Image is from this Bloomberg article, depicting world oil inventories plunging towards the operational floor at which pipelines and refineries cease operating, which is expected to occur in September at current rates.
A pretty short preamble below, in spoiler tags.
summary
The conflict continues to be kept at a relatively low level despite Iran’s fiery encounters with US destroyers. I think it’s only becoming increasingly obvious that the US is trying to cobble together some major clandestine operation mixing special forces, the air force, and naval destroyers to either seize Iranian uranium, take control of Iranian seaports, or both. Given a) how the Istafan op went, b) further Iranian preparations around sensitive sites, and c) a seeming strengthening of Iranian air defense around the Persian Gulf (multiple drones and manned aircraft have squawked emergency codes and potentially been shot down over the last few weeks), I find it difficult to imagine this operation fulfilling its objective, and even if did somehow work, why the removal of uranium would necessitate Iran ending the blockade and the war. On that note, I’ve seen reports that Iran is saying that if the US attacks their oil tankers again, they will resume firing on US military bases.
Additionally, Aragchi has stated that not only has Iran’s missile/launcher stockpiles not gone down from pre-conflict, it has actually increased by 20%. This is unsurprising given the total war that Iran is now in; all resources within reason must now be funnelling towards drone and missile production.
Atrocities in Gaza, the West Bank, and Lebanon are continuing. The toll that FPV drones are taking on the common Zionist soldiery are quickly becoming apparent, as we are receiving ever-increasing amounts of footage of vehicles and gatherings of soldiers being struck by Hezbollah’s drones. The casualty situation is, as expected, being hidden, but any kind of serious occupation of even the border villages of southern Lebanon (let alone up to the Litani) seems unsustainable.
Last week’s thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
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The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
The Zionist Entity's Genocide of Palestine
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against the temporary Zionist entity. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on the Zionists’ destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
Mirrors of Telegram channels that have been erased by Zionist censorship.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Last!
Ouch! Trump must not be happy rn.
Ukraine just launched a drone salvo at Moscow according to Naked Capitalism: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2026/05/breaking-ukraine-fires-hundreds-of-drones-at-moscow.html
This was the total mobilisation of all far-right forces in the UK that Tommy Robinson claims was “millions”.
That’s it, that’s the current total forces of the far right that they’re able to actually mobilise with a year of planning and mossad’s money to put it up on Nakba day as a distraction from the pro-palestine protests.
They’ve got fucking nothing. The rest of the UK hogs are just disillusioned reactionaries that want a better life and are successfully being manipulated, they’re not true believers and I don’t believe it’s possible to mobilise them.
Gustavo Petro on Bolivia
Bolivia is experiencing a popular insurrection.
It is the response to geopolitical arrogance.
Latin America is a diverse and different civilization; it cannot be homogenized from any corner of the planet.
Latin America and the Caribbean must be heard by the world, looking straight ahead in peace, and speaking with frankness.
My government is willing, if invited, to seek peaceful formulas for resolving the Bolivian political crisis.
There should be no political prisoners anywhere in the Americas; we must build a deep, multicolored democracy in our civilization that dates back 60,000 years in the Americas, but also comes from the ancestral Mediterranean, black Africa, and the deserts of the Sahara.
The legend said that the American jaguar would awaken if the condor was attacked, and the jaguar has awakened in popular consciousness.
In Panama, I spoke with the President of Bolivia about his father, Paz Zamora, the first Latin American progressivism, and his time in exile in Bogotá and Panama, where he received visits from General Torrijos and the M19 with Carlos Vidales, the son of the poet.
May that memory fill him today with love for his people and open the door to dialogue to transform Bolivia into an ever-deeper and more sovereign democracy, profoundly Latin American.
Footage of the mid air collision between a pair of Navy Super Hornets/Growlers during the Gunfighter Skies Air Show at Mountain Home Air Force Base moments ago.
Milei’s 29-month cumulative inflation in Argentina hit 304% in April, surpassing his predecessor Macri’s full-term (4 year) 296% for the first time.
