Image is from Wikipedia’s article on the war..
I’ve wanted to cover Myanmar for a while now but haven’t had the needed knowledge to write much more than “This situation really sucks.” After doing a little reading on the situation, I feel even more confused. A decent analogy is the Syrian Civil War, at least while Assad was in power (though it’s still pretty true today) - many different opposition groups, some co-operating with the United States, others not. The main government supported partially by an anti-American superpower, but who could live with that government collapsing if there are deals to be made with the group coming into power. A conflict kept going and exploited at least partially by the United States and other imperial core powers, though with plenty of genuine domestic animosity and desires for political independence.
Recently, the Myanmar government - the mainstream media uses “junta”, which is probably accurate despite the connotations - has promised elections at the end of 2025. This doesn’t seem likely to happen, and even if it did, how this would work in a country as war-torn as Myanmar is unclear. The government is losing territory and soldiers at a quick pace; they now hold only 21% of the country, though that 21% does at least comprise many of the cities. It’s difficult to get a handle on the number of people affected because civil wars and insurgencies have been ongoing in some shape or form for decades, but we’re talking at least millions displaced and thousands of civilians killed.
Here’s a comment by @TheGenderWitch@hexbear.net from fairly recently that covers the situation in Myanmar:
comment
The military government of Myanmar is losing to the Rebel Groups, and badly. https://www.voanews.com/a/myanmar-s-rebels-closing-in-around-junta-into-fifth-year-of-civil-war-/7958145.html
somethings really afoot though, news about myanmar from western outlets and channels have suddenly all remembered myanmar exists and written quite a lot about them in the last few days. Its suspicious, it could be capitalists trying to signal their want for US involvement in the civil war. It could also be a targeted propaganda campaign already pre planned in order to make sure people are clued into the conflict.
I think this seems to be another Assad situation. The Military government is pretty unpopular domestically and is losing quite a bit of ground. I would be surprised if they lasted to 2027. Supplied by both Russia and China, theyve been able to keep some flow of weapons, but are suffering a lot from manpower issues. Conscription has been enacted, but conscripts are a poor replacement for trained soldiers. According to reports, they only hold about 21% of the land and are losing lots of territory. They also have extended their emergency rule for another 6 months, throwing doubt on the ability to follow through with their 2025 election. They’ve lost large amounts of territory, thousands of soldiers, and 2 regional commands. They’re not dead yet though, as they have some ability to retake some territory and win some battles, but again 21%. Rebels currently are making steady progress towards the second largest city in the country.
while I don’t like the rebels, they are western aligned, they have popular support and are allied to many of Myanmar’s ethnic minority defence groups. Im wondering who really has the power in this situation though, since many of the gains seem to be made by the Ethnic armies, not the NUG. This revolutionary energy could be fueled to establish a socialist federation, but won’t, and the popular revolutionary energy is fueled toward the NUG. It’ll probably be another pro-west bourgeoisie democracy. It will probably then turn against the ethnic rebels and we’ll end up basically where myanmar was pre coup. Probably will have a strong military influence on politics as well, since the rebel forces seem to be made up of officers and very little political groups. By then, people will be extremely tired of war and more likely to accept any conflict resolution than another civil war. In the midst of “It Happened” stands a stronger, unmovable “nothing ever happens”. Would be neat if the Communist Party of Burma could somehow come out on top, but they have only around 1000 soldiers and don’t control a large amount of territory.
China’s interests in the region are still secure, but siding with the Junta is a bad idea, one I understand though. China doesn’t want a western aligned power to take over a china aligned state, and is trying to make sure their economic investments in the area are protected and their mineral income is continued. They have deep ties with many Ethnic Minority states, especially on their border, and the NUG forces, mostly again to protect infrastructure investments and keep the minerals flowing. They might flip back to the NUG as the Junta starts collapsing over the next year or so, especially since the new US administration seems to be really cutting back on foreign aid. The General in charge of the rebel government forces complained quite a bit about how much aid ukraine got and how much he wanted that aid. He was basically begging for anti aircraft systems “like in ukraine” lol. China could definitely swoop in and back the rebels, which while hurting their reputation, is probably the best move long term. China’s only interest is to keep Myanmar from being pro-west, keep control of Myanmar’s mineral flow, and protect other investments in the area.
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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.
After years of cracking down on “barbaric growth of capital" in the private sector, China is wooing entrepreneurs again. Is it too little too late? Former SCMP editor-in-chief Wang Xiangwei weighs in.
