Nato is growing reckless over Ukraine – and Russia’s German military leak proves it
Western Europe has no conceivable interest in escalating the Ukraine war through a long-range missile exchange. While it should sustain its logistical support for Ukrainian forces, it has no strategic interest in Kyiv’s desire to drive Russia out of the majority Russian-speaking areas of Crimea or Donbas. It has every interest in assiduously seeking an early settlement and starting the rebuilding of Ukraine.
As for the west’s “soft power” sanctions on Russia, they have failed miserably, disrupting the global trading economy in the process. Sanctions may be beloved of western diplomats and thinktanks. They may even hurt someone – not least Britain’s energy users – but they have not devastated the Russian economy or changed Putin’s mind. This year Russia’s growth rate is expected to exceed Britain’s.
The crass ineptitude of a quarter of a century of western military interventions should have taught us some lessons. Apparently not.
When you've lost the Grauniad...
Wait'll the Brit public gets a load of the price of fish and chips in a couple of months....
Europe has several strategic interests in driving Russian forces out of occupied areas of The Ukraine.
All the hydrocarbon deposits that lured greedy gangster Putin to attack in the first place, can pay back war costs over the next couple of decades. International rule of law could be preserved, Russian military capability neutralized, and deterrence restored. Sea control over the Black Sea from Crimea will contain Russia and defend Ukraine from future aggression. And it is just the right thing to do.
As for the west’s “soft power” sanctions on Russia, Gazprom now operates at a loss, and the five year transit agreement for the Russian gas still flowing through Ukrainian pipelines expires at the end of 2024, after which Hungary, Slovakia and Austria will be untethered from Russian economic influence, and Russia untethered from that last big bit of Natural gas income from Europe, with no physical means to move that product to other customers. Putin squandered that Strategic market, for good.
Russia just announced another 500K BPD production cut on their crude oil, as well as another export ban on gasoline, this time for six more months (totaling 9 months out of 12, with the other recent ban) supposedly for “planned maintenance”. Not the best “planning” comrades.
Nazi Germany, like Putin’s fascist experiment of Novo North Korea in Russia, posted an increased GDP number and low unemployment, as they ran big budget deficits and printed money, to pour into the bonfire of the war. It was not real value being created, but rather a measure of how quickly they were expending value in the short term.
Europe’s gas storage emerged from their warm Winter with record high volumes on hand, which will drive prices lower over the Summer. Prices had already returned from the temporary highs at the start of the war when most of the Russian supply was shut off, and Nordstream pipelines were demolished. Europe is over the hump on transitioning to non-Russian suppliers, and the last of the land locked stragglers will have their Russian gas turned off by year’s end.
The end of an era, because of Putin killed the goose that laid the Golden eggs.