Russia-Ukrainian War

[Xerxes]

1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:

Yes we do, but it’s diluted with Gulfstream, a mediocre military IT business and land systems (Abrahams tank, Stryker).

 

They are good operators but I don’t like many of their business they are in especially IT and Land systems.

 

Anything catering to the army will shrink, imo.

yeah. IT ain’t sexy enough for me. And the prevailing view on land system is not looking bright, even with the largest land war in Europe. Gulfstream though is a gem.

 

what is striking for me about GD is that since it’s corporate transformation in the 90s and very early 2000s, (I.e exiting aerospace and coming back to it via Gulfstream purchase) has not reshaped its portfolio, except for the bolt-on w/ IT in the 2010s, in contrast to the rest of cohort. 
 

 

[nsx5200]

7 hours ago, John Hjorth said:

Does anyone hear anything in the speech by Mr. Vance below the three upper levels in Graham's Hierarchy of Disagreement? :

 

Watching the video at even 1.5x wasn't fast enough for me.

Here's the transcript for those that wants to digest it quicker.

 

Given the past history of Trump's interaction with the media and his attempts to void the results of a past election.  All I can think of is the deployment of this technique, and loyalty litmus tests in questioning the true motivation behind that speech.  If there are valid counter arguments, using the same three upper levels, I'd be glad to hear it.

[Spekulatius]

5 hours ago, Hektor said:

@Xerxes Thanks for this. I've looked at EB when looking at BWXT, which is a sub contractor/supplier to EB. BWXT is a monopoly of interest to me. It's always pricey :(. 

You could buy BWXT for 13-14 earnings when nobody was paying attention to defense stocks. These things go around in cycles.

[Sweet]

21 minutes ago, nsx5200 said:

Here's the transcript for those that wants to digest it quicker.

Vances is right.  I don’t know what happened to us in Europe.  We’ve really lost our way.

[Hektor]

21 minutes ago, Spekulatius said:

You could buy BWXT for 13-14 earnings when nobody was paying attention to defense stocks. These things go around in cycles.

I need to revisit this one.

[Spekulatius]

10 hours ago, nsx5200 said:

 

Watching the video at even 1.5x wasn't fast enough for me.

Here's the transcript for those that wants to digest it quicker.

 

Given the past history of Trump's interaction with the media and his attempts to void the results of a past election.  All I can think of is the deployment of this technique, and loyalty litmus tests in questioning the true motivation behind that speech.  If there are valid counter arguments, using the same three upper levels, I'd be glad to hear it.

I agree, Vance/Trump can hardly take the high ground here. Trump still claims to this day that he won the 2020 election against all evidence.

 

However, Vance also brings valid points, regarding freedom of expression as well as ignoring their citizens and voters. Those are real problems in the EU. Emigration is clearly something that people in Europe want to reign in so rather than say, this is a right wing agenda, the democratic parties need to take the people will into account and act accordingly, imo.

 

But since we are talking mainly the Ukraine war here, I am perplexed about Trumps approach to end the war by giving out a bunch of free concessions to the Russia to start and basically take away Ukraines agency while basically stating that aside from negotiation they will not back any guarantees. I guess he could taking away military aide, what makes him think that the stakeholders will actually follow through with the negotiated results? Without backing up the result, Trump has no agency to negotiate imo. Will Ukraine fall apart militarily if the US aide goes away? Maybe we will find out. For sure tariffs to Russia won’t work.

 

In any case, the questions for European leaders is - well you don’t like it? So what are you going to do about it?

 

 

Edited Saturday at 11:39 AM by Spekulatius

[John Hjorth]

10 hours ago, nsx5200 said:

Watching the video at even 1.5x wasn't fast enough for me.

Here's the transcript for those that wants to digest it quicker.

 

Given the past history of Trump's interaction with the media and his attempts to void the results of a past election.  All I can think of is the deployment of this technique, and loyalty litmus tests in questioning the true motivation behind that speech.  If there are valid counter arguments, using the same three upper levels, I'd be glad to hear it.

 

Thank you for an absolutely awesome post here, @nsx5200,

 

Very good points. One could also call it hypocrisy or the application of double standards.

