And call me a mad optimist, but it might be that the history books will show that this is the period where Europe’s fight facilitates the US in saving itself. Supreme irony that at root it is Ukraine showing the way. Slava Ukraini.
Adrian, Ive thought about your question. In all honesty I personally would fight for my country if facing an aggressive invasion. Just as my father and Uncle did in the war. What we are seeing in Ukraine is surely just this sentiment? What bothers me much much more than the realities of fighting and dying is the failure by allies to really step in, and , by so doing , end the aggression. Ultimately, there really is no alternative but to fight. If you are a pacifist by principle then I respect that, but please stop confusing the Ukrainians willingness to fight and die for their country with some kind of indifferent spectator sport enjoyed by either the Prof or, I am sure, all other readers.
Spot on Jonathan! I'm too old to fight, but I can send money to help Ukraine, regardless of what the Tangerine Palpatine does at the behest of his Russian master. Adrian doesn't seem to understand that Ukrainians will fight for their country whether anyone aids them or not.
I’ve now read the Professor’s Atlantic piece and it surprised even me. A piece about attrition that completely ignores Ukrainian losses. It makes my case for me in spades. It would be hilarious if we weren’t talking about real humans, real maimings, real suffering and real deaths. It’s atrocious.
And in that context the assertions you make in your reply here are simply unsupported - and IMO - unsupportable. We don't really know how willing the Ukrainians are to fight, we don't know how many of them there are left even if they are. I think it's likely the case that all the willing have already enlisted and are either fighting, wounded, dead or captured.
As for whether I'd fight in their position, well that depends on whether I was a Russian speaker who'd had my language rights restricted, had voted for Zelensky on the basis of his promise to 'do all it takes' to bring peace, only to see him bottle it when the far-right threatened his life and smashed up his office (as they did in 2019). Had I been shelled routinely for 8 years I might have taken up arms - but against them. Were I a tatttooed Banderite, I'd be well up for it. Were I me, I'd have got me and my family our as fast as I could - this war was only ever going to finish one way.
For all the Ukrainians dying on the front lines, Adrian is ready to sacrifice millions more in occupied territories. Murder, terror, abductions, cultural genocide. Teens groomed to be Russia’s next army, to be pointed westward. It’s all already happening SYSTEMATICALLY, so don’t let anybody bullshit you into claiming some moral high ground. There is no good option, Ukrainians don’t want to be eaten by Russia, and it’s their decision to make.
And what will happen if we stand idly by? How many tens of thousands of Ukrainian teens in occupied territories will be conscripted and forced to wage war against their fellow country men? And then against Europe?
Why are you so ready to sacrifice millions to murder, terror, and cultural genocide?
I think that at this point we need to add to the “What Europe needs to do” list something along the lines of “prevent valuable know-how and technical information from getting leaked to the US”. Right now, Ukraine is in possession of extremely valuable know-how in regard to war-fighting. I mean non-public information and analysis that absolutely must be prevented from getting into Russian hands in any way. In that regard, Trump and his acolytes are a giant security hole. (The list in the article already has a related point about “intelligence sharing”. My point here is about a different category of information. Here I'm talking about war-fighting know-how, like what typically gets shared within NATO e.g. during joint exercises, and information like technical specifications of the capabilities of drones that Ukraine considers desirable.)
Yes--my guess is that there are pretty intense discussions going on amongst European states about what they can actually share with the USA--my guess is very little. I would not trust the present US IC leadership to keep anything secret.
Maybe they can plant “false intel” to see if it gets picked up and then transmitted to the Russians”. The if that happens it could be used to Ukraine’s advantage.
The reluctance of the US to promptly and sufficiently arm Ukraine has led to a paradigm shift brought about by necessity and enabled by the ingenuity of the Ukrainians. The lessons paid for with Ukrainian blood must be kept out of the hands of dictators and meglomaniacs.
I hope this does not sound mean minded. But I listen to the Shield of the Republic podcast regularly. And unless I nod it off and missed it I have yet to hear Elliott Cohen say that he was wrong about Trump. In October and November he said that Trump still had many hawkish conservatives in his entourage, and maybe it would not be as bad as everybody thought it would be for Ukraine. I’m still waiting for him to say “I was wrong about that guys.” One of those hawkish conservatives around Trump was Marco Rubio who sat through the debacle in the oval office, looking like a stuffed doll and who was caricatured on Saturday Night Live, saying ‘no habla Inglese.’
I’m sorry if it’s mean minded of me, but I think people need to just say ‘ I was wrong and Trump’s presidency is a disaster.’
I think Marx said that history repeated itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. It feels like it’s the other way round and the first Trump presidency was a farce and the second one is a real tragedy of global proportions.
I've always thought that Trump was a terrible and evil man and that it was disastrous to put him in the oval office and that he was going to be worse in his second term, if it came to that, than during his first term. But I nevertheless greatly underestimated how disastrous Trump's second term could possibly become. Mea culpa.
Most people did, because they couldn’t accept the man who became president in 2016 was an actual fascist. Now, he’s had four years to consolidate his collaborators, and they are causing havoc, at home and abroad. Henry Wallace’s 1944 description of American fascism is spot on, “The dangerous American fascist
is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in
Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His
method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is
never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to
deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.”
