A reminder that as the US continues to threaten countries around the world, fedposting is to be very much avoided (even with qualifiers like “in Minecraft”) and comments containing it will be removed.

Image is of the USS Abraham Lincoln arriving at Thailand, looking worn after a very long deployment to the Arabian Sea.


My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.

preamble

To start briefly with Iran, there’s been two significant developments over the last week. First is that Iran is now beginning to put into practice its policy that allows preemptive strikes - a policy which was authorized by the previous Khamenei a while before his death but has so far gone unused - to strike at Kuwait, Qatar, and Jordan without a corresponding American aggression immediately beforehand. The second development is that Iran is now taking a firmer stand against the US Navy in the waters of the Arabian Sea, beginning by testing anti-ship ballistic missiles against the US fleet - so far without confirmed hits as of me writing this sentence - as it is obviously disadvantageous for Iran to simply not do anything against the blockade even with US logistics under strain. The US has attempted to dissuade these new strikes by striking Iranian oil tankers, to which Iran has responded by striking oil tankers aligned with the West. This is very much not a shooting war that the US wants to get into as oil stockpiles continue to decline and diesel prices are at all-time highs (though if adjusted for inflation, we still have a little more time before we hit absolute highs). The overall picture is of an Iran growing in confidence.

There’s also been some encouraging news out of Yemen, where Ansarallah has been conducting a ground offensive weaken the enemy occupation of the western coast, including some breathtakingly precise drone-drop operations combined with using recon drones to guide ballistic missiles at enemy formations. As far as I’m aware, the blockade of the Bab el-Mandeb to Saudi tankers has been very successful, although stopping Saudi tankers from heading north towards Suez has been understandably trickier. I suppose if push comes to shove, they can continue to strike the very immobile coastal oil facilities rather than trying to hit moving ships at a great distance.

The news out of Russia/Ukraine has been quite miserable for particularly Ukrainian civilians over the past month or two, with Ukrainian strikes on Russian civilian logistics and warehouses being met with much greater Russian responses on Ukrainian civilian logistics and warehouses. Ukrainian ports are now effectively blockaded, making exporting agricultural products in the same quantities as before essentially impossible, and within the cities including Kiev, food suppliers are scrambling to find smaller warehouses to place goods in so that they aren’t as easily destroyed like the larger warehouses have been. I find it sincerely upsetting that the war has progressed to this point, though it’s always worth noting that, first, Ukraine had a few opportunities to sign pretty good negotiating terms with Russia; and second, in comparison, Western wars begin at the step of making a conflict about hurting civilians, even to the extent of it being a detriment to strategic goals by not solely hitting military targets (most famously in Gaza, but also e.g. during Obama’s term by bombing weddings and hospitals).

I will confess to not being as up-to-date on the situation in Europe, and especially Germany, in regards to the Ukraine War as I would like, but as a general statement, nothing I’ve seen over the last few years has demonstrated to me that Europe is capable of fielding a conventional force which would provide a formidable, let alone existential, threat to Russia at this stage. There’s been lots of embarrassing stories about European missile, drone, and shell production being well below standards in both quality and quantity. My thoughts are now that I think the age of the US/NATO posing an existential conventional threat to China, Russia, and probably Iran (and perhaps others like the DPRK?) is now conclusively over, with Western bases proven to be indefensible with existing missile defence programs, their logistics very vulnerable to disruption, and their aircraft not being safe to use over airspace at least as well-protected as Iran’s. The US can still do cataclysmic, nation-destroying damage to smaller, less defended countries like those in Latin America and Africa, but for the anti-US squad in Eurasia, the vast majority of the threat from the US is now a combination of financial/debt offensives and covert intelligence. We still have a long way to go on both those fronts, however - a minimum of a decade or two, I believe, even with Trump’s inadvertently anti-imperialist accelerationism.

Lastly for this preamble, the annual SCO summit took place on September 1st in Bishkek, with the leaders of China, Russia, Iran, India, Türkiye, Pakistan, and others in attendance. A lot of the usual statements were made: down with hegemonies, down with militarising space, down with unilateral sanctions, up with local currency exchanges, up with cooperation, up with peace, etc etc. The big proclamation this time around was the Bishkek Declaration, which reiterated all those points I just mentioned. Overall, it’s one of those documents where the content is mostly cool and indirectly jabs a lot at the US, but I find that paper is a generally ineffective barrier of protection against bombs and missiles, which is a pretty major avenue of… let’s say, “international communication” in the current day. And I would like to see some real contenders to the World Bank and IMF taking shape soon if we’re gonna truly start fighting hegemonism, but I digress.


