Image is an illustration that I have made to show what each side means when they say that Hormuz is “open” or “closed”, as various officials and analysts have created a lot of confusion with their statements, both intentionally and unintentionally.
I’m tentatively going back to the weekly thread format in the hopes that even if/when the conflict resumes, daily comment counts will keep us at or below ~3000 per week. If not, we’ll just go back to the 3000 comment threshold being what triggers a new thread being created.
The events of the last two weeks have been the most unintelligible of at least the last four years, and on some days I took one look at the situation and decided to just not even bother and do something else until the next day.
To attempt to summarize:
long summary
Against many people’s expectations, including my own, the ceasefire was not immediately scuttled upon its inception despite violations (predominantly against Lebanon), which indicates to me that both the US and Iran wanted a ceasefire more than they wanted to continue firing, at least for two weeks. For both sides, it represented an opportunity to reorganize, rebuild, and restrategize going forward.
The US has continued its rapid flurry of airlifting to and from the Middle East, and while what exactly they have brought and intend to do next is a mystery, airlifting is a very inefficient method of transferring resources en masse, meaning that any kind of massive ground invasion is still many months away (though I still strongly doubt it’ll ever happen). Attempting to do more raids like the failed Istafan raid seems like the most likely option, as well as perhaps some disastrous attempts to hold Gulf islands.
Meanwhile, Iran has been excavating the entrances to their missile cities and has rapidly rebuilt bridges and railway lines. While the rate of reconstruction has shocked some observers, people like us who have paid abnormally high attention to the Ukraine War will not be surprised - infrastructure is very difficult to take out for any meaningful length of time even when it’s not purposefully decentralized. It also seems extremely likely that Iran has continued to receive shipments of resources and weapons from Russia and China, though what exactly is being supplied is not concretely known.
Iran sent a highly qualified team to Pakistan to negotiate, and the US sent, among others, Vice President Vance too. After a marathon ~20 hour session, no deal was struck, and both sides left Pakistan (the Iranian team taking many precautions to not get shot down). While the nuclear issue seemed to be the major sticking point, it is very difficult to see the US - and Trump in particular - formally agreeing to a tollbooth in Hormuz or the retreat from their Middle Eastern bases even if they have already effectively retreated from most of them.
These negotiations took place in an environment of constant violations of the ceasefire on the Lebanon front. Iran initially tied their attendance of talks to a total cessation of conflict in Lebanon, though ultimately decided to go to Islamabad without a de facto ceasefire but with some sort of guarantee that we’ll go tell Netanyahu to stop firing for a while. A few days after the negotiations failed, a more comprehensive ceasefire was actually achieved in Lebanon. It’s still a Zionist Ceasefire (“you cease fire, we keep attacking”), and the Zionists committed several massive civilian atrocities just before the ceasefire began. After the ceasefire began, violations have, to my knowledge, been remarkably few up to the time of me writing this.
Shortly after the failure of negotiations, the US began their own blockade of Iran’s ports. As the US Navy cannot get within a few hundred miles of even the entrance of the Strait of Hormuz, the blockade is taking place at some line in the Sea of Oman, where Iranian ships will be intercepted. The confusion caused by this situation has been incredible, with a few days of people tracking Iranian tankers closely, concluding that if they had crossed the Strait of Hormuz, they had successfully ran the blockade (they had not). After about a week of this de jure blockade, it was indeed confirmed to be real when the US captured its first Iranian oil tanker. This prompted Iran to fully close the Strait of Hormuz (see the megathread image), and there are reports of, as always, at best questionable veracity that in response to the US’s blockade of their blockade, Iran possibly intends to 1) totally blockade Gulf State ports in the Persian Gulf of any kind, not just oil, and/or 2) talk to their ally Ansarallah and have them blockade the Red Sea (and they seem keen to do so in support of the Resistance).
Additionally, Iran has made the end of the US blockade the precondition to enter into new negotiations. The short term and even medium term effect of the US blockade will be minimal - China has a colossal strategic petroleum reserve which will last them several months even with their economy at full steam even assuming all Middle Eastern imports are cut off overnight, and Iran itself is not wholly reliant on oil exports for basic survival like other oil states (though it’ll certainly hurt the economy if prolonged). There are also certain ways that the blockade can be subverted, like potentially some advanced shadow fleet tactics with the cooperation of allied countries, or, in the long term, the construction of overland oil transportation routes (a significant railway route was constructed in the last few years between Iran and China).
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
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:
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.
You have typed words on the Internet and pressed submit, not submitted evidence nor really contending with any of the positions I put forward or evidence I’ve provided many times. You can watch the video I linked here for information from marxists who are actually engaged in this struggle. You can go look at the many links and things I’ve written in the past, sometimes to you, and actually try and read them and contend instead of just ignoring and pushing your agenda. That time you asked to disengage in the end and you haven’t tried to engage with other things I’ve said on the subject and I’m already assuming this is coming down the pipe.
