The Geopolitics of it all

[daftandbarmy]

"The Irish government often says the mass influx of asylum seekers cannot be helped. Ministers are wont to remind the Irish people of their need to fulfil Ireland’s “international obligations”. This has stoked anti-EU sentiment, with the Irish government regularly described by immigration sceptics as “puppets” for Brussels. This further lends itself to the sense of Ireland being under the cosh of a new empire – one that is aloof from the concerns of ordinary people."

Ireland's international obligations - what exactly is that? What are any nations "international obligations"?

What are Canada's "international obligations"? To be a doormat for any terrorist group that wants a safe haven?

Ireland's main effort is to keep the EU subsidies rolling in to fund their 'always on the edge of bankrupt' kleptocracy...

 

[Kirkhill]

The fading impact of Green Politics

In the UK

Labour has slashed its original £28bn green borrowing plan by four fifths and unveiled a new tax raid on oil and gas giants to bankroll the Net Zero drive.

Sir Keir Starmer announced that his flagship clean energy policy has been downgraded to just £4.7bn a year in the biggest about-turn of his leadership.

Speaking to reporters in Parliament, he blamed the Tories for “maxing out the credit card” and insisted that the original pledge was no longer affordable.

Under the new slimmed down blueprint, public funding for a major home insulation drive has been reduced from a planned £6bn a year to just £1.2bn.

Meanwhile the budget for Great British Energy, a publicly owned energy company that Labour plans to set up, will be handed £1.7bn a year of taxpayers’ cash.

Rachel Reeves, the shadow chancellor, said it will be financed by hiking tax on energy producers’ profits from 75pc to 78pc, raising £2.2bn a year.

Politics latest news: Labour cuts green investment plan by 80pc but would raise windfall tax

Labour has slashed its original £28bn green borrowing plan by four fifths and unveiled a new tax raid on oil and gas giants to bankroll the Net Zero drive.

www.telegraph.co.uk

An unpopular, unaffordable albatross of a programme reversed.

Blamed on there being no money in the kitty.

Had nothing to do with

EU's von der Leyen backtracks on cutting pesticide use

European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said the proposal to halve chemical pesticide use in the EU by the end of the decade had 'become a symbol of polarization.'

www.lemonde.fr

European Union chief Ursula von der Leyen on Tuesday, February 6, recommended the bloc bury a plan to cut pesticide use in agriculture as a concession to protesting European farmers. The original proposal, put forward by her European Commission as part of the European Union's green transition, "has become a symbol of polarization," she told the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France.

Noting that the plan – to halve chemical pesticide use in the EU by the end of the decade – had also stalled in discussions in the European Parliament and in the European Council representing EU member countries, von der Leyen said she would ask her commission "to withdraw this proposal."

 

[Kirkhill]

Oh. By the way. Doomsday has arrived.

The world has warmed 1.5 °C, according to 300-year-old sponges

By the time that official temperature records began, global temperatures had already risen by half a degree.

www.nature.com

We're still here.

 

[Kirkhill]

The backsliding from the green revolution continues.

The political class is only just realising that voters prefer prosperity over climate jingoism

Labour’s green U-turn reflects the shifting sands of climate policy

www.telegraph.co.uk

If you want to see how the politics of climate change are shifting, compare today with late 2009. In both cases, a general election was approaching.

In October 2009, with the Copenhagen climate summit imminent, the then prime minister, Gordon Brown, announced that we had only “50 days to save the planet”. The summit failed to agree any substantive action to reduce carbon emissions. The planet survived. But let that pass: the important point for Mr Brown was political. He wanted to make his party look as green as possible for the election, countering the Conservative opposition’s offer, under David Cameron, of “Vote blue, go green”.

It is 15 years on, and we shall have an election fairly soon. Sir Keir Starmer now, like Mr Brown then, is thinking mainly about the ballot box.

After a tussle with their consciences, Sir Keir and Rachel Reeves, who, in 2021, declared at the party conference that she would be Britain’s “first green chancellor”, announced on Thursday that her exciting green investment plan, unveiled in that same speech, will, sort of, not happen. Under that plan, a Labour government would have spent an extra £28 billion every year until 2030, including “borrowing to invest”.

