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NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg, at the conclusion of the summit’s first day, said, “we also made clear that we will issue an invitation for Ukraine to join NATO when allies agree and conditions are met.”

The final summit communique said that while “Ukraine’s future is in NATO”, the alliance would only “extend an invitation to Ukraine” when Kyiv had completed certain “democratic and security sector reforms”.

Zelensky branded the decision “absurd”, saying the decision by the 31-nation alliance falls short of any clear pathway with timelines for membership that his government has been demanding.

In a social media post before arriving in Vilnius, Lithuania, Zelensky said the wording on Ukraine’s membership was discussed without any Ukrainian government officials being present. This gives Kyiv little clarity on when and under what conditions accession will be granted, he added.

Earlier, Dmytro Kuleba, Ukraine’s foreign secretary, had said the summit would be “the best moment to offer clarity on the invitation to Ukraine to become a member”.

In the communique, NATO said it had realized the need to move faster on Ukraine but fell short of providing any timeframe for membership.

The decision to provide no clarity of a timeframe will be seen as a major setback for Ukraine.
Kyiv understood it would not become a member at the two-day summit in Vilnius, but was under the impression it would be offered with a clear timeline on when accession to the bloc will be granted.

Zelensky had in his earlier statement said Ukraine “deserves respect” and that “It seems there is no readiness neither to invite Ukraine to NATO nor to make it a member of the alliance.”

In a statement issued after the communique, the Ukrainian President said, “Today I embarked on a trip here with faith in decisions, with faith in partners, with faith in a strong NATO. In a NATO that does not hesitate, does not waste time and does not look back at any aggressor … And I would like this faith to become confidence.”

On Sunday, before the summit, Biden said Ukraine was not ready for NATO membership and that it had to show progress on “democratization” and “a whole range of other issues”.

U.S. Senator Rand Paul went a step further, branding the statement by Zelensky as “audacious”, saying the Ukrainian president might need to change his complaints to avoid alienating his Western allies.

“There’s an old English adage he might need to become aware of: Never look a gift horse in the mouth,” Paul, a Republican from Kentucky, told Fox News. “We’ve given them $100 billion, and he has the audacity to be so brazen as to tell us we’d better speed it up? I’d say that’s audacious. I’d say it’s brazen, and that’s not very grateful for the $100 billion that we’ve given him so far.”

U.S. National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan also issued a thinly-veiled warning to Kyiv one day after the Ukrainian president’s tirade, saying some of the charges leveled against the U.S.-led alliance were “entirely unfounded and unjustified.”

Sullivan added, “I think the American people do deserve a degree of gratitude from the United States government for their willingness to step up and from the rest of the world as well.”

The U.S. is by far the largest donor of military support to Ukraine, offering more than $46 billion worth of equipment to Kyiv.

The reality is NATO’s article 5 of its founding charter, that declares every member must agree “that an armed attack against one or more of them in Europe or North America shall be considered an attack against them all”. It requires member states to join in defending the country under attack.

The communique’s language strongly indicates the opposition from countries like Germany and the U.S. that commitment too strong could prompt retaliation from Russia and, if Ukraine was allowed to join the alliance while the conflict is ongoing, would ultimately drag some NATO members into a war with Moscow.

The U.S.-led military alliance kicked off its two-day summit in Vilnius on Tuesday by issuing the statement saying that Kyiv would be invited to join NATO only “when allies agree and conditions are met.”

Zelensky said it was “unprecedented and absurd” for Ukraine to be denied a concrete timeline, further highlighting Kyiv’s diplomatic failure at the summit.

Instead, Ukraine has been promised even more military aid to fight Russia on what experts believe to be on behalf of NATO members, in particular the United States.

It adds weight to the argument by observers that Ukraine, its territory, armed forces and population are being used as a proxy for the U.S. to contain Russia militarily and economically.

Whether that has been successful is up for debate. Whilst the rest of Europe is struggling with a cost-of-living crisis as a result of the war, Russia has had seen the lowest inflation on the continent.

This is while, barring the U.S., Ukraine has the largest military arsenal of any NATO member as Western countries have seen their weapons depots depleted, having shipped most of their artillery and other arms to the Ukrainian military.

European counties are rushing to replenish their own supplies, which is not only leaving them vulnerable, but also wondering rushing to remanufacture equipment to keep up with a war that is dragging on, longer than expected and appears to show no signs of abating anytime soon.

After securing new pledges for more weapons, Zelensky toned down his language on Wednesday, saying he expects Ukraine to join NATO once the conflict ends, after alliance leaders refused to set a timeline for membership.

“I am confident that, after the war, Ukraine will be in NATO. We’ll be doing everything possible to make it happen,” Zelensky said at a news conference at the NATO summit in Vilnius.

Most of the weapons that have been shipped to Ukraine are also made in the U.S., boosting lucrative profits for the country’s military industrial complex.

According to the Kiel Institute for the World Economy’s Ukraine Support Tracker, the second largest military donor, by contrast, is the UK, which has provided more than $6 billion in military equipment, earning British arms manufacturers a major source of profit as well.

But as the arms manufacturers in the West count their profits, there has been no serious peace initiative emerging from the West, which is prolonging the crisis in Ukraine, with both Ukrainian and Russian civilians paying the price of war.

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Hundreds of activists demonstrate in front of the Wunstorf air base in the northern German city of Hanover ahead of the Air Defender 2023 military drills, the largest air force war games the U.S.-led NATO military alliance has ever conducted.

The drills, which are being hosted by Germany, and set to take place from the 12th to 23rd June have been labelled as “defensive” in nature.

However, according to officials, the war games have been designed to simulate a high-intensity conflict scenario, with participants focusing on air-to-air and air-to-ground combat, as well as air mobility and logistics. Other scenarios include working with ground troops from the air, airborne battles against enemy jets and the use of medium-range missiles by NATO fighter bombers.

The drills will see the participation of 10,000 military personnel and 250 war planes from 25 countries in a bid to show off military force against the West’s adversaries. The United States alone has dispatched 2,000 American Air Guard troops and around 100 warplanes to take part in the 12-day maneuvers.

Officials also say the U.S. military has sent F-35 war planes, NATO’s most modern fighter jet, to take part in the exercises, while the North Sea will see drills against submarines and ships.

German and American officials have branded the war games as “a show of force” to “impress allies and potential adversaries such as Russia.”
Russia will most certainly be studying the war games carefully.
While the NATO military alliance conducts the war games in the skies over Germany, several flight zones are set to be temporarily closed to civilian air traffic with delays to civilian flights expected.