Many of US however understood this immediately, as soon as he rode down that fucking escalator. Of course we did not believe he would win. But because of the incompetence of the Democrats, he won twice.
During his first term, I considered him to be a wannabe fascist, not an actual fascist. I think that the key difference is that he is now surrounded by so many actual fascists that the restraints are now gone that kept him in the wannabe category during his first term. Even his immense self-centredness and stupidity are not effective as limiting factors anymore: The Trumpist system as a whole alas now contains so much intelligent evil intentionality that it has become truly dangerous.
For years, when Trump first appeared on the scene with his MAGA trumpet I would periodically post an important article written by Henry Wallace (FDR's V.P. at the time) in 1944 and published in the NYTimes that year entitled "The Dangers of American Fascism". Here it is again for anyone interested. It was prescient.
Very prescient, as was Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here. Well it’s happening, and it seems we Americans have been caught flat-footed because of our complacency.
Question: The article says: “We all know the part that the cartels played in bringing Hitler to power, and the rule the giant German trusts have played in Nazi conquests.” I’m unfortunately still uneducated in regard to those aspects. What is a good source for reading up on that aspect?
Don’t forget those tens of millions of voters who for some sh^t reason or another actively voted for him AND handed him unified control of government. Voters do share some, I think most, of the blame.
Well you just had to look at all the people in the MSM poo pooing the idea that Trump and his followers are fascists, when the evidence is as plain as the nose on our faces: reorganizing our foreign policy to favor Putin, supporting the AfD, etc. the list of pro-fascist moves by Trump and his cronies over the past eight years is quite long. The EU is now the last stand for Liberal Democracy—not my favorite kind, since it seems incapable of restraining capitalism since the time everyone abandoned Keynes in the 1970’s for neoliberalism, but it’ll do for now.
The reason I expected the worst from the second term is quite simple. While in the first term it seemed like he was surprised to win, he was quite literally fighting for his life when campaigning for the second term. All the lawsuits and quite serious (and treasonous) crimes means that not only would he need to regain the presidency, but it also means that he cannot let himself lose the presidency, even after he's served his term. It would be too dangerous for him. A lot of very rich and powerful people also depend on his patronage and will do everything in their power to keep him president/dictator (rule of law be damned). The good news is that everything in the US is about to go to shit, which will breed some more serious opposition than what they have now (which is quite frankly pathetic).
Time and time again, history has shown that the worst possible thing you can do is grievously wound you enemy, but not finish them off, and instead give them time to recuperate. That's what happened in the Winter war when Sweden didn't finish off Peter, in revolutionary France when the first coalition halted before approaching Paris and in Germany when Hitler failed in his Beer hall Putsch. This is the same reason I oppose a ceasefire unless made very advantageous to Ukraine (which Russia wouldn't accept anyways). Dictatorships tend to be much more brittle than they seem right up until their fall.
"The good news is that everything in the US is about to go to shit, which will breed some more serious opposition than what they have now (which is quite frankly pathetic)."
The reason for this is complicated, but it goes back to the post-civil war period. When we had a vital labor movement in this country, most of the people who were in it were immigrants. The powers-that-be know that when labor is pissed off, it can rock a country. But now, all of those Germans, Irish, Italians, etc., who formed the backbone of the labor movement in the late 19th century and early 20th century have been fully assimilated and consider themselves "white," middle class, and feel a vested demographic interest in keeping the next wave of immigrants disenfranchised. The whole anti-woke thing is about keeping unions of out and workers in service industries disenfranchised. It's been working for a long time. That's what neoliberalism is all about.
No, it's not mean. Placing any hopes in Rubio was ridiculous for anybody who saw him panic under attack from Chris Christie in the Republican debate before NH primary. He absolutely looked like a man you can't rely on in any crisis.
Francesa, Rubio has always been an empty suit who “talks” a good game but is intellectually vacuous. Seeing him come up through the Florida House and then in the Senate, and having met him, there is no “there there” so the pictures of him and his obsequiousness are totally in character.
Have you heard Cohen ever mention the number of Ukrainian casualties in all of this? It's part of the tragedy of global proportions that is never mentioned around here - certainly the Professor has never seriously addressed them. Please point me to links if you can - he literally never does - ask yourself why.
Feigned concern for Ukrainian casualties is upsetting. Pray do tell us again how everyone should sacrifice millions of Ukrainians in occupied areas to murder, terror, theft, abduction, and cultural genocide so that Ukrainian soldiers can die in the next Russian invasion instead of the current one. Your heart is really just so big.
Something else Europe should do: implement a visa program to attract American scientists, researchers, and engineers affected by Musk's gutting of the federal government. This is a historic opportunity to break their dependence on US research, defense, and tech, to develop home-grown alternatives.
And strategic thinking capabilities. Starting with clear thinking to gain clarity on what our strategic objectives are. We can no longer afford to simply follow the lead of the US.
No thank you, Europe has a more than sufficient number of Windmill scientists destroying our power supply, and we have more than enough climate pseudo-scientists diverting resources from the military effort to the so-called climate crisis.
