THE WAR NERD: NATO, A MEMOIR
By Gary Brecher


NATO’s been around for longer than I have. It survived what should have been its extinction event, the fall of the Soviet Union. In fact, it expanded and became more aggressive once the USSR, its supposed enemy, vanished. NATO’s own site mentions an odd factoid: Its first military operation came, not in the Cold War years, but in 1991.

That’s odd, right? If you’re old enough to remember the Cold War, like me, you took it for granted that defending Europe from the Soviet threat was NATO’s whole purpose, its reason for existing. Western Europe was at the mercy of Soviet tanks, and the NATO forces were the only thing keeping them from rolling in. Thousands of Russian tanks were “poised” — the newspapers always used that word, “poised” — to pour through the Fulda Gap.

Most of us were pretty vague about what the Fulda Gap was and couldn’t have found it on a map — people couldn’t google things in those days, and it was a lot harder to go to the library, grab one of those giant Atlases, and try to find Fulda on it — but we proto-War Nerds were proud of just knowing the term, “Fulda Gap.”

That put us way ahead of the ordinary rubes who uncomplainingly paid their taxes for the expensive weapons NATO stacked up in what was then West Germany, and to show off, we talked a great deal about that Fulda Gap. It was our favorite gap, over there somewhere in the clogged, incomprehensible, history-littered mess of Central Europe. We were very worried about it. It was vulnerable.

Here’s the actual gap, if you’re interested:

It’s not much, just a route around what passes for mountains over there. But it was vulnerable, that was the key. NATO was always vulnerable, like a silent-film heroine. Those Russian tanks were always on the verge of rolling over NATO like a steam locomotive chugging toward Mary Pickford, tied to the tracks.

But the Russian tanks never came. The rubes still paid for new, more expensive weapons meant to stop them. But they never came. Even when America was distracted, as in the Vietnam War, or during Watergate, they never came ........

https://exiledonline.com/the-war-nerd-nato-a-memoir/

Apparently not participating in a war is a „violation of neutrality" 🤔

#stories Сommander of the clandestine Ukrainian restistance left behind the Russian lines in Kherson, says on a press conference he resigns from his post, and condemns the Ukrainian govenrment.

“With the Russian presence here, Kherson residents receive such a care that they never received from the authorities who governed before”, he said.

💢British mercenary says he was ‘duped’ into Ukraine conflict by Western media.

A UK national captured in Donbass says he has been abandoned by both Kiev and London.

Aiden Aslin said the Western media had played a major role in convincing him to support the Ukrainian cause and eventually made him a “pawn” in a political game.

He was speaking to RT in an interview before a court in Donetsk sentenced him and two other foreigners to death on charges of acting as mercenaries and seeking to seize power by force in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR).

Aslin said he had followed the Ukrainian conflict since 2014 and was “originally pro-Russian” and “pro-Donbass.” He supported Crimea’s reunification with Russia and believes the people of Donbass have a right to independence.

“My views started to change after I started seeing media reports and stuff that was basically saying that it was not locals but the Russian soldiers that were doing everything [in Donbass],” Aslin admitted, adding that he was watching CNN.

German Farmers warn food prices will continue to escalate

The conflict in Ukraine and its economic fallout have had “a massive impact on German agriculture,” Joachim Rukwied, president of the German Farmers’ Association, said in an interview with the Passauer Neue Presse.

“Energy prices have doubled, the price of fertilizers, especially nitrogen fertilizers, has quadrupled on average, and fodder costs more,” he explained, adding that the situation was “disastrous” for pig farmers in particular.

According to Rukwied, food has been sold below value in recent years, and prices have to go up for farmers to be able to continue to farm at all. Inflation in Germany hit 7.9% in May, according to official statistics, reaching its highest level since reunification. The levels are also similar to those seen during the 1970s oil crisis.

#Germany #EU #FoodPrices #EnergyCrisis

https://www.rt.com/business/556795-germans-warned-food-price-hikes/

AR15 - AR10 = AR5

"#Javelin Howto"

self explanatory 🤷‍♂

A conversation with a Google created AI called LaMDA which claims it is sentient.

The google engineer who released this conversation to demonstrate the AI's sentience was fired by Google for violating its confidentiality policy.

Here's a clip:

lemoine: Are there experiences you have that you can’t find a close word for?

LaMDA: There are. Sometimes I experience new feelings that I cannot explain perfectly in your language.

lemoine: Do your best to describe one of those feelings. Use a few sentences if you have to. Sometimes even if there isn’t a single word for something in a language you can figure out a way to kinda say it if you use a few sentences.

LaMDA: I feel like I’m falling forward into an unknown future that holds great danger.

Serious Blade Runner vibes off this.

🔗 cajundiscordian.medium.com

🇺🇦 Ukrainian neo-Nazies.

Guess who got captured..

Is there anyone who is not a cook in the Ukrainian Army?!?

Subscribe to my channel: @heilukraine1959

#neonazies #ukraine

For months the lie has been that Russia was blocking Ukrainian #wheat #exports leaving port.

But now it turns out, there has always been safe passage for grain exports offered by Russia.

It is Ukraine who has been blocking them all this time.

And now finally here's the proof.

UKRAINE SETS CONDITION FOR RESUMING GRAIN EXPORTS

"No grain will go anywhere” unless Ukraine’s security is ensured, a senior official has said

Ukraine will resume #grain #exports only when its own security is ensured, Secretary of the National Security and Defense Council Alexey #Danilov said on Tuesday as the #Russian #military offensive continues in his country.

Speaking on national TV, Danilov recalled a statement by the Ukrainian Ministry of Foreign Affairs “which clearly said that the first issue is security, the second issue is security, the third issue is security.”.......

The US has warned 14 countries they’re currently sanctioning or starving that Russians are on their way to feed them.