In the largest deployment of air forces since NATO was formed, Sweden (which is seeking to become a NATO member), as well as Japan are also taking part, raising further eyebrows among anti-war activists.

People in Germany are concerned. Protesters in their hundreds, who took to the Wunstorf air base, home to the German air transport fleet (and one of the six military bases in Germany which will be used in the exercises), say it will send all the wrong signals to the outside world, in particular Russia.

The activists denounced the drills as offensive and measures that could escalate the crisis in Ukraine. They are demanding a diplomatic solution to the war along with a ceasefire.

Among the banners seen at the demonstration displayed slogans such as “Down with weapons! No to war! Disarmament now!”

Other footage at the airbase shows the protesters marching while holding flags and anti-NATO banners, displaying messages such as “Peace with Russia and China, Out of NATO”, and “Peace in Ukraine and with Russia, Stop the War, Negotiate Now” among others. The protesters have also demanded the removal of U.S. nuclear weapons from their country.

Gerhard Biederbeck, an anti-war activist said, “This is not funny and this is not a harmless maneuver. This is about life and death; this is about calling in the danger of the third World War”.

“The maneuver contributes to more rearmament,” Biederbeck added. “Right now every measure should be taken to diplomatically solve the Russian-Ukrainian conflict.”
Other activists have called on the German government to divert its foreign policy toward peace, calm, and negotiations. “NATO is calling for an air war over Germany. Germany is leading this maneuver and assumes military responsibility,” activist Ekkehard Lentz said.

This is not the first time that anti-NATO protests have been staged in Germany.

In the aftermath of the Ukraine conflict that erupted in February 2022, rallies against the U.S.-led military alliance have not been limited to Germany. Protests have gradually expanded to other European countries.

Protests against NATO and rising inflation in Europe are intertwined, as experts point out. It was NATO’s encroachment on Russian borders that triggered the Ukraine crisis, which in turn saw inflation rise significantly across the West.

On Sunday, protesters took to the streets of Stockholm to voice their anger at Sweden’s bid for NATO membership. The U.S.-led military alliance has been trying to bring Sweden into the fold before NATO leaders meet in Lithuania in July.
This month also saw thousands of Romanian teachers marching in the capital Bucharest in protest over pay as they concluded a third week of strike action for the first time since 2005. Unions have said the strike action is indefinite. Other Romanian sectors such as healthcare workers and the police force have also staged protests over pay and investment, while warning of possible strike action.
Poland, a strong supporter of NATO’s moves against Russia, has witnessed a rise in support for opposition parties who oppose measures taken by the government. Earlier this month, half a million people packed the streets of Warsaw in an anti-government demonstration.

Among the many protests in June, Italian protesters across the country waged anti-NATO rallies in a number of cities on the same day the country marked its annual Republic Day.

During the demonstration, protesters signed a petition demanding the government end its weapons shipments to Ukraine. The organizers argue it is impossible to achieve peace as long as Ukraine continues to receive arms from Western countries.

In April, tens of thousands of people rallied once again in the Czech capital Prague to protest high inflation and demand the government’s resignation.

Earlier in March a rally was organized by a new political party, referred to as PRO under an “against the poverty” banner.

Jindrich Rajchl, the head of the new party, blamed the European Union and the Czech government for soaring inflation. The demonstrators demanded the Czech Republic end its NATO membership. The protesters also condemned the government’s stance toward the Ukraine war.

In April, people held a rally in Sofia, the capital of Bulgaria, to protest against NATO and its support for the Ukraine war.

These are just some of the protests that have been held over the past few months. Other protests over the past year have been witnessed across Western Europe where inflation has also sky-rocketed as a result of unprecedented sanctions imposed on Russia, in particular its energy exports.

The Kremlin says it began a “special military operation” months after failing to receive security guarantees from NATO and the U.S. that the NATO eastward expansion will not bring security risks to Russian territory.

The mass protests signal that many have had enough with the cost of living crisis as they are appealing for an initiative to end the crisis in Ukraine, but that doesn’t appear to be on the minds of NATO leaders.
With the largest offensive war games in its history, the U.S.-led military alliance is sending a message to Russia that the NATO-backed war on Moscow is far from over.

NATO continues to send advanced weapons to Ukraine in a bid to contain Russia. The Kremlin says this will only prolong the suffering of Ukrainian people, who are caught in the middle.

Experts believe that the last issue in the thought process of policy makers in Washington, London and NATO headquarters is the suffering of the Ukrainian people.

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After Russia launched what it described as a “special military operation” on Ukraine in February 2022 to de-nazify the country, NATO shipped light arms to Kyiv.

As Russian forces advanced, heavier and more sophisticated weapons have been sent to Ukraine, including modern battle tanks and Soviet-era fighter jets.

The flashpoint of the war has taken place mainly in the country’s eastern Donbas region next to the Russian border.

The latest pledge in billions of euros of weapons to Ukraine is another bid to maintain a stalemate and comes after Russia appears to have the upper hand in the eastern Donbas city of Bakhmut, the longest and deadliest battle of the war so far.

Experts have pointed out that capturing Bakhmut would effectively pave the way for Moscow to secure the entire Donbas region.

The Russian Defense Ministry spokesman, Igor Konashenkov, says “the fiercest battles continued to be fought by units on the western outskirts of Bakhmut.”

This is the last remaining flank Ukraine says its forces hold on to in the city.

The promise to ship more arms was secured in the Ukrainian President’s quick trip to NATO members in Europe. Volodymyr Zelensky’s whirlwind tour to NATO members was not on a peace initiative as the international community has been calling for.

Instead, it comes ahead of a long-expected counter offensive that will drag out the conflict for a prolonged period of time.

The NATO members that the Ukrainian leader visited have stated the weapons are needed to assist Ukraine in this anticipated counter offensive.

Zelensky secured billions of dollars in military aid during the tour, which ended in the UK, where Prime Minister Rishi Sunak announced more military hardware from British arms manufacturers.

This comes after the UK became the first NATO member to supply Kyiv with long-range cruise missiles, which will allow Ukrainian forces to hit Russian forces and depots far behind the front lines.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov says that Russia viewed Britain’s decision to supply the missiles “extremely negatively”.

“Britain claims to be at the forefront among those countries that continue to pump weapons into Ukraine,” he told reporters in a daily call.

London’s arms shipments will not change much on the ground, Peskov said, adding, “It cannot have any significant or major impact on the course of the Special Military Operation, but it all leads to more destruction, to further military action and so on. So, for Ukraine, it makes things much more complex.”

