claims

Gov. Gavin Newsom used his final State of the State address to underscore California’s jaw-dropping crime figures — stats that he said refute the president’s claims about widespread murder and mayhem.

To put in perspective some of the numbers cited by the governor on Thursday:

The last time homicides were this low in Oakland, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. was visiting Joan Baez at Santa Rita Jail to commend her on her recent arrest in protest of the Vietnam draft.

Killings haven’t been so rare in San Francisco since superstar Marilyn Monroe wed baseball legend Joe DiMaggio at City Hall.

And violent deaths in the city of Los Angeles fell to rates not seen since the Beatles played Dodgers Stadium, their penultimate public show.

“We have seen double-digit decreases in crime overall in the state of California,” Newsom said. “We’ve got more work to do, but to those with that California derangement syndrome, I’ll repeat — it’s time to update your talking points.”

The governor’s remarks follow reporting by The Times that showed L.A.’s homicide rate is nearing a record low, mirroring trends in other cities nationwide.

With the counts based on data from the LAPD and other law enforcement agencies, President Trump’s insistence that crime in California is out of control has come to seem increasingly bombastic. Recently, the president has modified his message to warn of a possible crime resurgence.

“We will come back, perhaps in a much different and stronger form, when crime begins to soar again,” Trump said on Truth Social in a post announcing an end to his legal battle to maintain National Guard troops in L.A., Portland and Chicago. “Only a question of time!”

In his speech Thursday, Newsom credited the stark drop in violence to a flood of crime-fighting cash unleashed by the California Legislature.

“No one’s walked away from public safety,” Newsom said. “We didn’t turn a blind eye to this, we invested in it. We didn’t talk about it, we leaned in.”

But experts said the reality is more complicated. Those who study the root causes of crime say that it may take years, if not decades, to disentangle the causes of the pandemic-era surge in violence and the precipitous drop that has followed.

Trump hammered lawlessness in California’s streets during the 2024 presidential campaign and throughout his first year back in the White House. He rarely names Newsom without invoking crime and chaos, and regularly threatens to surge armed soldiers back into into the streets.

At the same time, the Trump administration has slashed hundreds of millions in federal funding from school safety grants, youth mentoring programs and gang intervention networks that experts say have been instrumental in improving public safety.

Proponents worry those cuts could threaten L.A.’s patchwork of alternative crisis response programs aimed at easing the city’s reliance on law enforcement. In recent years, scores of groups have sprung up to assist people dealing with homelessness, drug addiction and the symptoms of untreated mental health disorders — all of which can heighten the perception of crime, even when actual numbers go down.

Looming cuts in federal spending could hinder efforts to scale up these initiatives, some warned.

“I just don’t know how we can continue to trend in the right direction without continuing to invest in things that work,” said Thurman Barnes, assistant director of the New Jersey Gun Violence Research Center.

According to data published by the Major Cities Chiefs Assn., homicides were down in San Francisco, San José, Sacramento and Oakland. Other violent crimes, including rape, aggravated assault and robbery, also dropped, with a handful of exceptions.

Property crime was also down, the governor said Thursday.

Street-level disorder and perceptions of widespread lawlessness helped topple progressive administrations across California in 2024 and earned Trump an unexpected windfall in some of the state’s bluest cities.

Those concerns are “at the core” of California voters’ frustrations, Newsom acknowledged Thursday.

“We’re seeing results, making streets safer for everyone,” the governor said.

Jeff Asher, a leading expert in the field of criminology, said it’s hard to say whether the perception gap is closing “because we don’t necessarily track it super systematically.”

But he pointed to a Gallup poll from late last year that showed less than half of Americans believed that crime had gone up — the first time in two decades that that number had dipped below 50%.

“The pandemic broke us in a lot of ways, and we’re starting to not feel as broken,” he said.

Newsom also touted sharp declines in the number of people living on the streets.

Unsheltered homelessness dropped 9% in California and more than 10% in Los Angeles, the governor announced — data he sought to contrast with an 18% rise in homelessness nationwide.

The sight of encampments and people in the throes of psychosis in the streets drives perceptions of lawlessness and danger, studies show. Lowering it soothes those fears.

But California’s overall homeless population remains stubbornly high, with only modest reductions. Federal funding cuts could hamper efforts to further reduce those numbers, experts warned.

Rather than dig into the complexities of crime, Newsom sought to portray the president himself as the driver of lawlessness, calling the first year of his second term a “carnival of chaos.”

“We face an assault on our values unlike anything I’ve seen in my lifetime,” the governor said. “Secret police. Businesses being raided. Windows smashed, citizens detained, citizens shot. Masked men snatching people in broad daylight, people disappearing. Using American cities as training grounds for the United States military.”

“It’s time for the president of the United States to do his job, not turn his back on Americans that happen to live in the great state of California,” Newsom said.

KHLOE Kardashian has made a shocking claim in a recent episode of her podcast, Khloe In Wonderland.

The Good American co-founder shared her thoughts on aging and expressed a rather unconventional desire: she wants her body to be “frozen and preserved.”

This statement has ignited discussions about aging, beauty standards, and the lengths individuals might go to maintain their youthful appearance.

Khloe confidently stated, “As soon as I can be frozen and preserved, sign me up,” reflecting her ambition to defy the natural aging process and live until the age of 104.

Khloe’s remarks highlight a growing trend in celebrity culture where the pressure to look youthful and beautiful is immense.

The Kardashian family, already known for their extensive cosmetic enhancements, continues to be at the forefront of discussions regarding beauty standards.

PARANORMAL PALACE

Khloe Kardashian reveals Kylie Jenner has a GHOST in her $48m LA mansion

Khloe’s comments come after she has undergone a series of aesthetic procedures, and her desire to preserve her body could resonate with many individuals who share similar worries about aging.

She discussed the topic during and Ask Me Anything Episode of her show, sandwiched between her experiences with the paranormal, whether or not she Venmos her sisters, and rumors about planning her own baby shower.

This notion of “freezing” one’s body could refer to advancements in cryonics and other preservation technologies.

Cryonics is the practice of preserving individuals at very low temperatures with the hope that future medical advancements can bring them back to life or restore their health.

While the science is still in its infancy and remains largely theoretical, it raises intriguing ethical and philosophical questions about the lengths people might go to for immortality.

It also brings up memories of sci-fi movies like Jurassic Park, Encino Man, Alien 3, and Cryo.

Alongside her mother Kris Jenner, 70, and grandmother MJ, 91, who is seen as a vibrant near-centenarian, Khloe’s statements reflect a family legacy steeped in openness about beauty and aging.

The Kardashians have long faced scrutiny about their appearances and the messages they send to younger generations.

Supermodel sister Kendall has had rumors of a nose job, Kylie has publicly announced her breast implant size, and mama bear Kris is famous for her recent facelift.

Khloe’s comments are particularly pertinent in these discussions surrounding self-image and health.

While Khloe dreams of a youthful, preserved future, her call for body preservation sparks broader conversations about aging, the pressures of celebrity culture, and what it truly means to be “forever young.”

WASHINGTON — President Trump has made broad but vague assertions that the United States is going to “run” Venezuela after the ouster of Nicolás Maduro but has offered almost no details about how it will do so, raising questions among some lawmakers and former officials about the administration’s level of planning for the country after Maduro was gone.

Seemingly contradictory statements from Trump and Secretary of State Marco Rubio have suggested at once that the U.S. now controls the levers of Venezuelan power or that the U.S. has no intention of assuming day-to-day governance and will allow Maduro’s subordinates to remain in leadership positions for now.

Rubio said the U.S. would rely on existing sanctions on Venezuela’s oil sector and criminal gangs to wield leverage with Maduro’s successors.

The uncertainty on definitive next steps in Venezuela contrasts with the years of discussions and planning that went into U.S. military interventions that deposed other autocratic leaders, notably in Iraq in 2003, which still did not often lead to the hoped-for outcomes.

‘Disagreement about how to proceed’

The discrepancy between what Trump and Rubio have said publicly has not sat well with some former diplomats.

“It strikes me that we have no idea whatsoever as to what’s next,” said Dan Fried, a retired career diplomat, former assistant secretary of state and sanctions coordinator who served under both Democratic and Republican administrations.

“For good operational reasons, there were very few people who knew about the raid, but Trump’s remarks about running the country and Rubio’s uncomfortable walk back suggests that even within that small group of people, there is disagreement about how to proceed,” said Fried who is now with the Atlantic Council think tank.

Supporters of the operation, meanwhile, believe there is little confusion over the U.S. goal.

“The president speaks in big headlines and euphemisms,” said Rich Goldberg, a sanctions proponent who worked in the National Energy Dominance Council at the White House until last year and is now a senior adviser to the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a hawkish think tank.

Goldberg does not see Rubio becoming “the superintendent of schools” but “effectively, the U.S. will be calling the shots.”

“There are people at the top who can make what we want happen or not, and we right now control their purse strings and their lives,” he said. “The president thinks it’s enough and the secretary thinks it’s enough, and if it’s not enough, we’ll know very soon and we’ll deal with it.”

If planning for the U.S. “to run” Venezuela existed prior to Maduro’s arrest and extradition to face federal drug charges, it was confined to a small group of Trump political allies, according to current U.S. officials, who note that Trump relies on a very small circle of advisers and has tossed aside much of the traditional decision-making apparatus.

These officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss their understanding of internal deliberations, said they were not aware of any preparations for either a military occupation or an interim civilian governing authority, which has been a priority for previous administrations when they contemplated going to war to oust a specific leader or government. The White House and the State Department’s press office did not return messages seeking comment.

