I believe that considerations from ALL parties, has been primarily to prevent that "potential global humanitarian disaster", rather than any direct business,.... business. Not for any altruistic motive; but because everyone knows, and fears, how food and fuel shortages impact populations everywhere, and put match to fuze everytime.....
The West/Ukraine and Russia don't seem interested in a negotiated peace that either can stomach. The longer the war goes on the worse that'll become. No good outcomes loom on the horizon. Maybe we'll hand Henry Kissinger a bottle of multi-vitamins and send him in to square things away like he did in Paris from 1968-1973.
Ukraine & Russia were working on an agreement but Boris Johnson blew that up.
Like Mearshimer predicted, Ukraine is getting wrecked. And since Russia can find no honest partner to negotiate with, they will continue wrecking Ukraine until their security issues are solved.
Europe is one cold, dark , hungry winter from making some fundamental changes.
Nixon's campaign promise in 1968 was to end the Vietnam War. In the end, Kissinger delivered "Peace with Honor" in 1973 and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for it that same year. It was, of course, lipstick on a pig. Vietnam fell in 1975. When I said "square things away" I was, in my mind, comparing the tidy, if long drawn out, ending of the Vietnam War to the precipitous peace we got in Afghanistan. I like "tidy". Both were debacles, the latter more immediately recognizable as such. I tried to put "square things away" in italics facetiously, but couldn't. Hence, the miscommunication. But for all that, my comment failed. Shouldn't have used Kissinger...I want a precipitous end to the Russ-Uke War. I'd even fund the lipstick.
Nixon/Kissinger did indeed keep his promise, bent rules, worked hard and dang if he didn't end the useless war, I think maybe that is why he was hounded out of office, everyone with a brain wanted that war to end, What We wanted was Our POW's back, and breathing room to let nature take it's course.
It was lipstick on a pig and I understand the square things away LOL.
I too want an end to the war in Ukraine, but if those two Nations want to fight it out, we need to step back and let it happen.
Putin is not interested in "negotiation." The Ukrainians came to the table in Turkey last year and all they got from Putin was surrender terms. Take it or leave it. The Ukrainians walked, and rightly so.
The only negotiations that Putin would stand for is something that would allow him to keep what he has stolen. That has not been acceptable since the late 30s. Putin will simply wait a bit, rebuild, then restart the war.
This is an ignobel (sic) and wicked war, QM. Who can read Putin's mind? I can't even read Zelensky's mind. He might be a patriot, a hero of the Motherland or he might be a useful tool in the Great Game, albeit at the extreme western fringe of the game. But it seems for sure that the West wants no negotiations and that Ukraine was pretty spotty about living up to the Minsk Agreements. As is, this war will be over after the last Ukrainian soldier is killed or a week into a global nuclear exchange. Sane people would be negotiating both side's concerns right now.
Putin has stated his goals. Peter Zeihan has dealt with them in a presentation he gave to a group of Officers at Fort Benning last year. One does not have to read his mind, you just have to listen to what he has said. A number of reliable sources have dealt with the issue of what is going on in the Kremlin. Peter Zeihan is just one, and he is probably the best informed of what is going on over there.
The problem with "negotiations" is that the end result is allowing Putin to keep what he stole. That is not acceptable and hasn't been for many years. Putin is much like Hitler. he dictates what he wants, and that is the negotiation. Cowardice never got anyone anything other than defeat. What you stand for has been known as appeasement.
Which team has Nazi's fighting on their side? Pre-war from 2014, which side failed to live up to the negotiated Minsk Agreements? "Hitler, cowardice, appeasement"? Some left-handed reference to the Sudetenland in 1938? Germany Hungary and Poland gobbled that up. I stand by my innocuous opinion, friend.
1. Russia. Ukraine has no influential "Nazis" while Russia is loaded with them.
2. Once again, Russia. Puin claimed to be a gurantor, yet he was the guy shipping in mercenaries and heavy weapons, while Ukraine kept the forbidden heavy weapons out of range.
2. Appeasement is exactly what you are pushing. Your opinion is anything but innocuous. Stand by the lies all you like. You aren't my friend even in a sarcastic sense. I do not accept appeasers as anything like a friend.
