Sanctions Are Just As Deadly As War: Lancet Study

Via The Libertarian Institute

Ron Paul, the libertarian leaning former Texas congressman and GOP candidate for president, has always maintained that sanctions are acts of war. The Lancet Global Health recently published a study that proves him right.

Economists Mark Weisbrot, Francisco Rodríguez, and Silvio Rendón have found that the yearly total excess human death toll associated with economic sanctions across the world is roughly equivalent to the annual human death tolls of active wars and combat. In fact, the study reveals that on average the civilian deaths caused by sanctions exceed battle-related casualties in kinetic conflicts each year.

AFP/Getty Images

According to the study, the worst effects on populations across various age groups are caused by unilateral US and EU sanctions against targeted countries. The researchers argue “unilateral sanctions imposed by the USA or the EU might be designed in ways that have a greater negative effect on target populations.” UN sanctions, they add, “have been framed as efforts to minimise their impact on civilian populations, although the extent to which they have achieved this goal remains debated.”

In the period of 2012-2021, for example, the unilateral sanctions’ annual global death toll on average was 564, 258. The study also notes that most of the civilian deaths attributeable to sanctions between 1970 and 2020 were children less than five years old.

Economic and unilateral sanctions kill the most vulnerable members of a population including primarily children, the elderly, and the sick. The press release regarding the study, published by the Center for Economic and Policy Research, states “The researchers studied sanctions’ effects on age-specific mortality rates. They found that children under five made up 51 percent of total deaths due to sanctions over the 1970–2021 period. Most deaths (77 percent over the same period) were aged 0–15 and 60–80.”

The press release continues, “The study is the first to systematically examine the effects of sanctions on age-specific mortality in cross-country data using methods designed to address causal questions on observational data.” The researchers conclude that “the effects of sanctions on mortality generally increase over time, with longer-lived sanctions episodes resulting in higher tolls on lives.”

Washington has imposed  brutal “maximum pressure” or “crippling” sanctions on poor countries across the world such as Venezuela, North Korea, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Cuba. Over the years, it has been documented that these sanctions have contributed to the preventable deaths of tens of thousands and in some cases hundreds of thousands of people in Venezuela and Iraq alone.

The US also imposes extensive sanctions regimes on more powerful countries than those listed above such as Russia and Iran. By cutting off the possibility of economic cooperation and interdependence, war has resulted in both cases during the last three years.

In 2021, erstwhile Secretary of State Antony Blinken declared that Washington was absolutely committed “to [opposing] the reconstruction of Syria” absent regime change. To that end, the US implemented a callous sanctions regime on Syria using the bipartisan Caesar Act, a law which targeted any person or entity of any nationality that attempted to do business with the war-torn country. These sanctions deliberately targeted the country’s engineering and construction sectors.

As a result, the civilian population was devastated. In 2022, Alena Douhan, a UN special rapporteur on unilateral coercive measures, visited Syria. She explained at the time that the sanctions “severely harm human rights and prevent any efforts for early recovery, rebuilding and reconstruction.”

Douhan stressed that “12 million Syrians grapple with food insecurity” and “90% of Syria’s population currently lives in poverty,” with limited access to food, shelter, water, electricity, healthcare, heating, cooking, fuel, and transportation. Partly as a result of the bipartisan economic war on Syria, Al Qaeda offshoots were able to seize Damascus and take over the country. Since then, sectarian violence has seen thousands of civilians slaughtered.

The use of sanctions, largely spearheaded by the US, has spread across the world over the last several decades. “25% of all countries [were] subject to some type of sanctions by either the USA, the EU, or the UN in the 2010–22 period, by contrast with an average of only 8% in the 1960s.”

Rodríguez insists the entire policy of economic warfare must be reevaluated. “We have seen economic sanctions — especially those imposed by the US — contribute substantially to economic collapse in targeted countries, such as Venezuela… Sanctions often fail to achieve their stated objectives and instead only punish the civilian populations of the targeted countries. It is well past time that the US, EU, and other powerful actors in the international community seriously reconsider this cruel and often counterproductive mechanism.”

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 10:30

DOGE's AI Tool 'SweetREX' Set To Take Buzzsaw To Federal Regulations

Following Elon Musk’s exit from the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE), Democrats and mainstream media have largely turned their attention elsewhere. Yet, DOGE is quietly making steady progress on an ambitious plan to overhaul federal regulations, according to a report.

Central to the effort is an AI tool under development, the SweetREX Deregulation AI Plan Builder (SweetREX DAIP), designed to “promote prudent financial management and alleviate unnecessary regulatory burdens.”

The little-known project is being spearheaded by Christopher Sweet, a DOGE staffer initially presented as a “special assistant,” who was, until recently, a third-year student at the University of Chicago.

WIRED reports:

SweetREX was developed by associates of DOGE operating out of the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). The plan is to roll it out to other US agencies. Members of the call included staffers from across the government, including the Environmental Protection Agency, the Department of State, and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation, among others.

Leading Wednesday's call alongside Sweet was Scott Langmack, a DOGE-affiliated senior adviser at HUD and, according to his LinkedIn profile, the COO of technology company Kukun. (WIRED previously reported that he had application-level access to critical HUD systems; Kukun is a proptech firm that is, according to its website, “on a long-term mission to aggregate the hardest to find data.”) While Sweet led the development side of SweetREX, Langmack said he was taking point on demoing the tool for different agencies and pitching them on its benefits.

DOGE is likely to use the AI tool to eliminate up to 50% of 200,000 federal regulations by January 2026. A DOGE PowerPoint presentation, titled the “DOGE Deregulation Opportunity,” projects that the effort could yield $3.3 trillion annually in economic benefits.

“The DOGE experts creating these plans are the best and brightest in the business and are embarking on a never-before-attempted transformation of government systems and operations to enhance efficiency and effectiveness,” an administration spokesperson told the Washington Post, which first reported on the DOGE presentation.

On Tuesday, a federal appeals court cleared a key hurdle for DOGE, rejecting a labor union effort to restrict the agency’s access to sensitive U.S. user data from government agencies. In a 2-1 decision, the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals vacated a lower court’s injunction that had blocked DOGE from accessing data held by the U.S. Department of Education, Treasury Department, and Office of Personnel Management, citing potential violations of federal privacy laws, according to Fox News.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 09:55

Merz's Germany: 100 Days Of Economic Deep Freeze

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

The German federal government is already staggering into its first major crisis just months after its election. That it also stands economically bare amidst mostly self-inflicted turbulence has gone largely unnoticed. Meanwhile, no one in Berlin seems concerned about the country’s economic catastrophe.

