Heading towards World War III?

The US on Monday accused Iran of breaching the conditions of the 2015 nuclear deal with the West by selling ‘kamikaze’ drones to Russia. Moscow, however, stated that it is only using “Russian hardware.”

Russia has used autonomous loitering munitions to devastating effect in its attacks on Ukrainian military and energy infrastructure in recent weeks. Flying at low altitude, these unmanned aircraft can evade traditional air defense systems before dive bombing their targets, and are rumored to cost a fraction of the price of the missiles Kiev’s forces fire to intercept them.

The distinctive delta-wing design of the drones has led Ukrainian and Western officials to claim that they are Iranian Shahed-136 UAVs.

"Earlier today our French and British allies publicly offered the assessment that Iran’s supply of these UAVs [to] Russia is a violation of UN Security Council resolution 2231," US State Department spokesman Vedant Patel told reporters on Monday. "This is something that we agree with."

Adopted in 2015, Security Council resolution 2231 sets out the terms of Iran’s nuclear deal with the US, UK, China, France, Germany and Russia, in which it agreed to restrict its nuclear program in exchange for limited sanctions relief. The resolution includes embargoes on Iranian arms exports, and although the US unilaterally pulled out of the deal in 2018, Washington argues that an embargo on missile parts covers drone exports, and is valid until 2023.

Tehran has denied providing arms to either side of the conflict in Ukraine. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Monday that he had received “no information” concerning the alleged use of Iranian drones in Ukraine.

“Russian hardware is being used,” he said, adding: “you know it well. It has Russian designations.”

Photographs of wreckage from blast sites in Ukraine show the drones bearing the Russian designation ‘Geran-2’, allegedly a localized version of the Shahed-136.

Russia’s use of the so-called ‘kamikaze’ drones has sparked panic in Ukraine, with video footage showing troops desperately firing at them with small arms. Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has argued that Ukraine needs newer and more advanced air defense weapons from the West to counter the threat, although the Pentagon has no effective method of defending against these drones at present.

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The West should not settle for any peace agreement that would result in Ukraine losing territory it recognizes as Kiev's to Russia, German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock has said. According to the diplomat, flaws in the strategy were demonstrated back in 2014, when Crimea was absorbed into Russia.

Speaking at the 2022 Berlin Foreign Policy Forum, Baerbock said that while open public discussions are a key aspect of a true democracy, those suggesting trading Ukraine’s territorial integrity for the prospect of immediate peace have been repeatedly mistaken.

“Such naive strategies already failed in 2014, we’ve seen that the annexation of Crimea and Donbass was only a prelude to what has been happening in Ukraine ever since the 24th of February,” she claimed.

The minister called into question Russian President Vladimir Putin’s willingness to negotiate, adding that the Kremlin seems to be doubling down on brute force instead. With that in mind, “for Europe it is not about security with Putin’s Russia, for Europe it is about security from Putin’s Russia,” she noted.

“The security of the Baltic states, the security of Eastern Europe is Germany’s security,” Baerbock said in an apparent bid to illustrate Berlin’s commitment to solidarity with other European nations. She also added that Germany is going to “support Ukraine with weapons for all it takes,” pledging economic and humanitarian aid as well.

Last Wednesday, Ukraine’s Defense Minister Alexey Reznikov confirmed the arrival of the first unit of Germany’s cutting-edge IRIS-T air defense systems in Ukraine. Three more are expected to be supplied to Kiev next year.

Meanwhile, Germany’s own military has yet to receive a single unit of the system. This prompted Bavaria’s governor, Markus Soeder, to criticize the decision, calling on the government in Berlin to prioritize the country’s own security.

Earlier in October, a report published by Business Insider showed that German forces have only enough ammunition for two days of warfare.

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Army General Sergey Surovikin on Tuesday spoke to the media for the first time since assuming overall command of the ongoing Russian military operation in Ukraine.

Describing the situation as particularly “tense” around the city of Kherson in his statement to the broadcaster Rossiya-24, he added that the military may be forced to make “difficult decisions.”

“The NATO command of the armed forces of Ukraine has long been demanding offensive operations in the Kherson direction from the Kiev regime, regardless of any casualties – both in the Armed Forces of Ukraine and among the civilian population,” Surovikin stated.

The Russian military is aware of Kiev’s plans to use “prohibited” means of waging war in the Kherson area, Surovikin added. Namely, Ukraine is preparing a massive strike on the Kakhovka hydroelectric plant, located on the Dnieper River, as well as launching massive rocket and artillery attacks on Kherson itself.

“These actions can lead to the destruction of the infrastructure of this large industrial center and massive casualties among the civilian population,” Surovikin said.

In the ongoing effort to dislodge the Russian military from its positions, Kiev is pouring its reserves en masse into the frontline, the general said. The vast majority of those reserves are “territorial defense units, who have not been properly trained,” Surovikin added. Such troops have low morale, thus they are propped up by “barrier squads” composed of hardline nationalists “who shoot anyone trying to leave the battlefield,” he claimed.

The enemy’s daily losses amount to hundreds of casualties. We have a different strategy. <...> We are not aiming at fast-paced offensives, we spare every soldier and methodically grind the enemy’s attacking forces. This not only minimizes our own losses, but also significantly reduces the amount of victims among the civilian population.

“The enemy is the criminal regime that pushes Ukrainian citizens towards death. We are one people with Ukrainians and only wish for Ukraine to be a state independent from the West and NATO and friendly towards Russia,” Surovikin said.

