Image is of Trump's initial set of reciprocal tariffs. Source is CNN and Reuters.
It's difficult to keep up with the news around the tariffs; they get instated, then dropped, then reinstated... for example, on Friday, Trump said that certain electronics like smartphones would be exempt, causing markets to rally a great deal, but now the Commerce Secretary has said that they might not be exempt? The state of play right now, if you haven't been keeping up this week, is that the US recently announced a 90-day global pause on implementing the tariffs he had planned (that is, 25% on certain Canadian and Mexican goods, and at least 10% on every other nation) but nonetheless increased tariffs on China to 145%.
Meanwhile, China has been - quite remarkably - standing their ground, increasing tariffs on the US to 125%, and putting restrictions on rare earths. Xi Jinping has been in Vietnam and has made statements against a tariff war there, saying that it would have no winners. Meanwhile, a Chinese spokesperson has essentially said that China can endure the tariff war due to the increasing demand from its domestic market in combination with its growing economic ties with other countries.
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.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. 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.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
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.
Israeli flighter jets can't carry conventional bombs big enough to destroy the underground nuclear facilities, so other than sending commandos in to do it, the option would be to use a low yield (1-5 kiloton), tactical nuclear weapon with an Earth Penetrating Warhead (EPW) delivered by the ballistic vector. The planned (but never put into deployment) W-86 EPW nuclear warhead for the Pershing-II ballistic missile could penetrate appropriately 200ft/60 of soil before detonation. So a similar warhead put on a ground launched Jericho II, or air launched Golden Horizon ballistic missile would achieve similar.
That would be an even worse idea, a preemptive nuclear strike, which is why it's not even talked about in this NYT piece. Fundamentally Israel would need heavy US support for any conventional large scale attack against underground nuclear facilities in Iran. That is the way the situation is set up. Israel can't go at it alone in this regard. It's why Netanyahu visited the White House in early April in the first place, to try get this US support. The US military is the only military force with the conventional "bunker busting" capability, stealth capabilities for both stand off and stand in strikes, and SEAD/DEAD (suppression/destruction of enemy air defences) capabilities to carry out any large scale air campaign against Iran. The unique capability that Israel brings to the table in this regard is air launched ballistic missiles, some of which even have anti radiation (as in seeking out sources of radiation such as air defence radars) SEAD capabilities.
That's a bit nightmare-inducing, but as always I greatly appreciate your write-ups, comrade. Millitary technology is a major hole in my knowledge, so having comrades like you help fill that in is a massive boon.
I still think the chance of any nuclear pre emptive strike is highly unlikely at this time, so hopefully that calms you down.
The military enthusiast space is filled with libs and chuds unfortunately, not many communists there anymore after the fall of the Soviet Union. Maybe the rise of China will bring us some more knowledgeable communists there.
I agree on it being unlikely, but the mere entertainment in any offical capacity is nevertheless worrying. I do share hope that more millitarist comrades will join, the Martial Sciences are an incredibly important one for us to master if we are to disuade and overcome Capital.
The stealth element might be questionable at this point too. Did you see the reports of Iranian Bavar radar intercepting drones with a radar cross section less than an F-35 at 200KM distance?
They're explicitly training to engage F-35s at this point.
The Bavar 373 shot down a target drone with a 2.14 square metre(m²) Radar Cross Section (RCS) at at distance of 316 km. An F-16 has an RCS of 4m², an F-18 Super Hornet has an RCS of 1m². An F-35 has an RCS of below 0.005m2. The Bavar-373 uses an X-band (8-12GHz) fire control radar called the Meraj-4, so this makes sense. But stealth aircraft are explicitly designed to defeat X-band radars, as the vast majority of fire control radars operate in the X-band. Talks about tracking or defeating stealth aircraft revolve around "upgrading" the Bavar 373 system with a lower frequency L-Band, or VHF or UHF radar like the Iranian 'Matla Al Fajr-1' VHF radar, or arguing that due to the sheer power of the Meraj 4, it can detect stealth aircraft at distances around 80-120km despite being an X band radar. Lower frequency radars aren't used for fire control generally because they pick up a lot more clutter (including clouds), so detection and tracking range goes way down, even if they can detect stealth aircraft more reliably in theory as stealth aircraft aren't designed around defeating them. And even if the raw power of the Meraj 4 can detect an F-35 at distances of 100km or even 120km, the F-35 has anti radiation missiles with greater range that can take aim at the static Meraj 4, which is transported on the trailer of a massive truck. AGM-88E range is 148km, AGM-88G range is 300km. Both of these anti radiation missiles can be carried inside the F-35s internal weapons bay. In both cases, these missiles can be fired at the Meraj 4 radar and Bavar-373 system before the F-35 is even detected or engaged by the Bavar-373.
It's still a great capability of the Bavar-373 to be able to engage fourth generation fighter aircraft at distances of over 300km in theory, but it's not explicitly anti stealth. It's also why stealth is being seen as a minimum requirement, or entry point, to a modern air campaign, because if the Bavar-373 can engage non stealth targets at ranges of over 300km, and stealth targets at 100km with its X band Meraj 4 radar, you need stealth to even carry out strikes in that envelope. Stealth is still a great force multipler in that case, vastly reducing engagement range of the air defence system from 300km to 100km.
https://defencesecurityasia.com/en/irans-bavar-373-claims-ability-to-track-f-35-stealth-jets-a-game-changer-in-middle-east-air-power-dynamics/
Surely you'd be mad not to bury everything a couple hundred metres further underground