The reason I chose to interview the ambassador is because I accept as self-evident the truism that all wars end with diplomacy and the sooner we return to diplomacy the better.
To understand what’s going on in Iran, abandon what the Persians invented centuries ago: Manichaeism, black-and-white, political framing.
the US administration stresses that countries like Australia, New Zealand, South Korea and Japan will need to militarise as never before in peacetime to keep China in its place.
“The days of the United States propping up the entire world order like Atlas are over.” White House National Security Strategy, 2025
This weeks’ sabotage of a Polish rail line that enables freight to get to Ukraine is a big step in the undeclared war by Russia against European countries that support Ukraine.
The United States Department of Defense has been renamed as the Department of War. Nobody can be under any illusions anymore. More war is coming.
The greatest threat Russia poses to Europe is not that it marches west but that it turns its back and builds a brighter future to the east. We may be witnessing the emergence of a Eurasian World Order.
Putinversteher – one who “understands” Putin. It is meant as a slur but Professor Geoffrey Roberts, a British historian of Russia, embraces the term.
Henry Kissinger nailed it back in 2014: “For the West, the demonization of Vladimir Putin is not a policy; it is an alibi for the absence of one.”
A fascinating expose from Michael Hudson on the causes and implications of the recent rise in the price of gold. When Nixon took the US dollar off the standard in 1971 you could get an ounce for $35. Not now; Hudson explains why.
Trump’s opening bid for peace towards Ukraine was that the United States would gain access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals.
Well it didn’t take that long: from one SecDef to another in a matter of a month. It’s time for a rethink on Ukraine and much else.
Update: Hegseth’s speech video
With extensive use of internal documents, Maire Leadbeater’s excellent exposition of the various iterations of the security intelligence services tells a story of constant make-work in search of an adversary defined only by ideology.
The destruction on 23 May of a key part of Russia’s nuclear defence means the Doomsday clock is ticking closer to midnight. A Ukrainian/NATO drone attack on the Armavir radar station north of Georgia attcked a Voronezh-DM radar which is designed to detect incoming intercontinental ballistic missiles.
Unlike Mike Smith and other noisy members of the imperialist cohort, I applaud that NZ foreign policy has remained consistent in upholding UN and ICC policies against invasions and forced annexations. Ardern, Hipkins and now Luxon have all said the same thing.Supporting the UN charter has massively reduced war casualties over the last 70 years. Clearly the Russian Federation finds this constraining.
It is not clear exactly who persuaded Luxon to put Zelensky on his Xmas calling list. It might have been Albo or MFAT, no doubt on orders from the US, who are desperate to keep the illusion of victory alive until after the US Presidential election.
56 UK Labour MPs including 8 front-benchers defied the Leader and the Whip and voted for a SNP amendment to the King’s speech calling for an immediate cease-fire in Gaza.
We are further away from peace in parts of the world than a decade ago. But pessimism about peace isn’t a foregone conclusion.
Alexander Gillespie complains that kiwis are not being given answers on foreign policy in the election. Given the state of flux in the world, and the questions he poses, it is probably just as well. The answers might all be dangerous.
Belief in capricious gods would explain the perplexing habit of governments with intelligent and informed people to embrace policies which are manifestly an example of self-destructive stupidity. Clever people doing stupid things.
There will be no respite for any of us this year and National has no cure for it.
The prime minister stated in his speech last week our objective in the war in Ukraine was to aid Ukraine “to defeat Russia.” I couldn’t believe what I was hearing – that’s a declaration of nuclear World War III! Even the US neocons think its time to back off.
In case we just missed it, New Zealand really has picked a side. Prime Minister Hipkins will head to the NATO summit in Lithuania together with Australia, Japan and South Korean leaders. Also Vladimir Zelinskyy is intending to go as well.
We didn’t need the Russian invasion of Ukraine to tell us that great power competition is back, since China and the United States and Russia had been going at it well before even COVID temporarily messed up the multilateral trade system upon which we had built our little country. But it’s made it worse, and so we’re picking a side, and that side is NATO.
China has proposed a 12 point peace plan to start discussions towards ending the war by Russia against Ukraine. And Ukraine’s leader wants to meet Xi Jinping to hear more.
Historian Malcolm McKinnon in Thursday’s DominionPost states that “caution is needed when crafting victory over Russia as the primary war aim in Ukraine.” Truer words were never spoken, as western hysteria rejects calls for peace and escalates to wider war.
Vladimir Zelensky’s message to the New Zealand Parliament will be delivered in the last week before Christmas, in the bury-it time-slot. That seems appropriate, for much has changed since the heady days when our Parliament went straight for sanctions on Russia without discussion.
If 2020 was the worst year in my lifetime how does 2022 compare?
82-year old polymath Michael Hudson is my favourite economist. He currently lectures in China to million-strong audiences. His latest book is The Destiny of Civilisation: Finance Capitalism, Industrial Capitalism or Socialism. His latest article is well worth a read.
Interesting to see how the Russian protest plays out over conscription. Odd things happen in gatherings with tyrants. Jan 6 was one. But Romania 1989 was one Putin will know well.
The Russian invasion of the Ukraine has cost tens of thousands of people their lives, millions of people their homes, seriously disrupted billions of people, and increased the threat of nuclear war but there are positive developments coming from it.
Vladimir Putin has effectively conceded that the Ukraine war is not going well for Russia by seeking to conscript 300,000 new soldiers, planning for referenda in Russian held areas and threatening the use of Nuclear weapons if Russia’s modified territorial integrity is threatened.
We’re sending 120 troops to Britain to ‘train’ raw recruits for the Ukraine killing grounds. For the Defence Generals, it’s an overseas trip to aid retention. For the Ukrainian conscripts, it’s a prelude to early death. It is cynical and criminal: we should be arguing for the war to stop, not keep it going ”to the death of the last Ukrainian.”
Not content to stay in the North Atlantic, NATO is shortly about to reveal in Madrid its next ten-year plan to contain China. Jacinda Ardern will be there, who knows why. Are we nailing our colours to a flag at half-mast?
Every part of our energy-dense life from plastic to tarmac to food to clothes to building materials is about to get smashed like we ain’t seen.
RNZ’s “The Detail” asked are New Zealand’s sanctions against Russia working? They aren’t, but one detail we learnt that MFAT has 100 staff members assigned to sorting out their complications!! What a waste.
