Western sanctions against Russia have been used primarily to obfuscate the cause of western inflation and keep the citizen pitchforks from reaching various government offices.  So far, the strategy -assisted by western media- has been mostly successful.

However, the International Energy Agency (IEA) is reporting that despite the western sanctions against Russia, the Russian energy sector is having no trouble finding customers for its oil sales.  With global oil prices at their highest rates in years, in part driven by the energy policy of the same western leaders who triggered the sanctions, Russia is getting just as much economic benefit as it was before the sanctions regime was triggered.

(EU FINANCE) – Russia continued to rake in oil revenues in May despite a global boycott from companies and most countries following its invasion of Ukraine, a new report has shown.

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said the Kremlin’s oil-export revenues surged to around $20bn last month, an 11% increase from the month before, despite shipping lower volumes.

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A contracted mercenary has no legal recognition or protection as a prisoner of war.  Two American mercenary soldiers have been captured by Russian forces and now present a rather unique issue for the Biden administration.   The traditional end result for captured mercenaries is execution; however, Russian President Vladimir Putin may not want to hang these two State Dept. conscripts.

(Via Telegraph) – Two former US servicemen have been captured during fighting with Russian forces in Ukraine, The Telegraph has been told. The pair were taken prisoner during a fierce battle outside the north-east city of Kharkiv last week, according to comrades who were fighting alongside them.

Alexander Drueke, 39, and Andy Huynh, 27, had been serving as volunteers with a regular Ukrainian army unit. They are believed to be the first US servicemen to end up as Russian prisoners of war. They join a growing number of Western military volunteers captured by Russian forces, including at least two Britons.

Aiden Aslin and Shaun Pinner have already been told they face the death penalty as “mercenaries”. The capture of the two Americans will be diplomatically sensitive as the Kremlin may seek to use it as proof that America is becoming directly involved in the war. Vladimir Putin, the Russian president, is likely to demand significant concessions to release them. (read more)

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Joe Biden’s repeated use of the phrase “Putin’s price hikes” is intended to shift responsibility for inflation away from his own policy and assign blame to Russia. Biden is essentially pretending that Vladimir Putin has control over White House energy policy, in order to protect his administration from the American people realizing all of the economic pain they feel is being done purposefully.

Putin didn’t price hike anything. The cause of the current spike in global oil prices was created, in the largest part, by the western sanctions against Russia; not the action of Russia itself.

Factually, massive global inflation began in early 2021 as an outcome of Western government spending and monetary policy. The U.S. Federal Reserve, EU and western alliance central bankers created the issue and were always going to face inflation as an outcome of their agreed direction. As the inflation started to become a serious political problem for them, the Ukraine conflict became the excuse, the blanket to hide the real origin of the problem.

Almost every western government leader now deflects responsibility for their inflation by pointing fingers at Vladimir Putin, this is not coincidental.  Just like their agreement to follow each other into the unsustainable spending spiral via “Build Back Better,” the same Western alliance -united members of the World Economic Forum- must now collectively deflect attention away from the consequences of their catastrophic agenda.

The global inflation crisis is, in essence, a direct and immediate outcome from the designs of the ‘The Great Reset.’  It is within this reset where the global cleaving is underway.

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The Express.UK has a poll released today [DATA HERE] showing U.S. sentiment toward the Ukraine crisis.  “More Americans believe that it would be better for them for Biden to be removed (56 percent) than Putin (43 percent).” Also, “Russia is also only seen as the fourth biggest international threat (14 percent) compared to China (45 percent), Iran (20 percent) and North Korea (17 percent).”

The entire poll is devastating for the Biden administration – SEE MORE HERE

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I found this 8-minute video to be quite interesting.  As we consider the scale of food price increase in the United States, this video of a Russian supermarket yesterday is fascinating.

Considering the sanctions levied upon Russia by the western alliance, it would appear that they are coping quite nicely.  The guy who uploaded the video shares, “I took my camera with me on a quick Beer run to give you folks an idea of what a small local supermarket in a village South of Saint Petersburg, Russia looks like. How do the prices compare to where you live?”  WATCH:

https://youtu.be/6bq8MfAlNPY

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This is the kind of real information the U.S. media would never mention.

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Republicans in Washington DC, the right wing of the UniParty vulture, play the game of Chaff and Countermeasures whenever it comes to the investigation of lawbreaking that targets people outside the system.  If you are an ‘ordinary’ American with no connection to the insider’s club, the best you can hope for is a strongly worded message of support from the GOP.  Prior examples of Chaff and Countermeasures have included: Fast and Furious, IRS Targeting, Benghazi, Spygate, Trump-Russia Collusion, and the 2020 election fraud.

STEPS: 1) The electorate become aware of a political issue or action; often illegal. 2) The electorate becomes angry. 3) DC needs to protect itself. 4) Countermeasures are assigned and deployed to delay, obfuscate and create the illusion of investigation of the illegal governmental action. 5) Electorate watch. 6) Investigation goes nowhere. 7) Countermeasure deployment successful. 8) Pause-Wait-Repeat.

John Ratcliffe appears on Fox News with Maria Bartiromo to discuss the outcome of the Michael Sussmann not-guilty verdict.  Ratcliffe waxes poetically noting the evidence at trial looks very badly upon the Robert Mueller and Andrew Weissmann investigation.  Ratcliffe says justice is going to have to come at the ballot box.   WATCH:

In response to the arrest of Trump advisor Peter Navarro, which included handcuffs and leg-irons for a perp walk, Mr. Ratcliffe notes that FBI Director Christopher Wray should probably look into that…. As if Direct Chris Wray wasn’t an active participant in the decision-making.  Mr. Ratcliffe does a great job pretending not to know things.

