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The Bundeswehr has reportedly approached key companies to speedily move troops and equipment to Eastern Europe

Germany’s military, the Bundeswehr, has reached out to major logistics and defense companies to prepare for a possible NATO deployment to Eastern Europe “in the event of a Russian attack,” Handelsblatt reported on Tuesday.

Several eastern NATO members, especially the Baltic states, have repeatedly alleged that Russia is preparing for an invasion – an accusation that Moscow has consistently denied.

The Bundeswehr is reportedly holding confidential discussions with firms including Deutsche Bahn, Lufthansa, and Rheinmetall to secure their support in transporting troops, weapons, and equipment.

According to the newspaper, the German Defense Ministry has asked Deutsche Bahn to examine how it could help transport military convoys by rail during a crisis. Meanwhile, Lufthansa is being considered for basic training support for fighter pilots through its flight school. Rheinmetall is already involved in military logistics through a recent €260 million ($300 million) contract and is also in talks to expand its role.

This effort forms part of Germany’s strategic role as NATO’s central logistics hub, the outlet reports. Under the military bloc’s new defense framework, Berlin has committed to mobilizing thousands of soldiers and hundreds of aircraft and ships within 30 days if a crisis arises.

Defense officials told the newspaper that the Bundeswehr is not able to manage this large-scale mobilization on its own. German military leadership has therefore turned to the private sector to build what they describe as a “strategic deployment corridor” across the country.

“The Bundeswehr relies almost exclusively on civilian commercial service providers for the logistical transport of military goods and equipment outside of crisis zones,” the Bundeswehr Operational Command told Handelsblatt. “In sea and air transport for extra-wide and extra-heavy equipment, this figure is even 100 percent.”

The initiative comes as Germany seeks to recover from decades of underinvestment in its armed forces, which have left its military ill-prepared for large-scale conflict. Outgoing Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s €100 billion special fund, announced after the escalation of the Ukraine conflict, aims to reverse this trend. Germany’s chief of defense staff, General Carsten Breuer, recently stated that the Bundeswehr must be war-ready by 2029 so that it is able to fight Russia.

Russian President Vladimir Putin has rejected allegations that Moscow harbors aggressive intentions toward NATO countries, calling them “nonsense” designed to alarm Western Europeans and legitimize major increases in defense budgets.

The modern, liberal, secular world does not like to hear such reminders.  When a pope dies, the press will, predictably, praise his personal kindness and concern for the poor and marginalized.  In part, this is merely politeness of the kind appropriate when any person dies.  But it also seems to be what is emphasized in commentary on who a pope’s successor ought to be.  The liberal, secular world’s idea of a good pope is essentially a social worker with the personality of Mr. Rogers.  It is impatient with the idea that the main reason the papacy exists is to preserve the doctrine handed down to us by the Apostles, and to unite the faithful around that doctrine. 

This is, of course, in part because the modern world is hostile to many of the specifics of that doctrine.  But in part it is because liberal, secular modernity is founded on the idea that religious doctrine of any kind is a matter of subjective and idiosyncratic opinion that has only private significance.  The modern world cannot fathom how such mere opinion (as it sees it) could still seriously be thought the central concern of an office with the public visibility and influence of the papacy.  Hence it focuses its attention on the philanthropic activities of popes, which it finds more understandable and useful.

But the world’s priorities are not, and never should be, the Church’s.  She must always keep before her mind Christ’s Great Commission:

Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, to the close of the age. (Matthew 28:19-20)

And popes must always keep before their minds Christ’s words to St. Peter:

Simon, Simon, behold, Satan demanded to have you, that he might sift you like wheat, but I have prayed for you that your faith may not fail; and when you have turned again, strengthen your brethren. (Luke 22:31-32)

Christ’s command is to convert the world to his teaching, the deposit of faith.  Peter’s commission is to preserve that faith and confirm his brethren in it.  Naturally, that is not because doctrine is an end in itself.  As the Church’s Code of Canon Law famously emphasizes, the salvation of souls is her supreme law.  But the point is precisely that sound doctrine is the necessary prerequisite of the salvation of souls.  Christ’s commission was not “Go therefore and advance social justice in all nations.”  He did not say to Peter “I have prayed for you, that you may reach out to the marginalized.”  That is not because social justice and reaching out to the marginalized are not important.  It is because unless you get doctrine right, you are not going to understand what true social justice amounts to, and you are not going to know what you should be doing for the marginalized once you’ve reached out to them.

The priority of doctrine makes perfect sense when one properly understands the nature of the will and of the actions that flow from it.  As Pope Leo XIII taught, following St. Thomas Aquinas:

The will cannot proceed to act until it is enlightened by the knowledge possessed by the intellect.  In other words, the good wished by the will is necessarily good in so far as it is known by the intellect; and this the more, because in all voluntary acts choice is subsequent to a judgment upon the truth of the good presented, declaring to which good preference should be given.  No sensible man can doubt that judgment is an act of reason, not of the will.  The end, or object, both of the rational will and of its liberty is that good only which is in conformity with reason.  (Libertas 5)

Action follows from the will, and the will pursues what the intellect judges to be good.  Hence we cannot will rightly, and our actions will not reliably be good in their effects, unless the intellect’s judgements are correct.  Modern people are used to thinking in clichés to the effect that what matters is not what you believe, but rather doing the right thing and having a good will.  But the reality is that if what you believe is false, your will cannot be aimed at what is actually good (even if you are not culpable for the fact), and what you do will not be the right thing except by accident.  Hence sound doctrine is crucial to willing and acting rightly.

