Posted on 07/03/2022 2:00:44 PM PDT by delta7
So, the G-7 leaders are in agreement, more war with Russia. Without actually saying exactly that, that was the main takeaway from he meeting of the most feckless leaders in the world.
They also pledged $600 billion they don’t have to fund global infrastructure projects to ‘combat China’s Belt and Road Initiative.’ One wonders where all this money and, in the case of Europe, energy is going to come from to fund all of this.
But the question I’ve had from the beginning of this obvious war of attrition the West wants to impose on Russia is the following: Do we have the stamina, in terms of real production capacity, to cash these checks our leaders are writing?
A major report from the Royal United Services Institute (RUSI), one of the oldest military think tanks in the UK emphatically said not in anyone’s wildest dreams. Alex Mercouris of The Duran did an amazing job of breaking down what RUSI thought about NATO’s ability to wage war vs. Russia’s current military tempo, days before this idea caught fire.
nd weekly consumption by the UAF is staggeringly vast.
I told you at the outset of this war that Russia was absolutely engaged in a war of attrition against the West, hoping NATO would take the bait of a ground war in Ukraine. I didn’t have numbers to back this up, only the inference because of what I understood about Putin and his previous maneuvers against the West.
What’s obvious to me is the neocons and neoliberals controlling the West think they can turn Ukraine into a quagmire for Putin, but what if Putin thinks he can turn Ukraine into a quagmire for them?
Russia is not capable of conquering Europe. But he doesn’t need to to defeat them. He just needs to create a version of this map:
knew that Putin wouldn’t commit Russia to this conflict if it couldn’t sustain fighting it. I also knew that the West would LIE OUTRAGEOUSLY about the level of corruption within the Russian society to play on the biases of marginally-informed American armchair generals.
Is the Russian system perfect? No. Is there corruption? Yes. But it’s complete nonsense to think it wouldn’t be uncovered and stripped out of all branches of the Russian military/industrial complex during the initial military gambit. The shifts made by Russia strategically and in terms of personnel have set it up for the long haul, fighting a type of war they are very good at and which the US and NATO left the UAF mostly defenseless against.
Now, with sanctions further hollowing out the US’s and Europe’s economies and the “leadership” of the buffoons that just met in Germany, Russia is in the driver’s seat to grind out a victory in Ukraine and leave the West depleted of weapons if the current situation goes on without a course correction.
The point made by RUSI is that it may not be possible to course correct in time (or ever) in the time frame needed to affect the outcome in Ukraine, absent an unthinkable escalation.
The exhaustion we thought we would put to Russia, is the ultimate form of ‘sanctions boomerang’ on the West. To listen to RUSI tell the tale, we’re the ones without the capacity to fight if the conflict widens.
And yet, to listen to US Secretary of State Antony Blinken or National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan, you would think Russia is still on the verge of collapse.
Now the G-7 think they have the power to set a global price cap on crude oil. I’ve told you time and again that Davos really does believe they have some kind of monopsony power over Russia’s exports. They still believe that their thirst for energy, food, industrial metals, fertilizer, etc. gives them power over Putin.
And Putin is the moderate within Russian power circles. There are a hundred Banes waiting in the wings happy to snap the necks of the John Daggetts he no longer needs to sell oil and gas to.
I’ve watched Putin for years. I’ve seen him put pressure on his central bank and the bankers to reform the financial sector. I’ve seen him publicly dress down and reform major industrial oligarchs in metals production. Six plus years of military operations in Syria have given him a lot of data on how to execute a long-term strategy and find the break points of his logistics and operations.
And I’m sure that this war in Ukraine is as much another data gathering exercise for the capabilities of the West as much as it is a stress test on his own internal production systems.
Russia is now 4 months into this review. Lots of people have been fired, jailed, etc. The non-hackers are being weeded out. Operations are leaning out.
Now let’s look at the West.
The US under Biden is now amping up military spending, presumably to increase ammunition production levels. But it may not be. As Alex rightly points out, echoing points that Dexter White has discussed in the Gold Goats ‘n Guns newsletter, keiretsu or just-in-time manufacturing is how we operate here in the West. That system is under massive stress thanks to the supply chain breakdown created by Davos over COVID-19.
While sanctions may have limited Russia’s ability to procure or maintain a large arsenal of its highest technology tanks and/or airplanes, again as Dexter has pointed out, it may not be relevant here because this isn’t a war of bleeding edge technology.
It’s a WWI style artillery war, which we are not prepared to fight. Scott Ritter pointed out to me when we met at the recent Ron Paul Institute conference that NATO no longer trains in maneuver warfare. While Russia’s combined forces training is limited, as evidenced in its attack on Kiev in February, the US’s major advantage has been severely curtailed by lack of training and readiness over the past couple of decades.
So, what we have, overall, is a military picture with weak supply chains, limited ability to ramp production, and a military that hasn’t trained for sustained warfare on a mass scale.
This means that Biden’s expansion of the DoD’s budget to $813 billion this year may not even be what we think it means. Instead of being a buildup to fight a wider war, this may seriously be just the last dip at the trough before the whole system comes crashing down.
