(End of the American Dream)—In recent months, quite a few pundits have been openly warning us that World War III has begun.  Sadly, those pundits are quite correct.  Right now, a historic global struggle is being waged by two very powerful alliances.  The “western alliance” made up of the United States, Europe, Israel and their allies is engaged in a battle for supremacy with the “eastern alliance” made up of Russia, China, Iran, North Korea, Syria and their allies.

Over the past week, this battle for supremacy has erupted on a couple of new fronts, but most Americans have no idea what is really going on.

Just look at what is happening in Syria.  Most Americans have no idea that radical Sunni Muslims backed by the western alliance just conducted a highly successful offensive on Syria’s second largest city and are threatening to overthrow the Assad regime once and for all…

The Syrian military and its ally Russia conducted deadly joint air raids Monday on areas that Islamist-led rebels seized control of over the weekend. The strikes were a response to a lightning offensive by the rebels that saw them wrest control of swathes of northwest Syria from government forces.

The conflict that started more than a decade ago took a significant turn several days ago, catching many — including, it seems, Syrian dictator Bashar Assad and his Russian backers — by surprise. On Saturday, rebels, including many with the U.S.-designated Islamic terrorist group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham (HTS), took control of the major city of Aleppo in northern Syria.

The rebels seized Aleppo’s airport and started pushing into towns and villages in the countryside around the city on Sunday after leaving piles of dead government soldiers in the streets. Observers said the rebel forces were often met with little to no resistance by regime forces, but by Monday the pace of the surprise offensive appeared to have slowed, with Assad and his Russian backers ramping-up their response.

While she served as Secretary of State during the Obama administration, Hillary Clinton was instrumental in starting the civil war in Syria.  That civil war caused a massive refugee crisis that western Europe is still wrestling with to this day.

Now the civil war in Syria has freshly erupted, and if Assad gets toppled that will be a major victory for the western alliance.

Of course the eastern alliance does not plan to go down without a fight.  Over the weekend, Iraqi militia groups that are backed by Iran “have been pouring across the border into eastern Syria”…

Widespread reports, including observers on the ground, have indicated that Iran-backed Iraqi militias have been pouring across the border into eastern Syria to assist Damascus in repelling the Islamist militant advance after Al Qaeda splinter group Hayat Tahrir Al-Sham took over Aleppo this weekend.

A Syrian army officer has told Reuters that Iraqi militia forces crossing the border are “fresh reinforcements being sent to aid our comrades on the frontlines in the north.”

Many of the fighters have been identified as belonging to the Kataib Hezbollah and Fatemiyoun groups. The US has long been in an internecine conflict with Kataib Hezbollah in Iraq, with over the years periodic rocket fire even targeting the US Embassy in Baghdad, as well as various bases which host remaining American troops.

And it appears that Iranian military forces could be on the verge of intervening directly in the conflict…

Boroujerdi told a news conference in Damascus that Iran was ready to render military assistance to Syria. “Iran’s military aid will be provided as soon as Tehran receives a request from the Syrian government. We are going to announce it immediately,” the Iranian deputy said.

Boroujerdi, who is heading an Iranian delegation, arrived in Damascus on Wednesday for talks with Syrian Vice-Premier and Foreign Minister Walid Muallem. Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is expected to meet Boroujerdi on Thursday.

The Iranian deputy stressed the importance of the four-sided coordination of efforts by Russia, Iran, Iraq and Syria in fighting terrorism.

Iran normally prefers to fight their wars using proxy forces.

But desperate times call for desperate measures.

Meanwhile, Israel’s ceasefire with Hezbollah seems to be breaking down already…

The ceasefire in Lebanon, barely five days old, is near collapse as of Monday after Hezbollah fired rockets at Israel, following the Biden-Harris administration’s erroneous claim that Israeli surveillance drones violated the agreement.

The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) reported Monday that two Hezbollah rockets had been fired at Har (Mount) Dov, a strategic mountain that Breitbart News visited last Thursday and which Hezbollah claims, wrongly, is Lebanese.

If Hezbollah is forced to keep their forces in Lebanon in order to contend with the IDF, they won’t be able to intervene in the conflict in Syria. Ultimately, so many of these conflicts are interrelated.

Ukraine is hoping that at least some Russian forces get diverted to Syria to help the Assad regime, because last month the Ukrainians lost a great deal of territory…

Ukraine has endured a tough three months in which Russian forces made gains across the front, which are likely continue over winter, a military analyst has said.

“The trend is very worrying, and there’s no reason to expect the situation to calm down in December either,” Emil Kastehelmi, from the Finnish-based Black Bird Group, told Newsweek.

In an X, formerly Twitter, thread, the OSINT analyst said that, in the three months to December, Moscow’s troops had captured around 617 square miles in Ukraine and 190 in Russia’s Kursk oblast, where Ukrainian forces had staged an incursion but where they have lost the western flank, as well as positions in the Donbas region.

Ukraine is the one place where the western alliance is losing badly, and western politicians are extremely determined to turn things around.

But the truth is that unless NATO gets directly involved, Ukraine will definitely lose.

As the war drags on, Ukrainian soldiers are deserting from their posts in staggering numbers…

More than twice as many Ukrainian soldiers have been charged with desertion this year than in 2022 and 2023 combined, the Financial Times has reported. The spike in desertions has hampered Kiev’s ability to replenish its thinned-out ranks.

Ukrainian prosecutors opened 60,000 cases against deserters between January and October of this year, the British newspaper reported on Saturday, noting that those convicted face prison terms of up to 12 years.

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainians have already died on the killing fields of eastern Ukraine.

Let us hope for an agreement that will bring the endless slaughter to an end.

