News Review: An Empire in Decay
A mixed-message threat within NATO, impolitic empty threats and a failed war in southwest Asia, and picking a losing economic fight with China. Another troubling week in the Empire.
Published: 2025-04-20
Introduction
The US warned Ukraine and Britain, France and Germany that failure to engage in its peace efforts to end the NATO-Russia Ukraine war will result in a US withdrawal from leading the negotiations, and possibly supporting the war. Meanwhile, war propaganda continues in Europe, with the British caught targeting academics again.
The US cabinet is divided in its strategies for both ending the European war and pacifying the belligerent Zionists within it over their maximalist demands of Iran.
The US echoed Israel's war-crimes in Gaza, in Yemen with its attack on Hodeidah. Saudi Arabia expressed its solidarity with Iran against the US Zionist supported threats masquerading as negotiations.
Intra-NATO Threats
US Presidential envoy Witkoff and US Secretary of State Rubio variously toured Moscow, Kiev and Paris to further the US approach to ending the European war. As Rubio departed Paris he warned the European backers of the war that failing to support the peace process immediately may result in a sudden US exit from negotiating an end to it.
“If it is not possible to end the war in Ukraine, we need to move on,” he told reporters before departing Paris. “We need to determine very quickly now, and I’m talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable.”
[CNN]
“We’re trying to figure out very soon—and I’m talking about a matter of days…if this war can even be ended. If not, then the president is going to say ‘We’re done’.”
Larry Johnson noted changes in US armaments supplies and a possible path of withdrawing its support for the war:
The US is shutting down operations at the airfield in Poland, which has been a major supply hub for Ukraine. No additional supplies of weapons and vehicles are being sent to Ukraine. Donald Trump rejected Zelensky’s plea for more Patriot missile batteries. There are only two big shoes left to drop — i.e., withdrawal of US military and intelligence personnel from Ukraine, and an end to intel sharing, particularly intelligence surveillance and reconnaissance (ISR) data that is used to program Ukrainian missiles aimed at Russia.
[Johnson]
Johnson also re-affirmed analysis by John Helmer and re-issued here that of the two tracks for Russia's current engagement with the US, resolving the war and re-establishing diplomatic relations, it is focusing on the later.
Of the two poorly coordinated ceasefires constructed by Witkoff, the cessation of attacks on energy infrastructure was constantly violated by Ukraine. The ceasefire over maritime shipping in the Black Sea was undermined by Europe. It refused to allow SWIFT transactions by Russia's agricultural bank, making the proposal pointless for Russia. It is quite clear which parties are disinterested in ceasefires.
To emphasize the point, the Russian Ministry of Defense unilaterally declared a 30 hour ceasefire for the evening of Saturday through all of Easter Sunday.
The cease-fire regime is being introduced for humanitarian purposes and will be observed by the Russian Joint Group of Troops (forces), provided that it is mutually observed by the Kiev regime.
[Russian MoD via Moon of Alabama]
Media discussion of the the US threatening to withdraw from mediating a peace has universally failed to mention its context. On the day before Rubio issued his warning to the co-belligerents, Yulia Svyrydenko, Ukraine’s first deputy prime minister and economy minister, announced progress on the "minerals deal":
“We are happy to announce the signing, with our American partners, of a Memorandum of Intent, which paves the way for an Economic Partnership Agreement and the establishment of the Investment Fund for the Reconstruction of Ukraine,”
[Antiwar]
Details of the arrangement which have previously been disclosed (though things may have changed) amounted to the establishment of a bank account into which the Ukrainian government would pay money from various government supported business activities, like mining. The concept is that these funds would be used for reconstruction in Ukraine. It amounts of a tax placed on Ukraine by the US which will then employ its industry to rebuild the Ukraine which it destroyed while attacking Russia. The bank account called a "fund" will ensure that US industry gets a cut of the profits from rebuilding the nation it destroyed.
Manufacturing Consent and Persecuting Opposing Voices
A leak to Kit Klarenberg confirms the continuance of the British repression of British academic voices refusing to echo British government propaganda. The latest case involves Chris Donnelly, of Integrity Initiative infamy, using the political influence of British government intelligence services to marginalize Prof. Richard Sakwa.
Messages show Donnelly contacted influential UK lawmakers to stamp out the “influence” of Sakwa, whom he called his “number one” target, while calling for the blacklisting of other academics who might expose inconvenient truths about the conflict in Ukraine.
This is a repeat of earlier efforts by the British establishment to silence other academics who revealed the propaganda of and British involvement in the Syrian Dirty War.
Conformity with propaganda narratives to legitimize British wars are so important to its government institutions that they harass academics. In the case of the genocide in Gaza, the harassment extends to suppressing independent media as has been seen in the cases of Richard Medhurst and Craig Murray, among many others. Nobody should forget the decade long abuse of Julian Assange. The conclusion which one must draw is that controlling what people think is extremely important to the British government. AKA: Truth is revolutionary in an era of propaganda.