HONG KONG: At the start of 2019, Chinese President Xi Jinping convened senior officials in Beijing for a workshop to discuss and prepare for “black swan” and “grey rhino” events amid a slowing economy and rising international uncertainties.
This meeting followed then US President Donald Trump’s initiation of a trade war against China in July 2018, which sent bilateral ties into a downward spiral.
Mr Xi urged officials to remain vigilant and address “major risks” across various fields, including politics, ideology, economy, society, technology and the external environment.
A black swan refers to an unpredictable market event with extreme financial consequences, while a grey rhino is a highly probable and impactful threat that is often ignored.
Since then, China’s leadership has taken decisive steps to tackle perceived grey rhinos, such as ballooning local government debts, struggling city and community banks, and the “irrational and barbaric growth of capital” in the private sector, particularly targeting big tech firms like Alibaba, which owns the South China Morning Post.
However, Beijing’s harsh campaign against the private sector has inadvertently unleashed another grey rhino: A lack of confidence among private entrepreneurs.
STIFLING INNOVATION
This lack of confidence, known in China as “lying flat” or "tang ping”, initially caught on among the country’s overworked youth who sought to do the minimum and take a break from relentless work.
During the three years of the COVID-19 pandemic, this malaise spread nationwide, affecting not only bureaucrats but also entrepreneurs.
It was also partially fed by fear that success in private business could come with political risks: In 2020, Beijing abruptly halted the US$34 billion IPO of fintech giant Ant Group, controlled by Jack Ma, after he reportedly criticised regulators for stifling innovation.
What ensued was a multi-year crackdown on the so-called “excesses” and “barbaric growth of capital” in the private sector, which has since driven entrepreneurs’ confidence to historic lows.
Mr Ma largely disappeared from the public eye following those events, reinforcing concerns that China’s business climate had become too unpredictable.
Within this context, Mr Xi’s high-profile meeting with selected private entrepreneurs, including Mr Ma, at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on Feb 17 is significant - his first such meeting in nearly seven years.
ARE XI’S ASSURANCES ENOUGH?
According to Xinhua, Mr Xi reportedly told entrepreneurs, also including Mr Ma, Ren Zhengfei of Huawei and Wang Chuanfu of BYD, that it was "prime time for private enterprises and entrepreneurs to give full play to their capabilities”.
He assured them that the current difficulties and challenges facing the private sector could be overcome and called for renewed confidence in the future.
Mr Xi also vowed to create equal treatment for the private sector and pledged to ensure access to bank loans while addressing widespread illicit law enforcement and administrative actions, including arbitrary fees, fines, inspections and asset seizures.
Mr Xi’s remarks represent the strongest signal of support for private enterprises at a time when China’s economy is in a deflationary cycle, weighed down by falling property prices and low consumer confidence. Meanwhile, Mr Trump in his second term has threatened additional tariffs on Chinese products, and China’s exports, one of its traditional growth engines, remain bleak.
Beijing recently announced an economic growth target of “around 5 per cent” for this year, but revitalising the private sector is crucial to achieving this goal, especially since the private sector contributes about 60 per cent to China’s gross domestic product and over 80 per cent of employment.
Will Mr Xi’s words be enough? After all, China had already been unwinding its crackdown on the private sector starting in 2023, with officials increasing pro-business rhetoric and referring to private entrepreneurs as "one of us”.
Yet in many cash-strapped localities, illicit actions against the private sector, including arbitrary fees, fines, and asset seizures, have continued unabated.
Mr Xi’s remarks are expected to curb these illicit actions, but whether they will spark optimism among private businessmen remains to be seen.
the rest of the article
A REAL TURNING POINT?
Sensing scepticism, official media has ramped up efforts to reassure the private sector.
Notably, the People’s Daily, the Chinese Communist Party’s newspaper of record, recently published a long article titled I Have Always Supported Private Enterprises, highlighting Mr Xi’s support for the private sector and countering scepticism that he favours the state sector.
China’s latest efforts to reassure the private sector are a step in the right direction, but more needs to be done to restore confidence. The global success of DeepSeek’s AI language model and the popular animated film Ne Zha 2, both funded and developed by private entrepreneurs, offers significant insights.
More than anything, the rise of DeepSeek demonstrates that the private sector has elevated itself to drive China’s innovation and cutting-edge technologies, moving beyond its traditional role of job creation and playing second fiddle to the state sector.