To call Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s first 100 days a false start would be the understatement of the year. His initial report card is a disaster. His ostentatious alignment with the Left in fighting the AfD, the catastrophic decision to halt arms deliveries to Israel, and the break with Germany’s last vestiges of state raison d’être will contribute to the premature end of this coalition just as much as Merz’s wobbly course in the debate over the SPD-nominated Federal Constitutional Court judge Brosius-Gersdorf.

Fear-Driven Shock Paralysis

Merz is fear-driven, fleeing to the international stage to project an aura of strength domestically against the background of bellicose noise in Russia policy, avoiding the looming collapse of his government and the embarrassment of a short-lived chancellorship. Armament, military readiness, and a pinch of patriotism—this is the thin veneer of Merz’s last line of defense.

It is the nature of the media that the EU’s disastrous handling of the trade conflict with the US, the Gaza crisis, and the escalation of the Ukraine conflict dominate headlines. Meanwhile, Germany’s economic decline accelerates. To be fair, Merz inherited a poisoned political legacy. The country’s deep recession was handed down by his predecessor Olaf Scholz, along with the dire state of the German social funds, which currently show a deficit of around €47 billion.

The extreme imbalances in Germany’s social system - resulting from the recession, demographic aging, and uncontrolled migration - cannot be blamed on Merz any more than the hyperstate-like public sector, now managing half of all economic output through its channels. The energy crisis is also a fact the new government must confront, layered atop a complex mix of structural deficits that have rendered Germany nearly untouchable in the global competitive landscape.

Problem Recognized?

The question must be: Has Merz at least recognized the severity of the country’s economic crisis? And if so, what measures does his government plan to reverse it? In the third year of recession and with a loss of 700,000 jobs since 2019, it is clear Berlin knows the political course leads Germany toward catastrophe.

On the plus side, Merz can claim his so-called “investment booster,” mainly composed of two measures: the temporary reintroduction of declining balance depreciation until 2029 and a corporate tax cut from 15% to 10% starting 2028. These measures would relieve the economy by €11.3 billion, roughly 0.23% of GDP—laughably small given the economy already carries €146 billion in unnecessary bureaucracy costs.

Merz should have wielded the chainsaw here, but no German politician dares challenge a bureaucracy that has grown into a state within a state, adding half a million employees in the last six years.

Reform Refusal and Course Maintenance

Merz’s original promise to cut electricity taxes for business and consumers also signals, unspoken, that the green transition is seen as the root of the energy crisis, driving energy-intensive firms out of the country. Last year alone, €64.5 billion in direct investments left Germany, a long-standing trend now accelerating.

Consequently, Germany is losing its economic foundation, on the verge of becoming Europe’s Rust Belt, much like parts of the US. Yet Berlin does nothing: no electricity tax cut, no return to nuclear, no scrapping of the burdensome heating law. Merz refuses any reforms in the green transition. We are witnessing the continuation of Habeck’s deindustrialization agenda.

Merz avoids all conflict with Brussels’ Green Deal. The core of centralist policy, the key to Germany’s economic liberation, remains untouched, regardless of how sharply the recession bites.

An orderly withdrawal of the state from the frozen energy sector, weighed down by subsidies and regulations, is nowhere in sight. Talks with Moscow over gas imports are unthinkable—Brussels stubbornly polishes the 19th sanctions package. Merz watches as a policy takes root that delivers Germany a fatal economic blow.

Systemic Collapse

Even social fund problems, the scandalous citizen’s allowance, now promoted globally as aid for migrants, fall under economic policy. Like a rabbit before a snake, the government freezes amid widening deficits, attempting to fix health and pension insurance with new debt and supplementary transfers. Only an effective migration policy shift and painful reforms to social benefits could reverse the downward spiral.

Merz allows Germany to head toward French-style conditions—his historically and legally dubious €1 trillion debt program will push Germany into the middle ranks of European debt states, raising the debt-to-GDP ratio to 95%, turning the federal budget into an unbearable weight. Infrastructure spending is nice, but with social funds in crisis and defense commitments rising, resources will barely suffice to maintain existing assets.

No Regulatory Turnaround

Unless Germany’s economic course turns 180 degrees, this government will go down as a temporary continuation of the red-green agenda and a footnote in the country’s history. With a coalition backed by the Left, Merz lacks the political capital and personal reform drive to pull Germany out of crisis.

In Argentina today, one can observe the recipe for political turnaround: drastic state downsizing and deregulation should guide policy. The state’s share must shrink enough that private markets regain control of investment allocation.

Merz would need to break the ideological wall of his structurally leftist coalition, cancel the Green Deal with Brussels, and restore diplomatic relations with Moscow to turn the tide. Germany is light-years from such a paradigm shift. Until then, the economic substance left by two postwar generations will be politically squandered.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 09:20

Washington Cancer Patient Has Car Stolen On First Day Of Treatment

On what should have been a day focused solely on fighting prostate cancer, Washington state resident Val Mohney got blindsided by a different kind of battle — car theft.

Mohney, who lives in Davenport, had traveled to Columbia City to stay with his friend Kristen Dean while starting treatment, according to Yahoo. But at around 6 a.m. Tuesday, the police called with news guaranteed to ruin anyone’s morning: his car had been stolen, joyridden, and crashed into a fence at a nearby middle school.

"Unfortunately, I started my day off with having my car ripped off and driven through a fence," he told KING5. "I'm just trying to deal with cancer, and now I have to deal with that."

Yahoo writes that the car was in bad shape — the ignition looked like someone had "taken a grenade" to it — and it was left abandoned in the school parking lot. For Mohney, a real estate agent, the loss isn’t just inconvenient; it’s income-threatening. "I'm the sole bread winner so if I'm not making money there's no money coming in," he said.

"I wouldn't hold out much hope for the tape deck. Or the Creedence."

On top of everything, Mohney is caring for his mother, who has dementia, and his partner, whose disability limits how much they can work. Life has been throwing him lemons, bricks, and the occasional flaming bowling ball, but he’s focusing on his supporters.

"Really, I'm very fortunate because I have a big community of people that love me and I don't know how people that don't do it when stuff like that comes up," he said.

Dean is now shuttling him to work between treatments — a job that apparently now comes with “personal chauffeur” in the description. Seattle police are combing through surveillance footage to find the joyrider, who remains at large. Meanwhile, a GoFundMe is helping Mohney keep going while he battles cancer and, apparently, other people’s bad life choices.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 08:45

The key reports this week are July Housing Starts and Existing Home sales.