This makes it intelligible why, though schism is a very grave sin, Aquinas teaches that heresy is even worse (Summa Theologiae II-II.39.2).  Catholics must remain in communion with the pope, but precisely because the pope’s job is to preserve sound doctrine.  It’s not that we must avoid heresy so that we will avoid schism; rather, the point of avoiding schism is to avoid heresy. 

It also makes it intelligible why papal infallibility concerns only doctrine, and not a pope’s personal moral character.  The Church does not say that a pope cannot do bad things, or that he cannot have a bad will.  It claims only that, when he formally defines a matter of doctrine ex cathedra, in a manner intended to be absolutely final and definitive, he will not err.

It is no surprise, then, that the duty of popes to preserve the deposit of faith has been repeatedly emphasized in Catholic tradition.  Here are several examples:

The first condition of salvation is to keep the norm of the true faith and in no way to deviate from the established doctrine of the Fathers.  For it is impossible that the words of Our Lord Jesus Christ who said, “Thou art Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church,” should not be verified.  (Formula of Pope St. Hormisdas)

For the Holy Spirit was promised to the successors of Peter not so that they might, by his revelation, make known some new doctrine, but that, by his assistance, they might religiously guard and faithfully expound the revelation or deposit of faith transmitted by the apostles.  (First Vatican Council, Session 4, Chapter 4)

The living teaching office of the Church… is not above the word of God, but serves it, teaching only what has been handed on, listening to it devoutly, guarding it scrupulously and explaining it faithfully in accord with a divine commission and with the help of the Holy Spirit.  (Second Vatican Council, Dei Verbum, Chapter II)

The mission of Peter and his successors is to establish and authoritatively confirm what the Church has received and believed from the beginning, what the apostles taught, what Sacred Scripture and Christian Tradition have determined as the object of faith and the Christian norm of life.  (Pope St. John Paul II, Catechesis of March 10, 1993)

The Pope is not an absolute monarch whose thoughts and desires are law.  On the contrary: the Pope's ministry is a guarantee of obedience to Christ and to his Word.  He must not proclaim his own ideas, but rather constantly bind himself and the Church to obedience to God's Word, in the face of every attempt to adapt it or water it down, and every form of opportunism…  In his important decisions, he is bound to the great community of faith of all times, to the binding interpretations that have developed throughout the Church's pilgrimage.  Thus, his power is not being above, but at the service of, the Word of God.  It is incumbent upon him to ensure that this Word continues to be present in its greatness and to resound in its purity, so that it is not torn to pieces by continuous changes in usage.  (Pope Benedict XVI, Homily for the Mass of Possession of the Chair of the Bishop of Rome, May 7, 2005)

This last statement, from Benedict XVI, is especially eloquent.  And it reminds us that true humility in a pope entails a steadfast refusal to ignore or dilute or obfuscate the Church’s traditional teaching in any way, not even when others may delude themselves that doing so would be merciful or pastoral or better in line with the signs of the times.

May the cardinals take such reminders to heart as they deliberate.  May they elect a man willing to live by, and indeed if necessary even die for, these noble words from the tradition.  St. Peter, pray for us.

When Pope Francis first became head of the Church, I did some research on him.

I learned that, as a Cardinal in Argentina, he was quoted as saying, “Defend the unborn against abortion even if they persecute you, calumniate you, set traps for you, take you to court or kill you.”

Strong words from a man who valued the sacredness of life from the moment of conception to the instant of natural death. The late Holy Father was a champion of the marginalized—and no one is more marginalized in our society than the unborn child.

The pontiff also preached a “revolution of tenderness” which the pro-life movement lives out each day. Through its outreach to pregnant women in difficult circumstances, the movement offers mothers the hope and strength they need to carry on amidst trying times.

REACH PRO-LIFE PEOPLE WORLDWIDE! Advertise with LifeNews to reach hundreds of thousands of pro-life readers every week. Contact us today.

I also had a personal connection to Pope Francis. At a time when I was particularly worried and distraught, I sent him a letter asking for prayers. A Vatican representative responded by sending me a papal prayer card and a letter assuring me of the Holy Father’s prayers. I had the mementos framed and the display now hangs in my office—a constant reminder of Pope Francis’ kindness to me.

People around the world are grieving the loss of this Pope with a pastor’s heart. Let us pray that his successor will be equally devoted to defending the most defenseless among us.

LifeNews.com Note: Maria Gallagher is the Legislative Director and Political Action Committee Director for the Pennsylvania Pro-Life Federation and she has written and reported for various broadcast and print media outlets, including National Public Radio, CBS Radio, and AP Radio.

