InSync..

 

Senior Ukrainian officials are upset by a leaked “top secret” assessment suggesting Ukraine would make only “modest territorial gains” from its planned operation. 

Kyiv says the document shows the U.S. is once again underestimating its military’s capabilities.

The Washington Post, which reported the document, said it was part of the growing leak of classified U.S. intelligence on the war in Ukraine, China, Israel and other global hotspots.

“The same people who said Kyiv would fall in three days are now leaking harmful and equally ridiculous information ahead of an offensive critically important for the entire free world,” said a person in regular contact with senior officials in Kyiv.

The comments make clear that the United States and Ukraine aren’t as in sync as both countries claim 14 months into the war. It could also portend less trust between Washington and Kyiv. Just an "InSync" thought.

UN

 

The United Nations has raised concerns with the United States over reports that it eavesdropped on the private conversations of the UN secretary general, António Guterres, and other senior officials.

The leaked Pentagon files appear to show Washington was closely monitoring conversations between the secretary general and his aides.

The documents included embarrassing allegations that Guterres had expressed frustration with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelenskiy.

It followed a BBC report last week that the US felt Guterres was too sympathetic to Russian interests when he helped broker the Black Sea grain deal amid fears of a global food crisis. According to the broadcaster, one classified Pentagon file indicated that Guterres preferred to preserve the deal even if it meant accommodating Russian interests.

Democracy at work.  Just a thought.

The Lies..

 
President Biden has cited the strength of the widespread international commitment to the mission of defending an independent democracy against a brutal aggressor.

But newly leaked secret U.S. government documents provide details of how some close non-European allies have been reluctant to provide arms to Ukraine, and in the case of Egypt, even considered supplying rockets to Russia

Still, the documents shed light on the Biden administration’s difficulties in getting material help from Israel, Egypt and South Korea, for whom loyalty to the U.S. is balanced by a perceived need to refrain from offending Russia.

The documents didn't show secrets other than Biden giving a different spin on the Ukraine war, and camouflage the reality of war.

 Just a "classified" thought.

Macron..

 

French President Emmanuel Macron made a high-profile state visit to Beijing last week accompanied by European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen, just days after Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez.

German Foreign Minister Annalena Baerbock arrived in the northeast port city of Tianjin on Thursday, following a visit by Chancellor Olaf Scholz in November. The European Union's foreign policy chief, Josep Borrell, would have been in China this week, too, but he tested positive for COVID-19.

As an ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, Xi could play a pivotal role in helping to end the war in Ukraine. The conflict has dragged on for over a year, driven up energy prices and inflicted more damage on economies struggling to rebound from the coronavirus pandemic.

The writing is on the wall.  Just a "shifting "thought.

Affiliate..

 

NPR will no longer post fresh content to its 52 official Twitter feeds, becoming the first major news organization to go silent on the social media platform. In explaining its decision, NPR cited Twitter's decision to first label the network "state-affiliated media," the same term it uses for propaganda outlets in Russia, China and other autocratic countries.

The decision by Twitter last week took the public radio network off guard. When queried by NPR tech reporter Bobby Allyn, Twitter owner Elon Musk asked how NPR functioned. Musk allowed that he might have gotten it wrong.

Twitter then revised its label on NPR's account to "government-funded media." The news organization says that is inaccurate and misleading, given that NPR is a private, nonprofit company with editorial independence. It receives less than 1 percent of its $300 million annual budget from the federally funded Corporation for Public Broadcasting.

Let us not kid ourself, some aren't news outlets.

Recover..

 

A Yale School of Public Health study has found that older persons with mild cognitive impairment (MCI), a common type of memory loss, were 30% more likely to regain normal cognition if they had taken in positive beliefs about aging from their culture, compared to those who had taken in negative beliefs.

Researchers also found that these positive beliefs also enabled participants to recover their cognition up to two years earlier than those with negative age beliefs. This cognitive recovery advantage was found regardless of baseline MCI severity.
“Most people assume there is no recovery from MCI, but in fact half of those who have it do recover. Little is known about why some recover while others don’t. That’s why we looked at positive age beliefs, to see if they would help provide an answer,” said Becca Levy, professor of public health and of psychology and lead author of the study.

Autonomous..

On his flight home from Beijing, Macron gave an interview to POLITICO Europe. In it, he said that Europe must not become “just America’s followers” when asked about the prospect of China invading Taiwan.

“The question Europeans need to answer … is it in our interest to accelerate [a crisis] on Taiwan? No. 

The worse thing would be to think that we Europeans must become followers on this topic and take our cue from the US agenda and a Chinese overreaction,” Macron said, adding that Europe must not get “caught up in crises that are not ours, which prevents it from building its strategic autonomy.”

Strategic autonomy is a Brussels term that refers to the EU having an independent geopolitical policy, which relies in part on the bloc being able to become a third power and not get squashed between the US and China.

However, the China hawks, typically in Eastern Europe, have always been skeptical of anything that puts clear water between Europe and the US, who they see as the ultimate protectors of European territory through NATO.

China..

 

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