Konashenkov has announced for the first time that the Russian military had downed a long-range Storm Shadow missile supplied to Kyiv by London, which only last week publicly announced that it was providing them.

“Air defense systems intercepted seven (U.S. shorter-range) HARM anti-radar missiles, one (British) Storm Shadow long-range cruise missile, and ten (U.S. shorter-range) HIMARS-launched missiles during the day,” he stated.

But NATO still refuses to deliver more advanced warplanes that Ukraine has been long asking for.

The U.S.-led alliance publicly says Russian forces have been heavily weakened during the Ukraine war, yet the unwillingness to send sophisticated warplanes comes from NATO member’s fear of a direct confrontation with Moscow.

After Zelensky held talks with French President Emmanuel Macron in Paris, the French leader announced France will begin training Ukrainian fighter jet pilots on his country’s soil, an idea the Macron government had refused to entertain just a few months ago.

During an interview with France’s TF1 Presenter Gilles Bouleau, Macron was pressed on why the government has now decided that Paris is ready to train Ukrainian war plane pilots in France.

This is while France has rejected Ukraine’s request to deliver fighter jets to Kyiv in line with NATO’s policy of keeping the conflict at an impasse.

Here is a snippet of the interview:

TF1 Presenter:

“He (Zelensky) must have asked you for fighter jets, as he asks all the Western leaders he meets. You told him no? No for today, no for tomorrow, no forever?”

President Macron (deflecting on the question):

“We have opened the door to training the pilots.”

TF1 Presenter:

“In France? Ukrainian pilots in France?”

French President Macron:

“(And we are doing this) with several other European countries which are ready, and talks are ongoing with the Americans.”

TF1 Presenter:

“From when for the French planes? On Mirage 2000s? We can guess.”

French President Macron (deflecting on the question):

“Training can start right now.”

TF1 Presenter:

“So there is no taboo?”

French President Macron:

“There is no taboo… (Presenter interrupts Macron and says “there was a taboo for a few months”). No, we always followed the same line.

Pressed further about delivering warplanes to Ukraine, Macron said he had not discussed that issue with Zelensky.

As the U.S.-led NATO military alliance ships tens of billions of dollars worth of weapons to a conflict that sees no signs of abating any time soon, there has been a drain on resources in the NATO member countries who are facing major economic problems.

These problems have strongly affected the public sector in many Western countries, who have seen both public and private sector workers repeatedly go on strike and stage protests over an unprecedented rising cost of living crisis as a result of the conflict in Ukraine.

The protests have increasingly seen demonstrations against support for the war, NATO itself and in France a rally was held in protest against the Ukrainian leader’s visit to the country.

Meanwhile, Russian officials have denounced remarks by Macron that Moscow is becoming a subservient to China, saying Western countries must get used to a new world, nurtured by a strong Moscow-Beijing relationship.

In March, Russian President Vladimir Putin hosted his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping in an official visit, during which the two sides said they were deepening their strategic partnership by entering “a new era” of ties.

Peskov says Russia’s ties with China had nothing to do with dependence on Beijing and were more to do with those of a strategic partner.

Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Alexander Grushko also implied that the West had become obsessed with Moscow’s strengthened relations with China and changes that implied for a new world order.

“The West is scared by the emergence of a multilateral system of international relations with a range of independent centers, such as Russia and China, which is happening before our very eyes, this emerging new world order means the end to the centuries-long dominance of the golden billion countries.” Grushko wrote in a statement on the ministry’s website.

According to Russian officials, the West cannot get rid of its bad habits of pitting old friends against each other by any means possible and ongoing attempts at driving a wedge between one country’s ties against another.

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The Kremlin has warned of “counter-measures.”

It was NATO’s eastward expansion to Eastern Europe that triggered Moscow’s “special military operation” in Ukraine in February 2022.

As fighting rages into its second year, it looks like the U.S. seeks to further aggravate and contain Moscow by more than doubling NATO’s presence on Russian borders.

Moscow and Helsinki share a border that stretches around 1,300 kilometers.

It was no perhaps no surprise that U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken was at the ceremony at NATO headquarters in Brussels to complete the final paperwork for Finland’s accession.

It was a historic shift for a country that had been seeking a non-military alliance for seven decades.

What’s the advantage that now Finland has become NATO’s 31st member?

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg says it will make Helsinki “safer”.

He added that it will also make “our alliance (NATO) stronger”.

Contrary to what Stoltenberg says, these are dangerous developments for Finland as well as Sweden, which is expected to join NATO soon as well.

The U.S. and its European proxies will potentially station their weapons in the country.

War is not a video game. Civilians are the ones who bear the brunt of it.

Do Finnish people want to be caught in the middle of operations being orchestrated in Washington and designed by the CIA?

This development brings aggressive U.S. policies and those of America’s proxy European allies to Finland’s territory.

Russia was never interested in war but was forced to take action in Ukraine because of the U.S.-led NATO policies that Moscow considered an existential threat to its sovereignty and territorial integrity.

Again, Moscow will be compelled to (as the Kremlin said) “take counter measures” and possibly station its military near its border with Finland.

This not only will be a threat to Finland’s security but all of Europe’s for the second time in as many years.

Any country joining NATO means making the U.S. military on European soil even larger.

NATO should have been dissolved for the sake of international peace and security.

To end the Ukraine war, NATO must stop arms shipments to Ukraine. Pumping tens of billions of dollars of arms or expanding NATO to Russian borders will just expand and lengthen the conflict.

Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu told his top military officials that Finland’s move “creates the risks of a significant expansion of conflict.”

Moscow says its military would be forced to adjust depending on the kind of military deployments and infrastructure NATO stations in Finland.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov pointed out that “the expansion of NATO is an encroachment on our security, on the interests of the Russian Federation. That is exactly how we see it,”

“We will apply countermeasures to ensure our security in a tactical and strategic sense,” the spokesman added.

In a statement?, the Russian foreign ministry said “Helsinki’s policy of military non-alignment had long served Finnish national interests and was an important factor of confidence-building in the Baltic Sea region and the European continent as a whole.

“This is now a thing of the past. Finland has become one of the small members of the alliance that doesn’t decide anything, losing its special voice in international affairs. We are sure that history will judge this hasty step.”

Washington has been provoking Russia for nearly three decades, especially since 2014, by supplying arms for Ukraine to fight ethnic Russians in the country’s Eastern Donbas region.