The problem is Zelensky is defending a country from an invader that gave terms that amount to giving up the country. Zelensky's terms were unacceptable to Putin because he would not have gotten to keep what he stole. That is the difference. And Putin's terms are not acceptable under international law.
Zelensky is correct. Putin will not stop at Ukraine. He has other goals and Ukraine is simply in the way of the long range goals. Putin had no intention to negotiate. He wants what he wants, and will get it, or the fight goes on. He' is no better than Hitler in that regard. He has taken a number of pages from Hitler's play book.
Hopefully our Deep State POTUS handler are ignorant of history. During the Iran /Iraq tanker war:
"In December 1986, Kuwait's government asked the Reagan administration to send the U.S. Navy to protect Kuwaiti tankers against Iranian attacks.[4] U.S. law forbade the use of navy ships to escort civilian vessels under a foreign flag,[citation needed] so the Kuwaiti ships were re-registered under the U.S. flag. Even before Earnest Will formally began, it became clear how dangerous Persian Gulf operations would be. On 17 May 1987, an Iraqi F-1 Mirage fired two Exocet missiles at the guided missile frigate USS Stark, killing 37 sailors and injuring 21. Iraqi officials said that the targeting of the U.S. warship was accidental"
True, but also polishing a couple CMoHs. I should read "War is a Racket" again. The first time through I was decades more naïve than I am now, and found much with which to disagree.
Your two explanations here are, I think, broadly correct: it's about moderating global commodity prices. The Europeans are also broadly neutral because it is in their interest to be neutral. NATO is supposed to be a defensive alliance per the text of the treaty itself. It is not supposed to be an offensive pact that requires all parties to intervene when a third party to the treaty is attacked. But that is not what the US wants NATO to be. There's a gap between what it is, legally, and what the US wants it to be, practically, which is an extension of its own will.
This issue is similar to the issues faced by the Allies during WW2. Triangular trade with Germany thrived throughout WW2 because there were so many "gaps" with neutral countries. The kind of relatively effective blockade of WW1 was not possible because Germany had France by 1940 and much of Eastern Europe by late 1941. That type of geography issue is also a problem today like it was then. The Black Sea was (not coincidentally) a major avenue for imports destined for Germany. Ending that trade was one of the main motivations for the Italian campaign in 1943; it's why Stalin was so fervent in demanding it. The only way to stop neutral countries from trading with an enemy is to end their neutrality by attacking them. The US doesn't want to do that and can't really do that officially apart from looking the other way when mysterious frogmen blow up pipelines.
Power is a drug, just as potent as any opioid. The problem is that most POTUS teams tend to have addictive personalities, that is, a personality and/or psychological chemistry that makes them more likely to get drunk on power. We keep telling U.S. presidents they are the most powerful men on earth, so they act like it and try to make the world over in a way that benefits them, either as a means of staying “important” on the world stage (Carter, Clinton, Bush, Obama) or financially (Biden). We need a person in he Oval Office who, in the middle of one of those inwardly focused discussions, will pull out an aerosol boat horn simply to stop the insanity.
Just like the Russian Captain that kept all the lights on, inviting a drone attack, our elected “leaders” never seem to ask just how badly the other country might respond to our actions. As an example, my bet is that a lot of folk in D.C. were shocked to find a joint PRC-Russian task force off Alaska after all of those passes we’ve made thru the China Sea. Dumb as a box of rocks to not see that one coming.
The other issue re: your point on leadership is that our leaders are not very good anymore, which is not a novel problem in history, but it tends to be "solved" by the emergence of Napoleons, Cromwells, the various 1930s moustache men, Caesars, Pompeys, Alexanders, and Alciabadeses. There are only so many puppet governments with a childlike emperor that you can go through before someone picks up the scepter lying in the gutter.
One problem that we have now is perhaps that everyone knows that this situation is headed for a much larger war, but the steps that might avert it would be so shocking to everything -- currencies, economies, cultures, etc. -- that it is easier for leaders to say "whoops, my bad, didn't see that coming" after the catastrophe than it is for them to be proactive. Same thing we see here with Ukraine. It is easier for the American mandarinate to spend a lot of other people's money on a doomed campaign until it fails and then to say "oops, at least we were all wrong together."
