this post was submitted on 03 Aug 2026
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A reminder that as the US continues to threaten countries around the world, fedposting is to be very much avoided (even with qualifiers like "in Minecraft") and comments containing it will be removed.

Image is a map of Middle Eastern oil/gas production sites, which Iran has promised to strike in retaliation if their own energy infrastructure comes under attack.


My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.

preambleFor the weekend of August 1-2, Trump had once again promised major strikes on Iran, which would have included crossing the critical red line of striking their energy infrastructure. In response, Iran once again essentially promised to end the possibility of modern civilization as we know it throughout much of the Gulf States and, to a certain extent, the Zionist entity, with the economic impacts radiating outwards around the world from there. The frustrating part about these threats from Trump is that while he's reneged on them before, the consequences of them actually occurring are so dire that it's difficult to ignore them; rolling a dice with even a 5% chance for complete catastrophe will always be nerve-wracking.

Anyway, as we all know, these strikes did not occur, with the excuse this time being much the same as the previous times: our regional allies begged us not to (potentially true) and Iran called us and said they were willing to negotiate/surrender (untrue). The point of these threat displays is at least twofold: first, to see if Iran is genuinely going to flinch, or, at least, if internal elements that may or may not exist will be spooked into action against the IRGC; and second, to manipulate oil prices downwards by creating constant cycles of "relief" out of an otherwise relatively constant downward trend as Hormuz stays closed and oil reserves continue to ebb. I do say "relatively", of course, given that Ansarallah now appears to be delivering a boot up the ass of Saudi Arabia by taking offline quite a lot of its refinery infrastructure.

It is into this situation that Ukraine seems to want in. For those out of the loop, the situation over in Ukraine has largely the same overall attritional dynamics as previous years, but with a few added wrinkles. Ukraine started striking Russian infrastructure a while ago, and while their effectiveness is hotly debated and I don't want to dismiss them as totally ineffectual, it's clear that the psychological effects - such as they are - are greater than the material effects. Russia's retaliation strikes have been considerably more impactful, including strikes on Ukrainian Black Sea ports and vessels, and a campaign explicitly against gas stations across Ukraine, as well as some rather impressive and disruptive explosions at Ukrainian military fairs and production sites. Zelensky has admitted publicly that they are now basically out of Patriot missiles and that Russian missiles are now landing entirely unopposed (beforehand, they were just landing largely unopposed, given the lackluster performance of Western air defences in general). He seems to have considered a possible way out: linking together the Ukraine and Iran Wars to a united front against Russia and Iran, which would then grant Ukraine more munitions to keep fighting on.

Now, for all the fear I've seen of this occurring (and, don't get me wrong, the US and Russia being in non-proxy, direct conflict is a genuinely frightening prospect for continued life on Earth) how linking together two wars which the West is quite decisively losing into a single war would help at all is beyond me. At this moment, at least, US military planners appear to agree with me. Ukraine hit a Caspian Sea vessel going to Iran a while ago, but then seems to have quickly apologised after being given a stern talking to by the US. This shows just how willing the US is to grant Ukraine more aid, as their own interceptor stockpile is running very low due to Iranian strikes. One would almost feel sympathy for Zelensky if is wasn't for... well, everything that's happened. The path of Ngô Đình Diệm is a tough one to walk.


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Russia-Ukraine Conflict

Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
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Sources:

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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[–] carpoftruth@hexbear.net 21 points 1 day ago (2 children)

Ben aris of bneintellinews on the state of ukraine. This is a good roundup article if you haven't been paying attention to that conflict in the last few months. Ben is a ukraine sympathizer and a lib, but he's pretty clear eyed in his writing even if his heart is with ukraine.

https://www.intellinews.com/long-read-zelenskiy-sounding-increasingly-desperate-as-the-hunt-for-air-defence-ammo-fails-458638

[–] Feed_el_Castro@hexbear.net 29 points 1 day ago (4 children)

So the article spends 15 minutes worth of text describing the excruciatingly difficult situation of Ukraine:

Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy is starting to sound desperate

Kyiv is down to its last PAC-3 Patriot interceptor missile left

The talk of Nato membership has been abandoned as that is never going to happen

Ukraine went into this war with just under 60GW of generating capacity but currently has 14GW left

Russia has reportedly already begun stockpiling missiles for this year’s campaign and has ramped up missile production capacity in the last year – almost doubling the output to some 2,500 missiles a year