In February 2022, three days before the war broke out, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky declared at the Munich Security Conference that his country would no longer abide by the 1994 Budapest agreement which clearly stated that Ukraine would not acquire nuclear weapons.

Instead of denouncing the remarks, NATO representatives at the conference welcomed this announcement with applause. This is just one example that shows the aggressive nature of NATO towards Russia.

Washington’s refusal to accept or respond to security guarantees proposed by Moscow over the buildup of NATO military weapons in Ukraine and with a view to Kyiv joining the military alliance, this time months before the war broke out is another example of the dangers of NATO.

The roughly 1200 violations of the Minsk agreement to end fighting in the Donbas that sits on Russia’s border was the other reason that forced Moscow to undertake its “special military operation” in Ukraine against NATO.

Finland joining NATO and serving the U.S. interests, logically, doesn’t make sense for Helsinki’s own security.

Finland’s $9.4 billion purchase of 64 Lockheed Martin F-35s last year only served the U.S. arms industry.

So the wider question is how would joining NATO serve Finnish or Swedish interests?

These are countries that had been praised for their neutrality in global conflicts, a policy that had served them so well for so many decades.

They appear to have now sold out those values under pressure from Washington and at the expense of the security of their people.

Finland will also no longer have an independent foreign and security policy because, like other NATO members, it will now be under the guidance and instructions of the U.S.

The country will now most likely be forced to participate in U.S.-led NATO military missions and accept the imposition of advanced military hardware on its soil.

The U.S. regime’s deployment of weapons in Ukraine has brought nothing but suffering, displacement and poverty for Ukrainian civilians.

Is this what Finland wants for its people?

It’s a major policy change and one that Helsinki may regret in the future.

Last week, Russia changed it foreign policy doctrine, outlining “unfriendly states” it considers hostile. Many of these are NATO members.

Russia will be closely observing the deployment of NATO weapons in Finland.

“Believe me, our military will inform us about everything in due time,” Peskov said.

“We will closely monitor the developments in Finland and see how the North Atlantic bloc will use the territory of Finland regarding the deployment of weapons, systems, and infrastructure close to our border there, potentially posing a threat to us,” he warned.

He also emphasized that Moscow will take measures accordingly.

Meanwhile, the country, deputy foreign minister Sergey Ryabkov says “we will calmly disclose what we will do in response (to NATO expansion) when the time is ripe.”

According to Russian news agency TASS, he added that some Western governments “all of a sudden decided for some reason that there will be no reaction from the Russian side.”

“They are deeply mistaken,” Ryabkov stressed. “A reaction will follow.”

Critics argue that Western governments who believe Russia would fail to accomplish its military mission are living under some kind of illusion. Critics of the military alliance say Moscow has yet to use its more sophisticated weapons in the Ukraine war.

The war was instigated by the U.S. on European soil but has backfired massively on Western European countries.

Washington’s European allies are witnessing the most unprecedented strikes and protests in modern history, with inflation rising to record levels after the Ukraine war.

Finland’s move into NATO is not something that’s going to help its own economic recovery and the prosperity of its people.

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With all the military equipment NATO has sent, is it time for the military alliance to reassess its strategy toward the Ukraine war?

Speaking to reporters ahead of a NATO summit, Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg admitted that “the current rate of Ukraine’s ammunition expenditure is many times higher than our current rate of production – this puts our defense industries under strain.”

Boosting stockpiles and production, Stoltenberg emphasized, “requires more defense expenditure by NATO allies.”

The head of the U.S.-led military alliance has called on the 30 member states to speed up the production of arms for delivery to Ukraine and avoid a Russian victory.

“For example,” he noted “the waiting time for large-calibre ammunition has increased from 12 to 28 months. Orders placed today would only be delivered two-and-a-half years later. So we need to ramp up production, and invest in our production capacity.”

The West, with the United States in particular, has already shipped tens of billions of dollars worth of military assistance to the warzone in an attempt for Ukraine to retake control of the eastern Donbas region.

This is the same Donbas region in the country where ethnic Russians have been fighting Ukrainian forces since 2014, leading to at least 14,000 deaths as well as the failure of Kyiv to take control of the region.

Since Russia launched what it described as a “special military operation” in February 2022, citing multiple security concerns, the focus of the battle has been mostly based in the same eastern and southeastern regions of Ukraine.

As members of the so-called U.S.-led Ukraine Defense Contact Group met in Brussels to address the arms assistance crisis to Ukraine, they are facing pressure to speed up delivery and provide even more sophisticated weapons to Ukrainian forces.

But this is no easy task with Ukraine still waiting for the promises of battle tanks and warplanes. These calls have faced hesitation from Kyiv’s Western allies who don’t want to risk direct confrontation with Russia amid political hurdles and challenges back home.

“The essential question is: What do they want to do with planes? It’s not clear,” a French diplomat, who was unauthorized to speak publicly, told Politico. “Do they think that with 50 or 100 fighter jets, they can retake the Donbas?” the diplomat asked.

In response to a question about the U.S. providing fighter jets to Ukraine, U.S. Secretary of Defence Lloyd Austin said “in terms of whether or not we’re going to provide F-16s, I don’t have any announcements to make. I don’t have anything to add to what our president said earlier. I’ll just leave it at that.”

Experts say the war could have been easily avoided and flashpoint territories where ethnic Russians reside could have been settled without the eruption of further violence eight years later.

Russia argues the shipments of weapons to Ukraine are prolonging the war and suffering of Ukrainians.

But Stoltenberg appears adamant for the war to drag on, saying NATO has conducted research for each member’s munitions and is in the process of planning targets to increase the member states’ stockpiles for more munitions.

Critics of the war argue that with the first anniversary of the conflict approaching and with all the Western weapons that have been shipped to Ukraine so far, can the U.S.-led military alliance contain Russia?

And with Kyiv in urgent need of more military aid, the question is where exactly is this war heading and which parties are making lucrative profits at the expense of others.

Western arms manufacturers and U.S. gas firms have been making a lot of money whilst households in Western Europe have faced record inflation levels after the West slapped sanctions on cheap Russian energy supplies that Western Europe was heavily dependent on.

As the war shows no signs of ending, surveys indicate European households are growing increasingly wary about the conflict amid a cost of living crisis back home.

Nevertheless, the United States and NATO have pledged (in public) that Western military support will not lose momentum.

Cracks among NATO states have also emerged over the shipment of more advanced arms with debates around sending certain types of weapons, most notably tanks, resulting in high-level diplomatic spats.

