Vladimir Putin Inserts ‘Crazy’ Threat of Nuclear War Into Ukraine Diplomacy

Russian President Vladimir Putin raised the specter of nuclear war over Ukraine this week, a threat that strikes Western observers as both “crazy” and an effort to rig the diplomatic game in his favor.

“He goes pretty far,” Atlantic Council visiting fellow Petr Tuma, a career Czech diplomat seconded at the Washington, D.C.,-based think-tank, told the Washington Examiner. “It’s crazy to even mention something like this.”

Yet Putin broached the subject during a joint press conference with French President Emmanuel Macron, who had traveled to Moscow in search of a way to avert a major new Russian offensive against Ukraine. It’s a shocking rhetorical maneuver by conventional diplomatic standards, but trans-Atlantic officials and analysts regard it as just the latest Kremlin effort to use the threat of violence to gain leverage in negotiations with Western officials.

“He perceives that it works as a deterrent against the West, to talk about nuclear weapons, to talk about nuclear war,” a senior European official told the Washington Examiner. “It’s not something that you hear that often in the West because people have a long-held taboo that nuclear war is not winnable and that modern countries don’t threaten each other with nuclear war.”

Putin and President Joe Biden affirmed the principle that “a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought,” but Western officials believe that Russian military strategists have developed nuclear weapons that they regard as substantial enough to win a conflict in Europe without provoking a full-scale nuclear response from the United States. Against that backdrop, Putin described a hypothetical crisis in which he would feel obliged to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia’s control of Crimea, a peninsula that he annexed from Ukraine in 2014. (Read more from “Vladimir Putin Inserts ‘Crazy’ Threat of Nuclear War Into Ukraine Diplomacy” HERE)

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Nyet Again! Russia’s Olympic Darling Believed to Have Failed Drug Test

The darling of the 2022 Olympics is at the center of a brewing drug controversy.

Kamila Valieva, the 15-year-old Russian skating sensation, failed a drug test taken before the team competition, according to reports from the website Inside the Games and a Russian newspaper.

The news came after Valieva led the Russian team to gold on Monday, when she twice landed a historic quad jump. The teen figure skater became the first woman to land a quad jump at the Olympics.

The reports, labeled a “legal issue,” caused the medal ceremony to be delayed.

The International Testing Agency (ITA), which is conducting drug testing at Beijing 2022, released a statement saying it is aware of the reports about the situation. (Read more from “Nyet Again! Russia’s Olympic Darling Believed to Have Failed Drug Test” HERE)

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‘Wait and See’: China Vows Strong Response as U.S. Prepares to Arm Taiwan

China has demanded the United States revoke a possible arms agreement with Taiwan in support of its Patriot missile systems—a deal Washington believes will improve the island’s security and help maintain political stability.

The Taipei Economic and Cultural Representative Office, Taiwan’s de facto embassy in Washington. D.C, requested the purchase of equipment and services worth $100 million over five years, said the Pentagon’s Defense Security Cooperation Agency (DSCA).

Congress was notified of the State Department’s approval on Monday.

Taiwan’s armed forces operate a number of the American-made, surface-to-air and anti-ballistic missile systems, whose sole purpose is to deter and intercept Chinese aircraft and projectiles in the event of a conflict across the Taiwan Strait. The foreign military sale—the first involving Taiwan this year and the second under the Biden administration—will “sustain, maintain, and improve the Patriot Air Defense System,” according to DSCA’s statement. (Read more from “‘Wait and See’: China Vows Strong Response as U.S. Prepares to Arm Taiwan” HERE)

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Shocker: Capitol Police Surveillance Operation Is Really a Full-Blown Spy Operation…and a GOP Rep Caught Them

. . .They may not call it spying, but almost everyone will feel like their privacy has been violated. It’s meant to chill constituents meeting with their elected leaders. Period. Now, we find out that this little operation may go way beyond just a simple social media review. GOP Congressman Troy Nehls (R-TX) had a lengthy Twitter thread about how his office was illegally spied on by the Capitol Police.

They accessed his office when Congress was in recess last year and took photographs of confidential legislative documents illegally. Days later, Capitol Police officers dressed as construction workers tried to enter his office again but were caught by a member of his staff. Neither Congressman Nehls nor his senior staff was informed that they were the subjects of an investigation.

(Read more from “Shocker: Capitol Police Surveillance Operation Is Really a Full-Blown Spy Operation…and a GOP Rep Caught Them” HERE)

Photo credit: Flickr

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Report: China’s Uyghur Torchbearer Vanishes After Poor Showing; Is China Using COVID Quarantines to Rig the Winter Olympics? Athletes Blow the Lid, and It’s Chilling

By Breitbart. The Wall Street Journal revealed on Sunday that Dinigeer Yilamujiang, a Uyghur athlete who China made an Olympic torchbearer for the Opening Ceremonies, violated Olympic rules and failed to meet journalists after a poor performance on Saturday.

