Image is of the breach in the tailings dam near Kitwe.
On February 18th, 50 million liters of acidic waste from a copper mine was accidentally released into the Kafue River after a tailings dam collapsed. The Kafue River stretches for a thousand miles across Zambia and a majority of the country - millions of people - rely on it, for both the economy and drinking water.
The results have already been catastrophic. The water supply for the city of Kitwe, home to 700,000 people, was completely shut off. As the wave of contamination moved downstream, a wave of death accompanied it as dead fish dotted the river surface. The government is dropping lime into the river to try and counteract the acid with an alkali and neutralize the water, but the tailings also contain toxic heavy metals that will undoubtably seep into the nearby environment and affect the area for years to come.
A considerable portion of the media attention to the accident has been devoted to the fact that the mine was Chinese-owned, as well as China's broader influence and investment in the region. Western anti-China propaganda aside, it has been clear to those in the know that these mines have been badly managed and needlessly dangerous for years now, and it is disappointing - to say the least - to see disasters of this magnitude occur from Chinese businesses. Hopefully this prompts a wave of investigations into China-owned mine managers all around the continent, who will then hopefully face real consequences for their actions.
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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.
Wake up guys new shitty jet just dropped
That's some expensive manned suicide drone in development
47 lmao. this guy never gives it a rest
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/trump-awards-boeing-much-needed-win-with-fighter-jet-contract-sources-say-2025-03-21/
trump gave the contract to boeing, too
I'm sure that's going to go well considering their track record of the 787-9, the max and the starship klol.
Much needed win lol we all know if anyone needs a W right now guys, it’s Boeing
If it already has a prototype, it's Boeing's design
Prototype(s), likely including a Lockheed prototype that we might never see, have probably existed for years. This is what Trump means when he says that the F-47 has already been flying for years. Remember, there was both a Northrop Grumman (YF-23) and Lockheed Martin (YF-22) prototype for what eventually became the F-22 (Lockheed's YF-22 beat the YF-23), but as always there are political reasons involved in these procurement decisions. The F-22 pick involved politics, and so does the F-47 pick. I'm guessing there's a strong Musk - Boeing - Trump triangle going on.
Mysterious Aircraft Spotted at Area 51 - The War Zone - 4 February 2022
Image could be of a sixth generation fighter jet, or a Saab J-35 Draken aggressor squadron aircraft.
I figured they're just trying to give a win to Boeing because it's been struggling. I've been told the US tries to keep all it's MIC companies alive by rotating contracts and such.
I think the DoD is still pissed at Lockheed Martin for the initial mismanagement of the JSF/F-35. A lot of the issues have been fixed now and the F-35 project is looking good from a US perspective, but they were serious issues and it took a lot of work to get the F-35 project back on track (including making the F-35B basically a completely separate plane to the F-35 A and C). There was a serious risk of the entire thing going under, which is where a lot of the memes and jokes/dunks on the F-35 come from.
The DoD was also pissed at Northrop Grumman for the huge cost and overruns on the B-2 back in the 90s, which played a role in Lockheed beating them for the F-22 contract.
Participation trophy
It will be interesting to see this side by side with what we're seeing from China, I'm guessing this is the first time since the Cold War that a country we view as a threat is developing planes roughly on parity with us at the same time.
I am curious if China's industrial capacity will give it an edge here.
Boeing F-47 MAX
GOOD post
Looking forward to weekly news of these crashing into strip malls
Have they figured out how to deal with rain yet?
Or nose-up attitudes