As late as Tuesday, Sir Keir was still clinging publicly to the £28 billion figure. He said he was “unwavering”. But on Thursday he waveringly tried to defuse his own tax bombshell. He had decided, though of course he did not put it like this, that voters care more that Labour should be safe with the economy than it should save the planet.

Since July last year, when Labour failed to grab Boris Johnson’s old Uxbridge seat at a by-election, its leadership has finally noticed that the link in the public mind between the words “green” and “prosperity” has become tenuous. In that by-election, Sadiq Khan’s Ulez is thought to have worked its negative magic. Voters felt the pain of green policies, not the gain.

It follows that looking green is no longer a clear electoral plus. The Tories saw this slightly earlier than Labour last year. They stole a march by lessening the net-zero torture, extending the lives of the internal combustion engine and gas boilers. Probably Rishi Sunak intended no revolution of policy, only its softening, but the effect is marked. Once people realise you can have prosperity or an energy system dominated by renewables, but not both, they will choose prosperity. That realisation has big political consequences. I believe it makes net zero by 2050 unachievable.

A comparable cost-related disenchantment is visible in business. Last September, no bid was received for the government auction of offshore wind acreage. The subsidy was not big enough to make it worth bidders’ while. Before Christmas, Siemens Energy, one of the world’s biggest wind turbine companies, faced a collapse in its share price. Its chairman warned in January that the green transition must be paid for by higher energy bills: anything else was net zero “fairy-tale” thinking, he said.

Business wants green energy only if it is “de-risked” – in other words, if it is subsidised for the life of the asset. It is supposed to be “sustainable”, yet often only taxpayers’ money can sustain it. In short, it is unprofitable. And now, thanks to Biden’s Inflation Reduction Act (a title as good as The Ministry of Truth in Orwell’s 1984), businesses will try to extort higher subsidy here and buzz off to America if they cannot get it.

Thursday’s press reported that Ørsted, the gigantic Danish developer of offshore wind in Britain (and elsewhere), is sacking hundreds of workers and abandoning markets after losses of £2.2 billion in 2023. The day before, the new boss of BP, Murray Auchincloss, predicted resurgent demand for fossil fuels, especially gas, and is leading the company in that direction.

This is the same Mr Auchincloss who, under his now disgraced predecessor, Bernard Looney, had been a leader in the company’s plan to move away from fossil fuels in favour of renewables, which he described as the new “upstream oil and gas”. BP lost competitive edge against its rivals. We don’t hear about that plan any longer.

Part of the Looney case was that the switch to renewables was “grounded in economic reality”. We have now been with green energy and government attacks on fossil fuels long enough for people to wonder if that is true.

As is well set out in Rupert Darwall’s new short book, The Folly of Climate Leadership (RealClear Foundation), the increasing costs have been relentless. They are particularly high here because of what Darwall calls Britain’s “climate jingoism” – our vainglorious desire to get ahead in what successive governments have decided is a race to net zero.

Our Climate Change Act of 2008 mandated an overall cut in greenhouse gases of 80 per cent of the 1990 baseline by 2050. That was under Labour, led by Mr Brown. In 2019, that percentage was upped to 100 per cent (“net zero”) and became law after only 88 minutes’ debate in the Commons. That was under the Conservatives, led by Theresa May. In 2020, we were told that Britain would become “the Saudi Arabia of wind power”. That, of course, was under the Conservatives, led by Boris Johnson.

Our heroic example did not inspire others. Between 2008 and 2019, our CO2 fossil-fuel emissions fell by 33 per cent, but those from the rest of the world rose by 16 per cent, wiping out in 140 days, Darwall calculates, the reductions we achieved over 11 years.

There is a high price for setting this pace: by 2020, our citizens were paying about 75 per cent more for their electricity than were Americans. Darwall points out that, from 2008-22, Britain has experienced its lowest underlying growth rate since the 18th century.

