"Biden Crossed a Red Line on Saturday"

"Biden Crossed a Red Line on Saturday"

by Jim Rickards

"The Russian invasion of Ukraine enters its sixth day as talks between Russian and Ukrainian delegates took place in neighboring Belarus today. Ukraine has reportedly demanded an immediate ceasefire. There’s been no formal announcement yet. Either way, the U.S. and the West have escalated the sanctions regime against Russia. Joe Biden crossed a critical red line on Saturday, and the world will never be the same.

Biden and other Western powers agreed to kick certain Russian banks out of the SWIFT message system. This is like cutting off oxygen to someone in intensive care. What is SWIFT? SWIFT stands for the Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunication. Contrary to what you may hear, SWIFT is not a financial institution and it’s not a payment channel. It’s a message system.

But the messages are of the utmost importance. It’s how one major bank confirms to another major bank that a large payment is being made by specifying the sender, receiving bank, amount, currency, date and other details. Once the message is sent, the receiving bank becomes the legal owner of the amount in question. The actual payment may go through various payment systems such as Fedwire, but that’s mechanical. The SWIFT message is what sets the legally binding terms for both sides.

The Worst Liquidity Crisis Ever? The only major country that has been “deSWIFTed” in the recent past was Iran in 2011 and that was devastating to their economy. The Russian economy will slowly suffocate without access to SWIFT. Still, Biden went further. They not only kicked Russian commercial banks out of SWIFT, but also kicked the Central Bank of Russia out of the system except for certain transactions that may be approved on a case-by-case basis.

Here’s what Biden’s team of amateurs don’t understand. Every payment, every trade, has two sides. When you blow up one side (Russia) you also blow up the other side (world banking system). Linkages are dense and immensely scaled. For example, French Finance Minister Bruno Le Maire warns that the ban would hinder Europeans’ ability to recover payments on nearly $30 billion in debt owed them by various Russian entities. This will spill over into a global liquidity crisis within days. Count on it. It could be the worst liquidity crisis ever.

Is that what Biden wants? He may get a global depression before he knows it. Be careful what you wish for. Here’s something else to consider: If you look at the memberships of the EU, NATO and the SWIFT executive committees there's a huge degree of overlap. Now that SWIFT has kicked out Russian banks, I'm not sure that Russia will care about legalistic distinctions. They'll see SWIFT as NATO. Then there’s the China question…

Will China Invade Taiwan? The Russian invasion of Ukraine has naturally led to speculation about a possible Chinese invasion of Taiwan. What both invasions would have in common is a perception of weakness on the part of Joe Biden and the United States.

The way you deter war is through strength, not weakness. After the U.S. surrender and chaotic exit in Afghanistan, the world realized that Biden was weak and his team was incompetent. Putin and Russia raced to take advantage of that in Ukraine. Will Taiwan be next? My guess is probably not. Biden’s weakness may be something the two situations have in common, but there are critical differences.

Ukraine was a land invasion by Russia, which has a border with the target. Taiwan would be a massive amphibious invasion across the Taiwan Strait. China has no prior experience in amphibious warfare and such invasions are extremely difficult to execute. Just look at D-Day, Inchon, Iwo Jima and Okinawa if you want to see how difficult they are to plan, carry out and win. The U.S. does not have a formal treaty with Taiwan, but policymakers expect that the U.S. Seventh Fleet would intervene to at least slow any Chinese attack. And Taiwan has a far more capable and well-equipped military than Ukraine. That said, an invasion cannot be ruled out.

It’s All About the Semiconductors: The main economic impact would be in semiconductors. Taiwan is the largest single source of semiconductors in the world, including the most sophisticated chips of the 5-nanometer design. Taiwan is also working toward production of 3-nanometer chips. China would love to capture that technology and the fabrication plants that go with it, but they won’t. If an invasion began, Taiwan would destroy all of that capacity before the Chinese could get to it. If Taiwan didn’t, the U.S. would. This is why Taiwan Semiconductor and Intel are building multibillion-dollar fabrication plants in the U.S.

These will take several years to build, but when they’re done that new semiconductor capacity will be beyond the reach of the Chinese Communists. This bird will have flown. Still, there’s a global semiconductor shortage today even without a war. Rumors of a war in the Taiwan Strait will just make matters worse. But the good news is that an imminent Chinese invasion of Taiwan is unlikely. Unfortunately, I have to conclude on an ominous note…

“Don’t Go There”: World War III may be a lot closer than you realize. I’ve studied nuclear war fighting since the 1960s, including major scholarly works such as "On Thermonuclear War" (1960) by Herman Kahn.

There’s a lot of learning on the topic, but all of the studies boil down to the same warning: Don’t go there. What this means is that nuclear war is not a place where anyone begins an attack and it’s not a place where anyone wants to end up. But it can happen anyway.

The process by which nuclear war happens is called escalation. Two nuclear powers start out with a grievance of some kind. The grievance may be played out using proxy powers such as Vietnam in the 1960s and Afghanistan in the 2000s. One side escalates the conflict by doing something unexpected or extreme. The other side does not stand still; they take an extreme retaliatory action. The first actor then retaliates to the retaliation and so on. Now we have a dynamic where two sides are climbing the escalation ladder.

“The Escalatory Dynamic Has Begun”: Again, it’s important to emphasize that neither side really wants a nuclear war, but once they start climbing the ladder, it’s hard to stop. Eventually one side pushes the other so far that the only response is to use nuclear weapons. At that point, you’re no longer just escalating; you’re at the brink of a nuclear launch. To make matters worse, the other side sensing that their opponent may go nuclear will be under pressure to go nuclear first in order to avoid being hit themselves. This then goes into another branch of theory involving first-strike, second-strike, counterforce and counter-value strategies, etc.

I don’t have to do a deep dive on these theories in order to make the point that a nuclear war doesn’t begin with a nuclear attack. It begins with small steps that spin out of control. To make the point about escalation, just two days after NATO activated its response force, Putin activated the Russian nuclear forces by putting them on full alert.

