Europe

[Czech_pivo]

Russia has already said no to euro troops in Ukraine so either this is just some maneuver ro show Europe is ready to aid in a post war Ukraine, or Europe just grew a very big pair of brass ones and is preparing to give Russia the middle finger and push troops into ukraine

They would have British and French nukes to back them up, it’s a question if they would use them if the Russians sent over a handful of nuclear arty shells across the LOC

 

[daftandbarmy]

They would have British and French nukes to back them up, it’s a question if they would use them if the Russians sent over a handful of nuclear arty shells across the LOC

The British nukes are not independent, however, like France's.

 

[brihard]

The British nukes are not independent, however, like France's.

Are you able to source that? My understanding is that, while the UK relies on the U.S. for servicing of its Trident missiles, they have full independent ability to target, launch, and detonate them.

With that said, Britain would probably be well served by diversifying its delivery systems to add cruise missiles. Britain does design and manufacture its own warheads.

 

[MilEME09]

The British nukes are not independent, however, like France's.

And with France wanting to forward deploy Nuclear Rafale fighters, it's some major French posturing

 

[daftandbarmy]

Are you able to source that? My understanding is that, while the UK relies on the U.S. for servicing of its Trident missiles, they have full independent ability to target, launch, and detonate them.

With that said, Britain would probably be well served by diversifying its delivery systems to add cruise missiles. Britain does design and manufacture its own warheads.

'Semi-independent' at best...

United Kingdom nuclear weapons, 2024​

The United Kingdom’s nuclear deterrent relies heavily on American nuclear infrastructure, so much so that it has long been in question whether it possesses a truly “independent deterrent.” The United Kingdom does not own its own missiles but has title to 58 US Trident SLBMs from a pool of missiles shared with the US Navy.

https://thebulletin.org/premium/2024-11/united-kingdom-nuclear-weapons-2024/#:~:text=The%20United%20Kingdom's%20nuclear%20deterrent,missiles%20shared%20with%20the%20US

 

[MilEME09]

Are you able to source that? My understanding is that, while the UK relies on the U.S. for servicing of its Trident missiles, they have full independent ability to target, launch, and detonate them.

With that said, Britain would probably be well served by diversifying its delivery systems to add cruise missiles. Britain does design and manufacture its own warheads.

I'm willing to bet they are looking at making Spear 5 nuclear capable

 

[Good2Golf]

The complaints about "transactional" politics are hard to distinguish from whinging about having to bear a fair share of costs for the RBIO.

My perspective isn’t a complaint, but rather an “it is what it is, deal with the new reality.”

The challenge with transactionalism, is the temporal basis over which a transaction is deemed valid and how either or both parties feel bound to that period of validity.

 

[ueo]

My perspective isn’t a complaint, but rather an “it is what it is, deal with the new reality.”

The challenge with transactionalism, is the temporal basis over which a transaction is deemed valid and how either or both parties feel bound to that period of validity.

Ummm, what?

 

[IKnowNothing]

Ummm, what?

If a relationship is based purely based on deal making rather than principles, both parties need to be on the same page as to how long deals are in effect for, and be committed to respect the terms of the deal for that long.

Example- how we negotiate give and take with the States when something like CUSMA is being tossed aside well before it's set to reopen?

 

[Brad Sallows]

My perspective isn’t a complaint, but rather an “it is what it is, deal with the new reality.”

I understand, and agree. I suppose my own whinging is that many people suffer from such Trump animosity that they have difficulty looking at foundational issues objectively and seeing that sometimes a disruption to status quo corrects an imbalance. Sometimes they don't see the imbalance; it's just the water they swim in.

 

[Good2Golf]

Example- how we negotiate give and take with the States when something like CUSMA is being tossed aside well before it's set to reopen?

Exactly.

USMCA was Trump’s initiative in 2018, taking effect in 2020 with a 6 year validity period…”great deal! Greatest deal ever!”

Here we are before that agreed period ends, and the 2018 transaction is described as a horrible deal, and that Canada and Mexico are taking advantage of America…of a deal that Trump imposed. So double hit…override NAFTA that was still valid, and impose greater concessions…then the Trumpian Trifecta…change the period of validity of the last transaction…

That’s why at this point, even transactions agreed by all parties are of questionable validity, particularly where America is concerned.