 

It actually made my Saturday morning reading your post and the related stuff.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

Edit :

 

Also, please mind the actual narritive as discussion basis in the actual situation on the security conference in Munich contra latest known facts about defence spending by NATO member countries :

 

 

USA representatives states that Europe is the laggard and the culprit, while the fact is that USA is not even the frontrunner here, likely Canada also holding its head low in this ongoing discussion.

 

- - - o 0 o - - -

 

Pravda [Friday, 14 February 2025, 22:25] : Northern European leaders urgently meet on the sidelines of Munich Security Conference after Trump's statements.

 

Danish Prime Minister's Office [February 14 2025] : Joint Nordic-Baltic Leaders' Statement on Ukraine 14. February 2025 - Nordic-Baltic Leaders' Statement (Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Iceland, Latvia, Lithuania, Norway, Sweden).

 

Please note where you find these countries located in the graph above. Europe isen't just 'Europe' in this context, there are certainly shades and nuances to the situation, which there thus also should be to the discussion.

 

Edited Saturday at 11:18 AM by John Hjorth

[Charlie]

The germans federal president Steinmeiers speech from the Security Conference in Munich:

 

https://www.bundespraesident.de/SharedDocs/Reden/EN/Frank-Walter-Steinmeier/Reden/2025/250214-Munich-Security-Conference.html

 

 

Cheers!

[nsx5200]

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/zelenskyy-tells-aides-reject-trump-pitch-ukraine-mineral-reserves-rcna192426

"Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has told his aides to reject Trump administration officials' proposal that would grant the United States significant access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals...[as] a form of repayment for the support Washington has provided Kyiv since its war with Russia began"

"proposed the draft agreement, which would have granted the United States 50% ownership of Ukraine’s rare earth minerals...[,] titanium and iron ore, both of which are used to make a variety of technology products.  Many of the minerals, however, are in areas now controlled by Russian troops, according to U.S. officials."

 

It looks like Zelenskyy's found Ukraine's version of the silicon shield as a bargaining chip.  I hope Trump makes Russia give up at least those regions that are rich in the minerals that the US is interested in.  It'll give US some vested interest in keeping those region away from Russia's control, especially now that Russia is some form of China proxy.

[Xerxes]

20 minutes ago, nsx5200 said:

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/politics-news/zelenskyy-tells-aides-reject-trump-pitch-ukraine-mineral-reserves-rcna192426

"Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy has told his aides to reject Trump administration officials' proposal that would grant the United States significant access to Ukraine’s rare earth minerals...[as] a form of repayment for the support Washington has provided Kyiv since its war with Russia began"

"proposed the draft agreement, which would have granted the United States 50% ownership of Ukraine’s rare earth minerals...[,] titanium and iron ore, both of which are used to make a variety of technology products.  Many of the minerals, however, are in areas now controlled by Russian troops, according to U.S. officials."

 

It looks like Zelenskyy's found Ukraine's version of the silicon shield as a bargaining chip.  I hope Trump makes Russia give up at least those regions that are rich in the minerals that the US is interested in.  It'll give US some vested interest in keeping those region away from Russia's control, especially now that Russia is some form of China proxy.

imagine if Putin comes back with a counter offer:  I will give 60% control to the U.S. of rare earth in the Donbas (occupied by Russia or not) if U.S. formally recognize Russia’ annexation and halt all aides 

 

what a world 

[Pelagic]

This is to my knowledge the first time Ukraine has targeted a major oil pipeline, certainly the first successful strike on one. Ironically it primarily carries Kazakh oil through Russia for export from Novorossiysk. Crude export capabilities were a major red line under the Biden admin, he even had Harris discuss Ukraine's strikes on refineries last year at the Munich conference, asking them to focus their efforts on the battlefield rather than Russian energy assets. Perhaps a policy shift from Trump, perhaps Ukraine deciding to plot its own course. 

 

 

 

 

[Xerxes]

7 hours ago, Pelagic said:

This is to my knowledge the first time Ukraine has targeted a major oil pipeline, certainly the first successful strike on one. Ironically it primarily carries Kazakh oil through Russia for export from Novorossiysk. Crude export capabilities were a major red line under the Biden admin, he even had Harris discuss Ukraine's strikes on refineries last year at the Munich conference, asking them to focus their efforts on the battlefield rather than Russian energy assets. Perhaps a policy shift from Trump, perhaps Ukraine deciding to plot its own course.

