Image is from this article on the excellent Canadian environmental journalism outlet, The Narwhal.
The Giant Mine just outside of Yellowknife, Northwest Territories, Canada is one of the country’s largest recognized environmental liabilities. The mine’s 100 plus year history illustrates the continuity between resource colonialism in the late 19th/early 20th century and neoliberalism at the turn of the millennium.
There were several gold rushes in northern Canada/US in the late 19th century, such as the Klondike. The Giant gold strike on was first discovered by settlers about the same time as the Klondike, but as Giant is on Great Slave Lake (named for an Anglicization of the name of local peoples, not after slavery) instead of the Pacific Ocean, it is much less accessible and didn’t take off like the Klondike. Parallel with displacement of local Yellowknives Dene people https://ykdene.com/, the town of Yellowknife sprung up around small mining operations through the 30s. It wasn’t until after WW2 that the mine was developed at a large scale. Starting operation in 1948, Giant was owned by a Canadian mining conglomerate through the 80s, then some Australians, and for the last ten years of its operating life, by Americans, who went bankrupt and abandoned the property in 1999. The Canadian federal government is responsible for the site and its remediation now, similar to the way the EPA has Superfund sites in the USA.
The project is infamous for poisoning the people and environment of the surrounding area through arsenic poisoning. The ore at giant is arsenopyrite, an arsenic sulphide mineral that often contains gold. Roasting it in large furnaces or kilns releases the gold as well as fine arsenic trioxide dust. The most infamous arsenic poisoning incident was in 1951 when a Yellowknives Dene toddler in died after eating contaminated snow in the fallout area, 2 kilometers from the processing mill’s smokestack. Over the years, improvements to the mill reduced the amount of toxic dust released to the environment. This is better than blasting it into the air wildly, but meant that the site accumulated hundreds of thousands of tonnes of arsenic trioxide dust that they chucked in empty mine workings underground. Unfortunately, arsenic trioxide dissolves in water as easily as sugar and so represents a tremendous risk to groundwater and waterbodies nearby, like Great Slave Lake and Yellowknife’s water supply.
Arsenic issues contributed to labour disputes as well. In 1991 the union workers of the plant went on strike, refusing management’s demand to reduce their salary and wanting better safety measures for workers . The company brought in Pinkertons and strikebreakers, backed by RCMP thugs. The situation escalated, culminating in a bomb planted on a train track deep in the mine. When it was triggered, it killed 6 scabs and 3 Pinkertons. For the next year, the RCMP interrogated mine workers, their family and community without determining who did it, supporting the company in their refusal to sign a new contract until an arrest was made. Finally a worker named Roger Warren confessed to doing it alone and was sentenced to life in prison. He was released in 2014 and died in 2017.
Since 1999, the site has been the responsibility of the Canadian federal government and is being every so gradually remediated. Operated through what are effectively private-public partnership contracts, environmental engineering companies are attempting to clean up and isolate the huge amounts of arsenic trioxide dust. The concept is move the dust into specially ventilated chambers of the underground mine, where it is frozen in place and thus prevented from leaching into groundwater. Active remediation is supposed to be finished in about 15 years at a cost of $1 billion CAD, but will surely take longer and cost more than this. Also, freezing material in place will definitely work because the climate isn’t changing, and the Canadian north is definitely not seeing extreme levels of temperature rise.
After active works are complete, the site will require perpetual care.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel’s destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia’s youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don’t want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it’s just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists’ side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR’s former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR’s forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster’s telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a ‘propaganda tax’, if you don’t believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
@carpoftruth@hexbear.net is hosting the news megathread this week while I’m busy irl!
Make sure to head to the US electoral containment thread for everything to do with the election on a domestic level, as we don’t want too much US-centric news to flood this thread. Discussion of Harris’ or Trump’s potential geopolitical impacts is still perfectly fine here.
on a domestic level
Thought we were an internationalist forum?
Yeah but most of us are from
so I think it’s that we aspire to being an internationalist forum but we also acknowledge the reality that most of our users are from the imperial core and that this election will affect the whole world
Most tolerable thread ever thank you
we don’t want too much US-centric news to flood this thread.
S-Tier moderating decision
while I’m busy irl!
