“Spiderweb” Sledgehammer: Zelenskyy’s Brutal Strike Exposes MAGA

Ukraine struck more than Putin’s air force. Putin’s American assets are wounded.

Sunday morning in the United States, for those of us who enjoy freedom and democracy, was a celebratory moment, and rightly so. Ukrainian president Volodymyr Zelenskyy and the SBU, the Ukrainian military intelligence service, pulled off what is correctly being called “Russia’s Pearl Harbor.”

34% of Russia’s long-range bomber fleet was destroyed. These are largely irreplaceable assets valued at least $7 billion, over 40 aircraft capable of delivering the kind of missiles being rained down on Ukraine every day, but also capable of delivering nuclear warheads to Europe, or the United States. The aircraft they destroyed in this video are closer to Alaska than Kyiv.

The genius of this operation cannot be overstated—tactically and strategically. It was conceived 18 months ago and kept secret, including from the American government, until a near flawless execution yesterday. The SBU smuggled 117 first-person view (FPV) drones into Russia, concealing them in containers, which were put on 18-wheelers and parked near five air bases.

At a coordinated time, the tops of the trucks opened up and the drones emerged—flying towards their targets armed with precision weapons which were fired into the aircrafts’ fuel tanks. This is straight out of James Bond.

This operation was pulled off one day before the “peace talks” in Istanbul, in what was meant to be a performative ritual of Putin wasting time blaming Ukraine and NATO for his fascist, imperial ambitions while continuing to brutalize Ukrainian civilians. Zelenskyy was supposed to roll over and play dead, which is why Trump and JD Vance tried to bully him in the Oval Office three months ago.

Psychological Head-On Collision: The Existential Stakes of Zelenskyy’s Gambit

Zelenskyy was told he did not “have any cards” when it turns out he was just playing them very closely. The Russians are not taking it well, as might be expected.

However, this was not just a strike against Putin’s assets inside Russia, his American assets are equally wounded. This was not the narrative of the strong man they have been promised. The luminaries of MAGA are deeply upset at the “brashness” of Zelenskyy defending his nation—and the rest of the world—from Putin’s aggression.

The reaction from the White House is… muted.

Well look, the reaction is this war needs to come to an end. And this war has been brutal from both sides. Too many people have died. And the president wants this war to end at the negotiating table and he's made that very clear to both leaders, both publicly and privately.

What we’re seeing is the biggest crack in the armor of this regime being blasted open by 117 Ukrainian drones. Putin is, in many ways, the glue that has kept the parts of this larger movement together. On Steve Bannon’s show this morning, the chasm Zelenskyy pried open was illuminated brightly. Bannon said:

The phony crap they came up with in those early days in the Nullification Project, they got rid of General Flynn, all of that to make sure we can never have any type of strategic dialogue with the Russians. You're seeing, this is their payoff right now with the Deep State.”

Two years ago, Mike Flynn filed a lawsuit against me claiming it was defamatory to call him a “Russian asset.” While that part of the lawsuit was thrown out of court, needless to say, I rest my case. Bannon is saying Mike Flynn was the key to “strategic dialogue with the Russians.”

But the payload of this segment was delivered by Mike Flynn’s operative Boone Cutler, who wrote Flynn’s how-to psychological warfare manuals “Citizen’s Guide to Fifth Generation Warfare.” Boone is speaking for Flynn—who posted these clips himself with the note: “Pay attention! Boone is spot on.”

“I think we're learning that the art of the deal in business is a little bit different than the art of the deal in geopolitics. It's not working out. I don't think anybody's listening. I don't think he's getting the support that he needs. I don't think the decisions being made are being based upon the actual situations that are happening around the world right now. I think it's a little bit too idealistic based upon other frames of reference. I think we need to get very, very oriented to our operational environment right now because things are ready to kick off. Look at Taiwan, the Ukraine, Russia, Iran. I mean everybody's amplifying. They're not calming down.”

So, effectively, Bannon, Flynn and a large part of MAGA are taking Putin’s side, not just over Ukraine, but over America, and seemingly, over even Trump.

The allegiance to Putin and Putinism of the MAGA movement has been clear since it started, and Trump has been a useful idiot of Russian intelligence for four decades. But as I wrote, Trump now seems to be a marionette who is cutting his own strings, one by one, thinking he’s a real boy, when, by the time he’s done, he will just be a lifeless orange puppet lying on the ground.

Marionette Cutting His Own Strings

The tragedy unfolding around us was always a brittle, transient alliance between psychopaths who see American democracy as the primary roadblock to their individual accumulation of power. This is a game of Survivor to them. They think there must be only one winner. The fracture we’re seeing in the MAGA coalition was inevitable, but greatly accelerated by Ukraine’s strike on Russian air power.

Zelenskyy, very quietly and carefully over the last 18 months, placed a wedge in the crack. Then yesterday, he hit it with a sledgehammer. As patriotic citizens of America and the planet, we need keep pounding on that wedge, to break off the part of America that has decided that their allegiance to the dictator of Russia is more important than their allegiance to the U.S. Constitution.

Let them be on an island, alone.

Long live a free America. Heroyam Slava. 🇺🇦

---

I keep my articles free because my goal is to arm as many people as possible with information they can use. But if you are able to help me continue my work, please consider upgrading to a paid subscription. It really means a lot. Thank you!

I have a Zoom call each Sunday for paid subscribers to answer questions and discuss everything happening around us. We have a wonderful, supportive community. Thank you for reading and sharing my work. Grateful for your support.

If you’d like to help me with expenses, here is my DonorBox. 💙

If you’d like to help with my legal fees: stopmikeflynn.com.

My podcast is @radicalizedpod & YouTube — Livestream is Thursdays at 4PM PT.

Bluesky 🦋: jim-stewartson

Threads: jimstewartson

TikTok: jimstewartson