 

 

The Enemy  [I mean, Zelenskyy]  gets a Vote too.

 

[Dinar]

22 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

 

The Enemy  [I mean, Zelenskyy]  gets a Vote too.

 

Could be the carrot and the stick approach.  If Moscow does not settle, Ukraine (with Western weapons) can apply more pressure + I think Trump/Vance/Rubio floated additional sanctions.  

[Xerxes]

Revealed: Trump's confidential plan to put Ukraine in a stranglehold

 

Donald Trump’s demand for a $500bn (£400bn) “payback” from Ukraine goes far beyond US control over the country’s critical minerals. It covers everything from ports and infrastructure to oil and gas, and the larger resource base of the country.

The terms of the contract that landed at Volodymyr Zelensky’s office a week ago amount to the US economic colonisation of Ukraine, in legal perpetuity. It implies a burden of reparations that cannot possibly be achieved. The document has caused consternation and panic in Kyiv.

 

The Telegraph has obtained a draft of the pre-decisional contract, marked “Privileged & Confidential’ and dated Feb 7 2025. It states that the US and Ukraine should form a joint investment fund to ensure that “hostile parties to the conflict do not benefit from the reconstruction of Ukraine”.

 

The agreement covers the “economic value associated with resources of Ukraine”, including “mineral resources, oil and gas resources, ports, other infrastructure (as agreed)”, leaving it unclear what else might be encompassed. “This agreement shall be governed by New York law, without regard to conflict of laws principles,” it states.

The US will take 50pc of recurring revenues received by Ukraine from extraction of resources, and 50pc of the financial value of “all new licences issued to third parties” for the future monetisation of resources. There will be “a lien on such revenues” in favour of the US. “That clause means ‘pay us first, and then feed your children’,” said one source close to the negotiations.

 

It states that “for all future licences, the US will have a right of first refusal for the purchase of exportable minerals”. Washington will have sovereign immunity and acquire near total control over most of Ukraine’s commodity and resource economy. The fund “shall have the exclusive right to establish the method, selection criteria, terms, and conditions” of all future licences and projects. And so forth, in this vein. It seems to have been written by private lawyers, not the US departments of state or commerce.

 

President Zelensky himself proposed the idea of giving the US a direct stake in Ukraine’s rare earth elements and critical minerals on a visit to Trump Tower in September, hoping to smooth the way for continued arms deliveries.

Volodymyr Zelensky proposed a US stake in Ukraine’s minerals production when he met Donald Trump in September 

 

He calculated that it would lead to US companies setting operations on the ground, creating a political tripwire that would deter Vladimir Putin from attacking again.

 

Some mineral basins are near the front line in eastern Ukraine, or in Russian-occupied areas. He has played up the dangers of letting strategic reserves of titanium, tungsten, uranium, graphite and rare earths fall into Russian hands. “If we are talking about a deal, then let’s do a deal, we are only for it,” he said.

 

He probably did not expect to be confronted with terms normally imposed on aggressor states defeated in war. They are worse than the financial penalties imposed on Germany and Japan after their defeat in 1945. Both countries were ultimately net recipients of funds from the victorious allies.

 

A new Versailles

 

If this draft were accepted, Trump’s demands would amount to a higher share of Ukrainian GDP than reparations imposed on Germany at the Versailles Treaty, later whittled down at the London Conference in 1921, and by the Dawes Plan in 1924. At the same time, he seems willing to let Russia off the hook entirely.

 

Donald Trump told Fox News that Ukraine had “essentially agreed” to hand over $500bn. “They have tremendously valuable land in terms of rare earths, in terms of oil and gas, in terms of other things,” he said.

He warned that Ukraine would be handed to Putin on a plate if it rejected the terms. “They may make a deal. They may not make a deal. They may be Russian someday, or they may not be Russian someday. But I want this money back,” he said.

 

Trump said the US had spent $300bn on the war so far, adding that it would be “stupid” to hand over any more. In fact the five packages agreed by Congress total $175bn, of which $70bn was spent in the US on weapons production. Some of it is in the form of humanitarian grants, but much of it is lend-lease money that must be repaid.

Republican Senator Lindsey Graham suggested at the Munich Security Conference over the weekend that Trump’s demand was a clever ploy to bolster declining popular support for the Ukrainian cause. “He can go to the American people and say, ‘Ukraine is not a burden, it is a benefit,’” he said.

