Jonathan Haslam

At a time when Western establishment opinion is focused on the domestic impact of higher oil and gas prices - particularly given forthcoming elections in the US and Britain - and when anti-Russian sentiment is equally high for the fact that Putin benefits from those higher prices which reboot his war against Zelensky, it is worth listening to Russian economists, the purveyors of the dismal science. They are warning that the price hikes will end badly for everyone, including Russia. Igor' Yushkov from the Financial University, who advises Putin's people, warns that the price rise will cut demand and that will lead to lower production. The re-establishment of the market also such disruption will be complicated and could result in Russia losing its share of world production and high prices for energy. See vedomosti.ru/analytics/worl…

Cuba Deputy Assistant Secretary for Defense Joseph Humire said that "many high-level conversations" with Cuba had taken place with Nicaragua's compliance." In reponse to persistent questioning in Congress he refused to say whether the United States would invade Cuba. Alto cargo del Departamento de Guerra evalúa espionaje de Cuba como amenaza para EEUU (VIDEO) Hanoi Martínez Martí noticias marzo 17, 2026

Russia's Military Review points out the obvious: "Without external aid, Cuba could be relatively easy prey for the current US administration." And not even a hint that Moscow will do anything. "Доклад генерала в конгрессе может говорить о скором вторжении армии США на Кубу" Voennoe obozrenie, Сегодня, 18:02

Ukrainian drones have been reaching as far as the Urals. The Russian Security Council met on 17 March in Yekaterinburg Sergei Shoigu, the failed Defence Minister now secretary of the Council, pointed out that these drones had now hit regions like Sverdlovsk, Perm, Orenburg and Bashkiria. Nezavisimaya gazeta, 17.03.2026 "Киев нацеливает беспилотники на Урал Версия для печати Обсудить на форуме Ни один регион России не может чувствовать себя в безопасности, заявил Сергей Шойгу' 📷 Владимир Мухин

@maneco1964 Well if you believe that, you will believe anything. And unfortunately Jonathan Powell seems to do so.

Witkoff and Kushner have blood on their hands.

A good corrective on all sides of the trans-Atlantic relationship since the war is a slim and very readable account by historian David Reynolds and David Dimbleby. David is our leading specialist on Anglo-American relations in the 20th Century and will confirm what I have said about the so-called special relationship (which is a British obsession - unrequited love?)

As usual, GB News is a totally amateur organisation where international affairs are concerned. It keeps going on about the "special relationship" being broken. When I moved to work in Washington DC in 1984 I was rudely disabused about any such thing as the special relationship. Indeed, Luke Battle, who had been Secretary of State Dean Acheson's personal assistant at the time the term came into use, firmly denied that any foundation existed for the relationship being "special". The term was not used by the US Government even under Ronald Reagan, who greatly respected Margaret Thatcher. And, as to the idea that relations between London and Washington DC were never so bad as now, correspondent Bev Turner was not alive when Lyndon Johnson was infuriated with Harold Wilson for not joining the Americans in the Vietnam War even when the Australians did. And does she think the Suez Crisis was the high point of good relations? She should educate herself with some reading of history.

An abusive letter from a reader, Nyrobskii, replying to an op. ed. in the military review, accuses "that bastard" Chubais - responsible for privatisation under President Yeltsin and now exiled to Israel - of trying to destroy Russia's military industrial potential. Voennoe obozrenie: "Russia has only two allies - the armed forces and the military-industrial complex" "У России только два союзника – Вооруженные Силы и ВПК" 2 марта 2026

War in Iran Moscow sees the army rebelling against the Iranian régime: "Sources talk about increasingly frequent episodes of desertion, as the military decide to flee their position and seek refuge in populated settlements nearby. It is not to be excluded that the USA and Israel will base their calculations for the future in particular on the dissatisfaction of the military." Nezavisimaya gazete, 15 March Слабым местом Ирана становится армия Версия для печати Обсудить на форуме У военных растут претензии к власти 📷 Игорь Субботин

China and Iran: Moscow looks on Hardline paper Vzglyad reflects on why China is not intervening to save Islamist Iran. One reader writes in: "China isn't a military superpower, despite having a substantial army and navy. And they're not yet ready to "threaten." And showing the flag without making a threat could get you into serious trouble." Vzglyad, 15 March: Почему Китай не бросился защищать Иран

