Showing posts with label Congo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Congo. Show all posts

Sunday, December 14, 2025

Wars and Rumors of War, 2025. Part 9. The Neville Chamberlain Edition.

You will hear of wars and rumors of wars, but see to it that you are not alarmed. Such things must happen, but the end is still to come. Nation will rise against nation, and kingdom against kingdom.

Matthew, Chapter 24.

The settlement of the Czechoslovak problem which has now been achieved is, in my view, only the prelude to a larger settlement in which all Europe may find peace. This morning I had another talk with the German Chancellor, Herr Hitler, and here is a paper which bears his name upon it as well as mine. Some of you perhaps have already heard what it contains, but I would just like to read it to you. " ... We regard the agreement signed last night and the Anglo-German Naval Agreement as symbolic of the desire of our two peoples never to go to war with one another again".[3]

* * *

My good friends, for the second time in our history, a British Prime Minister has returned from Germany bringing peace with honour.

I believe it is peace for our time...

Go home and get a nice quiet sleep.

Neville Chamberlain.

Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain showing off the Munich Pact with Adolf Hitler that granted Germany territorial concessions in Czechoslovakia and which set the stage for increased German avarice and World War Two.

November 23, 2025

Russo Ukrainian War.

Regarding the articles of surrender being pushed by Donald Trump on Ukraine, a CST headline:

KYIV’S ALLIES PUSH BACK ON US PEACE PLAN

The claimant of Presidential Power, Дональд Трамп, stated that the proposal was his "final offer", as if the US is doing the offering.  Secretary of State Rubio, who always looks like he's caught in a bad dream and who is probably the only significant member of the cabinet who is not a complete today, claimed that the plan is a "wish list", not a plan.

Independent Maine Sen. Angus King said earlier in the day that the plan is “one of the most serious geopolitical mistakes in my lifetime" comparing it to the 1938 Munich Pact.  Sen. Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., said in statement, “if Administration officials are more concerned with appeasing Putin than securing real peace, then the President ought to find new advisors.” Sen. Thom Tillis, R-N.C., said McConnell’s criticism didn’t go far enough. “Putin is a murderer, a rapist and an assassin. . .  We should not do anything that makes him feel like he has a win here.” Sen. Jeanne Shaheen, D-N.H., ranking Member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, called the plan an “outrage.”

Israel v. Hamas in Gaza

Israel hit Gaza yesterday with airstrikes.

November 24, 2025

Israel v. Hezbollah

Israel launched a raid in Lebanon Saturday that killed Hezbollah's chief of staff.

November 26, 2025

Russo Ukrainian War

Steve Witkoff: Hi Yuri.

Yuri Ushakov: Yeah Steve hi, how are you?

SW: Good Yuri. How you doing?

YU: I am ok. Congratulations my friend.

SW: Thank you.

YU: You made a great job. Just a great job. Thank you so much. Thank you, thank you.

SW: Thank you Yuri and thanks for your support. I know your country supported it and I thank you.

YU: Yes, yes, yes. Yes. You know that’s why we suspend the organization of first Russian-Arabic summit.

SW: Yes.

YU: Yeah, because we think that you are making the real job there in the region.

SW: Well listen. I am going to tell you something. I think, I think if we can get the Russia-Ukraine thing solved, everybody’ll be jumping for joy.

YU: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, you need to solve only one problem. [laughs]

SW: What?

YU: Russian-Ukrainian war.

SW: I know! How do we get that solved?

YU: My friend, I just want your advice. Do you think that it will be useful if our bosses will talk on the phone?

SW: Yes, I do.

YU: You do. And when you think it could be possible?

SW: I think as soon as you suggest, my guy is ready to do it.

YU: Ok, ok.

SW: Yuri, Yuri, here’s what I would do. My recommendation.

YU: Yes, please.

SW: I would make the call and just reiterate that you congratulate the president on this achievement, that you supported it, you supported it, that you respect that he is a man of peace and you’re just, you’re really glad to have seen it happen. So I would say that. I think from that it’s going to be a really good call.