The post Pope Francis: “Defend the Unborn Against Abortion” appeared first on LifeNews.com.

Kiev and its European backers will be meeting with officials from Washington in London this week

The US will propose a peace deal that involves the recognition of Russian sovereignty over Crimea and freezing the Ukrainian conflict front lines, at a meeting with officials from Kiev and Western Europe this week, the Washington Post has reported, citing sources.

US President Donald Trump’s envoy Keith Kellogg is set to meet foreign ministers and security advisers from France, Germany, the UK and Ukraine in London on Wednesday. Trump's Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Special Envoy Steve Witkoff will reportedly skip the meeting. 

US proposals, presented to Ukraine in Paris last week, also include Washington eventually lifting sanctions against Moscow under a future accord, people familiar with the matter told the outlet on Tuesday. One Western official reportedly described the pressure on Ukraine as “astounding.”

European officials are expected to push for security guarantees for Ukraine and postwar reconstruction efforts, possibly funded in part by frozen Russian assets, the report said.

Trump has threatened to walk away from a Ukraine peace initiative if progress is not made soon. He told reporters on Monday that he would be releasing details of the US proposals “over the next three days.” 

Witkoff, who has had multiple rounds of talks with senior Russian officials, including President Vladimir Putin, will visit Russia later this week, Moscow has confirmed. According to one of the Post’s sources, it was “Witkoff’s idea” for the US to designate Crimea as Russian “without forcing Ukraine to recognize it.”

Crimea held a referendum to join Russia in 2014 following a Western-backed armed coup in Kiev. The new Ukrainian government, along with its Western backers, has refused to recognize the vote’s legitimacy.

Ukraine’s Vladimir Zelensky has ruled out relinquishing any territorial claims against Russia and has urged the US and other nations to continue providing military aid – a policy the Trump administration has said it will end.

Moscow insists that the status of Crimea, the city of Sevastopol, and the four former Ukrainian regions which voted to join Russia in 2022, is not up for negotiation. Russian officials have emphasized that recognizing the “reality on the ground” is key to achieving lasting peace.

The late Catholic leader was humble and always supported the abused and the downtrodden – except in one very sad case

When a great man and leader of the Roman-Catholic Church – and beyond it – like Pope Francis dies, it may seem almost impious to speak or write about politics. But in his case, we know for certain that it simply means doing what he told us to do.

For one of his fundamental teachings was that we have a religious and moral – not merely a civic – duty to engage in politics. He made this clear, for instance, in one of his major statements, the 2020 encyclical Fratelli Tutti (All Brothers). There, he spelled out the pronouncedly broad and political – not merely intimate, small-scale, or private – meaning of the story of the Good Samaritan, one of the most famous parables taught by the founder of all types of Christianity, Jesus of Nazareth.

In Fratelli Tutti, Francis stressed that the Good Samaritan story “summons us to rediscover our vocation as citizens of our respective nations and of the entire world, builders of a new social bond” in order “to direct society to the pursuit of the common good.” That is about as far away as you can get from the intellectual platitude and ethical cop-out of religion-is-just-a-private-matter. And that was a good thing, too.

Because, as Francis made clear time and again, he – rightly – saw our world in deep social, ecological, and, fundamentally, spiritual crisis. If you share his belief or not, it is important to understand that political engagement to save this world, for him, was a matter of survival of not just a species and its much-abused planet, but of God’s creation.

There is something else we should remember about this late pope. He was known for being both genuinely relatable – especially with the poor, weak, abused, sinful (his last major meeting was with JD Vance, after all), and troubled – and, at the same time, capable of harsh rebuke and tough determination. Having worked as a bouncer in his youth and later as a Jesuit taskmaster, he knew how to handle the gathering of careerist, vain, pushy, and scheming egos that the higher Church also is.

He was a decent and mostly kind man, but no push-over. And yet, with all his assertiveness, he was also humble, not in an ostentatious but a substantial manner: the kind of humility that makes you give up on many of the lifestyle perks that have corrupted the papacy and instead wash the feet of prison inmates. Or admit that you are not the one to judge, as once when commenting on a priest who was said to be gay.

Think about it: it is true, obviously; and, by the standards of tradition, it is at the same time something sensationally extraordinary for a pope to say about a priest. For, remember, the Roman-Catholic Church, is not a fake democracy – as secular states usually are now – but an unabashed absolute, if elective, monarchy.

Against that background – Francis’s instructions to engage with politics and his fundamental humility – two simple questions make sense: What is the political meaning of his tenure as pope between 2013 and 2025? And where did he succeed and where did he fail?

A full disclosure won’t do any harm either: I am writing about this pope as someone raised as a Roman-Catholic yet now largely lapsed. Largely, because, in reality, with something like a Catholic upbringing, about which I am far from complaining, “there are,” as the Russians wisely say about another experience that shapes you for life, “no formers.” Perhaps, that explains why I have always felt much sympathy for him. Although, come to think of it, that was due to his politics.