We also reject your offer to employ US gender scientists
Like the two dictators pictured, trump is a malignant sociopath. He is not smart but does possess a feral cunning. Thankfully he makes no attempt to hide his nasty nature. He cannot be reasoned with. He’s in it for the grift and his ego, but the people backing him have every intention of overturning liberal democracy. The 10 point plan is the right recipe for Europe’s future.
Trump may be all of those, but unlike his predecessor and the Professor and almost every commentator around here, he mentioned Ukrainian losses in this horrendous war. Concerned or not, what does that make you all?
Adrian, you don't seem to understand that a ceasefire/peace deal that doesn't have extremely, extremely strong security guarantees behind it, will just be broken as Putin has broken all other ceasefires in the past. There cannot be any trust baked into the peace deal, because there is none. The peace deal must be built upon real strength, so that Putin knows that of he tries again, he will lose more than he gains. You seem to suggest that people in these threads don't care about the Ukrainians dying every day on the front lines, but if this isn't settled correctly now, then there will be far more deaths in the future, and that could go far beyond Ukraine.
Europe does not have that 'real strength', the US barely does now. What's your plan for victory here? Are there enough live and fit Ukrainians to achieve it? These are real questions, with horrendous, bitter, heart-breakind consequences and no one here has bothered to ask the question. You're just another sad chickenhawk I'm afraid.
The Ukrainians have fought Russia to a virtual stand still. They are producing a large percentage of their own weapons. They will be their own security. Making peace now may be painful for some, but is wanted by many. Play a long game with Russia, and re-build with a western focus behind a DMZ. Clean-up your business and political culture, so you earn EU membership. Get American business in to rebuild civil infrastructure and extract rare earth metals. Europe doesn’t really want to play hardball with Russia, they need the oil too much. Stop Ukrainians from dying, allow the Ukrainian diaspora to return home, re-build for another day. Never forget Biden pulled the plug on the offensive.
You mean he exaggerated every challenge Ukraine faces while minimizing every challenge Russia faces as part of a strategy to turn his people against Ukraine? We should applaud him for trying to manipulate us? He does not care about Ukrainian losses - they are just a tool by which he plans to hurt Ukraine and cause even more losses. Indeed, Ukrainians are already dying as he follows through on what he set out to do.
It's you, the Professor and all the chickenhawks around here who care nothing about the Ukrainian dead. You're happy to cheer them all off to the front whilst making no serious effort to estimate their losses. It's as tragic as it is pathetic.
I have sought out info on Ukrainian losses and have posted here at least twice mentioning my findings. Unsurprisingly, it’s quite clear that Russian casualties are multiples of Ukrainian casualties. Except for Russia it’s a war of choice; for Ukrainians it’s an unprovoked fight for survival.
I replied to those replies asking how the RF losses are a multiple higher than the AFU's despite their massive advantage in fire power?
Meanwhile, I’ve now read the Professor’s Atlantic piece and it surprised even me. A piece about attrition that completely ignores Ukrainian losses. It makes my case for me in spades. It would be hilarious if we weren’t talking about real humans, real maimings, real suffering and real deaths. It’s atrocious.
We need to rearm. We recognise that Ukraine so far has hammered Russia's front line forces.
There are two relatively simple threats that can be made by Europe that can bring the war to a close without substantial risk.
1. The UK and France have the ability to blockade Russia's ability to export oil.
Stop and seize the shadow fleet. This makes it significantly harder for Putin to fund the war and purchase components from abroad. The Black Sea fleet is emasculated, the North Fleet is weak, and the Baltic fleet would be in a precarious position given that 99% of the Baltic shore is hostile.
2. Europe has the ability to overwhelm Russian air defences with massive production of drones.
Ukraine has demonstrated its ability to penetrate Russian air defences with 3 million drones a year (I think that is the production goal for this year). The EU has the ability to produce 100 million a year. Raids on Russian arms production facilities with 10,000 drones (only an order of magnitude larger than bomber raids in WW2 and far cheaper and safer) would rapidly exhaust Russian defensive capability and their production capability.
Both of these are asymmetrical. Russia cannot match them in either scale or impact.
The nuclear threat is always there but to escalate to Nukes because a railway junction is attacked, or a tank factory damaged, risks even further reducing the impact of Russian threats
Don't forget repatriating Russia's 300 billion$ fund to Ukraine. Materially speaking, there really isn't a huge difference between using interest of the fund to support Ukraine versus just using the fund itself. In a monetary sense however, the difference is huge and would pay for Russia's defeat. It could also pay for point #2 you are making.
The Europeans finally need to do what should have been done from the beginning - announce that all participants in Putin's "Special military operation" will be banned for life from entering Europe (while exceptions can be made for conscripts, who under Russian law were not even supposed to be there). A lot of them go there solely for money, so take from them one of the ways of enjoying it - ever. Also announce eternal sanctions against all Russian companies operating in occupied territories (including Crimea) and Russian banks doing business with them. Finally, ban from Europe Russian civilians traveling to occupied territories (including Crimea). Announce (whether it's true or not) that British satellites and recon drones over the Black Sea record license plates of all cars on the Kerch Bridge, cell phone signals etc. Such measures will reduce the value of those territories to Russia. Perhaps even announce sanctions against Russian companies employing veterans of this war. Right now there are not many of them, except for disabled ones and ex-prisoners who managed to survive six months of meat assaults (not exactly the primary targets for corporate recruiting anyway), but after the war reintegration of hundreds of thousands of psychologically traumatized men desensitized to violence will already be a big problem for Russian government, and further damaging their employment prospects will make the situation even worse.