We haven’t seen the Western military response yet, but it would come as no surprise if the U.S. put their nuclear forces on high alert also. The escalatory dynamic has begun. We’ll see where it ends up. Smart citizens should prepare for the worst. Let’s pray it doesn’t happen."

- dailyreckoning.com

"Financial System Shutting Down As Bank Runs Escalate; Bank Insolvency Danger; Debt Default"

Full screen recommended.

Jeremiah Babe, PM 2/28/22:

"Financial System Shutting Down As Bank Runs Escalate; 

Bank Insolvency Danger; Debt Default"

Musical Interlude: Genesis, "Land of Confusion"

Genesis, "Land of Confusion"

"A Look to the Heavens"

“Here is one of the largest objects that anyone will ever see on the sky. Each of these fuzzy blobs is a galaxy, together making up the Perseus Cluster, one of the closest clusters of galaxies. The cluster is seen through a foreground of faint stars in our own Milky Way Galaxy.

Near the cluster center, roughly 250 million light-years away, is the cluster's dominant galaxy NGC 1275, seen above as a large galaxy on the image left. A prodigious source of x-rays and radio emission, NGC 1275 accretes matter as gas and galaxies fall into it. The Perseus Cluster of Galaxies, also cataloged as Abell 426, is part of the Pisces-Perseus supercluster spanning over 15 degrees and containing over 1,000 galaxies. At the distance of NGC 1275, this view covers about 15 million light-years.”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap110712.html

The Poet: Rainer Maria Rilke, "Sunset"

"Sunset"

"Slowly the west reaches for clothes of new colors

which it passes to a row of ancient trees.

You look, and soon these two worlds both leave you,

one part climbs toward heaven, one sinks to earth,

leaving you, not really belonging to either,

not so helplessly dark as that house that is silent,

not so unswervingly given to the eternal as that thing

that turns to a star each night and climbs –

leaving you (it is impossible to untangle the threads)

your own life, timid and standing high and growing,

so that, sometimes blocked in, sometimes reaching out,

one moment your life is a stone in you, and the next, a star."

~ Rainer Maria Rilke

"It's Human Nature..."

“We’ve all heard the warnings and we’ve ignored them. We push our luck. We roll the dice. It’s human nature. When we’re told not to touch something we usually do even if we know better. Maybe because deep down, we’re just asking for trouble.”

- “Meredith Grey”, “Gray’s Anatomy”

If so, we've certainly got all we want...

"The Blame Game"

(Scenic view of sunflower field in Lviv, Ukraine.)

"The Blame Game"

by Bill Bonner

Youghal, Ireland - "It’s Putin’s fault. Shutdowns were necessary to save lives. Shutdowns caused supply chain disruptions. So, the Covid – a virus – caused today’s inflation; the feds are blameless. And last week, the Russians invaded Ukraine. So now we have another crisis. We have to keep printing money to fight the Russians and the supply chain disruptions.

Inflation? It’s Putin’s fault. Amy Bell at the Financial Times: "Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has shattered hopes of a strong global economic recovery from coronavirus, at least in the short term."

Another headline at the FT: "Ukraine conflict disrupts grain trade and provokes fears of global food shortages."

And here’s another: "Conflict Raises Possibility Of Stagflation"

When we left you on Friday morning, Russian troops were said to be advancing on Kyiv. The government there, headed by a Mr. Zelensky, was handing out guns – AK47s, with instructions to defend the capital. Surely, the Ukrainians were nervous. But there was nervousness all around. The Russian stock market lost a third of its value on Thursday. Lukoil CEO Vagit Alekperov lost $13 billion, according to Bloomberg’s handy billionaire index.

Incredible Claims: One of the problems with foreign policy is that it is too foreign. No one really knows what is going on at home, let alone abroad, especially not the ‘experts.’ Hillary Clinton, for example, was quick to seize the opportunity. The Russian invasion was a “state of emergency for democracy,” she said, and a time for “rebuilding our credibility.”

Uh oh. ‘Credibility’ is almost always cited just before a major foreign policy blunder. While she was Secretary of State, under Barack Obama, Ms. Clinton approved bombing raids on 7 different countries, largely because US ‘credibility was at stake.’

The emergency then was ‘terrorism.’ Ms. Clinton didn’t speak any of the many languages of the countries she bombed. Nor did she know their histories, cultures, religions, economies… or anything else. They are too ‘foreign.’ Any real knowledge would have caused her to think twice… to consider the ambiguities, the nuances. But the mob wanted blood. The foreigners made good ‘targets’… and they kept Ms. Clinton in the public eye – readying her for the election of 2016.

Like the Middle East, the situation in the Ukraine may not yield readily to simple-minded analysis by the patriotic masses or foreign policy ‘experts.’ There’s always more to the story. And they don’t want to know it. But what a marvelous opportunity to strut your stuff. Hillary is back in the news with her opinions. So are America’s retired generals, drawing on their experiences from America’s 20-year debacle in Afghanistan, where they repeated the Soviet Union’s mistakes.

Self-Harm Ahead: The Biden Administration, a light to the civilized world, expressed outrage on Thursday. And then it seemed to realize that Russia is the major source of strategic metals – such as titanium – on which much of modern industry relies. For their part, its European allies merely looked at their thermostats and hoped Russian gas would keep making its way into their furnaces and power plants.

Within hours, the emergency – like a snow squall – seemed to pass. The very next day the price of oil – thought to be most sensitive to the Russian menace – dropped… and prices for Russian stocks rose 45%. There was talk of a negotiated settlement. And on Friday, in the US, the Dow shot up more than 800 points.

This morning, the press reports that the Russian invasion seems to have ‘stalled.’ But the sanctions, including blocking Russian banks from the international money exchange system known as SWIFT, have gone ahead. Foreigners are now forbidden from trading in Russian equities. Russian assets are falling again. US stocks are headed down too. The US will probably not be harmed, in any plausible way, by what is going on in the Ukraine. But the war will give it plenty more opportunities to harm itself."