The two phenomena are related. Competitively priced energy is essential for robust economic growth. By the 1990s, with Arthur Scargill well beaten and privatisations accomplished in the previous decade, Britain had achieved a good and secure energy mix on the “gas to nuclear” track, rendered more efficient by letting price signals drive changes. Natural gas is a fossil fuel, but a relatively clean one. Today our energy system is expensive, creaky, insecure, teetering on the edge of serious power cuts and, since the invasion of Ukraine, vulnerable to the malevolence of Vladimir Putin.

If you survey this history, two thoughts arise. One is the uniformity of error across the political spectrum. How was it that most people in all main parties thought they had to think the same things about the complicated and uncertain subject of climate change? Why did they unquestioningly accept ideas like the uniformity of “the science”, the concept of “emergency” in relation to policy, or the ability of governments, rather than businesses and consumers, to make the most efficient choices?

In particular, why did the post-Brexit Tories not take the opportunity to develop an energy policy that catered for Britain’s needs rather than trying to lead the global COP-out from reality?

The other thought – and this is addressed especially to Sir Keir and his party – is “What about the workers?”. Labour, as its name suggests, was founded for the political representation of those who work. The whole climate-change caravanserai of international panels and world leaders gathering at summits to issue edicts and rebukes could have been expressly designed to exclude the wishes of the workers from their considerations.

I come back to Rupert Darwall’s point that net-zero obsessions coincide with the credit crunch, financial strains and slow growth. This combination is the path to relative poverty – not for our leaders, of course, but for most people who vote.

 

[Kirkhill]

Don Braid: Alberta NDP leadership candidate's startling opener — axe the carbon tax

The last people you'd expect to call for killing the carbon tax is the NDP but that's what leadership candidate Rakhi Pancholi wants.

nationalpost.com

And the drift continues....


Alberta NDP - provincial leadership candidate diametrically opposed to Charlie Angus's position.

Alberta NDP leadership candidate Rakhi Pancholi’s first campaign video has her talking proudly of Alberta’s industry with an oil rig in the background

The Edmonton MLA says it’s time to dump the consumer carbon tax.

“We have to acknowledge that we have not brought the public along with us on that issue and it may be time to move beyond a consumer carbon price and focus more on the things that do work, like the industrial carbon pricing and other measures,” she told Ryan Jespersen on his Real Talk video show.
With nearly 70 per cent of Albertans opposing the tax, she says, it’s time to consider a made-in-Alberta solution “that may not include a consumer carbon tax. I think that’s just a reality we have to look at.
“I’ve been having many conversations with leading climate activists in our province, experts in this area, and we need to continue those conversations to say, what would that climate plan look like without a consumer carbon price.”

 

[Quirky]

Don Braid: Alberta NDP leadership candidate's startling opener — axe the carbon tax

The last people you'd expect to call for killing the carbon tax is the NDP but that's what leadership candidate Rakhi Pancholi wants.

nationalpost.com

And the drift continues....


Alberta NDP - provincial leadership candidate diametrically opposed to Charlie Angus's position.

Is she running for the right party?

 

[Kirkhill]

Is she running for the right party?

There are lots of people of the left running away from the establishment position on climate change in the Western world. New Zealand, the UK, the EU and it several countries.

 

[RangerRay]

Don Braid: Alberta NDP leadership candidate's startling opener — axe the carbon tax

The last people you'd expect to call for killing the carbon tax is the NDP but that's what leadership candidate Rakhi Pancholi wants.

nationalpost.com

And the drift continues....


Alberta NDP - provincial leadership candidate diametrically opposed to Charlie Angus's position.

My understanding is that the concept of carbon taxes - taxes on fossil fuels used to cut income taxes - came from market-oriented economists as an economically efficient means of reducing carbon, over regulation, enforcement and fees on industrial emitters. Old-school leftists were against the carbon tax because they argued that the middle and lower classes shouldn’t be paying for industry’s externalities. Old-school leftists were never in favour of consumption taxes because they argued the burden fell on the classes that could least afford them.

In B.C., the country’s first carbon tax was brought in by the then free-enterprise coalition, the B.C. Liberals led by Premier Gordon Campbell. Carol James and the NDP opposed it. I voted B.C. Liberal because I wasn’t a socialist, but I had serious misgivings about this tax. My inner Marxist that I didn’t know existed till then, didn’t like it.

