Image is from this article, of a Chilean copper quarry.
Title is a reference to Trump's social media post about copper, which was, as usual, mostly deranged.
Trying to follow Trump's administration is pretty difficult, but as of right now, he is threatening 30% tariffs on Mexico and the EU starting on August 1st, as well as new tariff announcements on a bunch of other countries (including, bizarrely, a 50% tariff on Brazil), and also apparently a 50% tariff on copper, which the US imports half its supply of and is, of course, a very important metal in many applications.
I'm not sure what the plan is to bring back domestic copper production beyond hoping that it just sorta works out, but prominent copper producers, such as Chile and Canada, seem both concerned and confused. Reuters had a line that made me chuckle:
Boric said he was awaiting official communication from the U.S. government, including whether the tariffs would include copper cathodes, and questioned "whether this will actually be implemented or not."
Big mood, Boric.
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
If you have evidence of Israeli crimes and atrocities that you wish to preserve, there is a thread here in which to do so.
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.
That was absolutely not the point of my post, again why are we doing this weird subposting thing instead of directly replying? It wasn't even an analysis, it was merely stating that there's a lot of talk about the US giving Ukraine access to long range weapons with the range to hit Moscow, what that means is that these are the weapons systems are under consideration, with the range and a very brief overview of their capabilities and why that would be different than previous long range weapons deliveries. While expressing significant doubts that such a move will go ahead, no one should be surprised if it does. There was no analysis given at all to be honest.
For analysis, my analysis is not insightful and very basic, honestly not worth writing out or posting. A war of attrition cannot go on forever (given Ukraine's manpower issues, and Russia, while having a ton of equipment, does not have infinite stocks), so there will be attempts to break the attritional state. Russia chose to escalate the conflict again via large scale air attacks, similar to October last year. There is also much talk of a significant Russian summer offensive, to break the attritional state. However, this time around US/NATO/Ukraine had a different response to the air raids, starting with operation Spiderweb where they destroyed over 10 long range Russian bombers. Their response will continue to be different than before, and a significant part of that will be giving Ukraine better defenses, and it's own long range strike capabilitiy (currently with Ukrainian designed and manufactured weapons, funded by European NATO members, along with previous deliveries of US and European made weapons), and it should not come as a surprise if this long range strike capabilitiy includes new US or European made weapons, as though I have significant doubts, it is still very much a real possibility. I have no idea who will win such a battle (Russia is currently winning in the ground), but for the first time since 2022, there is actually an attempt from both sides to change the situation. (The Ukraine summer offensive of 2023 was wishful thinking).
I don't care about being called a doomer, a fed, NATO propagandist, or whatever nickname I'll get next week (this has been happening since Assad fell in Syria), it's happened so many times now that it doesn't matter. Label this account whatever you want. I don't see myself as any of those things anyways and know I am not that, obviously. Usually what I say gets proven correct in some form, and to me that is most important as I try to base what I write here on factual information, and do not care for telling others what or how to think. I have also given public apologies when I have said something that is incorrect.
Dawg I didn't even mean you in that specific call out but someone else that wrote something like 'I think Russia is going to throw in the towel in 2026' so I dunno stop being so prickly? Like yeah you are a doomer and I think this shit actually decreases the quality of your posts but again....
If me calling out the quality of the posts dropping has you this agitated then maybe stop cooking your brain in this toxic doomsludge the fact that you wrote out 'I don't care about being called a doomer, a fed, NATO propagandist, or whatever nickname I'll get next week, it's happened so many times now that it doesn't matter. I try to base what I write here on factual information, and do not care for telling others what or how to think.' is some real geh facts don't care about your feelings type shit and you should look at your mental well being because your brain sounds pickeled and needs some actual praxis.
If you want a left wing Fox News, then maybe this isn’t the place you should be looking for.
We all have different opinions here and the discussions on the news mega have been, for the most part, free from toxicity. It’s a place for discussion and to learn from one another, which means you should expect to read stuff that you don’t like or don’t agree with. At least we do our best not to post chud/reactionary stuff here.