☢️ US declassifies nuke numbers

The United States had 3,748 nuclear warheads in stock as of September 2023, according a new ‘fact sheet’ put out by the Department of Energy.

The tally includes both active (maintained in operational, ready-to-use configuration) and inactive (stocked at a depot with their tritium trigger components removed) warheads.

◻️ The US began to stockpile nukes in 1945 – when it became the first country to create a nuclear bomb, and the first and only nation to ever use it against another country, dropping nukes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan at the end of WWII. US nuke numbers rose exponentially between 1950 and 1967 – when they hit their historic maximum of 31,255 warheads.

◻️ The numbers began a gradual decline over the next two decades as the US developed increasingly advanced delivery systems and talked arms control with Moscow. By the end of the Cold War in 1989, the US had 22,217 warheads.

◻️ Arms control treaties with the USSR and Russia saw numbers drop dramatically through the first half of the 1990s to 10,904 in 1995, and again in the second half of the 2000s, falling falling below 4,000 in 2017 and remaining in the 3,700+ ballpark ever since.

◻️ Now, the DoE says about 2,000 retired warheads are awaiting dismantlement. 69 retired nukes were dismantled in 2023 – the smallest number recorded since 1994.

The US stopped publishing data on the size of the its arsenal in 2019, and stopped sharing this information with Russia in 2023, despite the requirement of the New Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (New START).

The US has the second-largest nuclear arsenal in the world after Russia (1,710 warheads deployed, 2,670 in storage). China has 500 (24 deployed, 476 in storage), France 290 (280 deployed, 10 stored), and Britain 225 (120 deployed, 105 stored).

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The Israeli Defense Forces officially claimed responsibility for the strikes on Hodeidah in their statement:

A short while ago, IDF fighter jets struck military targets of the Houthi terrorist regime in the area of the Al Hudaydah Port in Yemen in response to the hundreds of attacks carried out against the State of Israel in recent months. There are no changes in the Home Front Command defensive guidelines. In the case of a change to the guidelines, we will update the public accordingly. 

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Cameroon prepares for upcoming visit from Russia's Lavrov

Cameroon is expecting a visit from Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, with efforts underway to determine the date, Cameroon's Foreign Minister Lejeune Mbella Mbella told Sputnik.

"Currently, we are coordinating for my colleague Lavrov's visit to Cameroon. We are working on the agenda to set a date," Mbella Mbella said on the sidelines of the African Union meeting in Ghana.

Previously, in early June, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov visited the African continent for the sixth time in two years (including the BRICS summit), traveling to Guinea, the Republic of Congo, Burkina Faso, and Chad. The discussions covered various economic projects as well as military-technical cooperation. Additionally, during the three-day visit, the Russian Foreign Minister secured political support from African states once again.

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What countries own the US debt?

The US national debt situation worsened greatly since the 2008 crisis. Under Barack Obama, it added nine trillion; under Joe Biden's presidency the US national debt surged over $34.63 trillion as of June 2024.

In 2018, the US national debt was already at 78% of GDP - a figure the World Bank considers dangerous. These numbers also raise concerns for many countries around the world, due to its far-reaching implications for the financial stability of the global economy.

Take a look at Sputnik's infographics showing the US foreign debt and the top countries the US owes.

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Ukraine ‘shot itself in the foot’ by shutting down Russian oil transit to Slovakia & Hungary

Slovakia and Hungary confirmed this week that they’d stopped getting oil purchased from Russian oil giant Lukoil via the Soviet-built Druzhba pipeline running through northwestern Ukraine. Deliveries were halted after Kiev enacted a ban on the transit of Lukoil supplies last month.

The move signals another short-sighted escalation by Ukraine’s pro-Western elite which will ultimately harm Ukrainians in the long run, says veteran financial analyst Paul Goncharoff.

“Whether Ukraine can afford to further escalate the situation surrounding the movement of energy resources is a moot point. Escalation on all fronts has passed all reasonable limits, politically, economically and militarily. They cannot afford it economically [nor] politically as they have now estranged both Slovakia and Hungary, [but will continue to escalate], regardless of cost, as their marching orders from Washington along with the servile echoes of Brussels and their insistence to ‘demonstrate resolve’” dictate, Goncharoff said.

“The real consequences should become very clear in 3-4 months as winter descends on Ukraine, and any energy goodwill there may still be in countries neighboring Ukraine will be scarce to nonexistent,” the observer expects.

At this stage, Goncharoff says, other Russian oil exporters can still send oil through the Druzhba pipeline, but “how long this possibility will continue is anyone’s guess.”

The old saying ‘shooting oneself in the foot’ is an apt denoscription for Kiev, Brussels and Washington’s politics today, “while the world looks on, shaking its collective head in wonder,” Goncharoff summed up.

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◻️ What do Western media write on Biden's potential drop out from US presidential race?

◻️ How many nukes does US have

◻️ Drone surveillance reveals additional security lapses in Trump attempted assassination incident

◻️ IDF hit oil refining facilities in the city of Hodeidah

◻️ How did Ukraine ‘shot itself in the foot’

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Boeing strikes again: defense giant’s monkey wrench in Japan’s Patriot production ‘impacts US credibility’

“This impacts US credibility,” Lt. Col. (ret.) Earl Rasmussen told Sputnik, commenting on report by Reuters that Japan’s production of Patriot missiles had ground to a crawl thanks to a shortage of Boeing-made seeker components.

“So far, in order to supply Ukraine, the US has” already “suspended orders for Patriot deliveries to other countries except for Ukraine,” Rasmussen said, pointing out that the move to outsource production of the system in Japan was supposed to be a way to ease shortages.

The Boeing seeker head “bottleneck” mentioned by Reuters’ sources is “a very critical, perhaps one of the most crucial elements of the Patriot system,” the veteran defense observer explained, noting that it’s this component that allows the Patriot’s PAC-3 missiles to acquire their targets and guide them to those targets.

“Without the seekers the missiles just [aimlessly] fire away, and really lack any capability or any accuracy or the ability to actually get to the target. So it’s a key component for the system,” Rasmussen stressed.

Rasmussen predicts that after seeing the US renege on its commitments to deliver already ordered Patriots, combined with the Boeing monkey wrench inadvertently thrown into the missiles’ production in Japan, America’s partners “will most likely look not just at how [Patriots] are performing, but potentially will look at other solutions to their defense needs as well,” leaving Boeing, Raytheon and Lockheed Martin out of a contract.

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Israeli and US military representatives had several communications before today's attack on Yemen

This was reported by Axios, citing an anonymous source in the US government. An Israeli official also stated to the publication that the strikes were carried out in coordination with the US and the international coalition formed to counter Houthi attacks.

Earlier, the IDF confirmed the military operation, noting that it was in response to recent shelling of Israeli territory.

The video shows a fire at the port of the Yemeni city of Hodeidah following Israeli airstrikes.

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🪖 Russian "Pantsir" systems effectively counter enemy drones

The video shows the successful operation of the "Pantsir-S1" air defense system against an enemy drone.

The primary mission of the "Pantsir-S1" system is to provide close-range protection for various military and civilian facilities from attacks by modern aerial threats, including drones.

The uniqueness of the "Pantsir" systems lies in the integration of detection and targeting capabilities on a single platform. This creates a security dome with a radius of tens of kilometers over the protected object using minimal resources, which can be extended by grouping multiple systems together.

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