When the federal Liberals saw that the B.C. Liberals won on a carbon tax, they adopted it. The federal NDP, for some reason, followed suit.

A few years later, John Horgan and the B.C. NDP won. Instead of getting rid of the tax, they siphoned funds away from income tax reductions to a “green energy fund”. If that doesn’t sound dodgy, I don’t know what does.

Fast forward a few years to now the entire country being under one form of carbon tax or another. We have not seen a meaningful reduction in carbon emissions and the middle and lower classes in society are the ones least likely to afford to heat their houses or fill their cars with fuel, and the least likely to afford purchasing more efficient home heating systems or cars.

Ms. Pancholi is returning to the NDP’s roots.

 

[daftandbarmy]

There are lots of people of the left running away from the establishment position on climate change in the Western world. New Zealand, the UK, the EU and it several countries.

And China and India...

 

[Kirkhill]

And China and India...

Were China and India ever part of the consensus? Or were their establishments merely open to exploiting opportunities that presented themselves? Free money is always welcome.

As well I find it difficult to divine Left and Right when it comes to Chinese and Indian politics as well as how those labels apply to the establishments in either country.

The Chinese establishment is nominally of the left but functionally of the right. The Indian establishment, regardless of label seems to have strong authoritarian, or right wing tendencies. China, in my mind, seems to have a more brittle structure when it comes to internal establishment/anti-establishment relations. It is more likely to break than bend when stressed by its mobs. In that sense it feels more French to me. More likely to go through seasonal revolutions and serial constitutions. India feels more British - meandering with no particular destination.

Those were some of the reasons I left them off my list. Some countries are more reliably democratic than others and react more predictably to the types of stimuli associated with moving opinion in a democratic society.

 

[Kirkhill]

Joly was at pains to state that she didn't want to decide between Us and Them and that she wanted to keep the doors open to convene the next meeting where everybody would find Jesus and the millenium would be upon us.

That position is not universally held.

https://www.realcleardefense.com/articles/2024/02/10/our_restraint_destroys_your_deterrence_1010986.html

Sauve qui peut.

 

[Kirkhill]

Liberal elites – not Trump – will bring Nato to its knees​

Europe fooled itself into believing all disputes could be resolved at international tribunals. It must prepare for what comes next

Liberal elites – not Trump – will bring Nato to its knees

Europe fooled itself into believing all disputes could be resolved at international tribunals. It must prepare for what comes next

www.telegraph.co.uk

Donald Trump has once again caused a media storm with remarks made on the campaign trail. This, however, is more serious than some of his previous statements in terms of its implications and what it reveals. He argued that the US was being taken for a ride by its European allies because of their failure to deliver the required level of military spending and capacity. His threat was that should an attack on a Nato ally take place while he was President, the US would not honour its obligation under Article 5 of the Nato treaty, to provide military support. If this were to happen, it would be the end of the alliance.

How seriously should we take this? Very, is the answer. These views are not novel; Trump has expressed them before. Moreover, these remarks are calculated rather than impulsive and reflect his judgment that there is a large constituency for this position in the US electorate. Should he win in November (he is the increasingly strong betting favourite) we should assume this will be his policy.

If that happens we, and all of Europe, would be left in a highly exposed and vulnerable position. It would mark the definitive end of the current international order and the project associated with it since 1990, of creating a rule governed liberal global system. Nor should we think this is all down to one person, no matter how disruptive. Donald Trump is taking advantage of a major shift in attitude among a large part of the American population.

How has the West got itself into such a situation? The answer lies in the hubris and overreach of Western elites since 1989. In the aftermath of World War II, an international order was created to buttress and underpin western liberal democracy, in the face of the Soviet threat. Among the key institutions were Nato and the EU. In 1989 both American and EU elites hit upon the idea that this system could be globalised and made into a true world order with liberal capitalist democracy becoming a truly global system. This was ramped up even further after 2001, with a series of interventions in parts of the world that were not complying with that vision.