Before I conclude this article, I want to mention one more nation where the great battle between east and west has suddenly erupted.

In Georgia, angry protesters that are being backed by the western alliance have been clashing violently with the police for days.  Just like we witnessed in Ukraine in 2014, it appears that this could be an attempt to overthrow the democratically-elected government of Georgia…

Days of protests have rocked Georgia following the government’s controversial decision to delay the former Soviet country’s bid to join the European Union.

Tensions have been brewing for months in the South Caucasus nation of 3.7 million people, where critics accuse the ruling Georgian Dream party of following increasingly authoritarian, pro-Russia policies in a turn away from the West that has tempered hopes for Georgia’s long-promised path to EU membership.

The protests have been met with a violent police crackdown as the ruling party and thousands of protesters become locked in a deepening battle over the country’s future and whether Georgia should forge closer ties with Russia or Europe.

The U.S. and Europe would love to see a “color revolution” that removes the Georgian Dream party from power.

Of course the Russians and other eastern alliance nations would very much like to avert such an outcome.

I just wish that every country would be allowed to do what they want without outside interference.

But that isn’t going to happen, is it?

Sadly, the great struggle between east and west that we are witnessing is just going to continue to intensify, and at this stage it should be obvious to everyone that it is not going to have a happy ending.

We live in such perilous times, and if you have not been paying much attention to what is going on around the world now would be a great time to start.

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

These plants only started buying Iranian crude this year after receiving guidance from the US State Department that sanctions wouldn’t be enforced by the Biden administration, according to a note from the industry consultant, which didn’t name the refiners. If confirmed that would be the latest foreign policy scandal by the captured and corrupt Biden admin, which has made a mockery of sanctions enforcement, especially if the alternative is sharply higher oil and gas prices.

In any case, with the imminent arrival of Trump, the Chinese refining sector will be under significant pressure to consolidate and the government might be “willing to sacrifice the teapots to score some easy points against Trump by clamping down Iranian imports.”

Limiting access would raise the cost of feedstock and slash margins for teapots and help Beijing to trim capacity.

Activity by independent refiners has picked up in the spot market, with a number of plants securing barrels from the Middle East in recent trades, on top of WAF grades purchased two weeks ago. These were all unsold, discounted barrels from the previous cycles.

With Iranian oil set to become extremely scarce, China’s independent refiners have snapped up barrels from across the Middle East and Africa as offers of Iranian oil remain scarcer and more expensive than usual, in part due to broadening US sanctions.

In a separate Bloomberg report, we learn that a large Chinese processor bought about 10 million barrels of grades from Abu Dhabi and Qatar, according to traders who asked not to be identified. The cargoes are for loading in December and January, and helped to clear an overhang of unsold crude from previous trading cycles, they added.

China’s independent refiners, known as teapots, typically favor cheaper Iranian crude and take around 90% of the OPEC producer’s exports, but a slowdown in the amount of oil available to purchase has forced a change in buying habits. The incoming Trump administration has also led to some large processors backing away from Tehran’s crude due to their exposure to US banking, according to Energy Aspects.

Traders and shippers put the scarcity of Iranian supply down to the broadening of US sanctions in October to include more dark fleet tankers plying the Iran-China trade. That move has crimped the number of vessels available for ship-to-ship transfers, tightening supply and driving prices higher (see “Satellite Analysis Shows Enormity Of Secretive Oil Shipping Hub Funneling Iranian Crude To China“).

Flows of Iranian oil to China have dipped more than 10% this month compared with October, according to Kpler. Meanwhile, the volume of West African crude is at the highest on a monthly basis in at least two years, partly driven by the spike in Iranian oil prices, Sentosa Shipbrokers wrote in a report.

Beijing’s move to issue more import quotas to teapots has also spurred buying activity, traders said. Refiners were asked to submit requests to purchase more crude a few months ago and were provided verbal approvals this week, but some started buying ahead of the confirmation, they added.

Refiners in Shandong province collectively sought an allocation of about 3.8 million tons, or 28.5 million barrels, which will be valid until the end of the year, according to traders.

The initial build-up of Middle Eastern oil was spurred by bumper trading activity in contracts linked to the Dubai market in recent months. That led to the delivery of cargoes that ultimately went unconsumed and had to find buyers at a later date, traders said.

President-elect Donald Trump has already rattled the market with the threat of tariffs on China, Canada, and Mexico, and investors are closely watching to see how his administration will approach Iran. Sanctions on the OPEC producer are expected to tighten, according to Energy Aspects.

Key concerns include the possibility dark fleet tankers will be sanctioned en-route to their destination, a move that would spook the ports waiting to receive the vessels and lead to cargoes being stranded at sea.

We previously discussed how ship-to-ship transfers off Malaysia are also set to face more scrutiny, a process used to mask the origin of Iranian cargoes by re-labeling them as Malaysian oil.

Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Bill LaPlante spoke at an event hosted by Axios on Wednesday, where he said that Houthis are displaying and deploying advanced weaponry, especially missiles that “can do things that are just amazing.”

He described that Houthis “are getting scary” in terms of their capability on display for more than a year in the Red Sea, where they’ve gone to war against Israeli and international shipping.

“I’m an engineer and a physicist, and I’ve been around missiles my whole career,” LaPlante said before the summit, called the “Future of Defense” in Washington, DC.

“What I’ve seen of what the Houthis have done in the last six months is something that — I’m just shocked.”

Among the surprisingly advanced capabilities include anti-ship ballistic missiles. Analysts have widely asserted that without doubt Iran is directly supplying these and other capabilities.

The Houthis have also routinely scored direct hits on commercial shipping vessels with both aerial and drone boats.