So far you have asserted your theory of change posits that if Venezuela were to lose control over 100% of its oil it would have effectively given up all leverage and been defeated, lost all power, etc. you haven’t proven that is true, but even if it is,
Marxism is a theory of changed based in class struggle yet yours is based on who controls oil. Venezuela is a nation that is controlled by a socialist government, in unity with probably the largest per capita communes on the planet who are mostly self sufficient, firmly steeped in a decades long revolutionary anti colonial movement with large popular support. This is an ongoing class struggle between the Venezuelan nation and the imperialist nations, after decades of internal struggle that saw the toppling of the bourgeois class in Venezuela by the most oppressed classes, ushering in a socialist government that began construction of socialism in Venezuela pretty recently. The communard in the video talks about how they are deepening their revolution and are working with the government to do so. They all are on the same page, but you are on the page of the gringos, literally.
These are millions of socialist humans under siege who are showing a level of militant dedication to revolution that you certainly are not capable of. You say they are defeated because they are under siege and are making wise diplomatic decisions to unblock frozen assets, unblock their economic siege, and continue to fund and deepen their revolution. You have offered no alternatives aside from “resist” but yet feel confident Chavismo is defeated and you are a person who understands what they should have done differently. You haven’t provided sources for your claims, only appealing to “everyone knows it.” I know you aren’t going to even try to take this all in and really consider it but I know a lot of people here are actually trying and I appreciate that and want to contribute to it
Can’t put it much better than that
I for one am getting pretty tired of the person you’re replying to using liberal vibes analysis and declaring it marxist
I try to see it as an opportunity for me to keep myself fresh on combatting that kind of liberalism, a mildly masochistic exercise of some kind, but it is also an annoying thing to see. I don’t mind criticism or question asking or exploring hypotheticals or much really but to declare things so confidently and be so wrong and refuse to really engage with counter points is a special kind of behavior that raises a lot of questions about the character of the person doing it
I’m talking about material control of resources. You are the ones using idealism. Talk of “the revolution is alive you westerner!” Is not convincing to me. Use a Marxist argument about how power is being taken back by the people and maybe I’ll be more convinced but nobody is making those arguments because power is being siphoned out to the US, not the other way around
The people had power before this happened, they have been under an external economic siege which they have almost no control over or ability to stop aside from diplomacy. Your premise is by taking the president they have lost all power, when in reality they are making more money, funding their communes, maintaining internal unity, and continuing their ongoing revolution. You want me to show how they are taking power back which fundamentally proves you don’t have any ground to stand on! You have created an illusory goal post “prove me something that does not exist or you are wrong.” I can’t show you how they got their power back because it wasn’t taken from them, they have held it firmly for a long time and have only gained concessions since the US attack. As I already said, you aren’t engaging with much of anything already said, just kind of repeating yourself like chat bot and ignoring everything else
Repeatedly trying to argue about something you don’t know anything about isn’t useful or even adult behavior
Repeatedly asserting I’m wrong without making materialist arguments will never convince me and I’ll keep pushing back on your nonsense until you do
As a lurker who still finds some value in this newsmega (but seemingly less so all the time) I want to thank you for being one of the few people here willing to consistently stand up to the non-materialist panglossian wave of “analysis” that has swamped this forum. There is so much irony in how the few people saying “ok, let’s look at this from a material perspective” are constantly being accused of being anti-materialist by a set of loud commenters who dominate the conversation with this absurd happy-go-lucky “our guys are always right, are incapable of making any mistakes, we are always winning, and if you disagree you’re a doomer!” garbage. It is ironic that this supposed “doomerism” is always being referred to in this McCarthyist way, like it’s this great threat looming over hexbear that needs to be eradicated, when 95% of the time it’s nothing more than someone saying “wait a sec, are we maybe being too dismissive of the possibility that X event might have actually been bad for the resistance?” which is a healthy and necessary perspective to have even if it ultimately turns out to be incorrect. The real problem isn’t that it’s “doomer” it’s that it’s a counter to the narrative that they want to believe in and push everyone else to as well.
Lol all the anti-doomers know that it sucks that Venezuela was forced into this position, and all their options were less than ideal. But recognizing that they’ve taken the path which would preserve the ability to resist in the future is the correct stance. The whole conversation really feels like people who don’t understand strategy vs. tactics. The tactic is one of retreat and loss, but the strategy might still be sound
I wasn’t even talking about Venezuela, I was referring to the trend around here to shutdown any critique of the the most optimistic stance as “doomer ultraleftists” so your comment isn’t actually addressing anything I said.
