Logically speaking (if the concept of logic applies to the “vertical”), the Ozero cooperative [the group of oligarchs who support Putin] needs a completely controlled information space to nip any “surprises” in the bud. Combined with war fatigue, all this creates, at the very least, a basis for protest. And this isn’t just information noise. […]

But the main thing currently shaking the Tsar’s throne is the lawlessness in Novosibirsk, the [“anti-epidemic" measures] that have deprived a huge number of people of their sources of income without any justification, not even legal ones. The farmers surveyed don’t believe the diagnoses of pasteurellosis and rabies: those who have been raising livestock for a long time would easily recognize the symptoms. […]

In addition to the Novosibirsk region, livestock genocide has also been perpetrated in the Altai and Transbaikal territories, Buryatia, and the Altai Republic. […]

Novosibirsk Region Governor Andrei Travnikov called the mass slaughter of livestock “a strict but necessary veterinary measure.” This is par for the course for Russia’s “leaders.” Putin’s officials are not accustomed to admitting responsibility. We will never hear the truth from them. Because the fairy tales about slaughtering cattle due to pasteurellosis don’t hold up to scrutiny.

Schizophrenia is off the charts. They don’t even remember their own decisions. On October 31, 2022, the Ministry of Agriculture, by its Order No. 770, approved veterinary regulations for the implementation of preventive, diagnostic, therapeutic, restrictive, and other measures, the establishment and lifting of quarantines and other restrictions aimed at preventing the spread and eliminating outbreaks of various types of pasteurellosis. This regulation is completely inconsistent with the lawlessness currently unfolding in the Novosibirsk Region and other regions.

The uproar on Telegam, which will soon be blocked, or has already been blocked, partially helped draw attention to the situation. Still, the only thing this publicity has achieved is control over the procedure itself and at least some regulations for compensation payments. But this is far from certain.

What is happening is complete lawlessness and legal chaos. A logical question: for what purpose? Perhaps some of the Kremlin’s elite are using these informational outlets to fight their competitors. Moreover, they do so without regard for the consequences. As happened, for example, in 2023, when the desire to remove Shoigu from the Russian Ministry of Defense through wholesale criticism of the army command and the promotion of Wagner sparked Prigozhin’s rebellion. Incidentally, criticism of the closure of Telegram is often interpreted as a struggle between the “Kremlin towers.” One of them is lobbying for “de-Telegramization,” while others are trying to stir up a rebellion against it. Consequently, farmers in the Novosibirsk region could very well have fallen victim to the games of Putin’s “vertical,” which is extremely distant from the region, from livestock farming, and from the aspirations of the ordinary people under its control.

If this is indeed the case, Putin has lost control of the state. And this could very well end in disaster. Quite soon.

Our next commentary comes from Yandex’s blogging platform, which is sort of like Russian Substack:

According to the agenda, our country is on the verge of a monumental leap. True, the nature of this leap raises questions among those accustomed to measuring progress in factories built, rockets launched, or technologies implemented. But this is apparently an outdated approach. Modern Russian management has discovered a simpler and more effective path—development by subtraction.

Imagine a gardener who wants to grow a giant pumpkin. A normal gardener fertilizes the soil, waters the beds, and protects the seedlings from frost. Our strategic gardener, however, believes otherwise: the pumpkin will grow to enormous proportions if weeds are prevented from growing, if clouds are prevented from flying past the pumpkin without drenching it with rain, if frosts are prevented from appearing prematurely…

In short, a new word in agricultural technology—you just need to think carefully about what to prohibit, compile an extensive and comprehensive list of prohibitions, and impose it on the pumpkin: grow, you bastard!

In the digital realm, we live in a harsh asceticism. The internet is sometimes shut down, sometimes left in place, but with conditions. VPNs are sometimes banned, sometimes allowed, but by subscription, like premium access to freedom, and for a fee. YouTube, social media, Roblox—everything reminiscent of a global world is being crushed by the digital sovereignty steamroller. The logic is simple: if you remove everything incomprehensible and alien, something native will inevitably flourish. True, so far only the market for workarounds is flourishing, but these are details. […]

It’s as if the government has decided that national development isn’t about creating something new, but about completely erasing the old. If you ban everything bad, it will automatically become good. If you take away people’s internet access, they’ll start watching Skabeeva and Solovyov on TV [government propaganda]. If you ban vaping, everyone will quit smoking. If you increase fines, everyone will become law-abiding.

But history teaches us otherwise: bans don’t create the future. They only preserve the present. You can ban English words, but without modern technology, the language will still deteriorate. You can ban travel, but without knowledge sharing, science will wither. You can force people to have children, but without security for the future, families will not be happy.

The result is a paradox. The list of what’s “not allowed” no longer fits on one page. And the list of what’s “allowed” remains frighteningly short.

The government offers us a fortress-state, safe, quiet, and forbidden. But a fortress is a place for defense, not for living. Life requires roads, not barriers. We need factories, not fines. We need ideas, not bans.

For now, the only sector that’s truly developing and showing steady growth in the country is the industry of restrictions. And if things continue this way, we risk becoming the most developed country in the world in terms of the number of restrictions. But living in this “developed” world will become absolutely impossible.

Finally, I would like to share two texts I came across while browsing Yaplakal, a popular Russian news and discussion forum.

Both texts are essentially conspiracy theories, but they illustrate the rampant disillusionment and distrust in the government that is entirely ignored by Very Important and Serious Russia Experts With Direct and Indirect Ties to the Russian Government.

The first text:

I came to see my dad today and started whining over a glass of tea.

My dad is already at the age where he doesn’t need this internet. But after listening to me for a while, he abruptly said, “Stop. You’re telling me about prohibition and the collapse of the [Soviet] Union. Look at how it happened.”

He loves conspiracy theories.

“To destroy the Union, they started an unpopular war. It lasted a long time. During this time, the budget was depleted and people became disillusioned with the army.”

“Then they started passing weird laws. They tightened the screws for parasitism, any manifestation of dissent, etc. This was to create disillusionment with the government. And finally, they finished it all off with prohibition. They ruined an entire industry where people worked and, most importantly, killed people’s ability to relax normally. People didn’t drink less after that, but they started drinking whatever they could, and on the sly. They started giving prison sentences for selling alcohol. People started going blind from counterfeit alcohol. Well, it’s just like in your VPN, where people are willing to trust who knows who just to get around the restrictions.”

“And then, when distrust of the government reached its peak, when neither the people nor the army wanted such a government anymore, and anyone but them would rather have it, a coup happened. And mind you, it was almost bloodless. How much do they have to annoy everyone so that no one will stand up for the country?”

“And most importantly, all this was always done with the message that everything was being done for the people and the country. Mind you, it’s still the same. All to protect people from the corrupting influence of Western vodka. You’ll see, they already did it once, now they’re just repeating it.”

Of course, I laughed. Well, yes, there are a lot of coincidences. The long-standing scam, the empty budget, the idiotic laws and restrictions, the people’s disillusionment. There are a lot of coincidences, of course, but it’s just a coincidence.

Or is it? ((

The second text:

Conspiracy Theory:

Observing Roskomnadzor’s persistence in blocking Telegram and tightening control over messaging apps, I come to the conclusion that we’re misinterpreting what’s happening. The average person sees this as a fight against the opposition or spies. The opposition interprets it as a pre-election crackdown.

But what if this is part of a larger plan? A global rebranding of power, initiated by those who will soon leave the political arena.

Let’s consider the mechanism of a low barrier to entry for the future government. The scheme, although cynical, is quite effective.

Stage: Creating Problems. The current elite passes extremely unpopular laws.

We see this now—laws on blocking, mandatory biometrics, VPN bans, three-year data retention.

The old regime acts as an authoritarian controller, depriving citizens of their familiar tools.

The result is mass discontent. People previously apolitical begin to perceive the state as a source of problems. A grandmother, deprived of contact with her grandson, experiences negativity. Businesses losing customers due to restrictions are ready to support any changes.

The old regime, consciously or not, is generating hundreds of thousands of “silent protesters.”

Formation of a critical mass of irritation: When instant messaging apps are finally blocked, society will be divided into: 15% of tech-savvy users capable of bypassing the blockages (for them, the situation is not critical); 85% of the population, who will find themselves cut off from their usual communication channels.

For these 85%, any future government that declares, “We’re canceling this absurdity. Here’s the ‘Enable Telegram’ button,” will automatically become a savior. A low barrier to entry is achieved not by building something new, but by eliminating the negative consequences of previous policies.

An analogy with the 1990s: Gorbachev’s “dry law” generated hatred. Yeltsin, by figuratively legalizing alcohol, gained the people’s love. It doesn’t matter that this had its downsides. Allowing the banned became the key to high ratings.

The Savior stage: The arrival of a new government with a simple solution. Imagine: the year is 2026. Telegram is down, WhatsApp is unavailable. Communication has returned to 2005 levels. Discontent is skyrocketing. And then a “Technocrat” appears (his origin is irrelevant). His program consists of two points:

• Repeal all laws blocking instant messaging apps within 24 hours.

• Pay bonuses to telecom operators for restoring traffic.

What’s going on? The entire country, which until recently hated the “regime,” greets him with applause. The threshold for entering power is minimal. He doesn't need to understand complex issues. He simply lifted the ban.

This is precisely the technology of power change with a low threshold for legitimization. The old regime has so exhausted the people with senseless restrictions that anyone who lifts them will be perceived as a benefactor.

What are the motives of the old regime? Why are they playing the role of the “bad guy”? The most pressing question. Don’t they understand that they are working for the successor? They do. But they have limited choices:

• Either they tighten control, losing ratings but buying time.

• Or they don’t tighten it, and they will be swept away in the near future, since instant messengers are used to coordinate protests.

They choose the lesser evil. And at the same time, they create the perfect “safety cushion” for their successor. The successor has probably already been chosen. He is waiting. He already has a decree ready on the “abolition of digital oppression.”

We’re outraged by the bans imposed by Roskomnadzor and the parliamentarians. But perhaps they’re simply fulfilling their role, laying the groundwork for the next political cycle.

The new government in Russia will get an easy start not because of its own merits, but because of the actions of the previous one. All it will take is a promise to “restore everything as it was,” and the people will give it their full support.

So, this opinion has taken hold, should I go to the nuthouse, or is there some truth to it?

