By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with On Sunday afternoon, just before he began to eat what his calendar  called a “family dinner”, President Donald Trump believed he had ended his and Israel’s year-long war against Iran. He told the global oil and betting markets: “I hereby fully authorize the toll free opening of the Strait of Hormuz, […]

by Editor - Sunday, June 14th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Rulers often declare official holidays to celebrate what they require those they rule to forget – battlefield defeats, acts of surrender, crimes of treason. Long weekends under a warm summer sun are best for forgetfulness. And so it has been for Russia Day, as the annual June 12 public holiday is […]

by Editor - Friday, June 12th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Last week President Vladimir Putin said he believes war propaganda in the media of our time  began with Joseph Goebbels. “As far as the statements by European politicians about their preparations for a war against Russia are concerned,” Putin said on May 29, “that is nonsense. They are allegedly doing this […]

by Editor - Friday, June 12th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Roman Abramovich — the oligarch whom President Vladimir Putin has publicly declared to be “trustworthy and honourable”  and sent to Kiev last month to negotiate war terms  — has what is known on police blotters as FORM. That is a long list of previous offences; dishonesty, deception, bribery, and extortion as […]

by Editor - Wednesday, June 10th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with There was a map of the world on the wall of the Billy Mitchell Room of the Arctic Warrior Events Centre. That’s where President Donald Trump met President Vladimir Putin at Elmendorf Richardson Airbase in Anchorage, Alaska, on August 15, 2025. On the map, the world was flat. Crisscrossing it were […]

by Editor - Tuesday, June 9th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Last week, the Supreme Commander in Chief of the Russian Armed Forces, Vladimir Putin, revealed two military secrets of his strategy for achieving Russia’s war aims on the Ukraine battlefield. They involve weapons he has fired in the past.   The first was the launch of the Oreshnik missile (lead image) […]

by Editor - Sunday, June 7th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with It’s a brave king who fights on after losing his arms and his legs. It’s a foolish king who asks his army and his people to believe in the certainty of swift victory and then requires them to pay the costs of attrition. Or is it the other way round — […]

by Editor - Thursday, June 4th, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Bringing the war home was a powerful slogan of the American anti-war movement in the decade between 1965 and 1975,  as the Viet Cong and North Vietnamese Army advanced towards their victory, forcing the White House to armistice terms in Paris in January 1973, and then to evacuation of Saigon in […]

by Editor - Wednesday, June 3rd, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with Tehran Times spoke with John Helmer, a veteran journalist and geopolitical analyst based in Moscow, to assess the implications of the conflict for U.S. policy toward Iran, the role of domestic political calculations in Washington, and shifting regional alignments. In this interview, Helmer examines coercive diplomacy, regional security dynamics, and the […]

by Editor - Tuesday, June 2nd, 2026
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By John Helmer, Moscow  @bears_with When it comes to heads of state and government like Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin, there’s nothing new under the sun. Unfortunately, the sun doesn’t shine often enough to reveal what they say in secret so that this can be compared with what they are saying in public at the same […]

by Editor - Sunday, May 31st, 2026
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