Long discussion among agencies in previous interventions

Previous military actions that deposed autocratic leaders, notably in Panama in 1989 and Iraq in 2003, were preceded by months, if not years, of interagency discussion and debate over how best to deal with power vacuums caused by the ousters of their leaders. The State Department, White House National Security Council, the Pentagon and the intelligence community all participated in that planning.

In Panama, the George H.W. Bush administration had nearly a full year of preparations to launch the invasion that ousted Panama’s leader Manuel Noriega. Panama, however, is exponentially smaller than Venezuela, it had long experience as a de facto American territory, and the U.S. occupation was never intended to retake territory or natural resources.

By contrast, Venezuela is vastly larger in size and population and has a decadeslong history of animosity toward the United States.

“Panama was not successful because it was supported internationally because it wasn’t,” Fried said. “It was a success because it led to a quick, smooth transfer to a democratic government. That would be a success here, but on the first day out, we trashed someone who had those credentials, and that strikes me as daft.”

He was referring to Trump’s apparent dismissal of opposition leader Maria Corina Machado, whose party is widely believed to have won elections in 2024, results that Maduro refused to accept. Trump said Saturday that Machado “doesn’t have the support within or the respect within the country” to be a credible leader and suggested he would be OK with Maduro’s No. 2, Delcy Rodríguez, remaining in power as long as she works with the U.S.

Hoped-for outcomes didn’t happen in Iraq and Afghanistan

Meanwhile, best-case scenarios like those predicted by the George W. Bush administration for a post-Saddam Hussein Iraq that it would be a beacon of democracy in the Middle East and hopes for a democratic and stable Afghanistan following the ouster of the Taliban died painfully slow deaths at the tremendous expense of American money and lives after initial euphoria over military victories.

“Venezuela looks nothing like Libya, it looks nothing like Iraq, it looks nothing like Afghanistan. It looks nothing like the Middle East,” Rubio said this weekend of Venezuela and its neighbors. “These are Western countries with long traditions at a people-to-people and cultural level, and ties to the United States, so it’s nothing like that.”

The lack of clarity on Venezuela has been even more pronounced because Trump campaigned on a platform of extricating the U.S. from foreign wars and entanglements, a position backed by his “Make America Great Again” supporters, many of whom are seeking explanations about what the president has in mind for Venezuela.

“Wake up MAGA,” Republican Rep. Thomas Massie of Kentucky, who has bucked much of his party’s lockstep agreement with Trump, posted on X after the operation. “VENEZUELA is not about drugs; it’s about OIL and REGIME CHANGE. This is not what we voted for.”

Sen. Rand Paul, also a Kentucky Republican, who often criticizes military interventions, said “time will tell if regime change in Venezuela is successful without significant monetary or human cost.”

“Easy enough to argue such policy when the action is short, swift and effective but glaringly less so when that unitary power drains of us trillions of dollars and thousands of lives, such as occurred in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Vietnam,” he wrote on social media.

In addition to the Venezuela operation, Trump is preparing to take the helm of an as-yet unformed Board of Peace to run postwar Gaza, involving the United States in yet another Mideast engagement for possibly decades to come.

And yet, as both the Iraq and Afghanistan experiences ultimately proved, no amount of planning guarantees success.

Lee writes for the Associated Press.

Jan. 4 (UPI) — A far-left activist group sent police a letter taking credit for setting fire to part of a power plant near Berlin, leaving nearly 50,000 customers in the dark, as a protest against the fossil fuel industry.

The German activist group Vulkangruppe, or Volcano Group, acknowledged in a 2,500-word letter that it set a fire on Saturday near the Lichterfelde heat and power station, damaging high-voltage cables to “cut the juice to the ruling class,” The Guardian reported.

On Sunday morning, Stromnetz Berlin, the power company that owns the station, reported that roughly 45,000 homes and 2,200 businesses had lost power in the outage, Deutche Welle reported.

The power company said that while some connections have been turned back on in small waves, some customers may not have their electricity until as late as Thursday afternoon.

Some schools may also be closed for the part of the week because they do not have power, The BBC reported.

“We are expecting damage costing millions to plants and machines and owing to high losses in revenue,” Alexander Schirp, director of the regional business associations in Berlin and Brandenburg, said of the arson.

“This is a serious problem and stokes a feeling of insecurity in the business world,” he added.

Early Saturday, cables near the power plant were spotted burning and incendiary devices were later found to have caused the inferno.

In the aftermath, several hospitals and health care facilities received emergency generators, but many people had to be moved from either facilities or their own homes because there was no power.

Vulkangruppe said in the letter, which police have said is credible, that they set the fire in an “act of self-defense and international solidarity with all those who protect the Earth and life.”

The group condemned “greed for energy” by burning fossil fuels for the ever-growing electricity needs of humanity, and specifically called out the massive, and exponentially growing, use of electric for artificial intelligence computing.

“We are contributing to our own surveillance and it is comprehensive. The tech corporations are in the hands of me with power, which we give them,” the group wrote, calling the fire an “action in the public interest.”

Vulkangruppe previously took credit for a fire that was set at Tesla’s Gigafactory in Berlin in March 2024.

That arson included deliberately setting fire to a high-voltage electric pole, which damaged the electric line and cut power to the surrounding area, including the plant, officials said at the time.

Caracas, January 3, 2026 (venezuelanalysis.com) – US President Donald Trump has claimed that US Special Forces have captured Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro during a miltary operation against Venezuela in the early hours of Saturday.

In a social media message, Trump stated that the US had “successfully carried out a large scale strike against Venezuela” and that Maduro and first lady Cilia Flores had been “captured and flown out of the country.”

Venezuelan Vice President Delcy Rodríguez confirmed that Maduro and Flores’ whereabouts are unknown and demanded that the Trump administration provide proof of life.

US attacks began around 2 am local time, with loud explosions felt in the capital and nearby states.

Multiple military sites, including Fuerte Tiuna in Caracas, were reportedly bombed. Social media users reported low flying aircraft and active air defenses. The port in La Guaira was likewise among infrastructures hit.

Videos on social media also showed helicopters flying over the Venezuelan capital, with military analysts claiming that US Special Forces were deployed.

In a statement published on state outlets, the Venezuelan government accused the United States of carrying out a military attack against Venezuelan territory, describing it as a violation of the UN Charter and a threat to regional peace.

Authorities announced the activation of national defense plans, the deployment of the armed forces, and the declaration of a state of “External Commotion” nationwide. The Maduro government also called for popular mobilization and said it would raise formal complaints before international bodies, including the United Nations.

Venezuelan Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino Lopez issued a statement confirming US bombings in Caracas and surrounding areas.

Padrino reported that Venezuelan authorities are assessing damages and casualties from the attacks, claiming that US helicopters fired missiles on residential areas. The armed forces chief urged the international community to condemn Washington’s “criminal aggression.”

The Trump administration has escalated regime-change threats against Caracas im recent months and vowed to strike land targets.

[Story in development]

Russia has accused Ukraine of killing at least 24 people, including a child, in a drone attack on a hotel and cafe where New Year celebrations were taking place in a Russian-controlled part of Ukraine’s southern Kherson region.

Vladimir Saldo, the Russian-installed governor of the region, first made the claim in a statement on Telegram before Russia’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and senior politicians later accused ⁠Ukraine of carrying out “a terrorist attack”.

Saldo also published photos of what he wrote was the aftermath of the attack, which Al Jazeera has not been able to verify.

At least one person’s body was visible in the images beneath a white sheet.

The building showed signs that a fierce fire had raged, and there were what appeared to be bloodstains on the ground.

In the statement, ​Saldo said three Ukrainian drones had struck the site of New Year ‌celebrations in Khorly, a coastal village, in what he said was a “deliberate strike” against civilians. He said many people were burned alive.

Russia’s Foreign Ministry said initial information indicated that 24 people had been killed, and that 50 people had been injured.

“There is ‌no doubt that the attack was planned in advance, with ⁠drones deliberately targeting areas where civilians had gathered to celebrate New Year’s Eve,” the ministry said in a statement, calling the attack “a war crime”.

Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said in a statement on Telegram that ‌Ukraine’s backers in the West were ultimately to blame.

Senior politicians, including the speakers of both houses of Russia’s parliament, condemned Kyiv.

Kherson is one of the four regions in Ukraine ‍that Russia claimed as its own in 2022, a move Kyiv and most Western countries denounced as an illegal land grab.

Ukraine’s ‍military ‍did not comment on Moscow’s claim, but it said it had hit Russia’s Ilsky ⁠oil refinery in ​the Krasnodar region overnight, ‍adding that the results of the attack ‍were still ⁠being confirmed.

In a statement on Telegram, the military also said it hit the ​Almetyevsk ‌oil facility in Russia’s Tatarstan region.

The Almetyevsk facility is ‌more than 965km (600 ‌miles) from ⁠the nearest part of Ukraine, and even further ‌from the nearest territory currently controlled by ‍Kyiv.

Russia releases video of ‘attack’ on Putin’s residence

On Tuesday, Moscow claimed that Ukraine launched a long-range drone attack against one of President Vladimir Putin’s official residences in northwestern Russia, which Kyiv has denounced as a “lie”.

Russia’s Defence Ministry released a video on Wednesday of a downed drone it said was involved in the attack.

The night-time clip showed a man in camouflage, a helmet and a Kevlar vest standing near a damaged drone lying in snow.

The man, with his face covered, talks about the drone. Neither the man nor the Defence Ministry provided any location or date.