Maybe?

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We spoke about Iain’s plot to instigate a global mind-revolution, among other topics that have surely earned him a prominent spot on various government lists.

Iain is a terrific journalist and I am grateful he took the time to chat with me.

Enjoy!

— Riley

Edward: In December you gave a speech at the Mass Non-Compliance Protest Against (UK) Digital ID. A rousing address, too, if I may say so. Correct me if I’m mistaken, but you typically don’t bother with protests. As a journalist and writer, you have undoubtedly grappled with the “action vs. inaction” debate. Why do you think writing is a more valuable use of your time than protesting? Sometimes I receive angry emails from readers who tell me to shut up and “do something” instead of blogging. Maybe they’re right?

Iain: I think protest has its place and it is certainly supposed to be a democratic right, though it is being shut down everywhere. It is one of the ways we can demonstrate to those who claim the authority to rule us that we are not willing to go along with their harebrained schemes. That said, in my opinion, protesting against a wholly corrupt and venal power structure in the hope it will respond favourably is a complete waste of
time. Asking a slave master to be more generous is pointless. Protests of this kind serve as rallying calls to the disaffected but to believe they will make a material difference to the government policy is wishful thinking.

I attended the mass non compliance against digital ID protest because the objective was to highlight the real nature of digital ID and to expose the government's digital ID sale pitch as a lie. The purpose was to encourage people to prepare for mass non compliance, to maximise their independence from the system and to live lives beyond the digital reach of government, wherever possible.

With regard to the “action vs. inaction” debate, in my view, investigative journalism is one of the most powerful actions of all. This is why those who rule are obsessed with censorship. As Edward Bulwer-Lytton rightly said, “the pen is mightier than the sword.”

Ideas create movements and even reactionary protests are at their most powerful when those protesting know what solutions they want rather than just opposing the idea or policy they reject. I don't pretend for one to have any significant reach, or the answers for that matter, but I think it is vital that all voices, including yours and mine, stay on the battlefield of ideas. I firmly believe that if we are going to build a better world the essential revolution is a revolution of the mind.

I write long-form articles and books, stuffed with links and references to sources, in which I try to provide readers with access to information and evidence that they will rarely, if ever, read in mainstream pieces and publications. My objective is to encourage readers to question the state narratives they are given and, hopefully, to give them a foundation from where they can conduct their own research and decide for themselves what they believe to be the truth.

Like you, I get my fair share of criticism, but I am sure I also share with you the wonderful experience of readers contacting me to thank me for keeping them sane in confusing and often chaotic times, or starting them down their own path of discovery. Just one such message would make it all worth it and I am very lucky to receive many. I cannot thank people enough for their support and encouragement. I could not do this work without it.

Edward: So you admit to openly agitating for a “revolution of the mind”—I knew you would. Your website even features a radical and very disturbing manifesto: “Don’t trust me.” You explain: “Any media outlet or commentator that asks you to ‘trust’ them is suggesting that you abandon critical thinking and simply believe whatever they tell you. I will never ask that of you. Who am I to ask that of anyone?”

Are you suggesting that internet commentary shouldn’t be faith-based? It seems to me that you are agitating for mind-revolution without understanding that many people demand clarity and want to Believe. I think we can all agree that the role of a responsible internet commentator is to act as a kind of info-priest who performs elaborate e-ceremonies that will allow the faithful flock to continue Believing even when observable reality completely contradicts these Beliefs. Please explain yourself, and ideally, apologize.

Iain: I do not “agitate” in the sense of calling for a sudden or violent force, nor by deliberately causing distress, I “agitate” in the sense of hopefully arousing readers interest. As you highlight, I try to interest readers in the importance of applying critical thinking whenever they receive or encounter information from any the source, including from myself.

My “revolutionary manifesto,” is indeed that we should all think for ourselves and make up our own minds about what we believe and, more importantly, what we do as a result.

Though something of a contradiction, I guess that includes believing you should do whatever you are told. Similarly, if you choose to unquestioningly trust information from sources you consider “reliable,” that too is your choice. Though I would advise against both.

As the defendants at Nuremberg discovered, simply trusting information and following your orders is not actually a defence. When we think about it, crimes against humanity aren’t really possible unless people follow orders. So, as a matter of precautionary principle, I say obedience is not a virtue.

Something else I bang on about is evidence. Whenever I write anything I am essentially offering my opinion and I always provide referenced sources to try to substantiate my opinion. Equally, I never profess to be unquestionably right. Again, I ask the reader to make of it what they will.

Of course, readers can and should question both my opinions and the evidence I offer to support them. Hopefully they will be sufficiently agitated to want to investigate what I have said themselves. I hopefully provide starting points for, or additions to, their own research.

I certainly apologize to readers who expect me to provide all the answers and tell them what to do or what to think. Sorry guys and gals, that ain't my bag, nor is it any of my business.

I offer no apology to those who refuse to consider evidence. I think they should stick to mainstream propaganda, readily available online, as this rarely contains any, or makes it up. They will find slavish consumption of propaganda far more comforting than trying to wrestle with anything I write.

Edward: I’m glad you mentioned that you aren’t in the business of telling people what to do. I am also not in this line of work. (I am a blogger, i.e., unemployed.) However, sometimes I receive emails from displeased readers who ask me questions such as: “Oh, so you don’t think the White Hats will save us? Well then, what do you suggest we do, huh????” If I understand this logic correctly, reading internet articles reassuring you that the Patriots Are In Control is “doing something”, but if you question the existence of the White Hats you are “doing nothing” and your opinion is invalid unless you have a clear action plan that is more convenient than reading blog posts about how the White Hats will save us (i.e., doing nothing). Iain, you are a seasoned internet writer so I assume you also have the pleasure of receiving “what are we supposed to do then, Mr. Smartypants?” emails. How do you respond to these types of queries? Are you ever tempted to tell people what to do so that they will just leave you alone? Like... “trust the plan”?

I do indeed receive many such comments. I generally refer people to pieces where I have suggested possible solutions, like this one or this. However, I often find that these are not the solutions the critics are searching for. Perhaps because they involve doing something other than reading blog posts. Who knows?

I sometimes ask these critics what solutions they would prefer. I have noticed that their solutions usually include things like voting for the right White Hat, supporting the right war, or censoring the right people. So, then, I ask them, if they know what solutions they want, why are they asking me? I haven't got much of a response to this line of questioning.

My favourite criticism is that I haven’t written about certain things or that I haven’t included a specific detail in my exploration of a topic. When I point out that isn't the subject of the article or that I have no knowledge of, or don't accept, whatever I am supposed to have included in the article, this also seems to make people very angry. They get quite uppity sometimes and even use hurty words. I can only apologise
for disagreeing with them or for not having a clue what they are talking about.

Edward: What keeps you grounded? I am quite partial to Johann Sebastian Bach and Czech beer.

Most of my critics suggest I have a kangaroo loose in the top paddock and am not remotely grounded. I like to think that I am pretty level headed but then, in my experience, the unhinged never know they are unhinged.

In an effort to maintain plausible deniability at least, I like to walk the dog and then wind him up by playing “sticky-throwy” (the rules are quite complex but he has got the hang of it) so that my partner has to deal with his over-stimulated mud-splattering frenzies on our return. Sometimes we walk the dog together, in which case I never play “sticky-throwy” with him to ensure she remains none the wiser.

I like to engage in pointless but cathartic arguments on social media and dip in and out of it while I am depressing myself researching articles. I also enjoy listening to extremely aggressive metal, puffing on my vape, drinking British Ale (Czech beer? Pah!) and weeping unnoticed.

Thank you, Iain!

(Don’t forget to follow Iain on Telegram and purchase his latest book.)

Iain Davis Substack

The disillusioned Substack

Dear reader! Edward Slavsquat is back after an inexcusably long hiatus (I’ve been tilling a village field in Czechia with Katya and Edward Junior). Is everyone enjoying 2026? Wait until you hear about the ongoing Siberian livestock slaughter. Lots of fun topics to cover in the coming days and weeks…

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Lesson 1 was: “There are no ‘security guarantees’ for the peasants, especially if their security interferes with Gazprom’s God-given right to sell Russia’s natural resources at bargain-bin prices to whomever wants them.”

Less than 24 hours after I published this very important special military lesson, Russian state media reported (in Russian and English) that Gazprom had “delivered” record-setting volumes of natural gas to the European Union via NATO-state Turkey in January:

Turkish media was similarly excited about this impressive achievement.

The Kremlin has been nothing but selfless and kind towards NATO, and where’s the gratitude? Russia continues to sell its natural resources to NATO, even as NATO “prepares for a conflict with Russia” (source: Russia’s Foreign Ministry on January 30, 2026).

Four years of faithfully delivering gas to NATO, first through SATANIC NAZI Ukraine, and then through NATO-state Turkey—even as NATO weaponry is used to vaporize Russians—and this is how NATO repays Gazprom! How uncouth.

To summarize:

1. December 2021: Moscow says NATO is preparing to attack Russia and demands security guarantees.

2. February 2022: Vladimir Putin announces the start of the SMO. He promises that Moscow will “respond immediately” to any outside attempts to interfere with the operation, and warns that any state caught meddling in Ukraine will “face consequences … such as you have never seen in your entire history.”

3. NATO floods Ukraine with weapons and money.

4. ….

5. Four years pass. Hundreds of thousands of Slavs are slaughtered and maimed for no reason whatsoever.

6. Moscow says that NATO is preparing to attack Russia and demands security guarantees.

7. Moscow sells record-levels of natural gas to NATO.

This is why Russia’s “snail offensive technique” in Donbass is so ingenious. NATO must be put in its place—it thinks that a measly 10% increase in Russian gas purchases is acceptable? The SMO must continue until NATO promises to increase Russian gas purchases by 15%. Gazprom demands security guarantees!

As for the security of the people of Donbass—allegedly the whole purpose of the SMO—well, they’ll just have to be patient. True, it’s hard to be patient when you have no water, but they’ll manage.

This concludes today’s lesson. I hope you took notes because there will be an exam on February 24!!!

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There are no “security guarantees” for the peasants, especially if their security interferes with Gazprom’s God-given right to sell Russia’s natural resources at bargain-bin prices to whomever wants them.

This is demonstrably true.