As we on this blog understand, leadership is almost always learned in a “real life, tough” environment. And we haven’t had a president with that background since George Bush Sr. Surely we can find someone with actual real world pointy end of the spear experience.
I don't know that anyone truly capable in a leadership sense would take the job anymore. I'm in for Trump because he wears his flaws on his sleeve.
I think the "deep state," for lack of a better term, wanted Bush (85-93, but Reagan survived), Clinton (93-01), Bush (01-09), Clinton (09-17, but Obama lurched Left and popular too fast), Bush (17-25, but the reaction to Obama's Lurch Left allowed us to get Trump in).
Totally agree. I was just pointing out the likelihood that the Potomac Fleet (or White House) hadn’t expected any sort of physical pushback. But it must be pointed out that the joint PRC-Russian task group stayed out of US territorial waters. So far, PRC has yet to declare the South China Sea to be territorial waters, so they are abiding by those rules, if not that whole “Let’s set up an armed island” thing. Latest I heard in that regard was a PRC Coast Guard cutter trying to intimidate a Republic of the Philippines vessel re-supplying a disputed reef that RP has manned.
While they may not have declared the SCS as territorial waters, they do claim it as theirs and react stiffly to incursions from those neighboring the waters. They whine when we enter and cross, but that's about all they do. They know they are in no position to make anything stick at this point.
Agree - at this point. My concern is that the PLAN will get developed to the point, and the PRC Admirals will get nervy enough, that something kinetic will develop. If we have a weak, wannabe, don’t-plan-past-this-afternoon sort of President that day, or could be Katie bar the door.
I would not count on China to follow any rules it does not want to follow. They have been in flagrant violation of a number of treaties (anyone admit to remembering UNCLOS?) including WTO, for decades. They seem to be a believer in the classic "Might makes right" school of international relations.
They have to follow one hegemony or another, so they pick the one that matches their inclinations and interests. 15 million people total across both countries, both of which have had a lot of issues with Russia in the past (to say the least), so they're backing away from Cold War ambiguity. It's not really Russia's leadership that matters: China is the leader. Russia is the follower to China's emerging hegemony.
If the problem was just Russia, this would all be pretty easy, wouldn't it?
Some 78 percent of Finns have a positive attitude toward NATO membership and more than half are of the opinion that Finland should be open to all cooperation within NATO, including having military bases located inside Finland, according to a survey by the Finnish Business and Policy Forum EVA. The survey, released on November 23, said 8 percent of Finns have a negative attitude toward joining the Western security alliance, while 10 percent had a neutral position. In March 2022, when the previous EVA survey on NATO membership was carried out, 60 percent of Finns supported joining.
I wonder if the 8 and 10 percent are the ones who saw the pictures of Germans bring broomsticks instead of rifles to exercises a few years back. /s
I can see why Finland would want powerful friends who at least pay lip-service to a tradition of western values and personal freedoms. I'm not sure they are getting all that they envision at this point. Poland seems to have their heads screwed on solidly, but I wonder about the rest of us.
It’s odd how Airbus said they would, finally stop buying Titanium forgings from the Russian government but never issued a press release proclaiming they they have.
I think we mine titanium, we just don’t refine it. There are at least three processes and I’m pretty sure at least one is less messy that the one in Henderson.
We do have a handful of mines and they are not used as feedstock to refine to the metal form. There are groups in the US that certainly do not wish to see the expansion of mining or the re-booting of metal refinement. Better to rely on Japan (who just happens to be within PLA missile radius).
"Currently, the only place in the U.S. where titanium is mined is along an 80-mile swath of land stretching from North Florida to South Georgia, and none of that titanium ends its life as the metal used for national defense purposes.
In fact, there is currently no domestic producer of titanium sponge. Instead, the U.S. imports 90 percent of its titanium sponge from long-time ally, Japan. While the Trump Administration sounded the alarm over this dependence on imports, those within the industry remain unconcerned."
Those within industry are thinking of their bottom line and not "How do we import a strategic metal from Japan in a war west of Wake?"