Because — let me tell you what I told the President. I told the president that you - that the Russian Federation has always wanted a peace deal. That’s my belief. I told the president I believe that. And I believe the question is — the issue is is that we have two nations that are having a hard time coming to a compromise and when we do, we’re going to have a peace deal. I’m even thinking that maybe we set out like a 20-point peace proposal, just like we did in Gaza. We put a 20-point Trump plan together that was 20 points for peace and I’m thinking maybe we do the same thing with you. My point is this...

YU: Ok, ok my friend. I think that very point our leaders could discuss. Hey Steve, I agree with you that he will congratulate, he will say that Mr. Trump is a real peace man and so and so. That he will say.

SW: But here’s what I think would be amazing.

YU: Ok, ok.

SW: What if, what if... hear me out...

YU: I will discuss that with my boss and then I come back to you. Ok?

SW: Yeah because listen to what I’m saying. I just want you to say, maybe just to say this to President Putin, because you know I have the deepest respect for President Putin.

YU: Yes, Yes.

SW: Maybe he says to President Trump: you know, Steve and Yuri discussed a very similar 20-point plan to peace and that could be something that we think might move the needle a little bit, we’re open to those sorts of things — to explore what it’s going to take to get a peace deal done. Now, me to you, I know what it’s going to take to get a peace deal done: Donetsk and maybe a land swap somewhere. But I’m saying instead of talking like that, let’s talk more hopefully because I think we’re going to get to a deal here. And I think Yuri, the president will give me a lot of space and discretion to get to the deal.

YU: I see...

SW: ...so if we can create that opportunity that after this I talked to Yuri and we had a conversation I think that could lead to big stuff.

YU: Ok, that sounds good. Sounds good.

SW: And here’s one more thing: Zelenskiy is coming to the White House on Friday.

YU: I know that. [chuckles]

SW: I will go to that meeting because they want me there, but I think if possible we have the call with your boss before that Friday meeting.

YU: Before, before — yeah?

SW: Correct.

YU: Ok, ok. I got your advice. So I discuss that with my boss and then I come back to you, ok?

SW: Ok Yuri, I’ll speak to you soon.

YU: Great, great. Thank you so much. Thanks you.

SW: Bye, bye.

YU: Bye.

[Call Ends]

From Bloomberg.

This comes at a time when the illegitimate Trump Administration, headed by a man who committed actual sedition, is threatening to prosecute members of Congress for sedition.

November 28, 2025

Russo Ukrainian War

Putin termed the Trump surrender terms a "starting point" and threatened to overrun Ukraine with Russia's larger army if Ukraine did not come to terms.

It should be plain by now that Russia's army is crap.  It has been since some point before 1900.  If it could overrun Ukraine, it would have by now.  If all aid was cut off to it, and Russia then overran Ukraine, a guerrilla war would then ensue.

cont:

US. v. Venezuelan boats

From the Washington Post:

Hegseth order on first Caribbean boat strike, officials say: Kill them all

As two men clung to a stricken, burning ship targeted by SEAL Team 6, the Joint Special Operations commander followed the defense secretary’s order to leave no survivors

 

So now we kill people in the water.  Something we decried in World War One and World War Two.

A U-boat commander was tried and executed for that after the Second World War.

Heinz-Wilhelm Eck.  He ordered his crew to kill survivors and was convicted of a war crime and sentenced to death as a result.

November 30, 2025

United States v. Venezuela

Trump threatened to close Venezuelan air space.

cont:

The United Kingdom no longer shares intelligence with the US in the Caribbean due to the illegal actions of the United States in this region.

December 5, 2025

Congo

Rwanda and Congo signed an agreement aimed at bringing peace in the region, but analysts are skeptical of it holding.

United States v. Venezuela

U.S. Navy Adm. Frank M. Bradley denied in front of Congress that there'd been a "kill them all" order given by Hegseth.

