Don’t take my word for it. That’s what WH Spokes for NatSec said the other day:
“You don’t want to be trying to bake in long term support when you’re at the end of the rope.”
That’s an assessment that’s strikingly similar in tone, if not in simile/metaphor, to the Polish comparison of Ukraine to a drowning man who could drag down anyone who tries to save him. If one thing is clear at this moment it’s that “We stand with Israel” has trumped “Slava Ukraini.” Oh, sure, Zhou’s keepers are talking of putting together a package deal of bucks for Ukraine with bucks for Taiwan and Israel. That looks pretty flimsy:
That sounds like the gameplan for stripping out bucks for Ukraine and giving it all to Israel. In America, that’s the perfect cover for selling out Ukraine. Not that I feel much sympathy for Ukraine—they have no excuse for not knowing better.
Another bad sign is that Steve Scalise is said to lack the support to become Speaker. For my part I agree with MTG that Scalise should be focused on his cancer. On the other hand, Scalise is a known war monger. If he somehow manages to turn this around, he’ll have to do a deal with members who are unsympathetic to sending more bucks to Ukraine. That number is likely to grow as time passes—as it will—and the Speakership election drags on—as it may. More and more members will see the way to satisfy their constitutuents by selling Ukraine out under cover of standing with Israel. Splitting the difference—shutting down war in Ukraine while sending more gift packages to the MIC by supporting war, or something like it, in the Middle East.
The whole moral issue of the Neocons talking gullible Ukro-Nazis into destroying their own country with promises of Slava Ukraini, well, they’ll only be talking about that in Ukraine.
Meanwhile, continuing with Kirby’s rope metaphor, it’s becoming more clear by the day that Russia is tightening the noose on Ukraine. In particular, Russia appears to be closing encirclements on two significant concentrations of Ukrainian forces, one in the Kupyansk area near Kharkov and the other in Avdeyevka near Donetsk City.
In the Avdeyevka area the Russians have full fire control over the only road into the city.
In Avdiivka Russian soldiers managed to fully occupy the most important stronghold (the so-called "terrikon") on the dominant height. Its liberation will make it possible to control the approaches to the northern outskirts of Avdiivka.
Simplicius links to a lucid account of the importance of this battle—read him for futher details:
When you think about it, this is real progress. It only took a few days to force a debunking:
Israel's gov is now admitting the "beheadings" canard is unsubstantiated, but only after it was widely disseminated & used to distract from the killing of 1350 Gazans (inc. 270 kids) Every "journalist" who repeated this canard will go down in history for enabling mass atrocities
This will be Covid:
Putin:
“Israel was subjected to an attack of unprecedented brutality and has the right to protection. The only peaceful solution to the conflict is the creation of an independent state of Palestine with its capital in East Jerusalem”
Such a cure for a sore heart reading MiH lately, sound common sense, compassion, clear separation between fact and opinion, broadly sane comments for the most part. Just about everywhere else is so utterly toxic it restores my faith in humanity (sorry to gush but its from he heart).
Am heading off to Simplicius now at this link https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/israeli-ground-forces-get-cold-feet ... the one embedded in the post has been gremlined by SubStack.