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During press remarks yesterday, Joe Biden implied that Ukraine may need to cede territory in Eastern Ukraine to Russia as part of a “negotiated settlement.”

The statement came at the end of remarks centered around the May jobs report and Biden’s claim that U.S. consumers were in the best economic position of the past decade, therefore the government must begin increasing direct subsidies to offset energy costs and massive inflation pressure.  When Biden was asked, “does Ukraine have to cede territory to achieve some peace?” he stated:

[Transcript] – [F]rom the beginning, I’ve said and I’ve been — not everyone has agreed with me — nothing about Ukraine without Ukraine.  It’s their territory.  I’m not going to tell them what they should and shouldn’t do.

But it appears to me that, at some point along the line, there’s going to have to be a negotiated settlement here.  And what that entails, I don’t know.  I don’t think anybody knows at the time.

But in the meantime, we’re going to continue to put the — the Ukrainians in a position where they can defend themselves.  Thank you all so very much. (link)

It has been obvious from the outset that annexing Eastern Ukraine, the region containing a majority pro-Russia population, was always the intended objective of Russian aggression.  With Biden making this admission public, it raises the question then why did we agree to send $40 billion?

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Germany is the central and largest economy within the European Union; it is also the most influential for anything related to the response from the European Central Bank and EU Central Bank President Christine Lagarde.   Today, Germany is reporting a massive (unexpected) jump in overall inflation for May of 8.7%, up from the previous month’s 7.8%.

Ironically, it was a little more than a month ago when EU Central Bank President Christine Lagarde said she did not expect the EU inflation to be quite as bad as the U.S. inflation crisis due to the EU spending less on COVID relief and focusing on employment retention.  This was the ECB justification for not raising interest rates until later this summer.  Obviously Lagarde has joined Jerome Powell in the room filled with bad financial decisionmakers.

Germany is the largest and most influential economy inside the EU. If the German economy falters, the entire EU slips into a recession.  The massive inflation now being reported by Germany, that continues climbing each month, will increase the urgency for of Lagarde to raise rates.  They too are in the inflation spiral, and this issue will quickly fracture the EU response to Ukraine.

(Via Reuters) – […]  German consumer prices, harmonised to make them comparable with inflation data across the European Union, increased to 8.7% from 7.8% a month earlier, well ahead of expectations for 8%, data from the Federal Statistics Office showed on Monday.

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The Associated Press [HERE] and more importantly the U.S. Intel Community outlet, the Washington Post [HERE], are beginning to change direction in their narration of the war in Ukraine.

Both sources of information are starting to position Eastern Ukraine as a lost cause, with the Washington Post giving specific examples of conscripted Ukraine fighters who are abandoning the effort in the donbas region.  As noted, “after three months of war, this company of 120 men is down to 54 because of deaths, injuries and desertions. The volunteers were civilians before Russia invaded on Feb. 24, and they never expected to be dispatched to one of the most dangerous front lines in eastern Ukraine.”

The Ukraine commander, Serhi Lapko and one of his lieutenants, Vitaliy Khrus, “retreated with members of their company this week to a hotel away from the front. There, both men spoke to The Washington Post on the record, knowing they could face a court-martial and time in military prison.”  Together, Lapko and Khrus describe the essential elements of a fragmented Ukraine fighting force up against a committed Russian military advance.

Even the Washington Post admits the Ukraine central government is desperate to push morale boosting propaganda which seems constructed from the efforts of the U.S. State Dept, specifically the intelligence community within it. “Videos of assaults on Russian tanks or positions are posted daily on social media. Artists are creating patriotic posters, billboards and T-shirts. The postal service even released stamps commemorating the sinking of a Russian warship in the Black Sea.”

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If you were to read the play-by-play of information in the U.K. Telegraph [SEE HERE], you could get whiplash from the diametrically opposed narratives coming from both sides in the propaganda war.

On one hand the western narrative is that Russia is losing, getting weaker, running out of money and weapons.  On the other hand, France and Germany are asking Russian President Vladimir Putin to release all of the captured soldiers he is gathering, while western media claim all the Ukraine retreats are “strategic”.  It would appear the Monty Python knight has lost all his appendages and is yelling, “come back coward, I’ll bite your kneecaps.”

(Via Telegraph) – Russia said its forces were in full control of the Ukrainian town of Lyman, a railway hub in the Donetsk region, on Saturday in a gain that would help set the stage for the next phase of the Kremlin’s offensive in the eastern Donbas.

Ukrainian and Russian forces had been fighting for Lyman for several days. The town lies 40 km (30 miles) west of Severodonetsk, the largest Donbas city still held by Ukraine but now under heavy assault from Russian forces.  The governor of Luhansk region, which along with Donetsk makes up the Donbas, said on Friday that Russian troops had entered Severodonetsk.

The Russian gains indicate a shift in momentum in the war. (read more)

Meanwhile the U.S. State Department, the actual combatant command center for the U.S. proxy war, along with internationally aligned diplomatic corps and the U.S. intelligence apparatus, are continuing to push the propaganda as if we cannot see how clearly staged it is.

Indeed, with the Pentagon preferring a ceasefire and peaceful negotiations while the State Dept demands more war, these are very remarkable times on the other side of the looking glass.

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