A reminder that as the US continues to threaten countries around the world, fedposting is to be very much avoided (even with qualifiers like "in Minecraft") and comments containing it will be removed.

Image is of the Central Bank of Iran.


My weekly preamble is in spoiler tags below.

preambleThe so-called "Economic D-Day" is set to start this week, which is the term trotted out by the US to describe what it regards as the most crushing sanctions ever unveiled in all of human history against a foreign state. Up to me writing this, nobody appears to have many guesses as to what precisely this would entail, but a confirmed aspect is secondary sanctions - i.e. the sanctioning of any country that does business with Iran. China is Iran's largest trading partner, and has previously explicitly ordered their oil/refining companies to keep receiving and processing Iranian oil regardless of US sanctions. Assuming China maintains this relationship, and the ever-sanctioned Russia does likewise, it's difficult to see how these sanctions could not only 1) be significantly more effective than the current sanctions on Iran, which are very substantial and yet are being successfully sidestepped and mitigated, albeit at a meaningful cost to Iran's citizens, and 2) outright bring Iran to a position of surrender when it is in the midst of an existential war. The only conceivable way would be if the US did genuinely sanction China in response, which even the US, in this phase of baffling idiocy, is not yet so stupid as to attempt. Other suggestions I've seen is that the sanctions aren't so much about trying to keep China away as much as stopping the Gulf states from ever economically, politically, and indeed militarily reconciling with Iran; essentially saying "At the end of this war, you may not be on our side, but you certainly won't be on Iran's either."

Nonetheless, ever since Iran militarily proved themselves back in March and April, and, in particular, their missile cities proved effectively indestructible, I and many others came to the conclusion that the only way to destroy Iran would be some kind of internal political or economic crisis - likely both, going hand-in-hand - and it appears that US war planners now agree. A resumption of missile fire is still plenty possible, mind, but if I was the US, it would be in support of that hypothetical internal crisis, were it ever to start, rather than putting the cart before the horse. Therefore, one does have to take the threat of some kind of overwhelming economic offensive at least a little seriously, simply because it's the only non-nuclear vector left that has even the vaguest possibility of success. From all the analysts I take seriously, I'm getting signals that trend towards optimism that Iran will survive whatever the Bessents of the world can cook up; however, mere survival should not be Iran's medium/long term goal. Imaginary tankers transiting Hormuz notwithstanding, and with global diesel prices now skyrocketing notwithstanding, it's still unclear to me what the end result would be if Iran and the US simply decided to stop fighting from now on and apply maximum sanctions/energy disruption for weeks, months, or even years on end. Would China eventually pressure Iran to make concessions, for example? Could a critical portion of Iran's population, or a segment of the Iranian bourgeoisie, be tempted to try and overthrow the government to end the pain, long before the economy truly internally collapsed?

That's likely why, in response to the proposed sanctions on Iran, there have been signals coming out of the country (as always, hard to verify in the fog of invented/misattributed statements and exaggerations) that Iran could counterstrike by attacking US economic interests in the region - which, if correctly done, sounds much better to me than simply sitting there with thousands of missiles not being fired while you gradually bleed out over the medium term, hoping that the other guy will bleed out first. This would be a pretty profound step for Iran, though. Aside from maintaining the Hormuz blockade, they have always held the (somewhat strategically dubious) "moral high ground" of being the guy to respond to military attacks, perhaps due to an anxiety of being seen as a warmonger either internally or in countries throughout the world, not least their major allies.

So after all that bloviating, I have little more to offer than a shrug in terms of my predictions about what comes next.


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

If you have evidence of Zionist 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 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:

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.


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[–] 54 points 23 hours ago* (4 children)

"What we know about Trump's deal giving U.S. access to vast oil reserves in Venezuela" - PBS

The U.S. government and an unnamed private operator in Venezuela formed a new company that was given the rights to untapped oil fields for 100 years. A statement from Rodríguez said the deal involves the development of 17 fields with a proven potential of 65 billion barrels. It said the agreement could draw $100 billion in investment into Venezuela's oil industry and yield over $209 billion in taxes for Caracas.

The deal gives the United States 55% effective output of the new private company, including an ownership stake and rights to buy oil at cost. American purchases of the oil will go toward the U.S. strategic oil reserves along with the military, according to a U.S. official who was not authorized to discuss the matter publicly and spoke on the condition of anonymity.

Harvard University professor Ricardo Hausmann, a former Venezuelan planning minister, called it a "shameful deal." "Venezuelans will not respect this illegitimate deal and no major US oil company will take it seriously because they know it will not last," Hausmann said on social media, adding that Rodríguez "has no legitimacy or constitutional power to commit Venezuela to any such deal."

It also is unclear how the industry will react. Persuading big American oil companies to return to the region could prove a challenge given the political uncertainty and damaged infrastructure. Chevron, the only U.S. oil company actively producing in Venezuela, declined to comment. Separately from Trump's announcement, Chevron already had been in talks to expand investment in the country. Exxon Mobil also declined to comment.