Fed Chair Jerome Powell will speak on the "Economic Outlook" at the Jackson Hole Symposium on Friday.

----- Monday, August 18th -----
10:00 AM: The August NAHB homebuilder survey. The consensus is for a reading of 34, up from 33. Any number below 50 indicates that more builders view sales conditions as poor than good.

----- Tuesday, August 19th -----
8:30 AM ET: Housing Starts for July.

This graph shows single and multi-family housing starts since 2000.

The consensus is for 1.300 million SAAR, down from 1.321 million SAAR in June.

10:00 AM: State Employment and Unemployment (Monthly) for July 2025

----- Wednesday, August 20th -----
7:00 AM ET: The Mortgage Bankers Association (MBA) will release the results for the mortgage purchase applications index.

During the day: The AIA's Architecture Billings Index for July (a leading indicator for commercial real estate).

2:00 PM: FOMC Minutes, Meeting of July 29-30

----- Thursday, August 21st -----
8:30 AM: The initial weekly unemployment claims report will be released. The consensus is for initial claims to increase to 226 thousand from 224 thousand last week.

10:00 AM: Existing Home Sales for July from the National Association of Realtors (NAR). The consensus is for 3.92 million SAAR, down from 3.93 million last month.

The graph shows existing home sales from 1994 through the report last month.

Housing economist Tom Lawler expects the NAR to report sales of 3.92 million SAAR for July.

----- Friday, August 22nd -----
10:00 AM: Speech, Fed Chair Jerome Powell, Economic Outlook and Framework Review, At the 2025 Jackson Hole Economic Policy Symposium, Moran, Wyoming

 – by New Deal democrat Industrial production is much less central to the US economic picture than it was before the “China shock,” since so much production moved overseas, meaning US consumers buy much more imported goods than they used to. Still it is an important if diminished coincident indicator. This morning’s report for July can […]

The post July industrial production: meh! appeared first on Angry Bear.

This piece by Claudia Sahm is about two weeks old. The perspective is still worth reading. The economy is still be pulled one way or another as Tr__p plays he tariff games up and down and who makes deals and who does not. That is enough to create uncertainty in the market. “There are factors […]

The post Slowing Job Growth To Date? appeared first on Angry Bear.

The post Tariffs: Donald Trump’s Big Tax on American Households appeared first on CEPR.

France's Debt Time Bomb Is Ticking Beneath The Summer Calm

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

France remains a politically immovable monolith. A toxic mix of a ballooning budget deficit, an overgrown welfare state, and a persistent recession makes the country a prime candidate for a full-blown sovereign debt crisis. If the government fails to pass its budget, Europe could be in for a heated autumn.

Cuts to social benefits, pension freezes, or reductions in health coverage have historically ended in general strikes, highway blockades, or suburban riots. The media tends to romanticize this as “character strength” — a people resisting the stingy state and fighting for their rights.

What’s left unsaid is that France operates with a staggering government spending ratio of 57% of GDP — the largest welfare state in the EU, possibly even the democratic world champion of redistribution. This deeply socialist policy mix has driven the country into a fiscal and economic dead end.

Interest Costs Explode 

Public debt stands at around 114% of GDP, with Prime Minister François Bayrou’s government planning fresh borrowing of 5.4% of GDP this year — figures so far removed from the defunct Maastricht criteria they make you dizzy. In July, Bayrou managed to trim the projected deficit from 5.8% to 5.4%, a €5 billion reduction.

But in the face of a €3 trillion debt mountain, this is less than a drop in the bucket — a faint pulse from a policy in terminal decline. Bond markets have taken notice: yields on 10-year French debt have climbed 30 basis points over the past year to 3.3%. That means at least €67 billion in interest costs this year — €16 billion more than last year — squeezing government room to maneuver like ice melting on the Côte d’Azur.

Calm Before the Storm 

For now, the summer news drought has swallowed the debt crisis narrative. Since Bayrou’s mid-July reform package, the media has gone silent. In truth, budgets like France’s, Spain’s, or Italy’s have only been kept afloat thanks to the ECB’s willingness to crush bond market unrest with massive interventions — a habit developed since the last debt crisis 15 years ago.

Short of Luxembourg, no major EU state could fend off a sovereign debt crisis alone. At this point, real reforms may already be too late: any drastic cuts would collapse economies hooked on subsidies, cheap credit, and state interventionism, triggering mass unemployment and social unrest.

Still, Paris seems to have recognized the urgency. Three weeks ago, Bayrou unveiled the next consolidation package: €44 billion in spending cuts for next year (about 1.5% of GDP). The plan includes a hiring freeze for civil servants, merging inefficient agencies, and freezing welfare and pensions in 2026 at 2025 levels — a “blank year” for the welfare state. Only the defense budget will rise, in line with NATO demands.

Wealthy taxpayers will lose certain breaks, the healthcare system will be trimmed, and sick leave will be monitored more strictly. If the economy holds, the deficit could drop to 4.6% next year, with the government aiming for Maastricht’s 3% cap by 2029. But given France’s track record, few expect the numbers to hold once the social peace bill comes due.

Symbolic Misstep 

The package also scraps two public holidays — Easter Monday and, controversially, May 8, the WWII victory day. While aimed at boosting productivity, many patriotic French will see this as a provocation, hardly a way to win public backing for fiscal reform. Facing organized resistance and the threat of another no-confidence vote, Bayrou has floated the idea of a 2026 budget referendum — an unusual gamble that may backfire.

Like Germany, France’s budget crisis is unfolding amid recession. Weak consumer sentiment and falling retail sales are partially offset by tourism, expected to grow 6% this year. But France is deindustrializing, its manufacturing PMI stuck around 48, and construction output at 43 — deep in recession territory.

For now, the summer lull allows Paris to bury its own fiscal mess beneath coverage of America’s debt drama. But Brussels fears that a French bond market panic could bring down the EU’s entire debt edifice. With a deepening U.S. trade war and a worsening recession, France’s crisis could be back in the headlines within weeks — possibly ushering in a hot autumn in Paris and a new European debt drama.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a Germany graduate economist, has worked for over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 07:00

France's Debt Time Bomb Is Ticking Beneath The Summer Calm

Submitted by Thomas Kolbe

France remains a politically immovable monolith. A toxic mix of a ballooning budget deficit, an overgrown welfare state, and a persistent recession makes the country a prime candidate for a full-blown sovereign debt crisis. If the government fails to pass its budget, Europe could be in for a heated autumn.