- bonnerprivateresearch@substack.com

The Daily "Near You?"

Port-of-spain, Port-of-Spain, Trinidad and Tobago

Thanks for stopping by!

"Courage..."

"Courage isn't having the strength to go on -

it is going on when you don't have strength."

- Napoleon Bonaparte

○

"The Countdown To Nuclear War Has Begun"

"The Countdown To Nuclear War Has Begun"

by Michael Snyder

“It is my firm belief that the infinite and uncontrollable fury 

of nuclear weapons should never be held in the hands 

of any mere mortal ever again, for any reason.” 

- Mikhail Gorbachev

"Way too many people out there are treating the war between Russia and Ukraine as a form of entertainment. Here in the western world, we like to make a game out of almost everything, but this isn’t a game. When Russia invaded Ukraine, it marked the start of World War 3, and it also initiated the countdown to nuclear war. What we should be rooting for is an end to the shooting in Ukraine and for governments on both sides of the conflict to do all they can to de-escalate the situation. But instead, each new day brings more escalations. For example, on Sunday EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell announced that EU nations would be providing fighter jets directly to the Ukrainian military…

European Union countries will soon send fighter jets to Ukraine at the Kyiv government’s request to help it counter the Russian air and land assault, EU foreign policy chief Josep Borrell said Sunday, according to the AFP news service. “We’re going to provide even fighting jets. We’re not talking about just ammunition. We are providing more important arms to go to a war,” Borrell said at a news conference.

This is the first time in history that the EU has ever done anything like this. And apparently it was supposed to happen very rapidly. In fact, one EU official said that some of these fighter jets would be flying in the skies of Ukraine “within the hour”… "The military transfer appeared imminent, according to Alexandre Krauss, a senior advisor to the EU Parliament. “Flying in #Ukraine skies within the hour,” Krauss tweeted at 3:38 p.m. ET, citing Borrell’s announcement."

I don’t know how those fighter jets are possibly going to do any good, because the Russians have already attacked and disabled all of the major military airfields held by Ukraine. In addition, a lot of Ukraine’s trained military pilots are already dead. So who is going to fly those fighters? Will European nations be supplying the pilots as well? If so, that would mean that Europeans would be engaged in direct conflict with the Russians, and that would be a massive escalation.

In any event, Vladimir Putin has pledged that anyone that supplies military equipment to Ukraine will be targeted. Is Putin bluffing. Maybe. But of course many had assumed that he was bluffing about invading Ukraine as well.

On Sunday, we also learned that Putin has now put his strategic nuclear arsenal on high alert… "In a dramatic escalation of East-West tensions over Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, President Vladimir Putin ordered Russian nuclear deterrent forces put on alert Sunday in response to what he called “aggressive statements” by leading NATO powers.

The move means Putin has ordered Russia’s nuclear weapons prepared for increased readiness to launch, raising the threat that the tensions could boil over into a nuclear war. In giving it, the Russian leader also cited hard-hitting financial sanctions imposed by the West against Russia, including Putin himself."

Obviously, Putin did this to send a message to the U.S. and other western powers. But this is a massive escalation as well. Threatening to use nuclear weapons against somebody else is something that should not be done.

When she was asked about Putin’s move, this is how White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki responded… "White House press secretary Jen Psaki said Sunday that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s decision to put Russia’s deterrence forces, which includes nuclear arms, on high alert are part of a wider pattern of unprovoked escalation and “manufactured threats” from the Kremlin.

“This is really a pattern that we’ve seen from President Putin through the course of this conflict, which is manufacturing threats that don’t exist in order to justify further aggression — and the global community and the American people should look at it through that prism,” Psaki told ABC’s George Stephanopoulos on “This Week.” Additionally, a senior administration official told CNN on Sunday that Putin’s move was “yet another escalatory and totally unnecessary step,” a senior administration official said Sunday.

This is the closest that we have been to nuclear war in decades. (See also "Belarus Votes to Change Constitution & Deploy Nuclear Weapons") Did you ever imagine that we would be talking about such a thing in early 2022?

And just like the EU sending fighters to Ukraine, what Putin has just done is being called “unprecedented”… "Daryl Kimball, the executive director of the Arms Control Association, a Washington nonprofit group, said Putin’s action is a modern first. “This is unprecedented in the post-Cold War era,” Kimball said Sunday. “There has been no instance in which a U.S. or a Russian leader has raised the alert level of their nuclear forces in a middle of a crisis in order to try to coerce the other side’s behavior.”

It may be tempting to believe that Putin would never actually use such weapons, but a former U.S. ambassador to Russia is warning that we should be taking this very seriously…"Former U.S. Ambassador to Russia McFaul: “The people who know Putin the best - people I know in Russia - are worried about his recent nuclear statement. The people who know him the least are saying it’s cheap talk.”

At a moment like this, we need global leaders to act with cool heads. But every day both sides are making more alarming moves. Short of actually sending forces into Ukraine, western leaders are trying to think of everything that they can do to punish Russia, and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko insists that this is “pushing Russia into a Third World War”…

‘Now there is a lot of talk against the banking sector, gas, oil, SWIFT,’ Lukashenko said. ‘It’s worse than war. This is pushing Russia into a Third World War. We need to be restrained here so as not to get into trouble. Because nuclear war is the end of everything.’ Sadly, Lukashenko is quite correct. We need to be very, very careful at this moment in history, because a nuclear war really would mean the end of the world as we know it.

In anticipation of such a scenario, FEMA has apparently issued some new guidelines. According to these new guidelines, if a nuclear explosion happens you should wear a mask and try to maintain social distancing… “A nuclear explosion may occur with or without a few minutes warning,” reads the page, which was updated on Friday. “Fallout is most dangerous in the first few hours after the detonation when it is giving off the highest levels of radiation. It takes time for fallout to arrive back to ground level, often more than 15 minutes for areas outside of the immediate blast damage zones.