The “security” of ordinary Russians and Ukrainians is not even a top-ten priority. Actually, keeping the peasants in a state of perpetual terror is an excellent way to guarantee the security of the people who actually matter (and their property).

It’s important to understand this.

War, even when it is called a “special military operation”, is the most destructive and terrible of all human activities. It uproots life and plants seeds of hatred, bitterness, and sorrow; it breeds decades of despair.

These are the guaranteed results of the SMO for all yachtless Russians and Ukrainians, “one people part of a single whole” (source: Vladimir Putin circa 2021).

The good news is that progress is being made towards fruitful US-Russia economic cooperation:

Of course, the peasants continue to suffer what they must; but they understand the importance of US-Russia economic cooperation, surely?

The peasants should just be grateful that the slaughter will probably have to end, at least temporarily, eventually. And then Moscow and its “foreign partners, including the Americans” (source: Vladimir Putin circa 2025) can strip-mine Donbass together, peacefully, in accordance with the relevant security guarantees.

This concludes today’s lesson. I hope you took notes because there will be an exam on February 24.

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I come bearing predictable news. From our friends at Katyusha.org:

Our dire forecast regarding the implementation of biometrics in schools, which we presented in a large analytical report in early December, is being confirmed.

Following the [biometric ID] pilot program [for schoolchildren] in Tatarstan and several other regions participating in the experiment, the Leningrad Region has also extended its hand to children’s biometrics—as well as the country’s leading banker.

Katyusha is referring to a recent meeting between Leningrad Region Governor Alexander Drozdenko and Sber CEO Herman Gref, which resulted in “new promising projects” for the region, including the creation of a “biometric access project” that will allow children to “enter school securely and instantly, without cards or passes.”

Sounds very safe and convenient, no?

Drozdenko also boasted that Gref’s Leningrad cattle tag initiative would be the first “biometric access point” for schoolchildren in Russia. This is not even remotely true, and to this very day nobody knows why he said something so obviously untrue, but whatever.

Possibly Drozdenko meant that his region was joining a nationwide trend, spearheaded by Moscow, to “voluntarily” cattle-tag every Russian schoolchild.

If this is what Drozdenko meant, then yes, he is more or less correct.

Let us recall that in August, Deputy Prime Minister Dmitry Grigorenko stressed the importance of cattle-tagging all schoolchildren, arguing that “entry to school ‘by face’ is not only convenient, but also very safe.”

Those are his actual words.

As for Mr. Herman Gref, the former (?) WEF Board of Trustees Member, the author of the preface to the Russian-language edition to Klaus Schwab’s The Fourth Industrial Revolution, the Virus warrior who provided funding and “logistics” for the creation of Sputnik V, the turbo-patriot whose daughter lives in London ….

Do I need to say it? I feel like I say it every week. I don’t want to say it anymore. I’m tired of saying it.

It’s just nice to know that Gref’s “schools of the future” will pump out generations of young adults who will think that “paying with a smile” is completely normal.

And it will be. And Gref will smile.

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“Sure,” you reply out of politeness.

“Great. First question: WHAT’S THE POINT OF ALL THIS?”

Kit Knightly, editor of OffGuardian, was kind enough to humor me.

Don’t forget to follow OffGuardian on Telegram and subscribe to Kit’s Substack.

Edward: Perhaps this is a gross generalization, but by the end of 2021, it seemed like Covid (or, more accurately, the totally insane “public health” policies that were adopted by basically every government on earth) had disabused many of the false paradigms through which they interpreted world events. People seemed fed up with the geopolitical horserace that we’re told to cheer for. Then, basically overnight, Russia’s SMO breathed new life into the BRICS/Axis of Resistance/Global South/Multipolar World vs. Collective West (or whatever) narrative. Do you think this worldview is still as prevalent as it was in February 2022, or are people starting (again) to grow weary of the idea that there is a Side that will save us? Or maybe you completely disagree with the premise of my question?

Kit: That’s a good question.

It’s not a gross generalization, but an accurate one. And I would say that world view is still very much prevalent in the minds of many ordinary people. There is still a mass mistrust of all authority and a swelling in “they’re all the same” thinking.

Where it has retreated—or at least appears to have retreated—is in the minds and works of journalists and pundits in “alternative” or “independent” sphere. Many of whom arguably should know better, but have returned to the pre-covid world of multipolar geopolitics narratives.

Now, whether this is due to a kind of muscle memory, adherence to old allegiances, the reassuring comfort of the familiar or more cynical real-world motives I couldn’t say and wouldn’t wish to speculate.

Edward: Your observation that much of “independent” media seems to exist in a universe entirely foreign to the realities of ordinary people is a very interesting one, especially given that “alt” media was once commonly referred to as “citizen journalism”. There doesn’t seem to be a lot of good-faith open dialogue between “alt” media-persons who hold opposing views on various subjects. It seems that the same gatekeeping, deplatforming, and blacklisting that we see in legacy media is now also quite prevalent in “alt” media. In my experience, every time I try to reach out to an “internet thought leader” who adheres to a worldview different from my own, I'm either ghosted or called a fifth columnist (and then blocked on social media). What has your experience been in this regard?

Kit: Our experience is broadly similar; the feelings of community created by cross-spectrum Covid resistance didn’t survive long after the “special military operation” launched.

There were almost instant, quasi-factional splits and widespread refusal to discuss those splits. Instead it became an ideological issue, and nonbelievers were shunned. Covid era groups, previously warm and friendly, dissolved almost overnight.

That gave birth to a newer 3-tier model of media. There used to be “mainstream” and “alternative”, but what sprang up between them is the “mainstream alternative media” (MAM), that served to corral the dispossessed and doubting back into the mainstream fold via the backdoor.

Whether that was purely a social pressure issue, or there was some kind of financial or other manipulation at play I couldn’t say. Though it is my experience that even “alternative media” sites can be beholden to grants and donors some times.

That said, it felt much more pathological than cynical at the time, there was almost a need to return to the old worldview.

As you say, certain views and opinions lead to ghosting from the bigger indie platforms. You can believe Covid is a lab leak, but not fake, for example. You could distrust Trump or Harris, but not both.

We’ve covered it extensively on OffG, but both the MSM and the MAM devolved into a set menu of false binary either/or choices, and discussion outside those parameters was frozen out.

Edward: I don't think it’s an exaggeration to say that false binaries are the glue that binds us together. One could even say that our modern conception of “freedom” is based on the idea that you get to “choose” from a set of pre-approved, curated options, and your choice is very, very important, even though your choice is indistinguishable from the other choices; you are then supposed to yell at strangers on the internet about how your choice is the correct one, and all other choices are for fools, even though everyone has chosen the exact same thing. In the USA, we have even evolved to a point where everyone admits that there are no good choices, but still scream at each other about which choice is possibly slightly less horrific (the “lesser of two evils” argument that is now commonplace during each and every election). Okay, now I will formulate a question: Surely you must be exhausted by all this? OffG is in the trenches trying to hold the line as the internet is carpet-bombed with Marvel Comics worldviews—are you ever tempted to uninstall the internet, toss your computer out the nearest window, and then start walking towards the unknown, like one of those renegade penguins who waddles away from his flock? What’s the point of all this? I ask myself this question almost every single day, so I'm hoping you have a good answer that will put my troubled mind at ease.

Kit: Yes. I am tempted to walk away. The penguin is a nice reference.

The point, I suppose, is that it’s the right thing to do. “Should” overrules “could”. And your conscience is the voice that turns “should” into “must”.

As long as it feels like this work is what I should be doing, it takes precedent over the laundry list of things I could be doing.

The frontline is an apt metaphor, it does feel like that. We have a localised sea-level view of a fight stretching to the horizon to right and left, and all we can really do is plant a foot in the ground and hold our chosen spot. But it is holding.

You could say the very fact we’re still fighting is a sign we might be winning.

The very real truth is that, sometime soon, the decision to walk away will be taken out of our hands. We can be shut down forcefully any day, or the resources could dry up to the point continuing is simply not possible.

So we do what we can while we can.

Edward: On the subject of doing what we can while we can: The UK government seems extremely eager to adopt “digital ID” that would essentially bring an end to any semblance of anonymity on the internet. (Unfortunately this is a global trend.) Do you think this plan will ultimately succeed, and if so, how will it affect your work at OffG? Substack is already complying with Australia’s internet ID laws. The screws are tightening. Do you have a contingency plan? I don’t and I badly need one.

Kit: Yes, the plan will succeed, in that most tech platforms will comply and officially it will be illegal to have unverified profiles. I’m almost certain about that. But there will likely be workarounds, the most obvious being VPNs, but there could be others that a tech-savvier person could tell you about.

In terms of impacting OffG, hopefully—big emphasis on that word—it won’t much. We host the site on our own server space and own the domains so our “homebase” is secure.

There’s the ever-present threat of de-banking and such, and we don’t know how much verification culture might work its way into financial sites. But that kind of vulnerability is nothing new, we’ve all been hurt by it before.

Social media is a different issue, we could easily simply have to say goodbye to those platforms, but hopefully not.

It’s a difficult issue to decide upon, because you have to weigh up principle and pragmatism. You don’t want to comply, but if you comply to broadcast awareness maybe you help more people than fading out of sight.

It’s an age-old ethical dilemma, at what point living by a standard becomes about ego, I suppose.

So, to sum up, no we don’t have a contingency plan.

Thank you, Kit!

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The SMO will soon enter its fifth year. What are Russia’s stated goals for its “special military operation” in Ukraine, and have any of these goals been achieved? Listen to the podcast to find out!

I reference several documents in this audio recording. They can be found here:

Article by Vladimir Putin: “On the Historical Unity of Russians and Ukrainians” (July 12, 2021)

Agreement on measures to ensure the security of The Russian Federation and member States of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (December 17, 2021)

Address by the President of the Russian Federation (February 24, 2022)

The Lavrov interview I mention can be found here:

Have a nice Sunday.

— Riley

I recently had the honor of speaking with James Corbett about the rise and fall of the highly prestigious Edward Institute for Village Studies:

The Corbett Report

The Edward Institute: A Post-Mortem - #SolutionsWatch

SHOW NOTES AND COMMENTS: https://corbettreport.com/the-edward-institute-a-post-mortem…

Listen now

7 months ago · 150 likes · The Corbett Report

Our discussion is also available on James’ website and YouTube.

A catalogue of Edward Institute dispatches can be found here.