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  • [–] 32 points 22 hours ago* (1 child)

    Signing an oil lease for "100 years" really suggests that there were no oil guys involved in the deal at all. This is very likely just more Trump art of the deal Deals (TM) whose only purpose is the headline. Venezuela has also shown the ability to treat C-suite oil guys with the correct level of respect and why wouldn't they return to that in the future? They swapped a mid leader out for another one, they didn't kill the communes.

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  • [–] 28 points 21 hours ago (2 children)

    The "100 years" thing is also unclear (in fact, many details are unclear, other than 'the deal' being a joint development project involving about 65 billion out of Venezuela's 300 billion barrels, around 20%):

    Rodriguez later confirmed the deal, saying it covers 17 strategic oil fields with a proven potential of 65 billion barrels and envisages more than $100 billion in investment and over $209 billion in tax revenue for Venezuela. She said the fields would be developed with the participation of private operators, but the precise ownership structure remains unclear. Earlier reports suggested Washington had sought century-long development rights.

    https://www.rt.com/news/644794-trump-venezuela-oil-reserves/

    Obviously, the White House is going to try spinning it to make it sound as amazing (for them) as possible.

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  • [–] 1 point 1 hour ago

    They're saying it's the best and longest deal ever signed! You know England signed a lease on Hong Kong for only ninety nine years, I'm told the king wanted longer but the CHInese they run a hard deal and the king couldn't do it, he couldn't get a hundred years. Very sad, his advisors were running around saying sir the CHInese they don't want a hundred, they want ninety nine, and the king was very angry. We got a hundred years, a hundred year lease. The greatest lease in the history of real estate, I'm hearing.

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  • [–] 30 points 23 hours ago (3 children)

    It could just be immaterial at the end of the day. Oil infrastructure takes a lot of money to build, and it's very possible a lot of companies view the risk of nationalization as too high to really commit. Still pretty disappointing though. I get the fears of a US invasion. It's very understandable.

    But also the US is about as overextended as it's ever been. This is probably one of the strongest times to stand firm and show some sovereignty.

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  • [–] 32 points 18 hours ago* (2 children)

    But also the US is about as overextended as it's ever been.

    Idk, this is why I think laying low is better than standing firm now. Bolivarian revolution is multigenerational at this point. People here think in hours, but cycles of change are happening over years, decades, lifetimes. In the march of progress, all you can ask is "is my community moving forward, stalled, or moving backwards?"

    They know they have a real socialist project going, with their equivalent of soviets operating widespread and continually reaching new levels of self sufficiency and direct control over the means of production, undeveloped as they are.

    The strategy that psuv has been pretty clear about is to increase their national revenue and to continue diverting that money to the communes and encouraging their advancement towards total control over the state and means of production.

    The alternative is more dead Venezuelans, being greatly set back through key infrastructure being destroyed, and having the least possible national revenue due to oil blockade. This would stall the revolution or even put it backwards.

    The strategy they chose allows them to continue advancing their project, slowly but ever forward still, without any more setbacks than have already been taken from US aggression.

    It's not sexy, exciting, or inspiring. It is a vicious situation which costs real human lives. I feel that almost every socialist country regularly makes decisions we don't like that often make less obvious strategic sense than what Venezuela is doing right now. Venezuela has so far halted any more destruction to their project, is continuing to build it already, and will keep moving forward

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  • [–] 5 points 7 hours ago (3 children)

    with every humiliating concession PSUV and Delcy makes they weaken their own legitimacy and revolutionary credentials in the eyes of the people, as well as undermining their own hard won national sovereignty as a state. This isn't a strategy, these so called leaders are just scared and acting out of fear, which means they aren't acting rationally to advance interests of the nation and the revolution.

    Maduro got kidnapped and is being tortured by the imperialists and his "allies" responded by begging for mercy and emptying their pockets for the aggressor, its fucking sad. Their acts are doing more to damage the Bolivarian Revolution than American bombs would! We all know the empire doesn't shy away from merciless slaughter, but history shows people must fight and die for the right to live as a free and dignified nation. Vietnam, Nicaragua, China, USSR, Iran, Palestine... the path of appeasement is a road to slavery.

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  • [–] 8 points 7 hours ago (2 children)

    Vietnam, Nicaragua, China, USSR, Iran, Palestine

    You know what they all have in common? The ability to actually fight back.

    My understanding is that Venezuela focused on peaceful development when Chavez was elected. There was no violent revolution so it never built up a revolutionary army, and they didn't pivot towards developing the military once in power. They didn't build rockets or drones that could shut down the Panama Canal, nor did they work towards nuclear development.

    There's reasons for this. Military development takes food out of the mouths of hungry people and they believed that it was more important to develop the nation than to defend it. It was also appeasement, they knew military development would anger the US and trigger a violent response because the US will not allow military sovereignty in the Western hemisphere.

    The time to develop its military was ten years ago, I don't see what they could possibly do now.

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  • Ok, so state that. State the Venezuelan revolution is in imminent state of rot and collapse because it failed to develop its military in the past.