FEMA recommends the following steps to prevent ‘significant radiation exposure,’ which include “Try to maintain a distance of at least six feet between yourself and people who are not part of your household,” and “If possible, wear a mask if you’re sheltering with people who are not part of your household.”

For years, I was mocked for repeatedly warning that we were on a road to war with Russia. Nobody is mocking anymore, because now a potential war with Russia is front page news. At this point, all of us should be doing all that we can to try to prevent this from becoming a nuclear conflict. Because if nuclear missiles start flying, hundreds of millions of people will die."

- https://www.investmentwatchblog.com/

“What Are The Facts?"

“What are the facts? Again and again and again – what are the facts? Shun wishful thinking, ignore divine revelation, forget what “the stars foretell,” avoid opinion, care not what the neighbors think, never mind the un-guessable “verdict of history” – what are the facts, and to how many decimal places? You pilot always into an unknown future; facts are your single clue. Get the facts!”

- Robert A. Heinlein

○

“It seems to me what is called for is an exquisite balance between two conflicting needs: the most skeptical scrutiny of all hypotheses that are served up to us and at the same time a great openness to new ideas. If you are only skeptical, then no new ideas make it through to you. On the other hand, if you are open to the point of gullibility and have not an ounce of skeptical sense in you, then you cannot distinguish the useful ideas from the worthless ones.”

- Carl Sagan

○

And always remember...

"When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains,

however improbable, must be the truth."

- Sir Arthur Conan Doyle, "Sherlock Holmes"

Hey, who lied and told you any of this was easy?

"The World Economy Is A Very Unsafe Place - Several Bank Warnings"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly, 2/28/22:

"The World Economy Is A Very Unsafe Place - 

Several Bank Warnings"

"How It Really Is"

- https://www.usdebtclock.org/

Jim Kunstler, "Don’t Look Now"

"Don’t Look Now"

by Jim Kunstler

"Did “Joe Biden’s” handlers actually want to start World War Three? They are the same posse who contrived the Russian Collusion hysteria of 2016-19, then launched Covid-19 - and the even more deadly mass “vaccination” response to it - and have now successfully goaded Russia into cleaning up the international hub of grift and mischief known as Ukraine. One thing established for sure as fact: the “Joe Biden” family received plenty of cash off that grift wagon, and those “handlers” have neatly ring-fenced it from official scrutiny. Where does that leave the so-called president of the US in the current crisis?

The scant news coming out of Ukraine is so infected with propaganda that it’s impossible to know exactly what’s going on there these early days of the Russian invasion. Some interested parties say that Russia is getting its ass kicked by a Ukrainian resistance. More temperate reports suggest that Russian forces are proceeding methodically to capture and neutralize Ukraine’s meager military assets. Apparently, Ukraine and Russia are holding a diplomatic parlay today at the Belarus border. You might style that as “peace talks,” but who knows? There are no real functioning international news agencies anymore.

The current CIA-approved narrative wants you to believe that Vlad Putin seeks to reassemble the old Soviet Union and will move next to capture the Baltic States: Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania. I doubt this since all those countries have their own cultures rather emphatically hostile to Russia and required onerous operating subsidies from Moscow back in the Soviet day. Ukraine will surely be enough of a burden for Russia going forward.

An alternate narrative to the CIA’s scare story would follow the Occam’s Razor rule that the simplest explanation is probably the truth - namely, that there was no other way to stop Ukraine’s shelling and mortar attacks against the ethnic Russian population in the Donbas which, by the way, was carried out with US-gifted armaments. And there was no other way to disabuse the USA from the idea that Ukraine should join NATO and thereby become a missile launching base on Russia’s border.

Western Civ’s response so far is to cut off its nose to spite its face. A sidebar to the CIA-approved narrative is that the West should shut-down Russia’s export economy in response to their action in Ukraine. Of course, the EU members know that they can’t take a pass on Russian oil and natgas, unless they want to eat cold bratwurst and linguini in the dark. But this reality hasn’t stopped the USA from militating for that. Likewise, shutting Russia out of the SWIFT money transfer system will only achieve chaos in global trade and international banking - but chaos is what you get with “Joe Biden’s” Party of Chaos running things.

These are the folks who worked tirelessly to drive America insane since 2016 and now they’re capping their “hat-trick” of mind-f**kery with the specter of World War Three. Notice how neatly their engineered mass formation psychosis segued from Trump/Russia to Covid-19 and now the threat of going nuclear over Ukraine. My theory of the case would be as follows: America’s Deep State provoked Russia in Ukraine to cover up its own massive crimes against American citizens which now verge on being fully exposed.

The timing on Ukraine couldn’t have been more seemingly fortuitous. America - indeed the whole world -has awakened to the apparent reality that mass vaccination is killing off a lot of people before their time. The news is out, coming not from the public health bureaucracy but from such unexpected sources as actuaries in the insurance industry who collate quarterly death rates and morticians observing unusual morbid oddities in the bodies they prepare for burial. This comes at the very same time as reports that the CDC deliberately falsified Covid-19 death and injury statistics, both for the disease itself and for the mRNA “vaccines.” The FDA is also implicated in approving falsified “vaccine” trial data. One result of all that is the crash of Moderna and Pfizer stocks, as the geniuses on Wall Street suss out the mountain range of litigation that looms in the distance.

But they must know - and hundreds of appointed and elected officials must know - that the blowback from Covid-19 doesn’t stop with mere civil lawsuits but extends to criminal cases of supreme consequence: deliberate mass murder, extending to the highest levels of officialdom in many countries. To this day the CDC and state health departments are pushing “vaccines,” despite massive mounting evidence that the shots cause organ damage and mess up immune systems at a rate, and to a degree, astronomically above any previous vaccines. They must know that the official standard-of-care using remdesivir and intubation was overwhelmingly likely to kill hospital in-patients. They must know that early treatment protocols using cheap off-label drugs were highly effective and that banning early treatment - to maintain Emergency Use Authorization for killer “vaccines” - amounted to mass homicide.