Regarding those politics, for starters, let’s note a basic piece of context that, however, is often overlooked: It’s commonly noted that Francis was a multiple first: first pope from Latin America, first Jesuit, first one not from Europe for well over a millennium. But there was yet another important first: even if the Cold War between – very roughly – the capitalist West and the socialist-Communist Soviet camp ended in the late 1980s and Francis became pope in 2013, he was, actually, the first substantially post-Cold War pope.

Counterintuitive as that fact may be, it is not hard to explain it. It was the result of the de facto rule that popes get elected when they are old and likely to be set in their ways and – usually, not always – serve until death. Specifically, once the Cold War had ended, the very Polish and very conservative John-Paul II – a quintessential Cold War pope – stayed in office until 2005. His successor, the not merely conservative but leadenly reactionary Benedict XVI from Germany was, in essence, the Angela Merkel of the Vatican: the one you call when, in reality, everything must change, but you are in obstinate denial about it. And did Benedict fulfill those expectations!

It was really only after rigid Benedict abdicated and, in effect, retired – the first pope to do so in more than half a millennium – that there was an opening for finally moving the Church beyond this sorry state of stagnation. And Francis, once elected to his own surprise, certainly did his best – or, as his many critics and opponents would gripe, worst – to use that opportunity.

Apart from setting an example by his personal modesty – for instance, just two rooms in a Vatican hostel, a comparatively simple pectoral cross, no flashy cape or dainty red slippers, and, finally, orders for a fairly simple coffin, lying-in-state, and burial – Francis tackled major unresolved issues inside the Church, such as finance scandals and corruption, sexual abuse, and the prevalence of rule by clique and intrigue.

On these issues, he certainly did not universally succeed. Regarding child abuse by clericals, his reactions and actions were honest, well-intentioned, and sometimes unprecedented and consequential: as when he, in essence, forced a mass resignation of bishops in Chile and defrocked a truly demonic US cardinal for his revolting crimes and sins. But his record remains mixed. He himself, to his credit, ended up admitting his “grave mistakes” in this crucial area. Victims of clerical child abusers and critics find that his efforts did not go far enough.

Francis could neither defeat nor eradicate the hardy networks, lobbies, and plots of the Vatican and the Church leadership more broadly. In particular, the – surprise, surprise – conservative US cardinals form a powerful, mean lobby. But to be fair, no single person could have cleaned up these Augean Stables. That would take a miracle, one that did not take place under this pope.

Yet Francis did have an impact. His challenge was sometimes fierce, and the resistance it provoked proves that he hit a nerve. This, clearly, is an issue which will be decided, if ever, in the future. In that respect, note that kind, smiling Francis was worldly and tough enough to promote – where he could (an important caveat) – like-minded men to high office. As he installed the preponderant majority of the 135 or 136 cardinals who will elect his successor, his policies might be continued. Yet Church politics is less transparent than the Trump White House and much more complex. Nothing is certain.

Yet what about the world beyond the upper ranks of the Church? That is, after all, clearly what Francis – the pope with a personal cross that depicted Jesus as the Good Shepherd – cared about the most. For practical purposes and to greatly simplify, think of that world-beyond-peak-Church as consisting of two concentric circles: the inner yet large circle consists of currently about 1.4 billion Roman Catholics globally, and the outer, even larger one of everyone else in a world population over 8 billion.

There, Francis pursued two great lines: He clearly sought to finally do justice to the fact that demographically and in terms of commitment and dynamism, Roman-Catholicism’s center of gravity has inexorably shifted away from Europe and, roughly speaking, to the Global South-plus: Latin America, Africa, and Asia, too.  Indeed, over the last half-century, Africa and Asia have been the only two regions where the increase in the number of Catholics has exceeded population growth.

When elected, he immediately pointed out – with a hardly hidden edge, I believe – that his cardinal brothers had plucked him “from the ends of the Earth.” That was a statement in favor of those “ends” and against the breathtaking, institutionally inbred provincialism that has made 80 percent of popes come from tiny Italy. By now, though,  the cardinals who will elect the next pope come from 94 countries and less than 40 percent are from Europe, “with a record number from Asia and Africa.”

This, true globalization of the Roman-Catholic Church in its most fundamental meaning, namely as the community of its members is what Francis was in sync with as no pope before him, not even the globe-trotting John-Paul II. If the Church is wise, it will follow his example; if it is foolish – which, historically speaking, happens a lot – it will revert to Benedict XVI’s futile retreat into the past.

The other major policy Francis consistently pursued was – believe it or not – a form of socialism. Recall that socialism is a broader church than Marxism. Socialists, even by the narrowest, most modern definitions, existed before Marxism. If we widen the lens to ancient history, a certain rebel called Jesus, executed by the indispensable empire of his day, obviously, was one, too.

Francis understood that and stuck to it. That is why The Economist sniffles at what it mislabels as his populist and Peronist leanings. In reality, the last pope was a sharp critic of populism, if understood as, say, Trumpism (or Sanderism-AOC-ism, I would add): the fake appeal to longings for justice solely to control, mobilize, and profit.