 

[MilEME09]

That’s why at this point, even transactions agreed by all parties are of questionable validity, particularly where America is concerned.

Cant take America at its word, or whats written on paper when they will say/do something opposite the next day or week

 

[Kirkhill]

Interesting article from Tim Stanley.

Trump isn’t ‘un-American’, he’s just transparent

The Zelensky clash wasn’t a bolt from the blue, but a continuation of 20th-century US foreign policy

www.telegraph.co.uk

A common reaction to that notorious Trump/Zelensky press conference is “we haven’t seen anything like this before”. Seen is the key word.

Bust-ups and walk-outs do occur in diplomacy, the difference is that Donald Trump does in the open what is meant to be conducted in private. An example: in 2022, NBC reported that Joe Biden had spoken to Zelensky by phone about a $1 billion aid package, and when Zelensky began asking for more, the US president “lost his temper” and told him to be more grateful.

So, yes, America argues with its friends. Worse than that: it has a record of abandoning them. I’m struck by the parallel between Ukraine and South Vietnam, two regimes encouraged by the US to fight an invader – at huge cost in money and lives – only for Washington to cut and run.

Canadians have their own history of presidential abuse - US Presidents Haven't Always Gotten Along with the Leaders of Canada

....

All foreign policy is domestic. Rightly so. Presidents are elected to represent Ohio and Alabama, not Kabul or Kyiv, and as circumstances change it would be madness to stick to a failed policy. What confuses outsiders about America is that its ideals are universal, all men created equal etc, so it sounds as if it’s operating out of the goodness of its heart.

....

Trump would have been 16 years old during Cuba. Does he remember it? Most people my age have no memory of living with the fear of a nuclear exchange, but it conditioned an entire generation’s attitude towards Russian relations – and Donald mentions the risks often.

That’s why he’s reluctant to provide security guarantees for a country outside Nato, which puts him in the tradition of non-interference adopted during the Soviet invasion of Hungary, in 1956. Today it is taken for granted that Ukraine should be allowed to join Nato if it so wishes, but as late as 1998, when senators discussed Nato’s expansion, politicians of a less utopian era warned about “poking the Russian bear”.

As for fawning over Moscow’s leaders, as Trump does Putin, even Harry Truman, the wisest eagle of all, wrote in his diary, “I can deal with Stalin. He is honest – but smart as hell.”

...

While many historians agree that Trump is something unseen before, a few might conclude he’s the most American president we’ve ever had – his chief novelty being transparency. Viewers of the press conference were shocked by his volatility, but when he said “you don’t have the cards”, he expressed the way countless administrations have handled smaller countries, including our own. The reason why British policy consists solely of trying to persuade the US to support our goals is because the Americans previously undermined our ability to act as an independent power.

They made demolition of the empire a tacit condition for their support during the Second World War. The US insisted on creating a unipolar world and now complains about having to police it almost on its own. The irony.

"Our own". Read that as the UK or Canada or most other countries.

....

The greatest favour that Trump is doing the world is demonstrating that there is no Santa Claus. There actually is no Utopia. That no matter how friendly your neighbours appear, that can change. You have to be prepared to look after yourself. Once you are secure then you can afford to be generous, within your limits.

 

[Furniture]

The greatest favour that Trump is doing the world is demonstrating that there is no Santa Claus. There actually is no Utopia. That no matter how friendly your neighbours appear, that can change. You have to be prepared to look after yourself. Once you are secure then you can afford to be generous, within your limits.

The problem with the way Trump is doing us a "favour" is that he is doing it in an destabilizing way. It's one thing to say, "We are paying too much, so we can't contribute more." It's another thing to drag a national leader into a TV set and berate them in front of the world.

Countries prosper when they have stable, predictable relations with one another. They may not be your friends, but they maintain the veneer of civility because that veneer of civility is sometimes all that's holding things together behind the scenes. When countries act openly hostile towards each other, it's far easier for things to get out of hand. Often times because the people demand that "those others" pay for their transgressions.