It will get harder and harder to ignore widespread untimely death going forward as the “vaccines” work their vicious hoodoo on the boosted population, and even the most obdurately spellbound “vaccine” cheerleaders will have to endure such surges of cognitive dissonance that heads are sure to explode. So, the Ukraine invasion was the best means at hand to cover-up all that, and the longer the US government can feed that monster, and keep it going, the more they can shift the focus off the monumental frauds and homicides they carried out and will be criminally liable for.

Secondarily to all that, of course, is the emerging picture of pervasive corruption and crime among the three-letter agencies that special counsel John Durham is getting ready to feed to the dumpster fire of institutional failure that US politics has become. Ukraine is a manageable localized problem in a distant part of the world and Russia is going to manage it. The American crisis of confidence in its own operating system is something else."

- https://kunstler.com/

"The Tragedy..."

"The tragedy of modern war is that the young men die fighting 

each other instead of their real enemies back home in the capitals."

- Edward Abbey

Gregory Mannarino, "Critical Updates: War; Economic Meltdown; Arms Deals; Energy Crisis"

Gregory Mannarino, AM 2/28/22:

"Critical Updates: War; Economic Meltdown; 

Arms Deals; Energy Crisis"

- https://traderschoice.net

"Did NATO Just Declare War on Russia?"

"Did NATO Just Declare War on Russia?"

by Mike Whitney

“No matter who tries to stand in our way they must know that Russia will respond immediately, and the consequences will be such as you have never seen in your entire history. I hope that my words will be heard.” - Vladimir Putin issues warning to any country that tries to stop Russia’s “Special Operation” in Ukraine.

"In a move that can only be regarded as a major escalation, NATO officials announced on Friday that they would deploy troops from its Combat-Ready Response Force to support the Ukrainian regime in its war with Russia. The Alliance will also send additional weapons which will be used to blunt the Russian offensive that has already seized large parts of the country and obliterated most of Ukraine’s defensive capability. It is impossible to overstate the gravity of NATO’s action which assigns such importance to preserving its ‘junta regime’ in Kiev that they would willingly pit NATO against a nuclear-armed Russia in what could become a much broader regional war. Clearly, the strategic objectives of this murky conflict go far beyond the mere control of an ethnically-divided, failed state situated between Europe and Asia. Ukraine is no longer just a geopolitical trophy for western elites, but a last-gasp effort for Washington to prove it still controls the levers of global power."

Please view complete article here:

- https://www.unz.com/

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Related:

EU Provides $500 Million To Buy Arms For Ukraine; 

Turkey Readies Closure Of Straits To Russian Navy

○

"Experts Warned For Years That NATO Expansion Would Lead To This"

"...a near universal understanding among political leaders

 that NATO expansion would be a foolish provocation against Russia. 

How naive we were..."

○

Full screen recommended.

"In 'Unacceptable Escalation', 

Putin Orders 'Nuclear Deterrence' Forces On Alert"

"As we detailed earlier, President Vladimir Putin has ordered his army to put Russia's nuclear deterrence on "special" alert on Sunday following "aggressive statements" by NATO leaders. "Western countries are not only taking unfriendly actions against our country in the economic area. I'm speaking about the illegitimate sanctions that everyone is well aware of. However, the top officials of the leading NATO countries also make aggressive statements against our country as well," Putin stated on Russian media. 

Putin: "Western countries aren't only taking unfriendly economic actions against our country, but leaders of major Nato countries are making aggressive statements about our country. So I order to move Russia's deterrence forces to a special regime of duty." 

- pic.twitter.com/AC1yHncqZc

- max seddon (@maxseddon) February 27, 2022

"For this reason, I order the minister of defense and the chief of general staff to put deterrent forces on special combat duty," Putin continued. Earlier this month, Russia conducted exercises involving its nuclear forces including test launches of missiles. Placing Russia's nuclear deterrence on high alert may include the use of nuclear and conventional weapons. Russia's military definition said the deterrence is designed "to deter aggression against Russia and its allies, as well as to defeat the aggressor, including in a war with the use of nuclear weapons."

- https://www.zerohedge.com/

"I've Studied Nuclear War For 35 years - You Should Be Worried"; "The Insanity of Nuclear Deterrence"

○

Full screen recommended.

TEDx Talks, "Brian Toon: 

'I've studied nuclear war for 35 years - you should be worried.'"

"For the first time in decades, it's hard to ignore the threat of nuclear war. But as long as you're far from the blast, you're safe, right? Wrong. In this sobering talk, atmospheric scientist Brian Toon explains how even a small nuclear war could destroy all life on earth - and what we can do to prevent it. A professor in the Department of Atmospheric and Oceanic Sciences at the University of Colorado-Boulder, Brian Toon investigates the causes of the ozone hole, how volcanic eruptions alter the climate, how ancient Mars had flowing rivers, and the environmental impacts of nuclear war. He contributed to the U.N.’s Nobel Peace Prize for climate change and holds numerous scientific awards, including two NASA medals for Exceptional Scientific Achievement. He is an avid woodworker. This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community."

Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

○

Full screen recommended.

TEDxChristchurch, 

"Robert Green: The Insanity of Nuclear Deterrence"

Dec 13, 2017 - "When nuclear-armed nations face off, the threat of mutually assured destruction is expected to keep the worst from happening. But is this a rational strategy? Or is it one that is doomed to failure? In this eye-opening and powerful talk, Commander Robert Green shares his experience piloting nuclear-armed aircraft -- and his shift to becoming a staunch opponent of nuclear deterrence.

Commander Robert Green served for twenty years in the British Royal Navy. As a bombardier-navigator, he flew in Buccaneer nuclear strike aircraft and anti-submarine helicopters equipped with nuclear depth-bombs. His final appointment was as Staff Officer (Intelligence) to the Commander-in-Chief Fleet during the 1982 Falklands War.

