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Seriously… Governments around the world are telling citizens to prepare for war

June 11, 2024

Seriously… Governments around the world are telling citizens to prepare for war

You don’t need a high-tech mountain bunker to get ready for a potential crisis. The time to start is now.

We may be closer to World War 3 than at any other time in history. At least that’s what many political commentators are warning.

President Biden’s recent authorization of the use of American weapons to strike inside Russia, Russia’s possible ICBM installations in Mexico, Iran’s continued stockpiling of enriched uranium, and North Korea’s recent launch of military reconnaissance satellites are just a few examples. For the first time in decades, the threat of nuclear war is being discussed more seriously — and more openly.

Across Europe, countries are making plans to get their populations ready for conflict. Last week, Germany updated its ‘Framework Directive on Comprehensive Defence’ — a 67-page plan outlining the measures the country would take during a military conflict. The document was originally adopted in 1989, but the new update notes that Germany’s security policy environment has changed fundamentally since then, and that “Russia’s war of aggression against Ukraine” has put Germany under military threat for the first time in decades.

As CNN reported, this new plan of action notes that Germany would reinstate mandatory conscription into the army and demand that skilled laborers aged over 18 work certain jobs, “including in bakeries and post offices – as well as being prevented from quitting their jobs. Doctors, psychologists, nurses, and vets may also be repurposed in military and civil service roles.”

Rationing would also be brought in. In the event of dwindling food supplies, the government would stockpile food to provide citizens with “one hot meal a day” for an undisclosed period of time, according to the document. Federal reserves would include foods like rice, pulses and condensed milk.

…click on the above link to read the rest fo the article…

UK’s Sunak Vows Mandatory Conscription For 18-Year-Olds If Elected

May 28, 2024

UK’s Sunak Vows Mandatory Conscription For 18-Year-Olds If Elected

In another ominous sign of things to come, leading Western governments appear to be preparing for ‘something big’ at a moment the proxy war between Russian and NATO centered in Ukraine is escalating at uncontrollable pace.

“Rishi Sunak has vowed to introduce mandatory national service for 18-year-olds if he is re-elected, in his first major policy announcement since the start of the election campaign earlier this week,” Financial Times has reported.

Interestingly, the next line to the very same report screams Russia! as the subtext…

The move is part of what he said was an effort to provide security and opportunity in “an increasingly uncertain world”.

The plan would involve 18-year-olds working closely with the professional armed forces on a 12-month rotation or a ‘community work’ basis.

Sunak framed it in terms of civic duty and a matter of national patriotism…

“Generations of young people have not had the opportunities or experience they deserve and there are forces trying to divide our society in this increasingly uncertain world,” he said. 

It was only in January that the head of the British army, General Sir Patrick Sanders, urged for the populace to get ready to be on a war footing with Russia:

Britain should train a “citizen army” ready to fight a war on land in the future, the head of the Army has said.

General Sir Patrick Sanders warned that an increase in reserve forces alone “would not be enough”.

He highlighted the threat from Russia and pointed to steps being taken by other European nations to put their populations on a “war footing”.

This is part of the continuing theme of Western leaders asking their populations to ‘sacrifice’ for Ukraine amid deep trepidation and uncertainty over possible bigger nuclear-armed confrontation.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Conscription is coming back to Europe, but which EU countries have re-introduced compulsory military service?

May 28, 2024

Conscription is coming back to Europe, but which EU countries have re-introduced compulsory military service?

With Germany considering to re-introduce conscription, Hungarian news outlet Divány reviewed which countries across Europe enforce mandatory military service

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz speaks during a joint media conference with Lithuania’s President Gitanas Nauseda during the Lithuanian-German military exercise “Grand Quadriga” at a training range in Pabrade, north of the capital Vilnius, Lithuania, on Monday, May 6, 2024. (AP Photo/Mindaugas Kulbis)

While several countries are reintroducing compulsory military service, some EU politicians would welcome a uniform reintroduction across the EU. Hungarian news portal Divány has rounded up the countries that have reintroduced conscription.

Professional armies are understaffed across the continent, as more and more European countries are recognizing. In recent weeks, not only EU leaders but also the leadership of the German Christian Democratic Party has brought up the idea of reintroducing compulsory military service.