The video and claims could not be independently verified.

Peace talks

Kyiv has called the allegations of an attack on Putin’s residence a ruse to derail ongoing peace negotiations, which have ramped up in recent weeks on both sides of the Atlantic.

In his New Year’s address, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said a peace deal was “90 percent ready” but warned that the remaining 10 percent, believed to include key sticking points such as territory, would “determine the fate of peace, the fate of Ukraine and Europe, how people will live”.

Trump’s special envoy Steve Witkoff said on Wednesday that he, Secretary of State Marco Rubio and Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner had had a “productive call” with the national security advisers of the United Kingdom, France, Germany and Ukraine to discuss the “European peace process”.

“We focused on how to move the discussions forward in a practical way on behalf of [Trump’s] peace process, including strengthening security guarantees and developing effective deconfliction mechanisms to help end the war and ensure it does not restart,” Witkoff said in a post on X.

Lead Ukrainian negotiator Rustem Umerov also reaffirmed that European and Ukrainian officials plan to meet on Saturday, while Zelenskyy is due to hold talks next week with European leaders.

Russia’s attacks on Ukraine

Elsewhere in Ukraine, Russia attacked the Odesa region overnight, targeting civilian infrastructure in several waves of drone attacks, according to regional head Oleh Kiper.

In a post on Telegram, Kiper said a two-storey residential building was damaged and that a drone hit an apartment on the 17th floor of a high-rise building without detonating. No casualties were reported.

In its daily report, the air force said air defence forces had downed or suppressed 176 of 205 drones targeting Ukraine overnight.

It said 24 drone hits were recorded at 15 locations, and the attack was ongoing.

Dec. 31 (UPI) — The nation’s new jobless claims exceeded expectations with fewer than 200,000 reported for the week ending on Saturday, marking the third straight week that new jobless claims fell.

The number of new jobless claims fell by about 16,000 and posted a seasonally adjusted 199,000, the Labor Department announced on Wednesday.

The term “seasonally adjusted” refers to a statistical method in which seasonal effects, such as weather and holidays, are factored to better show the direction in which the nation’s job market is moving.

Last week’s decline was the third straight week and the seventh of the past eight in which seasonally adjusted new jobless claims declined across the country, MarketWatch reported.

Economists responding to a Wall Street Journal poll had estimated 220,000 new jobless claims for the week.

The prior week’s new jobless claims were revised up by 1,000, from an initial estimated of 214,000 to the adjusted total of 215,000.

The Labor Department reported 269,953 unadjusted new jobless claims last week, which was up by 5,333 and 25 from the prior week ending on Dec. 20. Economists had predicted an increase of 26,612 for a 10.1% increase last week.

The unadjusted new jobless claims for last week were down from 283,488 during the same period in 2024.

Meanwhile, the number of people with previously established unemployment claims fell by 47,000 to 1.87 million for the week that ended on Dec. 20.

The number of continuing claims had risen since the pandemic due to a slowdown in hiring, but they have not grown in number in recent months, according to MarketWatch.

While new and existing jobless claims are down, some economists cautioned that the slow hiring pace since the summer might herald an economic slowdown.

The nation’s total unemployment rate rose to 4.6% in November, which was its highest rate since September 2021.

The states with the five highest unemployment rates for the week ending on Dec. 13 were Washington state at 2.5%, followed by New Jersey, 2.4%; Massachusetts and Minnesota, 2.2%, each; and California, Illinois and Rhode Island at 2.1%, each.

Dec. 30 (Asia Today) — President Lee Jae-myung on Tuesday ordered prosecutors and police to investigate allegations that the Unification Church lobbied politicians, directing authorities to begin work even as political parties debate appointing a special prosecutor.

Speaking at a Cabinet meeting at the presidential office, Lee said investigators should coordinate in advance on how the case would be handled if it is later transferred to a special prosecutor.

“Even if it becomes a special prosecutor case during the investigation and is handed over then, it would be better for the prosecution and the Ministry of the Interior and Safety to consult beforehand and decide who will handle it or if they will work together, and form a team,” Lee said. “It doesn’t seem like something we should just wait around for.”

Lee said religious interference in politics, bribery and collusion are serious matters that threaten democracy and the country’s future.

Prime Minister Kim Min-seok also called for a strong response, saying he believes instability in state affairs has been fueled by what he described as “shamanistic politics” and church-state collusion.

Kim said it was timely that discussions are emerging about appointing a special prosecutor to investigate the Unification Church and potentially expanding the scope to include Shincheonji, while warning the process could be derailed by political disputes.

He suggested the government should prepare for the possibility the political process fails to produce an agreement and said authorities could consider setting up a government-level special investigation headquarters.

– Reported by Asia Today; translated by UPI

© Asia Today. Unauthorized reproduction or redistribution prohibited.

Belarus has announced the deployment on its territory of Russia’s still-shadowy Oreshnik intermediate-range ballistic missile. The development comes soon after the appearance of satellite imagery that suggests that Moscow is likely stationing the nuclear-capable missiles in Belarus. However, there remain questions about the status of the Oreshnik, as well as its overall capabilities.

The Belarusian Ministry of Defense today released a video that it says shows the deployment of the Oreshnik system on its territory. The footage shows a flag-raising ceremony involving Russian troops in Belarus as well as a column of vehicles moving out into a firing position in the field, where they are then covered in camouflage netting.

It’s notable that the vehicles shown appear to all be associated with support roles, rather than being transporter-erector launchers (TEL) for the missile itself. It could be the case that the TELs (and missiles) have yet to arrive in Belarus, or that they were deliberately omitted from the footage. It may also be that the missiles themselves are based elsewhere.

A senior officer is seen telling troops that the systems have officially been placed on combat duty and talks about the missile crews’ regular training and reconnaissance drills.

The location of the missile systems and the date of the video were not disclosed.

The release of the video follows Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko’s announcement earlier this month that the Oreshnik would be deployed in his country, part of his extensive military support for his staunch ally, Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Only last week, evidence emerged pointing to the likely stationing of the Oreshnik at a former airbase near Krichev (also known as Krichev-6) in eastern Belarus, around 190 miles east of the capital of Minsk, and 300 miles southwest of Moscow.

After assessing available satellite imagery, researchers Jeffrey Lewis of the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, in California, and Decker Eveleth of the CNA research and analysis organization in Virginia, said they were “90 percent certain” that mobile Oreshnik launchers would be stationed there, if they weren’t already.

Lewis and Eveleth highlighted a hurried construction project that began at the site between August 4-12, which was consistent with a Russian strategic missile base. By November of this year, key evidence included a “military-grade rail transfer point” surrounded by a security fence, from where TELs and other components could be unloaded. There were also signs of a concrete pad being constructed at the end of the former runway, “consistent with a camouflaged launch point.”

According to Lewis and Eveleth, the site near Krichev is large enough to accommodate three launchers. Previously, Lukashenko said up to 10 Oreshniks would be based in Belarus, suggesting that more might yet be fielded at other locations.

The researchers’ assessment “broadly aligns with U.S. intelligence findings,” Reuters reported, citing a person familiar with the matter who spoke to the news agency on the condition of anonymity.

After a December 2024 meeting with Lukashenko, Putin had made clear his plan to station Oreshnik missiles in Belarus, but the exact location had not previously been reported. The Russian leader had said the deployment would occur in the second half of 2025.

As for the Oreshnik (Russian for hazel tree) system itself, U.S. officials have said this is an intermediate-range design derived from the RS-26 Rubezh intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM). The new missile first emerged in public after it was used in an unprecedented attack on Ukraine in November 2024. Ukrainian authorities said that the missile that was fired at them carried six warheads, each containing six more sub-payloads, but that these contained no explosives.

Ok, two reasons why I think Russia probably used a variant of the long-gestating RS-26 Rubezh IRBM: (1) Russia hinted that it resumed development of the RS-26 this summer and (2) that’s what the Ukrainians predicated a day ago, down to the launch site. https://t.co/eUIPx7eqVt

— Dr. Jeffrey Lewis (@ArmsControlWonk) November 21, 2024

Otherwise, details about the Oreshnik remain limited. After its use against Ukraine, Putin described it as a “medium-range missile system” and “a ballistic missile equipped with non-nuclear hypersonic technology” capable of reaching a peak speed of Mach 10. “The kinetic impact is powerful, like a meteorite falling,” the Russian president also said.

Overall, Russian claims of hypersonic performance for the Oreshnik are questionable. There is no evidence of true hypersonic boost-glide vehicles, for example, but larger ballistic missiles, even ones with traditional designs, do reach hypersonic speeds, typically defined as anything above Mach 5, in the terminal stage of their flight.

The Ukrainian Air Force confirmed that Russia struck the Ukrainian city of Dnipro with a conventionally armed ICBM this morning, marking the first combat use of an ICBM in history.

Footage from Dnipro showed glowing reentry vehicles hitting the ground around 5 AM local time. pic.twitter.com/PWTGajH9bT

— OSINTtechnical (@Osinttechnical) November 21, 2024

Western estimates suggest the missile has a range of up to 3,400 miles.

While positioning the Oreshnik marginally farther west does extend its reach further into Europe, the difference is less significant, bearing in mind its already considerable maximum range is enough to hit every NATO capital city in Europe from within Russian territory. With that in mind, stationing these missiles in Belarus does little to practically enhance Moscow’s ability to deliver these kinds of weapons across Europe.

In fact, the missile’s likely minimum range, forward deploying the Oreshnik to Belarus might actually limit the ability to employ it against certain targets, such as those in Ukraine. For example, Ukraine’s capital Kyiv lies less than 60 miles from the border with Belarus.