 

Sen Graham told the Europeans to root hard for the idea because it locks Washington into defending a future settlement. “If we sign this minerals agreement, Putin is screwed, because Trump will defend the deal,” he said.

Ukrainian officials had to tiptoe though this minefield at the Munich forum, trying to smile gamely and talking up hopes of a resource deal while at the same pleading that the current text breaches Ukrainian law and needs redrafting. Well, indeed.

 

Talk of Ukraine’s resource wealth has become surreal. A figure of $26 trillion is being cast around for combined mineral reserves and hydrocarbons reserves. The sums are make-believe.

 

Ukraine probably has the largest lithium basin in Europe. But lithium prices have crashed by 88pc since the bubble burst in 2022. Large reserves are being discovered all over the world. The McDermitt Caldera in Nevada is thought to be the biggest lithium deposit on the planet with 40m metric tonnes, alone enough to catapult the US ahead of China.

The Thacker Pass project will be operational by next year. The value of lithium is in the processing and the downstream industries. Unprocessed rock deposits sitting in Ukraine are all but useless to the US.

It is a similar story for rare earths. They are not rare. Mining companies in the US abandoned the business in the 1990s because profit margins were then too low. The US government was asleep at the wheel and let this happen, waking up to discover that China has acquired a strategic stranglehold over supplies of critical elements needed for hi-tech and advanced weapons. That problem is being resolved.

Ukraine has cobalt but most EV batteries now use lithium ferrous phosphate and no longer need cobalt. Furthermore, sodium-ion and sulphur-based batteries will limit the future demand growth for lithium. So will recycling. One could go on. The mineral scarcity story is wildly exaggerated.

As for Ukraine’s shale gas, a) some of the Yuzivska field lies under Putin control, and b) the western Carpathian reserves are in complex geology with high drilling costs, causing Chevron to pull out, just as it did in Poland. Ukraine has more potential as an exporter of electricity to Europe from renewables and nuclear expansion, but that is not what is on Donald Trump’s mind.

The second violation of Ukraine

Ukraine cannot possibly meet his $500bn demand in any meaningful timeframe, leaving aside the larger matter of whether it is honourable to treat a victim nation in this fashion after it has held the battle line for the liberal democracies at enormous sacrifice for three years. Who really has a debt to whom, may one ask?

“My style of dealmaking is quite simple and straightforward,” says Trump in his book The Art of the Deal. “I aim very high, and then I just keep pushing and pushing and pushing to get what I’m after.”

In genuine commerce the other side can usually walk away. Trump’s demand is iron-fist coercion by a neo-imperial power against a weaker nation with its back to the wall, and all for a commodity bonanza that exists chiefly in Trump’s head.

 

“Often-times the best deal you make is the deal you don’t make,” said Trump, offering another of his pearls.

Zelensky does not have that luxury. He has to pick between the military violation of Ukraine by Putin, and the economic violation of Ukraine by his own ally.

[John Hjorth]

Upon the MSC2025 conference, I was this morning met by the following cartoon on JP.dk - what a great start on the day!  :

 

[changegonnacome]

Interesting times - and have many thoughts on this....

 

Strategically the US to seemingly save a few lousy bucks......with this defacto withdrawal from NATO/Europe is being 'penny wise pound foolish' move IMO - making monkeys out of the European's to supposedly 'pivot' to Asia is simply short sighted and makes a kind of mockery of the pivot to Asia strategy itself......hitting Europe with tariffs would be doubly so....dont really want to get into the politcs of this....but its consistent with my view that Trump/Hegseth have a very limited framework for how they think about the complexity of international security....which one would expect from a Manhattan real estate developer turned TV personality turned US president...and a foot soldier turned Fox TV personality turned United States Secretary of Defense. 