It still amazes me that in two short years, we went from this:

To this:

I think the main takeaway is that Chickenhof must be rebuilt so that we can all gather for CHIEF 2026 and talk about the deep stuff (potatoes).

Be well, internet friends —

Riley

The milestone did not go unnoticed in Russia, even though the Great Patriotic War was an entirely different animal. The senseless bloodbath we are currently witnessing in Ukraine more closely resembles a hyper-neoliberal WW1, in which mercenaries sit in trenches and wait for drones to murder them as the “belligerent parties” openly do business with one another. Nonetheless, the SMO is actually framed as a WW2 redux by the Russian government and its propaganda organs. The Cult of WW2 is Russia’s state religion, and Russians have been told for the last four years that they are finishing what their grandparents started by defeating the “Nazi regime” in Kiev.

If this is indeed the case, then surely it is not unreasonable to ask what has been accomplished over the past 1,418 days?

But actually, this is an unreasonable and very offensive question. It is common knowledge among independent media’s most independent intellects that Russia is fighting a brilliant and humane war of attrition, and that with each passing day Moscow’s victory over NATO-backed Ukraine becomes more total and complete. Indeed, the 1,418-day mark is cause for celebration: It means Russia is winning.

Confirmed and reconfirmed: Russia is using its ingenious “snail offensive technique” to score a “ten for one kill ratio” in Ukraine, Pepe Escobar recently explained.

The Russian snail offensive technique, combined with the mincing machine technique, has already, gradually, knocked out the extensive bunker system set up by NATO in Donbass, superior to the Maginot Line. These methods achieved a ten for one kill ratio in favor of Russia in relation to Ukraine. That’s another immutable fact on the battlefield. Only unredeemable fools deride Russia as “slow” and “weak”. The snail offensive will extend into 2026.

Yippee.

As Putin explained on February 24, 2022, the goal of the SMO is to kill as many Ukrainians as humanly possible over the longest possible period of time [I am being facetious; he actually said the exact opposite — Edward], so a “snail offensive” allegedly resulting in mass carnage (but only for Ukrainians, thank goodness!) is a very good thing, and means the SMO can end whenever Russia feels like ending it.

In fact, Russia could snail-storm the rest of Donetsk Oblast whenever it wanted to, and then snail-slither to Odessa and Kiev—but that would betray the snail-like brilliance of the snail offensive technique.

This is very logical, and supported by YouTube videos published by The Duran.

However, some people—curmudgeons like the late Marko Marjanović—disagree with the widely held view that the longer the SMO drags on, the more Moscow wins.

Today I will share with you an article by Marko on this very subject.

In “Russia says it’s fighting the whole world. Has anyone told Putin?”, Marjanović warned in April 2022 of the “baked-in” costs of the SMO, arguing that NATO’s decision to fund and arm Kiev meant that the longer the conflict dragged on, the more difficult it would be for Russia to achieve its stated goals—or achieve anything, really—in Ukraine.

If you are tired of “alt media’s” ceaseless attempts to gaslight you into cheering for this absolutely catastrophic crime against the Slavic people, then you should definitely read the below article.

Read it anyway. The observations that Marko made in April 2022 have never been more relevant.

Miss you, Marko.

— Riley

Russia says it’s fighting the whole world. Has anyone told Putin?

By Marko Marjanović; First published on April 25, 2022

Let’s do a mental exercise. Let’s try to imagine how much the US might be willing to spend to prop up Ukraine in its war with Russia?

What sum do you think is likely?

Would it be willing to spend as much as it spent on Afghanistan? Would it be willing to spend a lot more? Or a lot less?

On the one hand, Afghanistan was an American war where America’s own prestige and victory were on the line. On the other hand, there was the nagging feeling that they might not be the good guys.

And really what was the Afghan war for? To bring female education to the valleys of Pashtunistan? The benefit of backing Ukraine seems much clearer by comparison — to weaken, frustrate and humiliate Russia.

Backing Ukraine is the current hip thing and the current moral crusade. It has broad bipartisan support and — after 20 years of looking a lot like the baddies — American elites are embracing it as vindication that they are on the right side of history, and the benevolent empire after all.

I think Afghanistan has to be taken as the lower bound of how much the US is willing to spend.

After all, the US made no secret that in the case of a successful Russian invasion it intended to lavishly fund a Ukrainian insurgency. That it now gets to equip and bankroll a conventional war — which can inflict far greater losses on the Russians — instead, is Christmas come early for DC.

Dissident journalists calculate the Afghan war cost the US $2 trillion. But the Pentagon, which only counts the cost of military operations and reconstruction, puts the figure at $825bn. According to the Pentagon at the peak of the surge the US was spending $110bn on Afghanistan per annum, but as late as 2020 it was still spending $40 billion.

US Congress has voted in a $13.6bn Ukraine war “response” bill, but $3bn of that was for US redeployment in Europe and $4bn was allegedly to help refugees. However there was also $1.8bn there to help Kiev pay salaries and $3.5bn for weapons. Together that is $5.3bn but Biden has already said that the sum is almost exhausted and that soon Congress will have to allocate more. 60 days in and $5.3bn has almost already been spent.

If the US props up Ukraine with a new $5.3 billion every 3 months then per year that is $20 billion. But why should the US stop at this sum? The US has been steadily ramping up what weapons it is willing to send. In 60 days it has moved from man-portable missiles to heavy artillery. Janet Yellen has said the current aid packages are “only the beginning of what Ukraine will need” and other officials have said that the US is “always preparing the next package of security assistance.”

If the US feels it is getting a good return on its investment (which in Afghanistan was never the case) eg in dead Russians, then why wouldn’t the US ramp up the backing to $40-50 billion annually?

And that’s just the US. The EU has so far pledged $1.5 billion, Germany $1 billion, and Poland claims it has already transferred $1.6 billion in weapons. Can the US get its vast vassal swarm to collectively chip in another $10-20 billion?

Why not? They helped out with Afghanistan and that was never nearly as popular. So we’re looking at $60bn in aid to Ukraine per annum, and that’s not even counting what they will spend directly on training Ukrainians in Poland, and on flying their fleet of intelligence-gathering planes.

And $60bn is very possibly much too conservative. The US printed $4 trillion to “fight COVID” and the EU about $2 trillion. Why wouldn’t they print up a couple of hundred billion to fight Russians?

America’s main competition is with China, but weakening Beijing’s number one ally sure would be helpful and sweet — especially when it can be done with foreign blood and for sums that for America’s printing presses aren’t large at all.

People are ridiculing Zelensky for asking for $7bn per month in financial injections alone, but that is just the opening bid. He will very much be getting assistance of this type. It will be much less than $7bn but it will also only be the start.

Now let’s do a second mental exercise. Let’s try to imagine what getting a $60bn injection every year of war does for Ukraine’s military.

Russia herself normally runs a $60bn defense budget. This year it’s doubtlessly going to be higher.

But assuming a $60bn injection from the West and adding Ukraine’s own spending, the two could soon have equivalent military budgets in nominal terms.

What would equal spending do for military balance?

Russia has been spending that sum every year for many years and is far ahead. But the qualitative gap would certainly start to narrow. Ukraine is still the much smaller country with the much smaller population so perhaps Ukraine can’t possibly field a very large army? Normally in a war of materiel the limiting factor on army size is the labor force needed at home. If everyone is drafted then who is going to work at the equally important steel mill?

But if the majority of your war effort is being supplied and bankrolled from abroad that falls by the wayside. If the US becomes Ukraine’s military-industrial complex then how many Ukrainians are available to work in Ukrainian plants becomes rather irrelevant.

Moreover, the war has been devastating for Ukraine’s economy, especially with the Russians blockading the ports and causing a serious fuel crunch. This means that many Ukrainians in the private sector will start to go unemployed or see their wages slashed. Meanwhile, Washington will make certain that there is money enough to pay the soldiers. Soon the military might be a rare well-paying and reliable employer. Ironically Russia might be growing Ukraine’s pool of available manpower and channeling it toward the military.

It’s a country of 35 million. It has over 5 million men between 18 and 38. If the US is willing to pay for it all, there is no limit to how big its army can grow.

The retort is that the war has also already caused 5 million refugees to evacuate the country. But a friend who works on the refugee trains reports that among evacuees there are almost no men.

Also keep in mind that Ukraine’s pre-war GDP is only equal to that of 5-million Finland. Even replacing its entire economy is not beyond the means of the collective West.

Russia has a peculiar feudal arrangement with Chechens where Mosow bankrolls 70% of their budget but expects them to repay the favor by helping massively in its wars.

Can Ukraine become Washington’s Chechnya? Heavily dependent on the US financially but massively militarized and earning its keep by tying down the Russians?

The US would surely welcome such an arrangement and can definitely afford it.

Question is, can Russia afford to live with such an arrangement? Locked in a forever frozen conflict with a heavily militarized polity of 35 million bankrolled by the equally hostile 1-billion Collective West?

Putin claims his “Special Military Operation” was launched in part to improve Russia’s security situation. But if Russia accepts to live with such a Ukraine then its security situation will have definitely been enormously degraded.

It will mean that looking just at the security equation — without even factoring in Western sanctions and the damage to Russian-Ukrainian social relations — the war will have been a giant blunder for Moscow, and a stinging defeat.

To win territories home to 4 million people at the cost of turning a relatively manageable 40-million Ukraine that the West was only arming to a symbolic extent into a 35-million Prussianized battering ram for the Americans, composed of your ethnic kin, is not a win. It is a disaster almost without precedent.

Russia cannot control to what extent the US is willing to back Ukraine. But Russia can control what is there to back. Make it so that Ukraine isn’t a 35-million entity but a 20-million one and things become a lot more manageable again. At that point even a victory of sorts (a mangy one) could be claimed.

But that means taking territory. A lot more territory. Territory that at the present level of mobilization Russia isn’t capable of taking.

Right now Russia isn’t on pace to win anything that would make the cost of launching the war, which has already been baked in, remotely worthwhile.

The transformation of Ukraine into an Anti-Russia that Putin railed against has now been completed precisely by him and cemented for centuries or at least until an even bigger boogeyman comes around.

He has also given DC exactly what it needed to mobilize its vassal swarm for an almost unrestricted economic siege of Russia.

Banished from the global division of labor Russia will find itself falling further and further behind the West technologically as happened to late-era USSR.