The Shia group has also claimed many times to have scored hits on US, UK, and other allied warships; however, the US has kept a tight lid on the extent of this, or actual damage, perhaps wishing to not give the Houthis a propaganda win.

According to the latest attacks on US warships via an announcement this week from the Pentagon:

Houthi forces attacked two American destroyers with drones and missiles as the ships transited the Bab el-Mandeb Strait entering the Gulf of Aden on Monday, a Pentagon spokesman said today.

The Houthis launched at least eight one-way uncrewed aerial systems, five anti-ship ballistic missiles and three anti-ship cruise missiles at USS Spruance (DDG-111) and USS Stockdale (DDG-106), which engaged all the projectiles, Pentagon Press Secretary Maj. Gen. Patrick Ryder told reporters on Tuesday. U.S. Central Command has not yet issued a statement.

The Pentagon says that the warships were not damaged in the attack, which contradicts the account of Houthi spokesman Brig. Gen. Yahya Sare’e, who quickly claimed the attack on the pair of destroyers was successful.

The past year has seen a number of videos like the below showing destruction of large tankers off Yemen’s coast:

Footage released by the #Iran-backed Houthis of their targeting the Greek-owned and operated bulk carrier Tutor has sent shockwaves throughout the shipping industry, especially after it was confirmed Tutor sunk on 19 June.pic.twitter.com/MkfQMzlHKM

— Bachar EL-Halabi | بشار الحلبي (@Bacharelhalabi) June 20, 2024

The enduring conflict in the Red Sea has been widely acknowledged as the biggest naval battle that US forces have been engaged in since World War II. Several US and Israeli airstrikes have hit Houthi positions hard over the last months, but this appears to have done little to erode Houthi capabilities.

When that agenda failed (lockdowns blocked, mask mandates ignored, vaccine passports defeated and the CDC caught inflating vaccination numbers), the WEF and Klaus Schwab conveniently disappeared from the media radar.

When globalists tried to permanently establish ESG as a way of life for corporations, they introduced the Council For Inclusive Capitalism, run by Lynn de Rothschild and partnered with the Vatican. When ESG was exposed for what it really is (a bridge to full bore communism in which corporations enforce far left social engineering), the CIC vanished from the limelight as quickly as they appeared.

That said, there is one globalist group that has consistently been in the background during most of these operations – The Atlantic Council. Whenever there’s a propaganda push in play to misdirect the western public, whenever there’s a policy initiative to take away your freedoms, whenever there’s a regional war that might explode into a world war, I always end up finding the fingerprints of the Atlantic Council.

The council was deeply involved in covid propaganda from 2020 onward and they also have their hands in climate change propaganda, but their bread and butter is regional proxy wars.

In my recent article ‘Globalists Are Trying To Escalate The Ukraine War Into WWIII Before The US Election’, I outlined how the council is deeply interwoven into the escalation of the Ukraine war through their Eurasia Center and their Scowcroft Center. They have been stoking conflict in the region for at least a decade with the intention of drawing NATO forces into a direct confrontation with Russia.

In a report published by the Atlantic Council in 2014 titled ‘A Roadmap for Ukraine: Delivering on the Promise of the Maidan’, the group notes:

“Last fall, as Ukrainians massed on the Maidan to demand a better government and closer ties to Europe, the Atlantic Council began to mobilize on Ukraine. An Atlantic Council delegation visited Warsaw and Kyiv in March to map out our strategy, and during the visit of Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk to the Council that same month, we launched a one hundred- day campaign to galvanize the transatlantic community behind Ukraine’s democratic future in Europe.

As the crisis worsened, we convened at the highest levels, making vital connections between Ukrainian, American, and European policymakers and thought leaders. We deployed our substantial expertise to launch “red team” exercises that anticipated Russia’s actions and outlined strategies to respond to likely scenarios. Our rapid response working groups (“tiger teams”) made recommendations on issues fundamental to Ukraine’s success. An Atlantic Council delegation delivered this report, which brings all of these findings together, to Prime Minister Yatsenyuk and other leaders in Kyiv the first week of July. The findings are also being shared with American and European policymakers…”

On Ukraine’s security policy, the Council advised both NATO and Ukraine officials.  The document goes on to outline how NATO could covertly and overtly engage with Ukraine to strengthen their chances of joining with the EU over time; a move which Vladimir Putin claims was one of the very reasons for his invasion of the Donbas.  Finally, the paper described how NATO could foster a proxy war against Russia through Ukraine without directly declaring war on Russia.  As the Council states:

“Russia’s aggression provides an opportunity of strategic clarity and urgency that should be used to expedite building a robust, modern, and capable Ukrainian defense and security establishment…”

I believe the Atlantic Council is a root instigator behind every globalist scheme to trigger a larger war between the East and the West. Their ideal scenario seems to be the creation of a proxy conflict that acts as a first domino in a chain that leads to world war, a bit like DARPA’s “Linchpin Theory” which I have written about in the past.

To be clear, the council is not only interested in Ukraine and Russia. They’re happy to embroil Americans in a larger war wherever they can.

This past week, the Atlantic Council has published another war scenario report dealing with Iran titled ‘The Future of US Strategy Toward Iran: A Bipartisan Roadmap For The Next Administration’. The goal of the report is to influence a new defense doctrine with a mission to insert the US directly in the middle of the burgeoning war between Iran and Israel.

As the report states:

“In simple terms, the goal was to develop a US policy toward Iran, not a Democratic or Republican one. We termed the effort the Iran Strategy Project (ISP). And when we began recruiting experts to join our advisory committee and working group, we did so with two overriding principles in mind. First, ideological diversity and bipartisanship could not just be talking points—they were requirements. The wild swings of US policy toward Iran over the last decade created significant policy gaps that Iran exploited to more rapidly advance its regional malign influence and nuclear program…”

The assumption in the notion of a “bipartisan” posture on Iran is that there is common ground to be harvested between conservatives and leftists when it comes to war in the region. To be sure, the Democrats and the Neo-Cons are in full agreement on most things.  But Neo-Cons are not conservatives and the political base on both sides of the aisle has little interest in another war in the Middle East.