Another option might be to use a very high lofted trajectory that would allow the missile to hit targets at shorter ranges, but there would still be a limit to what could be achieved in this way. At the same time, we don’t know for sure what kinds of trajectories the Oreshnik can actually be fired on.

Regardless, the deployment does carry important political and strategic signals. It means that Belarusian and Russian affairs are even more deeply intertwined, with the former firmly and openly under the protection of the latter’s nuclear deterrent umbrella. Russia had already begun deploying nuclear weapons on Belarusian territory in cooperation with that country’s armed forces in 2023.

Russia really wants West to see they’re doing a tac nuke exercise. After several exercise videos they put the head of the 12 GUMO in front of a Belarusian Su-25 (possibly at Lida air base) loaded with what is said to be “training nuclear ammunition.” https://t.co/h9rHp2qvGv pic.twitter.com/sTzAqSNd9f

— Hans Kristensen (also on Bluesky) (@nukestrat) June 13, 2024

Placing these missiles (and air-dropped nuclear bombs) in Belarus is indicative of the Kremlin’s new nuclear strategy, which includes basing these kinds of weapons outside its territory for the first time since the Cold War.

The apparent deployment also comes only weeks before the expiration of the 2010 New START pact, the last U.S.-Russia treaty that puts limits on the deployments of strategic nuclear weapons by these two powers.

For NATO, it’s very much arguable whether Russia’s placing of the Oreshnik in neighboring Belarus, rather than on Russian territory, will really be seen as a more direct threat.

“The military implications of this missile being in Belarus are not all that different from the missile being in Russia — the technical support site is already very close to the Russian border,” Eveleth wrote on X last week.

For Belarus, the situation is different. For a country in the international wilderness, the deployment does underscore Russia’s guarantee of providing Belarus with (nuclear) protection.

Russia’s revised nuclear stance also relies increasingly on these kinds of weapons to deter NATO members from supplying Kyiv with weapons that can strike deep inside Russia, although it’s questionable whether placing the Oreshnik in Belarus will have a significant, if any, effect in this regard.

More generally, the deployment of the Oreshnik has to be seen as part of Moscow’s response to U.S. plans to send its own intermediate-range strike capabilities to Germany, and potentially elsewhere in Europe, in the coming years. This includes planned “episodic deployments” of the U.S. Army’s Typhon ground-based missile system, which can fire Tomahawk cruise missiles and multi-purpose SM-6 missiles, as well as that service’s still-in-development Dark Eagle hypersonic missile. The U.S. Navy has also demonstrated its ability to deploy containerized launchers related to Typhon, which can be employed in a ground-based mode and also fire Tomahawks and SM-6s, to sites in Europe.

While these U.S. long-range strike systems are all conventionally armed, it’s worth recalling that the Oreshnik, too, can be utilized in a non-nuclear version, as demonstrated in Ukraine. The missile, therefore, presents a longer-range strategic-level threat that can be employed without crossing the nuclear threshold.

The potential value of a conventionally armed intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM), which some countries may be looking at fielding if they haven’t already, is something that we discussed in detail in this previous story.

Provided that the Oreshnik is indeed now deployed on Belarusian territory, we still don’t know how many missiles might be involved, or what kinds of warheads they might carry. While we may learn more in due course, for now, the missile’s greatest significance is in the political domain.

Contact the author: thomas@thewarzone.com

Russia has threatened to retaliate against Ukraine after alleging that nearly 100 drones had targeted one of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s residences.

The threat on Monday was made as United States President Donald Trump tries to broker a peace agreement to end the war in Ukraine, which will enter its fifth year in February.

What has Russia claimed?

On Monday, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov alleged that Ukraine had launched the attack on the Valdai residence, one of Putin’s residences in the Novgorod region in northwestern Russia. The property is 360km (225 miles) north of Moscow.

Lavrov told reporters that Ukraine had launched 91 drones towards the residence. He added that air defence systems shot down the drones and no one was injured.

The Russian Ministry of Defence said 49 of the drones were shot down over the Bryansk region, one was shot down over the Smolensk region and 41 were shot down over the Novgorod region while en route.

“Such reckless actions will not go unanswered,” Lavrov said. “The targets for retaliatory strikes and the timing of their implementation by the Russian armed forces have been determined.”

Russian officials accused Ukraine and its president, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, of carrying out the strike to derail the prospects of a peace agreement.

In an apparent reference to Zelenskyy, Russian Security Council Deputy Chairman Dmitry Medvedev wrote on X: “The stinking Kiev b**tard is trying to derail the settlement of the conflict. He wants war. Well, now at least he’ll have to stay in hiding for the rest of his worthless life.”

Kremlin foreign policy aide Yury Ushakov said the strike took place on Sunday “practically immediately after” talks were held in Florida between Trump and Zelenskyy on ending Russia’s war on Ukraine.

After that meeting, Trump and Zelenskyy had voiced optimism, saying a peace deal between Russia and Ukraine was “close”.

Putin has not publicly commented on the attack yet. It is unclear where Putin was at the time of the attack, but he was holding meetings in the Kremlin on Saturday and Monday.

How has Ukraine responded?

Zelenskyy has strongly denied Russia’s allegation that Ukraine attacked one of Putin’s residences.

“Russia is at it again, using dangerous statements to undermine all achievements of our shared diplomatic efforts with President Trump’s team,” Zelenskyy wrote in an X post on Monday.

“This alleged ‘residence strike’ story is a complete fabrication intended to justify additional attacks against Ukraine, including Kyiv, as well as Russia’s own refusal to take necessary steps to end the war.”

Ukrainian Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha also condemned Moscow’s claims, saying they were designed to undermine the negotiations.

In a post on X, Sybiha said the claim was intended “to create a pretext and false justification for Russia’s further attacks against Ukraine, as well as to undermine and impede the peace process”.

In another post on Tuesday, Sybiha wrote: “Almost a day passed and Russia still hasn’t provided any plausible evidence to its accusations of Ukraine’s alleged ‘attack on Putin’s residence.’ And they won’t. Because there’s none. No such attack happened.”

How has Trump reacted?

Trump appeared to accept the Russian version of events on Monday when he told reporters: “It’s one thing to be offensive. It’s another thing to attack his house. It’s not the right time to do any of that. And I learned about it from President Putin today. I was very angry about it.”

But when reporters asked Trump if US intelligence agencies had evidence of the alleged attack, Trump said: “We’ll find out.”

Congressman Don Bacon, a member of Trump’s Republican Party, criticised the president for accepting the Russian account of events without assessing the facts.

“President Trump and his team should get the facts first before assuming blame. Putin is a well known boldface liar,” Bacon wrote in an X post.

How have other world leaders reacted?

Like Trump, other leaders appeared to accept the Russian allegations.

In a statement released on Monday, the United Arab Emirates Ministry of Foreign Affairs wrote: “The United Arab Emirates has strongly condemned the attempt to target the residence of His Excellency Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation, and denounced this deplorable attack and the threat it poses to security and stability.”

Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi wrote in an X post on Tuesday: “Deeply concerned by reports of the targeting of the residence of the President of the Russian Federation.”

Modi added that the ongoing diplomatic engagement being led by the US is the “most viable path” towards achieving peace. “We urge all concerned to remain focused on these efforts and to avoid any actions that could undermine them.”

Pakistani Prime Minister Shehbaz Sharif also condemned the alleged attack.

“Pakistan condemns the reported targeting of the residence of His Excellency Vladimir Putin, President of the Russian Federation. Such a heinous act constitutes a grave threat to peace, security, and stability, particularly at a time when efforts aimed at peace are underway,” Sharif wrote on X.

“Pakistan expresses its solidarity with the President of the Russian Federation, and with the government and people of Russia.”

Have Putin’s residences previously been attacked?

Russia has made previous claims of Ukrainian attacks on Putin’s residences, including on the Kremlin, Putin’s official residence and main workplace.

In May 2023, Moscow alleged that Ukraine had deployed two drones to attack Putin’s residence in the Kremlin citadel but said its forces had disabled the drones. Kyiv denied any involvement.

On December 25, 2024, Russia alleged that it had intercepted and destroyed a Ukrainian drone also targeting the Kremlin. Kyiv again denied responsibility.

Conversely, Ukraine has alleged that Russia has attacked Kyiv and other government buildings in Ukraine.

In September, the Ukrainian military said a Russian drone attack damaged a government building in Kyiv that is home to Ukraine’s cabinet. Plumes of smoke were seen emerging from the building. Russia said it had targeted Ukrainian military infrastructure only.

What has Russia now threatened to do?

While Russia has not outright threatened to end the peace talks, Moscow said it would realign its position in the talks.

“The diplomatic consequence will be to toughen the negotiating position of the Russian Federation,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters on Tuesday.

Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs spokesperson Maria Zakharova warned that Moscow’s response “would not be diplomatic”. Indeed, it has warned that it plans to hit back militarily but has given no details of how or when it might do this.

Will this derail the US-led peace talks?

Speaking to reporters after his “terrific” meeting with Zelenskyy on Sunday at his Mar-a-Lago residence in Palm Beach, Florida, Trump told reporters that Moscow and Kyiv were “closer than ever” to a peace deal.

But Trump has made this claim several times before. In April, Trump said Russia and Ukraine were “very close to a deal” after Trump’s envoy Steve Witkoff met with Putin in Moscow.

On December 15, Trump also said Russia and Ukraine were “closer than ever” to a deal after talks in Berlin involving Zelenskyy and the leaders of France, Germany, the United Kingdom and NATO.