And was it you who wrote about Chinese drones civilian specs, parts and kits, modified to suicide military uses that China supplies in whole or in parts to Ukraine? Complaints about Chinese aid to Russia but as with other manufactured goods the Chinese drones are said to be preferred by Ukraine to the American made counterparts.
DJI drones are great for civilian drones. Don’t know how the compare to aerovironment for military purposes. I’ve seen several source mention that nobody has yet supplied Ukraine with something as effective as the Russian Orlan-10.
This is the kind of phrase I come across occasionally that makes me smile, because it is ultimately very optimistic that whatever happens in the near future, there is likely a brighter future somewhere, sometime, ahead. It helps with regurgitation of the black pill:)
I think that arrangement has existed before can't think of an example.
The matter is now about to come to a head, Ukraine has stated they will attack RU shipping in the Black sea, that may be the trigger that makes this whole event go south.
Ukraine is Hitler in the Rhineland in 1936 revisited. Putin wants to put the band back together again. Hitler wanted to put the Austro-Hungry Empire back together again. Only it would be the GERMANY-austria Empire + basically the rest Europe Empire. For a start. China wants to put the China=Center of the World and the Middle Kingdom back together again.
There are other examples to situations similar to this for example American companies like Ford and Coca Cola continued to operate in Nazi Germany and the areas it occupied even after Germany declared war on the United States.
I believe that considerations from ALL parties, has been primarily to prevent that "potential global humanitarian disaster", rather than any direct business,.... business. Not for any altruistic motive; but because everyone knows, and fears, how food and fuel shortages impact populations everywhere, and put match to fuze everytime.....
"potential global humanitarian disaster",
plus a global PR disaster
The West/Ukraine and Russia don't seem interested in a negotiated peace that either can stomach. The longer the war goes on the worse that'll become. No good outcomes loom on the horizon. Maybe we'll hand Henry Kissinger a bottle of multi-vitamins and send him in to square things away like he did in Paris from 1968-1973.
Ukraine & Russia were working on an agreement but Boris Johnson blew that up.
Like Mearshimer predicted, Ukraine is getting wrecked. And since Russia can find no honest partner to negotiate with, they will continue wrecking Ukraine until their security issues are solved.
Europe is one cold, dark , hungry winter from making some fundamental changes.
Kissinger and Nixon were gaming a Nuclear strike on North Vietnam, called Duck Hook/Pruning knife. As well as mass bombing the red river dikes.
Kissinger told the North Vietnamese that and the casualties that would be incurred by the act.
In 1972 Linebacker I and II went after targets that were before off limits and killed a lot of civilians with B-52 bomber raids.
Square things away? Kissinger set up the fall of South Vietnam.
Nixon's campaign promise in 1968 was to end the Vietnam War. In the end, Kissinger delivered "Peace with Honor" in 1973 and was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for it that same year. It was, of course, lipstick on a pig. Vietnam fell in 1975. When I said "square things away" I was, in my mind, comparing the tidy, if long drawn out, ending of the Vietnam War to the precipitous peace we got in Afghanistan. I like "tidy". Both were debacles, the latter more immediately recognizable as such. I tried to put "square things away" in italics facetiously, but couldn't. Hence, the miscommunication. But for all that, my comment failed. Shouldn't have used Kissinger...I want a precipitous end to the Russ-Uke War. I'd even fund the lipstick.
Nixon/Kissinger did indeed keep his promise, bent rules, worked hard and dang if he didn't end the useless war, I think maybe that is why he was hounded out of office, everyone with a brain wanted that war to end, What We wanted was Our POW's back, and breathing room to let nature take it's course.
It was lipstick on a pig and I understand the square things away LOL.
I too want an end to the war in Ukraine, but if those two Nations want to fight it out, we need to step back and let it happen.
I'd fund lipstick as well!
Putin is not interested in "negotiation." The Ukrainians came to the table in Turkey last year and all they got from Putin was surrender terms. Take it or leave it. The Ukrainians walked, and rightly so.
The only negotiations that Putin would stand for is something that would allow him to keep what he has stolen. That has not been acceptable since the late 30s. Putin will simply wait a bit, rebuild, then restart the war.
