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US Approval of Long-Range Missiles Called 'Very Big Step' Towards World War III
One antiwar critic ripped Biden's permission for Ukraine to fire the powerful weapons on Russian targets as "utterly unhinged."
Nov 17, 2024
While neocons from both sides of the proverbial political aisle welcomed what some described as President Joe Biden's "long overdue" decision Sunday to allow Ukrainian forces to strike deep inside Russia with U.S.-supplied long-range missiles, antiwar voices sounded the alarm on what one senior Kremlin official called "a very big step towards the start of World War III."
"Biden has for the first time allowed Ukraine to use U.S. weapons to strike deep inside Russia," comedian, podcaster, and antiwar writer Lee Camp wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter. "Apparently the Dems want WWIII before they leave office. Utterly unhinged."
President-elect Donald Trump, who is set to take office in 63 days, has vowed to quickly end the nearly 1,000-day war, which Russia started in February 2022 with a massive invasion of its smaller neighbor amid significant NATO provocations.
The New York Timesreported that the Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS)—which has a range of 190 miles—will likely first be deployed against Russian and recently arrived North Korean troops in the Kursk region of western Russia, where Ukrainian forces have seized a sizable swath of Russian territory.
"Strikes with U.S. missiles deep into Russian regions will inevitably entail a serious escalation, which threatens to lead to much more serious consequences."
The Times said Biden dropped his previous reservations over allowing Ukraine to use the missiles for fear of Moscow's retaliation due to "the sheer audacity of Russia's decision to throw North Korean troops at Ukrainian lines."
Earlier this year, Biden quietly gave Kyiv the green light to carry out limited cross-border strikes near Kharkiv with shorter-range missiles as Russian forces menaced Ukraine's second-largest city.
Taking their cues from Biden, Britain and France on Sunday also dropped their objections to Ukraine using long-range offensive missiles provided by the two countries to attack targets inside Russia.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said Sunday: "Today, many in the media are talking about the fact that we have received permission to take appropriate actions. But blows are not inflicted with words. Such things are not announced. The rockets will speak for themselves."
In September, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned the U.S. and its allies that approval for Ukrainian attacks with Western long-range missiles "will mean nothing less than the direct involvement of NATO countries."
Russian officials responded to Biden's move with warnings of serious repercussions.
"Strikes with U.S. missiles deep into Russian regions will inevitably entail a serious escalation, which threatens to lead to much more serious consequences," said Leonid Slutsky, who chairs a key foreign affairs committee in the State Duma, according toReuters.
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Green Groups Blast 'Reckless, Unscientific' EU Carbon Capture Plans
"Rejecting the influence of the fossil fuel industry and investing in climate action that can actually deliver emissions cuts and steer a just transition from the fossil fuel economy is crucial."
Oct 11, 2024
As attendees gathered in the south of France Thursday for the start of a European Union-hosted summit on carbon capture and storage, an international coalition of green groups warned against funding "reckless, unscientific, and lobbyist-driven" false climate solutions and instead urged investment in "a just transition that prioritizes renewable energy, energy demand reduction, and energy efficiency."
"Today the Industrial Carbon Management Forum (ICMF) kicks off in Pau, France," 43 organizations wrote in a letter to the European Commission. "This forum has been revealed to be dominated by fossil fuel interests to the exclusion of civil society stakeholders and other expert voices with critical views."
The letter points to a report published Thursday by the Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA), which concluded that "most of Europe's planned carbon capture and storage (CCS) applications are too expensive to work on a commercial basis and are nowhere near ready to be rolled out."
According to the report, Europe's planned CCS projects will cost an estimated €520 billion ($569 billion), which IEEFA energy finance analyst and report author Andrew Reid said "will force European governments to introduce eye-wateringly high subsidies to prop up a technology that has a history of failure."
The green groups' letter also notes widespread criticism of CCS, which has been panned by Food & Water Watch—whose European branch signed the letter—as a "false climate solution" and a "lifeline for the fossil fuel industry."
The signers wrote that the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change "has labeled CCS as one of the most costly and least effective emissions reduction methods, and an Oxford study found high-CCS pathways could cost $30 trillion more globally than renewable alternatives," the signers wrote, referring to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The letter continues:
As well as being prohibitively expensive, plans for carbon capture and storage (CCS) at scale face overwhelming technical challenges and the records show 50 years of failure. Even with $83 billion in investment since the '90s, research found that nearly 80% of large-scale projects fail. The industry itself has acknowledged that for all these efforts, only 52 metric tons of carbon dioxide have ever been stored long-term, highlighting the unlikeliness of achieving the E.U.'s stated goal of storing 280 metric tons of CO2 by 2040...
The union has already spent over €3 billion ($3.3 billion) on CCS and hydrogen projects—hydrogen is often paired with CCS to attempt to capture the carbon dioxide emissions released during hydrogen production from fossil fuels in order to label hydrogen a low-carbon fuel. However, this ignores the ineffectiveness of CCS to reduce emissions and the continued use of fossil fuels in the process.
"We cannot afford to give further investments to the fossil fuel industry to gamble with our future and our tax money," the green groups stressed. "Money allotted to CCS would be better spent on the communities and countries that need it most and on ensuring a full and fair phaseout of fossil fuels."