The core of Francis’s de facto socialist position was – as The Economist, to its credit, also admits – “scorn for capitalism” or, to quote the Washington Post, another party organ of the global oligarchy – a strong concern for “social justice.” Indeed. And then some. In sum, Francis was not a Marxist. He did not see eye to eye with Latin American Liberation Theology and his behavior during the right-wing dictatorship in Argentina may have been less than exemplary. But, as pope, he was, in effect, a man of the Left. He had the breadth of mind and the strength of character to reject the unfortunate recent hegemony of liberal capitalism in favor of something fairer and more moral, something worthy of humanity. In the dark post-Cold War that we are forced to inhabit, that fact made the Roman-Catholic pope one of the main forces (next to China, intriguingly) – weak as it may have been – of survival of leftwing ideals.

Those tempted to underestimate such influence - as Stalin is reported to have done: “The pope? How many divisions?” - should ask themselves where  his Soviet Union is now (hint: nowhere). And yet the Church is still around.

There was another issue of immense importance for our future on which he stood out by being more honest and more courageous than all too many others: Francis did repeatedly censure Israel’s – and the West’s – brutal slaughter of the Palestinians, using terms such as “cruelty” and “terror” and pointing out that what Israel is doing is not even war, but, clearly something worse.

And yet, those who now claim that he condemned the Gaza Genocide are wrong, unfortunately. I wished he had, but he did not. The fact remains, painful as it may be for those who liked and respected him (such as I), that he failed to take this crucial and necessary step. The closest he came to it was the following, far too cautious statement: “According to some experts, what is happening in Gaza has the characteristics of a genocide. It should be carefully investigated to determine whether it fits into the technical definition formulated by jurists and international bodies.”

That was more than almost any other leader in the “value-driven” West; it was also more than the studious public silence practiced by Pius XII during that other holocaust, when the Germans did not support Jews committing a genocide, as now, but – together with their many collaborators and friends – committed a genocide against Jews. But both are pitiably low bars.

As the pope, that is, not just some political leader but a man with great soft power and extraordinary moral duties by design, he should, as a minimum, have condemned the genocide as being just that and told all Roman-Catholics that not opposing it in every way they can is a grave sin.

He should also have excommunicated co-genocider-in-chief Joe Biden and preening neo-Catholic JD Vance. Pour encourager les autres. Francis did have a steely side. This was where the world needed him to show it most, but he did not.

I like to think he would be the first to admit this fact. Because that is the way he was: great, fallible, and humble.

Ronen Bar claims he was fired by Israel’s PM for not displaying unconditional loyalty

The head of Israel’s Shin Bet, its domestic intelligence agency, has accused Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu of firing him for his refusal to carry out a number of illegal operations, including spying on domestic protestors.

Ronen Bar was formally sacked last month, with the official reason cited as a lack of trust and the spy chief’s alleged failure to prevent the October 2023 Hamas attack. It marked the first time in Israeli history that a domestic security chief was fired by the government. However, the Israeli Supreme Court has issued an injunction freezing the dismissal.

In a 31-page affidavit submitted to the Supreme Court on Monday, Bar dismissed the official reason, stating that it “does not lie in the professional realm but in a demand for personal loyalty” to Netanyahu.

He claimed that the Israeli prime minister wanted “to see the Shin Bet act against citizens involved in protest activity and demonstrations against the government,” with a special focus on monitoring “protest funders.”

According to Bar, he was also told to ignore court rulings in the event of a constitutional crisis and to obey the prime minister. On top on that, Bar claimed he was pressured to help Netanyahu, who faces corruption charges, avoid testifying in the case.

At the same time, the Shin Bet head acknowledged the agency’s failings ahead of the Israel-Hamas war and indicated he would resign before the end of his term.

READ MORE: UN points out major flaw in latest Israeli protest

Netanyahu is on trial in three graft cases, in which he is accused of taking bribes and luxury gifts from media personalities in exchange for furthering their financial interests. The prime minister has denied any wrongdoing.

Responding to the affidavit, Netanyahu’s office said it was “full of lies,” adding that Bar had “failed miserably” in his response to the Hamas attack.

Since the Hamas surprise assault, Netanyahu has faced widespread and persistent protests across the country. Many Israelis have accused his government of failing to prevent the deadly incursion and criticized his handling of the Gaza war. Demonstrators, including families of hostages held by Hamas, have demanded Netanyahu’s resignation and early elections.

A century ago, on April 22, 1925, a suburb of Paris witnessed the passing of André Caplet, a composer and conductor whose unique artistry distinguished him from his contemporaries. As the French poet and Germanist Maurice Boucher († 1977) astutely observed, Caplet “resembled none of his contemporaries and […] represented in his own way and in his own place an art that was always wide-awake and…

Source

CNN in a recent article has reported that:

The United States could end its efforts on ending the Ukrainian conflict within “days” if there are no signs of progress, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio warned Friday. 