He chaired the UK affiliate of the World Court Project, which led to the International Court of Justice judgment in 1996 that the threat or use of nuclear weapons would generally be illegal. Co-Director of the Disarmament & Security Centre in Christchurch since 1998, he is the author of "Security Without Nuclear Deterrence." This talk was given at a TEDx event using the TED conference format but independently organized by a local community."

Learn more at https://www.ted.com/tedx

Musical Interlude: Live, "Overcome"

Live, "Overcome"

"On Your Own Terms..."

“If the sun is shining, stand in it – yes, yes, yes. Happy times are great, but happy times pass – they have to – because time passes. The pursuit of happiness is more elusive; it is life-long, and it is not goal-centered. What you are pursuing is meaning – a meaningful life… There are times when it will go so wrong that you will be barely alive, and times when you realize that being barely alive, on your own terms, is better than living a bloated half-life on someone else’s terms.”

- Jeanette Winterson

"The Ideal Subject..."

"The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced

Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the

distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.”

- Hannah Arendt

"As World War 3 Escalates, Get Ready For A Terrifying Breakdown Of Our Food And Energy Systems"

"As World War 3 Escalates, Get Ready For A 

Terrifying Breakdown Of Our Food And Energy Systems"

by Michael Snyder

"If you believe that your life will continue on as normal because the war between Russia and Ukraine is on the other side of the globe, you should think again. We were already facing the worst energy crisis since the 1970s before the war broke out, and Russia is one of the most important energy producers on the entire globe. As energy markets are thrown into further turmoil, energy prices will go to unprecedented heights. And as I have documented repeatedly in recent months, the global food crisis has just continued to get worse as global food supplies have continued to get tighter and tighter. Normally, Russia and Ukraine export vast quantities of food to the rest of the world, but the war is going to change that. We really are facing a horrifying breakdown of our food and energy systems, and that is going to affect every man, woman and child on the entire planet.

Let’s start by taking a look at the impact that this war will have on food supplies. Even the Washington Post is admitting that the war in Ukraine will likely “push U.S. food prices even higher”… "Russia’s invasion of Ukraine could push U.S. food prices even higher, as the region is one of the world’s largest producers of wheat and some vegetable oils. And the disruptions could drag on for months or even years, as crop production in the area could be halted and take a long time to restart."

This new inflation shock comes at a time when global markets remain extremely strained because of pandemic-related disruptions. The price changes impacted commodity prices in recent days and could flow through to higher costs at grocery stores and restaurants soon. Food prices have already been rising very aggressively all over the world, and this has pushed millions upon millions of poor people at the bottom of the economic food chain into hunger.

But now this war threatens to push this crisis to a dangerous new level, because Russia and Ukraine typically produce “nearly a quarter of the world’s wheat”… "Russia and Ukraine together produce nearly a quarter of the world’s wheat, feeding billions of people in the form of bread, pasta and packaged foods. The countries are also key suppliers of barley, sunflower seed oil and corn, among other products."

So if exports from those two warring nations are reduced or completely cut off, how are we possibly going to replace that output? Does anyone have an answer for that?

Collectively, Russia and Ukraine usually account for “29 percent of all wheat exports and 75 percent of global exports of sunflower oil”… "Ukraine is the world’s fourth-largest exporter of both corn and wheat. It is also the world’s largest exporter of sunflower seed oil, an important component of the world’s vegetable oil supply. Together, Russia and Ukraine supply 29 percent of all wheat exports and 75 percent of global exports of sunflower oil, said Kelly Goughary, senior research analyst Gro-Intelligence, an agriculture data platform."

This isn’t just bad. This is really bad. Previously, I have written about how global agricultural production is going to be down all over the globe in 2022 because fertilizer prices have started to spiral out of control. In fact, in Africa alone it is being projected that enough food to feed 100 million people will not be grown this year because of the outrageous cost of fertilizer.

Well, guess what? It turns out that Russia is one of the biggest global exporters of fertilizer…"Russia is a key global player in natural gas, a major input to fertilizer production. Higher gas prices, and supply cuts, will further drive fertilizer prices higher. Russia is one of the biggest exporters of the three major groups of fertilizers (nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium). Physical supply cuts could further inflate fertilizer prices. One expert that was interviewed by the Washington Post admitted that we are “headed for a supply crunch that will be hard to resolve”.

That is one of the biggest understatements that I have heard in a long time. Even before the war erupted, some types of fertilizer had doubled in price, some had tripled in price and some had actually quadrupled in price. A few weeks ago, I shared what one industry insider told me about fertilizer prices. He warned that many farmers all over the U.S. simply will not be able to grow corn this year because it will not be profitable due to soaring fertilizer prices. And now fertilizer prices are likely to go much higher.

This really is a nightmare. Six months down the road, we are likely to see food riots all over the globe. Meanwhile, the global energy crisis is entering a very alarming new chapter. According to USA Today, 30 percent of all natural gas that Europe uses is provided by Russia… "Russia accounts for more than 30% of Europe’s gas for home heating, industry and generating electricity, and other potential supply sources are not adequately prepared to bridge the gap if Russian gas is curtailed, Rystad Energy analysts say."

Europe is absolutely addicted to Russian gas, and without it normal life in many European cities would rapidly come to a grinding halt. There are some that are suggesting that imports of liquefied natural gas from the United States could help while the war is raging… "Supplies of liquefied natural gas brought by ship from the U.S. has helped relieve some of Europe’s gas shortage this winter, but it’s expensive. Meanwhile, natural gas prices in the U.S. are approximately 60% higher than a year ago, according to Rystad."

Sadly, natural gas prices all over the globe are going to continue to go higher. As will propane prices. As will coal prices. And the price of oil will soon leave the $100 per barrel threshold in the rear view mirror for good.

Joe Biden is publicly saying that he will do all that he can to keep the price of gasoline down, but meanwhile his administration is working extremely hard “to freeze new oil and gas drilling leases”… "As oil prices continue to rocket, now further helped along by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration is still fighting tooth and nail to freeze new oil and gas drilling leases – even after a court ruled against the administration for using a metric to estimate “the societal cost of carbon emissions” to justify their move. Despite the court’s ruling, Biden’s administration has stopped new leases and permits for federal oil and gas drilling, MSN reported this week".