The wild card here is Trump. The establishment media reports that Iran hacked the Trump campaign’s election strategies and gave them to the Harris camp. There are also rumors spread by US intelligence agencies that Iran was working to have Trump assassinated.  Are these claims true? There’s little public evidence available to prove it.

Maybe Iran really wants to take Trump down. Or, maybe this is part of a plot to ensure that Trump backs a full blown war with Iran should he win the election.  Trump has said repeatedly that he intends to end the war in Ukraine upon his return to the White House. This would ruin over a decade of planning by the Atlantic Council. But what if they can sink the US into a different conflict with the same potential for a world war? That’s what Iran is – Another linchpin.

The council asserts that they will seek to tie the US inexorably to the fate of Israel by positioning a permanent American military force in the region:

“Deterring the threat posed by Iran and its proxies requires a multifaceted approach that includes maintaining an adequate military presence in the region and a willingness to respond with appropriate force to attacks on US interests and those of US allies; working with allies to enhance cooperation on regional security; collaborating with partners on ways to reduce conflicts and instability that create openings for Iran to exploit; and expanding security cooperation beyond traditional realms.”

They also want the US to create its own red line declaration; if Iran obtains nukes, then Iran must be destroyed (keep in mind, it is confirmed that Israel already has its own nuclear arsenal).

“The United States needs to maintain a declaratory policy, explicitly enunciated by the president, that it will not tolerate Iran getting a nuclear weapon and will use military force to prevent this development if all other measures fail. To support this policy, the United States should refrain from stressing that it does not seek conflict with Iran; announce that it will conduct yearly joint exercises with Israel, such as Juniper Oak.”

Juniper Oak was a joint live fire war exercise organized by US and Israeli defense forces in 2023 which is viewed as a theoretical trial run for an attack on Iran. War between Iran and the US has been a sought after outcome for globalists for a long time, but it seems to me that they are particularly interested in roping Trump into the agenda.  The following statement from the Atlantic Council report is highly suspicious:

“Because assassination plots against current or former US officials are a direct threat to US sovereignty, and in order to enhance deterrence, the United States needs to consider a standing policy of a kinetic military response against Iran in retaliation for a successful—or even close to successful—plot…”

This seems to be a direct reference or message to Trump concerning the rumors of Iran contracting his death. Given there have been at least two assassination attempts on Trump so far, I would not be surprised if after he wins the election new information is suddenly released linking Iran to at least one attack.  I would also expect a major terror attack in the US within the next year (real or false flag).

This is not to say that Trump wants war; I can’t make that claim one way or the other yet.  To his credit he was one of the few presidents that avoided the expansion of US conflicts during his first term. But as I warned back in 2016, he had a LOT of ghouls in his cabinet whispering in his ear. Keeping the Atlantic Council (among others) away from the Oval Office and Trump should be a priority in 2025.

The council appears to be positioning for a war under either administration – A war with Russia under Harris or a war with Iran under Trump.  I’m not a fan of Islamic fundamentalism, but a conflict between the US and Iran is exactly what the globalists want because it can easily metastasize like a cancer.

The council notes that there are already 40,000 US troops spread across the Middle East, and that this force could be reorganized into a contingent for rapid response to Iran, along with new troops added over time. Of course, they acknowledge that Iran’s situation has changed over the years, with far closer strategic associations with China and Russia:

“This requires recognition that Iran’s relationship with Russia and China has evolved in a manner that makes it difficult to convince either country to support new economic or military restrictions against Iran…”

In other words, the council understands that a war with Iran could escalate into a larger conflict with Russia and perhaps China.

The fight between Israel and multiple nations in the Middle East does not concern me. I have no stake in the success of either side. I’m an American and I care about America, but there are powerful people out there that WANT us to become invested in foreign wars. They want us to pick a side and they want us to cheer for American troops being sent to fight and die over these foreign conflagrations.

The greater concern here is that one day these proxy wars and regional wars will explode into something that lands on our doorstep. In the past Americans have been lured into apathy when it comes to foreign entanglements because we never have to deal with them in our daily lives. They’ve always been out of sight and out of mind. In the next war, we may not have that luxury.

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In other words, we are on the brink of the sort of all-out war between Israel and Iran that I specifically warned about in a chapter entitled “The 3 Wars Of The Apocalypse” that was featured in a book that I published last year.  I know that virtually everyone in the U.S. is really focused on the upcoming election at the moment, but what is going on in the Middle East right now is really big news.

We just witnessed the largest Israeli attack on Iran ever.  It is being reported that “dozens of fighter jets” were involved in a massive operation that struck targets all over Iran and Syria…

Dozens of fighter jets hit ballistic missile factories, air defence batteries and missile launchers. Israel launched a simultaneous attack on military targets in central and southern Syria. Among the pilots and navigators involved in the Iran strikes were a number of women, praised by the Israel Defence Forces (IDF) for their bravery.

It is thought the secret research base near Tehran was developing ‘kamikaze drone’ technology, designed to loiter over a target until instructed to attack.

According to Israeli military spokesperson Daniel Hagari, the Israelis now have “broader aerial freedom of operation in Iran”, and this will make it easier for the IDF the next time it becomes necessary to strike the Iranians…

Israel’s first open attack on Iran targeted missile production facilities and air defense systems, the military said Saturday, tempering fears of a broader foray but giving Israeli aircraft the ability to operate more freely in Iranian skies as the region entered a new phase of escalation.

