A week ago Russian gas giant Gazprom offered a 50% tariff discount for an additional gas transit to Europe. It was a modest gesture for dialogue and peace.
Washington promptly freaked out and made a wild accusation that resembles the Saddam WMD lies.

New commercial satellite photos taken on Monday confirm recent reports that Russia is once again massing troops and military equipment on the border with Ukraine after a major buildup this spring.

The new images taken by Maxar Technologies and shared with POLITICO show a buildup of armored units, tanks and self-propelled artillery along with ground troops massing near the Russian town of Yelnya close to the border of Belarus.

For those of you that don't remember, this method for starting a war was used once before.

But one reporter — Jean Heller of the St. Petersburg Times — wasn’t satisfied taking the administration’s claims at face value. She obtained two commercial satellite images of the area taken at the exact same time that American intelligence supposedly had found Saddam’s huge and menacing army and found nothing there but empty desert.

She contacted the office of then-Secretary of Defense Dick Cheney “for evidence refuting the Times photos or analysis offering to hold the story if proven wrong.” But “the official response” was: “Trust us.”

How can I say this? Because Ukraine didn't know anything about this so-called Russian troop build-up.

Ukraine's defence ministry on Monday denied a media report of a Russian military buildup near its border, saying it had not observed an increase in forces or weaponry.

The Washington Post said at the weekend a renewed buildup of Russian troops near the Ukrainian border had raised concern among some officials in the United States and Europe who are tracking what they consider irregular movements of equipment and personnel on Russia's western flank.

That is indeed curious. Well, maybe Ukraine's military simply didn't have all the information. Right?
Then why did this happen the very next day?

Ukraine defence minister Andrii Taran has submitted a letter of resignation, the government representative to parliament Taras Melnychuk said on his Telegram channel on Tuesday.
Reuters was not able to reach Taran for comment. Melnychuk gave no reason for the resignation.

Lawmakers from the ruling Servant of the People party had said on Monday they would nominate Deputy Prime Minister Oleksii Reznikov to replace Taran as defence minister.

Hmm. I wonder why the defense minister would feel it necessary to resign the day after he contradicted the official story for starting a war?
The very next day Republicans in Congress demanded that we send troops to Ukraine. We began deploying troops to Ukraine immediately.

The war machine immediately began ramping up.
Bloomberg had an alarming headline, "U.S. Can't Rely on Tripwire Forces to Deter China and Russia
A small contingent of troops can dissuade an enemy from attacking, but only if backed up by a much bigger commitment."
The Atlantic started banging the drums for war with, "Russia Took Advantage While the West Slept
By failing to offer realistic alternatives, the U.S. and Europe have left another region to the tender mercies of a predatory power."
We are so worried about Europe. More worried about Europe than Europe is.

France and Germany’s recent strange attempts at whataboutism, spurred by a Ukrainian drone strike last week, unfairly let Moscow off the hook for the conflict it keeps alive and kicking.

So I guess Germany and France aren't playing along either.

However, the biggest giveaway of them all that this is all a bunch of BS, is one of the first report that the brand new Ukraine defense minister released. Remember, this is the guy who replaced the guy who wouldn't lie us into war.

Ukraine will not become a member of NATO in the near future, but Ukraine must prepare for this membership today, Defense Minister Oleksiy Reznikov has said.
According to an Ukrinform correspondent, he said this on Savik Shuster's Freedom of Speech program.

"Today, the Ministry of Defense faces very important challenges, but the main goal is to implement the provisions of the Constitution on our relentless movement towards NATO, and as a result, joining the Alliance," Reznikov said.

Funny how NATO is on his mind.
Meanwhile, since there is dirty business afoot, we sent in the CIA.

President Joe Biden dispatched CIA Director Bill Burns to Moscow earlier this week to warn the Kremlin that the US is watching its buildup of troops near Ukraine's border closely, and to attempt to determine what is motivating Russia's actions.
The rare trip by Burns to Russia, where he held talks with senior Kremlin security officials directly involved in the military activity, came as the US has grown increasingly concerned by Russia's irregular movement of troops and equipment near Ukraine's northern border, according to multiple US and Ukrainian sources briefed on the meeting.

And then as if to bring this full circle, a couple paragraphs later in the article is this.

The flurry of high-level diplomacy underscores how seriously the Biden administration is taking the latest Russian troop movements, even after an earlier buildup in the spring ultimately did not lead to a renewed invasion. Tensions between Ukraine and Russia have also been exacerbated in recent weeks by a deepening Ukrainian energy crisis that Kiev believes Moscow has purposefully provoked.

All of this, this entire military build up, it's still only about Nord Stream 2 pipeline.