Image is of the Preah Vihear Temple on the Cambodian border. Image sourced from the UNESCO World Heritage website.
Over the last few days, Thailand and Cambodia entered into a heightened stage of conflict due to a long-running border dispute. Like many problems on this planet, Europeans are ultimately to blame - specifically France. Certain sections of the border drawn up by France about a century ago were not fully agreed upon by both sides, with the ownership of some Khmer temples being the most visible points of disagreement.
Despite interventions in favor of Cambodia in the 1960s and later 2010s by the ICJ - one of the mainly mostly useless global institutions that liberals periodically disown - the border conflict has simmered at a generally low level. Of the two countries, Thailand is significantly more militarily and economically powerful.
Last Wednesday, a Thai soldier lost his leg by stepping on a landmine, prompting a rapid escalation between Cambodia and Thailand that has since resulted in dozens of deaths and tens of thousands displaced. Cambodia was willing to come to the negotiating table fairly quickly, but Thailand was more hesitant. International pressure on the two countries by Malaysia, China, and the United States eventually forced Thailand to the table, and they have recently agreed to an immediate ceasefire courtesy of ASEAN.
Notably, Trump refused to hold trade talks with either country until they agreed to peace, which suggests that he really wants a Nobel Peace Prize - which he seems a shoe-in for given that he's met the two most important requirements that several Nobel Peace Prize recipients have needed to meet in the past, which are: 1) start at least one war, and 2) accelerate the genocide of millions of people as billions more people watch on. His policies vis-a-vis ICE creating a domestic terror regime only further increase his chances of winning the prize.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the RedAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Zohran Mamdani claims he has “grown” from previous “defund the police” tweets while speaking to reporters at a cop funeral
This comment is dedicated to the brave posters of hexbear
Giggling at the idea of people calling Zohran Mamdani a blorbo
lol nope
have fun everyone
The American Left is so broken and beat that we've had people on here arguing that he wasn't pro-cop, and that actually he wants to fund social workers (to do policing) which is somehow good, and are literally in here saying it's admirable political calculus to actually be talking about reformism and that defunding a fascist army is just extremism/ultra talking points. Hundred years after Rosa died and we still have "Leftists" talking about reformism in a literally fascist imperial state, truly such a sad nation.
The same people that will say some loser with a bad take deserves the wall are out here defending a guy with a massive platform using it to speak soft on the entity and its partners the NYPD.
[edit: if cops only working 40 hours at fascist oppression instead of working 65 hours at fascist oppression is a "bright side", then the darkness has won]
The 21st century leftists cannot imagine a future without electoralism, just like how 16th century French people could not imagine a future without monarchy. That is, until the inevitable happened. They are too ideologically constrained to see that History is always marching on. And all those who were still stuck to the tradition and not prepared for the radical change so alien to what they were accustomed to, are destined to be swept away by the Tide of History.
Having said that, Mamdani is still a positive change. However, we all know that he cannot do anything without a mass movement behind him, ready to take on any and every challenge that comes from the establishment. It is up to the American left to decide how they want to organize with or around him.
The speed at which western leftists can glee over a guy who literally said Israel has a right to exist because they'll "get" "subsidized" malls where they'll save maybe 30$ on groceries just shows me how they need to get a fucking grip. If a pretty smile and some milquetoast promises from THE DEMOCRATIC PARTY CANDIDATE can make you cheer for a guy, a suitcase of money will you make burn the world.
His goal is create a "democratic party one can be proud of", idk why some people have let themselves be enthralled into thinking he will be the american mao who is just hiding his true beliefs, which almost all communists explicit said one should not do, but anyways...Just because he is charismatic? Because he went to on that youtube short nyc subway channel?
I'm still waiting for him to win to judge based on what he does
Call it cope but he never said anything against ideologically purging the police of straight up fascists (yes I know, that's all of them, that's the point) and hiring a bunch of unemployed or underemployed leftists to actually go after real criminals instead of harassing and killing poor people
My biggest criticism of him is that he's letting himself be put on the backfoot and having to play defense instead of going on the assault and taking advantage of the current news cycle to go after Cuomo for his many ties to
and maybe even win over a few disillusioned chuds
Ok if he actually does a complete purge, I’ll concede this was a ploy. Usually it goes the opposite way, you have to moderate your ideas once within the system because of institutional opposition
He wants to drastically reduce the amount of overtime for cops. Notice that he always redirects back to keeping headcount the same. He isn't going to hire any new officers, he will push back on the overuse of overtime. Unfortunately, the police union is still very strong so it will be hard to do anything.
It was obvious.
I'l just get more AOC from here.
Western leftists when the Democratic mayoral candidate walks back all his radical positions: OMG America is having a revolution
The same leftists when BRICS doesn't nuke Israel or shut down the entire global economy and destroy themselves to stop a genocide entirely manufactured by the enemies of BRICS: OMG BRICS are the real Zionists
fell for it again award: chapo.chat edition
who thinks it's a revolution? i'm very clear that it is not, we can point and laugh at people who think it's the revolution together.
Those here who are vehement defenders of it against all legitimate criticism are acting as if it is a revolution, and often while being hypercritical of others in a way that seems in bad faith. Not everyone who is hopeful for mamdani is being myopic about this
HE'S FUCKIN DOGWHISTLING
His policy is to keep the police budget static and transfer the yearly budget increase to social services, thru inflation the overall police budget will shrink year on year, that IS DEFUNDING THE POLICE
Jesus christ people it's one of the smartest policy positions from a western left politician in years, but mfs are more concerned he isn't calling for the burning of police stations, like come on
Research his policies and you will see what he's trying to do
no if he doesn't personally execute every cop with his bare hands then he's a fascist
This is great man theory. A real socialist will set up struggle sessions in Central Park.
We never could have seen this coming
His public stance has long been to keep the current police budget, while increasing funding for social workers. He is carefully triangulating to avoid scaremongering from his opponents which could cost him the race.
Let the man cook.
Yeah love to defend selling out as “triangulating”
Am I in 1990?
Has a democratic socialist anywhere in the world ever run on defunding the police?
It's not a tenable electoral position at all. It's a strong slogan for activism because you know that the compromise is going to be somewhere in-between. Much like "fuck cars" or "antiwork" are fun extreme slogans for pulling people to left with entertaining extremism but everyone understands they're not tenable positions, the compromise would always be something in-between. Without a revolution of course.
What he should be careful of is using language like "grown". It implies the former movement was childish when it was not. It undoes some of the work it did. He should simply say that's not what he's running on and not what he would seek to carry out, something like "those movements had a useful purpose in using strong language at that time but they're not what the current moment calls for nor what I would implement". It's possible to say that's not what he wants without unintentionally putting down what was absolutely a good movement.