Image is from Wikipedia's article on the war..
I've wanted to cover Myanmar for a while now but haven't had the needed knowledge to write much more than "This situation really sucks." After doing a little reading on the situation, I feel even more confused. A decent analogy is the Syrian Civil War, at least while Assad was in power (though it's still pretty true today) - many different opposition groups, some co-operating with the United States, others not. The main government supported partially by an anti-American superpower, but who could live with that government collapsing if there are deals to be made with the group coming into power. A conflict kept going and exploited at least partially by the United States and other imperial core powers, though with plenty of genuine domestic animosity and desires for political independence.
Recently, the Myanmar government - the mainstream media uses "junta", which is probably accurate despite the connotations - has promised elections at the end of 2025. This doesn't seem likely to happen, and even if it did, how this would work in a country as war-torn as Myanmar is unclear. The government is losing territory and soldiers at a quick pace; they now hold only 21% of the country, though that 21% does at least comprise many of the cities. It's difficult to get a handle on the number of people affected because civil wars and insurgencies have been ongoing in some shape or form for decades, but we're talking at least millions displaced and thousands of civilians killed.
Here's a comment by @[email protected] from fairly recently that covers the situation in Myanmar:
comment
The military government of Myanmar is losing to the Rebel Groups, and badly. https://www.voanews.com/a/myanmar-s-rebels-closing-in-around-junta-into-fifth-year-of-civil-war-/7958145.html
somethings really afoot though, news about myanmar from western outlets and channels have suddenly all remembered myanmar exists and written quite a lot about them in the last few days. Its suspicious, it could be capitalists trying to signal their want for US involvement in the civil war. It could also be a targeted propaganda campaign already pre planned in order to make sure people are clued into the conflict.
I think this seems to be another Assad situation. The Military government is pretty unpopular domestically and is losing quite a bit of ground. I would be surprised if they lasted to 2027. Supplied by both Russia and China, theyve been able to keep some flow of weapons, but are suffering a lot from manpower issues. Conscription has been enacted, but conscripts are a poor replacement for trained soldiers. According to reports, they only hold about 21% of the land and are losing lots of territory. They also have extended their emergency rule for another 6 months, throwing doubt on the ability to follow through with their 2025 election. They've lost large amounts of territory, thousands of soldiers, and 2 regional commands. They're not dead yet though, as they have some ability to retake some territory and win some battles, but again 21%. Rebels currently are making steady progress towards the second largest city in the country.
while I don't like the rebels, they are western aligned, they have popular support and are allied to many of Myanmar's ethnic minority defence groups. Im wondering who really has the power in this situation though, since many of the gains seem to be made by the Ethnic armies, not the NUG. This revolutionary energy could be fueled to establish a socialist federation, but won't, and the popular revolutionary energy is fueled toward the NUG. It'll probably be another pro-west bourgeoisie democracy. It will probably then turn against the ethnic rebels and we'll end up basically where myanmar was pre coup. Probably will have a strong military influence on politics as well, since the rebel forces seem to be made up of officers and very little political groups. By then, people will be extremely tired of war and more likely to accept any conflict resolution than another civil war. In the midst of "It Happened" stands a stronger, unmovable "nothing ever happens". Would be neat if the Communist Party of Burma could somehow come out on top, but they have only around 1000 soldiers and don't control a large amount of territory.
China's interests in the region are still secure, but siding with the Junta is a bad idea, one I understand though. China doesn't want a western aligned power to take over a china aligned state, and is trying to make sure their economic investments in the area are protected and their mineral income is continued. They have deep ties with many Ethnic Minority states, especially on their border, and the NUG forces, mostly again to protect infrastructure investments and keep the minerals flowing. They might flip back to the NUG as the Junta starts collapsing over the next year or so, especially since the new US administration seems to be really cutting back on foreign aid. The General in charge of the rebel government forces complained quite a bit about how much aid ukraine got and how much he wanted that aid. He was basically begging for anti aircraft systems "like in ukraine" lol. China could definitely swoop in and back the rebels, which while hurting their reputation, is probably the best move long term. China's only interest is to keep Myanmar from being pro-west, keep control of Myanmar's mineral flow, and protect other investments in the area.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
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.