 

See Europe's lack of military capability is/was a feature not a bug of NATO.....Europe's lack of  strategic autonomy i.e. their complete dependence on the US from a military/security umbrella standpoint -  is what makes them such beautiful subservient partners to overarching global dominance of US foreign policy.....Europe for the longest time has had an overwhelming incentive to go along with whatever hair brained scheme the American's came up with whether that's economic (sanctions, tariffs on China or withholding technology from China (ASML)) or military (Iraq, Afghanistan etc.).......pivoting to Asia.....which is a containment strategy around China not moving out beyond the first island chain is enhanced by the US having effective strategic (military & trade) oversight over the world's wealthiest aggregate economic block of consumers.....the US has 331 million wealthy buyers of Chinese goods which is great leverage......but the EU (with the UK) has ~540m first world wealthy consumers......the combined leverage against mercantilist China is simply immense.....a fracturing of the US/EU coalition in anyway is a good day for Beijing.....China's aim is to maximize its relative power within the global system.....the European's peeling away from the Americans which one can envisage on foot of this Ukraine pivot with potential tariffs to follow.....increases China's relative power in the system while diminishing the US's.....this is not how you run a railroad folks!

 

Now in regards to the Ukraine:

 

The reality for those paying attention is that in a very real sense the Western coalition lost the war in the Ukraine perhaps 18 months ago.......there's no doubt that Russia now and for many months now has had the upper hand on the battlefield and most importantly has the will and the capacity to continue the offensive indefinitely. The same can not be said for Ukraine....most importantly they are running out of men......next they are running out of artillery (as the Russian artillery absolute advantage grows)....and most importantly they are running out of 'partners' who are willing to bankroll the whole thing. 

 

This was all depressingly predictable. For all our hot air in the 'West' about "Adolf Putin" - Russia proved that it cared more about the conflict than we did..how could they not care more?...many pages back in this thread I pointed this out...Ukraine is/was a side project for the EU/USA......a kind of liberal democratic nation building project that liberals are so enamoured with but fail at time and time again........nobody in the core EU ever seriously considered the threat inflation of the Biden rhetoric of Russia marching on Warsaw, then Berlin to be anything other than good old threat inflation.

 

For Russia - the Ukraine is and always will be existential.......perseverance which is measure of how much one cares about something......remains the most under-appreciated factor in most military conflicts......and the most consistent mistake in international security and conflict frameworks is the complete over-estimation of military power to effect strategic goals......ask the American's in Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam etc. or the British in its various colonies...or the Israeli's in Gaza/West Bank/Lebanon.......I'm not sure how many times folks need to be taught this lesson.....but in the era of nationalism there are profound limitations to hard power.

 

The reality in the war in Ukraine is that Russia expanded their military industrial base commensurate to how much they cared about their strategic objectives..........and we in the West with our 'We Stand with Ukraine' flags & all the puffery from European and US leaders never truly matched our rhetoric with concrete military industrial actions. For example by late 2024, many analysts noted that Russia was manufacturing more ammunition than all NATO countries combined – reportedly about 7× the West’s monthly output. Importantly the asymmetry in terms of artillery capability occured after the invasion of March 2022 and not before it.....the West wasn't blindsided by some secret Russian build up of artillery capability....it happened in plain sight with Ukraine's military reporting privately and publicly to its partners the growing asymmetry on the battlefield. The reality as evidenced by the hard reality of artillery production capability is that we simply didn't care enough about what happened to Ukraine on the battlefield. Its depressing but true - as I said many pages back and to mangle the Buffet adage - you shouldn't get involved in a war for twenty seconds that you wouldn't be happy to be involved in for twenty years. 

 

 

Edited 4 hours ago by changegonnacome

[Dinar]

@changegonnacome, I agree with you, except for one thing: it's not perseverance, it's the West's unwilligness to do what has been done since time immemorial - violence and population transfers.  It was easy to win the Afghan war, just kill them all!  (For the record, I am not advocating for the US to have done it, but it should have been killing 10,000 Afghans a day until Taliban handed over Bin Laden & Co!).   Similarly in Gaza/Judea and Samaria (West Bank technically includes Israel pre-1967 borders)/Lebanon, just transfer the populations to Syria, and end the problem.  This was done time immemorial, and in the 20th century Turks massacred millions of Greeks and Armenians and kicked them out of lands that they lived on for at least 3,000 years.  Germans were kicked out of Sudetenland, and Koenisberg, etc...

The problem is not the unwillingness to fight, the problem is not willing to be sufficiently brutal to ensure victory.  

 

[Spekulatius]

Essentially, NATO has been split apart and Europe needs to find a way on their own.

 

If Europe doesn’t arm itself, they have a combined Russian/ Chinese force on their door knocking in a couple of years making nuclear threats.

