Radio War Nerd EP #634 — Ansarallah's Yemen Offensive + Soviet-Finnish Wars, Pt. 3: The Finland-Nazi Invasion & Siege of Leningrad, feat. Annibale
Guest: Annibale
Recorded: September 10, 2026
Annibale joins to discuss Ansarallah's stunning sweep of Saudi-backed forces and seizure of the Bab al-Mandab Strait and the unraveling of the US empire + part 3 of our Soviet-Finnish Wars series, taking us into the first months of Finland's key role in Nazi Germany's Operation Barbarossa and one of the worst war crimes of WWII: the Siege of Leningrad.
First - Ames and Annibale discuss events of the past hours and days: the Houthi-led Ansarallah offensive in southwest Yemen, spiking debt rates (ie, falling bond prices), America's increasingly dangerous decline & more...
At 1:00:50 - Music interlude by Brendon Anderegg. Check out music from his group Mountains here
At 1:02:24 - Part 3 of Annibale's Soviet-Finnish Wars series
*Map of Ansarallah's offensive
*Perim Island, Bab al-Mandab Strait
Finnish-Nazi invasion of Soviet Union, 1941
*Eve of Finnish-Nazi invasion of USSR, summer 1941
*Karelian Isthmus offensive, 1941, enforcing siege of Leningrad (map from Finland's War of Choice: The Troubled German-Finnish Alliance in World War II by Henrik O. Lunde)
*Finnish advance into East Karelia, tightening siege on Leningrad and creating Greater Finland
Further listening
*RWN 630 - Soviet Finnish Wars, Pt. 1: Introduction
*RWN 632 - Soviet Finnish Wars, Pt. 2: The Winter War
*Annibale's Operation Barbarossa Series
Total time: 1:45:07
Direct link to this episode's mp3 here
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Sound production by Telescope Audio
Comments (46)
For those interested there’s an interesting article by kimmo rentola “finnish communists and the winter war” which paints interesting picture of situation for the finnish left during that time, interesting anecdotes etc.
Don’t siege Leningrad. Take it immediately.
I think something that Amerikanets did not make clear enough was that you do not *need* satellite ISR to be able to launch a ballistic missile at a carrier, all you *need* is up to date intel on where the carrier is. And that can be done by a drone, a boat, a submarine or any other platform as long as it is able to get close enough without being detected and destroyed. Or it can be done by someone on the carrier wittingly or unwittingly transmitting their location.
CENTCOM is America's Baghdad Bob
Gary Brecher is well on his way to bring a cyborg at this point
I grew up during Bush and came of age during Obama and I used to genuinely think that most people were for peace but now I understand that the vast majority of people are constantly foaming at the mouth in a desperate death drive for the sweet release of war. Only a crushing defeat on the battlefield can temporarily embarass them into thinking they're for peace
Minus the extreme minority of literal psychopaths, NOBODY who has experienced war, both directly or indirectly, wishes for war. Don’t let those who live comfy lives in the belly of the beast, watching Netflix and stuffing their faces with bacon cheeseburgers and zyn fool you. They do not know what it is they wish for, and if they got it. they would crumble faster than a Saudi ghost army.
What a great episode. Can’t wait for the next one. Bless you guys.
Saudi dismantling of STC was a blunder. People won’t fight to reconquer the north for the Saudis
42:02 chentcom
I have to chime in a out the canadian politics. The liberals spent ten years ruining this country. Trump is trying to kick down the door and hoping the foundation will buckle.
The resistance report on EI next week is going to be 🔥🔥🔥
I’m sorry but the Yuan hit the 67 on the dollar????? Lmfao
Ironic that the "Vietnam syndrome" was actually the most effective US imperial policy
He r
Hello Mark and John, you know what I think would be great? An episode on the great interesting Austrian writer Karl Kraus, especially his work The Last Days of Mankind.
Any evidence Mannerheim et al were handed financial rewards by the Nazis?
Not that I'm aware of, but he may well have, considering that Hitler was quite keen on handsomely bribing his allies/cohorts (and his generals).
Insane... I still remember early RWN episodes with guests talking about the humanitarian crisis and untold suffering in Yemen caused by the Saudi blockade, which they carried out because they couldn't face Ansarallah on the battlefield. Years ago now, Dolan said that the Saudi's effort to take over Yemen was one of the great military disasters of history. And somehow, the war has only gone *downhill* for the Saudis since then. There are no words for this farce.
Is the War Nerd dead?
The mystery procedure was turning him into an immortal sand worm god emperor, or at least a futurama head in a jar
Why not bring issa blumi back?. He was great in the old episode on Yemen.
"Chent-com!"
It is God's will and sense of humor that Saudi Arabia is getting its ass kicked today
"never fuck with Ansarallah" has got to be up there with "never get involved in a land war in Asia" among the Classic Blunders...... and yet people keep fucking with Ansarallah!!
Go back in history and extend that to North Yemen writ large. It’s like an island of Afghanistan in Arabia
Us bond yields are going up primarily because they’re getting crowded out by the big tech companies’ bond offerings. The size of the debt never really matters to these people; if Google is going to offer you 2-3% premium, yeah, you take it
The competition from tech companies plays a role, but anyone who can do arithmetic can see that the US needs to increase the M2 money supply (print) to pay the interest on the (growing) debt. Whether you're an adherent to MMT or more orthodox monetary theory, unproductive money printing creates inflation, which eats at the real return of bond yields. With the US running so much short term debt it has to refinance a LOT each year (I heard $30 trillion this year, though that was just a sound bite so take with salt), and foreign central banks are not net buyers. In short you have a lot of supply, little demand, and high inflation, which all drive yields up. Meanwhile, high yields are poison to US fiscal because the debt is uncomfortably large compared to tax receipts.
Djibouti and its US + international military contingent are just a few miles away from Houthi territory. I'd never realized that
Almost as if that's why all those forces are in the Horn of Africa
Intrigued by Annibale’s offhand comment that something could be popping off soon in North Africa
Most enticing episode title ever.
With regards to the map; is Sana'a not the capital of the Ansarallah government? The map makes it seem as though it is outside of their control.
Upside, inside out The Houthis have taken Mocha
I am going insane! Why do I see Charlie Kirk on the cover art? 🤣
There are cathedrals everywhere for those with eyes to see…
Sparking up a massive Bob-Marley joint for this one fellas
Shades of the rapid collapse of the Syrian Arab Army to the Hay’at Tahrir al-Sham. Never underestimate the Fremen.
Ansarallah truly chose an auspicious date for giving it to the Saudis
Official petition to have John go one calendar month without an injury or major surgery
What do you mean *petition*? You’d need to do a go fund me for a team of operators and corpsmen to watch him for the month
It's a crime that Finland wasn't punished like Germany after the war and it's a tragedy that the Red Army didn't march into Finland and kill everything east of the Gulf of Bothnia.
I should say "Punished" because the Nazis just became Nafoids.
LFG!!
Finland “I ain’t axis but I ain’t exactly allies neither”
I have never opened a notification so fast