The hubris was firstly to assume that the West had this power and secondly to assume that the rest of the world would simply accept this imposition of rules and ideas that they did not accept. The assumption was they lacked agency, the capacity to resist or follow their own agendas. The outcomes of these policies have been bad, particularly for that part of the US population which provides much of its military capacity. They have seen their young men sent abroad in a succession of failed wars.

The distinctive hubris of the EU, meanwhile, was to forget the centrality of armed force and military power in world affairs and to believe that all international tensions and disputes could be managed and resolved by legal means at international tribunals. This meant most of the heavy military lifting for the global project was left to the US. And this created the growing feeling that the Europeans were freeloading and taking advantage. Trump is tapping in to this and the reality of the sentiment cannot be denied. At the same time, the US military is having a crisis of recruitment, as indeed we are here. In addition, the economic results of globalisation for large parts of the American working class are perceived as disappointing, with the benefits seen to have accrued elsewhere, to the professional middle class. This also fuels the discontent with the global system and America’s role in it.

Nato has been a central feature of world affairs for all of our lifetimes. In politics, though, nothing last forever. It rested upon the power of the US and a democratic will to use that power in a particular way for particular ends. That will is about to be withdrawn. Everyone in Europe should now be thinking very hard about what to do if and when that happens.

Too easy to blame Trump. FukUYama.

 

[daftandbarmy]

Liberal elites – not Trump – will bring Nato to its knees

Europe fooled itself into believing all disputes could be resolved at international tribunals. It must prepare for what comes next

www.telegraph.co.uk

Too easy to blame Trump. FukUYama.

I like how the media keeps referring to Trump as if he's a sitting head of government.

Playing right into his hands quite nicely...

 

[Halifax Tar]

I like how the media keeps referring to Trump as if he's a sitting head of government.

Playing right into his hands quite nicely...

Well it works in their financial favor when he is a sitting head of Gov. When he's in their viewership goes through the roof.

 

[FJAG]

It's very easy to blame Trump and the article only gets it half right and dosen't account for the situation. Something typical of the Telegraph.

It wasn't hubris in 1989 that caused Europeans to cut back on defence spending, it was a changed situation of risk that enabled governments to put more money into social programs rather than armaments. It would have been hubris to keep spending hevaily on defence at a time like that.

Europe has alimited scope of interest that really only includes Russia as a foe (unless you count illegal immigration). From 1989 unitl 2014 Russia was relatively, albeit not completely, benign. In fact it had turned into a strong partner through the supply of abundant energy to keep European industries chugging along. Peaceful negotiations had worked. For all intents and purposes, the Cold War which had gone on for over forty years had been won. Warsaw Pact countries splintered off and moved to westernization (a process that went full steam after 1989. That was accomlished by a variety of both liberal and conservative governments through an effective system of detterance and negotiation. In Europe, very little blood was expended during this very real war.

The thing with detterance is this oft posted quote I truck out occasionally:

The gold standard of deterrence and assurance is a defensive posture that confronts the adversary with the prospect of operational failure as the likely consequence of aggression.[1]

---

[1] David Ochmanek, et al. “U.S. Military Capabilities and Forces for a Dangerous World” RAND Corp 2017, 45 https://www.rand.org/pubs/research_reports/RR1782-1.html

You can subvert that gold standard in several ways. One is to have a weak defence posture. Despite its current position, Europe is not weak (especially when viewed in the light of Russia's inability to defeat Ukraine out of hand and its subsequent losses).Europe alone consistently outspends Russia in defence. Russia in large measure relies on Cold War stockpiles of armaments, albeit it is rapidly finding new ways to fight.

Europe should have realized in 2014 that its defence dividend had run out and started ramping up - its delay in doing so - in light of its energy reliance on Russia - is understandable and far from inexcuseable. That liberal direction is changing. Even here in Canada we have been making greater commitments in capital expenditures (we're just to incompetent to make full use of it)

The second way of undermining the gold standard is to make stupid statements that if an ally isn't "paying its dues" and if attacked you won't come to fight. NATOs spending totals are Wikipedia material that Putin can access in a minute. The intent of deterence is to thoroughly convince an adversary he won't succeeed. If you undermine that, ot even give the impression that he has a reasonable chance of success, then deterrence has failed.