 

[Kirkhill]

The problem with the way Trump is doing us a "favour" is that he is doing it in an destabilizing way. It's one thing to say, "We are paying too much, so we can't contribute more." It's another thing to drag a national leader into a TV set and berate them in front of the world.

Countries prosper when they have stable, predictable relations with one another. They may not be your friends, but they maintain the veneer of civility because that veneer of civility is sometimes all that's holding things together behind the scenes. When countries act openly hostile towards each other, it's far easier for things to get out of hand. Often times because the people demand that "those others" pay for their transgressions.

I agree. No rational person would ask for chaos. But change only seems to occur from chaos.

One theory of evolution is based on catastrophic events creating new situations with new mutations "instantly" and then, over time, the survivors fight it out, learning how to prosper and get comfortable, Until the next catastrophic calamity.

Mutatis mutandis.

The good news? We're still here.
The bad news? The dinosaurs look like chickens.

 

[GK .Dundas]

My perspective isn’t a complaint, but rather an “it is what it is, deal with the new reality.”

The challenge with transactionalism, is the temporal basis over which a transaction is deemed valid and how either or both parties feel bound to that period of validity.

So far with the with this current American administration that appears to be 24 hours roughly.
As I recall from his last period in office that also occasionally depended upon who ever talked to him last....
The next four years are going to be.... interesting.
.

 

[Kirkhill]

Cant take America at its word, or whats written on paper when they will say/do something opposite the next day or week

As if anybody ever could....

The roots of Trump’s realpolitik

unherd.com

The ephemeral spasms of Wilsonian utopianism form the exception to the rule that American statesmen in every generation usually are guided by considerations of the national interest in their dealings with other major powers, including those whose internal regimes are repugnant to American principles. Uncle Sam may engage in flowery talk — but allies and enemies alike know that he drives a hard bargain.

There may be sound arguments based on realpolitik to oppose Trump’s strategy toward Ukraine. But to be consistent, moralists who invoke American ideals ought to condemn FDR and Churchill for agreeing to a Soviet sphere of influence in Eastern Europe that lasted half a century after 1945. And they must condemn Eisenhower and Johnson for failing to take significant action to punish the Soviet Union from crushing democratic rebellions in East Germany in 1953, Hungary in 1956, and Czechoslovakia in 1968.

As often happens, Trump breaks with American presidential traditions more in style than in substance. In reality, the 45th and 47th president is in a tradition of realist presidents, going back to Theodore Roosevelt more than a century ago, who have viewed world politics as a great-power club, rather than an arena for idealism.

In brokering the Treaty of Portsmouth that ended the Russo-Japanese war of 1904-1905, for example, Theodore Roosevelt accepted a Japanese sphere of influence in Korea, South Manchuria, and Sakhalin Island as the price of maintaining a balance of power in East Asia between Russia and Japan. In his 1906 Nobel Peace Prize lecture, TR said that “it would be a masterstroke if those great powers honestly bent on peace would form a League of Peace not only to keep the peace among themselves, but to prevent, by force if necessary, its being broken by others”.

...

A major problem I have is over the rare-earth deal. But, is it really any different than Churchill having to stump up to secure financing to fight WW2? Not really. And the Pitts certainly didn't give away their support of European monarchs for free. In fact, if I think about it, our "unwritten constitution" of 1689 is based on a beggars bargain. William of Orange needed money to fight Louis XIV. The English parliament offered access to that money in exchange for him accepting a diminution of the monarch's powers. In a sense he was, to the English parliament, the least cost solution. He demanded less for his services than James VII and II.

And Louis XIV traded in Canada for a couple of small islands that produced sugar because they were more profitable.

 

[Kirkhill]

Wishful thinking on my part?

Marco Rubio being interviewed by Stephanopoulos.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/video/2025/03/02/secretary_rubio_well_be_ready_to_re-engage_when_zelensky_is_ready_for_peace.html

I have a feeling that Rubio is pitching the corporate line because that is what he is being paid for. I'm not convinced that he is convinced on the course of action but it's the boss's COA. And maybe neither of them see a better COA.

....

But Trump promoting regime change in Ukraine? I'm a fan of regime change in Russia instead.