this post was submitted on 02 Feb 2026
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Bulletins and International News Discussion from February 2nd to February 8th, 2026 - The European Satrapies Are Revolting
(hexbear.net)
Get it? "Revolting" is a double entendre! Anyway...
As the Trump administration continues to accelerate the flagrant disregard of "international law", we have seen various European leaders flock to China (alongside Canada), seeking deals. Some trips have been more successful than others - for example, Macron's was fairly dire despite his lavish reception by Xi Jinping, but Starmer's resulted in some actual deals and tariff reductions. The intent of this wave of diplomacy with China is clear: leverage.
Nobody should be fooled into thinking this revolt immediately benefits the developing world, of course. While a relative weakening of the US compared to Europe is progressive in a limited sense (insofar as the US is the locus of imperialism), every indication shows that, when it matters, the European consensus remains aligned in most respects with the US, such as with them and the Zionist entity against Iran, against national sovereignty in Africa (e.g. ECOWAS), as well as in Latin America (either in support or not sufficiently opposing American designs there against Cuba and Venezuela, to name but two countries). It is also unclear how long such a divide will last - perhaps Trump leaving office in 2028 and a slightly less bellicose leader in power will result in many cancelled deals with China.
Despite the very shaky initial steps over the past couple years, Europe still has many miles it must traverse to achieve sovereignty, let alone socialism. For now, it will cheer on the sanctions against millions of vulnerable people and incoming bombing of Iran and Hezbollah, though perhaps it will also share a degree of the economic/military retaliation.
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.
The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. 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.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
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.
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EDIT: Looks like talks are back on, thanks @companero@hexbear.net for the update. Nuclear talks only in Oman, Iran got their way. Maybe Trump doesn't have the heart to actually do a strike knowing it could lead to a regional war the US can't just back out of. Who knows.
To the surprise of absolutely nobody, the "negotiations" between the United States and Iran have apparently broken down, mostly because the United States wants Iran to stop pursuing their missile program and that's a massive red line for Iran, totally not up for discussion. As expected, looks likely the United States will instead strike Iran this weekend.
Per https://www.axios.com/2026/02/04/iran-nuclear-talks-canceled-witkoff
There is no "small victory" for Iran, or defeat for that matter. The US is going to stick to its itinerary whether or not the Iranians meet, beyond perhaps total subjegation that would amount to a similarly catastrophic state of affairs.
Nonetheless, if they're going to get American warplanes over Tehran, they may as well lure the softliners into getting their shit rocked again. The compradors will have lost all credibility should they insist that the empire is worth bargaining with.
The Axios article you linked got updated.
The "negotiations" have been un-cancelled after the Gulf states feared for their ~~lives~~ oil money. Nuclear talks only. A small W for Iran.
This doesn't change the fact that the talks are a farce to begin with. The US isn't particularly worried about nukes or ballistic missiles. They want an Iranian puppet regime in place to help strangle China.
What I am interested in this time, should another round of this conflict commence is that Khamenei'z English twitter account stated that if this conflict recommences this time, it will be a "regional war". The read I take from that is that Iran is publicly threatening that another attack on Iran will not lead to just retaliation against the US but also retaliation against countries in the region actively aiding the US, which has been my stance since early 2024 on what Iran needs to do if it wants to accomplish its goals in this conflict. Countries like Jordan and the UAE have participated in the interception of missiles fired at Israel by Iran with no real consequence, on top of their own economic and political complicity or active and enthusiastic participation in this regional conflict and genocide, and will continue to do so until they actually face consequences.
I hope the Iranian leadership follow through with this. The United States has shown time and time again it is not something to be negotiated with, and they will demand more and more until you're dead. The explicit goal this time is regime change, and all of Iran's Axis of Resistance has been pretty much dismantled. There's little left to lose.
May the missile defense systems of the little and great satans suffer catastrophic failure
how i pray that iran gets some joker who wants to blow up burj kalifa, blockade straight of hormuz and explode qatar as an opener response and set oil fields on fire everywhere with their short range missiles. but you just know they will meh meh their way into dipshittery.
Yeah no surprise talks are collapsing. Even more of a farce than last time.
This really depends on how the airlift goes with regards to transportation of air defence systems, moving tactical fighter aircraft to the Middle East, etc if the US wants to stick to the current plan. The US has had two large logistical setbacks, which is probably why they even tried to initiate these talks, to buy time.
Signs to look out for if the US wants to move faster:
If we don't see this in the next few days, I'll assume that the US will wait longer for more build-up. The US can absolutely strike now if they wanted, or any time previously or after because of their global strike capabilities though. I'm basing the previous sentence on previously observed patterns when Trump takes military action, going back to Syria 2017 US strikes, and most recently against Iran last year and Venezuela last month.
One factor here that was not present any time previously is the air wing of the USS Abraham Lincoln aircraft carrier, one of the most advanced in the US Navy. Not only so they have operational F-35Cs and EA-18Gs with NGJ pods, but also "long range kill chain weapons" such as air launched SM-6/AIM-174B Gunslinger multi purpose missiles for their F/A-18 Super Hornets. These are missiles capable of air to air engagements at ranges in excess of 200nmi/230mi/370km, using F-35Cs and E-2D Hawkeye aircraft to complete the kill chain. (F-35 tracks target, passes on information to E-2D, back to the F-18 or datalinked to the AIM-174B). This may mean that F-22s aren't needed for air superiority.