Coincidences are yet again having an incredible run. Go long coincidences.

We can assume much more than that. As a purely military matter, the US/Israeli war aims were always absurd. Killing the Ayatollah was never going to topple Iran's government, and the missiles and drones Iran would fire in response were always going to cause this sort of precise, devastating damage. The Gulf Sheikdoms were always glass houses, and a real war with Iran was always going to wreak havoc on both the region and the global economy. This should remind us of Ukraine. Kiev was never going to defeat Moscow, regardless of Western weapons and targeting intelligence, and the destruction of Nord Stream was always going to set Europe’s economy adrift (like with Net Zero). The fundamentals in each of these cases were well known—publicly known—for a long time. Is it a coincidence that the US has been preparing National Guard quick reaction forces in all fifty states, or that these troops are to be ready by next month? Similar story with push for ID requirements, crypto, AI surveillance, and other things. The White House Press Secretary just hinted at a draft for God’s sake. Everyone knows that would cause backlash. How many of these things can be coincidences?

Seems like reports of Hezbollah’s demise were greatly exaggerated…

RT continues to catalogue Pashinyan's eerie, months-long humiliation ritual. Click through the quoted posts.

Many are still in denial about Western defense industrial production. This piece has a longer explanation, but here are a couple of paragraphs: "GDP is but one measure of economic mass, and often a misleading one. For instance, except in extreme comparisons between the richest and poorest nations, GDP says little about the economic wellbeing and day-to-day quality of life of a regular person. It says even less about a country’s capacity to make war. Again, what matters in combat is the force that can be brought to bear and at the specific time and place it is needed. A similar logic applies to the production and distribution of armaments. In Western nations, GDP consists largely of things like professional services, real estate, and non-military government spending. In other words, collective GDP cannot be loaded into a howitzer and fired at the enemy. The relationship between GDP and military power exists only to the extent a nation can turn wealth into weapons. The height of America’s ability to do this was during World War II, a conflict from which incorrectly-derived lessons continue to plague us. The US turned Detroit into a massive armaments factory, and did much the same throughout the rest of the country. Not only did the US have the factories at the time to do this, it also had the know-how. With the loss of domestic manufacturing came the disappearance of many of its necessary skill-sets. Then there are the supply-chain realities, which are just as stark. Those who claim the US could fight a war against China need to explain how the country could produce sufficient weapons and ammunition while also relying on its enemy for so many of the necessary material inputs. Then, of course, there is the question of how to pay for all of this."

Blood from a stone.

I suspect the Athenians never offshored their sword-making facilities to potential adversaries to bolster quarterly sword company profits for a few quarters, so the CEOs could put Italian tile in the 7th vacation home... 😉

The good news is we'd run out of ammo long before they could organize a draft.

"In this view, any nation unable to project power globally—essentially everyone except the US—is therefore inferior on the whole. This view is incorrect. What matters ultimately in war is the force that can be brought to bear, both the attacker’s and the defender’s, at the specific time and place it is needed."

Paper Oil is even more manipulated than paper Silver. 🤡

Mark Carney? The former Goldman Sachs executive, former Governor of the Bank of Canada, and former Governor of the Bank of England?

This is far less materiel than many assume. Big wars require bulk, and bulk moves by sea. It's a simple matter of throughput. Planes can't do the job.