By John Helmer
@bears_with
As if it wasn’t already clear, the mainstream media led by Reuters, a Russia warfighting propaganda platform based in New York, have just announced that when President Donald Trump says he is for peace with Russia, he is either winking at his Defense Secretary Peter Hegseth or blinking at President Vladimir Putin.
Or else the coordination between the President’s mouth and his eyes fails from time to time and he cannot control his officials, staff, and advisors because they can’t follow when he contradicts himself.
Reporting on a Trump and Pentagon order for the US to halt arms deliveries to Ukraine, through the Polish hub at Rzeszow, and then retraction of the order and resumption of the delivery flights, Reuters says infighting is rife within the White House and the Pentagon, and that either Trump is unaware or he is unable to control it.
“The cancelations,” according to Reuters, “came after Trump wrapped up a January 30 Oval Office meeting about Ukraine that included Hegseth and other top national security officials, according to three sources familiar with the situation. During the meeting, the idea of stopping Ukraine aid came up, said two people with knowledge of the meeting, but the president issued no instruction to stop aid to Ukraine. The president was unaware of Hegseth’s order, as were other top national security officials in the meeting, according to two sources briefed on the private White House discussions and another with direct knowledge of the matter. Asked to comment on this report, the White House told Reuters that Hegseth had followed a directive from Trump to pause aid to Ukraine, which it said was the administration’s position at the time. It did not explain why, according to those who spoke to Reuters, top national security officials in the normal decision making process didn’t know about the order or why it was so swiftly reversed.”
The January 30 Oval Office meeting was secret. The official White House schedule for that day reveals only that Trump held a press briefing in the morning on the fatal helicopter and airliner crash over Washington the night before; lunched with Vice President JD Vance; and then signed executive orders for the rest of the afternoon.
What Vance decided that day with Trump isn’t revealed by Reuters’s sources, some of whom have been fired from their Pentagon and National Security Council posts.
According to the news agency, “three sources familiar with the situation said Hegseth misinterpreted discussions with the president about Ukraine policy and aid shipments without elaborating further. Four other people briefed on the situation said a small cadre of staffers inside the Pentagon, many of whom have never held a government job and who have for years spoken out against U.S. aid to Ukraine, advised Hegseth to consider pausing aid to the country. Two people familiar with the matter denied there was a true cutoff in aid. One of them described it as a logistical pause…It’s unclear if Trump subsequently questioned or reprimanded Hegseth. One source with direct knowledge of the matter said National Security Adviser [Michael] Waltz ultimately intervened to reverse the cancelations. Waltz was forced out on Thursday and is expected to be nominated as U.S. ambassador to the United Nations…At least one of the staffers who had previously pushed for the administration to pull back its support for Kyiv, Dan Caldwell, was escorted out of the Pentagon for a leak he claims never happened. Caldwell, a veteran, served as one of Hegseth’s chief advisers, including on Ukraine.”
For more on Trump’s peace-is-war inside his own administration, the Caldwell sacking, and the Ozymandias strategy for outcome, read this.
The Reuters story has been amplified by the Russia warfighters in Washington, London, and Kiev to persuade Trump to escalate against Russia, not withdraw. “Despite the brief pause in February and the longer one that began in early March,” Reuters reports, “the Trump administration has resumed sending the last of the aid approved under U.S. President Joe Biden. No new policy has been announced.”
“This expose[s] a chaotic decision-making process and an unclear chain of command within former US President Donald Trump’s administration,” concludes Euromaidan Press, a Kiev propaganda outlet.
In this podcast with Nima Alkhorshid and Graham Fuller, we discuss how this is now playing out on all fronts – Russia and Ukraine, Iran, Yemen, and even Canada.
With the last of these, Trump has forced newly elected Prime Minister Mark Carney to make a public capitulation. Twitching with nerves in the Oval Office on Tuesday (May 6), Carney did not challenge Trump as he repeated his threat to annex Canada, insult Carney’s predecessor prime minister, Justin Trudeau; claim personal credit for the outcome of the Canadian election; and falsify the resource and goods trade between the US and Canada. Trump also arranged a diplomatic snub for Carney when his aircraft landed.