No relation whatsoever to what is going to happen in Tel Aviv next thursday
deleted by creator
Have fun storming the castle!
Apparently the IDF had to delay their initial ground invasion into Gaza because some random guy was in their control center for all the planning
Source (Hebrew)DPRK Foreign Minister Meets Russian President
Pyongyang, November 6 (KCNA) – DPRK Foreign Minister Choe Son Hui on an official visit to the Russian Federation met with Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin, president of the Russian Federation, in Kremlin, Moscow on Nov. 4.
Choe Son Hui courteously conveyed warm comradely greetings of the respected Comrade Kim Jong Un to Vladimir Putin.
Putin asked her to convey his warm greetings to Kim Jong Un.
They had a good talk over many undertakings for steadily developing the relations between the two countries and reaffirmed the will to further consolidate the DPRK-Russia friendship on a track of new comprehensive development. -0-
www.kcna.kp (2024.11.06.)http://kcna.kp/en/article/q/ca4322368cd7e4580fed1d67fc3b74ae.kcmsf
https://xcancel.com/cheriblossom__/status/1853903459277516942
The Chief of the Air Force is stuck in the streets of Tel Aviv due to large protests and street blockades
https://www.reddit.com/media?url=https%3A%2F%2Fi.redd.it%2Fu571ehtsjzyd1.jpeg
(Image uploads don’t seem to be working, sorry for reddit link)
This is the first official picture of China’s J-35A stealth fighter (previously known as FC-31), from the Zhuhai airshow.
It was originally built for export, then the navy decided they wanted a version for aircraft carriers, and now the air force looks like they will adopt it as well.
It has a more focused design than its US-made counterpart, the F-35, which will likely mean it’s better at its job and cheaper/easier to build in large quantities.
Looks almost exactly like an F-35, made with alleged stolen data from the F-35 programme.
China calls it the J-35
this seems like a big deal
Netanyahu sacks defense minister Gallant, says ‘trust cracked’ | The Cradle
The last Kufiya factory in Palestine (west bank), Hirbawi, sells Kufiyas on kufiya.org again. So if you want one and simultaneously support Palestinians you can order them there
IOF dumbasses failed to kick down a door on their first try before magdumping an empty room:
https://xcancel.com/Lebnews2004/status/1853825699104063648Genuinely wondering if there’s ever been a worse military than the modern IDF, obviously they can still spread a lot of misery and death but they seem useless in actual combat in a way I’ve never seen before.
Zionist defense minister Yoav Gallant has now been replaced by this guy
Gallant was calling Palestinians “human animals” within a week of Oct 7th and bombed every hospital in Gaza, so this isn’t a big shift in rhetoric or policy. Still, the Israeli government seems to be falling into more internal squabbling, which shows that the resistance is having some effect at least.
Honestly I’m surprised that it took this long. Given the timing, I’m suspecting it’s a signal towards their US masters.
I imagine that people displaying even the vaguest shred of empathy for men, women, and especially children are shot on sight if they get within a mile of an Israeli government building, so it’s unsurprising
The contradiction isn’t about whether they care about Palestinians. The settlers are mad about the drafting of the ultra Orthodox and the judicial reforms etc…
Just shuffling chairs on the sinking Titanic:
https://xcancel.com/AryJeay/status/1853859521565004053BREAKING: Netanyahu fired War Minister Yoav Gallant.
Netanyahu nominated Yisrael Katz as the new War Minister.
He was the, until now, foreign minister.
YAAASSrael
Hurricane Rafael just formed yesterday in the Caribbean. Looks like Havana will be hit tomorrow evening. Hopefully there won’t be the insane quick strengthening that we saw in the last few Caribbean hurricanes.