 

Some understand this but many do not yet. Welcome to the multipolar world.

[cubsfan]

1 hour ago, changegonnacome said:

Interesting times - and have many thoughts on this....

 

Strategically the US to seemingly save a few lousy bucks......with this defacto withdrawal from NATO/Europe is being 'penny wise pound foolish' move IMO - making monkeys out of the European's to supposedly 'pivot' to Asia is simply short sighted and makes a kind of mockery of the pivot to Asia strategy itself......hitting Europe with tariffs would be doubly so....dont really want to get into the politcs of this....but its consistent with my view that Trump/Hegseth have a very limited framework for how they think about the complexity of international security....which one would expect from a Manhattan real estate developer turned TV personality turned US president...and a foot soldier turned Fox TV personality turned United States Secretary of Defense. 

 

See Europe's lack of military capability is/was a feature not a bug of NATO.....Europe's lack of  strategic autonomy i.e. their complete dependence on the US from a military/security umbrella standpoint -  is what makes them such beautiful subservient partners to overarching global dominance of US foreign policy.....Europe for the longest time has had an overwhelming incentive to go along with whatever hair brained scheme the American's came up with whether that's economic (sanctions, tariffs on China or withholding technology from China (ASML)) or military (Iraq, Afghanistan etc.).......pivoting to Asia.....which is a containment strategy around China not moving out beyond the first island chain is enhanced by the US having effective strategic (military & trade) oversight over the world's wealthiest aggregate economic block of consumers.....the US has 331 million wealthy buyers of Chinese goods which is great leverage......but the EU (with the UK) has ~540m first world wealthy consumers......the combined leverage against mercantilist China is simply immense.....a fracturing of the US/EU coalition in anyway is a good day for Beijing.....China's aim is to maximize its relative power within the global system.....the European's peeling away from the Americans which one can envisage on foot of this Ukraine pivot with potential tariffs to follow.....increases China's relative power in the system while diminishing the US's.....this is not how you run a railroad folks!

 

Now in regards to the Ukraine:

 

The reality for those paying attention is that in a very real sense the Western coalition lost the war in the Ukraine perhaps 18 months ago.......there's no doubt that Russia now and for many months now has had the upper hand on the battlefield and most importantly has the will and the capacity to continue the offensive indefinitely. The same can not be said for Ukraine....most importantly they are running out of men......next they are running out of artillery (as the Russian artillery absolute advantage grows)....and most importantly they are running out of 'partners' who are willing to bankroll the whole thing. 

 

This was all depressingly predictable. For all our hot air in the 'West' about "Adolf Putin" - Russia proved that it cared more about the conflict than we did..how could they not care more?...many pages back in this thread I pointed this out...Ukraine is/was a side project for the EU/USA......a kind of liberal democratic nation building project that liberals are so enamoured with but fail at time and time again........nobody in the core EU ever seriously considered the threat inflation of the Biden rhetoric of Russia marching on Warsaw, then Berlin to be anything other than good old threat inflation.

 

For Russia - the Ukraine is and always will be existential.......perseverance which is measure of how much one cares about something......remains the most under-appreciated factor in most military conflicts......and the most consistent mistake in international security and conflict frameworks is the complete over-estimation of military power to effect strategic goals......ask the American's in Afghanistan, Iraq, Vietnam etc. or the British in its various colonies...or the Israeli's in Gaza/West Bank/Lebanon.......I'm not sure how many times folks need to be taught this lesson.....but in the era of nationalism there are profound limitations to hard power.

 

The reality in the war in Ukraine is that Russia expanded their military industrial base commensurate to how much they cared about their strategic objectives..........and we in the West with our 'We Stand with Ukraine' flags & all the puffery from European and US leaders never truly matched our rhetoric with concrete military industrial actions. For example by late 2024, many analysts noted that Russia was manufacturing more ammunition than all NATO countries combined – reportedly about 7× the West’s monthly output. Importantly the asymmetry in terms of artillery capability occured after the invasion of March 2022 and not before it.....the West wasn't blindsided by some secret Russian build up of artillery capability....it happened in plain sight with Ukraine's military reporting privately and publicly to its partners the growing asymmetry on the battlefield. The reality as evidenced by the hard reality of artillery production capability is that we simply didn't care enough about what happened to Ukraine on the battlefield. Its depressing but true - as I said many pages back and to mangle the Buffet adage - you shouldn't get involved in a war for twenty seconds that you wouldn't be happy to be involved in for twenty years. 