“Israel now has broader aerial freedom of operation in Iran,” an Israeli military spokesman, Rear Adm. Daniel Hagari, said in a statement after the attack concluded. The remarks signaled Israel’s willingness to strike Iran in the future, even as Israeli officials said the attacks were tailored to minimize casualties and allow Iran to deny major damage.

The Biden administration is trying to play down the size and scope of the Israeli operation, and Joe Biden is desperately hoping that the Iranians will choose not to respond…

“It looks like they didn’t hit anything other than military targets,” President Joe Biden, speaking to reporters in Philadelphia, said of the Israeli strikes. “I hope that this is the end.”

We should all hope that this is the end of it. But it appears that the Iranians have already made their decision.

The Daily Mail is reporting that Iran has “vowed revenge” and that Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi is using the phrase “no limits” to describe what Iran might do…

Iran vowed revenge yesterday after Israel’s missile blitz on Tehran destroyed up to 20 key military sites, including a top-secret research facility.

Foreign minister Abbas Araghchi said Iran had ‘no limits’ in defending its interests and was obliged to take retaliatory action.

Those are very strong words.

And we are being told that Araghchi has already delivered a letter to the United Nations that declares that Iran has the right to respond to the Israeli attack…

Iran’s top diplomat has condemned Israel’s unprecedented attack on multiple military sites across the Islamic Republic and has asserted Tehran’s right to respond to the latest escalation amid a year-long Middle East conflict in a letter obtained by Newsweek.

The letter was attributed to Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi and sent Saturday to United Nations (U.N.) Secretary-General António Guterres and U.N. Security Council President Pascale Christine Baeriswyl via Iranian Permanent Representative to the U.N. Amir Saeid Iravani.

According to Araghchi, Iran “reserves its inherent right to legal and legitimate response to these criminal attacks at the appropriate time”.

To me, it sounds like the Iranians do not plan to respond immediately. But a response is definitely coming. And the Israelis have already warned that they will hit Iran again if the Iranians strike back.

So this is it. The big war between Israel and Iran is here.

Of course the big war between Israel and Hezbollah has already been raging. In recent days, fierce fighting in southern Lebanon has resulted in a substantial number of Israeli casualties…

Ten Israeli soldiers were killed and at least 28 more wounded to varying degrees amid heavy battles against Hezbollah in southern Lebanon, Israel Defense Forces announced Thursday and Friday.

The soldiers were killed in three separate incidents in just over 24 hours. Since the start of the ground offensive in Lebanon, 27 soldiers have fallen amid the heavy fighting.

In the most recent incident, five reservists serving in the 8th Hazaken Brigade’s 89th Battalion were killed, and 19 others were wounded, with four in serious condition, when a Hezbollah rocket struck a supply point at a building in a southern Lebanese village.

We aren’t hearing much about this from the big news networks in the United States, are we?

If they give too much attention to what is going on in the Middle East right now, that could make Kamala Harris and the Biden administration look bad, and so they are being pretty quiet about it.

The big news networks in the United States are also being pretty quiet about the stunning Russian advances that are happening in eastern Ukraine…

With Russia advancing at the fastest rate in eastern Ukraine since the first months of the invasion, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy has been pleading with the West to allow Kyiv to fire deep into Russia with Western missiles.

The Biden administration’s plan for the war in Ukraine has completely and utterly failed.

Billions and billions and billions of U.S. taxpayer dollars have been poured into that war, but the Russians are still winning. In fact, the Russians are gobbling up more territory with each passing day. And now the Middle East is on the verge of erupting in flames.

We were warned about these wars way in advance, but most people still aren’t paying much attention.

What will it take before most of the population finally starts waking up?

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

The attacks targeted several villages and sites in the Syrian provinces of Aleppo, Raqqa, and Hasakah. One of the attacks hit an SDF military outpost in the countryside of the city of Al-Malikiyah, at the Syrian–Turkish–Iraqi tri-border region. Turkish artillery also hit SDF sites in the village of Umm al-Kaif in the countryside of the town of Tal Tamr, northwest of Hasakah.

According to field sources who spoke with Sputnik, Turkish artillery shelling hit the villages of Al-Sayyada, Aoun Al-Dadat, Al-Tukhar, and Al-Daraj.

On Thursday, the UK-based Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) reported that the attacks killed at least “27 members of military formations operating in SDF-controlled areas,” three soldiers from the Syrian Arab Army (SAA), and at least four civilians.

For its part, Turkiye’s Ministry of National Defense said 32 targets in Syria and Iraq were “destroyed” in the aerial offensive without providing details on the locations that were hit. Officials added that “all kinds of precautions” were taken to prevent harm to civilians.

The intense attacks were launched hours after armed assailants set off explosives and opened fire at the headquarters of the Turkish Aerospace Industries (TUSAS) in Ankara, which designs, manufactures, and assembles civilian and military aircraft, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), and other defense industry and space systems.

Turkish Interior Minister Ali Yerlikaya and Defense Minister Yasar Guler accused the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) of being behind the attack.

“We give these PKK scoundrels the punishment they deserve every time. But they never come to their senses,” Guler said. “We will pursue them until the last terrorist is eliminated.”

At least five people were killed and 22 injured in the Ankara attack. Two attackers – a man and a woman – were also killed.

Terrorist attack in Ankara Turkiye, numerous dead and injured.

At least one female attacker, amongst several carrying automatic weapons, struck a military aerospace company. pic.twitter.com/ykAJgEpTrk

— Chay Bowes (@BowesChay) October 23, 2024

Turkey regularly conducts air strikes against the PKK in Iraq and against the SDF in Syria. In 2014, the US military began partnering with the Kurdish People’s Protection Units (YPG), an offshoot of the PKK. The YPG later changed its name to the SDF.