Amen, Andrew! But I do not think Europe has the guts to do that, especially the Germans who in their hearts desperately want to do business in Russia. Also, like more than 20 years ago, they crave Russian gas for their energy needs.
Your plan is very well put and achievable on a relatively short term basis.
A massive increase in UAV production is quickly achievable and relatively cost-effective. Combining the technological and tactical advances of Ukraine with Europe's brightest could produce dividends rapidly.
Thanks Tim--that list was trying to be as practical and achievable as possible. There needs to be long-term structural changes as well, though those will take time.
Many thanks for this post. Agree 100%. It took Zelensky’s drubbing by Trump and Vance in the Oval Office for European leaders to realise, at long last, who exactly Trump is and what they need to do about it. It was the same warped vision that made many of them (and us! ) refuse to believe that he would win the election and then, hoping against hope, that he would not be as bad as many, like yourself, were predicting. Even in Macron’s fairly hard-hitting speech last night, he still said he hoped that America “will remain on our side”. As long as Trump is President, it won’t. This truth, like many others, has always been hiding in plain sight!
Europeans “can see clearly now” and action has to follow. The meeting of Chiefs of Defence Staff in Paris next week combined with Merz’s ground-breaking statements are an encouraging start. But only a start!
Does anyone now remember the tragedy of the Spanish Republic, and the terrible price Britain and France paid for their failure to support a fellow democracy in its heroic struggle against fascism?
"History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes."
Very good. I hope you're right. Even now we're hearing that Hungary may be allowed to veto further support to Ukraine. It's well past time to suspend Hungary's EU membership.
And Europe must surely get on with spending the Russian money that we've got sitting around in banks, not just the interest its earning.
And finally, this isn't a point I think you've made explicitly (except perhaps re: drones), though I think it's entirely compatible: if European states are serious about rearming - and they certainly should be - they should be prioritising where and how they can get the best bang for buck, which may well mean investing in Ukrainian production. I suspect Ukraine can produce a lot of what we need cheaper and more quickly, even if that means expanding production.
Without the US, is Europe helping protect Ukraine, or is it the other way around? Ukraine, with its largest army in Europe, experience against Russia, use of the latest innovations, and future source of cheap armaments, is a massive asset form European security.
I agree with all of this except point 2 , on the U.K. being offered rejoin the EU. Not that it’s not a good idea but because it would be such a huge distraction right now and split the political parties which , except for reform , are all together on supporting Ukraine
Please keep speaking truth to ?power? If the truth is repeated often enough, maybe it will finally sink in with European (and UK) leadership. Ironically, it seems to me, the requirement for countries to increase their defence spending to deal with Russia may be the only effective way for the countries to address their current highest priority: growth. We could kill two birds with one stone . . .
What extraordinary timing. Trump suspends USAID. Putin moves in with a Mafia style bag of cash for the new Syrian government. Sorry I bombed you lot to pieces and helped Assad gass your children, here’s a billion in freshly printed 250$ bills with a face you can trust. Can I keep my military bases and park all my gear inside your country again? Where are the USA and Europe? Busy fighting each other and themselves.
Unless I have misunderstood, Phillips has recently asserted that the weakening of the US through the actions of the current US government is in fact intentional. I’m not sure whether that can really be true, but what has been happening is certainly consistent with that hypothesis.
Trump's degree of rage towards Ukraine is remarkable. It's truly unhinged. There are signs here in the US that patience may be wearing thin with babysitting the Tyrant-child. He's determined to save Putin. But saving Putin may be a fool's errand. The Ukrainian army is the strongest in Europe. Now is the time for all of Europe to back it.
Absolutely spot on Phillips. And it all can be done.
Thanks Jonathan--yes it can be done, thanks to Ukraine.
And call me a mad optimist, but it might be that the history books will show that this is the period where Europe’s fight facilitates the US in saving itself. Supreme irony that at root it is Ukraine showing the way. Slava Ukraini.
We can but hope
I don’t see that happening any time soon.
And how many Ukrainians will die in the process? This is a concern that never bothers the Professor - does it both you Jonathan?
Adrian, Ive thought about your question. In all honesty I personally would fight for my country if facing an aggressive invasion. Just as my father and Uncle did in the war. What we are seeing in Ukraine is surely just this sentiment? What bothers me much much more than the realities of fighting and dying is the failure by allies to really step in, and , by so doing , end the aggression. Ultimately, there really is no alternative but to fight. If you are a pacifist by principle then I respect that, but please stop confusing the Ukrainians willingness to fight and die for their country with some kind of indifferent spectator sport enjoyed by either the Prof or, I am sure, all other readers.