Not all academics are cowed by the coercion. Their continued publication of their research in defense of academic freedom and freedom of thought is laudable.
The problem is not limited to the UK either. The current US regime is brutally enforcing the Zionist doctrine of any criticism of Israeli government policy as "anti-semitism" in its tertiary institutions by threatening the withdrawal of funds, grabbing students off the streets and beating peaceful protesters. This has been happening for a year and a half. It is just getting more brutal.
Palm Sunday: A Case of Media Propaganda
Vladimir Artyukh, the head of the Sumy regional military administration, organised an award ceremony for soldiers who had retreated from or supported Ukraine's invasion of Russia in Kursk. The ceremony was held at a building in the university in Sumy and was attended by officers of the 117th Territorial Brigade and reportedly foreign national (NATO member state) officers. Artyuk was warned not to hold the ceremony in such a dangerous place, risking the lives of civilians.
Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov, after Russia killed what it claimed were 60 officers and soldiers in its missile strike, described the context of the attack:
“We have facts about who was at the facility that was hit in Sumy. It was another meeting of Ukrainian military leaders with their Western colleagues, who were either masquerading as mercenaries or I don’t know who,” Lavrov told Interfax on Monday.
“There are NATO servicemen there and they are directly in charge,” the top diplomat added. “Everyone knows this,” Lavrov said, referring to last month’s New York Times report detailing US involvement in Ukrainian attacks on Russia since the escalation of the conflict in 2022.
Kiev has routinely flouted international law by placing armaments in or near civilian infrastructure, the minister said.
”International humanitarian law categorically prohibits the deployment of military facilities and weapons on the territory of civilian facilities,” Lavrov stated. Despite this, from the earliest stages of the conflict, “there were ‘a million’ examples of [Kiev’s] deployment of artillery and air defense systems in city blocks near kindergartens,” he added.
[RT]
Western media hooked onto the date, the Sunday before Easter, and civilian casualties to issue their narrative of "terrorism".
Collapsing Narratives
Prof. Diesen discussed with Aaron Mate (see Sources) the collapsed propaganda narratives over the war. Diesen noted that Ukrainian media were far more open, mentioning the clashes between civilian and military regional leaders in using the city to host the military award ceremony. The wide range of topics covered in their discussion included the recent admission, via the 20,000 word article in the New York Times, of direct US involvement in the military campaigns throughout the war. Of particular interest, was the revelation that to induce Zelensky to reject the negotiated Istanbul settlement but 6 weeks into the war, the US and UK offered bilateral security agreements. These, after peace was rejected, were downgraded to merely the supply of arms, leaving Ukraine to fight the Russians "to the last Ukrainian".
The Ukrainian, nationalist, neo-Nazi groups which threatened to murder Zelensky if he implemented his election promise of the Minsk II Accords got the war they and their US and European backers wanted. They have cleansed Ukraine of Russian speaking citizens by losing those territories to Russia. They have also lost half of the Ukrainian population, much of its land to foreign investment funds (like incumbent Chancellor Merz' Blackrock), a generation of young men, and most of Ukraine's productive industries.
The war pumped US weapons into Europe via the pockets of Ukrainian oligarchs, some of whom support the neo-Nazis. Some of those weapons and neo-Nazis are now awash in the rest of Europe.
Maximum Pressure 2.0 on Iran
Saudi King Salman sent his Defense Minister to Tehran with a letter for Ayatollah Khameini. This was a public display of support for Iran. One suspects that this is an example of the types of diplomatic and later economic support which China can offer the Islamic Republic against the Zionist assault on its statehood.
The Saudi solidarity with Iran represents the entire region's resistance to the war which the US is threatening on behalf of Israel, the only state which desires the conflict.
Col. Wilkerson concluded that the emergence of US Secretary of Defense Hegseth's resistance to the threatened war is due to having received a realistic assessment of the prospects of it from those 'in the know' at the Pentagon.
[See Marandi, Wilkerson & Freeman on Dialogue Works in Sources]
Murdering Medics for Greater Israel
The US illegal, unilateral war against Yemen has deepened with further attacks against civilian infrastructure. A recent target were the fuel terminal facilities of Port Ras Isa in Hodeidah to "deny income to Ansar Allah". This is the definition of collective punishment, outlawed internationally and broken every day by Israel in its genocide in Gaza for 560 days. The lawless US is nailing its fortunes to the Zionist mast and is suffering international opprobrium for it.
An Empire Divided
As James Carden noted, significant divisions exist within the US cabinet. Its policies in eastern Europe, southwest Asia and in international trade have achieved limited, if any, positive results, at least partially because they are so inconsistent. As Chas Freeman has been eloquently noting, international diplomacy and the real estate business require very different skills.
