“Essentially, the idea is that [the US] does a nuclear first strike. It's the nuclear sucker punch and the first person who launches wins. That's US doctrine at the current moment. It's also called a counter-force strike doctrine. But, because of this, we can understand this in the larger context as the US is escalating to war with China, as well as waging proxy war against Russia,” said KJ Noh, a journalist, political analyst and educator, told Sputnik’s The Backstory.

“[This report] strikes me as an act of madness. I mean, just think about this language. Simultaneous nuclear war with North Korea, Russia and China at the same time. I mean, just to put those, to type those words into a sentence and to think that that is a rational thing to publish is mind boggling,” said Noh.

“The reach of the deep state – the FBI, CIA – they're looking at all of us right now,” said Jackman, an independent journalist. “They're really looking to just chill free speech… And they're using all of these different legal justifications – FARA, the Foreign Agents Registration Act – to justify coming after a dissident.”

“More searches are expected soon, some of the officials said, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss investigations,” the newspaper reported. “Criminal charges are also possible, they said.”

“The First Amendment should be being screamed from the rafters by the ACLU,” said host Steve Gill in response to the apparent acts of political intimidation. “When you've got the Democrats having their convention, why aren't they screaming, in addition to democracy, First Amendment?”

“These are politically motivated at the end of the day,” agreed Jackman. “It's just really what they are. And, they can give all of these different excuses for why they're targeting certain individuals, but it's facially obvious.”

“We're heading to another election cycle here in just a couple of months. And so we're going to start hearing ‘Russia, Russia, Russia.’ Russia is going to be in the paintings, they're in the walls. They're everywhere,” said independent journalist John Jackman on Sputnik’s The Final Countdown program.

“People… on their own accord are speaking what they feel is the truth, right?” said Jackman. “They're looking at the world, they're determining that our media is lying to us at every turn. Our government, especially on issues of foreign policy, has lied to us repeatedly, the Ukraine war [and] the conflicts between Israel and Palestine being some of the latest examples.”

“It's ironic because they talk about media manipulation, they talk about false narratives, they talk about misinformation,” said Jackman. “It's not that they are scared of misinformation, it's that they're scared of the truth.”

“The more serious issue is that Germany is really losing its position as an economic giant, as an economic superpower,” said Szamuely on Sputnik’s The Final Countdown program this week. “German industries are being sidelined. They're moving out of Europe and they're being priced out of markets because there's just simply the energy costs. They're now really going through the roof.”

“No one in Germany is buying it,” Szamuely said of German officials’ latest explanation for the Nord Stream pipeline explosion. “It's a violation of common sense… Even if the German government is committed to this and saying, ‘oh, well Ukraine is behind this, which of course undercuts its position as to why you are assisting Ukraine since Ukraine is destroying your own infrastructure, Ukraine is creating ecocide.”

“‘They humiliate you, they destroy your infrastructure, they destroy your industry. This is what we're supposed to sacrifice ourselves for?’”