    That's a different argument than "everything bad you hear about Venezuela is fake news, the revolution is stronger than ever, colonization is good for the receiving people actually, this brings much needed oil revenue. If this was bad, the communes would revolt in civil war" arguments that you see here.

    Do you see the difference in terms of embracing reality and having sober analysis vs. rejecting it? The first aligns with reality and gives us useful analysis for what to do in the future. The second is living in a fantasy land, and is actually damaging to socialist analysis because it introduces apologetics for colonialism.

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  • [–] 2 points 3 hours ago* (1 child)

    If that's the case then they've just lost then. It's not a strategy, they've just been defeated with scarcely a shot fired and now they will have to suffer the consequences of their weakness. What good was that national development whenn it is now being stolen and repurposed to fund your enemy? So much for Socialism of the 21st Century I guess, toppled by Donald Trump and a DEA "police operation". I hope new Venezuelan leaders and aspiring socialists around the world can at least learn lessons from this and not repeat such mistakes in the future.

    I'm not sure I entirely buy it though, PSUV has as entire government apparatus, a professional (if antiquated) miltiary, favorable defensive geography, and a popular base with the communes. That's more than many socialist movements had to work with when facing more desperate odds. I think there is a failure of political will to fight up top. They fear what happened to Maduro will happen to them and are acting in their own self-interest instead of the interests of the nation. These selfish defeatists should have been purged from government when they still could be.

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  • [–] 7 points 7 hours ago* (2 children)

    history shows people must fight and die for the right to live as a free and dignified nation.

    Fight and die to who? All of your examples are of people fighting and dying to expell invaders from their nations, or fighting their immediate neighbors. who is Venezuela going to fight? They weren't being invaded, they were being economically blockaded. Venezuela literally has no capacity to bomb the US or even defend themselves from US aggression.

    If you analyze the actual material conditions of all of these nations using a marxist framework, it is pretty clear that there are fundamental differences which make it impossible to just copy and paste the choices one group makes onto another. This is entry level Marxism

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  • [–] 1 point 4 hours ago (1 child)

    Materialism is when you surrender to the USA. You may not like it, this is what peak Marxism-Leninism looks like, surrender.

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  • [–] 1 point 4 hours ago (1 child)

    the objectives of the US are not symmetrical to Venezuela. All Venezuela/PSUV has to do is continue to resist and survive as a sovereign polticial power, while the US has to topple the government and install a puppet regime with at least a degree of popular legitimacy. There are many examples of just how ineffective air bombardment is in accomplishing the latter. And an invasion would make survival harder, its not something that just brings targets into range. Venezuela doesn't win by inflicting casualties, the empire doesn't care about the fates of its cannon fodder, it is a contest of political will and popular legitimacy. Read Mao if you don't believe me, he's not just a Marxist he was one of the most influential miltiary strategists in history.

    But America will bomb them, okay, there are measures they could take to defend and make the country more resilient to that. First, their geography favors the defense, Venezuela has all that jungle to conceal stuff in. They could use it to harden and relocate industry, evacuate civilians from the cities, reform the miltiary command into Iranian-style mosaic structure to resist targeted decapitation strikes, mobilize the entire economy for war and introduce strict rationing- they weren't making much money anyway with the aggressive sanctions. Produce propaganda for a people's protracted war. Borrow, beg, and steal to obtain at least a few semi-modern air defense systems, whatever it takes to at least make the imperialists pilots a little nervous on their sorties. If by luck they shoot just one of down, glorify it and make it international news. These are very difficult things, but not impossible. War is never easy, but surrendering without a fight welcomes an even worse fate.

    But maybe you say this would be irresponsible, too many would die, too much would be destroyed, Venezuela is too weak and there is nothing they can do. Well they could literally do nothing. Systematic noncooperation. No diplomatic relations, no agreements, no discussions until they are treated with respect that a sovereign nation deserves. The international community (the non imperialist nations at least) usually finds that very sympathetic. All that oil and gold the imperialists want isn't just going to teleport over to them, they will be forced to go in and take it. If they don't, well there you go, if they do, refer to the previous paragraph. What Delcy and PSUV is doing now is worse than nothing, they're selling out the entire nation to save their own skin.

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  • [–] 26 points 20 hours ago (1 child)

    This is probably one of the strongest times to stand firm and show some sovereignty.

    Not to defende Delcy but if you stand firm in Latinamerica you are going to get fucked, either economically, see Cuba, or militarily, see Venezuela. We don't have ballistic missiles.

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  • [–] 25 points 22 hours ago (1 child)

    It could just be immaterial at the end of the day. Oil infrastructure takes a lot of money to build, and it's very possible a lot of companies view the risk of nationalization as too high to really commit. Still pretty disappointing though

    The copium take is that Delcy knows this and so there's not actually any real giveaway, it just satisfies Trump and keeps him thinking you're his friend.

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  • [–] 4 points 8 hours ago* (1 child)

    Imagine them actually getting some infra investment from the oil majors then nationalizing it again lololol

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