However, observers and analysts said the issue of territorial concessions remains a major sticking point. Trump’s 28-point peace plan for Ukraine, which he unveiled in November, involved Ukraine ceding large amounts of land that Russia has occupied during nearly four years of war. Zelenskyy has stated on numerous occasions that this is a line Ukraine will not cross.

Most analysts are sceptical that any progress has been made on this point and said the latest accusations against Ukraine will probably have little effect. “I don’t think there is anything to derail at this point,” said Marina Miron, an analyst at King’s College London.

The peace process “is not going well due to disagreements on key issues between Ukraine and Russia”, she told Al Jazeera.

“Trump has repeatedly claimed that a peace deal is close without sustainable agreement,” Keir Giles, a Russian military expert at the London think tank Chatham House, told Al Jazeera this month.

Russia has occupied nearly 20 percent of eastern Ukraine and has been slowly gaining territory as Ukraine’s military has been weakened by desertions, casualties and dwindling military aid. Moscow annexed Ukraine’s Crimean Peninsula in 2014.

“It’s probably impossible that Ukrainians will voluntarily withdraw from these territories unless we will also see a withdrawal of Russian forces on the other side,” Nathalie Tocci, director at the Rome-based think tank Istituto Affari Internazionali (Institute of International Affairs), told Al Jazeera.

Giles said there are still parallel negotiation tracks, however – one involving the US and Ukraine and another between Ukraine and European nations. He added, however, that there is no clear evidence that these efforts are fully coordinated or aligned in terms of strategy.

The passenger said she was flung out of her seat when the plane suddenly dropped – Ryanair has stated the plane was forced to make a U-turn due to air turbulence

A passenger aboard the Ryanair flight forced to return to the United Kingdom after a mid-flight emergency has said the experience ‘felt like something out of a horror movie’.

The Boeing 737 MAX, which departed from Birmingham Airport at about 2.50pm on Sunday, December 28, issued a 7700 squawk over Brittany, France, after reaching an altitude of 35,000ft. This code signifies a general emergency.

The Boeing was bound for Tenerife but was forced to return to the UK mid-flight.

“It felt like something you see on a horror movie,” said a 33-year-old passenger from Lichfield, who did not wish to be named.

“We were smooth cruising then out of nowhere all of a sudden the plane jerked to the left extremely quickly and then to the right, it felt like a loss of control, and then we plummeted down and we were flung out of our seats,” the passenger said.

Passengers informed The Aviation Herald that flight FR1121 experienced turbulence, resulting in injuries to several individuals while cabin service was underway. The flight then made a U-turn and descended to FL100 (flying at 10,000ft).

The aircraft safely touched down back at Birmingham around one hour and 32 minutes after take-off. According to AirLive, it was parked on a remote stand at the airport for paramedics to attend to passengers. The severity of the passengers’ injuries is yet to be determined.

“I came out physically unharmed but the mental toll this has taken it awful… this has really traumatised me,” the woman said.

“The cabin crew said within their 10 years as cabin crew they’ve never experienced anything like it.”

She said other passengers claimed to see a fighter jet pass the Boeing before the incident, but this has not been confirmed.

Ryanair said in a statement: “”FR1121 from Birmingham to Tenerife on 28th December returned to Birmingham Airport shortly after take-off due to air turbulence.

“The aircraft landed normally before passengers disembarked and returned to the terminal, where a small number of passengers were provided with medical assistance. This flight continued to Tenerife at 21:06 local.”

The Mirror has reached out to the airline for further comment.

WASHINGTON — Tips provided to federal investigators about Donald Trump’s alleged involvement in Jeffrey Epstein’s schemes with young women and girls are “sensationalist” and “untrue,” the Justice Department said on Tuesday, after a new tranche of files released from the probe featured multiple references to the president.

The documents include a limousine driver reportedly overhearing Trump discussing a man named Jeffrey “abusing” a girl, and an alleged victim accusing Trump and Epstein of rape. It is unclear whether the FBI followed up on the tips. The alleged rape victim died from a gunshot wound to the head after reporting the incident.

Nowhere in the newly released files do federal law enforcement agents or prosecutors indicate that Trump was suspected of wrongdoing, or that Trump — whose friendship with Epstein lasted through the mid-2000s — was investigated himself.

But one unidentified federal prosecutor noted in a 2020 email that Trump had flown on Epstein’s private jet “many more times than previously has been reported,” including over a time period when Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s top confidante who would ultimately be convicted on five federal counts of sex trafficking and abuse, was being investigated for criminal activity.

The Justice Department released an unusual statement unequivocally defending the president.

“Some of these documents contain untrue and sensationalist claims made against President Trump that were submitted to the FBI right before the 2020 election,” the Justice Department statement read. “To be clear: the claims are unfounded and false, and if they had a shred of credibility, they certainly would have been weaponized against President Trump already.”

“Nevertheless, out of our commitment to the law and transparency, the DOJ is releasing these documents with the legally required protections for Epstein’s victims,” the department added.

The Justice Department files were released with heavy redactions after bipartisan lawmakers in Congress passed a new law compelling it to do so, despite Trump lobbying Republicans aggressively over the summer and fall to oppose the bill. The president ultimately signed the Epstein Files Transparency Act into law after the legislation passed with veto-proof majorities in both chambers.

One newly released file containing a letter purportedly from Epstein — a notorious child sex offender who died in jail while awaiting federal trial on sex-trafficking charges — drew widespread attention online, but was held up by the Justice Department as an example of faulty or misleading information contained in the files.

The letter appeared to be sent by Epstein to Larry Nassar, another convicted sex offender, shortly before Epstein’s death. The letter’s author suggested that Nassar would learn after receiving the note that Epstein had “taken the ‘short route’ home,” possibly referring to his suicide. It was postmarked from Virginia on Aug. 13, 2019, despite Epstein’s death in a Manhattan jail three days prior.

“Our president shares our love of young, nubile girls,” the letter reads. “When a young beauty walked by he loved to ‘grab snatch,’ whereas we ended up snatching grub in the mess halls of the system. Life is unfair.”

The Justice Department said that the FBI had confirmed that the letter is “FAKE” after it made the rounds on Tuesday.

“This fake letter serves as a reminder that just because a document is released by the Department of Justice does not make the allegations or claims within the document factual,” the department posted on social media. “Nevertheless, the DOJ will continue to release all material required by law.”

The department has faced bipartisan scrutiny since failing to release all of the Epstein files in its possession by Dec. 19, the legal deadline for it to do so, and for redacting material on the vast majority of the documents.

Justice Department officials said they were following the law by protecting victims with the redactions. The Epstein Files Transparency Act also directs the department not to redact images or references to prominent or political figures, and to provide an explanation for each and every redaction in writing.

The latest release, just days before the Christmas holiday, includes roughly 30,000 documents, the department said. Hundreds of thousands more are expected to be released in the coming weeks.

Democrats on the House Oversight Committee released a statement in response to the Tuesday release accusing the Justice Department of a “cover-up,” writing on social media, “the new DOJ documents raise serious questions about the relationship between Epstein and Donald Trump.”

Documents from Epstein’s private estate released by the oversight committee earlier this fall had already cast a spotlight on that relationship, revealing Epstein had written in emails to associates that Trump “knew about the girls.”

The latest documents release also includes an email from an individual identified as “A,” claiming to stay at Balmoral Castle, a royal residence in Scotland, asking Maxwell if she had found him “some new inappropriate friends.” Andrew Mountbatten-Windsor, formerly known as Prince Andrew, has come under intense scrutiny over his ties to Epstein in recent years.

Speaking at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida on Monday, Trump said the continuing Epstein scandal amounts to a “distraction” from Republican successes, and expressed disapproval over the release of images in the files that reveal associates of Epstein.

“I believe they gave over 100,000 pages of documents, and there’s tremendous backlash,” Trump told reporters. “It’s an interesting question, because a lot of people are very angry that pictures are being released of other people that really had nothing to do with Epstein. But they’re in a picture with him because he was at a party, and you ruin a reputation of somebody. So a lot of people are very angry that this continues.”

ALLENTOWN, Pa. — When Idalia Bisbal moved to this Pennsylvania city synonymous with America’s working class, she hoped for a cheaper, easier life than the one she was leaving behind in her hometown of New York City.

About three years later, she is deeply disappointed.

“It’s worse than ever,” said the 67-year-old retiree, who relies on Social Security, when asked about the economy. “The prices are high. Everything is going up. You can’t afford food because you can’t afford rent. Utilities are too high. Gas is too expensive. Everything is too expensive.”

Bisbal was sipping an afternoon coffee at the Hamilton Family Restaurant not long after Vice President JD Vance rallied Republicans in a nearby suburb. In the Trump administration’s second high-profile trip to Pennsylvania in a week, Vance acknowledged the affordability crisis, blamed it on the Biden administration and insisted better times were ahead. He later served food to men experiencing homelessness in Allentown.

The visit, on top of several recent speeches from President Trump, reflects an increasingly urgent White House effort to respond to the economic anxiety voiced by people across the country. Those worries are a vulnerability for Republicans in competitive congressional districts like the one that includes Allentown, which could decide control of the U.S. House in next year’s midterms.

But in confronting the challenge, there are risks of appearing out of touch.

Only 31% of U.S. adults now approve of how Trump is handling the economy, down from 40% in March, according to a poll from the Associated Press-NORC Center for Public Affairs Research. Yet Trump has called affordability concerns a “hoax” and gave the economy under his administration a grade of “A+++++.” Vance reiterated that assessment during his rally, prompting Bisbal to scoff.