The skies over Ukraine are now open. This was the worst possible time to sack Defence Minister Mykhailo Fedorov and then fail to replace him

The last plank in Zelenskiy defence strategy is a call on G7 allies to close "all the gaps" in their sanctions regimes [...] that is not working either

The EU recently passed its 21st sanctions package, but was forced to significantly water its measures down thanks to heavy lobbying by member state vested interest

Zelenskiy is fighting a second war at home. Ukraine's largest street protests since 2014 broke out following the dismissal of Fedorov,

Tensions in Ukrainian society are rising before the reshuffle scandal broke as weariness with the war and hardship grows.

Violence towards the TCK officers has tripled in the last year, with one officer reportedly dying after being stabbed in the neck by his victims already

Violence towards the TCK officers has tripled in the last year, with one officer reportedly dying after being stabbed in the neck by his victims already

Fuelling the unrest is the metastasizing Energoatom corruption scandal that has implicated most of Zelenskiy's inner circle, focused on his close friend Tymur Mindich, who skipped town only hours before investigators raid his home and office in Kyiv. He is accused of siphoning off $100mn in kickback schemes – a toilet made of solid gold was found in his apartment

More ominously, protests first erupted last year after Zelenskiy attempted to gut Ukraine’s anti-corruption reforms

reports from the Donbas are starting to admit that the Russian forces are making slow by steady progress [by Russia]

We may soon learn that Zelenskiy expended unsustainable levels of Ukrainian manpower in the first half of 2026 to create his "turning point" PR campaign to try to win over Trump by the July Nato summit

Several key cities have fallen into Russian hands in the last six months. The key logistics hub of Pokrovsk was captured in December t

And the lack of manpower remains a major headache for both Ukraine and Russia

And despite all of this, the author only sees one way forward:

With interceptors scarce and the front under pressure, Ukraine's only option hurt Russia too as much as it is hurting Ukraine. That is fuelling the rapid escalation in the tit-for-tat missile war.

Famously, when you're losing a war, you should definitely totally escalate, very smart analyst.

[–] userse31@hexbear.net 4 points 1 day ago

a toilet made of solid gold was found in his apartment

This is literal comically rich wtf.

[–] Sword_of_Eos@hexbear.net 17 points 1 day ago

Arguing for any course of action other than escalation gets one labeled as pro-Russia

[–] carpoftruth@hexbear.net 10 points 1 day ago

Like I said, he's a euro lib. Sort of to his credit, he's also not a military analyst. He's on firmer ground talking about energy issues than what the AFU ought to do. Still, I think he is worth reading. He has a couple good interviews on radio war nerd.

[–] Kieselguhr@hexbear.net 3 points 1 day ago

With interceptors scarce and the front under pressure, Ukraine's only option hurt Russia too as much as it is hurting Ukraine. That is fuelling the rapid escalation in the tit-for-tat missile war.

Famously, when you're losing a war, you should definitely totally escalate, very smart analyst.

More generous reading would be that "Ukrain[ian regime]'s only option hurt Russia too as much as it is hurting Ukraine"

Pretty common journalistic shorthand when saying [Country] they mean the de jure leadership group, not the mass proletariat of the country. And in that sense he is kinda right, Zelensky is backed into a corner. The Ukrainian people should oust the Zelensky power elite of course.

[–] edge@hexbear.net 11 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (1 children)

dismissal of Fedorov, who local reports claim the president saw as a growing political rival. Zelenskiy is believed to have also sacked the former commander-in-chief General Valerii Zaluzhnyi when he also overtook the president in the polls

If a non-US aligned country's president did that, the West would be screaming about "dictatorship". And of course his term ended 4 years ago but he won't hold elections. Zelenskyy fits the mantle of "crazy, self-centered dictator" more than anyone, especially Yanukovych.

[–] IranOuttaOil@hexbear.net 5 points 1 day ago (2 children)

What a terrible leader, to be afraid of his own subordinates.

[–] InexplicableLunchFiend@hexbear.net 12 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago)

He's so corrupt and incompetent that whenever one of his subordinates shows even the slightest amount of competence or spending funds correctly towards the war it becomes a massive threat to him, because the contrast is very evident

[–] WilsonWilson@hexbear.net 10 points 1 day ago

could just be the cocaine-induced paranoia