Click to view the hour-long podcast here.
The first report of the agreement on a Russia-US summit meeting next week, when Trump is in the Middle East, appeared last Saturday (May 3); click. The report also described the Russian reasons and conditions, which included testing whether Trump can control the Ukrainian campaign of drone and missile attacks on the Russian hinterland, and attempts by Ukrainian ground forces to break across the border into Belgorod. “The planned meeting may be derailed at the last minute if the Ukrainians violate the Victory Day ceasefire [between May 8 and 11], and if Trump is either shown to be incapable of controlling the Kiev regime, or duplicitous in aiding the violations. If the Ukrainians do not observe it, the Russians will hit back hard, very hard, and then ask Trump if he still wants to meet. It might go to the wire.”
This uncertainty is the reason that when Trump said he was planning “a very, very big announcement, as big as it gets,” he qualified this by adding that he would not make his disclosure until Thursday or Friday, or possibly not until next Monday. Watch Trump at Min 16, Min 29.
Source: https://johnhelmer.net/
Trump was almost upstaging Putin who will be holding summit-level meetings with China’s President Xi Jinping and other leaders who are attending the Victory Day celebration on May 9. To make sure the Americans did not betray their preliminary agreement on the summit, Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov announced earlier on May 6 that the US had been invited to send its Moscow ambassador, Lynne Tracy, to the ceremony.
For the opening of the Russian army’s spring offensive, click to watch this operations map analysis by Major (retired) Mark Takacs.
Source: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H-z-JrJjdJM
There is a correlation between the General Staff’s electric war campaign – once Kremlin restrictions have been lifted – and Russian advances on the battlefield.
This can be visualized in this charting of army gains of territory over time. Omitted is the start of the campaign and the first intensive raids of October 2022. The peaks on the chart from 2023 to the present show there is a time lag between the electric war raids, damage assessment by the General Staff, and advances on the battlefield. This corroborates what Takacs is calling the pattern of the strict timetable.
The dates of the major electric war raids have been October 10-12 and 16-20, 2022; October 22-27, 2023; March 29-30, 2024; June 1, 2024; and November 7, 2024. President Putin accepted Trump’s proposal for a 30-day halt to electric war raids which began after their telephone call on February 12. Click to follow each stage of the electric war.
A NATO veteran and military engineer comments: “looking at the graph and the data spreadsheet on which it’s based, I’m thinking the Russians would not have made even the progress they have to date without the electric war. In fact, we may be able to argue that the electric war has been so successful that it outstripped Russian political capacity to keep up with it. The not-so-secret is that the Special Military Operation could be over at the flick of a switch, literally.”
2. Yemen front
At his Oval Office presser on May 6, Trump used the same word as his negotiator Steven Witkoff has used against Hamas – capitulation. Trump’s reference, however, is to a ceasefire limited by Ansar Allah to Houthi action against US vessels, not against all other shipping travelling to and from Israel or in the Red Sea. Oman has confirmed its officials have mediated this ceasefire arrangement.
Source https://x.com/badralbusaidi/status/1919823059256533103
Source: https://x.com/badralbusaidi/status/1919842287426928793
However, the Ansar Allah response intimates that Trump was motivated to seek the ceasefire for the time he is in the Middle East, within range of Houthi missiles. The Houthi military chief, Field Marshal Mahdi al-Mashat, issued a statement on May 9 declaring that “we indirectly informed the Americans that the continued escalation will affect the visit of the criminal Trump to the region, and we informed them of nothing else…if the criminal Trump wants to stop his aggression and compensate for what he has left behind, this is up to him.”