Cuts to social benefits, pension freezes, or reductions in health coverage have historically ended in general strikes, highway blockades, or suburban riots. The media tends to romanticize this as “character strength” — a people resisting the stingy state and fighting for their rights.

What’s left unsaid is that France operates with a staggering government spending ratio of 57% of GDP — the largest welfare state in the EU, possibly even the democratic world champion of redistribution. This deeply socialist policy mix has driven the country into a fiscal and economic dead end.

Interest Costs Explode 

Public debt stands at around 114% of GDP, with Prime Minister François Bayrou’s government planning fresh borrowing of 5.4% of GDP this year — figures so far removed from the defunct Maastricht criteria they make you dizzy. In July, Bayrou managed to trim the projected deficit from 5.8% to 5.4%, a €5 billion reduction.

But in the face of a €3 trillion debt mountain, this is less than a drop in the bucket — a faint pulse from a policy in terminal decline. Bond markets have taken notice: yields on 10-year French debt have climbed 30 basis points over the past year to 3.3%. That means at least €67 billion in interest costs this year — €16 billion more than last year — squeezing government room to maneuver like ice melting on the Côte d’Azur.

Calm Before the Storm 

For now, the summer news drought has swallowed the debt crisis narrative. Since Bayrou’s mid-July reform package, the media has gone silent. In truth, budgets like France’s, Spain’s, or Italy’s have only been kept afloat thanks to the ECB’s willingness to crush bond market unrest with massive interventions — a habit developed since the last debt crisis 15 years ago.

Short of Luxembourg, no major EU state could fend off a sovereign debt crisis alone. At this point, real reforms may already be too late: any drastic cuts would collapse economies hooked on subsidies, cheap credit, and state interventionism, triggering mass unemployment and social unrest.

Still, Paris seems to have recognized the urgency. Three weeks ago, Bayrou unveiled the next consolidation package: €44 billion in spending cuts for next year (about 1.5% of GDP). The plan includes a hiring freeze for civil servants, merging inefficient agencies, and freezing welfare and pensions in 2026 at 2025 levels — a “blank year” for the welfare state. Only the defense budget will rise, in line with NATO demands.

Wealthy taxpayers will lose certain breaks, the healthcare system will be trimmed, and sick leave will be monitored more strictly. If the economy holds, the deficit could drop to 4.6% next year, with the government aiming for Maastricht’s 3% cap by 2029. But given France’s track record, few expect the numbers to hold once the social peace bill comes due.

Symbolic Misstep 

The package also scraps two public holidays — Easter Monday and, controversially, May 8, the WWII victory day. While aimed at boosting productivity, many patriotic French will see this as a provocation, hardly a way to win public backing for fiscal reform. Facing organized resistance and the threat of another no-confidence vote, Bayrou has floated the idea of a 2026 budget referendum — an unusual gamble that may backfire.

Like Germany, France’s budget crisis is unfolding amid recession. Weak consumer sentiment and falling retail sales are partially offset by tourism, expected to grow 6% this year. But France is deindustrializing, its manufacturing PMI stuck around 48, and construction output at 43 — deep in recession territory.

For now, the summer lull allows Paris to bury its own fiscal mess beneath coverage of America’s debt drama. But Brussels fears that a French bond market panic could bring down the EU’s entire debt edifice. With a deepening U.S. trade war and a worsening recession, France’s crisis could be back in the headlines within weeks — possibly ushering in a hot autumn in Paris and a new European debt drama.

* * * 

About the author: Thomas Kolbe, a Germany graduate economist, has worked for over 25 years as a journalist and media producer for clients from various industries and business associations. As a publicist, he focuses on economic processes and observes geopolitical events from the perspective of the capital markets. His publications follow a philosophy that focuses on the individual and their right to self-determination.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 07:00

The weekend is here! Pour yourself a mug of Colombia Tolima Los Brasiles Peaberry Organic coffee, grab a seat outside, and get ready for our longer-form weekend reads:

• Behind Wall Street’s Abrupt Flip on Crypto: The reversal risks declawing a century of consumer financial protections and replacing the backbone of bank accounts. (New York Times)

• 21 Ways People Are Using A.I. at Work: “I can give it tasks and just walk away.” “It captures details I would have otherwise forgotten.” “There’s so much low-hanging fruit.” “The important thing is to maintain a reserve of skepticism.” (Upshot)

• Capitalists Love This Podcast. So Do Their Critics. “Odd Lots” goes deep on lentils in Saskatchewan, the global tractor supply and trucking markets. Is it the skeleton key to understanding this strange economic moment? (New York Times)

• So You Bought a Fancy Vintage Car. Now Who’s Going to Restore it? The restoration industry faces years-long waiting lists and a disappearing labor force. (Bloomberg)

• The private sector can’t replace official statistics—but could be a great partner: Private sector data offer speed and specificity that official statistics cannot match, despite not being representative or comprehensive. At the online real estate platform Trulia during the foreclosure crisis in the late 2000s and early 2010s, my team built a list-price index showing home-value trends months ahead of leading sales-price indexes. (Peterson Institute for International Economics)

• She was one of the first influencers. It nearly ruined her life. Lee Tilghman’s new memoir delves into the dark, dehumanizing side of the influencer industry, where people become brands and clout can mean cancellation. (Washington Post)

• Facebook is Dead; Long Live Meta: Another strong quarter with more than 3.4 billion people using at least one of Meta’s apps each day, and strong engagement across the board. The wild card? Heavy investment in AI efforts. (Stratechery)

• Canada Is Killing Itself: In 2016, Canada gave its citizens the right to die, @elainaplott writes. Now doctors are struggling to keep up with demand. How did the country become the world’s euthanasia capital?  (The Atlantic)

• Armies Tormented by Drones Innovate Ways to Spot, Jam and Zap on the Cheap: U.S. forces test technology including computerized rifle sights and backpack-portable jammers. (Wall Street Journal)

• ‘Fleetwood Mac’ at 50: A Marvel of Serendipity and Perfectionism: The album that turned the band into superstars is getting an anniversary rerelease that shows why it still gleams. (New York Times)

Be sure to check out our Masters in Business interview  this weekend with Deven Parekh, Managing Director, Insight Partners, a global venture capital and private equity firm. He has made 140 investments in enterprise software, data &, consumer internet businesses in N. America, EU, India, Southeast Asia, Israel, Africa, Latin America, and Australia. He was named to CB Insights’ Top 100 Venture Capitalist.