Russian media connected to the military are reporting on the riots in Cuba. "Since yesterday thousands of Cubans have been coming out onto the streets of major cities such as Havana, Ciego de Avila and Morón. The protestors have been shouting anti-government slogans, making threats and setting fire to Communist Party offices and those of other government buildings. The government no longer controls the streets and the crowd says that it has nothing to lose. According to witnesses people have been grabbing furniture, portraits and propaganda material from the buildings to create bonfires." Voennoe obozrenie: На Кубе массовые беспорядки, правительство не справляется с протестами

What of Hezbollah's seemingly suicidal motives for joining the war against Israel and the US? Nezavisimaya gazeta comments: "In conversation with N[ezavisimaya] G[azeta], Middle East expert Anton Mardasov explained that on the 12th day of the war in the region, Hezbollah's leadership likely believed Iran would withstand attacks from Israel and the US and decided to support it. "This was done to increase the damage from the Lebanese strikes and to divert Israel's resources to the operation on two fronts," the NG source noted." Mardasov. whose training and background is never disclosed, belongs to the Russian International Affairs Council attached to the Foreign Ministry as a "military expert" on the Middle East. Unusually he worked for a time at the Middle East Institute in Washington DC. He specialises in Hamas and other non-state actors in the region and has been very open in his criticism of the entirely statist policies inherited from the Soviet régime. He attributes this to the Chechnya syndrome - the long campaign to suppress the Chechens from the 1990s which rendered all Islamists beyond the pale. Any links to Russian intelligence, military or civilian, must be a matter of speculation.

@redpillb0t Nice to know he was entirely wrong. How many others will follow suit and admit it. Read Electroverse.info for the facts. Plants absorb carbon. As much as they can get. We get oxygen in exchange.

BlackRock CEO Larry Fink now admits that transitioning to solar and wind will cause a global power shortage, after spending years pressuring companies to do exactly that. The transition has sabotaged our power supply & raised our electricity bills.

The Sovietisation of Cuba and the Literary Left of Latin America 1959-1970 Kindle Edition by Jonathan Haslam (Author) Format: Kindle Edition Available 14 March. Cuba is now completely isolated. The United States will any day negotiate an end to the ruling régime with or without the use of force. So why and how did the communist system constructed by Fidel Castro fail? This book explains how a promising revolution determined to spread across the Latin American world came into direct collision with the United States and in so doing turned to the Soviet Union for economic support. In return for this the Russians increasingly dominated the Cuban economy and then the political system. This alienated the widespread solidarity for the régime from the intellectual élite of Latin America, leaving the country not only isolated but also bankrupt.

Russian specialists on Cuba are far better informed and objective than their Western counterparts who long ago sold out to Castro. The leading authority, editor of the key journal on Latin America at the Academy of Sciences, a historian of Castro's Cuba, Viktor Kheifets says: "Alas, Cuba is no longer the same; the strength of its former glory is exhausted. Fidel is gone, Raúl is gone, and Díaz-Canel is not a charismatic leader who could lead the masses. The people who made the Cuban revolution are now 90 years old. Their experience is irrelevant to thirty-year-olds who have never known the good life, and this is the fault not only of the Cuban authorities but also of the United States, which imposed an economic blockade on the country...the standard of living in Cuba is such that people are forced to work two jobs just to get food, which doesn't bolster the regime's stability." Argumenty nedeli, 11 March 2026

@DrewPavlou No

Rory Stewart: “As Britain becomes less ethnically British, should we embrace the fact that our foreign policy will be shaped by new migrants and their connections to their home countries?” He’s thinking about this now for the first time

The Russians may well have found a new source or perhaps a renewed source of anxiety: Turkey. Given that it was boxed in by others in the past decades, Turkey never merited as much attention as others, even under the ambitious Erdogan, who has encouraged a revival of centuries old imperial ambitions; now that Russia rather than Turkey looks to be the sick man of Europe, economically at least. The Russians are understandably now looking ahead somewhat pessimistically at the possible shape of Eurasia should Islamic Iran collapse under the dead weight of American military power. Without actually mentioning the elephant in the room - the complete rebalancing of the Middle East under US hegemony - Russia's leading Turkish specialist refers to "The relative calm in Gaza and the emergence of the "Peace Council" at Trump's instigation have revived discussions about a new configuration for Eurasia in the coming decades." How about a revival of Turkish influence over the Caucasus and Central Asia backed by the United States? Yuri Mavashev in Vzglyad, 8 March 2026 Турция пытается стать центром Евразии