Source: https://www.saba.ye/ar/news3477282.htm
On May 6, it was reported in Washington that a second F-18 aircraft from the USS Harry Truman had been lost during operations against the Houthis. In this latest incident, the aircraft crashed as it was landing on the deck of the aircraft carrier. On April 29 an F-18 had rolled off the vessel as it was being prepared for takeoff, during evasive manoeuvres by the Truman under Houthi fire.
3. The Kashmir front
For the background to the Pahalgam attack on April 22 and the subsequent Indian, Pakistani, Russian, and other international responses, read this.
A day later, on May 5, Putin telephoned Prime Minister Narendra Modi to convey his “condolences over the death of Indian citizens killed in a barbaric terrorist attack committed on April 20 in Pahalgam, Jammu and Kashmir. Both leaders emphasised the need to uncompromisingly fight terrorism in all its forms. During the conversation, an emphasis was made on the strategic nature of the Russian-Indian relations based on the special and privileged partnership. Resistant to any external influence, they continue to develop rapidly across all areas.”
This was not the full Russian support which some Indian media have reported.
Putin’s coolness, an Indian political source said, was the reciprocal of Indian statements following the start of the Russian Special Military Operation (SVO). Then, says the source, the Indians not only did not support Russia publicly, but they also scolded Putin. And yet there was unreserved support at all levels. [In the present situation] Russia will do the same — suggest peace and aid in any way it can. If Modi were to ask — we doubt he will — the Putin advice will be not to repeat any of the mistakes of the SVO; to have very clear goals for a military operation; to prepare well and start the fight when you are prepared for the worst, the unthinkable scenario and can’t stop till you have your goal, no matter what the cost. Calculate that cost. ”
Today (Wednesday May 7) the Indian military launched air attacks against nine targets in Pakistan. Here is the Ministry of Defense bulletin: “A little while ago, the Indian Armed Forces launched OPERATION SINDOOR, hitting terrorist infrastructure in Pakistan and Pakistan-occupied Jammu and Kashmir from where terrorist attacks against India have been planned and directed. Altogether, nine (9) sites have been targeted. Our actions have been focused, measured and non-escalatory in nature. No Pakistani military facilities have been targeted. India has dernonstrated considerable restraint in selection of targets and method of execution.”
“These steps come in the wake of the barbaric Pahalgam terrorist attack in which 25 Indians and one Nepali citizen were murdered. We are living up to the commitment that those responsible for this attack will he held accountable. There will be detailed briefing on OPERATION SINDOOR, later today.”
“No Pakistani civilian, economic or military targets have been hit. Only known terrorist camps have been hit.” Source: https://www.ndtv.com/
Sindoor, literally, is a vermilion red or orange cosmetic powder primarily used in India and Nepal. In Hindu culture, it symbolizes a woman's marital status, and is typically applied along the hairline by married women; its removal often indicates widowhood. It is also associated with fertility and power.
The Delhi source comments: “Modi’s response has been very measured and it satisfies public opinion. It demonstrates Indians can hit any target inside Pakistan at will. In anticipation of Pakistani retaliation, the government has announced blackouts and safety drills for today. If Pakistan hits back, the second strike will be massive, and hopefully that will be that.”
4. Canada front
On his arrival in Washington, Prime Minister Carney was met by an official US welcoming party of two – Abigail Jones, the acting White House protocol chief and Colonel Randall Heusser; he is head of the refuelling unit at Joint Base Andrews which will fuelled Carney’s aircraft for its return flight to Ottawa. Heusser ranks below the airbase chief. His and Jones’s rank were a calculated snub to the head of the Canadian Government.
Left: Airport ceremony: https://x.com/dimitrilascaris/status/1919582194382623028
Right: Oval Office press conference -- https://www.youtube.com/live/9t5W_pqiw_8 The transcript of remarks can be read here. Note that Carney spoke only in English, and omitted to speak also in French, as he did while campaigning in Canada where French is the second official language. When France’s President Emmanual Macron was in the Oval Office to meet Trump in February, he spoke in French and in English.
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