“In his world,” Bisbal, a self-described “straight-up Democrat,” responded. “In the rich man’s world. In our world, trust me, it’s not an ‘A.’ To me, it’s an ‘F,’ ‘F,’ ‘F,’ ‘F,’ ‘F,’ ‘F.’”

Agreement that prices are too high

With a population of roughly 125,000 people, Allentown anchors the Lehigh Valley, which is Pennsylvania’s third-largest metro area. In a dozen interviews last week with local officials, business leaders and residents of both parties, there was agreement on one thing: Prices are too high. Some pointed to gas prices while others said they felt the shock more at the grocery store or in their cost of healthcare or housing.

Few shared Trump’s unbridled boosterism about the economy.

Tony Iannelli, the president and CEO of the Greater Lehigh Valley Chamber of Commerce, called Trump’s grade a “stretch,” saying that “we have a strong economy but I think it’s not yet gone to the next stage of what I would call robust.”

Tom Groves, who started a health and benefits consulting firm more than two decades ago, said the economy was at a “B+,” as he blamed the Affordable Care Act, widely known as Obamacare, for contributing to higher health costs, and he noted stock and labor market volatility.

Joe Vichot, the chairman of the Lehigh County Republican Committee, referred to Trump’s grade as a “colloquialism.”

Far removed from Washington’s political theater, there was little consensus on who was responsible for the high prices or what should be done about it. There was, however, an acute sense of exhaustion at the seemingly endless political combat.

Pat Gallagher was finishing lunch a few booths down from Bisbal as she recalled meeting her late husband when they both worked at Bethlehem Steel, the manufacturing giant that closed in 2003.

Now retired, Gallagher too relies on Social Security benefits, and she lives with her daughter, which helps keep costs down. She said she noticed the rising price of groceries and was becoming exasperated with the political climate.

“I get so frustrated with hearing about the politics,” she said.

A front-row seat to politics

That feeling is understandable in a place that often gets a front-row seat to the national debate, whether it wants the view or not. Singer Billy Joel’s 1982 song “Allentown” helped elevate the city into the national consciousness, articulating simultaneous feelings of disillusionment and hope as factories closed.

In the decades since, Pennsylvania has become a must-win state in presidential politics and the backdrop for innumerable visits from candidates and the media. Trump and his Democratic rival in 2024, Kamala Harris, made several campaign swings through Allentown, with the then-vice president visiting the city on the eve of the election.

“Every race here, all the time,” Allentown’s mayor, Democrat Matt Tuerk, recalled of the frenzied race last year.

The pace of those visits — and the attention they garnered — has not faded from many minds. Some businesses and residents declined to talk last week when approached with questions about the economy or politics, recalling blowback from speaking in the past.

But as attention shifts to next year’s midterms, Allentown cannot escape its place as a political battleground.

Trump’s win last year helped lift other Republicans, such U.S. Rep. Ryan Mackenzie, to victory. Mackenzie, who unseated a three-term Democrat, is now one of the most vulnerable Republicans in Congress. To win again, he must turn out the Republicans who voted in 2024 — many of whom were likely more energized by Trump’s candidacy — while appealing to independents.

Mackenzie’s balancing act was on display when he spoke to the party faithful Tuesday, bemoaning the “failures of Bidenomics” before Vance took the stage at the rally. A day later, the congressman was back in Washington, where he joined three other House Republicans to rebel against the party’s leadership and force a vote on extending Obamacare subsidies that expire at the end of the year.

Vichot, the local GOP chairman, called Mackenzie an “underdog” in his reelection bid and said the healthcare move was a signal to voters that he is “compassionate for the people who need those services.”

A swing to Trump in 2024

Lehigh County, home to Allentown and the most populous county in the congressional district, swung toward Trump last year. Harris’ nearly 2.7-percentage-point win in the county was the tightest margin for a Democratic presidential candidate since 2004. But Democrats are feeling confident after a strong performance in this fall’s elections, when they handily won a race for county executive.

Retaking the congressional seat is now a top priority for Democrats. Gov. Josh Shapiro, a Democrat who faces reelection next year and is a potential presidential contender in 2028, endorsed firefighter union head Bob Brooks last week in the May primary.

Democrats are just a few seats shy of regaining the House majority, and the first midterm after a presidential election historically favors the party that’s out of power. If the focus remains on the economy, Democrats are happy.

The Uline supplies distribution factory where Vance spoke, owned by a family that has made large donations to GOP causes, is a few miles from the Mack Trucks facility where staff was cut by about 200 employees this year. The company said that decision was driven in part by tariffs imposed by Trump. Shapiro eagerly pointed that out in responding to Vance’s visit.

But the image of Allentown as a purely manufacturing town is outdated. The downtown core is dotted by row homes, trendy hotels and a modern arena that is home to the Lehigh Valley Phantoms hockey team and hosts concerts by major artists. In recent years, Latinos have become a majority of the city’s population, driven by gains in the Puerto Rican, Mexican and Dominican communities.

“This is a place of rapid change,” said Tuerk, the city’s first Latino mayor. “It’s constantly changing ,and I think over the next three years until that next presidential election, we’re going to see a lot more change. It’s going to be an interesting ride.”

Sloan writes for the Associated Press.

The PM says the part of the plan on south of the Litani River is ‘only days away from completion’.

Lebanon is close to completing the disarmament of Hezbollah in the south of the Litani River before a year-end deadline as part of a ceasefire deal with Israel, according to Prime Minister Nawaf Salam.

Saturday’s statement comes as the country races to fulfil the key demand in the US-backed deal agreed in November last year and ended more than a year of fighting between Israel and Hezbollah.

The agreement requires the disarmament of the Iran-aligned Lebanese armed group, starting in areas south of the river adjacent to Israel.

Lebanese authorities, led by President Joseph Aoun and Salam, tasked the US-backed Lebanese army on August 5 with devising a plan to establish a state monopoly on arms by the end of the year.

“Prime Minister Salam affirmed that the first phase of the weapons consolidation plan related to the area south of the Litani River is only days away from completion,” a statement from his office said.

“The state is ready to move on to the second phase – namely [confiscating weapons] north of the Litani River – based on the plan prepared by the Lebanese army pursuant to a mandate from the government,” Salam added.

Committee meeting

The statement came after Salam held talks with Simon Karam, Lebanon’s top civilian negotiator on a committee overseeing the Hezbollah-Israel truce.

In a meeting on Friday, the committee focused on how to return displaced people to their homes, addressing civilian issues to help prevent renewed war if the year-end deadline to disarm Hezbollah is not met.

The 15th meeting of the committee reflected a longstanding US push to broaden talks between the sides beyond monitoring the 2024 ceasefire.

At Friday’s meeting in the southern Lebanese coastal town of Naqoura, civilian participants discussed steps to support safe returns of residents uprooted by the 2023-24 war and advance economic reconstruction, the US Embassy in Beirut said.

Since the ceasefire, Israeli warplanes have repeatedly targeted parts of Lebanon, mostly southern Lebanon, but sometimes even the capital.

Israel says it is questioning the Lebanese army’s efforts to disarm Hezbollah.

Hezbollah, a Shia Muslim armed group, has tried to resist the pressure – from its mainly Christian and Sunni Muslim opponents in Lebanon as well as from the US and Saudi Arabia – to disarm, saying it would be a mistake while Israel continues its air strikes on the country.

Israel has publicly urged Lebanese authorities to fulfil the conditions of the truce, saying it will act “as necessary” if Lebanon fails to take steps against Hezbollah.

The United States is reviving a policy first set out in the 1800s that treats Latin America as its strategic sphere of influence. As Washington expands maritime operations in the Caribbean and eastern Pacific, critics warn of legal violations and rising regional instability.

Uruguay’s Foreign Minister Mario Lubetkin joins Talk to Al Jazeera to discuss US strikes, Venezuela, migration pressures, and China’s growing role in the region — and whether diplomacy can still prevent escalation in a hemisphere shaped once again by power politics.

Thomas Skinner is reportedly suing the BBC as it’s claimed he has proof the organisation rigged Strictly Come Dancing voting to ensure he left the competition early

Former Strictly star Thomas Skinner appears to be the latest to stick the boot in to the BBC. The reality TV star is reportedly suing the organisation with claims suggesting he believes the dance show’s voting was rigged.

It’s said he believes he has proof that there was foul play in order to eliminate him as soon as possible. The star of The Apprentice and his professional dance partner Amy Dowden were given their marching orders at the start of the series.

The show saw scores from the judges from the first two weeks added together, along with results of a public poll. While the BBC never revealed exactly how many public votes each star got, Thomas is said to think he has proof they deliberately downplayed his total.

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A source claims he is now following in Donald Trump’s footsteps and suing the organisation. Speaking to The Sun, an insider said: “Thomas is adamant he got a larger share of the public vote and believes he has the evidence to prove it. He is determined to see it through, but there’s no way the BBC will take this sensational claim lying down.”

They went on: “They’ll robustly defend any kinds of claims that the voting was rigged or fixed.”

Asked to comment on the allegations, a BBC spokesperson told the Mirror: “Strictly Come Dancing’s public vote is robust and independently overseen and verified to ensure complete accuracy.”

Sources at the corporation also told the Mirror it hasn’t received any legal complaint or paperwork in relation to this matter. .

The Sun’s source also added that while Thomas was supposedly asked to return for the final this weekend, there was no chance he’d accept the invitation.