Putin has been surprised by both the vigour of Ukraine's defence, NATO support to Ukraine and his own militaries incompetence. He can fix the last over time. Ukraine wasn't part of the alliance. He struck and has to date failed. He will probably take Trump's words at face value. I'm willing to bet that much of the Republican current financial holdup on more Ukrainian aide is Trump connected. Trump is a Putinphile if not a Russophile.. Putin is dug in and can wait out 2024 to see which way the wind blows in the US. Trump is giving him hope of disassembling NATO. Back to the Domino thoery.

It's not the liberal elite that will bring NATO to its knees. Its stupid conservatives that can't see beyond their next election. Words matter.

 

[Kirkhill]

While histrionics beget histrionics effects are in evidence....

Trump is no aberration. America won’t guarantee our safety, we must

The Republican candidate uses hitherto unthinkable language, but his policies are not such a departure

www.telegraph.co.uk

Europe needs to be ready to defend itself

The United States' growing frustration with its Nato partners is not confined to Donald Trump

www.telegraph.co.uk

European leaders call for stronger defence ties after Trump’s Nato remarks

Polish PM Donald Tusk says ‘all for one, and one for all’ in thinly veiled riposte to Republican frontrunner

www.theguardian.com

There seems to be movement in Trump's desired direction.

 

[Kirkhill]

And speaking of histrionics

A little bit of madness goes a long way. Deterrence relies on both sides believing that the other side is sufficiently irrational as to act irrationally.

 

[daftandbarmy]

It's very easy to blame Trump and the article only gets it half right and dosen't account for the situation. Something typical of the Telegraph.

It wasn't hubris in 1989 that caused Europeans to cut back on defence spending, it was a changed situation of risk that enabled governments to put more money into social programs rather than armaments. It would have been hubris to keep spending hevaily on defence at a time like that.

Europe has alimited scope of interest that really only includes Russia as a foe (unless you count illegal immigration). From 1989 unitl 2014 Russia was relatively, albeit not completely, benign. In fact it had turned into a strong partner through the supply of abundant energy to keep European industries chugging along. Peaceful negotiations had worked. For all intents and purposes, the Cold War which had gone on for over forty years had been won. Warsaw Pact countries splintered off and moved to westernization (a process that went full steam after 1989. That was accomlished by a variety of both liberal and conservative governments through an effective system of detterance and negotiation. In Europe, very little blood was expended during this very real war.

The thing with detterance is this oft posted quote I truck out occasionally:


You can subvert that gold standard in several ways. One is to have a weak defence posture. Despite its current position, Europe is not weak (especially when viewed in the light of Russia's inability to defeat Ukraine out of hand and its subsequent losses).Europe alone consistently outspends Russia in defence. Russia in large measure relies on Cold War stockpiles of armaments, albeit it is rapidly finding new ways to fight.

Europe should have realized in 2014 that its defence dividend had run out and started ramping up - its delay in doing so - in light of its energy reliance on Russia - is understandable and far from inexcuseable. That liberal direction is changing. Even here in Canada we have been making greater commitments in capital expenditures (we're just to incompetent to make full use of it)

The second way of undermining the gold standard is to make stupid statements that if an ally isn't "paying its dues" and if attacked you won't come to fight. NATOs spending totals are Wikipedia material that Putin can access in a minute. The intent of deterence is to thoroughly convince an adversary he won't succeeed. If you undermine that, ot even give the impression that he has a reasonable chance of success, then deterrence has failed.

Putin has been surprised by both the vigour of Ukraine's defence, NATO support to Ukraine and his own militaries incompetence. He can fix the last over time. Ukraine wasn't part of the alliance. He struck and has to date failed. He will probably take Trump's words at face value. I'm willing to bet that much of the Republican current financial holdup on more Ukrainian aide is Trump connected. Trump is a Putinphile if not a Russophile.. Putin is dug in and can wait out 2024 to see which way the wind blows in the US. Trump is giving him hope of disassembling NATO. Back to the Domino thoery.

It's not the liberal elite that will bring NATO to its knees. Its stupid conservatives that can't see beyond their next election. Words matter.