Together, the US and its Kurdish proxies occupy Syria’s northeast, including Hasakah, Raqqa, and parts of Deir Ezzor, denying Syria access to its oil resources and wheat-producing agricultural land.

Wednesday’s attack in Ankara came as Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan was in the Russian city of Kazan to attend the annual BRICS summit. He condemned the “hateful attack” alongside Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoǧan told local media on Saturday that Russia, Iran and Syria should do more to protect Syria’s “territorial integrity.”

“It is essential that Russia, Iran and Syria take more effective measures against this situation, which poses the greatest threat to Syria’s territorial integrity,” Erdoǧan said when asked about the recent alleged Israeli airstrike in the nation’s capital, Damascus.

Obviously Iran and Syria are already working very closely together. But we shall see what Russia and Turkey decide to do.

The Russians definitely have their hands full with Ukraine, and so they don’t really have resources to spare for a war in the Middle East. And Turkey is a member of NATO, and that status would certainly be jeopardized if Erdogan decided to jump into this conflict. But as for Iran and Syria, they are already essentially at war with Israel.

The IDF is constantly bombing targets inside Syria, and the Iranians recently launched about 200 missiles into Israel.

Now we are waiting for the Israeli response, and Iran has already told the Biden administration that it will respond in kind to any Israeli attack…

Iran has informed the United States that it will retaliate against any new attack by Israel, a source in Tehran told CNN. Iran’s government has also been engaging in urgent diplomatic efforts with countries in the Middle East to gauge whether it can reduce the scale of Israel’s response to its missile attack earlier this month and — if that fails — help protect the capital, sources say.

Nobody is backing down this time.

The final showdown between Israel and Iran has arrived, but both sides don’t seem to fully realize this yet.

Meanwhile, the IDF continues to bomb the living daylights out of Hezbollah targets all over Lebanon…

Israel expanded its targets in its war with Hezbollah militants in Lebanon on Monday, killing at least 21 people in an airstrike in the north, health officials said, while millions of Israelis took shelter from projectiles fired back across the border.

So far the main focus of Israel’s military operations in Lebanon has been in the south, the Bekaa Valley in the east and the suburbs of Beirut.

I am expecting some really big escalations in the coming days.

But for the moment we are still waiting for the next big shoe to drop.

At the same time, the Russians and the Chinese just continue to develop closer ties with one another…

Russian Defense Minister Andrei Belousov arrived in Beijing Monday for talks with his Chinese counterpart, who called for strengthening military cooperation between the two countries.

Moscow and Beijing have forged closer ties since the full-scale invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, an alliance that has sparked anxiety in the West as both countries seek to expand their global influence.

How many years have I been warning about a very strong alliance between Russia and China?

This is precisely what we have been anticipating, but very few people in the western world seem to be alarmed about what is happening.

Despite all of the money that we have poured into Ukraine, the Russians are winning that war.

At this point, the Ukrainians are so desperate for manpower that they are literally dragging young men out of restaurants, clubs and bars in front of everyone…

Ukraine’s military recruiters have launched targeted raids in Kyiv, detaining those whose documents do not comply and press-ganging them into the army.

Video footage captured the moment two men were dragged away by officers as they exited the Palace of Sports on Friday where Ukrainian rock band Okean Elzy played.

One concertgoer could be seen struggling and shouting ‘Get away from me!’ at three policemen as they pulled him towards the recruitment desk set up outside the venue.

A series of raids were carried out at restaurants, clubs, bars and a concert hall in the capital city, according to reports.

Of course the Ukrainians have been quietly doing this sort of thing for a long time, but now they aren’t even trying to hide it anymore.

On the other side of the world, the Chinese just surrounded Taiwan with warships and fighter jets…

On Monday China has launched large military drills encircling the self-governing island of Taiwan, which Taipei has blasted as an “unreasonable provocation”. China’s PLA military deployed warships and fighter jets to send a “stern warning” against “separatist acts of Taiwan independence forces”.

The PLA Eastern Theater Command deployed joint operations of the army, navy, air force and rocket force. These assets have been largely concentrated in the Taiwan Strait, as well as surrounding Taiwan. “The joint drills focused on sea and air combat readiness, blockading key Taiwanese ports and areas, and assaults on maritime and ground targets,” described the eastern theatre command’s spokesperson, senior captain Li Xi.

The good news is that this was just a military exercise.

The Chinese are practicing for a future blockade of Taiwan, and just before the military exercise commenced a video was released that boldly declared that the Chinese military is “prepared for battle at all times and can fight anytime”…

Just before these fresh drills, China’s military issued and circulated a propaganda video entitled “prepared for battle” on vairous social media accounts. The about one-minute video features fighter jets, warships and amphibious assault vessels taking to the air and sea near Taiwan. Mobile rocket launchers are also seen being maneuvered and made ready for attacks. Text associated with the video said Chinese forces are “prepared for battle at all times and can fight anytime.”

A blockade will probably be the very first step that the Chinese take when they decide that it is time to forcibly “reunite” with Taiwan.

And the moment that they establish such a blockade, the U.S. and China will be at war.

Sadly, that could happen a lot sooner than most people think.

Like I said at the beginning of this article, war is in the air.

We are so close to the unthinkable, and our window of opportunity to avoid a global nightmare is rapidly closing.

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

U.S. Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump is worried that World War III could break out in the next four months due to the policies of the Democrats leading the US government.

“I actually worry about the next three months. I really do. I worry about the next three and a half four months will end up in a world war because of this, the people that we have [in government],” he said at a rally in the state of California.