‘If it is not possible to end the war in Ukraine, we need to move on,’ he told reporters before departing Paris, where he had held high-level talks with European and Ukrainian officials. ‘We need to determine very quickly now, and I’m talking about a matter of days, whether or not this is doable,’ he said. 

This is framed as if the US is serving as some sort of mediator between Russia and Ukraine. In reality, the US is one of two primary parties to the conflict – the other being Russia, with whom this war was provoked.

A US War on Russia Since the Cold War Ended… 

The US had since the end of the Cold War invested billions of dollars in political interference within Ukraine, including regime change operations attempted in 2004 and successful regime change finally taking place in 2014. From 2014 onward, Ukraine was transformed into a military proxy of the United States aimed specifically to threaten the Russian Federation, just as a politically captured Georgia in 2003 was used to attack Russian peacekeeping forces in 2008.

The growing security threat this posed to Moscow precipitated the launching of Russia’s February 2022 Special Military Operation (SMO) and the subsequent fighting that has continued ever since.

A series of articles from the Western media itself has revealed over recent years the degree to which the US had not only politically captured Ukraine, but also institutionally captured its military and intelligence agencies, reconfiguring them to operate as armed extensions of the US along Ukraine’s border with Russia, and even across it within Russia itself.

Among these admissions is the New York Times’ February 2024 article titled, “The Spy War: How the C.I.A. Secretly Helps Ukraine Fight Putin,” which admits to, “a C.I.A.-supported network of spy bases constructed in the past eight years that includes 12 secret locations along the Russian border.” 

The article would also admit:

Around 2016, the C.I.A. began training an elite Ukrainian commando force — known as Unit 2245 — which captured Russian drones and communications gear so that C.I.A. technicians could reverse-engineer them and crack Moscow’s encryption systems. (One officer in the unit was Kyrylo Budanov, now the general leading Ukraine’s military intelligence.) 

And the C.I.A. also helped train a new generation of Ukrainian spies who operated inside Russia, across Europe, and in Cuba and other places where the Russians have a large presence.

While the New York Times tries to insist the CIA did not help Ukrainians conduct offensive lethal operations, it later admits CIA-trained Unit 2245 not only conducted lethal operations, but did so within Russian territory, claiming:

At the time, the future head of Ukraine’s military intelligence agency, General Budanov, was a rising star in Unit 2245. He was known for daring operations behind enemy lines and had deep ties to the C.I.A. The agency had trained him and also taken the extraordinary step of sending him for rehabilitation to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Maryland after he was shot in the right arm during fighting in the Donbas. 

Disguised in Russian uniforms, then-Lt. Col. Budanov led commandos across a narrow gulf in inflatable speedboats, landing at night in Crimea. 

But an elite Russian commando unit was waiting for them. The Ukrainians fought back, killing several Russian fighters, including the son of a general, before retreating to the shoreline, plunging into the sea and swimming for hours to Ukrainian-controlled territory.

In other words, the US was training, equipping, arming, and directing deadly operations out of Ukraine into Russian-held territory before Russia launched its 2022 SMO.

The same article admitted that these CIA officers deployed to and overseeing operations in Ukraine began playing a central role after Russia launched its SMO in 2022.

The NYT would admit:

Within weeks, the C.I.A. had returned to Kyiv, and the agency sent in scores of new officers to help the Ukrainians. A senior U.S. official said of the C.I.A.’s sizable presence, “Are they pulling triggers? No. Are they helping with targeting? Absolutely.” 

Some of the C.I.A. officers were deployed to Ukrainian bases. They reviewed lists of potential Russian targets that the Ukrainians were preparing to strike, comparing the information that the Ukrainians had with U.S. intelligence to ensure that it was accurate.

Subsequent articles by the New York Times would expand upon just how deeply involved the US has been in the fighting – making the war for all intents and purposes an American war fought through the Ukrainians.

Washington’s War on Russia 

A March 2025 New York Times article titled, “The Partnership: The Secret History of the War in Ukraine,” would explain that not only has the US provided tens of billions of US dollars worth of military equipment, weapons, and ammunition, including, “a half-billion rounds of small-arms ammunition and grenades, 10,000 Javelin antiarmor weapons, 3,000 Stinger antiaircraft systems, 272 howitzers, 76 tanks, 40 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems, 20 Mi-17 helicopters and three Patriot air defense batteries,” but that the US military itself has been (and still is) playing a central role in picking and striking at targets on both sides of the Ukrainian-Russian border.

It admitted that it was US intelligence used to carry out many of Ukraine’s most successful attacks on Russian military headquarters including at the Crimean port of Sevastopol which had been under Russian control even before the 2014 US overthrow of Ukraine and Crimea’s subsequent reunification with Russia.

Much of Washington’s control over the conflict was coordinated through a mission command center established in Wiesbaden, Germany. While many of Ukraine’s military operations were attributed to Ukrainian planning, the New York Times has since revealed it was instead overseen by the US and other NATO members through Wiesbaden.

