Over the last week, Sri Lanka has been hit by their worst national natural disaster since the 2004 Boxing Day Tsunami. Over 2 million people (about 10% of the population) were affected; the death toll is currently climbing past 600; nearly a hundred thousand homes have been damaged or destroyed, transport infrastructure is heavily damaged; industry has been damaged; and farmland has been flooded. The cost of damage so far looks to be about $7 billion, which is more than the combined budget spent on healthcare and education in Sri Lanka.
While there is plenty to say meteorologically about how this yet another concerning escalation as a result of climate change (Sri Lanka does experience cyclones, but they are usually significantly weaker than this), it’s important to note that such disasters are, to at least a certain extent, able to warned about and their impacts somewhat mitigated. However, this requires both access to early detection and warning equipment, and an economy in which development is widespread - in this case, particularly in the construction of drainage systems and regulated construction, which has not generally occurred.
The IMF, on its 17th program with Sri Lanka, is doing its utmost to prevent such an economy from developing, as they instead promote reductions in public investment. On top of this, the rebuilding effort for Sri Lanka is already being planned and funded, and such donors include, of course, many Sri Lankan oligarchs, who will rebuild the damaged portions of the country yet further according to their visions, while sidelining the working class.
Perhaps neoliberalism’s decay into its eventual death occurring concurrently into the gradual intensification of climate change and renewed wars signifies the rise of the era of disaster capitalism.
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The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. 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.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
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.
UK Navy to stop provoking China
spoiler
The Royal Navy is to reduce overseas training in the Indo-Pacific and the Middle East amid concerns that stealth cost cuts are destroying Britain’s ability to project power and challenge China.
Al Carns, Labour’s armed forces minister, who unveiled the plan, said the decision was intended to strengthen “homeland defence” by focusing on activity with Nato in the Atlantic, Arctic and European waters, which were increasingly being threatened by Russian warships.
The decision means ships will be deployed on fewer training exercises outside Britain’s immediate neighbourhood, casting doubt on the Senior Service’s ability to fight anywhere in the world.
Critics said it risked weakening the country’s role in combating the threat from China, which now has the world’s biggest navy and is increasingly aggressive towards Taiwan and other nearby rivals.
The Conservatives accused the Government of attempting to make stealth cuts to training to save cash, after The Telegraph revealed in October that the Ministry of Defence (MoD) had overspent by more than £2bn on its 2025-26 financial budget.
James Cartlidge, the shadow defence secretary, said: “We all know the real reason Labour are slashing overseas training for the Armed Forces – to save money.
James Cartlidge James Cartlidge says ‘the men and women of our Armed Forces deserve much better’ “The Telegraph recently exposed the £2.6bn black hole in the Ministry of Defence this financial year, and the continued delays to the defence investment plan – promised for the autumn – show this is a Government failing to prioritise defence, as the threat demands.
“Cutting training and funding is not a serious approach to boosting war readiness, and the men and women of our Armed Forces deserve much better.”
The Navy is already facing immense pressure. General Sir Gwyn Jenkins, the First Sea Lord, this week warned it was “struggling” to cope with the number of Russian ships entering UK waters, and that without extra cash the Navy was at risk of “losing its advantage” in the Atlantic.
The Navy’s ability to go to sea has been on a downward trend for at least a decade, The Telegraph can disclose.
Reports by the MoD show the number of so-called “readiness days” – when ships are available to sail – has plunged from 16,630 in 2014 to a decade low of 12,433 last year. The overall size of the Navy has also shrunk during this time.
The UK is responding to the leash jerk and pulling back from harassing China with their tin navy. Good news for the world, let’s hope they don’t change their minds.
The new Division of Labor strategy being adopted by the US requires the UK (and all European vassals) to focus their full “might” on Russia, not China.
The US is prepping their Asian vassals (Taiwan, South Korea, Japan, Philippines, Singapore, etc.) to fight a proxy war with China. The US wants to pull out their (and NATO’s) troops to pave the way for this.
This strategy seems dead in the cradle, their vassals in yurop have spent themselves in support of ukraine and it’s in slow motion collapse. Their productive capacity has been kneecapped by US policy, they won’t be able to develop a native defense industry to match Russia’s. Our asian vassals seem to be eyeballing other options except for japan for the moment, don’t they? If this is their plan, it’s insane, isn’t it?
Doesn’t matter. Their goal isn’t to keep their vassals safe and prosperous, but simply to weaken their geopolitical enemies.
China would inevitably win such a war, but at great cost. It could potentially delay the collapse of US world hegemony.
Absolutely. And why wouldn’t they? Russia may be winning in Ukraine, but it is also being contained there. The goal will be to entangle China in much the same way even if for a few years.
I wonder if the Philippines can even fully participate in whatever Marcos Jr. wants to do with Japan and Taiwan, with the flood control scandal… I think that even though a lot of Filipinos are being propagandized against China (not just because of the South China Sea issue, some actually support the whole western aligned alliance against China) no one wants to fully to go to war, and nobody really trusts the government.
Whether you’re a liberal, leftist or even dutertist, because there are demands, protests and movements. But as long as the ‘anti-corruption movement’ is split between actual dedicated leftists with the goal of changing the government, liberals with vague transparency and accountability goals, and the supporters of duterte and marcos both opposing each other, it’ll be a precarious situation with damage control from the dynasties until something happens to spark more anger (because after the Sep. 21 and Nov. 30 Mega Protests, the movement has been in the ‘maintenance of the fire’ mode).
I could see the US letting their hounds lose on China & Russia, accepting that they might get destroyed in the process but causes so much damage to china & russia, that the us can recuperate and consolidate its empire in the americas again before striking out. Basically ukranization of NATO & Asian puppet states
You’re all thinking about this wrong. Russia has not been weakened by the Ukraine war, it has been strengthened by it. Its economy is significantly more robust and its army much larger, more experienced and more technologically advanced. Victorious nations don’t emerge from wars weaker, they emerge stronger, even if they have taken some casualties.
The same would happen with China if it was forced into a war, only on a scale ten times greater. A China that is forced into adopting a war economy would be an industrial behemoth the likes of which the world has never seen.
We also see this in history: the Red Army of 1945 was an incomparably more potent fighting force than the Red Army of 1941, despite the immense losses incurred over the course of the war. The USSR made great leaps in technology and industrial production during the war, and as a result of its victory its geopolitical position in Europe and across the world was greatly improved.
All that the empire achieves by engineering proxy wars is keeping Russia and China busy for a few years, but that only benefits the empire if it can use that time to actually consolidate and strengthen its global position, and get ahead again industrially and technologically. This won’t happen because the systemic imperatives driving the US’s decline cannot and will not be removed.
I did not say that russia has been weakened. I said that the usa might think to let their vassals cause so much destruction that they delay china & russia from claiming their own spheres. You literally repeated my point in the last paragraph.
Obscure Marvel character that had a cameo in Iron Man 6
You can tell they’re just a fantasy navy because of their official ranks, first sea lord is a guy who got burned by a dragon in some obscure history referenced in a game of thrones auxiliary lore book
There’s also a second sea lord and an even faker office called the deputy first sea lord.
Assistant to the first sea lord
They’re moving to positions that threaten russia no doubt.
The UK still has a navy?
barely lmao. most of it is in port
The austerity measures thing is very real. A lot of people don’t know this, but the Royal Navy essentially had to steal units (and therefore funding) from the Royal Air Force to buy F-35Bs for it’s carrier air wings. The pilots and aircraft flying from the UK’s aircraft carriers aren’t technically Navy pilots, but Air Force pilots and aircraft because of this. Quite an absurd situation.