So when you are soon paying seven dollars for a gallon of gasoline, just remember who did this to you. Everything is changing, and the months ahead are going to be extremely challenging.

I think that Mike Adams summed up the current state of affairs very well when he warned that we are heading for a “total collapse”… "In all, these factors combine (food, war, fuel, inflation, currency, etc.) to create a total collapse of the world we once knew. Forget about affordable food or just-in-time delivery of anything. The world is about to become extremely inconvenient, expensive and broken. The supply chain disruptions will get FAR worse from here forward, and crime is going to absolutely skyrocket out of sheer desperation. Expect to see flash mobs looting grocery stores in broad daylight. Carjackings will skyrocket. Home invasions will become commonplace, even outside the cities as looting gangs hit suburbs."

All the way back in 2013, I released a novel entitled “The Beginning Of The End” in which I specifically described the insane societal environment that we will soon find ourselves living in. So many of the things that myself and others have been warning about for so many years are starting to come to pass right in front of our eyes. We really are heading into a nightmarish breakdown of society, and all of us will be shaken to the core as it happens."

- http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/

Greg Hunter, "Serious Global Pain as Economic Model Dies – Daniel Estulin"

"Serious Global Pain as Economic Model Dies – Daniel Estulin"

by Greg Hunter’s USAWatchdog.com 

"International best-selling author, journalist and counter-intelligence expert Daniel Estulin says the problems in the world revolve around the rapidly dying financial system and a “coming global bankruptcy.” Estulin contends, “We are looking at $3 quadrillion or $4 quadrillion of global debt, and you are looking at the end of the Bretton Woods economic model. We are at a critical stage for humanity that will determine the direction of the world. There is much at stake for us but especially for the liberals because their model, which is based on infinite growth, is coming to an end.”

According to Estulin, the United States is in for hardship and poverty never seen before. Estulin says, “This is the year for the United States. A lot of things are going to be decided financially, economically, socially and with a president that should not be there. The Democrats understand this, and that is why they are leaving in droves. We are coming into some serious pain moments for the global economy. The Russians are used to suffering and having to live on nothing. You (USA) are not.”

How bad will this get? Estulin, who is former Russian intelligence, says just look at what happened to the Soviet Union when it broke up in 1991. Estulin points out, “Between 1991 and 1998, 26 million Soviet citizens died. It was caused by starvation, depression, drugs, alcohol and all kinds of things. Most importantly, it was because 40% of our countrymen lost everything that they saved over the history of their country. In 1989, in the entire Soviet satellite space, there were around 500 million people in the Soviet Union. There were only 14 million people living under the poverty line. That’s 14 million out of 500 million people. In 1996, just seven years later, these 14 million with the destruction of the Soviet Union, became 168 million. So, from 14 million, it went up to 168 million people living under the poverty line. 

 The same thing is going to happen to the West and the United States. This will be at least two times worse than what happened in the 1929 to 1933 period. That means future generations are going to be infinitely worse off than my generation. It means the standard of living in the West is going to be something they have never in their lives imagined. The kinds of things coming to America and to the west is what you see on television. You are talking about World War III zombies or some kind of other horrible things. It is coming home because the United States is in the same position as the Soviet Union in 1991. You have a President named Joe Biden who has dementia for goodness’ sake. This is a carbon copy of Brezhnev in the Soviet Union in 1981.”

Estulin also contends to deal with the so called “reset” and their dying financial system, the desperate globalists have no problem doing away with large chunks of the population or dramatically changing their DNA. Estulin says, “The final stage for the liberals is the evolution of humanity. In other words, the politics of post humanism. The liberals (such as Klaus Schwab of the World Economic Forum) are praising the new possibilities of post humanism. We need to understand what these people are going to do with us, and it’s in black and white. It’s the fusion with a machine that will greatly enhance body strength, memory and genetic engineering. What these people want is immortality. Any one that does not agree with this agenda, they are declared enemies of open society, and you get cancelled.”

- https://usawatchdog.com/

Join Greg Hunter on Rumble as he goes One-on-One with best-selling author Daniel Estulin to talk about what is going on now with the “global bankruptcy” and “reset.” These are just a few of the topics Estulin analyzes in great detail in his latest book “2045 Global Projects at War.” (There is much more in the 54 min. interview.)

- https://rumble.com/

"People are Tired of the Supply Chain Problem - Fuel and Commodities are Spiking"

Full screen recommended.

Dan, iAllegedly PM 2/27/22:

"People are Tired of the Supply Chain Problem - 

Fuel and Commodities are Spiking"

"Tensions are high. People are sick of the supply issues. It doesn’t matter what industries you’re working in. Everybody is being affected by this and some industries are worse than others. We are going to see fuel, natural gas and commodities actually spike in the coming weeks. People need to prepare and stock up on household goods and supplies while they can."

"Fears Of Rising Food Prices, Freight Rate Spike & Extensive Shortages Trigger Panic On Supply Chains"

Full screen recommended.

"Fears Of Rising Food Prices, Freight Rate Spike & 

Extensive Shortages Trigger Panic On Supply Chains"

by Epic Economist

"Brace for more shortages, shipping disruptions, and painful price hikes as global tensions continue to escalate and wreak havoc on supply chains. This week’s events have sparked unforeseen chaos on global trade and already led to major interruptions in the flow of goods across the world. As the conflict continues to accelerate, industry experts are warning for catastrophic damages in the shipping industry, as well as soaring oil prices and a worldwide shortage of commodities and raw materials

In the past few days, several international companies already started a mass shutdown of factories, adding further strains to fragile global supply chains. The situation is threatening to cause extended delivery delays and exacerbate shortages all around the globe. The impact of the crisis on transportation is going to trigger shockwaves in every link of the global supply chain, but it won’t be the only ominous ramification. From grains to barley, and copper to nickel, every sector of the global industry will suffer as the confrontation takes a turn for the worse.