The article would explain:

Side by side in Wiesbaden’s mission command center, American and Ukrainian officers planned Kyiv’s counteroffensives. A vast American intelligence-collection effort both guided big-picture battle strategy and funneled precise targeting information down to Ukrainian soldiers in the field.
One European intelligence chief recalled being taken aback to learn how deeply enmeshed his N.A.T.O. counterparts had become in Ukrainian operations. “They are part of the kill chain now,” he said.

The New York Times also admitted:

Military and C.I.A. officers in Wiesbaden helped plan and support a campaign of Ukrainian strikes in Russian-annexed Crimea. Finally, the military and then the C.I.A. received the green light to enable pinpoint strikes deep inside Russia itself.

The article admits that Western military officers – not Ukrainians – made the final decision regarding what targets would be hit and how.

This included the use of US-provided M777 howitzers and the HIMARS multiple launch rocket system.

The New York Times admitted:

Wiesbaden would oversee each HIMARS strike. [US] General Donahue and his aides would review the Ukrainians’ target lists and advise them on positioning their launchers and timing their strikes. The Ukrainians were supposed to only use coordinates the Americans provided. To fire a warhead, HIMARS operators needed a special electronic key card, which the Americans could deactivate anytime.

Every large-scale Ukrainian operation, including the 2022 Kherson and Kharkov offensives as well as the failed 2023 offensive, were planned, organized, and directed by US military officers from Wiesbaden. This also included the creation of new Ukrainian brigades, the New York Times admits was overseen by US Lieutenant General Antonio Aguto Jr.

It is also revealed that it wasn’t Ukraine who asked for longer range weapons like the Army Tactical Missile System (ATACMS), it was US generals.

The New York Times admits:

Generals Cavoli and Aguto recommended the next quantum leap, giving the Ukrainians Army Tactical Missile Systems — missiles, known as ATACMS, that can travel up to 190 miles — to make it harder for Russian forces in Crimea to help defend Melitopol.

It was also revealed that Ukrainian commanders realized the US-planned and directed 2023 offensive was doomed during its earliest phase, yet US commanders demanded Ukraine “press on.” 

Various options were formulated to try to salvage the failed offensive, with the New York Times attributing its failure to a number of factors, including infighting among Ukrainian commanders and even tension between Ukrainian commanders and their US handlers. In reality, the offensive failed because of the realities of material limitations on Western military industrial production and their inability to fight the type of war of attrition Russia had prepared for years in advance and imposed on them.

Toward the end of the New York Times article, it admitted that, “the coalition simply couldn’t provide all the equipment for a major counteroffensive. Nor could the Ukrainians build an army big enough to mount one.”

Various operations were described throughout the article including US-British attempts to destroy the Kerch Bridge connecting Crimea to the rest of Russia, which all ended in failure.

While the article attempts to blame the gradual draw down of US support for Ukraine on the election of President Donald Trump and his desire for “peace,” it is clear the US simply exhausted the means to continue waging a proxy war against a Russian military much better able to replace its losses than Ukraine and its Western sponsors.

The New York Times essentially admits this was a US war waged against Russia, simply using Ukraine as intermediaries.

Every major military operation down to specific targets to be struck and which US-European-made and provided weapon system to use to strike it with was made by American – not Ukrainian generals.

Playing “Mediator” While Seeking to Freeze a Failed Proxy War 

Today, the US government is attempting to play the role of a frustrated mediator trying to broker peace between Ukraine and Russia, when in reality this was always a war between the US and Russia.

In reality, current US Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, in a February 12, 2025 speech, discussed “European and non-European troops” being sent into Ukraine as a “security guarantee” which would in practice either freeze the conflict or precipitate direct hostilities between Russia and Europe.

Secretary Hegseth also instructed Europe the next steps regarding Ukraine would be “donating more ammunition and equipment” to Ukraine, as well as “expanding your defense industrial base.”

What Secretary Hegseth actually laid out was a directive not toward peace in Ukraine, but to once again freeze the conflict as the US and Europe did during the Minsk agreements, during which the US and Europe could expand their own military industrial bases to match or exceed Russian production and rearm and reorganize Ukrainian forces to resume hostilities again in the future when factors lean in Washington’s favor, not Moscow’s.

Secretary of State Marco Rubio’s predictable boredom with peace talks with Russia signals the US’ readiness to transfer responsibility for its proxy war fully onto Europe as it pivots toward a much more dangerous confrontation with Russia’s ally to the east – China.

The Trump administration and the Biden administration before it never had any intention of addressing the actual cause of the conflict in Ukraine – NATO’s expansion up to and all along Russia’s borders with every intention of inevitably absorbing Russia itself. Because of this, genuine peace was never possible regardless of the Trump administration’s public rhetoric and empty gestures toward Russia.

While the Trump administration has paid lip service to NATO expansion, its only decision regarding NATO specifically has been to demand NATO members more than double funding for NATO.

Russia, for its part, has left the door open for honest negotiations and has provided the United States ample exit ramps from both an unwinnable proxy war and indefinite confrontation with Russia into the future. The US is obviously not interested. Russia had, throughout “peace talks” with the US, continued its war of attrition against Ukrainian forces, continuing the process the New York Times describes as the central contributing factor for the proxy war’s current failure.