 

Feeling Especially Hot and Sticky This Summer? Now There’s a Metric for That

Source: Wall Street Journal

 

Sign up for our reads-only mailing list here.

~~~

To learn how these reads are assembled each day, please see this.

The post 10 Weekend Reads appeared first on The Big Picture.

U.S. SOUTHCOM Deploying 4,000 Troops To Latin American Waters As Counter-Narco-Terror Operations Loom

The Trump administration is preparing for a large force projection across the Latin American and Caribbean theater.

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) will deploy 4,000 Marines and sailors to counter narco-terrorist cartels. The move aims to enhance hemispheric defense and deter or limit Chinese activity in the region, particularly around critical infrastructure and trade chokepoints.

The news of this first comes from CNN, citing unnamed officials who stated:

The deployment of the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) and the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit to US Southern Command, which has not been previously reported, is part of a broader repositioning of military assets to the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility that has been underway over the last three weeks, one of the officials said.

A nuclear-powered attack submarine, additional P8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft, several destroyers and a guided-missile cruiser are also being allocated to US Southern Command as part of the mission, the officials said.

A third person familiar with the matter said the additional assets are “aimed at addressing threats to US national security from specially designated narco-terrorist organizations in the region.”

While the deployment is intended primarily as a deterrent, it gives SOUTHCOM prepositioning and allows Trump broad military options if he orders action against narco-terrorists. Officials note the Marines aren’t trained for drug interdiction and would need Coast Guard support.

The incoming buildup follows a Pentagon directive making border security, counter-narcotics, and protection of the Panama Canal top priorities. The deployment shifts U.S. assets from earlier Northern Command border operations to a sustained SOUTHCOM presence.

Last week, The New York Times reported that Trump issued a directive authorizing the Pentagon to conduct direct military operations against certain Latin American drug cartels. Shortly afterward, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum rejected the future presence of U.S. military forces on her soil.

By Wednesday evening, open source intelligence analysts posted flight tracking data of a General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper spy drone operated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that flew deep into Mexico.

The broader move here by the Trump administration is clear: Enhance hemispheric defense through counter-narcotics operations and maritime security. The second objective is to deter and limit Chinese activity in the region. 

By making moves to secure the Western Hemisphere, the Trump administration plans to disrupt command-and-control nodes between China and Latin American drug cartels that have waged irregular chemical warfare on the American people through the fentanyl crisis.

Source: Heritage Foundation

It might only be a matter of time before the U.S. Department of the Treasury moves to target Mexican and Chinese banks.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 05:45

U.S. SOUTHCOM Deploying 4,000 Troops To Latin American Waters As Counter-Narco-Terror Operations Loom

The Trump administration is preparing for a large force projection across the Latin American and Caribbean theater.

U.S. Southern Command (SOUTHCOM) will deploy 4,000 Marines and sailors to counter narco-terrorist cartels. The move aims to enhance hemispheric defense and deter or limit Chinese activity in the region, particularly around critical infrastructure and trade chokepoints.

The news of this first comes from CNN, citing unnamed officials who stated:

The deployment of the Iwo Jima Amphibious Ready Group (ARG) and the 22nd Marine Expeditionary Unit to US Southern Command, which has not been previously reported, is part of a broader repositioning of military assets to the SOUTHCOM area of responsibility that has been underway over the last three weeks, one of the officials said.

A nuclear-powered attack submarine, additional P8 Poseidon reconnaissance aircraft, several destroyers and a guided-missile cruiser are also being allocated to US Southern Command as part of the mission, the officials said.

A third person familiar with the matter said the additional assets are “aimed at addressing threats to US national security from specially designated narco-terrorist organizations in the region.”

While the deployment is intended primarily as a deterrent, it gives SOUTHCOM prepositioning and allows Trump broad military options if he orders action against narco-terrorists. Officials note the Marines aren’t trained for drug interdiction and would need Coast Guard support.

The incoming buildup follows a Pentagon directive making border security, counter-narcotics, and protection of the Panama Canal top priorities. The deployment shifts U.S. assets from earlier Northern Command border operations to a sustained SOUTHCOM presence.

Last week, The New York Times reported that Trump issued a directive authorizing the Pentagon to conduct direct military operations against certain Latin American drug cartels. Shortly afterward, Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum rejected the future presence of U.S. military forces on her soil.

By Wednesday evening, open source intelligence analysts posted flight tracking data of a General Atomics MQ-9 Reaper spy drone operated by U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) that flew deep into Mexico.

The broader move here by the Trump administration is clear: Enhance hemispheric defense through counter-narcotics operations and maritime security. The second objective is to deter and limit Chinese activity in the region. 

By making moves to secure the Western Hemisphere, the Trump administration plans to disrupt command-and-control nodes between China and Latin American drug cartels that have waged irregular chemical warfare on the American people through the fentanyl crisis.

Source: Heritage Foundation

It might only be a matter of time before the U.S. Department of the Treasury moves to target Mexican and Chinese banks.

Tyler Durden Sat, 08/16/2025 - 05:45

Israel Alarmed Over Suspected Chinese Support For Iranian Missile Program

Via The Cradle

Israel is concerned about a surge in military cooperation between the Islamic Republic of Iran and China, according to a report by Yedioth Ahronoth. 

The report notes that the concern lies with Chinese–Iranian cooperation on the manufacture of surface-to-surface missiles. It also says western intelligence agencies, particularly European agencies, have observed close cooperation between Tehran and Beijing recently. 

Shutterstock

“We do not know China's intentions yet, and we have sent clear messages to them, but Beijing does not confirm that it intends to supply Iran with surface-to-surface missiles,” Israeli officials are cited as saying by the outlet. According to the report, China “is now actually rebuilding the Iranian capabilities.”

In late July, Israel’s Ambassador to the US, Yechiel Leiter, warned that there were “troubling” signs of Chinese support for Iranian efforts to rebuild and restock its missile arsenal following the 12-day, US-backed Israeli war in June. 

“There's some traffic that is troubling for us ... and we want to make sure that we're not dealing with chemicals [and] the ability to reconstitute a ballistic missile program,” Leiter said in an interview with Voice of America. 

He said Israel bears responsibility for ensuring that “China or other bad actors don't allow them to reconstitute” missile stockpiles. “There's no reason why we couldn't have good relations with the people of China. But we certainly don't want to see China acting alongside those who threaten our very existence.”

Weeks before the ambassador’s remarks, Middle East Eye (MEE) reported that China sent surface-to-air missile batteries to Iran after the 12-day war. The report said Tehran has paid for new Chinese deliveries with shipments of Iranian oil. 