At its party congress at the beginning of May, the CDU adopted a proposal that young people should be obliged to serve for a certain period either in the army or the social sector. Manfred Weber, leader of the European People’s Party, made a similar statement recently, saying he would extend conscription to the whole continent.

Germany abolished conscription in 2011, and this is what would be gradually rebuilt. The former compulsory military service would be reintroduced as a year of community service, either in the Bundeswehr or a social institution. The initiative would also open up the possibility for women to enter the military. The German government would reintroduce conscription based on several scenarios, making it compulsory for all 18-year-olds.

The Swedish model is seen by many as an example, with all citizens in the Nordic country, both men and women, having to register and, at the same time, indicate their willingness to serve in the military…

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Germany’s Dark Future

May 18, 2024

Germany’s Dark Future

The Pot is calling the kettle black.

Many in Germany are now afraid to fly the German flag, for fear they will be labelled a “nationalist”.

By weaponizing the fear of being labeled a Nazi, the currently governing German government is going further down the dark path of censorship and, even worse, is moving towards an outright banning of political leaders of the AFD (Alliance for Deutschland) party as well as the AFD party itself. To provide context, the center-right populist AFD party is leading in current German polling ahead of the upcoming election of delegates to the European Union. The elites don’t want people to actually have a democratically elected representative European Union or German government. The German elites want to choose the available leaders people are allowed to vote for. That is not democracy. That is a form of totalitarian oligarchy, one which is dependent on a variety of “public-private partnerships” involving very large and often transnational corporations. One version of modern corporatism.

One recent example:

The debate about a possible ban on the far-right Alternative for Germany (AfD) never really went away, but it is once again getting louder. That’s because the Münster Higher Administrative Court (OVG) has on Monday rejected a complaint by the party against its classification by the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV) as a suspected right-wing extremist case. The Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution is the domestic intelligence service.

On Tuesday, a court ruled against Thuringian AfD leader Björn Höcke for allegedly using a slogan from the paramilitary wing of the Nazi Party, the Storm Troopers (Sturmabteilung). The graduate historian and former history teacher denies knowing the origin of the banned slogan “Alles für Deutschland” (Everything for Germany).

Höcke was fined €13,000 ($14,060) which is to go to a grassroots anti-extremism program.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How Europe and Britain are getting ready for ‘WWIII’: Interactive graphic reveals how West will stop Putin unleashing Armageddon, with nukes at Russia’s doorstep, mass conscription at 18 and arms factories firing up

May 16, 2024

How Europe and Britain are getting ready for ‘WWIII’: Interactive graphic reveals how West will stop Putin unleashing Armageddon, with nukes at Russia’s doorstep, mass conscription at 18 and arms factories firing up

  • More than two years into the Ukraine war, Vladimir Putin has doubled down
  • UK and European allies are steeling their economies and armed forces for war

Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 saw the horrors of a large-scale war darken Europe’s doorstep for the first time since the end of World War II.

For a short while, hope endured that a swift resolution to the conflict would materialise, but before long the prospect of a speedy diplomatic solution lay in tatters as Moscow’s drones and missiles continued to batter Ukraine’s cities.

Now more than two years into the conflict, Vladimir Putin has doubled down.

His forces have made noticeable gains on the frontlines in recent weeks as they pressure war-weary and ammo-starved Ukrainian defenders, and his decision to appoint civilian economist Andrei Belousov as defence minister suggests the Kremlin is committed to sustaining its war economy over the long run.

Meanwhile, the president’s long-serving and intensely loyal foreign minister Sergei Lavrov earlier this week challenged what Russia calls the ‘collective West’, declaring Moscow‘s troops are ready to meet NATO on the battlefield.

In light of the downward spiral of East-West relations – not to mention the alarming escalation of tensions further afield in the Middle East and Indo-Pacific – the UK and its European partners could soon be forced to contend with any number of major military threats.

As a result, many countries are reversing decades of peacetime policy to reignite their war engines. Others never stopped and are only consolidating efforts to ensure they are fit for conflict.