In stark contrast, E.U. Energy Commissioner Kadri Simson said during the opening session of the CCS summit that the 27-nation bloc's climate target plan "underlines that industrial carbon management is not just an alternative, it is a vital complement to renewable energy and energy efficiency."
The letter's signers are calling on E.U. policymakers to:
- Stop wasting money on CCS projects and commit to a full phaseout of fossil fuels;
- Reject the influence of the fossil fuel industry;
- Commit to a full consideration of the scientific and real-world evidence of CCS' failures, limitations, and challenges; and
- Invest instead in real climate, health, and nature solutions that deliver a transition to a clean, healthy, and safe economy.
"The current fossil fuel industry influence on the E.U.'s carbon capture policy undermines the E.U.'s ability to meet its climate goals and responsibilities, and is damaging its reputation and leadership," the groups asserted. "Rejecting the influence of the fossil fuel industry and investing in climate action that can actually deliver emissions cuts and steer a just transition from the fossil fuel economy is crucial if the E.U. is to deliver real solutions for climate, nature, and people."
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'Shame Must Change Sides': Thousands March in France Against Sexual Violence
The protests were organized in support of Gisèle Pélicot, who has become a symbol of feminist defiance in the country when she chose to make the rape trial of her husband and 50 other men public.
Sep 14, 2024
Thousands of people took to the streets in 30 French cities and Brussels on Saturday to protest rape and sexist violence and to support Gisèle Pélicot, a woman in her early 70s whose husband of 50 years is on trial for drugging her periodically and inviting dozens of men into their home to rape her while she was unconscious.
Pélicot has become a symbol of the fight against sexual violence in France when she decided to make the trial of her husband and 50 other men public to ensure that "no woman suffers this."
"We are all Gisèle," protesters chanted in Paris, according to Le Monde. "Rapist we see you, victim we believe you."
The crime was discovered when her now ex-husband Dominique, a 71 year old who has plead guilty to drugging and raping his wife, was caught taking photos up the skirts of women in 2020. As part of that investigation, police uncovered a USB drive with a file labeled "abuse," which included more than 20,000 photos and videos of the attacks on his wife that were taken over a nine-year period. There was evidence that he had recruited more than 80 men to participate via an online forum. Police identified and charged 50 of the participants.
At the trial, which began September 2 and is expected to last four months, Pélicot described her harrowing experience. As The Guardian reported:
"My world fell apart. For me, everything was falling apart. Everything I had built up over 50 years."
She said she had barely recognized herself in the images, saying she was motionless. "I was sacrificed on the altar of vice," she said. "They regarded me like a rag doll, like a garbage bag."
"When you see that woman drugged, mistreated, a dead person on a bed—of course the body is not cold, it's warm, but it's as if I'm dead." She told the court rape was not a strong enough word, it was torture.
Saturday's protests were called by feminist groups in France.
"We thank her a thousand times for her enormous courage," Fatima Benomar of the feminist group "Coudes a Coudes" association toldBFM TV.
34-year-old Justine Imbert, who attended a 200-strong march in Marseilles with her six-year-old daughter, told Le Monde, "It must have taken huge courage, but it was essential," for Pélicot to make the trial public.
"It allows people to see the faces of her husband and all the others, to see they are not outcasts but 'good fathers,'" Imbert said.
"I am here to support Gisele and all women as there are many Giseles, too many Giseles."
The men accused in the trial include a member of the local government, a civil servant, a journalist, a former police officer, a prison guard, and more than one nurse.
"It's shocking… because we see that the [men on trial] are a bit like Mr Everyman. It goes against the idea that there is only one type of rapist," 21-year-old photographer Pedro Campos said, according to The Guardian.
Martine Ragon, 74, told journalists she had come to the demonstration in Marseilles to "denounce rape culture."
"This well-publicized trial will allow people to speak out about it, to raise awareness," Ragon said.
Anna Toumazoff, who helped organize the protest in Paris that brought around 700 people to the Place de la Republique, also emphasized the need to talk about "rape culture."
"After seven years of MeToo, we know that there is not a special type of victim. We are also collectively realizing that there is no special type of a rapist," Toumazoff toldThe Associated Press.
Magali Lafourcade, a magistrate and secretary general of the National Consultative Commission on Human Rights, told AP that Pélicot's sharing of her story was important because 90% of women who are raped in France do not press charges and 80% of the cases that are brought forward are dropped.
Lou Salome Patouillard, a 41-year-old artist, who joined the demonstration in Marseilles, toldReuters, "I am here to support Gisele and all women as there are many Giseles, too many Giseles."
During the trial, Pélicot said that she began to have problems with her memory during the period when her husband was repeatedly drugging her. When she told her husband she was afraid she had Alzheimer's, he scheduled her a doctor's appointment. During the investigation, it was revealed that she had contracted multiple sexually transmitted diseases.
Through her lawyer, Stephane Babonneau, Pélicot explained her decision to make the trial public.
"It's a way of saying... shame must change sides," Babonneau said at the start of the trial, words that have been taken up as a rallying cry by France's feminist movement.
When supporters unfurled a banner from the Marseilles court building on Saturday, that is what it said: "Shame must change sides."
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