THE FOG OF LIES

World War III update

Since mid-July, there has been an amazing lack of information coming out of Ukraine. According to CBS News and thegrayzone.com, most of the billions of dollars in aid that American taxpayers were forced to surrender ended up in the hands of the black market or in the pockets of corrupt politicians.

Rather than tax my own limited cognitive ability, I'd like to quote Chris Henges in his recent Substack.com essay:

on August 4, Amnesty International published a report titled “Ukrainian fighting tactics endanger civilians.” The report charged Ukrainian forces with putting civilians at risk by establishing bases and operating weapons systems in populated residential areas, including in schools and hospitals, violating the laws of war. To call out Ukrainian for war crimes, however well documented, saw the press and the ruling elites come down in fury on Amnesty International. The head of Amnesty International’s Kyiv office resigned, calling the report “a tool of Russian propaganda.” In one of the many broadsides the Royal United Services Institute in London wrote that “The amnesty report demonstrates a weak understanding of the laws of armed conflict, no understanding of military operations, and indulges in insinuations without supplying supporting evidence.”

So, there's that.

There were stories leaked to the war-hungry public that Russia was targeting its own troops at the Zaporizhzhia nuclear plant. I don't know about you, but this information seemed a bit off to me. Some of us remember America destroying the city of Khe Sanh in Vietnam "in order to save it"; but even the most rabid war hawks never suggested that the Russians were in danger of losing control of that city. The only logical explanation is that Ukraine was endangering all life on the planet by raining missiles onto the nuclear plant.

But, of course, most of us have lost the ability to think clearly and the government believes we will believe anything they tell us.

Ukrainians have been shooting Russian soldiers in the legs and torturing them. But that's okay, because we support our government in Kiev. Mercenary soldiers from the UK and the USA have been captured and their fate is in question. The International Convention against the Recruitment, Use, Financing and Training of Mercenaries, is a 2001 United Nations treaty that prohibits the recruitment, training, use, and financing of mercenaries. Ukraine signed that treaty, making its use of mercenaries illegal and the lives of these professional killers are not protected by the Geneva Accords. No official word has been whispered about their treatment or whether they received their just rewards.

It's like the war is being fought in secret.

The closest thing I've read to a report by a war correspondent are those several conficting reports about the murder of Darya Dugina. Even that story is cloaked in mystery. On August 22, several news outlets reported on her murder. Yet, there seems to be a lot of confusion whether she was targeted for death by Ukraine or by Putin. And there is even more contention whether her father, Alexander Dugin, continues to be seen by the Western press as Putin's brain or as a strident critic of President Putin. Similarly, there are conflicting reports concerning Dugin the elder. He either had a heart attack upon seeing his daughter assassinated or he had a nervous breakdown.

It is likely that we will never learn the truth about what is happening with our tax dollars in eastern Europe. But that's okay because every day those dollars are worth less and less.

"and that's the way it is" - RIP Walter Cronkite