April Showers Bring Nazi Startups

 

'Fortifying the strategic partnership'

During the first week of May, the Special Operations Medical Association (SOMA) held its annual conference in Raleigh, North Carolina, “the largest gathering of Special Operations Forces medical providers in the world.”

At least a few medics from the so-called “depoliticized” Azov Brigade/Corps in the National Guard of Ukraine spoke at the event, including Lt. Daryna Smolnikova, who rubbed shoulders with George Soros’ heir at the World Economic Forum in January. Her boyfriend, the famous Azov officer “Gandalf,” who once said he doesn’t “believe in any holocaust, it’s just a story,” already made it to Davos last year. More recently, Illia “Gandalf” Samoilenko met the right-wing pundit Ben Shapiro during his trip to Ukraine for an interview of Volodymyr Zelensky.

The Azov movement’s 3rd Assault Brigade, a more openly neo-Nazi military unit, also sent a delegation to SOMA 2025, thanks to the New York City-based NGO “Razom for Ukraine,” which has been described as the Ukrainian AIPAC. At least some speakers at this event dedicated their time to sharing “key lessons from Ukraine’s medical response … to adapt TCCC [Tactical Combat Casualty Care] practices for future peer conflicts,” that is, between the United States and China.

Meanwhile, “SOF Week 2025” kicked off in Tampa, Florida, “the premier annual event for the international Special Operations Forces (SOF) community.” Featured speakers included US intelligence chiefs and military commanders, foreign leaders and defense ministers, with keynote speeches by Pete Hegseth, US Secretary of Defense; Gen. Dan Caine, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff; and Gen. Bryan P. Fenton, Commander of the US Special Operations Command.

“Everything starts and ends with warriors, from training to the battlefield,” said Hegseth. “We are leaving wokeness and weakness behind. No more pronouns, no more climate change obsession, no more emergency vaccine mandates, no more dudes in dresses.” Straight Arrow News reports, “According to Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth, SOF will shift from a counterterrorism-centric mission to a broader role in great power competition.”

Andriy Smolensky, a severely wounded Ukrainian veteran who has spent many months undergoing treatment in the United States, met General Fenton at SOF Week, which Smolensky attended as the “U.S. Partnership Officer” of a new US-Ukrainian think tank connected to the Azov movement. About a month earlier at Harvard Business School, under the cover of this recently established organization, which is “dedicated to fortifying the strategic partnership between Ukraine and the United States,” some prominent Azovites probably met Fenton’s Vice Commander of the Special Operations Command. These and other stories about the burgeoning “Azov Lobby” have flown under the radar in recent months.  (more...)

April Showers Bring Nazi Startups