But there is little doubt that all Europe is now scrambling to prepare in anticipation of what may lie over the horizon.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

I’ve Got A Bad Feeling About This

May 16, 2024

I’ve Got A Bad Feeling About This

Ideally, I would have written this on May 4th not 14th, but I am going to talk Star Wars.

I was a fan in 1977, kept the flame alive when only battered VHS cassettes of the original trilogy existed, and was delighted to get prequels. Until the opening crawl announced, “The taxation of trade routes to outlying star systems is in dispute.” I recall thinking, “This is my job – boring!” But the prequels were better than the sequels and all the TV shows I don’t watch. Indeed, the prequels’ clunky theme of democracy crumbling into autocracy, dispute over trade routes, then war, seems even more prescient than my 2016 ‘Thin Ice’ report, which underlined how the 21st century could echo the 20th, and our more detailed fragmented ‘World in 2030’ report in 2020.

In just the last week: the IMF warned the world risks splitting into walled-off FX/trade blocs; The Economist stated “The liberal international order is slowly coming apart,” with “a worrying number of triggers that could set off a descent into anarchy”; Germany flagged conscription for all 18-year olds and spending over 3% of GDP on defence; China introduced military training for all High School students; Biden raised tariffs on Chinese EVs to 102.5%, and Trump said he would make it 200%, with tariffs on used cooking oil likely next; Bloomberg warned “The US, China, Russia are in a spiral towards war”; the manager of the Hong Kong trade office in London was arrested for spying; and, as some underline Russia has shifted to a full war economy that incentivises the martial, my prediction that markets will serve national security going forwards came true in Putin firing his defence minister to appoint an economist to the role instead.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Bringing Back the Draft Won’t Stop Unnecessary Wars

October 31, 2017

Bringing Back the Draft Won’t Stop Unnecessary Wars

Conscripting soldiers neither stops unnecessary wars nor makes the death toll more egalitarian.

Every now and then the old argument that the draft should be reinstated pops back up. Most recently it appeared here at The American Conservative in a piece by Dennis Laich and Lawrence Wilkerson that contended America’s all-volunteer force is deeply unfair. Without directly stating it, they implied that the draft should be brought back.

“Said more explicitly,” they write, “if the sons and daughters of members of Congress, of the corporate leadership, of the billionaire class, of the Ivy Leagues, of the elite in general, were exposed to the possibility of combat, would we have less war?”

It seems like a reasonable question. Fortunately, history gives us the answer: No, we would not have less war. In fact, when we’ve had a draft we’ve actually had more war and more Americans killed in battle by several orders of magnitude.

Conscription Leads to More Death

In one 33-year period from 1940 to 1973 when conscription was in effect, we had three of the largest wars in American history, resulting in 497,271 Americans killed. In the 44 years since the end of the draft, we’ve engaged in a series of small overseas conflicts and three undeclared wars with about 7,000 Americans killed. About as many of our countrymen were killed in the Normandy landings than in all the wars since the end of the draft.

America has never fought a war with volunteers in which more than 10,000 Americans were killed in action. America has never fought a war with draftees in which there were fewer than 30,000 KIAs. There is no question about it: our biggest and highest-casualty wars have been fought with drafted troops.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Are the American Youth Ready for Conscription?

June 30, 2015

Are the American Youth Ready for Conscription?

The shining future that America once had is all but a page note in the history books now. Record unemployment, failed foreign policies and domestic strife is the new normal. And how is the brain trust in DC going to solve these problems? National service for all 18 – to 28-year-olds!

In America today, there are close to 50 million people living in poverty and there are more than 100 million people that get money from the federal government every month. As the middle class continues to disintegrate, poverty is climbing to unprecedented levels. Even though the stock market has been setting record high after record high, the amount of anger and frustration boiling just under the surface in our nation grows with each passing day.

As an example of just how bad off joe-sixpack is these days, the WSJ notes that — “Only 38% said they could cover a $500 repair bill or a $1,000 emergency room visit with funds from their bank accounts.” A person quoted in that article said — “A solid majority of Americans say they have a household budget, but too few have the ability to cover expenses outside their budget without going into debt or turning to family and friends for help.”

Read more: http://sputniknews.com/radio_connecting_the_pieces/20150626/1023889810.html#ixzz3eY7opQLD

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