Remember, that Davos wants the US destroyed. It has assiduously hollowed out vital US manufacturing capability while simultaneously putting it in a fragile fiscal position with a divided and angry population.
The stage is set for internal conflict of a type and kind that we haven’t seen in over 150 years. And we’re supposed to fight a war with Russia, a nuclear and conventional military powerhouse?
This is leaving aside the reality that if NATO declares open war on Russia that Blinkered Blinken and the anti-Diplomats have pushed China into being paranoid about our intentions over Taiwan.
The real stress test is happening now. Ukraine is getting crushed under the weight of Russia’s ability to sustain an inhuman level of artillery bombardment. The RUSI article only touches on the potential for Russia to continue its production of the needed munitions, but one gets the idea that these things are cheap and fully domestically sourced.
This has forced into the open the massive shortfall of industrial capacity in the West as well as fracturing the political leadership as to what they should ultimately do here.
Half of them want to continue the war in perpetuity. The other half want a ceasefire. None of them would admit this at the G-7 meeting out of a need to not look weak or admit that the Russians have exposed them.
It takes a staggering amount of energy to fight a sustained war. The West is at the mercy of Russia to get that energy.
The next phase of this war is now the complete divorce of Europe from the Russian energy complex at prices that can’t keep Europe from sinking into depression if not outright depravity.
To achieve this, these out-of-touch narcissists think they can set a limit on what they will pay for a barrel of oil? I thought I’d heard it all in this life, but this is almost as delusional as the average Libs of TikTok video post Roe v. Wade’s demise.
The financial war of attrition against the West I’ve discussed at length for months is the reality of the day. Ultimately without energy or the money to procure or produce it, there is no real conventional war. Industrial warfare having returned, as is the premise of the RUSI article, has already determined the outcome in Ukraine.
This is just part of the reason why Henry Kissinger urged at this year’s Davos meeting to open up talks and begin the negotiations. It seems at this point his admonishments have fallen on deaf ears. Given the average age of the idiots making these decisions, this is, of course, not surprising.
Davos has set the US up for complete humiliation in Ukraine, sacrificed thousands of Ukrainians, bankrupted millions of Europeans and corrupted hundred of millions sustaining a vast bureaucracy incapable of responding to the growing needs of a failing system.
The sad part is this: They think they are #winning, because so much of this is going according to plan. They are missing the big parts about destroying the US too quickly in the process, if you want it to fight your war to cover your bankruptcy.
Russia and China will cut Europe off from global trade if Europe defaults on its debt, which ECB President Christine Lagarde just told the world she is ready to do. The Fed’s hawkishness is already destroying the Eurodollar markets, the source of Davos’ power.
So, in conclusion this is what I see next:
Russia will not stop with their victory in Donbass They will take Nikolaev, Kharkov and Odessa (Note Russian spelling, screw the BBC!). Russia will not take the bait over Kaliningrad, but will cut off all gas to Germany. The German government will fall, but it won’t matter b/c the Greens, who set policy, control the Bundesrat. Russia will continue to not give Davos the excuse to start WWIII, even with Finland and Sweden entering the alliance. They will keep upping the stakes while further exposing the emptiness of their threats. The Biden Admin. will keep trying to start a war over Taiwan Eventually China will oblige them, even though they don’t want to. Bulgaria’s collapse is just the start of the end of the EU in Eastern Europe. NATO will either collapse or nukes will fly…. I’m still betting on the former. Erdogan caving over NATO expansion means Putin will oppose him in Syria. The Fed will continue raising rates while the ECB hangs on for dear life. In desperation I expect a false flag provocation to force the Russians into a move or simply justify the Davos pulling us into their next war, i.e. another virus or chemical weapons attack this time blamed on Putin.
The goal of this project is an independent Europe, a broken US and vassalage for Asia.
They will achieve, at best, one of those three things. An independent, but broken Europe under the vassalage of Russia and China, the the US retreats and licks its wounds. That’s the future I see now, if the nukes don’t fly.
I like your post ... Succint. To the point, and easy to understand... 👍
Russians haven’t changed one bit since 1991. They are as imperialistic and corrupt as they were in USSR times.
[Nah. Europe has had more than 50 years.
They have a union of 26 countries.
This is their task.
We are not their financed and military outsource.
Cut the umbilical cord on these welfare queens!
It’s time for them to stand on their own feet.]
Relative to today’s economy, we spent the equivalent of $44T in WWII. I think of $40b as a small price to pay.
Ultimately, Russia is an 11 time zone country. I completely understand Germany wanting lebensraum, It used to be half the size of Ukraine and 1/50 the size of Russia. For Russia to want lebensraum? If Russia isn’t big enough today, it will *never* be big enough. Russia’s limitless territorial ambitions combined with its massive expanse and a regime structured for war are what make it dangerous.
Then let Europe pay it.
Until we break even, body count-wise (and the Russians are 60K short), we should supply Ukraine just to even out the cosmic balance.
It can be Europe getting "even". We shouldn't give them another penny. Europe should.
Russia’s limitless territorial ambitions combined with its massive expanse and a regime structured for war are what make it dangerous.