The Israeli army stated it would prevent Iran from being able to fire ballistic missiles at Israel during the war, but failed to achieve that goal. 

Iran’s missiles caused widespread destruction across Israel. Key universities, research centers, and technological hubs were struck. Several military bases were also hit, yet media censorship has prevented much of the details from being released.

The Yedioth Ahronoth report comes as there is talk of a renewed war between Israel and Iran. Israeli officials have publicly threatened to resume strikes on the Islamic Republic. Israeli Defense Minister Israel Katz announced on 27 June that he instructed the Israeli army to prepare an “enforcement plan” against Iran’s nuclear and missile programs. 

Tehran has vowed to continue pursuing nuclear enrichment and a peaceful nuclear energy program, despite threats. Intelligence assessments have confirmed that US President Donald Trump’s bunker-buster attack on Iran, while damaging, failed to “obliterate” the country’s atomic energy program.

An analysis by Foreign Policy released on August 11 suggested a potential resumption of the Israel–Iran war. 

“Israel is likely to launch another war with Iran before December – perhaps even as early as late August. Iran is expecting and preparing for the attack. It played the long game in the first war, pacing its missile attacks as it anticipated a protracted conflict. In the next round, however, Iran is likely to strike decisively from the outset, aiming to dispel any notion that it can be subdued under Israeli military dominance,” it said, warning that the next battle would “be far bloodier than the first.”

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 22:35

After 18 Years Without A Voice, AI-Powered Brain Implant Helps Stroke Survivor Speak Again

At age 30, Ann Johnson’s life in Saskatchewan was full. She taught math and physical education at a high school, coached volleyball and basketball, and had recently married and welcomed her first child. At her wedding, she delivered a 15-minute speech filled with joy.

Everything changed in 2005, when she suffered a brainstem stroke while playing volleyball with friends. The stroke left her with locked-in syndrome - near-total paralysis and an inability to speak. “She would try to speak, but her mouth wouldn’t move and no sound would come out,” researchers said. For nearly two decades, she communicated slowly using an eye-tracking system, spelling out words one letter at a time.

In 2022, Johnson became the third participant in a clinical trial run by researchers at the University of California, San Francisco, and the University of California, Berkeley. The project aimed to restore speech using a brain-computer interface, or neuroprosthesis, that bypasses the body’s damaged connections.

Ann Johnson became paralyzed after a brainstem stroke in 2005, at age 30. As the third participant in a clinical trial led by researchers at UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco, she heard her voice again in 2022, the first time in 18 years. Noah Berger, 2023

“We were able to get a good sense of the part of the brain that is actually responsible for speech production,” said Gopala Anumanchipalli, an assistant professor at UC Berkeley who began the work in 2015 as a postdoctoral researcher with Edward Chang, a UCSF neurosurgeon. “From there, they figured out how to computationally model the process so that they could synthesize from brain activity what someone is trying to say.”

The device records signals from the brain’s speech centers, sending them to an AI model trained to translate the activity into text, sound, or even facial animation. “Just like how Siri translates your voice to text, this AI model translates the brain activity into the text or the audio or the facial animation,” said Kaylo Littlejohn, a Ph.D. student and co-lead on the study.

To give Johnson an embodied experience, researchers had her choose from a selection of avatars, and they used a recording of her wedding speech to recreate her voice. An implant plugged into a computer nearby rested on top of the region of her brain that processes speech, acting as a kind of thought decoder. Then they showed her sentences and asked her to try to say them.

“She can’t, because she has paralysis, but those signals are still being invoked from her brain, and the neural recording device is sensing those signals,” said Littlejohn. The neural decoding device then sends them to the computer where the AI model resides, where they’re translated. “Just like how Siri translates your voice to text, this AI model translates the brain activity into the text or the audio or the facial animation,” he said. -Berkeley.edu

For Johnson, the trial was emotional. “What do you think of my artificial voice? Tell me about yourself. I am doing well today,” she asked her husband during one session. The researchers had used a recording of her wedding speech to recreate her voice and paired it with a digital avatar she had chosen.

“We didn’t want to read her mind,” Anumanchipalli emphasized. “We really wanted to give her the agency to do this. In some sessions where she’s doing nothing, we have the decoder running, and it does nothing because she’s not trying to say anything. Only when she’s attempting to say something do we hear a sound or action command.”

The early version of the system had an eight-second delay between prompting Johnson and producing speech. But a March study in Nature Neuroscience described a streaming architecture that reduced that to about one second, enabling near-real-time translation. While the avatar in earlier tests bore only a passing resemblance to her, researchers say more lifelike 3D photorealistic versions are possible. “We can imagine that we could create a digital clone that is very much plugged in … with all the preferences, like how Zoom lets us have all these effects,” Anumanchipalli said.

Johnson’s implant was removed in February 2024 for reasons unrelated to the trial, but she continues to advise the research team. She has urged them to develop wireless implants and told them the streaming synthesis “made her feel in control.”

Looking ahead, Anumanchipalli said the goal is for neuroprostheses to be “plug-and-play” and part of standard medical care. “If that means they have a digital version of themselves communicating for them, that’s what they need to be able to do,” he said.

Johnson hopes to work as a counselor in a physical rehabilitation facility, ideally using such a device. “I want patients there to see me and to know their lives are not over now,” she wrote to a UCSF reporter. “I want to show them that disabilities don’t need to stop us or slow us down.”

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 22:10

Deep Throat For The Deep State

Authored by Sasha Gong via American Greatness,

By any normal standard, the recent filing from Voice of America (VOA) Director Michael Abramowitz - alleging the U.S. Agency for Global Media (USAGM) is trying to fire him illegally - should have been a Beltway bombshell. Instead, it barely rippled the news cycle. That’s convenient for the people who prefer the U.S. government’s vast international broadcasting complex to remain a black box, opaque, unaccountable, and - most importantly - under their control.

I remember the last time a VOA director was shown the door. On January 20, 2021, less than two hours after Joe Biden took office, Robert Reilly told me over the phone, “The guards are escorting me out of the building right now.” That same day, the new administration swept out Trump appointees across the USAGM—VOA, RFE/RL, RFA, and MBN—leadership, included—and dissolved boards on the spot. Media outlets applauded, framing it as a restoration of “experienced journalists.” The subtext was unmistakable: the right people were back in charge.

Here’s the problem. “Back in charge” at VOA under Biden did not mean neutral, mission-driven journalism beamed to the world. It meant a taxpayer-funded megaphone that echoed the ruling party’s priorities while targeting Donald Trump and his voters. Programming celebrated progressive policies, blurred the line between reporting and advocacy on immigration, and, in multiple languages, provided content that critics say veered into how-to guides for navigating U.S. benefits. When your transmitter reaches 45 language services, the line between domestic influence and foreign broadcasting doesn’t just blur—it disappears.