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

If you have evidence of Zionist 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 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:

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.


  • Tervell [he/him]@hexbear.net
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    15 hours ago

    https://archive.ph/7909B

    F-35 costs jump in latest production lots

    Compared to recent contracts, the average flyaway cost of an F-35A and F-35B rose by over 11 percent, while the price of an F-35C climbed over 8 percent, according to figures supplied by the F-35 Joint Program Office.

    more

    The cost of all three variants of the F-35 Joint Strike Fighter are increasing by as much as roughly 11 percent, according to the Pentagon. A spokesperson for the F-35 Joint Program Office (JPO) confirmed to Breaking Defense that the average flyaway cost — a metric that measures when a jet has all the equipment it needs for delivery — of the conventional takeoff and landing F-35A rose to $92 million in the aircraft’s 18th and 19th production lots, which will deliver over the next two years. That’s up from the $82.5 million price tag of the jet’s most recent group of production contracts spanning 2023 to 2026, a growth of 11.5 percent. Similarly, the price of a jump jet F-35B rose to $121.4 million across lots 18 and 19, while the carrier-capable F-35C climbed to $110.8 million. For the F-35B, that’s an increase of 11.4 percent compared to a previous price tag of $109 million; the F-35C had the smallest increase of 8.5 percent set against a prior cost of $102.1 million. Air & Space Forces Magazine was first to report the new figures.

    In response to a Pentagon document known as a modernized selected acquisition report (MSAR), which revealed rising buying costs for the stealth fighter, F-35 manufacturer Lockheed Martin previously said the report “shows the combat-proven F-35 program moving into full-rate production, resuming high-volume development deliveries and growing globally.” The company added that the report “also shows that the hard work has shifted from proving the basic aircraft to executing major modernization, improving fleet readiness and controlling long-term sustainment and integration costs.” Lockheed referred back to that statement today when asked to comment on the increased flyaway costs. The F-35 program has been battered by inflation, rising prices of raw materials and supply chain issues, which drove up costs for lot 18, the Pentagon previously told Breaking Defense. Rising rates even sparked a cost dispute with Switzerland, culminating in Bern trimming its buy of the stealth fighter. The flyaway cost includes government-furnished equipment outside the scope of Lockheed’s contract, such as the jet’s F135 engine built by RTX subsidiary Pratt & Whitney. The aircraft’s upgraded radar is supplied by Northrop Grumman, though delays have forced the Pentagon to accept new aircraft without the nose-mounted sensor, Breaking Defense previously reported. It’s not clear exactly how much those features may have influenced the overall price increase.

    Projected F-35 buying costs are going up by over $50 billion across the program’s lifespan due to factors like upgrades, shifting buy profiles and a surge in spare parts to boost lackluster readiness rates. Those costs, detailed in the MSAR document, also showed the F-35’s total lifecycle costs — the sum total the government expects to spend to buy and sustain the fighter — dipping beneath $2 trillion after surpassing that number in 2024. One set of upgrades underway for the fighter is meant to enhance its engine, while a separate is intended to deliver a new power and thermal management system to address cooling challenges. Another modernization program known as Block 4 — which is over budget and years behind schedule — will add a suite of capabilities for the fighter, officials say. Block 4’s computing backbone, known as Technology Refresh 3, has still not been certified for combat, relegating jets delivered over the past two years to training. A total of 20 customers globally, including the US, are on contract for the F-35. International customers can have differing requirements, which may come with varying costs. Foreign buyers also largely acquire the A variant, though some are procuring the F-35B; only the US flies the F-35C. The Pentagon is planning to acquire 148 aircraft each in lots 18 and 19, for a total of 296 aircraft. Lockheed said in September 2025, when the contract was finalized, that the increase in price per jet was below the rate of inflation, while the JPO has said that the cost of the fighter’s airframe is “consistent” compared to prior years when adjusting for inflation.