By August 14, 1945, the US Navy peaked at 6,768 active ships, by 1950 that number shrank to 634 ships
Later that same year in 1950 due to the Korean War the US Navy expanded back up to 980 active ships before topping out at 1,122 ships in 1953 at the end of the war and remained at a stable 900 ships for the rest of the fifties
Between 1958-1974 the US Navy slowly shrank until stabilizing again at around 550 ships until Reagan’s 600 Ship-Navy Campaign Plank
The 1980s plan to rebuild the U.S. Navy, known as the 600-ship Navy, was a campaign plank of Ronald Reagan’s 1980 presidential campaign. The plan included: Recommissioning Iowa-class battleships, Keeping older ships in service longer, A large new construction program, and Increasing production of Nimitz-class aircraft carriers
The 600-ship Navy was the most expensive peacetime military buildup in U.S. history, costing $1.5 trillion over five years
The US Navy peaked at 594 ships in 1987 before experiencing a sharp decline between 1989-1992
The US shipbuilding industry has always been kinda shit but it’s worse now than ever. It’s kinda pathetic
somewhat related NC article from today on industrial policy and shipbuilding. not super critical for your point or the article, but I liked this quote from yves at the beginning:
Most Western governments like to pretend that that they are not in the business of industrial policy. In fact, they clearly are, in the form of numerous subsidies, like interest rate breaks, tax credits, subsidies, borrowing guarantees and large and lax government purchasing schemes. So in the US, the preferred sectors include the medical care,1 real estate, higher education, and arms makers.
https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/11/industrial-policy-lessons-from-chinas-shipbuilding.html
Would European foreign policy change much under Trump?
Idk but judging from the constant propaganda we receive about him here (which is true, but just as true for the dems also) they must have reasons not to want him elected
Nah, too servile. Remember how euros made some noises over trump abandoning iran deal, and then got put in place by their master.
Only icj/icc could break the spell for the law and order eu. Which is why icc is getting bent, and icj would be dicking around for 10 years.
It could perhaps. the EU liberal bureaucrats seem to really dislike trump and trump seems like he has the individual juice to potentially make a difference in ukraine (as opposed to israel where he is just as bloodthirsty as biden/harris). another 4 years of trump fucking about and disrespecting EU liberals could help drive the message home that americans despise europe as a vassal. whether that materially makes a difference to EU policy or not is up in the air, but I imagine it combining with declining economic conditions in europe to show EU bureaucrats that they’ve got to go their own way to some extent. the dutch would probably also find the neutering of ASML more distasteful if administered by trump rather than harris.
this ryan grim article talks about some specifics around ukraine but not in tremendous detail: https://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2024/11/so-what-happens-after-a-trump-or-harris-win.html
yeah, I think if Trump’s elected then it wouldn’t be a day 1 thing where every European leader suddenly defects from NATO or anything, but 2-3 years into his presidency, under mounting pressure both domestic and foreign, and with the war in Ukraine hopefully having concluded badly for the West, I think we’ll see an anti-Atlanticist turn. or at the very least, significant battles between anti-Atlanticists and the capitalists who just wanna force the government to buy a $100 billion laser-guided ultrashittium teraflops hellfire AI missile system that can, at best, occasionally shoot down endangered bird species. who wins that battle will depend so much on factors we don’t know about yet (how the Middle East looks by then and therefore oil prices and how that affects European energy, how the China-US conflict is shaping up, etc) that I can’t make any predictions.
like most things European, it’ll take a racist and imperialist position because I strongly doubt that the left will be strong enough by then to guide any anti-American movement
Tervell posting, translation of caption
“ 🔷️ Old soldier, still in service
The Ministry of Defense of Russia has released a video of the activity of a mobile defense unit armed with a 23mm ZU-23-2 cannon to deal with drones. If you remember, at the beginning of the arrival of Gran 1/2 suicide drones in the Russia-Ukraine war, Ukrainian mobile defense units were formed by mounting anti-aircraft guns on tactical vehicles.
It has been some time now that the Russians have started to form such patrol units to deal with all types of Ukrainian long-range drones, which operate deep inside Russian soil and near sensitive points. Cannons like this ZU-23 with shrapnel ammunition have sufficient power to deal with the attacks of such drones, but if they are still used in almost the same way as 60 years ago, it will definitely reduce their effectiveness.
#Russia #Ukraine #Defense #UAV
NPC @Partisan2015”
Zu-23 in action with Russian Guntuber. Crazy stuff.
I found a YouTube link in your comment. Here are links to the same video on alternative frontends that protect your privacy:
True Promise 3 is the only thing that could revive this mega thread now, come on Iran!
Can we normalize saying that the entity “got TeePeed” when the next strike happens?
