this post was submitted on 27 Apr 2026
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Image is of Iranian speedboats spotted by a satellite in the Strait of Hormuz.


Not terribly much has happened in the last week. The main two developments is the very much expected resumption of fire in Lebanon as the ZIonists are famously agreement-incapable, and the continuing supply of equipment to the Middle East, including the George H.W. Bush aircraft carrier. This means there are now three aircraft carriers in the general vicinity, and while I'm uncertain how much of a role the burnt-out Ford and the increasingly exhausted Lincoln will ultimately play (they were rather ineffective during the first round), there are also a good ~20 destroyers and however many submarines that are carrying their own munitions. I have a couple more paragraphs of exposition below, but it's unlikely to be major news to anybody here, so I've spoilered it.

spoiler

On the one hand, it feels like a resumption of the war for the US at this point would be complete madness. We are getting article after article from even the Western media admitting to US standoff+interceptor missile shortages, as well as detailing the extensive damage to US bases. The Zionists are also getting ever more mired in Lebanon, with Hezbollah's unjammable fibre optic drones playing an ever more prominent role in causing substantial long range damage to invading forces. On the other hand, it is very unlikely that most of the US's remaining firepower is being brought to the region on a mere bluff. For its part, Iran and their allies seem to have their finger on the trigger, with their own extensive repairs, upgrades, resupplies, and adjustments having been made for round two.

Assessing the overall global economic situation is difficult, not least because of a degree of financial manipulation that is almost admirable in its sheer scale and recklessness - to quote Ghalibaf: "Their frontline is the yield curve." Multiple countries are now facing real and desperate shortages, including major economies like Japan. Diesel prices continue their record rises, and reports about the potential impacts to all sectors of the global economy are streaming in, with famines around the world now very likely. While the US is profiting from the rise in oil prices, it seems like it will be unable to meaningfully increase production for at least a year or two, and so the US will certainly not be replacing the massive oil barrel deficit to create an energy hegemony, as some have suggested. In contrary: this is the best opportunity in a generation for China, Russia, and Iran to collectively make economic decisions that could cripple entire pillars of American hegemony. However, if the response is lacking - and we've all seen before over the last four years how China's responses to crises have been on the lacking side - we could see a (albeit temporary) strengthening of the US's financial power, as this global crisis will almost certainly result in debt climbing even higher as Western financial institutions grant loans en masse to struggling countries in the developing world. It's very uncertain times.

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Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
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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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[–] Tervell@hexbear.net 44 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

https://archive.ph/Ccd8k

Russia runs full combat aviation grouping in Mali

Russia has quietly assembled one of its most capable combined aviation groupings outside of Ukraine — not in the Middle East or Central Asia, but in West Africa, where the African Corps is running a sustained air campaign across Mali with a fleet that includes attack helicopters, strike drones, heavy transport aircraft, and front-line bombers operating out of Bamako’s international airport.

more

The scale of Russian aviation in Mali has become clearer through imagery and reporting from Russian military channels, which have shown African Corps helicopters conducting supply runs to forward bases including Hombori in the Gao region and evacuating wounded personnel from combat zones. What those images reveal, taken together, is not an advisory presence with light air support — it is a full combined-arms aviation grouping conducting active combat operations alongside Mali’s armed forces, known by their French acronym FAMA. The rotary-wing backbone of the grouping consists of approximately ten Mi-8AMTSh multirole helicopters and four Mi-24P attack helicopters. The Mi-8AMTSh — the combat assault transport variant of Russia’s most widely operated military helicopter — is the workhorse of the operation, moving personnel, ammunition, and supplies between Bamako and forward positions that ground routes cannot reliably service in contested terrain. The Mi-24P, the dedicated attack variant of the Hind family, provides fire support for ground operations — a heavily armed gunship capable of engaging targets with rockets, gun systems, and anti-tank missiles. Both types operate dynamically, cycling between Bamako and forward outposts based on mission requirements rather than maintaining fixed basing at a single location, a pattern that reflects the operational tempo and the range of tasks the grouping is being asked to cover.