There is a difference between “the strategy may be sound,” which I wholeheartedly agree with, and “the strategy IS sound, period,” which is naive but even that is still different than “the strategy IS sound, that is for sure the strategy that they’re using, and if you don’t see it that way you’re a doomer ultraleftist who needs to stfu,” which is what I see way too often around here, and what my comment was actually referring to.
I wasn’t only talking about venezuela, either. People do it every time any group has to take a step back. China, Russia, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, Iran. I’m describing a general unwillingness by a portion of marxists to confront that materialist goals are sometime only achieved through long term strategy for any of various reasons (capacity of a party, international pressure, lacking conditions, etc). And this prioritizing of a long term strategy of survival above martyrdom for the cause (as a group) will take the concrete form of a concession to the enemy.
This strategy is still playing out on the world stage, but many doomers are convinced that the lack of overt revolutions since the 90s is a sign that the strategy has failed. I’m convinced that the strategy has yet to produce large fruit but that the strategists understood this as a very long term thing that never was supposed to win by now. So doomers saying “it’s failed” are expecting fruit as proof of success, but yet the strategy was not even to be at that point yet. So yeah, its unhelpful and hurting the movement to do yell that it failed when nobody who matters thought it would be a huge success yet
This is so disingenuous. Coming on here and saying “Venezuela has ceded all political and economic power to the US and is basically a vassal now run by compradors” is not the type of open minded and thoughtful question you are purporting. You are straight up making things up, as is the person you are responding to, and providing no sources for the claims while acting like everyone else providing actual reasoning and sources for their perspectives are just towing the line.
I’m making things up? lol, not only did I not say any of that, I’m not even talking about Venezuela. I am talking about the entire trend of screeching “doooooooooomer!” every time someone is justifiably worried about something that happened or has any concern about a choice made by a member of the resistance. It’s not just about Venezuela, it happened with the ceasefire, it happens literally anytime anyone questions the most optimistic possible interpretation of how the struggle against imperialism and the Great Satan is unfolding. There is a cohort of commenters here, you included apparently, constantly using the smug emoji and insulting comrades as “ultras” (without even knowing what that means), whenever someone disagrees with the Iranian/Venezuelan/X-anti-Imperialist-group’s leadership can do no wrong and always makes the right moves mode of “analysis.”
What “claims” do you want me to source? Just do a search of the news comm for the term “ultra” and sort by new. Go look at any interaction you’ve had with InexplicableLunch or how about this one with @Leegh@hexbear.net vs others in the Rose-colored-glasses “dissent is doomer” brigade. I commented then as well, one of the many times I was exasperated by the insulting language and behavior so inappropriately used against comrades making valid points, but one of the few times I spoke up about it.
spoiler
For anyone who doesn’t want to click through, this is what I said to Leegh at the time. The top part being quoted was part of her response to someone else that I was referencing:
There are a number of loud commenters here who do think exactly that. And anyone who questions the wisdom of some of the choices made by the IRGC is just a “doomer ultraleftist.” They think the only analysis that has any legitimacy is analysis that assumes it as a foregone conclusion that Iran knows with omniscient power what the best course of action is. If you disagree, you’re just a fool western armchair general, and you have to be over there literally fighting if you want to have any ground to disagree. Nearly everything they say about “doomers” could be said just as reasonably about them, but applied to their non-materialist rose colored glasses regarding their belief that anti-imperialist states are incapable of mistakes or bad tactical decisions.
I almost exclusively lurk rather than comment, but I don’t know why much of the rest of the newsmega seems to go along with it so easily. It’s a shame because on several broader issues, I tend to agree with them more than the one or two bold commenters here who are willing to put up with their petty name-calling and try to engage with them and argue against their Panglossian commentary. The constant “you’re just a doomer” and “you have no valid concerns or thoughts because you are just a lib/ultraleftist westerner” is beyond off-putting and it makes it harder for me to take the rest of their analysis seriously. For all their complaints of how much “doomerism” there supposedly is here, it’s their own pettiness that really drags down the quality of discussion and analysis in the newsmega. It’s all the more ironic when someone posts a comment they they don’t like (which is anything slightly critical of any of the choices Iran has made) and they pull out the “what, you think you know any better you weak minded westerner?” line, because it’s practically certain that there are elements within the Iranian leadership structure that have similar concerns and probably disagreed with a number of the decisions that were ultimately made.
There is plenty more I could say, but I feel like what’s the point when a top level comment getting scores of upvotes is equating a number of people here with literal Zionists just because they have discussed fears that Iran’s agreement to the ceasefire may have been miscalculation.