Spot on Jonathan! I'm too old to fight, but I can send money to help Ukraine, regardless of what the Tangerine Palpatine does at the behest of his Russian master. Adrian doesn't seem to understand that Ukrainians will fight for their country whether anyone aids them or not.
I’ve now read the Professor’s Atlantic piece and it surprised even me. A piece about attrition that completely ignores Ukrainian losses. It makes my case for me in spades. It would be hilarious if we weren’t talking about real humans, real maimings, real suffering and real deaths. It’s atrocious.
And in that context the assertions you make in your reply here are simply unsupported - and IMO - unsupportable. We don't really know how willing the Ukrainians are to fight, we don't know how many of them there are left even if they are. I think it's likely the case that all the willing have already enlisted and are either fighting, wounded, dead or captured.
As for whether I'd fight in their position, well that depends on whether I was a Russian speaker who'd had my language rights restricted, had voted for Zelensky on the basis of his promise to 'do all it takes' to bring peace, only to see him bottle it when the far-right threatened his life and smashed up his office (as they did in 2019). Had I been shelled routinely for 8 years I might have taken up arms - but against them. Were I a tatttooed Banderite, I'd be well up for it. Were I me, I'd have got me and my family our as fast as I could - this war was only ever going to finish one way.
For all the Ukrainians dying on the front lines, Adrian is ready to sacrifice millions more in occupied territories. Murder, terror, abductions, cultural genocide. Teens groomed to be Russia’s next army, to be pointed westward. It’s all already happening SYSTEMATICALLY, so don’t let anybody bullshit you into claiming some moral high ground. There is no good option, Ukrainians don’t want to be eaten by Russia, and it’s their decision to make.
And what will happen if we stand idly by? How many tens of thousands of Ukrainian teens in occupied territories will be conscripted and forced to wage war against their fellow country men? And then against Europe?
Why are you so ready to sacrifice millions to murder, terror, and cultural genocide?
https://substack.com/@spytalk/note/c-98771651?r=1ez5zk&utm_medium=ios&utm_source=notes-share-action Interesting listen from the front-lines of Ukraine from a former CIA officer.
I think that at this point we need to add to the “What Europe needs to do” list something along the lines of “prevent valuable know-how and technical information from getting leaked to the US”. Right now, Ukraine is in possession of extremely valuable know-how in regard to war-fighting. I mean non-public information and analysis that absolutely must be prevented from getting into Russian hands in any way. In that regard, Trump and his acolytes are a giant security hole. (The list in the article already has a related point about “intelligence sharing”. My point here is about a different category of information. Here I'm talking about war-fighting know-how, like what typically gets shared within NATO e.g. during joint exercises, and information like technical specifications of the capabilities of drones that Ukraine considers desirable.)
Yes--my guess is that there are pretty intense discussions going on amongst European states about what they can actually share with the USA--my guess is very little. I would not trust the present US IC leadership to keep anything secret.
Maybe they can plant “false intel” to see if it gets picked up and then transmitted to the Russians”. The if that happens it could be used to Ukraine’s advantage.
The reluctance of the US to promptly and sufficiently arm Ukraine has led to a paradigm shift brought about by necessity and enabled by the ingenuity of the Ukrainians. The lessons paid for with Ukrainian blood must be kept out of the hands of dictators and meglomaniacs.
There are still many US assets in Ukraine and how they are proceeding in the field may not reflect what Trump is spouting back in DC.
Yes, but the top down direction is quite clear - the most senior decision makers are trying to harm Ukraine.
I hope this does not sound mean minded. But I listen to the Shield of the Republic podcast regularly. And unless I nod it off and missed it I have yet to hear Elliott Cohen say that he was wrong about Trump. In October and November he said that Trump still had many hawkish conservatives in his entourage, and maybe it would not be as bad as everybody thought it would be for Ukraine. I’m still waiting for him to say “I was wrong about that guys.” One of those hawkish conservatives around Trump was Marco Rubio who sat through the debacle in the oval office, looking like a stuffed doll and who was caricatured on Saturday Night Live, saying ‘no habla Inglese.’
I’m sorry if it’s mean minded of me, but I think people need to just say ‘ I was wrong and Trump’s presidency is a disaster.’
I think Marx said that history repeated itself, the first time as tragedy, the second time as farce. It feels like it’s the other way round and the first Trump presidency was a farce and the second one is a real tragedy of global proportions.
No one gets it right all the time, as Im sure he would say as much as anyone. I believe his most recent writings and podcasts have been excellent.
I've always thought that Trump was a terrible and evil man and that it was disastrous to put him in the oval office and that he was going to be worse in his second term, if it came to that, than during his first term. But I nevertheless greatly underestimated how disastrous Trump's second term could possibly become. Mea culpa.
You were hardly alone--most people seemed to have been hoping like yourself
Most people did, because they couldn’t accept the man who became president in 2016 was an actual fascist. Now, he’s had four years to consolidate his collaborators, and they are causing havoc, at home and abroad. Henry Wallace’s 1944 description of American fascism is spot on, “The dangerous American fascist
is the man who wants to do in the United States in an American way what Hitler did in
Germany in a Prussian way. The American fascist would prefer not to use violence. His
method is to poison the channels of public information. With a fascist the problem is
never how best to present the truth to the public but how best to use the news to
deceive the public into giving the fascist and his group more money or more power.”