The majority of the world has not joined the siege but you can’t go to Argentina for machine tools, Tanzania has not yet mastered avionics, and you can’t start a joint chipmaking venture with Indonesia. Even if you could the Empire’s vassal swarm would soon threaten them with secondary sanctions and they would fall back in line.

This has nothing to do with Russian talent, but only with scale. If an industrial and technological superpower like Germany was similarly cut from the global division of labor it would just as surely start to fall off. Having to figure out every step of everything by yourself, and being able to collaborate with no one, isn’t a recipe for rapid advancement.

The only hope is offered by China. Perhaps China will soon have analogs for everything Russia was sourcing in the West. (Not likely.) Perhaps China will soon even be making these analogs without Western inputs (patents, components, machine tools) so that they will remain exportable to Russia.

Even then, it would leave Russia’s technological level dependent on the political winds in Beijing. The Chinese have the talent and the numbers to accomplish anything, but more than once in their history their advancement was arrested and reversed by their own state.

If Beijing continues to unlock China’s productive and deductive powers via increased economic liberalization that’s great. But if it turns again more to stifling command economics the first victim will be Russia’s hopes for competitive Chinese analogs.

To sum up, the situation for Russia is:

— The cost of having launched the war is very high and already baked in.

— The cost of not making very large territorial gains will raise the cost even higher.

— With each month meeting these objectives becomes more difficult.

You would think that in such a situation the Kremlin would be unambiguously signaling its iron resolve to make large gains that could make up for the negatives.

And you would think it would be taking action to realize these gains quickly before Western supplies and Ukraine’s mobilization make it even harder.

If so, you could not be more wrong.

The Russian government continues to utterly fail to explain what this war is about. What it hopes to accomplish, or what military goals need to be met to get there.

The Russian government is also acting like there is no urgency to the war. As if whether Russia springs into action today, 6 months from now, or 2 years from now doesn’t make a difference.

I have never seen anything so feckless.

The deputy commander of Central Military District (correctly) states that Russia has embroiled itself in a war against the entire world:

“Apparently, we are now at war with the whole world, as it was in the Great Patriotic War, all of Europe, the whole world was against us. And now the same thing, they never liked Russia.”

But the Kremlin stubbornly refuses to fight an actual war. The Russian effort is clearly crying out for manpower. At the same time there isn’t even a partial mobilization, there isn’t retention of conscripts, there isn’t even deployment of conscripts to Ukraine. The army has literally been told to treat one-third of its manpower as untouchable and to leave it at home.

Until very recently the vast, overwhelming majority of all soldiers in the world were conscripts. And conscripts have fought and won every major war in the past 200 years.

In two months the West has transferred to Ukraine $5 billion in arms. That is five times Ukraine’s annual military procurement budget. In two months.

Meanwhile, Vladimir Putin balks at deploying trained soldiers who became soldiers via conscription. Perhaps this is a reflection of his humanism? But if he is so humane perhaps he should not have started the war in the first place? Why start a war and *then* remember how pacifistic you are?

What will be said of Putin’s “humanism” if months from now conscripts nonetheless have to be sent in, but it’s a new batch that isn’t as well trained (the current one isn’t being retained) and only to face a larger, more experienced and reequipped Ukrainian army?

Where is the mercy of standing by as Ukrainian forces reform and expand, and only moving decisively many months into the war after the West has been allowed ample time to ensure the fighting will be of the utmost intensity?

Russia isn’t in a position to intercept the flow of Western arms as they enter Ukraine. The trucks are unmarked and Russia’s fleet of armed drones is tiny anyway. It doesn’t have a way to loiter and have permanent eyes in the sky at such distances.

But Russia could block the shipments from reaching the left bank. Destroy the crossing points across the Dnieper and Ukraine is reduced to transferring equipment via the pontoon and tugboat combo that is sure to become a bottleneck.

Russia has so far launched over 1700 precision-guided missiles. Precisely one has targeted a Dnieper bridge. Naturally, splitting Ukraine into two halves would also greatly harm its economy and impose hardships on its civilians. But maybe the time to think about that was before the war was launched? If you’re that humanistic maybe just don’t launch a war in the first place as I humbly suggested?

Putin is acting like a man who started a war and is now embarrassed to fight it. He looks like a man who doesn’t believe his cause justifies full-hearted war or can be realized by one. That’s too bad because full-hearted war is exactly what Kiev and NATO are fighting.

It’s also ironic because nobody else in Russia knows if this war is worth fighting because nobody knows what Putin’s objective is or what he would settle for. There’s precisely one man in Russia with the information to know if this is worth it and he apparently doesn’t have a clue.

Pray do tell what sort of a 5D move is it to embroil a nation of 150 million people in a war with the 1-billion Collective West that lords over another 6 billion and then decline to actually prosecute that war?

Moscow went into Crimea in 2014 without a clear plan. The plan was to go in and wing it. Moscow was happy with the outcome and the Kremlin drew the lesson that improvisation works.

In reality, the outcome was mixed and showed just how unpredictable these type of adventures are. On the one hand Crimea was gained without a shot fired, but on the other hand, it sparked an uprising in Donbass to ask for the same liberation granted to Crimea that Moscow neither expected nor desired.

In addition to gaining the not-very-big Crimea, Moscow also became embroiled in intra-East Slavic bloodshed, gained the enmity of Ukraine, and peeled away 5 million pro-Russians so that pro-Russians could never again carry a Ukrainian election.

Russia cites Ukraine’s “Nazification” and “militarization” as gripes that need to be addressed by force, but until eight years ago Ukraine sold defense products to Russia and hosted Russian military bases. It honored May 9, its army retreated from Crimea under cherished Soviet battle flags, and only had 5000 combat-ready troops.

In fact, this utter lack of a serious military is the reason civilians, even neo-Nazi civilians, were welcomed to come help the military suppress the Donbass rising. Having fought they won prestige that made them impossible for politicians who had none to purge. And besides, what if they were needed to fight the Russians again?

A different lesson drawn from 2014 could have been that intervention causes yet more fallout that also calls for intervention. Another lesson might have been that not being able to decide if yours is a pacifistic or militaristic approach ultimately begets you the worst of both worlds. All the burned bridges of the militaristic strategy with none of the direct gains to show for it.

Anyhow, even if we accept that Crimea improvisation worked, it was a trick that was only going to work once.

Moscow’s belief that it can jump into things headlong and figure things out later immediately caused it to suffer $360 billion in “frozen” reserves that are now lost forever.

To escalate a frozen Donbass War into a hot Ukraine War and not think to evacuate your euros from foreign banks beforehand is quite something.

But it is only the most obvious facepalm in this disaster, but not at all the most consequential.

To start a war with NATO and then spend two months pondering whether to allow the army to use a third of its complement, that’s the real fecklessness and catastrophe. But it’s worse. The Kremlin will in the same press conference tell the public it is in an existential struggle for the very survival of Russia, then “reassure” it that one-third of Russia’s military is off-limits for combat in Ukraine.

Meanwhile, US officials are already working on ramping up production for Ukraine. Early on ramping up production is difficult. Then it gets progressively easier. In 6 months or a year $100 million in aid can represent vastly more missiles than it does now.

Really, what is the game plan here? Take the rest of Donbass and declare victory? Fine, but that will actually be a defeat. Not the least because Washington and Kiev will get to vote on whether what follows is peace or years of positional warfare. Or is the plan to follow it up with Odessa or more of the left bank, or both? Fine, but that is going to take using conscripts so you might as well start doing it now and get a better correlation of forces that will make things faster and less painful for everyone.

The Kremlin is prosecuting this war with all the conviction of a provincial Russian cop enforcing the vax pass. The difference is the war was Putin’s idea. It was sprung on the nation and the soldiers as a surprise. There was literally no debate on its merits because officially war was beyond impossible.

At the time I thought the war was launched after months of denials because that’s what makes sense militarily. However the effort was accompanied by so much of what flies in the face of military logic that this explanation becomes doubtful. The whole point of surprising the enemy is to overwhelm his unprepared force quickly. Instead the enemy is being given ample time to build up its force, only after which Moscow will start using Russia’s draftee soldiers.

But this secrecy is perfectly in line with how the Russian government loves to do things to start with. To this very day, Russia only has the official tally of 374,902 covid deaths but not even a simple breakdown by age bracket. This information does not exist in the public domain. The number of vaccine injuries exists and that number is zero. The number of Ukrainian dead is known to the Russian MoD down to the single digit and provided regularly, but the Russian public has no right to know the number of the Russian dead.

Never having to explain itself to anyone, or even sharing just the most rudimentary information is exactly how Russia’s technocratic Caesarism system likes to roll. Transparency is treated as an even bigger enemy than Americans, Zelensky, Azov and sanctions combined. The government doesn’t just withhold information. It actively works to discourage the very notion the public is owed data or explanations or should have any expectation of such.

And here lies the problem with a national call to arms.

Start mobilizing or using conscripts and the Russians will go along with it but they will also have a lot of questions, a lot of conditions, and a lot of ideas of their own. Techno Caesarism goes out the window.

Soulless staged rallies in front of government workers bused in for the occasion suddenly no longer do the trick. Suddenly you’re having to engage with people who are merely anti-anti-Putin but who aren’t United Russia cronies.

Waging a state effort is one thing, but a popular, national effort is another thing entirely. It means unlocking movements and forces you are not fully in control of.

On the one end of that spectrum lies Russia where Putin sitting in his covid cocoon can plunge the nation into a war with the whole world without even a debate.

On the other end of the spectrum lies Ukraine where every regiment has its own foreign policy and can veto the President.

Doubtlessly the Ukrainian way has its own pitfalls but the Kremlin way isn’t getting the job done either.

It is said that support for the war is high in Russia.

That’s not exactly right. What is high is the support for the war effort. The Russians are at war with the whole world, what other choice do they have but support Russia’s effort?

But that’s not the same thing as being an appreciator of the war. To support a war you first have to know basic things about it. What is the objective? How can it be accomplished? And at what cost?

If the nation is asked to finish what Putin started (without consulting with it) then it will go to Ukraine and finish the job.

And then the veterans will come back and will pass judgment on whether they were well-led in the war, was the war worth it, and was the war a wise decision or the work of a pyromaniac.