Let's look forward to the end of the 'Bonsai Armies'

 

[Colin Parkinson]

It's very easy to blame Trump and the article only gets it half right and dosen't account for the situation. Something typical of the Telegraph.

It wasn't hubris in 1989 that caused Europeans to cut back on defence spending, it was a changed situation of risk that enabled governments to put more money into social programs rather than armaments. It would have been hubris to keep spending hevaily on defence at a time like that.

Europe has alimited scope of interest that really only includes Russia as a foe (unless you count illegal immigration). From 1989 unitl 2014 Russia was relatively, albeit not completely, benign. In fact it had turned into a strong partner through the supply of abundant energy to keep European industries chugging along. Peaceful negotiations had worked. For all intents and purposes, the Cold War which had gone on for over forty years had been won. Warsaw Pact countries splintered off and moved to westernization (a process that went full steam after 1989. That was accomlished by a variety of both liberal and conservative governments through an effective system of detterance and negotiation. In Europe, very little blood was expended during this very real war.

The thing with detterance is this oft posted quote I truck out occasionally:


You can subvert that gold standard in several ways. One is to have a weak defence posture. Despite its current position, Europe is not weak (especially when viewed in the light of Russia's inability to defeat Ukraine out of hand and its subsequent losses).Europe alone consistently outspends Russia in defence. Russia in large measure relies on Cold War stockpiles of armaments, albeit it is rapidly finding new ways to fight.

Europe should have realized in 2014 that its defence dividend had run out and started ramping up - its delay in doing so - in light of its energy reliance on Russia - is understandable and far from inexcuseable. That liberal direction is changing. Even here in Canada we have been making greater commitments in capital expenditures (we're just to incompetent to make full use of it)

The second way of undermining the gold standard is to make stupid statements that if an ally isn't "paying its dues" and if attacked you won't come to fight. NATOs spending totals are Wikipedia material that Putin can access in a minute. The intent of deterence is to thoroughly convince an adversary he won't succeeed. If you undermine that, ot even give the impression that he has a reasonable chance of success, then deterrence has failed.

Putin has been surprised by both the vigour of Ukraine's defence, NATO support to Ukraine and his own militaries incompetence. He can fix the last over time. Ukraine wasn't part of the alliance. He struck and has to date failed. He will probably take Trump's words at face value. I'm willing to bet that much of the Republican current financial holdup on more Ukrainian aide is Trump connected. Trump is a Putinphile if not a Russophile.. Putin is dug in and can wait out 2024 to see which way the wind blows in the US. Trump is giving him hope of disassembling NATO. Back to the Domino thoery.

It's not the liberal elite that will bring NATO to its knees. Its stupid conservatives that can't see beyond their next election. Words matter.

I think Russia/Putin felt that if only took small slices at a time, Europe would not act or coordinate, combined with the trade and gas supplies, he likley felt that he had them right where he wanted them. It seems that was only partly true.

 

[Kirkhill]

Trump's NATO jibe won't be a surprise for Europe — but it could spell a reckoning

Alliance members have for decades relied on the U.S. to protect them against the threat of Russia. The former president is making them contemplate going it alone.

www.nbcnews.com

Factoid gleaned from here:

List of global manpower fit for military service - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

Canadian males - 6.6 million
UK males - 12.1 million
US males - 60 million

EU males - 90 million (added up all the EU states)

Britain and France do have small nuclear arsenals, but these are dwarfed by both that of the U.S. and Russia. Meanwhile Europe’s conventional military forces are well equipped to deal with smaller, asymmetric conflicts, such as France’s ongoing counterinsurgency operation in Africa’s Sahel region. But they do simply not have the might to respond to Putin without the U.S., Pothier said.

“That’s the paradox of Europe,” he said. “It does not have the density of forces to hold the line against a major land invasion on the European continent. That’s the big gap, and it’s problematic.”

Russian males - 21 million

If the EU doesn't have the density of forces to hold the line without going nuclear it is not because it lacks the manpower.

It outnumbers Russia 90 million to 20 million.

It can go the Polish route if it wants to.