Ukraine should announce ASAP that the military parade on the Red Square on May 9 will be a legitimate military target, including not only troops and equipment, but also Putin and military commanders standing next to him, and urge Russia civilians and foreign leaders not to serve as Putin's human shields. That alone will probably be enough to keep Trump away.
Just to make sure. And scare others away. Lukashenko will have no choice but others will. And the interesting question will be how much Putin will trust his own air defenses. This is a rare case when it is known in advance that he will be at a particular outdoors location (known up to several feet) at a particular time. If Ukraine wants to test some new missile or drone, that may be the time.
I'm given to wonder if a Ukranian misinformation/misdirection campaign aimed at Russians might be sufficient? Force russia to concentrate defences in Moscow, and for people to stay away. I'm also curious to see what equipment they actually have left to parade with.
Which does underline the stupidity of the situation. That the Don (aka the world's most powerful man child) is letting Putin off the hook at such a critical time for Russia!
Yes, they can issue vague threats (that's why I suggested merely calling the parade a military target rather than explicitly promising to hit it). It's hard for people in the West to understand the full importance of that parade. In Russia there's literally a cult of "Great Victory", created and promoted by the government. The 80th anniversary parade presided over by Putin is greater than Papal Easter Vigil or Christmas Mass are for Catholics. It's the ultimate act of worship of both Russian greatness and Putin personally.
We can only hope that Trump visits the Red Square. I want Trump & Putin to clasp hands and raise them in the air triumphantly.
The #1 challenge is that leaders/pundits in both Europe and the U.S. are clinging to the hope that Trump can be steered into being a somewhat kinder and gentler mafia boss. The temptation to accommodate both Trump & Putin is great.
Accommodating the mafiaoso is tantamount to appeasement and surrender. Believe people when they tell you who they are! Why is it that Europe and others cannot follow that simple rule with the orange narcissist?
No, it's not worth it. The Russians will then be convinced that their country fully defeated Ukraine, NATO and the US. Ukraine's continuing resistance will create a cognitive dissonance, and the domestic pressure on Putin to resolve it with nuclear weapons may become too great for China to counterbalance. It was bad enough that Clinton went to the 50th anniversary parade in the middle of the First Chechen War, but now...
How on earth could this have happened to the US? It looks like nearly half of the country voted for a protection racket and is totally fine with it. The other half is suffering from a bystander effect. It's really shocking from a European point of view. It's not the people of Europe that are at fault in the first place, this time it's the people of the US that wilfully voted a dictator in the White House. Really, you should all take a look in the mirror and repent in a Walk of Shame.
Some Republicans are unhappy about the abandonment of Ukraine. But they can't do anything about it now without personal risk.
They are almost all fine in principle with the abandonment of the rule of law in order to putatively destroy aspects of the Federal government they dislike.
It turns out that a majority of Americans support authoritarianism to achieve ends.
I think that will change if they are dissatisfied with the ends.
As George Carlin said, “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.” We rely on the character of leaders.
Thanks for your reply. What I think should happen after this sh*tshow has run its course is a fundamental reflection on the political structures of the USA. The current resilience test DOGE style by Trump et al sheds light on system failures. One of the fundamental flaws I see for instance is the lack of labour protection for civil servants. It's far too easy now to fire civil servants and replace them with someone you like better. The civil service should be far better protected against political arbitrariness.
I agree with your advice. But it does seem like you have to restore respect for law before the details of law matter. THe executive is not respecting existing civil service protections. Hell, we've even lost the ability of the legislature to pass laws.
We have executive rule with a declining judicial check. This is the work of a generation.
More like a third of the people voted for this, and the third that didn’t vote in the third that voted for something else or stuck with it. For now. The coward and shamefulness of the other elected Republican leaders I guess shouldn’t be stunning, but it still is.
Arent, as a US citizen and resident it is utterly disheartening. The only good news is that red state residents are already attacking their elected officials over what is happening in DC regarding service and cuts. They are not even paying attention to the foreign policy as they are simply trying to get by, and looked at immigrants and better educated as keeping them down.