A leader who does not issue a call to arms when the situation clearly demands it is one who is not certain the people’s judgment would be in his favor.

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Iurie, in our last conversation from February 2024, you argued Putin was neither a bloodthirsty monster (as portrayed in the West) nor a fearless patriot (as presented by Kremlin-linked “alternative media”), but rather a mediocre careerist guided by a “merchant mentality”. Moscow paid Kiev to transit Russian gas across Ukraine right up until the start of 2025, and Russia continues to supply the United States with enriched uranium. (It still amazes me that Putin, bemoaning the possibility of losing the gas transit deal with Kiev, told Russian state media in December 2024: “War is war—but we supplied regularly and paid [Kiev], and still pay, money for [gas] transit [across Ukraine].” The phrase “war is war, but…” is simply awe-inspiring.) Do you see this same “merchant mentality” reflected in Russia’s approach to reaching a negotiated settlement with Washington to end the conflict in Ukraine?

What is important to remember in the case of Russia is that it is not the head of state who governs the country, but the private entities, big business, the clique of oligarchs who control the national economy, first of all the energy resources and the banking system. They are largely not Russian, but form the network of Israeli influence, which has also placed its people everywhere in state structures and in the Kremlin’s propaganda machine, “the media”.

The myth of Putin as a powerful personality, as a dictator, is just a smokescreen for this oligarchic and xenocratic regime that usurps power in Russia at the expense of the Russian people. Let us not confuse political theatre with the act of decision-making, the spectacle for the general public with real political power.

Over the last two hundred years, much has been written about the fact that with the rise of the merchant and usury class, especially after the French Revolution of 1789, politics itself died, being subordinated to the economic factor. And Russia, which was absorbed by the neoliberal paradigm of the collective West in 1991, is no exception to this rule. This is unlike the countries of the “axis of resistance” that the Kremlin betrays one after another: Libya, Iraq, Syria, Venezuela, Iran. And in Putin’s case the famous expression in the movie “The Godfather” fits perfectly: “Nothing personal, just business”.

Four years after the beginning of Russia’s military intervention in Ukraine, it is clear that the Kremlin is waging this war in a way diametrically opposed to a regime eager to win an unequivocal military victory. Otherwise there would have been a general mobilization of the economy for the necessities of war, as well as a massive mobilization of conscripts for military actions. But it should be noted that Russia’s economy works the same as before the war, and Russian society continues to exist as before 2022, including cultural, sporting, and touristic events, etc. Show-biz spectacles and entertainment are efflorescing in a country that is experiencing huge human losses, hundreds of thousands, destruction, and massive drone attacks daily. Remember, in Ukraine only mercenaries fight, not the regular Russian army. Each combatant has a contractual relationship with the Ministry of Defense and is paid a monthly salary for killing in this war. That being the case, can we talk about a patriotic war?

And the fact that the Putin regime accepted the role of the US president as a mediator to end the war demonstrates Moscow’s subordination to Washington. In this case, the whole bellicose Kremlin rhetoric about the infamous ”Collective West” becomes ridiculous. It is known that the US is behind the Zionist regime in Kiev, and is pursuing the destruction of Russia through this proxy war. The geopolitical constants of the USA have remained invariable in relation to Russia for a very long time. These geopolitical constants do not change depending on who gets to play the role of president—actually a puppet of banksters or the Deep State.

The strategy of the Americans in relation to Russia is taken from the British Empire and is motivated by the obsession of taking control of the huge natural resources of this country. But Washington cannot carry out a direct military aggression against Russia, as it did in the destruction of the countries of the Middle East and Venezuela. That is why in this case, the US operates through proxy and prefers some long-term military conflicts, which will totally deplete the target country.

The paradox of the situation in the case of Russia in recent years is that it is in a “double vassal” relationship. Since the imposition of Western sanctions in 2014, Russia has reoriented its exports of raw materials such as oil, gas, wood, metal, etc., to China, which has fully colonized the Russian market. In fact, Russia has become the banana republic of China. At the same time, the Kremlin accepting Trump as a mediator in the Ukrainian war betrays Moscow’s vassal position in relation to Washington.

At the same time, it is also worth noting who are the main negotiators from the US and Russia on the issue of ending the war in Ukraine. The US delegation is headed by ultra-Zionist Jared Kushner, Trump’s son-in-law, and Steve Witkoff, both of whom are “prominent American real estate developers” and affiliates of the fundamentalist Hasidic sect Chabad-Lubavitch. Neither could be called professional diplomats. Instead, they represent certain religious and economic interests.

Putin’s envoy is an equally interesting character—Kirill Dmitriev, who was educated in the United States and worked in large American corporations before returning to Russia. It is enough to take a brief look at his biography to understand that he represents the interests of American capital in Russia.

In addition, it seems that he is from the same tribe as the two US “diplomats” mentioned above. To assume that this triumvirate represents, respectively, the interests of the states that formally delegated them to those roles would be a grave mistake. They only represent big business, nothing more.

On the subject of Ukraine: There is a great deal of triumphalism in “alternative media” regarding the SMO. Apparently, Russia has already “won” and is just waiting for Kiev to surrender. In your opinion, what has Moscow accomplished in Ukraine since February 2022? Have the stated goals of the SMO been achieved?

The 2022 military intervention did not start from the national interests of the Russian state. Because if this were so, then Moscow should have started the war in 2014, when the Zionist regime in Kiev unleashed terror against the Russian population, using Ukrainian nationalists for this purpose. And if in 2022 the Kremlin wanted the military defeat of Ukraine, then it would not have withdrawn from Kiev, left the already conquered territories, and withdrawn from the Kharkov and Kherson regions. These strange maneuvers were determined by powerful factors of influence, which were able to dictate to Putin such major military failures.

Remember also that Zelensky remains a person that Moscow is not allowed to touch. In this sense you see the interview of former prime minister of Israel Naftali Bennett, who boasted that Putin had promised him at the beginning of the war that Zelensky would not be targeted by the Russians.

The goals officially declared by Moscow have not been achieved. Instead, the hidden goals of those who control this bloody game have been completely achieved. The main goal—the murder of as many Russians and Ukrainians as possible—has already been achieved. The war has also successfully led to the destruction of Ukraine’s economy and society. The massive exodus of the native population has also led to Ukraine’s depopulation—another goal complete. Yes, the war has already been “won”, but continues because it serves to help with the accelerated implementation of the satanist strategy called the UN 2030 Agenda, which aims to establish a world technocratic tyranny, a global digital GULAG. Beyond the macabre spectacle connected with this war and other wars now taking place is hidden the occult principle Solve et coagula (”dissolve and coagulate”) intended to establish the New World Order, in which transhumanist dystopia will become the norm.

Of course, “alt media” triumphalism is not limited to Ukraine: Every day there are fresh reports about how the “Axis of Resistance” is running circles around Washington/Israel/NATO, etc. And yet, over the past three years: 1. Gaza has been ethnically cleansed (again) and flattened (this time permanently?) by Israel, and is now occupied by the IDF, 2. Syria fell (and Putin gave the country’s new Al Qaeda president a warm welcome in the Kremlin) 3. The US military “kidnapped” Maduro from Caracas. (I still don’t know what to make of this bizarre episode.) Does the “Axis of Resistance” even exist?

Let us be direct in our approaches. One: President Donald Trump is a docile and cynical puppet of the all-powerful Israeli lobby. Two: Putin is also a spokesman and instrument of the same lobby.

As long as this reality is not understood in all its depth and tragedy, any attempt at geopolitical analysis will be partial and implicitly far from the truth.

We know very well the so-called “post-war consensus” that tabooed the subject, but the need to understand the major events in today’s world forces us to abandon them. To make it possible to destroy the “Axis of Resistance”, the Zionist mafia must first ensure that it eliminates any risk of strong reactions from Russia and China in support of countries that opposed the Tel-Aviv-Washington axis. To this end, immediately after the fall of the communist regime, Russia was heavily infiltrated by Zionist networks of influence.

They managed to penetrate massively into the structures of state power, the media, and especially the economy. In the case of Putin, his very promotion to the position of head of state was not foreign to that network. The name of Henry Kissinger is worth remembering in this regard.

And in Putin’s immediate entourage throughout his 25 years in power, it is worth mentioning at least a few key figures from that lobby: Anatoly Chubais, Sergei Kiriyenko-Izraitel, who served as Boris Yeltsin’s prime minister before becoming Putin’s chief of staff, the Chief Rabbi of Russia, Berel Lazar, of the Chabad Lubavich sect (who parachuted into Russia in 1990 from New York), and the oligarch Roman Abramovich, nicknamed “Putin’s wallet”, among others.

It is from this perspective that Russia’s impotence to support the countries under attack by the Israel-USA axis must be viewed. Moscow always limits itself to critical rhetoric, but in fact abandons the countries that rely on its support. And the duplicitous attitude towards the genocide in the Gaza Strip, as well as towards the terrorist policy of the state of Israel in relation to Lebanon, Syria, Iran, Palestine, etc., shows the subordination of Russia’s foreign policy to the cause of international Zionism.

You’ve paid a very high price for being an outspoken dissident journalist, who curries favor from neither Moscow nor Washington, in your home country of Moldova. Can you explain what has transpired since the Moldovan government brought cooked-up charges against you?

In fact, during my long career as a politician and journalist, I have always been the target of prosecution. I don’t even know how many criminal cases have been initiated against me since 1989. And the last case boils down to the following story: In 2017, power in Moldova was usurped by a group of criminals led by an oligarch, Vlad Plahotniuc, who ordered the opening of a criminal case against me under the pretext of “trafficking in influence”. The criminal prosecution lasted until May 2018.

And six years later, after three judges had changed, on August 2, 2024, I was sentenced by the first instance to 6 years in prison. This time, the order came from President Maia Sandu, who is the exponent of the SOROS mafia network in Moldova (they have all the power in the state). And on September 25, 2025, I was sentenced by the Court of Appeal to 4 years of imprisonment. This time the decision is enforceable.

However, I happen to be very far from my country and for the moment it is more difficult to be imprisoned. The situation is not simple at all, but I cannot give up my lifelong struggle. I am not accepted by any center of power, I do not seek anyone’s favors, I believe in God and I do my duty as a journalist and editor.

Those who wish can read my work on my blog.

