TAMARA RYZHENKHOVA—After the war, it was necessary to clear the territory of mines. Since Algeria did not have qualified sappers, it requested assistance from European countries (Italy, Sweden, and Germany), but they refused to help. Private companies could not solve the problem either. It was then that the USSR agreed to help Algeria, free of charge. On July 27, 1963, an agreement was signed between the Soviet leadership and Algeria. Soviet specialists removed about 1.5 million mines in Algeria from 1962 to 1965.
COLONIALISM
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US Artillery Capabilities Fall Victim to “Profit Over Purpose,” No Solution in Sight
17 minutes readBRIAN BERLETIC—Washington’s problems continue to stem from its private industry-dominated military industrial base, which favors profits over purpose and performance, preferring small numbers of expensive weapon systems over large volumes of simple but effective equipment.
After abandoning the US Army’s own ERCA prototype, it is now investigating existing systems like Israel’s Elbit Systems Autonomous Truck Mounted Ordnance System (ATMOS) Iron Sabre, as well as systems produced by the UK’s BAE, France’s Nexter, and others.
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GARLAND NIXON—Garland and Dr Monteiro discuss the enormous political and structural changes taking place in the world as the US empire, representing the aristocratic/racist/exploitative colonialist order, now mired in irrevocable decline and chaos, slowly gives way to a new world order rooted multilateral sovereignty and genuine democracy. These are exciting times for humanity, says Dr Monteiro. There are indeed troubles and dangers ahead, but if the US ruling class can somehow finally accept (or be forced to) a new egalitarian multinational system, many things will rapidly begin to improve for most of humanity. The Global Majority—the “non-white” portions of the world—will now be in command.
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Israeli Suffering Is Not Comparable To Palestinian Suffering
20 minutes readCAITLIN JOHNSTONE—I’m sick of hearing October 7 mentioned in the same breath as Israel’s incineration of Gaza as though they’re equal or even comparable. A thousand Israelis dying (probably hundreds by indiscriminate IDF fire) is not comparable to tens of thousands of Palestinians (probably more) being deliberately exterminated by high-tech war machinery, even if before you account for the fact that Israel was the aggressor and that the violence of the oppressed is not comparable to the violence of the oppressor in the first place.
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ALASTAIR CROOKE—As symbolically significant as the Damascus attack is that the U.S., France and Britain – after a brief ‘hat tip’ to the Vienna Convention – refused to condemn the levelling of the Iranian Consulate, thus placing the shadow of doubt over the Vienna Convention’s immunity for diplomatic premises.
Implicitly, this refusal to condemn will be widely understood as a soft condoning of Israel’s first tentative step towards war with Hizbullah and Iran.