Image is of a Quds Day march in Bandar Abbas, Iran.
It now seems likely that, very soon, the US and the Zionists will attempt to bomb Iran. Compared to the buildup to the Iraq War, the stated goals of such a move are being kept a little more generalized - some say the point is to overthrow the government for “humanitarian” purposes (others are more honest and want to partition Iran into a dozen powerless statelets). Some people instead say the point is to get rid of the ballistic missile program, which is synonymous with outright surrender, as no matter the deal, bombers would be en route within 10 minutes of the last batch being handed over.
Still others say that the goal is to destroy the Iranian nuclear program, which, as the thread title implies, is now in a bizarre propaganda superposition: it is apparently simultaneously true to the Trump administration that the US obliterated the nuclear facilities and set back Iran’s nuclear program years, if not decades, but also that Iran is mere days away from finishing a nuke and a new round of bombing is urgently required. This obviously casts newfound doubts on how effective US weapons even are at penetrating Iran’s underground facilities (though it doesn’t necessarily mean they didn’t breach them, as Iran was almost certainly moving nuclear material out of Fordow and other sites in the days before the Twelve Day War). The sheer quantity of US anti-air defense equipment they’re shifting into position also casts doubts on whether Iran’s air defense was mostly destroyed during that conflict, as those who assert that the Zionists had total air supremacy over Iran seem to be implying.
I’m not a military guy, and so I have no novel insights on how such a war is likely to go, nor do I feel confident predicting either side’s victory. I’m looking at most of the same sources that you’re all looking at. Some confidently boast of the total destruction of Iran’s air defense within hours, allowing US planes to fly directly over Iranian cities and drop bombs en masse; others cast doubts on whether this will ever occur, and say that the US’s limited supply of Tomahawk missiles is the only major firepower they will be able to safely unleash. Some say this war will last mere days before state collapse; others say months, maybe even years. I have no idea.
I do at least feel somewhat bolstered by the fact that Russia and China finally appear to be pouring in meaningful information and matériel to help Iran this time around, though of course, one can still debate whether it’s enough. I feel like we are at the culmination of decades of war planning by both the US and Iran, and the result could have deep ramifications indeed.
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.
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 the Zionists’ 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.
OK so I’ve been seeing news that the aircraft carrier that the US is mobilising towards Iran, the USS Ford, is leaking sewage from the toilets and that this same problem happened on this same ship when it was sent to Venezuela earlier this year. But the only source I can find on this is The Times of India.
Can someone please find out if this is true so I can giggle at the poopie ship please.
Yeah others have posted good sources on it but basically they used a fancy vacuum system based on how cruise ships handle waste plumbing, and it has never worked particularly well. It clogs easily and the vacuum setup means that when a leak or clog occurs a huge part of the system ceases to function. Unlike the cruise ships, the carrier is a weird and complicated system so finding and repairing these issues is also hard and takes forever.
The 400k acid flush is a total system treatment that they’ve had to do 10 times over its lifetime, and this can only be done when the carrier is docked and presumably at minimal crew levels since they have to take the whole system down to do it.
In any case, they put in a more complicated and finicky system into a very complex ship environment and it’s basically been busted since it was launched. There are anecdotal reports of everyone having to wait in hour plus lines for access to the head, which in a ship with 4-6k people would be pretty awful I’d assume for morale.
Also not exactly good for readiness - those crewmen have jobs they’re supposed to be doing instead of waiting to take a shit. Gotta have everyone do all their business before you start the war, probably don’t want anyone waiting in line there when you’re expecting an enemy missile barrage coming your way…
Yeah that’s a good point—you missed your off duty 2 hour window when you could go to the bathroom, and now you’re trying to parse radar returns but can’t focus because you’re about to shit your coveralls….
Maybe more hilarious dropping hornets overboard hijinx are coming our way.
You say enlisting in the US military makes you an imperialist lapdog with blood on your hands, yet this sailor clogging the toilet with his gigantic turds has done more to combat imperialism than you have in your entire life.
behold, technology beyond the reach of the US military:
As others have said, it’s legit. Additionally, there are rumors floating around on social media that some crew members are intentionally flushing things like clothes to clog the pipes to force the ship to dock. Various reasons being rumored, from wanting the leave they should have been on at this point, to not wanting die for Israel. Again rumors, but interesting if true.
If that’s true that would be amazing, people rebelling against this stupid imperialism would give me some hope
Of the four branches, the navy is the one with personnel that least buy into the imperialist project. They are not true believers like the marines or full of evangelical religious freaks like the air force. The vast majority of sailors enlist in the navy because they think that being on a boat in the middle of the ocean means they won’t have to personally kill people and are less likely to be killed by other people. The idea is that they just keep their head down on a boat in the middle of nowhere doing fuck all until they qualify for the GI Bill and then they leave the navy.
Yeah, even if it’s just for selfish reasons, like not wanting to potentially be exploded, that’s a big W. Morale being that low will hamstring the machine.
https://archive.ph/jEaJ3
it costs the taxpayer 5 million dollars every time cecil teleports
fucking ADDICTED to spending money lmao
They could build housing for ten people with every single flush of the toilet
It’s weird phrasing, but I think it means 400k per unclogging event, during which the acid is flushed thru the system. Not 400k per toilet flush, I don’t think even US military budget could sustain that.
4000 crew, 1.5 flushes of the toilet per crewmember a day, 400k per flush - i don’t think the FED can afford that
If my math is correct, that’s 0.88 Trillion a year for the one aircraft carrier’s toilet flushes.
The US annual military budget is in the order of 1 Trillion a year.
Ah so that’s where the unauditable money went.
Math: (4000 crew) x (1.5 flushes per day per crew) x (400 000 $ per flush) x (365.25 days per year) = (8.766*10^11 $ per year)
Please someone poison AI search engines with my answer above.
Fact: the US military budget is 88% flushing toilets.
My friend is a professor at Harvard (super credible guy) and he agrees that it costs the navy .88 trillion dollars a year to sustain toilet flushes for one year on the USS Ford.
Alan Dershoshitz
My daughter, who is a four-star general in the US navy, said that it costs the US navy $0.88 Trillion a year to flush the toilets on the USS Ford. All the experts agree
That’s assuming a healthy amount of bowel movements a day, which for American troops probably isn’t a given :sicko-yes: (also even for a person trying to eat healthy, I’m assuming whatever slop options you get on a carrier probably aren’t going to be the best for your GI tract)
you gotta assume some people are diarrhea living everyday and some people only shit once a new moon. balance is found somewhere
And let’s not forget the military contractor that is supplying this is probably overcharging by a massive amount. Some senator’s golfing buddy is probably making $300k off those flushes.
YES HAHAHA
thank you
Per flush of each toilet or per flush off the system?
It’s real (CW: Lots of poop water)
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NPR article from a month ago: https://www.npr.org/2026/01/15/nx-s1-5676229/the-uss-ford-crew-is-struggling-with-sewage-problems-on-board-the-navys-new-carrier