🇨🇳❗️🇪🇺 — 🇪🇺 Euronews | Von der Leyen is 'playing with fire' over Taiwan, China warns after her reelection | Beijing has taken issue with the political guidelines of Ursula von der Leyen, which call for the status quo in the Taiwan Strait to be respected | July 19, 2024:

"The re-election of Ursula von der Leyen as European Commission president has already triggered the first international spat: China has denounced the political guidelines of her second mandate for containing "gross interference" in the country's internal affairs.

"Playing with fire on Taiwan is highly dangerous," Wang Lutong, the director general for European affairs at the Chinese Ministry of Foreign Affairs, said on Friday, one day after the Commission chief clinched a majority in Strasbourg.


"Meddling and even trying to join forces is by no means a right choice for Europe."

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🌐 🇷🇺 🇨🇳 Patricia Marins: NATO needs to be concerned about the automation of the Russian military industry.

🔶️ The war in Ukraine has created a distinct class of weaponry, vastly different from the rest produced and utilized worldwide. A small group of countries has acquired highly guarded knowledge: Russia, Ukraine, the USA, Germany, and France. Other NATO countries have amassed tactical and operational knowledge, but this initial group has field experience on refining defense and offensive weaponry. Ukrainians possess unique tactical knowledge on maritime usage unmatched by any other nation. Russians share part of this knowledge, mainly focusing on defensive measures.

🔶️ Not long ago, I wrote about how Russians have evolved in the field, transitioning from traditional BTG formations to smaller tactical units and subsequently operations on a squadron level. However, Russian advancements have been most notable in electronic warfare, air defense systems, and ballistic and cruise missiles.

🔶️ It is precisely these advancements that attract Chinese interest. A significant portion of Chinese air defense comprises HQ9B systems, an enhanced version of the Soviet S-300.

🔶️ While the Chinese have refined this system and developed others using domestic technology, the war in Ukraine highlighted the inefficacy of unproven systems until battle-tested and improved in actual combat situations. Both Western and Russian systems have undergone numerous upgrades based on battlefield experience.

🔶️ Guided weaponry is no exception. For example, HIMARS rocket systems have undergone three upgrades to thwart Russian jamming systems that began obstructing all Western satellite-guided ammunition—a technology the Chinese would undoubtedly seek at any cost.

🔶️ There are also evasion techniques that Russian missions have successfully employed against Western systems, learned over time in warfare. Additionally, when it comes to employing less impactful armaments, knowledge on ammunition and armor also could interest the Chinese, albeit to a lesser extent. What would the Chinese be willing to negotiate with the Russians?

🔶️ The automation of Russian military factories would likely be a topic in such negotiations. Russia has recently begun automating the production of 152mm ammunition and long-range drones but this process is limited to a small portion of their scale. A full automation akin to what is seen in China today would exponentially boost the Russian military-industrial complex.

🔶️ As warfare reshapes global military power dynamics, it will be a challenge that NATO must address post-conflict. The transfer of knowledge gained in Ukraine is a valuable asset in this realm.

📎 Patricia Marins

🇺🇸❌🇺🇸🇮🇳 — Donald Trump says Kamala Harris will be easier to defeat than Biden, reports Reuters

➡️ Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump told CNN on Sunday that he thinks Vice President Kamala Harris will be easier to defeat in November's election than Democratic President Joe Biden who stepped aside as his party's candidate.

➡️ A CNN reporter said on X that Trump made the comments to the network shortly after Biden announced his decision.

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https://archive.is/Q5kwy

🇦🇷🏴💥🌹🌐 — The President of Argentina, Javier Milei, accused the Director of the Western Hemisphere Department of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Rodrigo Valdés, of having "manifestly bad" intentions towards Argentina and of being allied with Latin American progressivism:

"There was complicity between the head of the IMF Argentina mission and the previous government. Rodrigo Valdés has manifestly bad intentions. He does not want Argentina to succeed. He has another agenda. We overachieve with everyone, but they preferred to support the disaster of (Sergio) Massa.

Why did the IMF allow Massa everything? We overachieve all the time, and they keep finding faults because this administration was aligned with the São Paulo Forum and the Puebla Group (left-wing)."

❗️ The Argentine president also recalled that Valdés was Chile's Minister of Finance from 2015 to 2017, during Michelle Bachelet's second term (2006-2010 and 2014-2018), when he "caused the disaster he caused in Chile."

Source 🖇

#BREAKING

🇺🇸❌🇺🇸❗️ Mike Johnson, Trumpist speaker of the United States House, calls on Joe Biden to immediately resign as president.

“If Joe Biden is not fit to run for president, he is not fit to serve as president. He must resign from his position immediately,” he said.

🇪🇺📝🔫 — 🏴 ZeroHedge | The EU's Planned Transformation Into A Military Union Is A Federalist Power Play | Authored by Andrew Korybko via Substack | July 21, 2024:

"Newly reappointed European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen just announced that “it is now time to build a veritable union of defense”, which Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said represents a marked change in priorities that’ll intersect with NATO’s interests. The EU’s planned transformation into a military union is being sold to the public as a response to the protracted Ukrainian Conflict, but it’s really a federalist power play that’s designed to forever entrench German hegemony over the bloc.

That country has sought to federalize the EU for years already, and despite some notable successes in getting member states to surrender significant parts of their sovereignty to Brussels, it’s thus far failed to yield the expected results. This plan might also become more difficult to implement as two new groups have emerged in the European Parliament since the latest elections: the AfD-led “Europe of Sovereign Nations” and the Hungarian-led “Patriots for Europe”, both of which are fiercely against federalization.

The only possible way to push through this agenda in the face of such growing opposition is to double down on anti-Russian fearmongering in the hopes that member states’ ruling liberal-globalist elites will agree to federalize under the pretext of defending against a supposedly impending invasion. It’s not directly stated, but the subtext is that NATO’s American leader couldn’t be relied upon to defend its allies in that event despite repeatedly reaffirming its commitment to Article 5’s mutual defense obligations.

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🇻🇪🔐 — 🗳 The Venezuelan regime, led by Nicolás Maduro, announced that the country's borders will be closed starting at midnight on July 26, in preparation for the elections on the 28th

➡️ The decision was announced by the Ministries of Defense and Interior, which also established a ban on carrying weapons and the prohibition of alcoholic beverages from the same date until 11:59 PM on July 29.

🚫 Additionally, the commercialization, distribution, and use of pyrotechnic objects, the circulation of heavy cargo, and the holding of public demonstrations will be prohibited—restrictions that are customary in electoral processes.

❗️ In power since 2013, Maduro is accused by the opposition and various democratic governments of establishing an authoritarian regime in Venezuela, a country plagued by a long crisis that has already driven millions of refugees worldwide, especially in Latin America, leaving hundreds dead in protests.

The snake in the grass quickly shed its old skin

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