I do not think we can wait until mid-terms next year as the damage will be done and the mafia will have firmly entrenched itself and be so hard to remove. Frankly, my wife and I are looking to go back to her native Spain.
Long story, I've been following it for decades. The Republican Party turned fascist decades ago, attacked education, suppressed voting rights. They're neo-Confederate racist sexist authoritarian scum. They forced out all the legitimate factions.
Then we got spectacularly weak loser Democratic Presidents who refused to fight them (Joe Biden even lied to people about Covid & actively spread Covid in hospitals), and so a whole bunch of people bailed out and stopped voting (but will probably sign up for a civil war).
The government will run out of funding on March 14, and there's no chance the real funding bill will be passed by then. So there will be yet another CR. Some House Republicans won't vote for it no matter what. So it can't pass without Dem votes (as has actually been the case since at least 2006). The Dems should resist the temptation to make a whole bunch of demands, especially about unpopular agencies like USAID and instead make just one but very consequential demand. The CR must stipulate that the US designates Putin as a war criminal responsible for unprovoked Russian aggression against Ukraine, that he is barred for life from entering the US and that all US officials (including the president) are barred from meeting him in person (and no government funds can be in any way used for that purpose). Trump desperately wants a meeting with Putin, but he'll have to shut the government down in order to do that. Government shutdowns are unpopular (as Trump already learned the hard way) and Putin is extremely unpopular. So chances are Trump will just become more unhinged and say more crazy things driving his approval down. Most importantly, he won't be able to talk to Putin without any Americans knowing what he's saying. Lots of people will be on any phone or video call, and I doubt that Trump will dare to tell Putin e.g. that he won't defend Estonia if Putin decided to grab Narva.
If Trump wants to embrace Putin no legislation will stop him.
The greatest tool we have been handed is that Trump and Vance have so openly and fervently aligned with Putin & the AfD.
Do not try to fix or steer U.S. foreign policy. It's over for years. The hope is to encourage free Europe, Australia, South Korea, Japan, maybe Turkey and others to resist the far right global wave. They hold a winning hand on their own! RU is weak if they aren't permitted to rebuild.
It's not steering, it's denying Trump his childlike wish and denying Putin huge propaganda victory. Support for war in Russia is the lowest ever, with huge casualties, inflation, high interest rates, disappearance of high quality new cars and many consumer goods. That's one of the best hopes for Ukraine's victory. A meeting with Trump will be a physical proof to the population that Russia is winning the war, and there's light at the end of the tunnel. The added domestic benefit of preventing it is that instead of talking about popular parts of his agenda, Trump will keep ranting about not being allowed to meet with Putin.
My guess is that the deficit extremists in GOP will be under immense pressure to give Trump a win and, ultimately, they will fold. The CR will pass with no Blue votes, I sadly predict.
For the GOP holdouts in the House, conservative principles of fiscal responsibility have far less traction now that Biden is gone.
They have never folded before. And right now they need literally ALL of them. Musk has made it even harder with all his lies about massive waste and fraud. Those who have never voted for any budget are not going to start now.
US politics is about US issues (foreign policy ALWAYS takes a back seat) and the demand the Democrats are going to make is going to be about Trump's attempts to evade US law -- it's going to be something along the lines of the No Kings Act, ousting Musk and DOGE, or forcing Agent Krasnov to obey the courts in some way
Silver lining - the most important countries in Europe, The UK, France, Germany, Poland and Italy, are all lead by pro-Ukraine governments and that won't change for years to come (only France could change I guess). Mertz looks highly likely to win today. Let's hope he does. He's better than Scholz on Ukraine. If there has ever been a set of European leaders to stand up to the appalling betrayal by the US, then we have it here today. And general support for Ukraine in European populations remains relatively high.
The problem is that it may take months to form a coalition, effectively leaving Germany on the sidelines till then. It would be nice if at least they lifted restrictions on weapons use until then.