Upon Yilamujiang’s 43rd place finish in the cross-country ski event, she did not pass through the mandatory media zone for interviews, a violation of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) rules, according to the Journal. Reporters waited indefinitely for her, as no officials notified them that she would not be coming. The newspaper noted that her whereabouts remain unknown to foreign reporters at the time of the article’s publication.

The IOC declined to comment to the Journal on Yilamujiang’s absence. Likewise, China’s National Olympic Committee did not respond to the publication’s request for comment.

After the event, Yilamujiang’s name was reportedly barely mentioned by Chinese state media.

“Though Ms. Yilamujiang wasn’t available to answer journalists’ questions after Saturday’s race, China’s state-run broadcaster did have an exclusive interview, in which she expressed incredulity at having been entrusted with the role of torchbearer,” the Journal reported. (Read more from “Report: China’s Uyghur Torchbearer Vanishes After Poor Showing” HERE)

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Is China Using COVID Quarantines to Rig the Winter Olympics? Athletes Blow the Lid, and It’s Chilling

By WND. . .According to the UK Daily Mail, dozens of athletes said they had experienced inhumane conditions while in isolation due to positive COVID-19 tests.

Russian biathlete Valeria Vasnetsova said she was served an extremely small and unappealing meal three times a day for five days while she was in isolation. By the end, she said her “bones [were] sticking out,” the Daily Mail reported. . .

Polish speed skater Natalia Maliszewska had a similarly terrible experience. She said she was repeatedly moved into and out of isolation due to conflicting results from the unreliable COVID-19 tests being used in China.

One particular night was burned into her memory. She was woken up in the middle of the night and told she would be able to return to the Olympic Village, but officials then reversed their decision and sent her back to isolation. (Read more from “Is China Using COVID Quarantines to Rig the Winter Olympics? Athletes Blow the Lid, and It’s Chilling” HERE)

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NIH Spent Billions Supporting Research in China Including Its Biowarfare Program

Judicial Watch obtained 301 pages of emails and other records from the NIH through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.

Among those documents is a list of 2,221 research projects awarded to U.S. universities between 2010 and 2018, through which money was funneled to Chinese research centers. The major portion of those grants (22%) were provided by Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

Chief among the recipients of Anthony Fauci’s generosity was Major General Wuchun Cao (shown in the photo as a Senior Colonel), who has been identified as a key figure in China’s biowarfare program.

Wuchun Cao has been the Director of the Institute of Microbial Epidemiology, Academy of Military Medical Sciences and Director of the State Key Laboratory of Biosafety of Pathogenic Microorganisms, both in Beijing.

He has also been a part-time research scientist and doctoral supervisor of the Institute of Remote Sensing Applications, Chinese Academy of Sciences and Shandong University.

Wuchun Cao is a senior advisor on bioterrorism to the Chinese Communist Party and a scientific advisor for Wuhan Institute of Virology. He was second-in-command of the military team under Major General Chen Wei, presumed leader of China’s biowarfare program, that was sent to Wuhan to control the outbreak of COVID-19 early in the pandemic.

Wuchun Cao was a participant in the 2013 NIAID research grant R01AI083640-05 for $343,817, awarded to Xiaofeng “Frank” Yang of the Indiana University School of Medicine.

The China-origins of Xiaofeng “Frank” Yang remain hidden, but he was a guest speaker at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2012.

The joint work between Xiaofeng “Frank” Yang and Wuchun Cao, which included Duke and Yale Universities, was published in 2015.

Wuchun Cao was a participant in the 2014-2017 NIAID research grant R01AI108993 for $1,719,354, awarded to Gregory Gray of Duke University.

An earlier Gateway Pundit article described the long-term research collaboration between Wuchun Cao and Gregory Gray concerning the epidemiological spread of influenza virus and how that research may have played into the planning around the COVID-19 pandemic.

Wuchun Cao was a participant in the 2014-2018 NIAID grant R01AI110820 for $3,926,048, awarded to the University of Maryland School of Medicine in Baltimore.

Wuchun Cao was a participant in the 2017-2018 NIAID grant R01AI125842 for $1,493,667 awarded to the University of California at Berkeley.

People’s Liberation Army scientists Shibo Jiang of the Lindsley F. Kimball Institute at the New York Blood Center and his long-time collaborator Yusen Zhou of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences in Beijing teamed up on NIAID research grants R03 AI088449 (2011-2012), R21 AI128311-01 (2017) R01 AI139092-01 (2018), R21 AI128311-02 (2018) and R01 AI137472-01 (2018) for a total of $2,400,883.

Both Shibo Jiang and Yusen Zhou have deep connections with China’s People’s Liberation Army and were involved in research leading up to the laboratory origin of COVID-19, fact that have been exhaustively detailed in Gateway Pundit articles, here, here and here.