They claimed he has been “locked in rows with bosses ever since he was sent home”. “He’s convinced the BBC was hell-bent on getting him out as soon as possible — no matter how many of his fans got behind him,” they said.

Despite the source’s allegations, it’s reported Thomas’s no-show this weekend is simply down to a prior commitment. Amy will be back to dance with her fellow ballroom stars, though.

Other stars who appeared on the series this year included Geordie Shore legend Vicky Pattison, Emmerdale’s Lewis Cope and Doctor Who actress Alex Kingston.

And it’s expected that they will all make a return to the dancefloor, alongside other former contestants like drag queen La Voix, showbiz guru Ross King and Gladiator Harry Aikines-Aryeetey amongst a host of others.

There has been speculation following Thomas since his initial inclusion in the series. He stirred up a storm over his behaviour off the dancefloor before the show started.

He faced backlash over his social media posts, notably a selfie with Vice US President JD Vance and later stormed out of the press launch for Strictly and snatched a journalist’s phone. Then, an affair was uncovered as Thomas admitted to cheating on his wife just weeks after their wedding.

The Mirror also revealed one of his firms hasn’t paid back a £50,000 Covid bounce back loan.

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MEXICO CITY — President Trump has ordered a partial blockade on oil tankers going to and from Venezuela, potentially crippling the nation’s already battered economy, and accused Caracas of stealing “oil, land other assets” from the United States — a significant escalation of Washington’s unrelenting campaign against the government of President Nicolás Maduro.

Asked about Venezuela on Wednesday, Trump said the United States will be “getting land, oil rights and whatever we had.”

“We want it back,” Trump said without further elaboration. It was unclear if Trump planned to say more about Venezuela in a televised address to the nation late Wednesday night.

The blockade, which aims to cripple the key component of Venezuela’s faltering, oil-dependent economy, comes as the Trump administration has bolstered military forces in the Caribbean, blown up more than two dozen boats allegedly ferrying illicit drugs in both the Caribbean and the Pacific, and threatened military strikes on Venezuela and neighboring Colombia.

“Venezuela is completely surrounded by the largest Armada ever assembled in the History of South America,” Trump said in a rambling post Tuesday night on his Truth Social site. “It will only get bigger, and the shock to them will be like nothing they have ever seen before.”

Not long after Trump announced the blockade Tuesday night, the government of Venezuela denounced the move and other Trump efforts as an attempt to “rob the riches that belong to our people.”

Leaders of other Latin American nations called for calm and United Nations Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, after a phone call with Maduro, called on U.N. members to “exert restraint and de-escalate tensions to preserve regional stability.”

Also Wednesday, Trump received rare pushback from the Republican-dominated Congress, where some lawmakers are pressuring the administration to disclose more information about its deadly attacks on alleged drug boats.

The Senate gave final approval to a $900-billion defense policy package that, among other things, would require the administration to disclose to lawmakers specific orders behind the boat strikes along with unedited videos of the deadly attacks. If the administration does not comply, the bill would withhold a quarter of Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s travel budget.

The bill’s passage came a day after Hegseth and Secretary Marco Rubio came to Capitol Hill to brief lawmakers on the U.S. military campaign. The briefings left lawmakers with mixed reaction, largely with Republicans backing the campaign and Democrats expressing concern about it.

The White House has said its military campaign in Venezuela is meant to curb drug trafficking, but the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration data shows that Venezuela is a relatively minor player in the U.S.-bound drug trade.

Trump also declared that the South American country had been designated a “foreign terrorist organization.” That would apparently make Venezuela the first nation ever slapped with a classification normally reserved for armed groups deemed hostile to the United States or its allies. The consequences remain unclear for Venezuela.

Regional responses to the Trump threats highlight the new ideological fault lines in Latin America, where right-wing governments in recent years have won elections in Chile, Argentina and Ecuador.

The leftist leaders of the region’s two most populous nations — Brazil and Mexico — have called for restraint in Venezuela.

“Whatever one thinks about the Venezuelan government or the presidency of Maduro, the position of Mexico should always be: No to intervention, no to foreign meddling,” Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum said Wednesday, calling on the United Nations to look for a peaceful solution and avoid any bloodshed.

Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva has also urged Trump to pull back from confrontation. “The power of the word can outweigh the power of the gun,” Lula said he told Trump recently, offering to facilitate talks with the Maduro government.

But Chile’s right-wing president-elect, José Antonio Kast, said he supports regime-change in Venezuela, asserting that it would reduce migration from Venezuela to other nations in the region.

“If someone is going to do it, let’s be clear that it solves a gigantic problem for us and all of Latin America, all of South America, and even for countries in Europe,” Kast said, referring to Venezuelan immigration.

In his Tuesday post, Trump said he had ordered a “complete blockade of all sanctioned oil tankers going into, and out of, Venezuela.” While potentially devastating to Venezuela’s economy, the fact that the blockade will only affect tankers already sanctioned by U.S. authorities does give Venezuela some breathing room, at least for now.

Experts estimated that only between one-third and one-half of tankers transporting crude to and from Venezuela are likely part of the so-called “dark fleet” of sanctioned tankers. The ships typically ferry crude from Venezuela and Iran, two nations under heavy U.S. trade and economic bans.

However, experts said that even a partial blockade will be a major hit for Venezuela’s feeble economy, reeling under more than a decade of of U.S. penalties. And Washington can continue adding to the list of sanctioned tankers.

“The United States can keep sanctioning more tankers, and that would leave Venezuela with almost no income,” said David A. Smilde, a Venezuela expert at Tulane University. “That would probably cause a famine in the country.”

The growing pressure, analysts said, will likely mean the diminishing number of firms willing to take the risk of transporting Venezuelan crude will up their prices, putting more pressure on Caracas. Purchasers in China and elsewhere will also likely demand price cuts to buy Venezuelan oil.

Trump has said that Maduro must go because he is a “narco-terrorist” and heads the “Cartel de los Soles,” which the While House calls is a drug-trafficking syndicate. Trump has put a $50 million bounty on Maduro’s head. Experts say that Cartel de los Soles is not a functioning cartel, but a short-hand term for Venezuelan military officers who have been involved in the drug trade for decades, long before Maduro or his predecessor and mentor, the late Hugo Chávez, took office.

In his comments on Tuesday, Trump denounced the nationalization of the Venezuelan oil industry, a process that began in the 1970s, when Caracas was a strong ally of Washington.

Echoing Trump’s point that Venezuela “stole” U.S. assets was Stephen Miller, Trump’s homeland security advisor, who declared on X: “American sweat, ingenuity and toil created the oil industry in Venezuela. Its tyrannical expropriation was the largest recorded theft of American wealth and property.”

Among those believed to be driving Trump’s efforts to oust Maduro is Secretary of State Maro Rubio, the son of Cuban immigrants to Florida. Rubio has long been an outspoken opponent of the communist governments in Havana and Caracas. Venezuelan oil has helped the economies of left-wing governments in both Cuba and Nicaragua.

Christopher Sabatini, a senior fellow for Latin America at Chatham House, said Rubio has been on a long-time campaign to remove Maduro.”He has his own political project,” Sabatini said. “He wants to get rid of the dictators in Venezuela and Cuba.”

Staff writers McDonnell and Linthicum reported from Mexico City and Ceballos from Washington. Contributing was special correspondent Mery Mogollón in Caracas.

Noble laureate’s son says military must ‘prove’ Suu Kyi is healthy after her years in detention and unseen following military coup.

Military-ruled Myanmar has said the country’s jailed Nobel Peace Prize laureate Aung San Suu Kyi is “in good health” amid concerns about the health of the pro-democracy leader who was removed from power by a coup in 2021.

“Daw Aung San Suu Kyi is in good health,” a statement posted on the military-run Myanmar Digital News said on Tuesday, using an honorific for the country’s leader.

The military, which offered no evidence or details about Aung San Suu Kyi’s condition, issued the statement one day after her son, Kim Aris, told the Reuters news agency that he had received little information about the 80-year-old’s condition and fears she could die without him knowing.

“The military claims she is in good health, yet they refuse to provide any independent proof, no recent photograph, no medical verification, and no access by family, doctors, or international observers,” Aris told Reuters on Wednesday in response to the military’s statement.

“If she is truly well, they can prove it,” he said.

A Myanmar regime spokesman did not respond to calls seeking comment.

Interviewed in October, Aris told the Asia Times news organisation that he believed his mother, who has not been seen for at least two years, was being held in solitary confinement in a prison in the capital Naypyidaw and “not even the other prisoners have seen her”.

Aung San Suu Kyi was detained after the 2021 military coup that toppled her elected civilian government from power, and she is now serving a 27-year prison sentence on charges that are widely believed to be trumped-up, including incitement, corruption and election fraud – all of which she denies.

Aris also said the military was “fond of spreading rumours” about his mother’s health in detention.

“They have said she is being held under house arrest, but there is no evidence of that at all. At other times, they said she has had a stroke and even that she has died,” he told Asia Times.

“It’s obviously hard to deal with all this false information,” he said.

A civil war has gripped Myanmar since the 2021 coup, but the military plans to hold elections at the end of this month that analysts and several foreign governments have dismissed as a sham designed to legitimise military rule.

While fighting rages across the country, Aung San Suu Kyi’s National League for Democracy (NLD), Myanmar’s largest political party, remains dissolved, and several anti-military political groups are boycotting the polls.

On Wednesday, the military said it was pursuing prosecutions of more than 200 people under a law forbidding “disruption” of the election, legislation that rights monitors have said aims to crush dissent.

“A total of 229 people” are being pursued for prosecution “for attempting to sabotage election processes”, the military regime’s Home Affairs Minister Tun Tun Naung said, according to state media.