Number 3 is unacceptable. De-militarized Ukraine is one of the goals of the SMO and Russia has stated hundreds of times that all goals will be met
What Russia states, and what can be accomplished, are two different things. Unless Russia can get themselves in a battlefield position to demand the de-militirisation of Ukraine, there can't be any de-militirisation. Russia was last in this position in early 2022, which is why Russia demanded Ukrainian de-militirisation in the Istanbul peace talks back then. Getting into such a position again will either require a rapid collapse of the Ukrainian frontlines over the next few months (basically what happened in Kursk over the past few days, but across the entire front), or years more of war, with Russia grinding Ukraine down until Ukraine is forced to accept the demand of de-militirisation.
Given that the frontlines outside of Kursk are not collapsing and US military aid and intelligence sharing have resumed, is Russia prepared to fight the war until 2026, or 2027, or even longer until Ukraine collapses? Or will Russia accept the deal that they can get now, and try to negotiate some more concessions? That is the most important question to ask right now...
If Russia negotiates right now without Ukrainian demilitarization then this will be merely be launching point of the imperialist WW3 in a few years. Putin will grind them into dust
Well Putin has fallen for/went along with such shit before. We must keep his interests in mind, and it's likely still his dream to be accepted as an equal on peaceful and profitable terms. I hope he's not going to do it again, but I see no reason to believe he's fundamentally shifted in the past 10 years. His interests have shifted his alliances but those can be shifted again
we are in the midst of a bloody three year war that he initiated proactively. the west has acted perfidiously repeatedly under all leaders. he's been through minsk 1 and 2. I just don't think he'll do the same thing, he snapped in 2022
Seems idealistic to think this. His interests haven't changed, but how he can/if he can materially gain benefits in those interests has changed. And I shouldn't even focus on him, this is about the ruling class of Russia. Just because the relationship between the current situation and their material interests has shifted doesn't mean that those interests have. His "snapping" was due to a realization that those interests were no longer in line with actions in line with Western Empire. That can still shift quickly and easily if the US really chooses to change those conditions. Using the word 'snapping' and making this claim insinuates some discontinuity which I just see no evidence for.
you have no explanation then for why he started the war against the west
I absolutely do, though I don't think he "started the war against the west" in those terms. I resent being accused of such for a claim I'm not convinced you even understand.
Putin and Russia have interests in security on their borders and national security in general, because that stability is in the ruling class interests. For a long while, the assumed greater stability in these interests was to be found in going along with the west instead of confronting them. Due to the west's continued antagonism, due to Ukraine's position geographically, politically, and economically relative to Russia, and due to a growing possibility to find stability outside of the unipolar Western Empire (e.g. with China), the greater stability was clearly to be found in negotiating a more advantageous position for Russia through war against the party being used against those interests. The fact that the interests eventually pointed in direct opposition to the Western Empire is not due to any discontinuity in these material interests, but in a slow shift in the effects and future effects of the policies of the west on those material interests.
This is clearly no fundamental shift, and it doesn't make him some ideological hero (or hero in any real sense), just the representative of a set of interests which became aligned against the west. The US could today guarantee, with material backing (I can't imagine how at the moment, but I need no example for something that has happened so often in the past) that the interests of the ruling class will be brought in line by a policy shift of the west. And with that guarantee, I'm entirely unconvinced that Putin and the Russian ruling class will maintain your "war against the west".
I'm no pessimist about this, I think that the US is unlikely to do this and that the interests of the two ruling classes are too fundamentally, in the bases, opposed. The West would have to do some Cold-War level concession-giving, which is too forward thinking than the West is used to at the moment. But that is very different than thinking Putin himself had some fundamental shift.