The Biden administration has been making colossal mistake after colossal mistake in the Middle East.

Now the time for talk is over and Israeli tanks have entered southern Lebanon…

Israeli tanks have burst through the gates of a United Nations peacekeeper base in southern Lebanon, the UN confirmed today.

It comes after Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu demanded the UNIFL withdraw from combat zones and Hezbollah strongholds — and accused the UN of inadvertently ‘providing terrorists with human shields’.

In a statement addressed to U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Netanyahu said: ‘The time has come for you to withdraw UNIFIL from Hezbollah strongholds and from the combat zones.

Of course Hezbollah has been quite busy as well. On Saturday, Hezbollah fired missiles at four different Israeli military bases…

Hezbollah claimed it had destroyed four military bases in Israel today as it launched a blistering rocket attack across the southern border.

The Iranian-proxy group said it had hit bases in Al-Jarrah, Za’rit and bases in the Golan Heights after claiming to have pushed back advancing forces late Friday.

Its fighters were ‘targeting the explosives factory there with a salvo of… missiles’, the group said in a statement this morning.

Then on Sunday, a massive Hezbollah drone attack injured more than 60 people in northern Israel…

More than 60 people have been injured, several of them critically, in a drone attack in northern Israel, according to first responders.

There were no immediate official reports of deaths from the attack, but the high number of injuries reported makes the attack one of the bloodiest since the war started last October.

The news comes after Hezbollah said Sunday it had fired a swarm of attack drones on an Israeli “Golani” infantry training camp in Binyamina, south of Haifa. The Lebanon-based militant group said the attack was in response to Israeli strikes in Lebanon on Thursday that killed 22 people and injured 117, according to the Lebanese Ministry of Health.

Most Americans are not really paying much attention to this war yet.

And most Americans don’t seem to realize that we will be directly involved.

In fact, it is being reported that approximately 100 U.S. troops will be operating the THAAD air defense systems that are about to be sent to Israel…

On Saturday we were among the first outlets to report that the United States is preparing to deploy THAAD anti-ballistic missile systems in Israel, a major development which will put American troops directly in harm’s way (or… boots on the ground) amid the tense showdown with Iran.

The Pentagon in follow-up statements to the NY Times has confirmed the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) systems will be sent to Israel, and that about 100 American troops will operate them.

If Iran and Israel start lobbing thousands of missiles at one another, those troops will be very heavily involved in what is happening.

Israel has promised to respond to Iran’s recent missile attack, and that could unleash a chain of events that nobody will be able to control.

According to the Daily Mail, the Iranians are making some very alarming threats…

Iran has threatened to recalculate its nuclear weapons programme if Israel launches a revenge strike as Biden has insisted Tehran is not building nukes. Since Hamas’s October 7 attack last year on Israel triggered a wave of regional hostilities between Israeli forces and Hezbollah militants, officials in Tehran have warned the Islamic republic could change its nuclear doctrine if it faced an existential threat. But they have been deliberately vague about what that might entail.

Pretty soon, both sides will be forced to reveal all of their cards. And once that happens, everything will change.

Meanwhile, the Russians continue to gobble up more territory in eastern Ukraine…

Russian forces have seized control of another eastern Ukrainian settlement, Moscow said on Sunday, in what would be the latest in a string of gains in the Donetsk region if confirmed.

The Kremlin said on Sunday that its Center group of forces had captured the Donetsk village of Mykhailivka.

Several settlements in Ukraine bear the same name, and Russia’s Defense Ministry statement is likely referring to the village immediately east of Selydove, southeast of the strategic Ukrainian-held hub of Pokrovsk where Moscow has been concentrating its efforts.

The Russians clearly have the upper hand at this stage.

Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelensky desperately wants NATO to give him permission to use western missiles to strike targets deep inside Russia, and he is also accusing the Russians of using North Korean troops against him…

Zelensky’s comments came days after visiting several European capitals to press his case for more military and financial help in the war against invading Russian forces.

“We see an increasing alliance between Russia and regimes like in North Korea,” Zelensky said in his evening address.

“It is no longer just about transferring weapons. It is actually about the transfer of people from North Korea to the occupier’s military forces.

“Obviously, in such circumstances, our relations with our partners need to be developed. The frontline needs more support,” he said.

Both sides just continue to escalate matters, and I am entirely convinced that it is just a matter of time before the U.S. and Russia are directly fighting one another.

If our leaders had any sense, they would sit down at the negotiating table before things ever have a chance to reach that point.

Before I end this article, there is one more thing that I wanted to mention.

According to the Wall Street Journal, fleets of unidentified drones have been flying over U.S. military bases on the east coast…

U.S. Air Force Gen. Mark Kelly wasn’t sure what to make of reports that a suspicious fleet of unidentified aircraft had been flying over Langley Air Force Base on Virginia’s shoreline.

Kelly, a decorated senior commander at the base, got on a squadron rooftop to see for himself. He joined a handful of other officers responsible for a clutch of the nation’s most advanced jet fighters, including F-22 Raptors.

For several nights, military personnel had reported a mysterious breach of restricted airspace over a stretch of land that has one of the largest concentrations of national-security facilities in the U.S. The show usually starts 45 minutes to an hour after sunset, another senior leader told Kelly.

The first drone arrived shortly. Kelly, a career fighter pilot, estimated it was roughly 20 feet long and flying at more than 100 miles an hour, at an altitude of roughly 3,000 to 4,000 feet. Other drones followed, one by one, sounding in the distance like a parade of lawn mowers.

I would very much encourage you to read that entire article, because it is absolutely stunning.