At the center of the current drama is Michael Abramowitz, a former Washington Post editor tapped by then–USAGM chief Amanda Bennett. To Trump supporters, Abramowitz represents continuity with Washington’s media-political nexus; to his defenders, he’s a credentialed professional trying to keep politics out. Both can be true in Washington—and that’s precisely why the structure matters more than the personality.

Donald Trump understood VOA’s strategic value. After his 2024 victory, he named Kari Lake, an experienced broadcaster, to lead VOA and redirect it to its core mission: telling America’s story credibly, not carrying any administration’s water. Instead, she ran headlong into a new maze of “reforms” installed during Biden’s tenure. Agency directors could no longer be removed by the CEO; ultimate authority now rested with a seven-member International Broadcasting Advisory Board (including the Secretary of State), whose members meet sporadically and require Senate confirmation—a process famous for taking forever when the minority decides it should. Another tweak eliminated the ability to appoint an interim CEO; the VOA director—inevitably a holdover—would automatically act in the role.

Translation: permanent government beats elected government every time.

This wasn’t a policy debate about programming standards. It was a procedural encirclement—belt-and-suspenders bureaucracy designed to outlast elections. If you think that’s too cynical, ask Michael Pack, Trump’s first-term USAGM nominee, who waited three and a half years for confirmation. Or ask Kari Lake, who arrived in Washington prepared to lead VOA and discovered she first had to run the gauntlet of a never-ending confirmation calendar.

Trump adjusted.

If the front door was barricaded, he’d use a side entrance—naming Lake a special adviser with a mandate to unwind a “defunct” agency (Hillary Clinton’s word, not his). That move triggered the present standoff with Abramowitz, who, according to staff accounts and his own legal filing, decided he would not step aside, would not facilitate reforms, and would instead force a legal-political confrontation that keeps the old machine humming.

This is not a small fight.

USAGM’s $1-billion apparatus shapes how hundreds of millions abroad understand America. If it becomes a domestically resonant propaganda arm—soft power turned inward—then we’ve crossed a line the charter was designed to prevent. And suppose its leadership can be insulated from electoral accountability by clever rule changes and Senate slow-walking. In that case, the “administrative state” has discovered yet another pressure point where it can outlast voters.

The fix is simple in principle: restore electoral accountability while preserving the VOA Charter’s editorial independence, set firm timelines for Senate confirmation so nominations can’t be buried by delay, and re-center VOA on its core mission of telling America’s story abroad—measured annually by independent audits. Elections must have operational consequences, and the public should be able to see if the agency is living up to its mandate.

Critics will object that giving a president more control risks politicizing coverage. That objection arrives decades too late.

The choice isn’t between politicization and purity; it’s between politicization hidden inside an unaccountable bureaucracy and politicization constrained by law, sunlight, and elections. I’ll take the latter.

Abramowitz’s lawsuit is not the story—it’s the symptom. The disease is a governing class that prefers to win by rule change rather than persuasion. If the people cannot change the direction of their own government media through the ballot box, then the “deep state” isn’t a conspiracy theory. It’s a workflow.

Kari Lake promised to make VOA programming fairer, sharper, and more recognizably American. Let her try—or defeat her vision in the open, not by burying it in process.

Sunlight, not stalemate, is the real test of confidence. If USAGM’s defenders believe in their product, they should welcome both.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 21:45

Why The Government Is Not The Answer To Urban Planning

Via SchiffGold.com,

City planning is a task that is often seen as a unique realm of governmental necessity.

The existence of externalities means that the market could create extremely sub optimal outcomes when creating a city.

For example, a house with a messy front yard hurts everyone, but the people in this house might have little incentive to clean up. A network of streets might not benefit its creator as much as the people who use it. While there are certainly some examples where the government intervening can be very helpful for most people, there are also many circumstances where government intervention is actually the key to a city’s demise.

The importance of city planning is so great that it truly cannot be the decision of any one individual.

Governmental city planning has many wins, but even more losses, not as a result of any specific government’s choices, but as a result of the institution’s inherent inability to capture information. 

The first problem with governmental urban planning is that they cannot effectively gather information on what people want.

It would be uncommon for them to even run surveys on individual preferences. Beyond this, preferences themselves fluctuate. Predicting people’s preferences far into the future is almost impossible, and even more impossible for cash-strapped governments. People often cannot predict even their own preferences, so even if this information was to be gathered, there is no guarantee it would remain true. This harms city planning practically in the example of deciding how walkable a city will be versus how much it will allow people to live in the suburbs and commute in. The usefulness of a city is derived from  how well it fulfills the preferences of its residents. People who try to make city planning a science don’t account for the fact that the exact same city would be a success or failure, depending entirely on the people who live within it. 

The second problem with government driven urban planning is that there is an extremely poorly-functioning feedback loop.

Governments obscure their understanding of their own successes because they typically benchmark against other cities. They can only see their actions in conjunction with so many other environmental factors that it is difficult to disentangle the results of their policy and what would have happened anyways. The problem with benchmarking against other cities is that the inherently different environmental, social and legislative conditions of each city mean that a success for one city would truly be a failure for another city. However, there is too much pressure for urban planners to compare between fundamentally different cities. Sometimes a city will view itself as a failure and take drastic remedial action, but not realize that they have actually improved greatly from their previous state and would have kept proving with even less drastic action. Like anything in the study of humans, it is almost impossible to isolate factors within city planning. The relative success of a given district within a city might arise from 30 different subjective factors but also allow urban planners to falsely attribute the success to either outcome variables, or insignificant elements of the urban tapestry.

A final limitation of governmental urban planning is the lackluster incentive structure.

People are voted into office based on a wide variety of factors, but most often the most divisive policy points. Except for a few extreme cities, urban planning and infrastructure are not often in this list of big ticket items. While it directly affects people’s lives, they are more likely to attribute their sense of unhappiness on their commute to any policy other than the policies that actually created their roads and city structure. People like to think that things can be changed after one electoral cycle, but the problems that towns and cities face require years of complicated work in the same direction. Elected officials have the strongest incentives to satisfy the people’s desires, but the people who do most of the city planning lack this incentive as strongly. Urban planners are much more concerned with pleasing the bureaucrats and politicians who hired them then they do in developing an understanding of what the people of the city want. They are incentivized to present ideas that have worked in other places and are theoretically agreed-upon in general which leads them to creating spaces that work well in many places but not incredibly well in any one place.  It is easy to tell when something has been created in this way because there are specific types of public transportation and urban spaces that seem to have been given the greenlight in the prestige-driven industry of urban planning. 