Many of US however understood this immediately, as soon as he rode down that fucking escalator. Of course we did not believe he would win. But because of the incompetence of the Democrats, he won twice.
During his first term, I considered him to be a wannabe fascist, not an actual fascist. I think that the key difference is that he is now surrounded by so many actual fascists that the restraints are now gone that kept him in the wannabe category during his first term. Even his immense self-centredness and stupidity are not effective as limiting factors anymore: The Trumpist system as a whole alas now contains so much intelligent evil intentionality that it has become truly dangerous.
For years, when Trump first appeared on the scene with his MAGA trumpet I would periodically post an important article written by Henry Wallace (FDR's V.P. at the time) in 1944 and published in the NYTimes that year entitled "The Dangers of American Fascism". Here it is again for anyone interested. It was prescient.
https://truthout.org/articles/the-dangers-of-american-fascism/
Very prescient, as was Sinclair Lewis’ It Can’t Happen Here. Well it’s happening, and it seems we Americans have been caught flat-footed because of our complacency.
Awesome article!
Question: The article says: “We all know the part that the cartels played in bringing Hitler to power, and the rule the giant German trusts have played in Nazi conquests.” I’m unfortunately still uneducated in regard to those aspects. What is a good source for reading up on that aspect?
Try "The Nazi Seizure of Power", by William Sheridan Allen. Hint: Forget about the cartels.
Don’t forget those tens of millions of voters who for some sh^t reason or another actively voted for him AND handed him unified control of government. Voters do share some, I think most, of the blame.
Those who voted for or didn’t vote bear all of the blame.
I agree. I had no idea it could really be this bad.
Well you just had to look at all the people in the MSM poo pooing the idea that Trump and his followers are fascists, when the evidence is as plain as the nose on our faces: reorganizing our foreign policy to favor Putin, supporting the AfD, etc. the list of pro-fascist moves by Trump and his cronies over the past eight years is quite long. The EU is now the last stand for Liberal Democracy—not my favorite kind, since it seems incapable of restraining capitalism since the time everyone abandoned Keynes in the 1970’s for neoliberalism, but it’ll do for now.
The reason I expected the worst from the second term is quite simple. While in the first term it seemed like he was surprised to win, he was quite literally fighting for his life when campaigning for the second term. All the lawsuits and quite serious (and treasonous) crimes means that not only would he need to regain the presidency, but it also means that he cannot let himself lose the presidency, even after he's served his term. It would be too dangerous for him. A lot of very rich and powerful people also depend on his patronage and will do everything in their power to keep him president/dictator (rule of law be damned). The good news is that everything in the US is about to go to shit, which will breed some more serious opposition than what they have now (which is quite frankly pathetic).
Time and time again, history has shown that the worst possible thing you can do is grievously wound you enemy, but not finish them off, and instead give them time to recuperate. That's what happened in the Winter war when Sweden didn't finish off Peter, in revolutionary France when the first coalition halted before approaching Paris and in Germany when Hitler failed in his Beer hall Putsch. This is the same reason I oppose a ceasefire unless made very advantageous to Ukraine (which Russia wouldn't accept anyways). Dictatorships tend to be much more brittle than they seem right up until their fall.
"The good news is that everything in the US is about to go to shit, which will breed some more serious opposition than what they have now (which is quite frankly pathetic)."
The reason for this is complicated, but it goes back to the post-civil war period. When we had a vital labor movement in this country, most of the people who were in it were immigrants. The powers-that-be know that when labor is pissed off, it can rock a country. But now, all of those Germans, Irish, Italians, etc., who formed the backbone of the labor movement in the late 19th century and early 20th century have been fully assimilated and consider themselves "white," middle class, and feel a vested demographic interest in keeping the next wave of immigrants disenfranchised. The whole anti-woke thing is about keeping unions of out and workers in service industries disenfranchised. It's been working for a long time. That's what neoliberalism is all about.
No, it's not mean. Placing any hopes in Rubio was ridiculous for anybody who saw him panic under attack from Chris Christie in the Republican debate before NH primary. He absolutely looked like a man you can't rely on in any crisis.
Francesa, Rubio has always been an empty suit who “talks” a good game but is intellectually vacuous. Seeing him come up through the Florida House and then in the Senate, and having met him, there is no “there there” so the pictures of him and his obsequiousness are totally in character.
Have you heard Cohen ever mention the number of Ukrainian casualties in all of this? It's part of the tragedy of global proportions that is never mentioned around here - certainly the Professor has never seriously addressed them. Please point me to links if you can - he literally never does - ask yourself why.
Feigned concern for Ukrainian casualties is upsetting. Pray do tell us again how everyone should sacrifice millions of Ukrainians in occupied areas to murder, terror, theft, abduction, and cultural genocide so that Ukrainian soldiers can die in the next Russian invasion instead of the current one. Your heart is really just so big.