Surovikin assumed overall command of Russian troops participating in the military operation earlier in October. The general has significant combat experience, ranging from hostilities in Chechnya to the operation in Syria, for which he was awarded the title of Hero of Russia back in 2017.

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Controversial Ukrainian website Mirotvorets, which acts as a database of enemies of Kiev, was updated on Wednesday to include the president of Kazakhstan, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.

He was added to the list for “publicly refusing to acknowledge Russia’s aggression against Ukraine” and “denying Russia’s attack on Ukraine in 2014 and capturing its territory.”

As proof of the offense, the website cites Tokayev’s interview with Deutsche Welle in 2019, in which he said he does not consider Crimea joining Russia in 2014 to have been an ‘annexation’.

“We don’t call what happened in Crimea … an annexation. What happened, happened. Annexation is too strong a word to be applied to Crimea,” Tokayev said, adding that Kazakhstan has “absolutely trusting and good neighborly relations” with Russia and believes in the wisdom and decency of the Russian leadership.

The Mirotvorets website, translated as ‘peacemaker’, was launched in 2014 and is widely known to be connected to Ukrainian security services. It positions itself as an independent database run by anonymous moderators to single out threats to Ukrainian national security.

The website, which provides personal information, such as names, dates of birth, home addresses, photos and social media pages of people considered to be a threat to Ukraine, claims it is simply helping law enforcement agencies and “special services” apprehend pro-Russian terrorists, separatists and war criminals, among others.

Some, however, have called the database a ‘kill list’ which is supported by the Ukrainian government, after several people, including writer and historian Oles Buzina, politician Oleg Kalashnikov, and Russian journalist Darya Dugina were assassinated shortly after their profiles appeared on the website.

Mirotvorets has also been condemned by EU officials and journalist groups for leaking personal data on more than 4,000 members of the media.

Recently, the website briefly added US billionaire Elon Musk over his threats to cut funding for the Starlink Satellite internet services, and Pink Floyd co-founder Roger Waters, who has publicly criticized the Kiev government and opposed Western military meddling in the region.

The list also features information on 327 children, including Faina Savenkova, a 13-year-old girl from the Lugansk People’s Republic, who called on the UN to stop the fighting in her region, which has dragged on since 2014.

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Ukraine should recognize Crimea as part of Russia and renounce its bid to join NATO for the sake of peace, US billionaire hedge fund manager Bill Ackman has said. As with SpaceX and Tesla CEO Elon Musk before him, Ackman was immediately criticized online for suggesting that Kiev should be ready to make concessions in order to end the hostilities.

“Crimea was part of Russia until 1954 and is largely comprised of ethnic Russians, which was apparently why the world did little when Russia annexed it back in 2014,” Ackman, the CEO of Pershing Square Capital Management, tweeted on Monday.

He added that the borders should return to where they were prior to February 24, when Russia launched its military operation in the neighboring country and before four former Ukrainian regions voted to join Russia. He added that the West should then help Kiev with its recovery, while the country should stay outside NATO.

“Thousands of lives will be saved and resources can be invested to rebuild [Ukraine] rather than in a war that will only lead to more destruction and death,” the billionaire wrote. “If there is a viable path to peace, we should pursue it. Each day the conflict continues, the risk to the world rises.”

After receiving criticism online, Ackman clarified his stance on Tuesday. “Yesterday, I suggested that a reasonable peace settlement might be a return to the borders as of [February 24], a Marshall Plan to rebuild [Ukraine], and [Ukraine’s] decision to not join NATO. Then the knives came out. I was accused of being an appeaser and worse,” he wrote.

I ask: is [Ukraine] better off in a continued prolonged war that leads to 1,000s more [Ukrainian] deaths and the leveling of the country or does some kind of negotiated settlement make sense? … I am by no means an expert. It just saddens me to see death and destruction with no apparent end date or opportunity for resolution.

“In a negotiated settlement, both parties must concede something or there is no opportunity for resolution. What is the least that both parties can concede that is acceptable for both? What am I missing in my analysis? What better ideas do you have?” Ackman argued.

Ackman’s comments came as more public figures in the West have been making suggestions for a possible peace deal between Russia and Ukraine. Venture capitalist and tech entrepreneur David Sacks tweeted on Sunday that the US should propose a ceasefire based on the February 23 lines and guarantee that Ukraine will not join NATO.

Musk offered his own vision of a peace settlement this month, which includes Ukraine recognizing Crimea as Russian territory. Kiev and Western officials quickly blasted Musk for what they considered to be a plan that heavily favors Moscow.

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Martial law has been imposed in the four regions that recently voted to become part of Russia amid the conflict with Ukraine. Russian President Vladimir Putin announced the decision on Wednesday.

The Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, already had martial law in place when they became parts of Russia, Putin explained. So, the decision provides the legal basis for it to remain in place under Russian sovereignty, he said during a meeting of the National Security Council.

The document signed by Putin introduces martial law starting midnight on Thursday. It also orders various parts of the Russian government to submit corresponding action plans within three days.

In a separate decree signed on Wednesday, the Russian president ordered a state of ‘mid-level response’ in several other parts of the country bordering Ukraine. These include the Crimean Republic, the city of Sevastopol, as well as Krasnodar, Belgorod, Bryansk, Voronezh, Kursk, and Rostov Regions. This is a special regime that gives officials additional authority to ensure security and rapid reaction to any emergencies.

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