The fact that the Hangzhou-based company was under the official radar until its sudden rise to fame suggests that if the government allows the private sector to operate without political, ideological and regulatory straitjackets, it can produce global winners.
This is likely the best way to restore confidence and tame the charging grey rhino.
For those paying attention to the “two sessions” in China, it shouldn’t surprise you that private capital has indeed made a come back with Jack Ma’s reappearance a few weeks earlier.
I am increasingly losing faith in Xi’s ability to curb private capital. Since Li Qiang (Shanghai lib) became the Premier in early 2023, from abandoning Zero Covid policy to opening up China’s capital markets, all indications are pointing to what I have suspecting all these while, that the liberals have indeed succeeded in their coup and have been having the upper hand since 2023.
People already clowning on his corpse lmao
what a piece of shit
Yeah the fact that there are just random people who would do that in the street says a lot about this piece of shit.
Good. Fuck im
Yemen has BANNED the import of BURGERS. We salute the People of Yemen and Ansar Allah in their brave campaign against treatlerism.
even imagining a burger can lead to ruin, many such cases
*comprador treatlerism, specifically.
🍔
Unlimited Genocide on international burgerism
This is a human rights violation and I support US efforts to airdrop happy meals into the afflicted territories
This seems to be more of a ban on imported pastries and bread than anything else for self sufficiency.
import substitution time
I think Noah Kulwin just got arrested occupying Trump Tower
Russian President Vladimir Putin has invited Nicholas Maduro, President of Venezuela, to attend the Victory Day Parade in Moscow on May 9th.
- Telegram
Chrystia Freeland getting demoted to transport minister. This is legitimately good news.
Jolani hugs and daps up former director of Turkish intelligence and current foreign minister Hasan Fidan
I’ve just checked what Zizek was up to nowadays
I shouldn’t have
CW: SA
(from the end of January)
This romanticized notion of Russia is often combined with another leftist dogma: that NATO is the ultimate evil. According to this view, anyone in conflict with NATO must have something good or virtuous about them. By this logic, Ukraine is disqualified from support because it’s seen as merely fighting a “proxy war” on behalf of NATO.
when I pointed out that treating Ukraine’s defense as a proxy war for NATO essentially insults Ukrainians, people don’t seem to grasp it. Ukrainians are being portrayed as if they could choose peace but instead decide to engage in a war that displaces a quarter of their population, just for the sake of a proxy war. But in reality, it’s a matter of their survival.
So, as of mid-march, not a proxy war at all
I once made this comparison: it’s like a woman, Ukraine in this case, being brutallyremovedd. In despair, she tries to do something — what would you do if you were in that situation? I can only imagine as a man, maybe you would scratch, try to hit his eyes, or do whatever you could to survive. And then the West’s response would be to say to this woman, “It’s too painful, don’t provoke him.”
I truly, deeply deplore this analogy, not that war is nice, but someone who has been writing about Marxist aesthetics should know better, should know that metaphors are ideological constructs, and explaining war with sexual assault is straight out of the trashcan of ideology
For propagandistic purposes, sure, but this is just trash, and not worthy from a “marxist philosopher”
Yep, Zizek is a “Marxist” in the same way that AOC is a “socialist.”
NATO is the ultimate evil. According to this view, anyone in conflict with NATO must have something good or virtuous about them. By this logic, Ukraine is disqualified from support because it’s seen as merely fighting a “proxy war” on behalf of NATO.
I mean … yea?
an anticom grifter who has always had trouble hiding his misogyny
Despite famously having a younger, attractive wife for a time, he’s basically an incel. He stayed on a friend’s couch when visiting their university and he fucking reeks in person and is very obviously a pornography addict with serious sexual impulse control issues.
Zizek had been effectively banned from the “mainstream” presses since 2015. Then during the Ukraine war, suddenly he had a piece in the Guardian and another in the New Statesman, both of which he had never written a piece for in years. I’ll leave you to decide why would that be the case.
living through balkanization and carrying water for NATO is wild
It makes sense, if you know that he was an active participant in that balkanization on the side of the west “bravely defending liberal dissidents from government repression”.
he was a ‘disident’ in Yugoslavia. he wrote in the anti yugoslav slovene magazine Mladina, he ran for president in independent Slovenia in 1990 as the candidate for the liberal democratic party, and was widely involved in many liberal organisations that pushed for the breakup of Yugoslavia. balkanisation was a proud moment of his career, not a dark time of suffering
he told you to get the bag, he getting it himself
something something believe themThis romanticized notion of Russia is often combined with another leftist dogma: that NATO is the ultimate evil. According to this view, anyone in conflict with NATO must have something good or virtuous about them. By this logic, Ukraine is disqualified from support because it’s seen as merely fighting a “proxy war” on behalf of NATO.