This is an ignobel (sic) and wicked war, QM. Who can read Putin's mind? I can't even read Zelensky's mind. He might be a patriot, a hero of the Motherland or he might be a useful tool in the Great Game, albeit at the extreme western fringe of the game. But it seems for sure that the West wants no negotiations and that Ukraine was pretty spotty about living up to the Minsk Agreements. As is, this war will be over after the last Ukrainian soldier is killed or a week into a global nuclear exchange. Sane people would be negotiating both side's concerns right now.
Putin has stated his goals. Peter Zeihan has dealt with them in a presentation he gave to a group of Officers at Fort Benning last year. One does not have to read his mind, you just have to listen to what he has said. A number of reliable sources have dealt with the issue of what is going on in the Kremlin. Peter Zeihan is just one, and he is probably the best informed of what is going on over there.
The problem with "negotiations" is that the end result is allowing Putin to keep what he stole. That is not acceptable and hasn't been for many years. Putin is much like Hitler. he dictates what he wants, and that is the negotiation. Cowardice never got anyone anything other than defeat. What you stand for has been known as appeasement.
Which team has Nazi's fighting on their side? Pre-war from 2014, which side failed to live up to the negotiated Minsk Agreements? "Hitler, cowardice, appeasement"? Some left-handed reference to the Sudetenland in 1938? Germany Hungary and Poland gobbled that up. I stand by my innocuous opinion, friend.
Ansewers:
1. Russia. Ukraine has no influential "Nazis" while Russia is loaded with them.
2. Once again, Russia. Puin claimed to be a gurantor, yet he was the guy shipping in mercenaries and heavy weapons, while Ukraine kept the forbidden heavy weapons out of range.
2. Appeasement is exactly what you are pushing. Your opinion is anything but innocuous. Stand by the lies all you like. You aren't my friend even in a sarcastic sense. I do not accept appeasers as anything like a friend.
I offered some opinions. Yet you can read my mind and infer what you will from it. OK.
From what I have read, the terms put forth by Zelensky also amounted to surrender terms and are also unacceptable;
"In his Aug. 8 interview, cited by Presidential Office, Zelensky said his peace plan was the only diplomatic way to achieve peace in Ukraine."
https://news.yahoo.com/zelensky-ukraines-peace-plan-help-174702648.html
https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/what-is-zelenskiys-10-point-peace-plan-2022-12-28/
Not, to my mind anyway, a serious attempt to negotiate.
The problem is Zelensky is defending a country from an invader that gave terms that amount to giving up the country. Zelensky's terms were unacceptable to Putin because he would not have gotten to keep what he stole. That is the difference. And Putin's terms are not acceptable under international law.
Zelensky is correct. Putin will not stop at Ukraine. He has other goals and Ukraine is simply in the way of the long range goals. Putin had no intention to negotiate. He wants what he wants, and will get it, or the fight goes on. He' is no better than Hitler in that regard. He has taken a number of pages from Hitler's play book.
Putin will never deal in good faith.
Apparently, President Zelensky has told an Argentine newspaper that he is willing to play tit-for-tat should merchant shipping in to/out of Ukraine be attacked. There could be a lot of grain on the bottom of the Black Sea and oil on the surface if UKR starts attacking RUS traffic. https://www.lanacion.com.ar/el-mundo/entrevista-con-volodimir-zelensky-la-contraofensiva-es-complicada-probablemente-mas-lenta-de-lo-que-nid06082023/
Those ships would need somewhere to load in Ukraine, Russia is removing those ports off the board.
Apparently, that's why ship owners are paying the war insurance premium and running the gauntlet. Pulling your ship into a port that has been pounded into rubble is a quick way to bankruptcy. https://nosi.org/2023/08/02/israeli-freighter-becomes-first-to-break-russian-blockade-of-ukrainian-black-sea-ports/
Or maybe missile attacks are just a nuisance and port facilities are largely operational to the extent that there is profit to be made.
Ship owners don't pay for that...Customers do.