While US President Trump may deserve some credit for his attempts to resolve the Ukraine conflict, those have been amateur because his primary negotiator has neither the experience nor the full support of a capable US bureaucracy. Trump has continued to arm and politically support the genocide in Gaza and re-started a war against Yemen which is failing as badly as previous efforts. Not only have the BRICS+ international community stood behind Iran, but the whole region too, except for the warring Israeli Zionists. On top of that, the Pentagon seems to have made reality clear to the Zionist hawks in the US cabinet. As for the US trade war against China, dominant informed opinion is that China has far more cards to play on that front than the US does. It, too, is a failed enterprise.
We are witnessing a decaying empire.
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Sources
Rubio: US To Decide Within Days If Ukraine Peace Deal Is Possible; Kyle Anzalone; Antiwar; 2025-04-18
US will abandon Ukraine peace efforts 'within days' if no progress made, Rubio warns; CNN; Archive.today; 2025-04-18
Donald Trump to Europe - You Want to Fight Russia? Go Ahead, It's All Yours; Larry C. Johnson; SONAR21; 2025-04-18
Rubio Warns US Readying to 'Abandon' Ukraine Peace Efforts; Simplicius; Simplicius' Garden of Knowledge; 2025-04-19
Ukraine - Easter Ceasefire, Trump Bailing Out; b.; Moon of Alabama; 2025-04-19
US, Ukraine Sign 'Memorandum of Intent' To Move Forward on Minerals Deal; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-04-17
Disruption: historians challenge Russophobic propaganda; Eugene Doyle; Natylie's Place: Understanding Russia (republished from Solidarity of 2025-03-29); 2025-04-17
British intel sought to silence West's top Russia academic, leaks reveal; The Grayzone; Natylie's Place: Understanding Russia (republished from The Grayzone of 2025-04-01); 2025-04-18
The 'Integrity Initiative' - A Military Intelligence Operation, Disguised As Charity, To Create The "Russian Threat"; b.; Moon of Alabama; 2018-12-15
Russian forces strike university building in Sumy; Kyivindependent; Archive.today; 2025-04-19
'He was warned' - Ukrainian mayor blames Sumy military administration for recent strike; RT; Archive.today; 2025-04-13
Russian strike on Sumy targeted Ukrainian and NATO officers - Lavrov; RT; Archive.today; 2025-04-14
Trump's National Security Team Is A House Divided Against Itself; James Carden; Natylie's Place: Understanding Russia (republished from Substack of 2025-04-15); 2025-04-18
Saudi and Iranian Ties Strengthen on the Eve of the Next Round of talks between Washington and Tehran; Larry C. Johnson; SONAR21; 2025-04-17
US Massacres Civilian Workers and Paramedics in Attack on Yemen Fuel Port; Dave DeCamp; Antiwar; 2025-04-17
The US Just Massacred Civilians In Yemen Without Even Claiming They're Military Targets; Caitlin Johnston; Caitlin's Newsletter; 2025-04-18
NATO's War Narratives Collapse; Glenn Diesen interviews Aaron Maté; Glenn Diesen; 2025-04-17
Trump and the Fall of the American Empire; Alkhorshid interviews Richard D. Wolff; Dialogue Works; 2025-04-17
Mohammad Marandi, Larry Wilkerson & Chas Freeman: Talks or Total War? Clock Ticks for Iran and U.S.; Alkhorshid interviews Marandi, Wilkerson & Freeman; Dialogue Works; 2025-04-18
Russia Declares Easter Truce... But Ukraine Doesn't✝️🕊️ Military Summary And Analysis For 2025.04.19; Dima; Military Summary; 2025-04-19
Copyleft: CC0
Thanks for the insights on the Sumy attack. I knew something was fishy about the reporting on it, because all the western media in synchronized action were making noise about it emotionally...while ignoring 2 years of mass murder in palestine. NONE of the news reports I read even mentioned a word about a military assembly or the NATO officers. I guess because those kind of fact would make the public ask far more questions about the actual nature of western involvement in that needless war.
One side commnent on this:
"...As Chas Freeman has been eloquently noting, international diplomacy and the real estate business require very different skills...."
On the above, I would say yes and no. At level we are talking about, the real estate business isn't about hiring tradesmen to put bricks together and collecting rent on the building.
At THAT level, you make money in real estate by influencing public policy: zoning, development planning, commercial planning, housing planning, and not least taxation. And sometimes the window of opportunity is very short.
Doing THAT requires elite skills at project planning, business and finance, networking, coalition builidng, law, and negotiation. Plus you have to understand and master stakeholder management. There will be people who can pull levers like lawmakers, and you have to influence them, you have to do detailed negotiations with financiers who are very concrete, and you will even have to influence those who have an indierect impact or are impacted, such as local communities, cultural institutions etc. That is what is takes to make big money in the real estate business at that scale.
It's also why Trump went bankrupt so many times. He's sloppy. Witkoff might not be.
I dont know anything about Witkoff specifically. All I'm saying though, is that I wouldnt be so quick to write the guy off in the way that the media shallowly does: "real estate speculator". Those types exist, to be sure, but the are also megabrains in that business, and we shouldnt automativally assume them to be all the one type.