No Zizek. Anyone in conflict with NATO is not necessarily good. But anyone in conflict with NATO is good for us. There is a difference.
When we have a revolution who are we going to be fighting against Zizek? Who is going to be our enemy and who is going to be the likely potential sources of supply and weapons that we might be able to tap into? Enemies of NATO.
NATO are not going to be allies when revolution occurs.
when I pointed out that treating Ukraine’s defense as a proxy war for NATO essentially insults Ukrainians, people don’t seem to grasp it. Ukrainians are being portrayed as if they could choose peace but instead decide to engage in a war that displaces a quarter of their population, just for the sake of a proxy war. But in reality, it’s a matter of their survival.
They don’t survive by fighting a war. And they aren’t being exterminated. Palestine is being exterminated, the two wars look COMPLETELY FUCKING DIFFERENT and he’s insulting everyone’s intelligence by continuing to try to pretend this is a war of extermination or a genocide perpetrated by Russia, it obviously is not.
but someone who has been writing about Marxist aesthetics should know better
He does know better. He’s just a deeply dishonest dickhead and a piece of shit.
Hearing Zizek speak on nuclear proliferation really just solidified my opinion that he has no clue about what he’s talking about half the time. Even pro NATO analysts called him out for being ignorant.
A Nuclear Ukraine Accomplishes Nothing
Note the paragraph about Zizek’s comments. Zizek doesn’t even understand the difference between compellence and deterrence.
He also gave an interview to Süddeutsche Zeitung, published yesterday (in German). Shitty hot takes include:
But we must not forget that the origin of the Enlightenment is humility. Humility in the sense that Europe is the only great civilization to expose itself to permanent self-criticism.
So humble.
The worst thing in Trump’s eyes is for Europe to say: yes, we should significantly increase our military spending. That would be an example of principled pragmatism. Of course I am in favor of peace. But there are situations in which the only way to make peace a little more likely is to arm ourselves and prepare for a possible war.
So doing want Trump says he wants (increase the military budget) is actually the best way to own him, because he doesn’t actually want that. Also why? Then something something “principled pragmatism”, probably just trying to confuse people with that. I hope he chokes on this sophistry.
At the end of the interview he starts blaming migrants for not wanting to be integrated.
Great civilizations comes from humility!
This dude has gone full trash can of ideology
So yesterday Starmer announced they’re scrapping NHS England and the UK soft-left is basically eating it up with an optimistic “oh it was started by the tories so it was bad, this could possibly lead to even worse things”.
…It’s going to government for now but it won’t stay there, the role it played will be fucking outsourced to some american ai company or some shit.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/live/cx29lrl826rt
We’re so fucking fucked. Beyond fucked. Our left is dumb as shit. They’re naive credulous morons.
A lot of libs are mad at the Dems and Schumer right now, even absolute ghouls like Neera and Stencil. In a few days they will calm down and realize they have nowhere else to go - the only alternative to the establishment Dems is the left and the libs would rather destroy the party than give in to the left. So we will be back to business as usual.
Got some clarity on the Canada tariffs;
stock market open: tariffs on
stock market closed: tariffs off
this is good for the stock market
Maybe he’s trying to make a pair of glasses
Toad worshiper Don
Oh nice so it’s an inverter.
If the Trump admin keeps up like this soon we’ll be able to get some sick sounds if we put this through a motor
I find it strange how the Western media keeps blaming Assad for whatever is happening in Syria, I imagine them seeing Bashar Al Assad, just like Gman from Half-Life, who goes around Syria generating neo-baathist rebels just to mess with the pro-Western government. Dude is probably sleeping in Moscow watching football matches all day and sending music to his wife.
It’s because they didn’t get to kill him.
They wanted a Gaddafi
tbh he does look like the Gman
: “Rise and Shine, Mr. Putin, Rise and Shine. Not that I wish to imply you have been sleeping on the job. No one is more deserving of a rest. And all the effort in the world would have gone to waste until…well, let’s just say your hour has come again. The Russian man in the wrong Syria can make all the difference in the world. So, wake up, Mr. Putin. Wake up and smell the ashes.”Heh, I thought Putin would be his employer, not his employee,
After all, GMAN, despite employing Freeman, has his own employers.