Hopefully our Deep State POTUS handler are ignorant of history. During the Iran /Iraq tanker war:
"In December 1986, Kuwait's government asked the Reagan administration to send the U.S. Navy to protect Kuwaiti tankers against Iranian attacks.[4] U.S. law forbade the use of navy ships to escort civilian vessels under a foreign flag,[citation needed] so the Kuwaiti ships were re-registered under the U.S. flag. Even before Earnest Will formally began, it became clear how dangerous Persian Gulf operations would be. On 17 May 1987, an Iraqi F-1 Mirage fired two Exocet missiles at the guided missile frigate USS Stark, killing 37 sailors and injuring 21. Iraqi officials said that the targeting of the U.S. warship was accidental"
"War is a racket." - Major General Smedley D. Butler, USMC
Said, it should be noted, after he was collecting his pension.
He also was involved in the central American wars for Dole Fruit... War was a racket.
And we didn't have any migration problems when UFC ran the place, did we?;)
True, but also polishing a couple CMoHs. I should read "War is a Racket" again. The first time through I was decades more naïve than I am now, and found much with which to disagree.
Your two explanations here are, I think, broadly correct: it's about moderating global commodity prices. The Europeans are also broadly neutral because it is in their interest to be neutral. NATO is supposed to be a defensive alliance per the text of the treaty itself. It is not supposed to be an offensive pact that requires all parties to intervene when a third party to the treaty is attacked. But that is not what the US wants NATO to be. There's a gap between what it is, legally, and what the US wants it to be, practically, which is an extension of its own will.
This issue is similar to the issues faced by the Allies during WW2. Triangular trade with Germany thrived throughout WW2 because there were so many "gaps" with neutral countries. The kind of relatively effective blockade of WW1 was not possible because Germany had France by 1940 and much of Eastern Europe by late 1941. That type of geography issue is also a problem today like it was then. The Black Sea was (not coincidentally) a major avenue for imports destined for Germany. Ending that trade was one of the main motivations for the Italian campaign in 1943; it's why Stalin was so fervent in demanding it. The only way to stop neutral countries from trading with an enemy is to end their neutrality by attacking them. The US doesn't want to do that and can't really do that officially apart from looking the other way when mysterious frogmen blow up pipelines.
There was a time where NATO was a defensive alliance, but it is now a disguise for US hegemony.
Power is a drug, just as potent as any opioid. The problem is that most POTUS teams tend to have addictive personalities, that is, a personality and/or psychological chemistry that makes them more likely to get drunk on power. We keep telling U.S. presidents they are the most powerful men on earth, so they act like it and try to make the world over in a way that benefits them, either as a means of staying “important” on the world stage (Carter, Clinton, Bush, Obama) or financially (Biden). We need a person in he Oval Office who, in the middle of one of those inwardly focused discussions, will pull out an aerosol boat horn simply to stop the insanity.
Just like the Russian Captain that kept all the lights on, inviting a drone attack, our elected “leaders” never seem to ask just how badly the other country might respond to our actions. As an example, my bet is that a lot of folk in D.C. were shocked to find a joint PRC-Russian task force off Alaska after all of those passes we’ve made thru the China Sea. Dumb as a box of rocks to not see that one coming.
The other issue re: your point on leadership is that our leaders are not very good anymore, which is not a novel problem in history, but it tends to be "solved" by the emergence of Napoleons, Cromwells, the various 1930s moustache men, Caesars, Pompeys, Alexanders, and Alciabadeses. There are only so many puppet governments with a childlike emperor that you can go through before someone picks up the scepter lying in the gutter.
One problem that we have now is perhaps that everyone knows that this situation is headed for a much larger war, but the steps that might avert it would be so shocking to everything -- currencies, economies, cultures, etc. -- that it is easier for leaders to say "whoops, my bad, didn't see that coming" after the catastrophe than it is for them to be proactive. Same thing we see here with Ukraine. It is easier for the American mandarinate to spend a lot of other people's money on a doomed campaign until it fails and then to say "oops, at least we were all wrong together."
As we on this blog understand, leadership is almost always learned in a “real life, tough” environment. And we haven’t had a president with that background since George Bush Sr. Surely we can find someone with actual real world pointy end of the spear experience.
I don't know that anyone truly capable in a leadership sense would take the job anymore. I'm in for Trump because he wears his flaws on his sleeve.
I think the "deep state," for lack of a better term, wanted Bush (85-93, but Reagan survived), Clinton (93-01), Bush (01-09), Clinton (09-17, but Obama lurched Left and popular too fast), Bush (17-25, but the reaction to Obama's Lurch Left allowed us to get Trump in).