As far as Venezuela, I don’t know all the details and I never claimed otherwise. But what I do see, including from everything I’ve read here (from “doomers” and the panglossian posse alike) is that under Maduro there was hard opposition to the US and imperialism. Now since the fascist’s kidnapping of Maduro, Venezuela is opening up in significant ways which is deeply concerning to me, meanwhile Delcy Rodriguez is tweeting her sympathies and well wishes to all the fascists at the Correspondent’s Dinner. On the surface all of this looks very bad, and if you want to make a materialist argument that it’s not, and it’s all part of the anti-imperialist plan then fine, do that. If you do, it’s hard to make out when every other sentence is filled with this petty jeering at the “doomers” who are in general if not in every specific case, making much more rational and genuinely materialist arguments.
You were lauding a person for the way they interact here and framed it as if they are just having reasonable level headed takes. the first section you quoted from my comment is me paraphrasing what that person’s take was.
I wasn’t accusing you of saying it, although you are in some ways cosigning it by praising this person.
The next section you quoted is again referencing the behavior of the person you were thanking, who certainly hasn’t provided sources to me when I asked directly, not sure what you are trying to get it by saying looking there will provide them. I wasn’t saying you needed to source anything.
As to the rest of it, I really don’t feel like I need to be charitable, respectful, or kind to people who enter leftist spaces and essentially do the work of the enemy. Most of my comment history is not insulting anyone, calling anyone a doomer, or an ultra, or otherwise. It is very specific people who make it a point to push these ideological lines that I call out and will continue to do so. I have spent plenty of time doing it without insulting anyone but sometimes I might and I’m okay with that
So was Maduro a hindrance or a boon to communards and campesinos or not? 'cause 4 months ago any criticism of him was labelled ultra-leftist, idealist, every other word internet grandstanders use to silence critical understanding of the world. But now apparently they didn’t need Maduro at all and makes it seem like campist hysterics for 4 months ago.
It was the same with Assad. You could not criticize his government or his actions at all, until he fell, then suddenly it was “he’s a corrupt joke” etc. etc.
Where was all that critique and analysis of his corruption and incompetence before his fall? Silenced by campists. After his fall, now we have to pretend we knew all along.
When you see the campism flip 180 it really makes you thonk
Assad and Ba’athism were heavily criticized by marxists the whole time, he got critical support because the alternative was ISIS and now here we are. So yes if your criticism of his gov was that it shouldn’t exist, sure people would rightfully point out that you are essentially taking a pro ISIS stance and are therefore on the side of the US, which you seem to have no problem with because you are consistently on their side against self proclaimed socialist states. All you have is strawmen, why don’t you try actually engaging with the arguments laid out
Maduro was fine enough, the point is that acting like because the US took him the whole project has collapsed is really the whole point of the US taking him. Their only play is manufacturing a narrative that sows division among revolutionaries in hopes that they tear themselves apart from the inside, because from the outside the US can’t do that much since it also needs Venezuelan oil desperately and a land invasion isn’t realistic, especially after their assault on Iran. Cuba is close enough that it is more at risk but Venezuela is very difficult topography.
The US got a symbolic victory that didn’t really effect Venezuela’s project negatively, and actually forced the US to concede to Venezuela that they would lift the blockade against them and even facilitate money going back to Venezuela.
If you take the US and internet ultras position, you believe the symbolic taking of Maduro is a crushing defeat of Venezuela, who has now become a neo colony because of it.
The vice president stepped up and Venezuela continues with more money than they had before due to the US concessions, the communes are getting more funding and diversifying themselves away from oil, but somehow the US wins and chavismo is defeated because they captured the king or whatever.
You see how one side is just a headline and the other is the reality that there has been no shift of power in Venezuela and in fact more funding for their ongoing revolution? That’s the point, taking maduro is a headline, but the revolution is in the hands of the people as it always has been and necessarily must be, and until that fundamentally changes any defeat is only another precursor to a future victory as the struggle continues.
Was reading this article today about MST in Brazil/Venezeula and it gives me a lot of hope, but you’ll notice it’s more about on-the-ground organizing and integration of industries and stuff for people. https://monthlyreview.org/articles/land-cooperation-and-socialism/
Has criticisms of Lula, which internet MLs would label ultra, most likely.
I will try and read it later but generally trust MST probably has good critiques of Lula. He is not anywhere close to as revolutionary as Bolivarian revolutionaries, and is kind of like a Bernie type soc dem if anything, although he is being forced left due to the strong right in Brazil and the global geopolitical situation.
It seems like you think that some MLs are against criticizing leftist leaders and that is far from the case, it’s just that ultras are not criticizing they are purity testing without having any analysis of the material conditions so their criticism is basically made up and also ends up almost always being the exact same made up criticism of the capitalist mouth pieces. It is so tiring to have people pretend to be leftists and then repeat all the lines of the US state department against people actively resisting the US government, while also “criticizing” them for “not resisting correctly.”