Wouldn’t it be easier at this point to just pretend that Hormuz isn’t closed, instead of reminding everyone that it is? At least for market manipulation purposes. Except right before Trump actually wants to restart the attacks.
Rural indigenous communities have surrounded Evo Morales’ residence to protect him. Leaked docs (attached below) show US armed forces & Bolivian police preparing a joint operation to kidnap him & massacre villagers. “If we surrender now, how will our future generations live?”
Shit is popping off in Bolivia. I’m seeing a lot on Instagram.
Whip-wielding poncho rojos break a riot cop barrier and repel the fascist pigs
I’ll post some more good ones when I see them.
According to a classified intelligence report, Cuba has received more than 300 long range suicide drones, likely from Iran and Russia, and is preparing to use them against the U.S. base at Guantanamo Bay, U.S. Navy vessels, and the Florida Keys, in case of an American attack on the Island nation – Axios
- Middle East Spectator Telegram
Political asylum application being processed for Bolivian President Rodrigo Paz in Argentina. Milei would grant him political asylum if the operations in El Alto fail. The democratic mechanism is the resignation of Rodrigo Paz , and new elections must be called within three months with a transitional government . All personnel of the Supreme Electoral Tribunal (TSE) and the Supreme Court of Justice (TSJ) must be removed to guarantee the participation of all political parties that were banned.
A piece about recent damage assessments of U.S. military infrastructure in the Gulf region during the war on Iran.
The Damage You Can’t Hide by Robert Pape
Select excerpts
All emphasis is from the original article.
Over the past several days, satellite imagery, leaked intelligence assessments, and independent reporting have begun revealing the extent of Iranian missile and drone strikes on American and Gulf infrastructure during the conflict. The images matter because they reveal something deeper than battlefield destruction.
They reveal the widening gap between tactical success and strategic success.
The United States demonstrated it could repeatedly strike Iran from the air. But Iran demonstrated something equally important: it could impose meaningful military and political costs on the American position in the Gulf without closing the Strait of Hormuz, without invading neighboring states, and without defeating the United States militarily in any conventional sense.
That distinction may become one of the defining strategic lessons of the war.
…if Iran can continue threatening American bases, logistics hubs, energy infrastructure, and naval operations after repeated U.S. air campaigns, then short bursts of bombing are unlikely to produce decisive strategic outcomes.
Instead, they produce the exact dynamic I have described for months as the Escalation Trap: each round of coercion increases pressure for further escalation because neither side achieves durable strategic resolution.
Relatively weaker regional powers armed with precision missiles, drones, hardened infrastructure, and dispersed launch systems may increasingly be able to blunt portions of American intervention advantages without defeating the United States outright.
That is a profound strategic shift.
What makes this moment so dangerous is that much of official Washington still appears psychologically unprepared for it.
…several Gulf states have become increasingly cautious about facilitating expanded American operations against Iran. They understand something fundamental: geography does not change.
Iran will remain their neighbor long after American carrier groups rotate home.
Once policymakers accept that tactical military success has failed to produce strategic resolution, pressure grows inside Washington for expanded escalation. If short bombing campaigns fail, advocates demand longer campaigns. If airpower alone proves insufficient, pressure shifts toward broader targeting, expanded regional operations, cyber escalation, maritime confrontation, or eventually some form of ground commitment tied to securing missile sites or nuclear infrastructure.
That is the “trap” in the Escalation Trap.
The logic of coercion begins consuming the logic of restraint.
The debate in Washington is no longer really about whether the war succeeded.
It is increasingly about whether the establishment in Washington is prepared to escalate further simply to avoid acknowledging that limited coercion failed to restore the old regional balance.
The question is whether even overwhelming American military power still reliably translates into political control.
The deeper issue is no longer whether the United States can punish adversaries militarily.
The deeper issue is whether punishment alone still produces political control.
https://xcancel.com/CostaKapo/status/2055647181676126390
“We’re facing the largest supply shortage of lubricating fluids in the modern history of America. Realistic, middle-of-the-road estimates are for our average available supply in this product category to drop by 40%.”
Internal AutoZone Memo
Iran shouldn’t even be allowed to read the Wikipedia entry about nuclear weapons.