By other people, do you mean future generations of Americans?
These people won't admit they were wrong, at the very least they will memory hole this failure.
- There are only so many puppet governments with a childlike emperor that you can go through before someone picks up the scepter lying in the gutter.
“Every normal man must be tempted, at times, to spit on his hands, hoist the black flag, and begin slitting throats.”
The South China Sea is international waters. Allowing China to shut it off because of some ridiculous claim is not wise.
Totally agree. I was just pointing out the likelihood that the Potomac Fleet (or White House) hadn’t expected any sort of physical pushback. But it must be pointed out that the joint PRC-Russian task group stayed out of US territorial waters. So far, PRC has yet to declare the South China Sea to be territorial waters, so they are abiding by those rules, if not that whole “Let’s set up an armed island” thing. Latest I heard in that regard was a PRC Coast Guard cutter trying to intimidate a Republic of the Philippines vessel re-supplying a disputed reef that RP has manned.
While they may not have declared the SCS as territorial waters, they do claim it as theirs and react stiffly to incursions from those neighboring the waters. They whine when we enter and cross, but that's about all they do. They know they are in no position to make anything stick at this point.
Agree - at this point. My concern is that the PLAN will get developed to the point, and the PRC Admirals will get nervy enough, that something kinetic will develop. If we have a weak, wannabe, don’t-plan-past-this-afternoon sort of President that day, or could be Katie bar the door.
" so they are abiding by those rules, "
I would not count on China to follow any rules it does not want to follow. They have been in flagrant violation of a number of treaties (anyone admit to remembering UNCLOS?) including WTO, for decades. They seem to be a believer in the classic "Might makes right" school of international relations.
That was also de Gaulle's concern, which he expressed when he partially withdrew France from NATO's command structure in the late 1960s: https://otan.delegfrance.org/Archive-Letter-from-President-Charles-de-Gaulle-to-President-Lyndon-Johnson-on -- this type of issue is not new for NATO, but it's kind of interesting in that Europe has never really been this weak relative to the US at any time before.
Yet Sweden and Finland prefer to be part of that particular hegemony instead of the hegemony of the Russian Near Abroad. Why is that?
Because their WEF masters told them to.
Well that explains it! Got a copy of the memo?
They have to follow one hegemony or another, so they pick the one that matches their inclinations and interests. 15 million people total across both countries, both of which have had a lot of issues with Russia in the past (to say the least), so they're backing away from Cold War ambiguity. It's not really Russia's leadership that matters: China is the leader. Russia is the follower to China's emerging hegemony.
If the problem was just Russia, this would all be pretty easy, wouldn't it?
Have a former Marine that worked for me. She killed a few people in hand to hand combat when she was a he.
Too bad you can't meet her.
The inclination and interests match at the elites level, not sure the same in the populace.
It's starting to look more like a protection racket.
Oh yes.
Some 78 percent of Finns have a positive attitude toward NATO membership and more than half are of the opinion that Finland should be open to all cooperation within NATO, including having military bases located inside Finland, according to a survey by the Finnish Business and Policy Forum EVA. The survey, released on November 23, said 8 percent of Finns have a negative attitude toward joining the Western security alliance, while 10 percent had a neutral position. In March 2022, when the previous EVA survey on NATO membership was carried out, 60 percent of Finns supported joining.
I wonder if the 8 and 10 percent are the ones who saw the pictures of Germans bring broomsticks instead of rifles to exercises a few years back. /s
I can see why Finland would want powerful friends who at least pay lip-service to a tradition of western values and personal freedoms. I'm not sure they are getting all that they envision at this point. Poland seems to have their heads screwed on solidly, but I wonder about the rest of us.
It's very difficult express criticism of NATO (of which I have many) without the Russophiles jumping in looking for an ally
Ain't funny that the most rational of people here can still express a critical thought about NATO without getting into conspiracy theories?
Show us on the doll where the Jew circumcised you.
It's comforting. That's why I like to come here; I get to hang out with the rational people and try to emulate them! :)
Where's our DivThu? Highlight of my week sometimes.
Ask! And poof! Our host delivers!