December 8, 2025

United States v. Venezuela 

Members of Congress appeared on the weekend shows about the murder of two men in the fist strike who were on a remnant of the destroyed boat.

Tom Cotton showed himself the most extreme, maintaining that they were a dangers as they were attempting to upright the boat and reload the cargo, which is absurd.  He pretty much took the position that killing drug runners through military force is perfectly okay.

If that's the GOP position, and it apparently is in Congress, they should just state that.  The problem is, of course, that Trump just pardoned convicted drug runner, former Honduran President Juan Orlando Hernández.  Cotton claimed not to know the details of that while berating the host of This Week.

Add Cotton to the list if individuals who are temperamentally unsuited to be in Congress.

Thailand v. Cambodia

The countries entered into a ceasefire agreement recently which Trump claims as one of his "eight wars".  Thailand bombed Cambodian positions on their disputed border yesterday.

December 11, 2025

United States v. Venezuela

The US seized the Guyana-flagged "Very Large Crude Carrier" that was loaded covertly with 1.1 million barrels of oil in mid-November.   The ship was headed for Cuba, but has been anchored offshore Venezuela since being loaded with oil.  Half of the country's oil production goes to Cuba.

Why did we stop it?

This isn't clear, actually.  The government claims the ship is involved in the illegal transportation of oil.

December 14, 2025

US (and Syria) v ISIL

An attack in Syria killed U.S. troops and civilians.

Israel v. Hamas

An attack by Hamas wounded Israeli soldiers and Israel retaliated by killing a top Hamas figure.

Related threads:



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Thursday, November 20, 2025

Thursday, November 20, 1975. Death of Franco.

Franco with Eisenhower in 1959.

Francisco Franco died at age 82, ending his long dictatorship and bringing the country back to the path of democracy.

Franco, in spite of his long reign, remains one of the most enigmatic of 20th Century figures  Often cited to be a fascist, he was not, but he was certainly a fascist fellow traveler in the 1940s, and Spain's true Fascists, the Falangists, were consolidated under his rule and had no choice but to follow them, even though he very occasionally suppressed them.  He supported the Axis in much of World War Two while managing to avoid actually having Spain become a full blown combatant.  German submarines had refuge at Spanish ports for a time, and early in the Battle of Britain the Luftwaffe used northern Spain for launching aircraft on Great Britain1  Fascistic Spanish troops fought as a German foreign legion.2  Always savvy to political winds, he began to draw away from the Axis late war.  He might be best compared to Petain in his political alignment, but even that is imperfect.  

A monarchist at heart, he restored the Spanish monarchy late in his rule, but even at that he did not ever release power. Death brought that.

Franco's rule commenced with the Spanish Civil War, which he was not originally the right wing military head of.  The war itself was basically a military revolt against an incoming Communist regime.  Franco fought the war well, but it also maximized violence in some notable ways.  Approximately 420,000 Spaniards were killed by way of extrajudicial killings during the Civil War, and in state executions immediately following its end in 1939, a remarkable figure given that Republican combat deaths were about 110,000, and Nationalist about 90,000.  Killings tapered off thereafter and into the 50s.  His rule emphasized Spanish nationalism and traditionalism, enforcing by force of law.  

Economically, his policies were murky, and for some time the country adopted autarky, which was the economic theory favored by the Nazis, and which didn't work out for them either.  Economic disaster resulted in reform.

Like France, Spain attempted to retain its empire post World War Two, but Franco was forced to yield to the times.  When France yielded to Moroccan independence, Spain largely did as well, but retained some holdings.  Spain fought a war with Morocco to hold on to the Spanish Sahara, but in 1975 it ultimately ceded to Moroccan wishes.  Spain,under Franco, provided bases to the OAS in its effort to retain French control of Algeria.