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PUBLIC SERVICE ANNOUNCEMENT: I will be LIVE on Substack Live with the lovely Tessa Lena at noon (EST) today, January 9, 2026. That’s less than two hours away! Tell your secretary to cancel all your appointments, including your conference call with BRICS, because you don’t want to miss this. This is the link to our Live-Talk. Click click click.

As a devoted reader of Pepe Escobar (who like all fearless independent journalists refers to Russia’s Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman as a “goddess”), I was initially confused as to how Nicolas Maduro was seemingly teleported to the USS Iwo Jima last week. Independent journalist Pepe Escobar promised me, repeatedly, that Maduro was armed to the teeth with the finest Russian and Chinese weaponry and would not go quietly. Besides, Moscow and Beijing had already outfoxed Washington, again, because BRICS.

Yes, I was very confused, indeed. That is until I read Pepe’s latest column for independent truth outlet Strategic Culture Foundation, which provided much-needed clarity and relief.

Citing unnamed White Hat sources stationed in BRICS’ secret Multipolar Moon Base, Escobar reveals:

Maduro was protected only by Venezuelan forces, not Russians, as confirmed by independent Caracas sources. When a Russian command got to Maduro’s residence, at first they met resistance by some of Maduro’s own corrupt security.

When they were neutralized and the Russians got inside the residence, Maduro had already been extracted by the Delta Force, with key internal help. The chief of Maduro’s security detail was then apprehended – and duly executed.

Okay. Now I feel better because … Russian soldiers on Venezuelan soil executed the head of Maduro’s security detail—instead of, you know, keeping him alive so that he could be interrogated by relevant (Venezuelan) authorities and then put on trial (by the Venezuelans, because they are in Venezuela)?

I thought the Multipolar World Order was all about honoring International Law!?!?!

Why does Pepe insist on inventing total baloney nonsense that any normal person would be embarrassed to write? Why is he incapable of not doing this?

Let us recall some of Pepe’s other Exclusive Reports.

Remember when independent journalist Pepe Escobar reported that Russia shot down an Israeli F-35 “loaded with a nuclear bomb”? Do you remember that? Do you remember when Pepe Escobar, a very serious independent journalist, told you that the Russian air force SHOT DOWN AN ISRAELI JET CARRYING A NUCLEAR BOMB?

Do you remember when celebrated independent geopolitical truth-teller and Unz Review mega-superstar Pepe Escobar told you that Russia vaporized “9 underground US bioweapon labs” in Ukraine with Iskander missiles? DO YOU REMEMBER?

By the way: It’s no coincidence that both of these exclusives were “confirmed and reconfirmed” by Pepe’s high-level sources at White Hat HQ in Beijing. That’s double-confirmation.

PEPE!

Let’s return to Escobar’s latest Exclusive about how Maduro’s magic carpet ride to the USA is part of a multipolar trap for the Empire of Chaos, which will be brought to its knees by … legal fees:

There has been a tsunami of splendidly stupid speculation that China did not do anything to “save” Venezuela. China is way too sophisticated to engage in brawls. Beijing will fight the Empire of Chaos in court.

Silently, with no fanfarre [sp], Beijing has made it very clear that any American attack on Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) projects sealed by contract around the Global South – 150 participating nations at least – will be met with international arbitration in every court from Caracas to Jakarta. Translation – in the only way Western barbarians understand: the legal cost of American regime change operations will become prohibitive.

So the country that allegedly kidnapped the leader of a sovereign nation from his own capital, in the most unapologetic and unlawful way imaginable, is going to care what a court in Indonesia thinks?

Yes. Exactly.

The Axis of Resistance is lawyering up to take down Trump.

This is how we win.

Confirmed and reconfirmed.

In conclusion, I primarily wrote this blog post to announce that I WILL BE APPEARING ON SUBSTACK LIVE VERY SOON, TODAY, WITH TESSA LENA. CLICKETY-CLICK-CLICK. Sorry for kidnapping two minutes of your time. I will not return it to you until you give me all of your delicious oil.

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Take a quick gander at Kirill Dmitriev’s X.com account, and you might notice a common theme:

Again, keep an eye out for a repeating motif. It’s subtle:

There are plenty more just like these, but let’s stop here.

Are you noticing a pattern?

You are probably thinking to yourself: “Yes. This Kirill Dmitriev fellow sounds just like my unhinged uncle who continues to insist that Trump arrested Hillary Clinton and sent her to Gitmo, where she was executed by firing squad after being convicted of high treason during a top secret military tribunal.”

But Kirill Dmitriev is not your uncle (or if he is, my condolences). Kirill is Vladimir Putin’s “special representative of the Russian president for investment and economic cooperation with foreign countries”.

He also happens to be a Stanford and Harvard Business School grad, an alum of Goldman Sachs and McKinsey & Company, and a World Economic Forum Young Global Leader. Coincidence or fate?

Concerningly, Kirill has also assumed a prominent role in ongoing negotiations between Moscow and Washington on the Slav-culling in Ukraine.

But is it normal for a diplomat to refer to the leader of a hostile foreign power directly and indirectly fueling a proxy war that continues to systematically vaporize and maim your own people, “daddy”?

I understand that the “daddy” meme comes from Mark Rutte’s strange NATO summit outburst, but Kirill is not using this moniker to merely portray European leaders as Washington’s lapdogs. He apparently believes it’s good diplomacy—a sign of respect—to call the president of a nation that is directly and indirectly killing Russians every day, “daddy”.

He even shares AI-generated QAnon erotica, just like your insane uncle does.

But again, Kirill is not your uncle. He is Putin’s “special envoy”. Do you understand why that’s worrying?

Somehow we live in a world where this craven bootlicker and human embarrassment is one of Moscow’s most-senior negotiators on Ukraine.

Think about what this means.

Yes, it means that Moscow is demanding that Washington extract rare earth metals from Donbass.

Please don’t misunderstand me: The sooner the pointless Slav-culling in Ukraine ends, the better. I’m just wondering why the Kremlin’s lead negotiator, a Davos-groomed Goldman Sachs alum, apparently can’t stop calling Trump “daddy”.

…As I was typing this-here blog post, he did it again!

(Slightly off-topic: Wasn’t Venezuela supposed to be defended by 10,000 Russian S-900 Novichok missile systems and ten battalions of BRICS’ most elite special forces? I’m pretty sure this is what Pepe Escobar, and many other Very Serious and Important and Completely Independent Journalists, were “reporting” not so long ago.)

Meanwhile, RT’s social media team has been ordered to share every unfortunate word that dribbles out of Dmitriev’s mouth-hole:

Why does the Kremlin think this is a good idea? It’s honestly shocking that Moscow’s upper management thinks this is wise, or accomplishes anything.

Guys, listen (I know some of you read the blog): You’re not driving a 5D wedge between Washington and Brussels by calling Trump “daddy”.

Please stop doing that. Please. I am asking nicely.

Thank you.

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The last few months have been rough.

My Russian village mentor, Andrei, died in July. Literally the next day, Ekaterina was deported from Russia, forcing the Edward Institute for Village Studies—which is still considered the most prestigious unaccredited institute for higher village learning in Novgorod Oblast—to close its doors. A few weeks later, I left Potato the dog and Susan the misgendered cat with a neighbor and flew to Egypt.

While in self-imposed exile in Alexandria, Egypt, I learned of the death of my friend and blog colleague, Marko Marjanović. The circumstances of his passing are still a mystery to me.

Then the FSB informed us that Ekaterina had received a 25-year ban from Russia. The reason? To ensure the security of the state. The evidence against Ekaterina? That’s a state secret.

We lost a lot in a period of less than three months.

Thankfully, I was reunited with Edward Junior in early December. We are now visiting family and friends in the States. But what comes next is still a very open question.

Ekaterina will be attending the People’s Reset conference in Morelia, Mexico at the end of January. She will be serving as an official emissary of the Edward Institute and will have the authority to sign treaties and memoranda of understanding with like-minded folks seeking to create parallel societies where we can grow root vegetables and build stately palaces for our poultry. Everything else is just noise blasted into our eardrums by the global oligarchy.

What I’m trying to say is that you should go to Mexico next month and meet up with Ekaterina and help plan our next move. Tickets are still available.

Meanwhile, starting on January 3, Edward Slavsquat will be officially REBOOTED.

I really do apologize for the horrendous lack of blogging. I blogged my heart out in October while I was in Alexandria, but then I got sidetracked while volunteering as a day laborer at a Moldovan vineyard (more on that later?), and then I had to rush over to Tbilisi, Georgia, to scoop up my son, and now, after several weeks of family-visiting in the USA, things are finally settling down.

Apart from committing to more regular blog-posting, I am going to attempt to publish a weekly Squatcast. Yes, I too have one of those podcast things, although it is even more neglected than the blog.

I will also try to make myself more available to anyone who might want to chat about Russia-related topics. Over the past few weeks I was honored to speak with Maryann Gebauer and Folkets Radio:

Maryann Gebauer

Riley Waggaman: The Russia you do not know

Riley Waggaman is a former RT journalist and has lived in Russia for over a decade. This unfiltered account of Russia contradicts every report on Russia by the media and provides an accurate first-hand glimpse into the country. Follow or support Riley Waggaman who goes by the pen name of Edward Slavsquat on…

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9 months ago · 46 likes · 24 comments · Maryann Gebauer

I was also invited to do a very long-form written interview with a journalist from Scandinavia, which I hope to complete in the coming days. So stay tuned for that.

The blog reboot will also focus on republishing Marko’s writings.

I am eternally grateful to those who have helped preserved Marko’s journalism and commentaries. There are now several versions of what (in theory) should be Marko’s complete works. Reader “Wesley” was the first to send me a zipped archive of Marko’s website. Shortly after, the curator of Events in Ukraine enlisted a tech-savvy friend to create an archive of Marko’s work, which I was able to download. A publicly available archive of Marko’s website was created by veteran reader Vanusha, and can be downloaded here.

There were others who emailed me or left comments with suggestions and ideas about how to best go about preserving Marko’s writings. Thank you to you all.

Since then, Marko’s domain has been suspended by his hosting provider (I’m assuming because of non-payment).

My plan is to republish one of Marko’s articles every week in the blog’s newly created “Marko Was Right” category.

I miss you, Marko. But we’ll always have Austerlitz.

That pretty much does it for now.

I will give Edward Junior, who is a celebrated commentator in his own right, the final word:

Happy New Year.