China has a fused military-civilian virus research program, which includes its bioweapon development effort.

It now appears, as documented in a previous Gateway Pundit article, that China’s fused military-civilian biowarfare program has been extended to incorporate U.S. laboratories and U.S. taxpayer funding.

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Lawrence Sellin, Ph.D. is retired U.S. Army Reserve colonel and a veteran of Afghanistan and Iraq. He had a civilian career in international business and medical research. His email address is [email protected].

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Biden Vows U.S. Will ‘End’ Nord Stream 2 Gas Pipeline if Ukraine Invaded by Russia

President Biden vowed Monday during a joint news conference with Germany’s chancellor that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline “will be no longer” if Russia invades Ukraine.

Biden promised fuel would be prevented from flowing directly to Germany from Russia through the newly constructed Baltic Sea pipeline — before German Chancellor Olaf Scholz gave a noticeably less enthusiastic endorsement of the idea.

“If Russia invades — that means tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine, again — then there will be there will be no longer a Nord Stream 2,” the president said in the White House East Room. “We will bring an end to it.”

Scholz, standing next to Biden, gave a verbose answer in German to the same question from Reuters reporter Andrea Shalal, who pointed out that Scholz did not specifically mention the pipeline. (Read more from “Biden Vows U.S. Will ‘End’ Nord Stream 2 Gas Pipeline if Ukraine Invaded by Russia” HERE)

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Ratings for Beijing Olympics Tank; 2022 Opening Ceremony Hit All-Time Low in TV Viewership

Thus far, the 2022 Beijing Olympics have been an absolute flop. The ratings for the opening ceremony of the Winter Olympics hit all-time lows.

On Saturday, NBC Sports revealed that Friday’s full-day opening ceremony coverage averaged “nearly 14 million TV-only viewers.”

The viewership plunged 43% from the opening ceremony for the 2018 Winter Olympics in Pyeongchang, South Korea, which had 23.8 million people watching the international sporting event.

“The previous low over the last three decades was the 1992 Barcelona games, which had 21.6 million viewers,” noted The Wrap which added, “The high watermark for an opening ceremony was the London Games in 2012, when more than 40 million tuned into NBC’s tape-delayed coverage.”

Deadline reported, “A paltry 8.7 million tuned in on NBC in primetime see the pre-taped Mike Tirico and Savannah Guthrie-led coverage of the propaganda-heavy spectacle put on by Chinese President Xi Jinping and filmmaker Zhang Yimou.” (Read more from “Ratings for Beijing Olympics Tank; 2022 Opening Ceremony Hit All-Time Low in TV Viewership” HERE)

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Chinese Communists Parrot Woke Rhetoric to Attack DOJ

The Biden administration is experiencing an uptick of Chinese Communist Party (CCP) spokesmen channeling left-wing talking points aimed at discrediting American institutions.

Seeking to denounce a key Department of Justice (DOJ) counterintelligence program billed to “identify priority Chinese trade theft cases,” Foreign Ministry spokesperson, Zhao Lijian, invoked its domestic critics during a recent Jan. 18 presser.

“There is an old Chinese saying to the effect that ‘He who has a mind to frame others can easily trump up some charges’,” said Zhao, echoing critics’ assertions the DOJ harbors “implicit biases” and deliberately engages in “racial profiling” while investigating China Initiative cases.

Launched by Attorney General Jeff Sessions in 2018, the China Initiative set out to counter “China’s malign behaviors” and identified academia as one of America’s “most vulnerable sectors” to CCP espionage.

However, the China Initiative has since come under fire from Democratic Party politicians, academics, activists and mainstream media outlets. (Read more from “Chinese Communists Parrot Woke Rhetoric to Attack DOJ” HERE)

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Olympic Coach Accuses China of Violating Player’s Human Rights With 18-Day COVID Isolation

Finland’s Olympic ice hockey coach is accusing China of violating the human rights of athletes because one of his players has been confined to his hotel in isolation for 18 days over a positive coronavirus test.

Finland team forward Marko Anttila has been confined to his hotel room for more than two weeks after testing positive for the virus upon landing in Beijing. And the situation is intolerable, as far as coach Jukka Jalonen is concerned, Fox Business Network reports.

Jalonen says that being cooped up without proper nutrition and exercise is physically dangerous to the 6-foot-8, 230-pound Fin.

“He’s a professional athlete, and he would like to participate in team practices and games in the near future,” Jalonen said. “He’s not getting great food, and he’s a very big guy.”

“Because he doesn’t know what’s going on and what will happen with him, it’s like uncertainties, so it’s a bad thing also mentally,” the coach added. (Read more from “Olympic Coach Accuses China of Violating Player’s Human Rights With 18-Day COVID Isolation” HERE)

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