Reports say the information war is extremely sensitive at this moment in time as it’s difficult to gauge the exact figures on exactly how much munition each NATO member has left and not replaced.

It might explain why Stoltenberg had to travel to South Korea and Japan to ask Seoul and Tokyo to ship weapons in addition to pleading with Latin American countries to make military contributions as well.

Richard Shirreff, a retired British Army general and NATO’s former deputy supreme allied commander in Europe, told CNN: “This is critical to national and European security. You don’t want to demonstrate your vulnerabilities to any potential aggressor. But at the same time, people need to understand that this is serious, something has to be done urgently.”

“All of the NATO countries must take a serious strategic look at this. We might be at the stage where we need to tell bicycle manufacturers to pivot and start making ammunition. The only way we are going to get back on track is to prepare for the worst case, which means relearning lessons from the Cold War to avoid another world war,” Shirreff added.

There is certainly a concern in the U.S.-led military alliance over the looming ammunition crisis as it did not anticipate Russia to hold on to the frontlines so firmly for so long.

CNN has reported that even the biggest supplier of weapons to Ukraine and the world’s top military exporter, the United States, is having trouble keeping up with the arms supply demand.

As Stoltenberg warns that Kyiv is using up its ammunition far faster than its allies can provide, estimates suggest Ukrainian forces are firing up to 6,000-7,000 artillery shells every day.

Reports say that during meetings with EU heads, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky and his senior officials gave each EU leader a special list requesting weapons and equipment based on the country’s known stocks and capabilities.

“The first thing on the list was, everywhere, the ammunition,” Estonian Prime Minister Kaja Kallas has been cited as saying.

“If you have the equipment and you don’t have the ammunition, then it’s no use,” the Estonian leader added.

And the West is by all accounts low on ammunition in their arsenal.

“It is clear that we are in a race of logistics,” Stoltenberg told reporters. “Key capabilities like ammunition, fuel, and spare parts must reach Ukraine before Russia can seize the initiative on the battlefield.”

“Ukraine has urgent requirements to help it meet this crucial moment in the course of the war,” Austin added.

NATO deputy assistant secretary general Jamie Shea also said NATO had “largely used up the available stocks” and this meant it “had to persuade its defence industries to go back to opening up the production lines” and to produce the stock at scale and quickly.

Asked if it would be possible to do this, Shea added, “It’s not going to be easy, but there is a push going on.”

“While we get production ramped up if we can persuade some of these other sorts of pro-Western countries beyond NATO to provide these types of munitions that should help to fill the gap in the meantime.”

What may prove risky for NATO is that it is led by the United States and history proves the Pentagon’s foreign military adventurism has not exactly been successful in the past several decades.

On the contrary, the U.S. has waged or triggered wars which have very rarely (if ever) ended in a victory for Washington.

**************H
Estimates suggest Ukrainian forces are firing up to 6,000-7,000 artillery shells every day.

***********
“Do they think that with 50 or 100 fighter jets, they can retake the Donbas?” a French diplomat told Politico.

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The remarks were made in response to NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg’s comments on China’s military developments.

Apparently, only NATO has the right to develop its military while the rest of the world is prohibited from making any military progress to defend and preserve its territorial integrity, independence or sovereignty.

But the NATO chief went a step further claiming the country was becoming a “more and more authoritarian power” that was displaying assertive behavior, threatening Taiwan, and developing military capabilities.

This is while the military alliance led by the United States have military bases at every corner of the planet to wage wars, instigate or incite violence, provoke wars, and occupy large chunks of countries against the wishes of the respective country’s legitimate government.

If there is a conflict on this planet, the U.S. and its NATO allies have fanned the flames of it.

The terror which the U.S.-led military alliance has unleashed around the world under its so-called “war on terror” since 2001 has created terror groups in West Asia that had no existence before the mysterious and dubious war mission began.

For example, Daesh and the Nusra Front are similar to al-Qaeda but on heavy steroids.

When Washington doesn’t care about the communities it terrorizes back at home or its neighbors in Latin America as a direct result of its own actions, never mind West Asia and beyond, that makes the U.S. the most authoritarian regime in the world today.

Of course, the NATO chief can’t speak out against his master in Washington DC, but he can take orders from the Pentagon to regurgitate U.S. rhetoric against Beijing.

The Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson, Mao Ning, did hit back, saying “that NATO, on one hand, keeps breaching its traditional defense zones and areas, asking member countries to increase military spending and military build-up. But on the other hand, it’s talking down to China. This is a typical double-standard move. China adheres to the path of peaceful development and is the country with the best record on peace and security issues. We have never invaded any country nor never engaged in proxy wars, never engaged in military operations around the world, and never threatened other countries with force.”

The facts on the ground show that China has never waged a war against another country.

The region where Beijing has dispatched its troops outside the Chinese mainland is a very small contingent in Africa as part of the United Nations Peacekeeping Forces. In other words, to preserve the peace in Africa under the United Nations.

On the contrary, the wars waged by the U.S.-led military alliance, the number of proxy wars it has engaged in, the numbers of conflicts it has stirred as well as the number of countries it has threatened are too long to list.
The facts on the ground show how much NATO has destabilized international peace and security.

“What NATO should do is to abandon its Cold War mentality and ideological bias and seriously reflect on what role it actually plays for the stability of Europe and the world, instead of stirring up conflicts and playing up the Chinese threat everywhere.” the Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson said.

NATO claims China is not an adversary, but the military measures and provocations it has made against China, in particular the U.S., would suggest the opposite.

Contrary to Stoltenberg’s remarks, Taiwan is a province of China. Under international law it is part of China, something that is recognized by the U.S. itself. Under the one-China policy, which has a clear and unambiguous meaning, there is only one China and Taiwan is an inalienable part of China. The government of the People’s Republic of China is the sole legal government representing entire China.

If anything, it is U.S. and NATO-backed separatist forces in Taipei that are displaying assertive behavior, threatening the Chinese mainland.

China has also reacted to White House allegations that the Chinese balloon shot down was part of a fleet that spanned five continents.

This is in reference to a weather balloon which sent the American establishment into a frenzy, alleging it was a spy object despite Beijing’s logical statements that the unintended and unexpected entry of the unmanned civilian airship into U.S. airspace was entirely caused by “force majeure”.

The Chinese foreign ministry said, “The U.S. is the number one country in surveillance and reconnaissance. It has long-running intelligence programs across the globe.”

It added that U.S. aircraft and warships frequently conduct close-in reconnaissance around China, which seriously threatens China’s national security and undermines regional peace and stability.