Read the new conspiracy comment before the CDR deletes it!
Also found “disguised hegemony” cited here:
https://manilastandard.net/opinion/columns/backbencher-by-rod-kapunan/369825/disguised-hegemony.html
+++
We could be asking the same about ourselves.
https://www.foreignassistance.gov/cd/afghanistan/2022/obligations/0
https://www.foreignassistance.gov/cd/afghanistan/2023/obligations/0
https://www.cnn.com/2023/04/19/politics/afghanistan-congress-watchdog-hearing/index.html
It’s odd how Airbus said they would, finally stop buying Titanium forgings from the Russian government but never issued a press release proclaiming they they have.
We have eliminated all US domestic titanium refining. The Titanium Sponge Working Group's final report (https://www.federalregister.gov/documents/2023/08/04/2023-16624/notice-of-report-publication-from-the-titanium-sponge-working-group) was placed on the BIS website last month. Coming as a surprise to absolutely no one, restarting the necessary mines and refineries were NOT one of the five recommendations. That would be all icky polluting and dangerous employment. Can't have that.
Recommendations:
1. Add titanium to the National Defense Stockpile.
2. Explore restructuring tariffs.
3. Promote recycling and spur innovation in titanium using industries..
4. Monitor idled domestic titanium capacity.
5. Maintain good relations with Japan and other allied titanium producing countries.
I think we mine titanium, we just don’t refine it. There are at least three processes and I’m pretty sure at least one is less messy that the one in Henderson.
We do have a handful of mines and they are not used as feedstock to refine to the metal form. There are groups in the US that certainly do not wish to see the expansion of mining or the re-booting of metal refinement. Better to rely on Japan (who just happens to be within PLA missile radius).
https://saportareport.com/titanium-a-fantastic-mineral-the-u-s-doesnt-need-from-near-okefenokee-swamp/columnists/david/
"Currently, the only place in the U.S. where titanium is mined is along an 80-mile swath of land stretching from North Florida to South Georgia, and none of that titanium ends its life as the metal used for national defense purposes.
In fact, there is currently no domestic producer of titanium sponge. Instead, the U.S. imports 90 percent of its titanium sponge from long-time ally, Japan. While the Trump Administration sounded the alarm over this dependence on imports, those within the industry remain unconcerned."
Those within industry are thinking of their bottom line and not "How do we import a strategic metal from Japan in a war west of Wake?"
And was it you who wrote about Chinese drones civilian specs, parts and kits, modified to suicide military uses that China supplies in whole or in parts to Ukraine? Complaints about Chinese aid to Russia but as with other manufactured goods the Chinese drones are said to be preferred by Ukraine to the American made counterparts.
DJI drones are great for civilian drones. Don’t know how the compare to aerovironment for military purposes. I’ve seen several source mention that nobody has yet supplied Ukraine with something as effective as the Russian Orlan-10.
The Middle East has a long tradition of keep the trade flowing as much as possible since before the Bronze Age Collapse.
It will be interesting to see if anti-economy operations keep expanding.
A couple 120mm mortar rounds deployed properly outside the war zone would cause a major panic, that's for sure.
"since before the Bronze Age Collapse."
This is the kind of phrase I come across occasionally that makes me smile, because it is ultimately very optimistic that whatever happens in the near future, there is likely a brighter future somewhere, sometime, ahead. It helps with regurgitation of the black pill:)
I think that arrangement has existed before can't think of an example.
The matter is now about to come to a head, Ukraine has stated they will attack RU shipping in the Black sea, that may be the trigger that makes this whole event go south.
https://www.phactual.com/8-american-companies-that-worked-with-the-nazis-during-world-war-ii/
Ukraine is Hitler in the Rhineland in 1936 revisited. Putin wants to put the band back together again. Hitler wanted to put the Austro-Hungry Empire back together again. Only it would be the GERMANY-austria Empire + basically the rest Europe Empire. For a start. China wants to put the China=Center of the World and the Middle Kingdom back together again.
Everything old is new again.
LOL, you really hurt my feelings with that one.
There are other examples to situations similar to this for example American companies like Ford and Coca Cola continued to operate in Nazi Germany and the areas it occupied even after Germany declared war on the United States.