Unlike most of the far right dictators of the European 20th Century, Franco always retained a bit of a following in certain sectors of the US, and still does.  In some circles he was viewed as the only alternative to Spanish communism, and in fact, in terms of the Spanish Civil War, that might actually be right.  That wouldn't excuse the nature of his rule, however.3

Others, more alarmingly, are currently attracted to his politics.  A Wyoming Hageman intern, for example, resigned his position when he was found to be a follower of Francoist websites, although he later successfully reemerged as a Turning Point USA figure at the University of Wyoming, brining the late Charlie Kirk to the campus..  Some figures on the Illiberal Democracy, National Conservative, side of the GOP are very close to being Francoist in their views.  Indeed, absent the economic aspects of it, Francoism is nearly the model of how certain Illiberal Democrats imagine Western nations should be run.

This is one of those things I can actually remember from 1975 and place the date on.  For some reason, on this date, I was traveling with my father in our 1973 Mercury Comet.  I think we were going to Cheyenne.  The radio news broke in continually with updates on Franco's physical decline.4

A report by the U.S. Senate Intelligence Committee confirmed that the U.S. Central Intelligence Agency had tried twice to assassinate Cuban dictator Fidel Castro, and once to tried to poison Congo Premier Patrice Lumumba.  It also confirmed that the CIA had supplied aid to insurgentes who later assassinated South Vietnam's President Ngo Dinh Diem and Dominican Republic dictator Rafael Trujillo.

However, it also confirmed that "No foreign leaders were killed as a result of assassination plots initiated by officials of the United States", which is good I guess, but it wasn't for want of trying in the case of Castro.  Diem and Lumumba were in fact both assassinated, but not by the US, in spite of the ongoing belief that the US actively participated in Diem's assassination.

Dr. Heinrich Schuetz was sentenced to ten years in prison after being convicted of war crimes in Munich, West Germany. In 1942 as an SS colonel he had injected bacteria into eleven Catholic priests at Dachau.

Footnotes:

1.  Churchill has his diplomats quietly approach the Spanish government and informed them that the UK was aware of where the Luftwaffe plains taking off in northern Spain were coming from, and that the UK would bomb the airbases if it didn't stop.  It stopped.

2.  The unit started off as an outright Spanish contribution to the German effort in the USSR, but after the Allies complained, troops in the Spanish Army were ordered to return home to Spain or resign. Those who resigned remained behind as a unit in the German SS.

3.  My mother, who was well aware of the Spanish Communist sacrilegious desecration of Catholic churches, took the position that Franco was Spain's only choice against Communism.  My father took the much more nuanced view that whichever side won, the Spanish were going to lose.

In the US, the Republicans were generally seen, in the Great Depression, as liberal democrats, which they largely were not.  As the war progressed, the Republicans became more communistic as Spanish Communists, with support from Moscow, presumed victory and began to purge the rival forces on the left.  American leftists famously contributed the Abraham Lincoln Brigade of volunteers to the Republican cause, some of whom were American Communists.  In the pre Cold War era, the full nature of Communism was not really very well understood in the US.

In Europe, in contrast, the war drew volunteers to both sides. Both Irish and English mercenaries volunteered, for example, to serve under Franco.

4.  The fact that it was a Thursday means my father took a very rare off day from work.  What I think we were doing is going to Warren Air Force Base so we could pick up uniforms for the Civil Air Patrol.  When we were there I recall a supply sergeant gave my father a USAF "Dumbo Collar" OG-107 Field Jacket.  My father unsarcastically loved it and wore it as a winter outdoors coat for the rest of his life.

I was 13 years old.

The next time I would be on Warren AFB would be when I was 17.  I had applied for admission to the Air Force Academy and was required to go there for a physical.  My father likely drove me down as I probably wouldn't have driven to Cheyenne as a 17 year old.  I can recall when I checked in the Air Force medic noted my name and told me he had the same first name, albeit in Spanish.

As I was also an applicant to the U.S. Military Academy (and the Naval Academy) I took an Army physical at the local Army National Guard armory.

I obviously didn't get in, which I'm glad about, I think.

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