Something else Europe should do: implement a visa program to attract American scientists, researchers, and engineers affected by Musk's gutting of the federal government. This is a historic opportunity to break their dependence on US research, defense, and tech, to develop home-grown alternatives.
Ryan, it is already happening. I am seeing it first hand with opportunities being given to folks in academia here in a large research university town.
And strategic thinking capabilities. Starting with clear thinking to gain clarity on what our strategic objectives are. We can no longer afford to simply follow the lead of the US.
No thank you, Europe has a more than sufficient number of Windmill scientists destroying our power supply, and we have more than enough climate pseudo-scientists diverting resources from the military effort to the so-called climate crisis.
We also reject your offer to employ US gender scientists
Like the two dictators pictured, trump is a malignant sociopath. He is not smart but does possess a feral cunning. Thankfully he makes no attempt to hide his nasty nature. He cannot be reasoned with. He’s in it for the grift and his ego, but the people backing him have every intention of overturning liberal democracy. The 10 point plan is the right recipe for Europe’s future.
I hope at least some of that plan is turned into action
Trump may be all of those, but unlike his predecessor and the Professor and almost every commentator around here, he mentioned Ukrainian losses in this horrendous war. Concerned or not, what does that make you all?
Adrian, you don't seem to understand that a ceasefire/peace deal that doesn't have extremely, extremely strong security guarantees behind it, will just be broken as Putin has broken all other ceasefires in the past. There cannot be any trust baked into the peace deal, because there is none. The peace deal must be built upon real strength, so that Putin knows that of he tries again, he will lose more than he gains. You seem to suggest that people in these threads don't care about the Ukrainians dying every day on the front lines, but if this isn't settled correctly now, then there will be far more deaths in the future, and that could go far beyond Ukraine.
Europe does not have that 'real strength', the US barely does now. What's your plan for victory here? Are there enough live and fit Ukrainians to achieve it? These are real questions, with horrendous, bitter, heart-breakind consequences and no one here has bothered to ask the question. You're just another sad chickenhawk I'm afraid.
The Ukrainians have fought Russia to a virtual stand still. They are producing a large percentage of their own weapons. They will be their own security. Making peace now may be painful for some, but is wanted by many. Play a long game with Russia, and re-build with a western focus behind a DMZ. Clean-up your business and political culture, so you earn EU membership. Get American business in to rebuild civil infrastructure and extract rare earth metals. Europe doesn’t really want to play hardball with Russia, they need the oil too much. Stop Ukrainians from dying, allow the Ukrainian diaspora to return home, re-build for another day. Never forget Biden pulled the plug on the offensive.
You mean he exaggerated every challenge Ukraine faces while minimizing every challenge Russia faces as part of a strategy to turn his people against Ukraine? We should applaud him for trying to manipulate us? He does not care about Ukrainian losses - they are just a tool by which he plans to hurt Ukraine and cause even more losses. Indeed, Ukrainians are already dying as he follows through on what he set out to do.
It's you, the Professor and all the chickenhawks around here who care nothing about the Ukrainian dead. You're happy to cheer them all off to the front whilst making no serious effort to estimate their losses. It's as tragic as it is pathetic.
I have sought out info on Ukrainian losses and have posted here at least twice mentioning my findings. Unsurprisingly, it’s quite clear that Russian casualties are multiples of Ukrainian casualties. Except for Russia it’s a war of choice; for Ukrainians it’s an unprovoked fight for survival.
I replied to those replies asking how the RF losses are a multiple higher than the AFU's despite their massive advantage in fire power?
Meanwhile, I’ve now read the Professor’s Atlantic piece and it surprised even me. A piece about attrition that completely ignores Ukrainian losses. It makes my case for me in spades. It would be hilarious if we weren’t talking about real humans, real maimings, real suffering and real deaths. It’s atrocious.
Well, when you literally use people as cannon fodder, I guess that will do it. Any other questions?
We need to rearm. We recognise that Ukraine so far has hammered Russia's front line forces.
There are two relatively simple threats that can be made by Europe that can bring the war to a close without substantial risk.
1. The UK and France have the ability to blockade Russia's ability to export oil.
Stop and seize the shadow fleet. This makes it significantly harder for Putin to fund the war and purchase components from abroad. The Black Sea fleet is emasculated, the North Fleet is weak, and the Baltic fleet would be in a precarious position given that 99% of the Baltic shore is hostile.
2. Europe has the ability to overwhelm Russian air defences with massive production of drones.
Ukraine has demonstrated its ability to penetrate Russian air defences with 3 million drones a year (I think that is the production goal for this year). The EU has the ability to produce 100 million a year. Raids on Russian arms production facilities with 10,000 drones (only an order of magnitude larger than bomber raids in WW2 and far cheaper and safer) would rapidly exhaust Russian defensive capability and their production capability.
Both of these are asymmetrical. Russia cannot match them in either scale or impact.
The nuclear threat is always there but to escalate to Nukes because a railway junction is attacked, or a tank factory damaged, risks even further reducing the impact of Russian threats
Don't forget repatriating Russia's 300 billion$ fund to Ukraine. Materially speaking, there really isn't a huge difference between using interest of the fund to support Ukraine versus just using the fund itself. In a monetary sense however, the difference is huge and would pay for Russia's defeat. It could also pay for point #2 you are making.