“The Chinese side has repeatedly voiced our grave concerns. The U.S. needs to put an immediate end to such provocations,” it said.

China also says it is not aware of any “fleet of balloons”, saying “That narrative is probably part of the information and public opinion warfare the U.S. has waged on China. As to who is the world’s number one country of spying, eavesdropping and surveillance, that is plainly visible to the international community.”?

The country’s vice-foreign minister, Xie Feng, has lodged a formal complaint with the U.S. embassy over the incident, accusing Washington of overreacting to an accident “caused by force majeure”.

Xie emphasized that the Chinese civilian unmanned airship strayed into the U.S. airspace due to accidents and incidents caused by force majeure. The facts are clear and cannot be distorted or smeared. However, the U.S. turned a deaf ear and insisted on indiscriminate use of force against the civilian airship that was about to leave U.S. airspace. It obviously overreacted and seriously violated the spirit of international law and international practice.

China says it resolutely opposes and strongly protests the use of force in shooting its unmanned civilian aircraft, and has called on the U.S. not to take further actions that harm China’s interests, and not to escalate or expand the tension.

The Chinese government says it is paying close attention to the development of the situation, and will resolutely safeguard the rights and interests of Chinese companies, resolutely defend the interests and dignity of China, and reserves the right to make further necessary reactions.

“The facts are clear … but the United States turned a deaf ear and insisted on indiscriminate use of force against the civilian airship that was about to leave the United States airspace. It obviously overreacted and seriously violated the spirit of international law and international practice,” Xie has been quoted as saying.

The irony is that during the era of President Donald Trump, the White House rhetoric against Beijing was more intense and provocative.

The Pentagon now says there were three instances during the Trump administration of Chinese balloons swaying over the U.S., yet even Trump did not make a fuss as experts say the intelligence clearly suggested at the time these were balloons of a civilian nature. (Trump has since denied the claim).

The suspicious timing of the U.S. announcement and its sinister accusations against China, on the eve of U.S. Secretary of State Anthony Blinken’s proposed trip to Beijing (which China didn’t even announce) indicates that Washington wants to resume its provocative measures against the growing economic superpower.

However, the Biden administration appears to have fewer cards to provoke China with.

This is why it resorted to the use of force over a weather balloon with limited self-steering capability and deviated far from its planned course and entered into the airspace of Latin America and the Caribbean.

Washington is clearly desperate and its latest dramatic filmed actions of warplanes overreacting by shooting down a civilian aircraft (at the orders of President Biden) is yet another sign of America’s weakness.

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The U.S.-led military alliance wants to drag the war out as long as possible to contain Russia’s rising economic, military, and global standing.

Washington doesn’t like competition even if that competition doesn’t harm its national security interests or territorial integrity.

For example, the U.S. establishment knows China doesn’t pose any military threats to America but Beijing’s advanced technological achievements, strong economic growth and expanding diplomatic ties over the past decades indicate that it will overtake the U.S. over the next ten years. Even some experts say it could take less than that.

That goes against the goals of the U.S. hegemonic and colonial plans.

This same U.S. fear applies to Russia as well with Washington sending a steady supply of weapons to Kyiv.

The Russian Federation has regained economic, military and other geopolitical progresses similar to the Soviet days.

It has become an international superpower and the idea of using the Donbass region or the issue of Crimea to trigger an all-out war against Russia is absurd.
These matters could have very easily been dealt with peacefully and can still be resolved peacefully. Peace talks, a resumption of the Minsk agreements, agreeing to Russia’s uncomplicated proposals for security guarantees are just some examples of to end of the war today.

But NATO simply doesn’t want peace.

It wants to prolong the violence.

Whenever Russian forces are advancing on the ground in the Donbas in eastern Ukraine, the U.S. and NATO send more advanced and sophisticated weapons to Ukraine.

And when Ukrainian forces advanced in the country’s east late last year, NATO leaders and Western mainstream media lavished praise on Kyiv.

Western headlines spoke of an unexpected Ukrainian victory.

But the delivery of weapons to Ukraine slowed down, drawing complaints from Kyiv.

That’s because NATO doesn’t want Ukraine to regain these territories either, which could also end the war.

Now that Russian forces (as was expected) are on the front foot again, NATO is sending its most advanced battle tanks and longer-range missiles.

But how many tanks is NATO exactly sending?

According to many reports the combined number of main battle tanks being dispatched is around 200.

Double that to 400 and it’s not rocket science to figure out that this number does not match Russia’s active combat tanks estimated at more than 10,000.

The tanks are also not enough to achieve a battleground victory against the Russian military as Moscow has yet to deploy its most advanced military equipment.

The NATO tanks are being sent for Ukrainian forces to continue fighting, shedding their blood and continuing the status quo on behalf of the United States.

As Western intelligence agencies assess the delivery of tanks and training Ukrainian troops will take time, Russian forces have advanced further.

That is why some NATO members (immediately after agreeing to send battle tanks) are now in talks over the delivery of warplanes to Ukraine.

Addressing diplomats on Monday, United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres said, “The prospects for peace keep diminishing. The chances of further escalation and bloodshed keep growing.”

Those remarks will be music to the ears of the Pentagon.

“I fear the world is not sleepwalking into a wider war. I fear it is doing so with its eyes wide open.” Guterres added.

Russian Security officials have said Moscow is fighting NATO and not Ukraine.

The secretary of Moscow’s Security Council pointed out in October last year that NATO is waging war against Russia in Ukraine.

“Actually, the NATO alliance is fighting against us and its members are providing [Kyiv] with heavy weapons, ammunition and reconnaissance data and training military specialists,” Nikolay Patrushev said.

The Russian security chief noted that NATO member states “are involved in planning military operations.”

This is while the NATO chief has repeatedly called on member states to send more arms to Kyiv, even travelling to South Korea and calling on Latin American countries to play their part as some Western weapons stockpiles look like they are slowly depleting.

Moscow has repeatedly said shipping more weapons to Ukraine will only prolong the war and the suffering of the Ukrainian people, while ending the chances and options for peace talks.

But again, the United States and NATO are not interested in any peace.

Writing on social media, the Ukrainian-Canadian political scientist posted this:

“Bombshell: Former Israeli prime minister says that Western leaders blocked #Ukraine & #Russia peace deal which he negotiated on #Zelensky request in March because they wanted to continue to strike #Putin. He says that there was good chance of such deal.”

