Sweden's foreign minister, Tobias Billström, announced his resignation — and retirement from politics — out of nowhere today. His spokeswoman, as well as that of PM Ulf Kristersson, denied reports by two Swedish newspapers (Expressen and Aftonbladet) that some kind of personal rivalry was to blame.

Which makes me suspect there may have been something to the rumors that Swedish instructors teaching Ukrainians how to operate donated AWACS and other systems may have been among the scores of dead at the Poltava Signal School yesterday, after all.

Regional elections in Germany (Saxony and Thuringia) continue the alarming trend in the West of people stubbornly expressing their displeasure by voting for populists, and the governments equally stubbornly "fortifying" the results in their favor and declaring populism illegitimate.

When you prevent people from expressing their discontent through legitimate, systemic avenues, they will find a way to express it through non-systemic means. Or, if you ban populism today, you'll get something much less nice tomorrow. That's the hard lesson the Globalist American Empire appears to be determined not to learn.

The US is behind the censorship of X/Twitter in Brazil, according to former State Department official Mike Benz.
Given the thunderous silence of Washington on the matter, I'd say he's onto something.

X (formerly Twitter)

Mike Benz (@MikeBenzCyber) on X

Brazil just banned X. Here's what to do.

The Kursk gambit failed. It was obvious that it failed last week, as Russian drones hunted Ukrainian vehicles on the plains of Kursk and Iskanders, FABs and Lancets devastated air defenses and HIMARS in Sumy. Still, the West and Kiev ran turbo-cope that this has "embarrassed Putin" somehow, and was therefore worth it.

Until it became obvious to careful observers, about three days ago, that the southern Donetsk front has been well and truly attritted to the point of breaking — and breaking is what it appears to be doing right now. Russian forces are less than 20km from Pokrovsk, a key Ukrainian fortress/logistical hub. The Karlovka Reservoir has been secured, both securing the supply route and flank of the advancing Pokrovsk force, and turning the flank of the Ukrainians at Vodyanoe/Ugledar.

Once Pokrovsk is gone, the troops at Konstantinovka, Chasov Yar, Slavyansk-Kramatorsk and points north are basically dealing with getting enveloped from the south and will have to retreat as well — except there is nowhere to go but the Dnieper. And that's across miles and miles of open steppe, with Russian drones, FABs and Iskanders just waiting for a shooting gallery.

It's impossible to give a coherent timeline for this prediction, but things have been deteriorating for Kiev quite rapidly in just the past two weeks. I think Hemingway's "gradually, then suddenly" will apply.

German media today had a story about the alleged Nord Stream bomber — Ukrainian diver "Volodymyr Z" (aka Vladimir Zhuravlev) — escaping arrest in a Ukrainian diplomatic vehicle and a wink and a nudge from Poland.

I still think the story about a handful of Ukrainians deciding to blow up the pipeline — supposedly with Zelensky's blessing, but then he changed his mind, but then it was too late — is absurd in its entirety and a "limited hangout" intended to protect the real culprit. Seymour Hersh says it's the Americans, others suspect the British. There is also zero doubt in my mind that Poland was involved in some way or another (esp. given the "Thank you USA" and "Shut up" tweets from the current leadership in Warsaw).

But whatever may be the case, my dear friend and colleague Henry Johnson makes a good point: Whoever did it, knew they could. That there would be no consequences, at least from the "rules-based international order."

Perhaps that's why they fear the shape of things to come, for in it their impunity is bound to end.

RT

Blast from the past: Why the Nord Stream sabotage may yet have its day of reckoning

Economic hardship in Europe and military humiliation in Ukraine mean this pivotal event won’t stay on the figurative sea floor forever

Ukraine's "lift the restrictions" messaging reminds me a lot of the 1990s "lift and strike" messaging of the Western propaganda. The "lift" part related to the UN arms embargo on Yugoslavia (and therefore on its shards like Bosnia), which the US got around by teaming up with Iran of all places. The "strike" part ended up being the back door for NATO to get involved in the conflict and usurp the role of the UN.

While the Ukraine conflict bears a lot of similarities with the demise of Yugoslavia — makes sense: same screenwriter, recycled scripts — there is one major difference when it comes to "lift the restrictions": it's cope.

Basically, it sounds like a ready-made excuse for why Ukraine has lost the war (and it has well and truly lost it, however much some people aren't willing to admit it yet). The very GAE that created this Banderist abortion, and then armed, equipped, financed and kept it on life support all this time, will eventually be blamed by the Banderites for their inevitable defeat.

Same as the Bosnian War propaganda was envisioned as a two-step process: persuade the world that the Evil Serb Aggressors were Genociding Innocent Peaceful Bosnians, then have the US ride in as the White Knight to save the day.

Surprise, surprise, Islamists around the world glommed onto the first part (which was a lie, btw) and ignored the second (which was also a lie, btw). And we got Al-Qaeda, ISIS and the like.

Anyway, just a thought.

?? While Ukrainian propaganda remains as cringe-worthy as ever, the individual who was supposed to 'shoot the arrows' was ironically killed by one.

? By the way, the mayor of Lutsk, who first published information about the Ukrainian F-16 pilot being killed, has since deleted the Facebook post upon realizing the propaganda mistake. Unfortunately for him, the internet never forgets.

? @DDGeopolitics

Say what you want about the West, and I often do, but it has the Art of the Narrative mastered to a fine point. Remember, human beings aren't rational, but rationalizing animals: we tell stories to ourselves — some small, some bigger — to explain the world around us and our own actions in it.

Now, granted, this natural narrative ability appears to have metastasized into outright delusional psychosis in the Globalist American Empire, whose leadership seems to have bought its own wishful thinking that they create reality itself — not just by acting, but by speaking about it! — and are thus ever victorious. As a result, we now have a de facto WW3, which has only gone kinetic in the lands of the former Ukraine. So far.

Obviously, lapsing into this delusional behavior is a bad thing and every society needs to be on the lookout for it. But that is no excuse for being almost deliberately bad at dealing with narratives in general. To do so is a dereliction of duty to one's people and country.