Image is of the Preah Vihear Temple on the Cambodian border. Image sourced from the UNESCO World Heritage website.

Over the last few days, Thailand and Cambodia entered into a heightened stage of conflict due to a long-running border dispute. Like many problems on this planet, Europeans are ultimately to blame - specifically France. Certain sections of the border drawn up by France about a century ago were not fully agreed upon by both sides, with the ownership of some Khmer temples being the most visible points of disagreement.

Despite interventions in favor of Cambodia in the 1960s and later 2010s by the ICJ - one of the mainly mostly useless global institutions that liberals periodically disown - the border conflict has simmered at a generally low level. Of the two countries, Thailand is significantly more militarily and economically powerful.

Last Wednesday, a Thai soldier lost his leg by stepping on a landmine, prompting a rapid escalation between Cambodia and Thailand that has since resulted in dozens of deaths and tens of thousands displaced. Cambodia was willing to come to the negotiating table fairly quickly, but Thailand was more hesitant. International pressure on the two countries by Malaysia, China, and the United States eventually forced Thailand to the table, and they have recently agreed to an immediate ceasefire courtesy of ASEAN.

Notably, Trump refused to hold trade talks with either country until they agreed to peace, which suggests that he really wants a Nobel Peace Prize - which he seems a shoe-in for given that he’s met the two most important requirements that several Nobel Peace Prize recipients have needed to meet in the past, which are: 1) start at least one war, and 2) accelerate the genocide of millions of people as billions more people watch on. His policies vis-a-vis ICE creating a domestic terror regime only further increase his chances of winning the prize.

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.

Israel-Palestine Conflict

If you have evidence of Israeli 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 Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:

UNRWA reports on Israel’s 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.

English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.

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.

  • Tervell [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
    49·
    1 month ago

    wait, so Western rearmament is all just loans? https://archive.ph/6wP75 (yesterday’s episode in this saga: https://hexbear.net/comment/6366482)

    Poland Gets New U.S. Loan for Weapons, Plans to Use It to Upgrade its F-16 Fighter Jets

    U.S. gives Poland new FMF loan to keep key arms buyer — funds will go to F-16 upgrades, helicopters, and air defense systems. Poland will receive a new $4 billion loan from the United States under the Foreign Military Financing (FMF) program. This will be the country’s fifth such loan in the past two years. In total, Poland has recently secured $15.08 billion in military loans.

    dawg I love to be 5 loans deep into my military modernization program, this will surely have no further consequences down the line

    also, btw, some of you military procurement heads may have heard of all the South Korean tanks and other gear that the Poles are buying. You know how they’re financing that? That’s right - a loan… from, uh, South Korea?! Love to loan a guy some cash so he can then pay me my own money to buy my stuff!

    According to Defense24, the new funds will be used to upgrade its F-16C/D Block 52+ fighter jets, as well as to purchase AH-64E Apache helicopters and Patriot air defense systems. The U.S. has stated its interest in continuing cooperation in this area. The F-16 upgrades will include new AN/APG-83 SABR AESA radars, mission computers, data fusion systems, electronic warfare systems with updated databases, modern weapon systems, and other improvements.

    Previously, after the announcement of the new U.S. defense budget, there were concerns in Poland that it might no longer be able to access FMF loans for new weapons purchases — essentially jeopardizing large defense contracts with American companies. As an alternative, the European Security Action for Europe (SAFE) program was proposed, allowing countries to borrow funds to purchase European-made weapons. Poland even created a list of qualifying domestically produced equipment under the program. For example, the Czech Republic plans to use SAFE funding to acquire Leopard 2A8 main battle tanks. Even Ukraine has expressed interest in such funding to address urgent needs in UAVs, missiles, and ammunition.

    Now it’s clear that Poland does not have to give up on U.S. weapons while having an alternative path for procuring European equivalents. This allows Warsaw to choose the better option and cover a broader range of defense needs. Of course, the loans will eventually need to be repaid —but given their favorable terms, they allow Poland to strengthen its defense now and spread the financial burden over time. It’s not a perfect solution, but it’s a practical and available tool.

    • vovchik_ilich [he/him]@hexbear.netEnglish
      39·
      1 month ago

      Poland really loves to go into debt in other countries’ currency doesn’t it? It really didn’t learn the lesson from the 70s-80s.

      Also, you should compile the various news you’ve been posting of EU failing to remilitarize and post them all together in one single post or comment in the news thread, the stories really complement each other.

    • MarmiteLover123 [comrade/them, any]@hexbear.netEnglish
      22·
      1 month ago

      Poland just wants to buy as much military equipment as they physically can in the shortest amount of time possible. Just look at the lists of what they’re buying, it’s quite wild for a country with less than 40 million people. Obviously the money doesn’t exist to buy all this stuff right now, so they have to use loans. The US is more than prepared to give out such loans (at least for now), so they can arm Poland to the teeth. 32 F-35s and 6 Patriot batteries on order, as well as looking at the South Korean KF-21 4.5/5th generation aircraft (with 36 South Korean FA-50s already on order), and US F-15EXs. There’s already an AEGIS ashore site in Poland as of last year as well. And that’s just higher level air defence and air force stuff, not counting all the tanks they want to buy. Poland borders Belarus, Ukraine, Lithuania and most importantly, the Russian enclave Kaliningrad.