Other peace efforts spearheaded by Turkey, Iran and other countries were also swiftly blocked by the West.

One of the methods that the U.S. and its Western allies used to block the peace efforts was to give promises to Ukraine to grant it NATO membership.

Last month, Ukraine said it has become a de-facto member of the NATO military alliance.

Kyiv says this is because it is receiving Western arms with Ukrainian armed forces being trained to use those weapons inside the territory Western NATO countries.

But experts say this is solely propaganda and Ukraine can never join the U.S.-led military alliance as members can only be decided by the unanimous vote of all members.

That means all the countries in Europe that are party to NATO as well as Canada and of course the United States.

NATO member Hungary has already said it has no interest in widening and expanding the war, and has strongly indicated it would veto any Ukrainian membership.

Other NATO countries have indicated the same. So, there is a zero possibility of Kyiv joining the alliance despite the sinister U.S. pledges.

Also, when a country is accepted as a NATO member the first requirement is that it should have sovereignty over its own territory.

At this moment in time, Russia has annexed four provinces of Ukraine, where ethnic Russians reside.

Ukraine does not recognize these four provinces as part of Russia which effectively means Ukraine itself is saying it does not have sovereignty over its own territory and therefore it is not eligible for membership in NATO.

If NATO were to violate its own charter and force the membership of Ukraine against the wishes of Hungary and possibly result in Hungary leaving NATO and Ukraine does become a member then that will mean NATO will automatically be at a state of war.

That would result in all NATO members declaring war with Russia because the territory of the country NATO recognizes as Ukraine is currently annexed by Russia.

The entire process is ridiculous as NATO members have time and again declared their reluctance to enter in a war with Russia.

The only NATO mission in this war is to contain Russia’s growing power, cut its energy to Europe and more importantly make lucrative profits for the Western arms manufacturing companies.

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Some NATO leaders have said that they are open to the idea, while others have refused to entertain any more escalation.

Berlin has once again rejected any such delivery while implying that some parties in NATO are trying to provide more advanced weapon systems than others.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has toughened up his government’s rejection of any demands by Kyiv to supply Ukraine with fighter jets following the fiasco that ended up with Berlin’s agreement to deliver its Leopard battle tanks.

President Joe Biden has also said the United States would not provide F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine.

Speaking to reporters at the White House, Biden said he was opposed to supplying American fighter jets to Ukraine, as Kyiv expands its list of weaponry.

“No,” he said when asked if he was in favor of sending F-16s or others. His refusal to send F-16 fighters come as the U.S., Germany and other countries have agreed to boost the Ukrainian arsenal by providing heavy battle tanks.

There isn’t just a split in the NATO military alliance, but also in the U.S. foreign policy elite.

Analysts have pointed out that key advisors to the Pentagon have come out saying that it is in America’s interests that the war be stopped sooner than later so that the United States can concentrate on its next area of conflict, which is of much greater interest, that is containing China.

Victoria Nuland, the U.S. Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, made it quite clear in her remarks to Congress during a testimony a couple of days ago that her department understands the fragility of the Ukrainian military position.

Other statements made by Nuland and others have been seen by analysts as U.S. foreign policy makers are at odds with each other on how to move forward with the crisis instigated by Washington.

The ouster of Ukrainian officials over corruption scandals has renewed questions about how the government in Kyiv is addressing concerns about U.S. military aid, which has been shipped to the tune of tens of billions of dollars.

Analysts believe that the war may be gearing up for a significant escalation in the coming months and NATO warplanes would increase Kyiv’s power, with its own air force significantly depleted after nearly a year of war.

In an interview with a German daily newspaper, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said “the question of combat aircraft does not arise at all … I can only advise against entering into a constant competition to outbid each other when it comes to weapons systems.”

“If, as soon as a decision has been made, the next debate starts in Germany, this does not look very serious and shakes the confidence of the citizens in government decisions,” Scholz told Tagesspiegel. “Such debates should not be conducted for reasons of domestic political profiling. It is important to me now that all those who have announced their intention to supply battle tanks to Ukraine do so,” he added.

French President Emmanuel Macron has said Paris would not rule out providing fighter jets to Ukraine but has warned against the risk of escalation in the conflict.

Following talks with Holland’s Prime Minister Mark Rutte, Macron declared that “nothing is excluded in principle.”

Rutte, for his part, has said he is also open to the idea of sending U.S.-made Dutch F-16s to Ukraine.

“There is no taboo but it would be a big step,” said Rutte.

Any arms delivery “must not weaken the capacity of the French armed forces,” Macron pointed out, adding that France would have to be confident that the weapons would not be used to strike inside Russia, which would significantly escalate the war.

At the same time, NATO members are wary of sending further advanced weapons to Ukraine at the risk of entering into a direct confrontation with Russia.

Many say this is what left Germany dithering over sending its battle tanks to the warzone as it did not want to appear as the warmonger in the conflict.

Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, has said that Kyiv was in talks with allies about the delivery of warplanes, but revealed that some NATO members have a “conservative” attitude on arms deliveries.

Advocates of a peaceful resolution to the war have slammed the delivery of tens of billions of dollars’ worth of weapons to prolong the war in eastern Ukrainian territories.

Fighting has continued at key points along the long front as Russian forces sought to expand their hold on territory in the Donetsk region.

These are the same eastern regions that have witnessed deadly fighting between armed ethnic Russians and the Ukrainian military since 2014, killing some 14,000 people before the war began in February 2022.

With the failure of the Minsk agreements to end the fighting and the U.S.-led NATO military alliance expanding on Russian borders, Moscow dispatched troops into the ongoing battle in what the Kremlin described as a “special military operation”.

Many have also highlighted NATO and the U.S.’s failure to address Moscow’s security guarantees in the months leading up to the war which erupted on 24 February 2022.

With Ukraine’s supplies of artillery munitions heavily depleted, France and Australia announced on Monday a deal to jointly produce 155 mm shells for Kyiv’s forces.

“Several thousand 155 mm shells will be manufactured jointly,” French Defense Minister Sebastien Lecornu said.

Meanwhile, while in Seoul, NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg called on South Korea to “step up” military support for Ukraine, calling on the country to reconsider its policy of not exporting weapons to countries in conflict.

There is an “urgent need for more ammunition,” Stoltenberg said.

NATO’s call for more military support for Ukraine comes despite Moscow calling Western shipments of arms to the country a blatant provocation. Russia says the move is extremely dangerous and will escalate the conflict and suffering of Ukrainians.

Analysts say Western governments and mainstream media are lying when they claim the world is united against Russia.