 

 

 

I remember your posts on this subject very well 18 months ago - and you certainly called it correctly regarding Russia's goal to keep NATO out of Ukraine. You also called the stalemate due to displacing a dug in Russia and production of artillery. 

 

At the current time, Europe has to swallow a tough pill: If Europe is so concerned about future Russian aggression - then why are they not scaling up their defense spending dramatically?

The Europeans have had 3 years to do it - yet - they want the USA to carry the burden.

 

The current President's message is clear: The USA will be an ally against Russia - but the Europeans need to shoulder the burden of spending. It could not be more obvious.

 

The USA has a $37B deficit while funding to protect the borders of Europe, without protecting our own borders. The President is making a pragmatic and popular decision among Americans.

The tide is turning on Europe -and if they wish to self-destruct with minimal defense spending and out of control immigration - the USA is going to stand by and watch with this new adminstration.

 

After the JD Vance speech, the flunkies at the Munich conference acted so immature about "protecting democracy" while shutting down the most important values of a democracy - free speech -  and free and fair elections across much of Europe.

[Xerxes]

In couple of years time, Warsaw will have a nuclear weapon. It is clear. How else does one protect itself.  

 

Many refer to UK as an European nuclear power. I somewhat disagree. Only France has truly sovereign control over its nuclear arsenal while UK’ arsenal is subordinated to US to a certain degree. 

[John Hjorth]

17 minutes ago, cubsfan said:

 ... The USA has a $37B deficit while funding to protect the borders of Europe, without protecting our own borders.  ...

 

... After the JD Vance speech, the flunkies at the Munich conference acted so immature about "protecting democracy" while shutting down the most important values of a democracy - free speech -  and free and fair elections across much of Europe. ...

 

Mike [ @cubsfan ],

 

Why do you continue to derail this topic with these kinds of political nonsense and *BS*, not related to the war we discuss here? To me, by doing so, you are playing with the posting privileges of others in this topic, who can stay on topic here.

[cubsfan]

25 minutes ago, John Hjorth said:

 

Mike [ @cubsfan ],

 

Why do you continue to derail this topic with these kinds of political nonsense and *BS*, not related to the war we discuss here? To me, by doing so, you are playing with the posting privileges of others in this topic, who can stay on topic here.

 

....Says the guy posting offensive political cartoons for all to see.

 

Keep it up John.

Edited 2 hours ago by cubsfan

[changegonnacome]

1 hour ago, Spekulatius said:

Europe doesn’t arm itself,

 

Yes that's the obvious answer...Europe should load up on weapons......the issue with re-arming Europe is like the person who buys a gun to protect his family from somebody breaking into their home.....not realizing that by bringing a lethal weapon into his house he's made his family statistically less safe, not more safe.

 

See the other, somewhat unarticulated, purpose of NATO for many years.......was to create a security umbrella under which European players but mainly France & Germany had no need to build up a military defensive capabilities. This type of re-arming is exactly how the continent has been wrecked twice in the last hundred years or so.

 

European history is the story of nations—especially France and Germany—expanding their military capabilities in the name of defense.....the issue here however is that external parties defensive military investments are kind of indistinguishable from offensive investments because its impossible to know the full intent of another countries leadership or more impossible still it's impossible to know the intent of future political leaders whom may come to power in those countries. This is important as say for example the far right in Germany seems to be gaining political traction.

 

Security competitions but lets call it defense spending, as I've described, has a way of breaking out into full blown military conflicts because as at a certain point one party reasons that the best defense is a good offense and so they should strike first to gain a desceive military advantage over their competitor.