I believe this is almost completely a propaganda narrative of the West in order to have an enemy.
That said, if there is a chance it is true, time for Europe to step up.
Europe wasn’t going to go all in on a U.S. proxy war for the Ukraine crime syndicate involving George Soros, Klaus Schwab, Jao Bai-din, Hunter Biden, Paul Pelosi, John Kerry Jr., Christopher Heinz (Kerry), and Alex Vindman.
Yeah. Right. Sure.
Putin’s aim was to take on NATO.
Guess you don’t hear yourself.
Russia is far too corrupt and inbred to ever threaten Europe. If Europe falls it will be from within due to immigration.
[I believe this is almost completely a propaganda narrative of the West in order to have an enemy.
That said, if there is a chance it is true, time for Europe to step up. ]
[Russia is far too corrupt and inbred to ever threaten Europe. If Europe falls it will be from within due to immigration.]
I’d say that institutionally speaking, Russia is set up as a despotism wired for territorial conquest. That’s why, like China, only the complete dismantlement of the empire, with its component parts becoming independent countries, will end the threat. Barring that, we can only guard against them and arm the targets of their ambitions where we aren’t explicitly allied with those targets. Russia’s wars are clumsy, inefficient and inelegant. But by the end of its campaigns, it is bigger, land- and population-wise, and the free world is smaller. That’s why we can’t ignore Russia’s military expeditions.
—> Something like 10% of government spending is defense. I’m OK with that.
Sure. Southern border of the US - our national interest.
[Sure. Southern border of the US - our national interest.]
If price caps on Russian oil fail and gas prices explode vastly higher, it is only a matter of time until we hear talk of taking Russian oil itself.
Somebody will suggest we invade Russia and take their oil fields.
Soviet Russia must be destroyed.
It was in 1991.
________________________
At the time, we had been given one of those tall, large, old satellite dishes. The MSM at that time did not encrypt their feed, so we had silent pool footage of calm, burly factory workers building barricades out of whatever they could find along with those little state-produced cars. We also could see the editing bays for the major networks, which was instructive. The bays may have had sound, but I don’t really remember.
So, that revolution was televised.
No matter the outcome in Ukraine, the WEF and the “Great Reset” wins. “Small wars, pandemic, economic chaos, starvation, abortion, non-reproductive/queer sex;”
_______________________________________
The 4th Reich is not winning, although they do keep plodding forward, if only because they dare not stop and lose momentum.
They are not winning the current *small* war. Putin has called them out, by name and deed and vowed to end them...actually, he has declared them ended.
No one believes the plandemic scam any longer, except for a small cadre still wedded to legacy media. C19 is over for the populace. Money pockets fizzled immediately. Economic chaos continues, but it does look as though the petrodollar is on life support and all the West can do is issue worthless paper.
Starvation is looming in the 3rd/4th world, but already the grain deliveries are slowly exiting the Black Sea and Russia has the capability of sending food by plane, if it gets that bad. The US has the most permissive abortion laws in the world and those are now relegated to the individual states, without the force of the Federal government behind it. Many trannies are not surgically altered and the new attention-getter/virtue signal is for intact biological women who present as males to become pregnant by their biologically male partners, who present as women. Ukraine took great pains to protect their Ukranian surrogates, as that is a source of foreign capital from male homosexuals, as well as a source of profitable fetal tissue now that Planned Parenthood has ben forced into retreat.
Worst of all, we know who the 4th Reich is in terms of organization and individuals. Secrecy served them well for a long time, but that is now gone.
They’ve done some damage, but likely no more than 10%-15% of global population. And everyone affected is angry & out for blood.
Ukraine is a disaster for them.
it is certainly revealing cracks in nato.
i was surprised germany had gone along with any of this. they have developed close ties with russia in the last 3 decades. former heads of state openly worked for russia after retirement. nordstream 2 was about to go on line.
presumably one side intent of the UK/US was force germany to separate from russia. I suspect both russia and germany are hoping that they can continue business once things calm down in a year or two, rather than end up in continuous war.
so uk/us want ww3, almost certainly put lithuania up to the kaliningrad trick, and france/germany put their foot down and said no.
What is air power against more competent fliers and layered air defense?
I am unaware of any fact of the Ukrainian air defeating a Russian aircraft in the air battle. Ukrainians were getting shot down on a daily basis until they lost their aircraft. Whatever assets they hid in Poland and Romania get shot down to this day everywhere it shows up.
This article cannot serve as a basis for rational discourse. It is slanted and warped and fallacious from the get-go.
It might be fun for some FReepers to pick it apart and reveal how profoundly flawed it is, sentence by sentence, but I, personally, regard that as a waste of time.
Regards,
There is no Supreme Soviet, and no Chairman of the Presidium.
Russia has had a bicameral Federal Assembly since 1993.
As for the global economics, the war is only four months old and is going to last at least on year, maybe two. One economic quarter is not enough to show any real global economic changes. Russian losses can not be made up like Ukraine's. Russian production of war material may look good short term, the in the long term the writing is on the wall due to sanctions. Too busy and tired this holiday weekend to go into the rest of this.
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