Convictions under election laws in Myanmar’s courts can result in up to a decade in prison, and authorities have made arrests for as little as posting a “heart” emoji on Facebook posts criticising the polls.

The legislation also outlaws damaging ballot papers and polling stations – as well as intimidating or harming voters, candidates and election workers, with a maximum punishment of 20 years in prison.

A Canadian lawmaker who was denied entry to the occupied West Bank, alongside fellow politicians and civil society leaders, has dismissed Israel’s claims that the delegation posed a threat to public safety.

Jenny Kwan, a Canadian MP with the left-leaning New Democratic Party (NDP), questioned whether Canada’s recognition of an independent Palestinian state earlier this year contributed to Israel’s decision to block the group.

“How is it that members of parliament are a public safety concern?” she said in an interview with Al Jazeera. “How is it that civil society organisations who are doing humanitarian work… [are] a security concern?”

Kwan and five other MPs were among 30 Canadian delegates denied entry to the Israeli-occupied West Bank on Tuesday after Israel deemed them a risk to public safety.

The delegation, organised by nonprofit group The Canadian-Muslim Vote, was turned back to Jordan at the King Hussein (Allenby) Bridge crossing, which connects Jordan with the West Bank and is controlled by Israel on the Palestinian side, after an hours-long security check.

Kwan said another female MP in the group was “manhandled” by Israeli border agents while attempting to keep an eye on a delegate who was being taken for additional interrogation.

“She was shoved – not once, not twice, but multiple times – by border agents there,” Kwan said. “A member of parliament was handled in that way – If you were just an everyday person, what else could have happened?”

The delegates had been expected to meet with Palestinian community members to discuss daily realities in the West Bank, where residents have faced a surge in Israeli military and settler violence.

They were also planning to meet with Jewish families affected by the conflict, said Kwan, who described the three-day trip as a fact-finding mission.

“I reject the notion that that is a public safety concern,” she said of the delegation’s mission.

Lack of information

Global Affairs Canada, the country’s Foreign Ministry, did not respond to Al Jazeera’s questions about the incident.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Anita Anand said on Tuesday afternoon that the ministry was in contact with the delegation and had “expressed Canada’s objections regarding the mistreatment of these Canadians while attempting to cross”.

The Israeli military did not respond to Al Jazeera’s repeated requests for comment.

In a statement to Canada’s public broadcaster CBC News, the Israeli military agency that oversees affairs in the occupied Palestinian territory, COGAT, said the Canadian delegates were turned back because they arrived “without prior coordination”.

COGAT also said the group’s members were “denied for security reasons”.

But the delegates said they had applied for, and received, Israel Electronic Travel Authorization permits before they reached the crossing. Kwan also said the Canadian government informed Israel ahead of time of the delegation’s plans.

“I’m not quite sure exactly what kind of coordination is required,” Kwan told Al Jazeera.

“We followed every step that we’re supposed to follow, so I’m not quite sure exactly what they mean or what they’re referring to.”

Canada-Israel ties

Canada, a longstanding supporter of Israel, faced the ire of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu after it joined several European allies in recognising an independent Palestinian state in September.

“Israel will not allow you to shove a terror state down our throats,” Netanyahu said in a speech at the United Nations General Assembly in New York City.

The recognition came after months of mass protests in Canada and other Western countries demanding an end to Israel’s genocidal war against Palestinians in Gaza, which has killed more than 70,000 people since October 2023.

Rights advocates also called for action to stem a surge in deadly Israeli violence against Palestinians in the West Bank.

Against that backdrop, members of the Canadian delegation questioned whether their entry refusal was part of an Israeli effort to prevent people from witnessing what is happening on the ground in the Palestinian territory.

“‘What are they trying to hide?’ is the question that comes to mind,” Fawad Kalsi, the CEO of the relief group Penny Appeal Canada and one of the delegates, told Al Jazeera on Tuesday.

Kwan, the Canadian MP, raised a similar question, saying, “If people cannot witness” what is happening on the ground in the West Bank, “then misinformation and disinformation will continue”.

She added that she also saw foreign doctors being turned back to Jordan at the King Hussein (Allenby) Bridge crossing as they tried to bring medicine and baby formula into the West Bank.

“If we as members of parliament could face denial of entry,” she said, “imagine what is going on on the ground with other people, and the difficulties that they face, that we do not know about.”

Ukraine’s state security service (SBU) said it carried out the first-ever uncrewed underwater vehicle (UUV) attack on a Russian vessel. The strike was on a Project 636 Varshavyanka class, or Improved Kilo class diesel-electric submarine, in the Black Sea naval stronghold of Novorossiysk. It would mark a historic first successful use of a UUV as an anti-ship attack weapon.

The SBU released a video it says shows the submarine docked at Novorossiysk along with several other ships. The video pans from right to left and at about the 16-second mark, the submarine erupts in an explosion. That means the UUV, which is not visible in the video, was able to navigate a packed harbor to strike a specific vessel. While we cannot independently verify the SBU claim about the use of a UUV in the strike, they did confirm that assertion to us directly.

Russia, meanwhile, denies any damage was caused by the attack.

‘The information disseminated by special services of Ukraine about the alleged ‘destruction’ of one of the Russian submarines in the bay of the Black Sea Fleet’s Novorossiysk naval base does not correspond to reality,” the Russian Defense Ministry (MoD) claimed on Telegram. “Not a single ship or submarine as well as the crews of the Black Sea Fleet stationed in the bay of the Novorossiysk naval base were damaged as a result of the sabotage. The watercraft serve normally.”

Today’s UUV attack appears to be the culmination of Ukraine’s development of these weapons and once again shows that the war-torn country is at the forefront of modern drone warfare innovation. Little is known about the Sub Sea Baby UUV, not to be confused with the highly adaptable Sea Baby uncrewed surface vessels (USVs) that have wreaked havoc on the Russian Navy.

Ukraine is developing several UUVs, at least that we know of. It released images in September 2023 of a UUV dubbed Marichka, designed to launch kamikaze attacks against ships and maritime infrastructure. That followed the announcement earlier that year of another UUV known as Toloka, which you can see in the following video.

Автономний підводний дрон TOLOKA

Being able to operate underwater not only helps greatly in avoiding detection and destruction, but it can also potentially mitigate some defensive barriers Russia has already built around ports as a result of Ukraine’s uncrewed surface vessel (USV) campaign. This onslaught has already kept Russia’s Black Sea Fleet (BSF) at bay, forcing it to retreat from Crimea to Novorossiysk. Ukrainian USVs have also damaged enemy military facilities in occupied Crimea and the Kerch Bridge, You can see one Ukrainian USV being destroyed below.

Russian Defense Ministry announced that Ukraine attempted to attack the Ivan Khurs signals intelligence ship of the Russian Navy with 3 unmanned surface vessels (USVs) in the Black Sea this morning.

Moscow released footage allegedly showing the destruction of one of the USVs. pic.twitter.com/YfS7xWSGWw

— Status-6 (Military & Conflict News) (@Archer83Able) May 24, 2023

The U.S., China and many other nations are developing their own UUVs for missions like the one that struck the Improved Kilo class submarines. UUVs can provide the ability to strike vessels and other targets at long distances and can be launched from submarines and motherships, extending their range. They can also be used for reconnaissance and mine laying, among other duties. You can read more about these vessels in our catalogue of stories here.

In the case of the Improved Kilo class boat, “the vessel suffered critical damage and was effectively put out of action,” the SBU claimed. “On board the submarine were four launchers for ‘Kalibr’ cruise missiles, which the enemy uses to strike at the territory of Ukraine.”

The submarine damaged by the Sea Baby UUVs is one of six Improved Kilo class boats that were operated by the Russian Black Sea Fleet, a retired Russian Navy officer who uses the @Capt_Navy X handle told The War Zone.

These submarines are quite capable and can be very hard to detect when dived and running on battery power. These submarines carry Kalibr long-range cruise missiles that have frequently been used to attack Ukraine.

The Sub Sea Baby UUV attack “was a joint operation of the 13th Main Directorate of Military Counterintelligence of the SBU and the Naval Forces of Ukraine,” SBU explained, adding that the estimated cost of one of the Russian submarines is about $400 million.

This incident also marks the second time an Improved Kilo class submarine in Crimea was attacked by Ukraine. In September 2023, the Rostov-on-Don was severely damaged during a combined missile and uncrewed surface vessel (USV) attack on Sevastopol. Ukraine later claimed it was destroyed. You can see the damage to that submarine below.

If today’s attack did damage the submarine significantly, Russia would be left with four examples operating as part of the Black Sea Fleet.

While much about the Sub Sea Baby UUVs remains a mystery, a proven ability to use them as weapons holds Russian vessels at even greater risk. Novorossiysk was seen as something as a relative safe haven for the Black Sea Fleet, although aerial and sea drone attacks have occurred there. But the idea that Ukraine can use underwater drones to strike ships in port there changes this calculus, if that is indeed the true method of the attack. As a result, we will also be seeing a change in Russia’s defensive posture at the sprawling port located on the northeastern edge of the Black Sea.

At the same time, if this attack was executed by a UUV, it would be another world first and is likely a harbinger of things to come. Hitting ships in port over great distances via underwater drone attack is an asymmetric capability. It’s also one that America’s adversaries are investing in heavily, and especially China.

With all this in mind, the attack on the submarine serves as another reminder that the war in Ukraine has become a conflict where theory and development are put into practice.

Contact the author: howard@thewarzone.com