The real question that remains is whether or not Russia can continue this process at a faster and more effective rate than the US and Europe can continue “donating more ammunition and equipment” to Ukraine while attempting to expand their “defense industrial bases.” Only time will tell for sure.

As Syria has demonstrated, a proxy war the US has lost one moment can be frozen, revisited, and eventually won if it is able to overextend designated adversaries like Russia and Iran for long enough and extensively enough elsewhere. The US has already embarked upon armed conflict with Yemen and is threatening war with Iran – forcing Russia to once again make difficult decisions regarding where it invests finite military resources versus the seemingly infinite US capacity to create instability and conflict wordwide.

The survival and success of multipolarism depends on the multipolar world cooperating against US attempts to reassert American primacy – not only through direct and proxy war, but also through economic coercion and political interference – and to understand that a US war on Russia in Ukraine or a proxy war waged against Syria in the Middle East – is, in fact, a war against the rise of multipolarism altogether and the promise of peace and prosperity it offers.

Reprinted with permission from New Eastern Outlook.

ROME – Following the death of Pope Francis on Easter Monday, the Vatican has announced that his funeral will be held Saturday morning in Rome at St. Peter’s Basilica, before his coffin is transferred to a different location, per his special request, for his entombment.

The pope died Monday at 7:35am local time after experiencing a cerebral stroke that subsequently led to a coma, and cardiocirculatory failure.

His death came as a shock to many, given that he had made an appearance for Easter Sunday, giving his traditional noontime Urbi et Orbi blessing and taking his first ride in the popemobile to greet and bless faithful and pilgrims in St. Peter’s Square.

On Tuesday the Vatican announced that on Wednesday, April 23, at 9a.m. local time, Francis’s coffin will be transferred from the chapel inside the Vatican’s Saint Martha guesthouse, where he resided for the past 12 years, to St. Peter’s Basilica after a brief prayer by the papal Camerlegno, Cardinal Kevin Farrell.

Once inside the basilica, Farrell as Camerlegno, who governs the church during the sede vecante until a new pope is elected, will preside over the Liturgy of the Word, after which visits to the pope’s body will begin for his official lying in state.

Pope Francis’s funeral will be held Saturday, April 26, at 10a.m. local time, in St. Peter’s Square, and it will be presided over by Italian Cardinal Giovanni Battista Re, Dean of the College of Cardinals.

In addition to flocks of faithful from around the world, his funeral Mass is expected to be attended by various dignitaries and heads of state from around the world. It is unclear if United States President Donald Trump will attend the Mass.

U.S. Vice President JD Vance had a private meeting with the pope Sunday, less than 24 hours before his death, and is believed to be the last official appointment the pope had prior to his stroke and subsequent passing.

After Pope Francis’s funeral Mass, his coffin will be transferred to the Roman Basilica of Saint Mary Major, his favorite of the Roman basilicas which he visited before and after every international trip to pray in front of the famed Maria, Salus Populi Romani (Mary, health of the Roman people) icon, and where he said he wants to be buried.

In his last testament, Francis said he wished to be buried in a tomb prepared in the Pauline Chapel of the basilica, where the Salus Populi Romani icon is housed, without extravagant décor, and with the simple inscription of his papal name in Latin, Franciscus.

“I have always entrusted my life and episcopal ministry to the Mother of Our Lord, Mary Most Holy. For this reason, I ask that my mortal remains rest awaiting the day of resurrection in the Basilica of Saint Mary Major,” he said in the testament.

Francis voiced his desire that “my last earthly journey conclude precisely in this ancient Marian sanctuary, where I went to pray at the beginning and end of every apostolic journey to confidently entrust my intentions to the Immaculate Mother and to thank her for her docile and maternal care,” he said.

A rosary will be said for Pope Francis in St. Peter’s Square Tuesday night at 7:30p.m. local time, led by Re.

Follow Elise Ann Allen on X: @eliseannallen

(The late Pope Francis’ body lies in the chapel of the Casa Santa Marta | VATICAN MEDIA Divisione Foto)

The post Funeral for Pope Francis to be held on Saturday morning in Rome first appeared on Catholic Herald.

The post Funeral for Pope Francis to be held on Saturday morning in Rome appeared first on Catholic Herald.

Putin’s Never-ending Ever-widening War

EU and UK preparing naval blockade of Russia 

Yesterday Russia’s Maritime Board stated that Russia is facing escalating threats and challenges at sea amid growing geopolitical tensions. 

https://www.rt.com/russia/616084-eu-uk-russia-naval-blockade/ 

New Mexico Democrat Judge Resigns After ICE Arrests Alleged Tren de Aragua Gang Member in His Home

https://www.breitbart.com/border/2025/04/20/new-mexico-democrat-judge-resigns-after-ice-arrests-alleged-tren-de-aragua-gang-member-in-his-home/ 

As insouciant Americans should know by now, the Democrats and their puppet judges are aligned with immigrant-invaders against Americans.