The Europeans finally need to do what should have been done from the beginning - announce that all participants in Putin's "Special military operation" will be banned for life from entering Europe (while exceptions can be made for conscripts, who under Russian law were not even supposed to be there). A lot of them go there solely for money, so take from them one of the ways of enjoying it - ever. Also announce eternal sanctions against all Russian companies operating in occupied territories (including Crimea) and Russian banks doing business with them. Finally, ban from Europe Russian civilians traveling to occupied territories (including Crimea). Announce (whether it's true or not) that British satellites and recon drones over the Black Sea record license plates of all cars on the Kerch Bridge, cell phone signals etc. Such measures will reduce the value of those territories to Russia. Perhaps even announce sanctions against Russian companies employing veterans of this war. Right now there are not many of them, except for disabled ones and ex-prisoners who managed to survive six months of meat assaults (not exactly the primary targets for corporate recruiting anyway), but after the war reintegration of hundreds of thousands of psychologically traumatized men desensitized to violence will already be a big problem for Russian government, and further damaging their employment prospects will make the situation even worse.
Amen, Andrew! But I do not think Europe has the guts to do that, especially the Germans who in their hearts desperately want to do business in Russia. Also, like more than 20 years ago, they crave Russian gas for their energy needs.
100%
Your plan is very well put and achievable on a relatively short term basis.
A massive increase in UAV production is quickly achievable and relatively cost-effective. Combining the technological and tactical advances of Ukraine with Europe's brightest could produce dividends rapidly.
Thanks Tim--that list was trying to be as practical and achievable as possible. There needs to be long-term structural changes as well, though those will take time.
Many thanks for this post. Agree 100%. It took Zelensky’s drubbing by Trump and Vance in the Oval Office for European leaders to realise, at long last, who exactly Trump is and what they need to do about it. It was the same warped vision that made many of them (and us! ) refuse to believe that he would win the election and then, hoping against hope, that he would not be as bad as many, like yourself, were predicting. Even in Macron’s fairly hard-hitting speech last night, he still said he hoped that America “will remain on our side”. As long as Trump is President, it won’t. This truth, like many others, has always been hiding in plain sight!
Europeans “can see clearly now” and action has to follow. The meeting of Chiefs of Defence Staff in Paris next week combined with Merz’s ground-breaking statements are an encouraging start. But only a start!
Does anyone now remember the tragedy of the Spanish Republic, and the terrible price Britain and France paid for their failure to support a fellow democracy in its heroic struggle against fascism?
"History doesn't repeat itself, but it often rhymes."
Very good. I hope you're right. Even now we're hearing that Hungary may be allowed to veto further support to Ukraine. It's well past time to suspend Hungary's EU membership.
And Europe must surely get on with spending the Russian money that we've got sitting around in banks, not just the interest its earning.
And finally, this isn't a point I think you've made explicitly (except perhaps re: drones), though I think it's entirely compatible: if European states are serious about rearming - and they certainly should be - they should be prioritising where and how they can get the best bang for buck, which may well mean investing in Ukrainian production. I suspect Ukraine can produce a lot of what we need cheaper and more quickly, even if that means expanding production.
Without the US, is Europe helping protect Ukraine, or is it the other way around? Ukraine, with its largest army in Europe, experience against Russia, use of the latest innovations, and future source of cheap armaments, is a massive asset form European security.
I agree with all of this except point 2 , on the U.K. being offered rejoin the EU. Not that it’s not a good idea but because it would be such a huge distraction right now and split the political parties which , except for reform , are all together on supporting Ukraine
Please keep speaking truth to ?power? If the truth is repeated often enough, maybe it will finally sink in with European (and UK) leadership. Ironically, it seems to me, the requirement for countries to increase their defence spending to deal with Russia may be the only effective way for the countries to address their current highest priority: growth. We could kill two birds with one stone . . .
Thank you. What needs to be done is painfully obvious. But as citizens we must do our part to raise our voices and take actions.
Action list at bottom of my Substack.
https://open.substack.com/pub/marklagus/p/big-men?r=1tggo9&utm_medium=ios
I found this interesting way of supporting Ukrainian culture for those in the US:
Ukrainian-American Artists Directory
https://art.unwla.org/
What extraordinary timing. Trump suspends USAID. Putin moves in with a Mafia style bag of cash for the new Syrian government. Sorry I bombed you lot to pieces and helped Assad gass your children, here’s a billion in freshly printed 250$ bills with a face you can trust. Can I keep my military bases and park all my gear inside your country again? Where are the USA and Europe? Busy fighting each other and themselves.
Unless I have misunderstood, Phillips has recently asserted that the weakening of the US through the actions of the current US government is in fact intentional. I’m not sure whether that can really be true, but what has been happening is certainly consistent with that hypothesis.
Trump's degree of rage towards Ukraine is remarkable. It's truly unhinged. There are signs here in the US that patience may be wearing thin with babysitting the Tyrant-child. He's determined to save Putin. But saving Putin may be a fool's errand. The Ukrainian army is the strongest in Europe. Now is the time for all of Europe to back it.