From the 193 countries in the world, about 30 have imposed sanctions on Russia or send military hardware to Ukraine.

This essentially means the vast majority of the world is opposed to the West’s position on Russia when it comes to the Ukraine war.

NATO not only has asked South Korea but also some countries in Latin America.

This suggests that NATO members are running short of weapons. Experts say countries like Canada, the UK, France and Germany have almost emptied their own stockpiles, which is why NATO is calling on South Korea and certain Latin American countries to send weapons.

The other question is whether the NATO chief has the authority to demand from other sovereign countries to become a party to the war.

NATO has no right whatsoever to call on other countries to get involved or send weapons to a warzone.

Some NATO critics say Ukraine is set to lose the war and Stoltenberg is making attempts to reshape international approach toward the conflict by turning global opinion against Moscow.

Polls in European countries have indicated more people want an end to the war as they foot the bill for their government spending on a conflict that has seen inflation hit record levels on the continent.

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The demonstration reflects similar rallies being held across Europe in opposition to their respective government’s support for the war in Ukraine. The constant supply of arms by mainly NATO members has prolonged the conflict in Eastern Europe, leading to the suffering of civilians caught up in the cross fire.

When Russia expressed legitimate concerns about the NATO military’s eastward expansion toward its border, it opened the door to discussion, negotiation and proposals on security guarantees. However, these were ignored which many critics said, at the time, will lead to a military confrontation that will hurt ordinary Europeans. In this case, Ukrainian civilians are suffering from the human cost and ordinary civilians are falling into poverty.

Russia’s sense of insecurity in the face of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization seemed quite genuine, but critics say the media coverage has dismissed Moscow’s initial concerns.

Opposition to NATO has been strong in Europe. The military alliance’s summits are always met with anti-war demonstrations. In June this year, protesters marched during an anti-NATO rally ahead of the summit that was held in Madrid. The organizers said the American-led military alliance is not the solution to the war in Ukraine. U.S. arms manufacturers have made lucrative profits from the war.

Last month, an estimated 70,000 people protested in Prague against the Czech government, calling on the ruling coalition to do more to control soaring energy prices and voicing opposition to the European Union and NATO.

For many years, the Kremlin has made it clear that if NATO continued to mass troops and weapons on the Russian border, the expansion would likely be met with serious resistance by the Russians, even with military action. That view was not just limited to Russian officials. Even some prominent American foreign policy experts backing the same possible scenario. The current director of the CIA, William Burns, has been warning about the provocation and consequences of NATO’s expansion on Russia for more than 20 years now.

On the other hand, Europe’s decision to cave into American pressure and impose unprecedented sanctions on Moscow has heavily restricted the gas supplies to the continent which have instead pushed energy prices up, leaving many in poverty. Europe relied on 40% of Russian gas before the conflict erupted.

The shortage of energy on the continent and rising prices for the fuel has been met with angry voters bringing down governments at the polling stations.

A recent poll by Elabe reveals that support for anti-Russian sanctions is on the decline across France. The survey shows only 40% of the French population are in favor of the anti-Russian sanctions. The poll also reveals that 32% of French people think the anti-Russia sanctions must be restricted to diminish their effect on the livelihoods of the French people.

The opposition French Patriots party again called for the demonstrations after the initial protests that took place on September 3rd. The protesters want Macron to leave office and withdraw from both NATO and the European Union.

The French government, like others in Europe, is adopting or considering various emergency measures ahead of the winter, such as the possibility of three-hour power outages in the United Kingdom.

As inflation levels are biting, a group of French intellectuals, including Nobel literature prize winner Annie Ernaux, have urged people to join the protests being organized by the left for next week. They accuse President Macron of not doing enough to help the poor cope with high prices while the profits of some companies are spiking.

The group of 69 signatories, including writers, film directors and university teachers, said in a text published in the Journal Du Dimanche that “Emmanuel Macron is using inflation to widen the wealth gap, to boost capital income at the expense of the rest.”

“It is all a matter of political will,” said the text, co-signed by Ernaux, who on Thursday became the first French woman to win the Nobel Prize for Literature.

The statement also said the government has not done enough to fight the skyrocketing energy prices and declined to raise taxes on companies making enormous profits as a result of high inflation.

The signatories have also urged the public to join the protest march planned for October 16, which is being organized by the political movement of the France Unbowed party, which this year struck an alliance with more moderate leftwing parties to form France’s largest opposition bloc.

Next week’s protest is being promoted as “against the high cost of living and climate inaction”. It comes as Macron faces stiff resistance from unions over a planned pensions reform and as strikes by workers demanding a pay rise from retail to refineries have disrupted parts of the economy.

There is more misery for the French government as a number of fuel service stations are grappling with supply problems amid strike action at refineries run by major oil companies TotalEnergies and ExxonMobil. The walkout by members of the national trade union center CGT mainly over pay has disrupted operations at refineries and storage facilities. The industrial action has forced the government to tap into the country’s strategic reserves.

Environment Minister Christophe Bechu earlier told French media the government will, for the time being, not be rationing petrol for drivers or restrict the use of service stations in response to supply problems. “We haven’t reached this point yet,” Bechu said when asked if the government would impose any national measures beyond the bans already in place in some regions on filling large flat-sided metal containers for storing or transporting petrol.

The strikes at the refineries of ExxonMobil and TotalEnergies will continue, union officials at both companies have said. “It is continuing everywhere,” a CGT representative said, adding that there had been no contact from TotalEnergies since Saturday’s call by the union for the company’s managers to begin talks on pay.

In some areas, the share of affected petrol stations is much higher than the national average. An interactive map compiled by the website mon-essence.fr, where more than 100,000 users have reported outages in recent days, shows a large majority of petrol stations in and around Paris were marked out of service.

Across France, long queues have been seen outside fuel stations. “The waiting line will take you at least one-and-a-half hours or two”, motorist Jean Galibert said as he entered the last stretch of a 700-metre tailback in front of a Paris service station. Another motorist, Franck Chang, said, “This situation right behind me reflects the state of France. We’re struggling.”

Reports say the strikes have reduced France’s total refinery output by more than 60% which will be seen as another blow to the French government. On Sunday, TotalEnergies claimed to have offered to bring forward wage talks, in response to union demands, as it strongly seeks to end the industrial action that has disrupted supplies to almost a third of French petrol stations.

Amid warnings that energy shortages and rising inflation are set to extend in coming winter, further protests and anger at governments’ economic policies across Europe are expected to expand.

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