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 20:55

Fewer Women Are Using Birth Control Pills In The US

Fewer women in the United States are opting for birth control pills than before, according to KFF data.

Where 33 percent of women aged 18 to 49 years old said they used oral contraceptives in 2022, that had ticked down to 29 percent in 2024.

As Statista's Anna Fleck reports, after male condoms, the pill is still the most commonly used form of contraception in the U.S.

You will find more infographics at Statista

Recently, there has been a growing number of influencers on TikTok criticizing different forms of hormonal birth control and promoting tracking fertility cycle apps instead.

This goes against experts’ advice, which states that contraceptives such as the pill and IUDs are safe and effective and that risks have been exaggerated online.

This is a trend that has been seen in other countries too.

The BBC reports that in the United Kingdom, some women are moving away from “hormonal” products such as the pill to “natural” fertility tracking apps.

While in Germany, health concerns have been cited in recent years, with younger women in particular moving away from the pill.

The KFF reports that almost four in ten (39 percent) of women of reproductive age have heard something on social media about birth control in the past 12 months, including half (49 percent) of women aged 18 to 25. Meanwhile, one in seven women aged 18 to 25 said they made a change or thought about making a change to their birth control method because of something they saw or heard on social media.

2024 data shows that emergency contraception increased by 5 percentage points compared to two years prior. This brings it to 12 percent of U.S. women aged 18 to 49.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 20:30

Indonesia Will Play A Key Role In Russia's Asian Balancing Act

Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack,

Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto was Putin’s guest of honor during mid-June’s St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.

The privilege that was bestowed upon him wasn’t surprising since bilateral ties have greatly strengthened since last year as documented here in January. Russia envisages Indonesia playing key role in its Asian balancing act, which will only grow after their newly signed strategic partnership agreement. The present piece will detail some of the forms in which this will take.

To begin with, Russia helped Indonesia complete its accelerated accession to BRICS as a full-fledged member, for which Prabowo thanked Putin during their meeting and in statements to the press afterwards. The evening beforehand, Putin told the heads of international news agencies during his meeting with them that Indonesia’s nearly 300 million people enable it to play a larger role in the global economy, with the innuendo being that this will lead to it playing a greater role in global governance too.

It's here where the relevance of Indonesia’s Russian-assisted accession to BRICS comes into play. Although cooperation within BRICS is purely voluntary, the group can still collectively contribute to accelerating financial multipolarity processes and then gradual reforms to global governance afterwards. Accordingly, given Indonesia’s growing economic and corresponding political weight in the world coupled with their traditionally friendly ties, Russia expects that they can cooperate more closely to this end.

In pursuit of this goal, which is assessed to be the driving force behind their strategic partnership, both countries are prioritizing the comprehensive expansion of their economic, political, and military ties. From Russia’s perspective, the economic dimension can open new markets for all manner of energy and real-sector exports, closer ties with de facto ASEAN leader Indonesia can give Russia more of a presence in that bloc, and more military-technical cooperation can strengthen Indonesia’s own balancing act.

About that, Indonesia multi-aligns between rival powers just like India does, and closer military-technical cooperation with Russia could help it avoid the growing zero-sum dilemma to commit to China or the US. After all, closer such cooperation with either of them could unsettle the other and lead to more pressure upon Indonesia, but China probably wouldn’t mind its Russian strategic partner supplying Indonesia with arms while the US might not overreact to this if their incipient rapprochement remains on track.

As for Russia’s Asian balancing act, it aims to preemptively avert disproportionate dependence on China, some of the consequences if troubled Indo-US ties improve, and being caught in a zero-sum dilemma to commit to one over the other. Closer economic ties with Indonesia therefore help Russia hedge against trade dependence on China, closer military-technical ones could partially replace declining market share in India, and closer political ties with ASEAN can give Russia more flexibility amidst the Sino-Indo rivalry.

Altogether, Russia and Indonesia play complementary roles in one another’s balancing acts, with each serving as valve of sorts from the pressure to commit to China-India and China-US respectively. Their close Soviet-era strategic cooperation before General Suharto’s mid-1960s coup serves as a nostalgic reference point for the level of relations that their contemporary leaders are eager to revive. Now is the perfect time to do so, and since there aren’t any impediments, the future of their ties looks very bright.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 20:05

Hezbollah Chief Threatens 'No Life In Lebanon' If Government Moves To Disarm It

Hezbollah leader Naim Qassem has warned that if the Lebanese government moves to disarm Hezbollah, which is the large Shia militia group backed by Iran, then the whole country will suffer destabilization, death, and destruction.

He claimed that there would be "no life in Lebanon" should its weapons be taken by force - which brings to mind the mass death and destruction the country experienced during the prior two-decade long Lebanese civil war of the end of the 20th century.

Via AFP

The United States has long exerted immense pressure on the Lebanese government of President Joseph Aoun to take away Hezbollah's weapons. These pressures have amplified in the wake of the recent Israel-Lebanon war, which subsided due to a fragile truce.

This is why Qassem has accused the Lebanese government of in essence "implementing an American-Israeli order to end the resistance, even if it leads to civil war and internal strife."

"The resistance will not surrender its weapons while aggression continues, occupation persists, and we will fight it… if necessary to confront this American-Israeli project no matter the cost," he continued, warning the government "not to hand over the country to an insatiable Israeli aggressor or an American tyrant with limitless greed."

Without doubt, Hezbollah has been immensely weakened since last year's assassination of longtime leader Hassan Nasrallah - and the killings of many other top and mid-level leaders.

Hezbollah's abiding by the ceasefire with Israel is a reflection of this. However, the last year has seen sporadic airstrikes on southern Lebanon by Israel. The fall of Assad in Syria last December has also greatly weakened Hezbollah.

Still, the group remains the single most well-armed and militarily powerful entity in the Lebanese state. It is actually stronger that the Lebanese Army. 

So if there is a big move to disarm Hezbollah, there's a likelihood that indeed the whole state would unravel - also at a moment the country has been experience economic collapse, and destruction due to recent Israeli bombings.

The general view among regional analysts is that Hezbollah, representing the 'Shia axis', has ultimately lost at this point. This is also underscored in the fact that the Israeli army is now occupying large swathes of southern Syria - perhaps less than a dozen miles from the outskirts of Damascus.

Tyler Durden Fri, 08/15/2025 - 19:40