Source?
Scroll up 10 posts.
Of the $23B Europe is sending to Russia for the purchase and delivery of fossil fuels, how much would be available for Russia to use to further its war effort, and how much is required to pay for the labor and infrastructure that facilitates the extraction, processing, and delivery of those fossil fuels?
Impossible to be sure. Russia undoubtedly has good margins on the fuels, though, and if they aren’t selling them then they’d be letting capital equipment (and maybe some workers) go idle. So the income could be higher than just the gross margins. Anyway, it’s probably true that the net difference isn’t quite in Putin’s favor, once you account for all these things; nevertheless, it’s still true that many billions of dollars are going to fund the war effort. And also that Europe would be in better shape had they not shut down 37 nuclear reactors (IN A ROW!?):
Yet another thoughtful and timely gift from Trump to Putin:
The US has cut off intelligence-sharing with Kyiv in a move that could seriously hamper the Ukrainian military’s ability to target Russian forces, according to officials familiar with the matter.
It’s a quick read, but worth it. It … gets worse.
One has to wonder how that’s going over with the U.S. personnel doing the actual work of sharing the intelligence, coordinating with their opposite numbers in Ukraine.
Doesn’t matter. They’ll all going to be fired anyway,
Doesn’t that depend on whether the people gathering, analyzing, and sharing the intelligence are military or civilian?
The Americans to really feel sorry for are agents embedded in Russia. They must know their identity will be given up soon, if it hasn’t already; whether through malice or incompetence or both.
Worth mentioning … following talks today, Ukraine has agreed to a 30-day ceasefire. Russia has not yet, but following Ukraine’s agreement, intel sharing and military aid to Ukraine has resumed:
So now Russia will agree to a ceasefire and within a few weeks will engineer a reason to break it and blame Ukraine. Trump will fall for it hook line and sinker and we will be back to square one.
“Nobody could have seen that coming!” says everyone on Fox News.
Stranger
Sadly, that’s not a stretch. I wish Trump didn’t have his tiny, filthy hands on it. Him receiving Nobel Peace Prize might just push me right over the edge.
Is there an Ig Nobel peace prize?
Sadly, if Putin and Trump were playing chess, Putin would be rapidly moving towards checkmate while Trump would have to be constantly instructed on how the pieces are supposed to move, and would eventually attempt to eat his king piece because the black looks like licorice.
But I have to hope that there are still enough sensible people left within the executive branch and the senior ranks of the military to provide sensible advice and see through the (almost inevitable) Russian ruse. Putin truly is a master of cunning, and that’s no exaggeration, while Trump probably needs help tying his shoes.
Yes, it is just the Nobel Peace Prize. Like the photon, it is its own anti-prize.
Marco Rubio is just one man, and a kind of pathetic, mealy-mouthed one at that. His backbone has already been surgically removed; you don’t expect him to carry the entire weight of Trump and Musk on his narrow, bowed shoulders, do you?
Stranger
Actual humans on the prize committee have to give it to him, and something tells me that they would be disinclined to do so. Forever.
Again, not a Putin fan, and I think he is willing to do anything to advance his goals, no matter how evil or devious.
But would it make sense for him to attack Ukraine again in a few weeks? I think the point would be for him to play a bit longer game than that: i.e., rebuild and attack again in a few years.
Also, isn’t a ceasefire agreement predicated on the goal of eventually signing a long-term peace agreement?
If Putin does wait we might face a kind of weird race between Europe and Russia as Russia rearms as quickly as possible using a big percentage of its GDP while Europe ramps up it’s defence capabilities without breaking their own economies and upsetting voters. I’m not sure how long Russia can keep it going like this, but surely the longer term would give the advantage to Europe which is currently under-prepared due to its reliance on the US providing elements of support (this was by design and encouraged by previous US Presidents but seems really stupid now). So if Russia wants to go up against Europe its best chance is now - presuming they can rely on the US turning its back on Europe.
I wonder if Russia will try to test NATO soon with some micro aggression against a minor NATO member? When the US doesn’t answer the article 5 call, NATO will be undermined. Putin must be considering whether this will work.
That makes sense.
Right, and I suppose it would depend on how the sanctions are stepped down, etc.
Well, Peter Zeihan has said that one big reason for Russia to launch invasion in 2022 was that its demographics are so bad that this was essentially its last chance to do it with sufficient manpower. That situation obviously hasn’t improved.
Putin has to decide which thing gives him the better chance of rebuilding the USSR: keep grinding as he is now, or take a break and attack later. Even though the latter gives him a very poor chance, it at least leaves him some chance, so my guess is that he will go for that.
Despite some here who think I am a Russian asset for saying this kind of thing, I think it’s better for Ukraine as well (and better for Ukraine than it is for Russia), since they can rebuild and regroup as well, but they have better resources than Russia (Europe and hopefully the US behind them). Putin will be gone eventually, and I doubt that Russia will come up with as effective and evil a leader as he. The Ukraine can work diplomatically to get back their lost land. Not easy, but possible over time.
So I have inferred that some in this thread think that the only desirable and acceptable option for Ukraine at this point is to be loaded up with weapons and push Russia out totally. That’s problematic in two ways. One, despite the fact that the land until recently was Ukraine’s, it would now be an offensive war, which is, ceteris paribus, much harder and more costly to wage. Does anyone here think that would not cost tens of thousands, if not hundreds of thousands, of additional lives? Two, succeeding runs the risk of putting Rat Putin in a corner and having him do something impulsive, crazy, and bad. Getting a ceasefire and playing the long game would seem to minimize that risk.
No way. He’s too weak. NATO could blow away his entire military in short order, and then he really would have to choose whether to push the nuclear button. I don’t think that would be Putin-style risk-taking.