— Riley

P.S. — don’t forget about Mexico.

The commercial enterprise that controls Russians’ biometric data has introduced new ways to use your face as a form of ID, resulting in unprecedented levels of safety and convenience in the Russian Federation. Russians young and old are already reaping the benefits of their country’s “digital transformation”—including very, very young Russians.

The Russian government is working on amending federal legislation to allow schools across the country to monitor and identify students using biometrics, Kommersant reported on December 3. Plans for a standardized “biometric turnstile system” for Russian schools are already being tested in Tatarstan.

Authorities have stressed that schools will be able to choose whether or not to switch to biometric identification, adding that parents must first consent before their childrens’ faces are scanned and entered into Russia’s Unified Biometric System (UBS).

Conservative-patriotic media outlets in Russia responded positively to this completely voluntary and very safe and convenient initiative.

Concentration camp? A bit dramatic, no? These so-called Russian patriots could learn a thing or two from disaffected westerners who read RT and understand the delicate nuances of the Russian government’s Plan, which must be trusted at all times.

Here is an unrelated excerpt from Kommersant’s recent article on the subject:

The Ministry of Education told Kommersant that the biometric school entry system is already being tested in 20 schools in Tatarstan, where “special attention is paid to security”: the school grounds are fenced, cameras are installed along the perimeter, and entry is through checkpoints.

Perfect for learning.

As this blog reported, at the end of August, Deputy Prime Minister of the Russian Federation and Chief of Staff of the Government Executive Office Dmitry Grigorenko deployed familiar language when describing the advantages of using biometrics to identify schoolchildren:

Entry to school ‘by face’ is not only convenient, but also very safe. Because it is always clear who is entering, who is exiting, who is in school... After all, this is where our children spend their lives.

But underage children aren’t the only Russians basking in the safety and convenience of biometric identification (although they are very obviously the primary targets of the country’s “digital transformation”; dehumanization must start at a young age so as to seem “normal”): Russians of all ages can now leave their unsafe and inconvenient paper IDs at home.

The Center for Biometric Technologies, the joint stock company that stores and manages Russians’ biometric data, recently unveiled a new platform for providing biometric services, “Migom” (Мигом, which can be translated as “instantly” or “in an instant”).

On December 11, the company posted a photo collage demonstrating how Migom will be incorporated into everyday life in Russia.

The accompanying caption:

[W]e want to show you how these [biometric] services look in real life. These photos show how easy it is now to access familiar services: order documents at the MFC [government services portal], check into a hotel, verify your age when purchasing age-restricted goods [including energy drinks; no, not a joke] at vending machines and self-checkouts, and soon, undergo pre-flight security checks.

Let’s have a closer look at these inspiring photographs.

A lady with nice long hair checkmates George Soros by using her FACE, and not her NATO-ENDORSED PAPER ID, to prove that she is a responsible taxpayer, and not a terrorist-biohazard!

Respectable suit-wearing man receives facial recognition-permission to buy something from a vending machine. VERY MULTIPOLAR, INDEED.

Energy drink enjoyers in Russia can now prove they are old enough (18+) to drink their favorite drink using their FACES. Davos trembles.

The End.

NOTE FROM EDWARD: My sincere apologies for the extended blog silence. After weeks of wandering the globe, I have finally settled down (for at least two weeks). Commence the blogging (until I have to move again)!

Brazil and the EU said their newly formed Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Markets will promote “carbon markets as one of the drivers of climate action” while seeking “interoperability of compliance carbon markets in the long term”.

Praising the carbon market alliance with BRICS’ Brazil, President of the European Commission Ursula von der Leyen said:

Carbon pricing has become a central tool to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with a strong business case for the economy and for the people. I am happy to confirm the support of the European Union to the Declaration on the Open Coalition on Compliance Carbon Market. We want to work closely with Brazil and with many like-minded partners on putting a price on carbon.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva was similarly supportive of the coalition’s mission to create international standards for carbon markets.

“Carbon markets can become important sources of public revenue, but they will only gain scale if countries move towards common parameters,” Lula noted.

The carbon market alliance already boasts 18 members, including BRICS’ multipolar powerhouse, China.

Russia, South Africa, and India, all of whom are developing national carbon markets, have not yet joined their fellow BRICS members in the newly formed alliance.

But not everyone is as excited as BRICS about buying and selling carbon.

“Carbon markets are a new way for billionaires and corporations to extract more wealth from our territories,” said Anderson Amaro, a member of Brazil’s Small Farmers’ Movement and the Latin American Coordination of Rural Organizations.

Some might find it strange that the EU (Satanic West) and BRICS members (our multipolar saviors) would work together to integrate their carbon markets.

But it is not so strange if you stop and think about it.

Turning carbon, an essential element for all life on Earth, into a tradable commodity probably won’t protect the environment or prevent Category 5 hurricanes or whatever, but it’s very profitable for Goldman Sachs, and at the end of the day, isn’t that what really matters?

And so it’s perfectly logical that BRICS members would join forces with the EU to “put a price on carbon”.

After all, BRICS is a Goldman Sachs-coined acronym—did you think it would be bad for business?

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To paraphrase the G20’s website: that’s not good—that’s bad.

South Africa has used its G20 Presidency to zero in on this existential threat: “While the challenges we face are common, their causes and consequences are unevenly distributed…A lack of predictable and sustainable financing for development and climate action exacerbates these inequalities.”

Of course, actions speak louder than words, especially when there is dire need for climate action.

BRICS, which serves as the multipolar world order’s Fellowship of the Ring, just with fewer wizards and more public-private partnerships, has been working behind the scenes to lay the groundwork for equitable carbon-accounting mechanisms that will help all relevant stakeholders achieve their SDGs before the world is enveloped in life-ending carbon.

Just in the last six weeks, BRICS states have made huge strides towards accounting for, and eventually exterminating, all carbon on Earth.

September 25: China’s carbon market is booming!

Xinhua news agency provided highlights from the China Carbon Market Conference, held in Shanghai at the end of September:

By the end of August, the cumulative trading volume of China’s carbon emissions trading market was nearly 700 million tonnes, with a trading value of approximately 48 billion yuan (about 6.6 billion U.S. dollars).

Notably, the total transaction volume for the whole of 2024 was the highest since the market began trading in 2021, according to a report on the development of the national carbon market.

October 10: Brazil to propose international standards to integrate global carbon markets

Brazil has cooked up something special for the upcoming UN Climate Conference, COP30, which will be held in the Brazilian port city of Belém from November 10-21.

TV BRICS, a Moscow-based media project funded by the Russian government, reported:

Brazil intends to present the Open Coalition for Carbon Market Integration project at the 30th UN Climate Change Conference (COP30). The initiative by the country’s Ministry of Finance involves harmonising the standards of international carbon emissions trading systems and creating a single, transparent and sustainable market.

The coalition is set to become part of the New Brazil government programme, a strategy aimed at combining economic growth, social justice and environmental protection. Participation in the initiative will be voluntary, and the structure will be open to new members at any time.

According to Cristina Reis, Deputy Secretary for Sustainable Economic Development at the Ministry of Finance, the aim of the project is to accelerate global decarbonisation.

“The idea is for countries to work together to reduce emissions, thereby reducing the threat of climate crisis and the negative impact of greenhouse gases on the planet,” she said.

October 20: Can India’s carbon market fuel the country’s “cleantech future”?

There is growing excitement about India’s Carbon Credit Trading Scheme (CCTS), which launched in 2023. Carbon trading is set to begin next year, and there are high hopes that the scheme will “power India’s cleantech future”, whatever that means.

October 22: South Africa to introduce “high-integrity” carbon markets

South Africa has also been busy with its own project to promote “climate-smart growth”.

South African state media announced the good news:

[The] government is set to introduce a new framework to guide and expand high-integrity carbon markets in South Africa.

Addressing the Carbon Markets Africa Summit 2025, the Minister of Forestry, Fisheries and the Environment, Dr Dion George, said when carbon markets are governed with integrity, they can mobilise finance, transfer technology, and drive inclusive growth.

“The framework lays the foundation for developing, governing, and scaling high-integrity carbon markets in South Africa. It is designed to create an enabling environment for credible, transparent, and socially inclusive carbon market activity, aligned with our Nationally Determined Contributions and with the Paris Agreement’s cooperative mechanisms,” the Minister said in Johannesburg on Wednesday.

Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) embody South Africa’s efforts to reduce national emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change.

“The future of carbon markets will be defined not by promises but by performance. Our goal is simple: to build a credible system that attracts investment, delivers real emission reductions, and creates lasting value for our people. Through integrity, innovation and partnership, Africa can lead a new era of climate-smart growth,” George said.

The Draft South African Carbon Markets Framework was developed under Article 6 of the Paris Agreement.

Meanwhile, South Africa has been working with the G20’s Sustainable Financing Working Group to “enhance the integrity of carbon credit markets, reduce market fragmentation and enhance carbon market efficiency”.

October 27: Russia flaunts carbon market achievements to G20

Ahead of the summit in Johannesburg, Ministry of Economic Development of Russia Nikita Kondratiev met with G20 colleagues in Cape Town to share Moscow’s well-documented affinity for carbon accounting:

G20 countries need to share experiences in the development of low-emission technologies that are a significant driver for climate change mitigation.

This was stated by the Director of the Department of multilateral economic cooperation and special projects of the Ministry of Economic Development of Russia Nikita Kondratiev following the final meeting of the working group and the G20 Ministerial Meeting on Environment and Climate Sustainability, which was held in the South African city of Cape Town.

Discussions in the two meetings were based on the priorities set out by the South African presidency. On climate, the parties discussed the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions in the context of sustainable development and adaptation to climate change, mechanisms to respond to collateral losses and damage, and ensuring equitable transitions to a low-carbon economy.

“Our delegation presented … successes in achieving carbon neutrality in Sakhalin, as well as the first successful results in the development of the national voluntary carbon market in Russia,” concluded Nikita Kondratiev.

Please clap.

Bizarrely, BRICS’ crusade against carbon has been curiously ignored by trusted voices in independent media who preach about the glorious ascendance of the multipolar world order. Why do they remain silent about BRICS’ greatest triumphs? This makes no sense if you are trying to promote what the multipolar world stands for: equitable, sustainable, high-integrity carbon trading.

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