Of course, it’s not just the European Union that will be hit - many nations around the world, including the U.S., rely on exports, and interruptions to the shipment of goods can affect food security in many regions. “Rising food prices would only be exacerbated with additional price shocks, especially if core agricultural areas are seized by loyalists,” warned Per Hong, senior partner at consulting firm Kearney.

Together, both countries account for almost 29 percent of the global wheat export market. The countries in conflict are also major supplies of metals and other commodities. Right now, one major concern for the U.S. industry is the rising price of crude oil and oil derivatives spurred by the worsening tensions. Oil prices soared to over $100 per barrel this week, and the effects of the rise are already apparent.

Shipping companies have announced another round of price hikes in the coming days and weeks. Last month alone, the price of maritime fuel used to power ships had surged by 23% due to ongoing upward pressure on global crude prices, Bloomberg reported.

Meanwhile, truckers are warning that they will become more selective” in the jobs they pick amid fuel price uncertainty. One truck company owner told The Loadstar: “The sustained high price of road fuel has already started to affect which jobs we will and won’t do. Crude prices have hit their highest in several years, and this is a pricing situation that cannot go on deteriorating. But it looks likely that this will only be getting worse with news of the Ukraine fiasco.”

On a consumer level, the Americans were definitely amongst the first in the world to feel the impacts of the price distortions caused by the crisis. Overnight gas prices have shot up. At the beginning of the week, national gas prices were averaging $3.56 per gallon, by the end of Thursday prices were already up by $0.10 per gallon, closing at $3.66.

The relentless rise in gas and energy prices is already making the cost of everything reach extraordinary levels, and inflationary pressures will remain a headache for consumers and businesses. The CEO of Allegion said he sees an "iceberg" of inflation that will soon start to move through the economy, and noted that what we experienced so far is nothing compared to the turbulence that’s coming. He highlighted that as fuel costs rise, labor market shortages will become more acute, and businesses will struggle to hire truckers to deliver their goods across the country.

“You’re going to really start to see an impact on people’s buying power and you just worry about the long-term business impact on how that might start to play out,” he added. With inflation, supply chain issues, and now the impact of sanctions, many Americans are concerned about what the future may hold.

It seems that this modern-day nightmare is far from over. The simultaneous emergence of global conflicts, health and hunger crises, natural disasters, and a financial meltdown will definitely change the world as we know it. Now more than ever, we should start watching global events very closely because things could change in a snap of fingers, sinking the entire world into unprecedented chaos."

- https://www.epiceconomist.com/

"A Look to the Heavens"

“What will become of these galaxies? Spiral galaxies NGC 5426 and NGC 5427 are passing dangerously close to each other, but each is likely to survive this collision. Typically when galaxies collide, a large galaxy eats a much smaller galaxy. In this case, however, the two galaxies are quite similar, each being a sprawling spiral with expansive arms and a compact core. As the galaxies advance over the next tens of millions of years, their component stars are unlikely to collide, although new stars will form in the bunching of gas caused by gravitational tides.

Close inspection of the above image taken by the 8-meter Gemini-South Telescope in Chile shows a bridge of material momentarily connecting the two giants. Known collectively as Arp 271, the interacting pair spans about 130,000 light years and lies about 90 million light-years away toward the constellation of Virgo. Recent predictions hold that our Milky Way Galaxy will undergo a similar collision with the neighboring Andromeda Galaxy in a few billion years.”

- http://apod.nasa.gov/apod/ap130825.html

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Full screen recommended.

Monty Python, "The Meaning of Life: Galaxy Song"

"I'd Still Swim..."

“If I were dropped out of a plane into the ocean and told the nearest land was

a thousand miles away, I'd still swim. And I’d despise the one who gave up.”

- Abraham Maslow

"No Smooth Road..."

"Life has no smooth road for any of us; and in the bracing atmosphere

of a high aim the very roughness stimulates the climber to steadier steps,

till the legend, over steep ways to the stars, fulfills itself."

- W. C. Doane

The Daily "Near You?"

Philomath, Oregon, USA. Thanks for stopping by!

The Poet: Czeslaw Milosz, “A Song On The End Of The World”

“A Song On The End Of The World”

“On the day the world ends

A bee circles a clover,

A fisherman mends a glimmering net.

Happy porpoises jump in the sea,

By the rainspout young sparrows are playing

And the snake is gold-skinned as it should always be.

On the day the world ends

Women walk through the fields under their umbrellas,

A drunkard grows sleepy at the edge of a lawn,

Vegetable peddlers shout in the street

And a yellow-sailed boat comes nearer the island,

The voice of a violin lasts in the air

And leads into a starry night.

And those who expected lightning and thunder

Are disappointed.

And those who expected signs and archangels’ trumps

Do not believe it is happening now.

As long as the sun and the moon are above,

As long as the bumblebee visits a rose,

As long as rosy infants are born

No one believes it is happening now.

Only a white-haired old man, who would be a prophet

Yet is not a prophet, for he’s much too busy,

Repeats while he binds his tomatoes:

There will be no other end of the world,

There will be no other end of the world.”

~ Czeslaw Milosz

"It May Be Then..."

"Passion doesn't count the cost. Pascal said that the heart has its reasons that reason takes no account of. If he meant what I think, he meant that when passion seizes the heart it invents reasons that seem not only plausible but conclusive to prove that the world is well lost for love. It convinces you that honor is well sacrificed and that shame is a cheap price to pay. Passion is destructive. It destroyed Antony and Cleopatra, Tristan and Isolde, Parnell and Kitty O'Shea. And if it doesn't destroy it dies. It may be then that one is faced with the desolation of knowing that one has wasted the years of one's life, that one's brought disgrace upon oneself, endured the frightful pang of jealousy, swallowed every bitter mortification, that one's expended all one's tenderness, poured out all the riches of one's soul on a poor drab, a fool, a peg on which one hung one's dreams, who wasn't worth a stick of chewing gum."

- W. Somerset Maugham