Bamako’s international airport serves as the primary hub for the heavier elements of the grouping. The Su-24 front-line bombers — exact numbers unconfirmed — operate from Bamako, giving the African Corps a fixed-wing precision strike capability that no other actor in the Sahel theater can match at comparable range and payload. The Su-24 is a variable-sweep wing, two-seat attack aircraft designed for low-altitude penetration and precision strike, and its presence in Mali signals that the African Corps is not limiting its air campaign to rotary-wing close support. Also based at Bamako is the Mi-26 — the world’s largest production helicopter by payload capacity — which handles the heavy logistics requirements that the Mi-8 fleet cannot manage alone, including the movement of large equipment consignments and bulk supplies from the capital to forward areas. The unmanned component rounds out a capability set that would be impressive for a declared military operation, let alone one conducted under the political framing of a security partnership. Inokhodets reconnaissance-strike drone systems — the Russian equivalent of a medium-altitude long-endurance armed UAV — are confirmed in Mali and have participated in strikes against rebel and jihadist forces. Orlan reconnaissance drones provide persistent surveillance coverage, feeding intelligence into the targeting process that guides both the Inokhodets strikes and manned aircraft operations. Together, the drone component gives the African Corps the kind of continuous overhead awareness and precise strike capability that Malian forces could not independently generate.

The logistics chain sustaining all of this runs through Ilyushin Il-76 military transport aircraft operated by the Russian Aerospace Forces, supplemented by various private aviation companies, a supply architecture that blends official military resources with commercial operators to maintain operational continuity and obscure the full scale of Russian military commitment. Personnel, ammunition, and equipment arriving on those flights are then distributed by the helicopter fleet to forward positions, with the Mi-8 fleet serving as the critical last-mile connector between Bamako’s logistics hub and the outposts where operations actually occur. The Sahel is not a permissive environment for this kind of aviation campaign. The armed groups operating in Mali’s north and center have demonstrated the ability to engage aircraft, and the terrain favors ground-based ambushes against landing zones and low-flying helicopters. The risks of sustained rotary-wing operations in that environment are real, as confirmed by the shootdown of an African Corps Mi-8AMTSh near Wabaria in the Gao region on April 25 — a loss acknowledged by Russian sources including the Fighterbomber channel, and a data point that reflects what it costs to run this kind of air campaign at the tempo the African Corps has sustained. What Russia has built in Mali is not a symbolic military presence. It is a functioning combined aviation force — strike drones, attack helicopters, transport helicopters, a heavy lifter, front-line bombers, and reconnaissance assets — conducting real combat operations in support of a government that has made Russian partnership the cornerstone of its security strategy.

[–] ColombianLenin@hexbear.net 12 points 16 hours ago (4 children)

Why does Russia care about ASL? Genuine question

[–] Boise_Idaho@hexbear.net 10 points 12 hours ago

It's a front where anti-imperialist forces are on the offensive and Western imperialists are retreating. Russia would be fools not to care about the AES.

To help destroy the Western European imperialists' neo-colonial empire in West Africa -- and without that empire, the EU/UK will be much less of a threat to the Russian world.

[–] CarmineCatboy2@hexbear.net 19 points 15 hours ago* (last edited 14 hours ago)

I think it starts off as exporting arms and soldiering as a service. Then it becomes a political imperative because you can't allow your partners to keep failing, like Syria did. Finally it ties into larger geopolitical warfare, as Ukraine and NATO back Mali's enemies.

[–] aanes_appreciator@hexbear.net 8 points 15 hours ago

The Sahel states could be a further extension of Russian influence in Africa.

Mali borders Algeria, which is Russia's prime export customer for advanced military technology including the SU-57 (Russia's early production 5th generation fighter jet) and the SU-35 (fighter-bomber set to replace the SU-24 mentioned in the original article).

There's probably some grand strategy in cultivating a sphere of influence since Europe is turning inwards and China has consolidated its own back yard. Meanwhile Algeria, Libya, Egypt are extenstive collaborators with Russian military interests. Africa is as close as it gets for a modern Russian sphere outside of the Union State.