Our military has no idea where the drones are coming from, and they are not being allowed to shoot them down…

Officials didn’t know if the drone fleet, which numbered as many as a dozen or more over the following nights, belonged to clever hobbyists or hostile forces. Some suspected that Russia or China deployed them to test the response of American forces.

Federal law prohibits the military from shooting down drones near military bases in the U.S. unless they pose an imminent threat. Aerial snooping doesn’t qualify, though some lawmakers hope to give the military greater leeway.

If a fleet of unidentified aircraft is flying over highly sensitive military bases, you shoot them down.

I don’t even understand why there would be any debate.

My guess is that the drones are probably from either Russia or China. But if they are not from either Russia or China, that is probably an even more troubling scenario.

In any event, it has become clear that we are living at a time of wars and rumors of wars.

This war in the Middle East has escalated to an extremely dangerous level, the war in Ukraine is reaching a critical stage, and I believe that it won’t be too long before a conflict between the U.S. and China erupts.

World War I and World World War II both killed millions of people. World War III will kill billions of people, and it is right at the door.

Michael’s new book entitled “Why” is available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.com, and you can subscribe to his Substack newsletter at michaeltsnyder.substack.com.

The Pentagon in follow-up statements to the NY Times has confirmed the THAAD (Terminal High Altitude Area Defense) systems will be sent to Israel, and that about 100 American troops will operate them.

This means that at least 100 American soldiers will be placed in positions likely to be targeted by another potential barrage of ballistic missiles from Iran, at a moment Israel is preparing its own counterattack in the wake of the the Oct.1st strikes (which witnessed about 200 missiles sent) on Israeli territory from the Islamic Republic. Each full missile battery and associated systems cost American taxpayers some $800 million to $1 billion.

All of this follows the Pentagon having weeks ago deployed thousands more US troops to the broader region amid escalation in Lebanon. Some of those forces were sent to Cyprus, and others likely to Gulf countries or possibly Jordan.

The Pentagon has tried to deflect from language which portrays the obvious: that without Congressional authorization American troops are entering an escalating overseas war zone to defend a foreign country.

The NY Times acknowledged the following exchange:

When asked on Sunday, Mr. Biden said only that he had ordered the Pentagon to deploy the system “to defend Israel. General Ryder said in his statement that the battery would “augment Israel’s integrated air defense system.” It was not immediately clear how quickly the missile defense system and troops announced on Sunday would arrive in Israel.

“This action underscores the United States’ ironclad commitment to the defense of Israel, and to defend Americans in Israel, from any further ballistic missile attacks by Iran,” the statement said. “It is part of the broader adjustments the U.S. military has made in recent months to support the defense of Israel and protect Americans from attacks by Iran and Iranian-aligned militias.”

So interestingly this is the new talking point from the national security state: Americans are being deployed to defend Americans who happen to still be in Israel. This certainly marks a new and interesting rationale.

This big “gift” is being sent to Israel even after rising tensions between Netanyahu and Biden…

So by deploying THAAD to Israel, we're not really solving the problem, just incentizing Iran to build up more missiles. So what we are actually doing is tieing ourselves further into the Israel-Iran missile/BMD race for only short term benefits.

— Decker Eveleth (@dex_eve) October 13, 2024

One regional observers has observed that this is Netanyahu’s longtime dream come true:

Journalist Séamus Malekafzali argued the U.S. deployment of troops and the THAAD system shows that “the Israelis are clearly planning something for Iran that is going to cause a retaliation they know their own systems are unable to take.”

“U.S. troops being deployed to Israel in this matter is seismic,” Malekafzali added. “The U.S. military is now inextricably involved in this war, directly, without any illusions of barriers. Netanyahu is as close as he has ever been to his ultimate wish: making the U.S. fight Iran on Israel’s behalf.”

Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin on Saturday had actually issued some soft criticism of Israel after two UN peacekeeping troops in south Lebanon were wounded by Israeli fire an a UNIFIL command post.

Austin “expressed his deep concern about reports that Israeli forces fired on U.N. peacekeeping positions in Lebanon as well as by the reported death of two Lebanese soldiers” in a phone call with his Israeli counterpart.

Netanyahu has spent a year treating Biden like a doormat, Biden is nonetheless sending American troops to protect Israel, and afterwards Biden will probably go back to pretending as if America has no meaningful leverage over Israel https://t.co/YNrHoxkb8y

— Gregg Carlstrom (@glcarlstrom) October 13, 2024

As for the missile battery contingent of 100 US troops being sent to Israel, likely there were already US special forces and commanders who have been in Tel Aviv and near Gaza in an “advisory” role. But this clearly marks a new much more direct role of US forces in the conflict, especially given the Iranians have already threatened that if hostilities escalate, anti-air batteries in Israel will come under attack.

Lebanese security sources have reported their inability to establish contact with this prominent figure, Hashem Safieddine, after Israel allegedly targeted him during airstrikes in the southern Beirut suburb of Dahieh.

Subsequent strikes have hampered rescue efforts, leaving uncertainty regarding Safieddine’s fate, as separate sources have indicated.

When queried during a Friday evening briefing about the possibility of Safieddine’s death in the strike, Israeli military spokesperson Nadav Shoshani stated that the military was still investigating the outcome of the raid.

“Around midnight, we struck the Central Intelligence headquarters of Hezbollah in Dahieh,” Nadav Shoshani said. “When we have more information to share about who was there and what the result of the strike was, we will share it.”

The recent death of former Hezbollah chief Hassan Nasrallah during Israeli airstrikes on the Lebanese capital last weekend has sent shockwaves through the organization. His deputy, addressing the situation shortly thereafter, asserted that a new leader would soon be elected.

Israel has proclaimed that the elimination of Nasrallah marks merely the initial phase of their broader campaign against the group.