 

Perhaps Europe can build a military capability that is abstracted away from a France or Germany and sits at a supra-national level - and if that's possible it should desperately try to build out this European Defense Force - the only issue remains that the EU construct is quite a weak foundation I think.....when push comes to shove....old habits die hard and I dont see in Europe a European nationalism like I do in the US.......I see 27 distinct nations....who've pooled some sovereignty for economic upside but I see very very little pooling of national identity into an overarching European one.....no child in Europe goes to school in the morning and pledges their allegiance to the United States of Europe....this is a big problem if individual nations in Europe go on a spending spree in the name of national defense..........nations & persistent nationalism are forged in the fire....perhaps a United States of Europe will be created when Putin & Xi's armies pour across the borders of Belarus into Poland and beyond but at this point I dont see it.......Europe at this point IMO is more likely to fragment than to come together to create a European Defense Force......I see little Brexit's everywhere I look in Europe right now  

[cubsfan]

4 minutes ago, changegonnacome said:

 

Yes that's the obvious answer...Europe should load up on weapons......the issue with re-arming Europe is like the person who buys a gun to protect his family from somebody breaking into their home.....not realizing that by bringing a lethal weapon into his house he's made his family statistically less safe, not more safe.

 

See the other, somewhat unarticulated, purpose of NATO for many years.......was to create a security umbrella under which European players but mainly France & Germany had no need to build up a military defensive capabilities. This type of re-arming is exactly how the continent has been wrecked twice in the last hundred years or so.

 

European history is the story of nations—especially France and Germany—expanding their military capabilities in the name of defense.....the issue here however is that external parties defensive military investments are kind of indistinguishable from offensive investments because its impossible to know the full intent of another countries leadership or more impossible still it's impossible to know the intent of future political leaders whom may come to power in those countries. This is important as say for example the far right in Germany seems to be gaining political traction.

 

Security competitions but lets call it defense spending, as I've described, has a way of breaking out into full blown military conflicts because as at a certain point one party reasons that the best defense is a good offense and so they should strike first to gain a desceive military advantage over their competitor.

 

Perhaps Europe can build a military capability that is abstracted away from a France or Germany and sits at a supra-national level - and if that's possible it should desperately try to build out this European Defense Force - the only issue remains that the EU construct is quite a weak foundation I think.....when push comes to shove....old habits die hard and I dont see in Europe a European nationalism like I do in the US.......I see 27 distinct nations....who've pooled some sovereignty for economic upside but I see very very little pooling of national identity into an overarching European one.....no child in Europe goes to school in the morning and pledges their allegiance to the United States of Europe....this is a big problem if individual nations in Europe go on a spending spree in the name of national defense..........nations & persistent nationalism are forged in the fire....perhaps a United States of Europe will be created when Putin & Xi's armies pour across the borders of Belarus into Poland and beyond but at this point I dont see it.......Europe at this point IMO is more likely to fragment than to come together to create a European Defense Force......I see little Brexit's everywhere I look in Europe right now  

 

Brilliant.

 

I wish the Europeans the best of luck - as you say, they face very difficult decisions regarding the future of their continent given the tightrope they attempt to walk.  New leadership is required for an effective defense.

[changegonnacome]

53 minutes ago, Xerxes said:

In couple of years time, Warsaw will have a nuclear weapon. It is clear. How else does one protect itself.  

 

Absolutely - Ukraine would not be in the situation its in today if it did not foolishly believe the USA and UK's assurances around security guarantees giving up its 1200 nukesor whatever it was and signing the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons in exchange for verbal vibe assurances around its borders. Deeply deeply foolish move by the Urkanian leadership at the time.

 

The post-WWII ideal of nuclear non-proliferation was completely correct and again back to my point about the short sightedness of these Trump/Hegseth moves......you dismantle the global security architecture (however imperfect/costly) at your peril .....in the nuclear age the concept of national security for a superpower via isolationism is quaint & naive......a concept from a time when the world didn't have ICBM's and 100 megaton bombs ...the US withdrawing into itself and away from Kissinger-esque stable equilibriums or balances of power which manifest themselves in supra-national organizaitons.....really does not enhance the safety of Americans, it makes them less safe over the long pull...in a world without rules with no cop on the beat so to speak.....nuclear proliferation is now the logical default position for any sovereign nation.....that looks at the rules based system (NATO, UN, WTO etc.) being sidelined or completely deconstructed by Trump.

 

I admire what Trump is doing in terms regulation, the deficit and backing us philosophically out of this crazy woke cul-de-sac we were in I actually applaud him on these polcies.... but as it relates to foreign policy (tarriffs on allies, UN/WTO/NATO) I must say I dont see a President optimizing for America's interests over the long pull.....I see a guy smashing away at a load bearing wall with no plan for what's going to hold up the roof up after he's done with the wall.