Many thanks for this assessment. I concur with everything your say about the US sliding towards a mafia state. Interestingly, you make no mention of Kellogg, who seems to have had a good meeting with Zelensky and made some sensible comments afterwards, which will obviously displease his boss. it will be no surprise if Kellogg is soon fired or simply ignored from now on.
Waiting with trepidation for the German election results this evening. Independently of the main parties who will be candidates for a coalition (except the AfD) the point to watch will be how many of the smaller parties (FDP, die Linke, BSW) clear the 5% hurdle to enter the Bundestag. The more that do, the more difficult it will be to form a viable coalition.
Additionally on the European side, Macron will be in Washington on Monday, Starmer later in the week. Both have been working together and behind the scenes to put together "a coalition of the willing ", that most players are now saying will be neither all NATO nor all EU. This is a step forward. Hopefully, this time next week we shall have some positive news from Europe.
The theory that Kellog is a honorable man has been debunked. He just executed the mafia extortion hit on Zelensky. I read his comments, he's doing disaster control over the act he never wanted to go public.
It is possible that Kellogg is not a sociopath and genuinely feels shame for his participation.
One thing I take away from this is the threats aimed at Zelensky, personally. If anything happens to him, a hard look at potential U.S. involvement should be undertaken. Trump has no compunction when it comes to ordering assassinations...as Iran found out. What better outcome for Trump and his buddy, Putin, if Zelensky is removed from the equation. Now Ukrainian intelligence is going to have to review their relationship with U.S. intelligence services, including the military. Do not allow them to know where Zelensky is. What a world that we have come to this.
The mafia language is an accurate descriptor, not an analogy. We're seeing fascism in full flower. It's important to note the reported brutality with which Kellogg delivered the initial "sign or else" papers. He's supposed to be the good cop. Yesterday Kellogg was talking nice publicly. Probably damage control and genuine personal shame.
What I'm struck by is the resistance of European leaders/pundits to fully accept that America is a lost cause. They are horrified and correctly analyze what is happening. But they calculate it is too hard of a problem to face so they respond with strategies to bring Trump around.
The Trump presidency was the necessary shock to get Europe moving, and if anything Trump-Putin alliance is still insufficiently terrifying. The financial and political risks are daunting. Did I read that Keir Starmer is going to visit Washington? To what end?
Europe will have to build the plane while they fly it. Starlink is gone, but surely they have inferior alternatives. France, Germany and GB can and should send symbolic troops & advisors to Ukraine quickly. They say it will take a decade to build a fully integrated army. Fine, this is going to require a less effective, ad hoc start. North Korea isn't integrated into the Russian system. Europe has to accept that their security requires that Ukraine endure.
Richard, as I understand it Starlink has not yet gone but the US is threatening to switch it off at any time. The British company OneWeb which is part owned by the UK government has capabilities that could replace Starlink. Their satelites have a higher orbit and as a result have greater latency. I've looked at the figures and for the type of uses in Ukraine it should be comparable the only issue is delivering sufficient hardware to ensure that the US threat is negated.
I would like to think that the UK government had foreseen this and had already started delivery but I suspect, given the competence of the Ukranian military and their experience previously of Musk switching off the system during an operation, they will have already put in place a contingency to ensure that Musk's on/off capabilities cannot be replicated.
Hi, I know Starlink is operating but Europe must accept that it can be pulled away at any moment. For planning purposes it's gone. Gotta face the worst fears a step forward.
Nick Cohen did a superb job of expressing the points I was trying to make today. It's an extension of Phillips's piece. Please, check out "Can Europe resist Trump’s gangsterism?"
The initial deal is already rejected and while I was initially against the concept the idea of American infrastructure and Americans in Ukraine is useful for Ukraine. I was given some optimism by two separate Fox News reporters. First in an interview of Trump himself the Fox radio interviewer stated that Russia invaded Ukraine and cut in successfully on Trump several times. At the end the interviewer asked Trump if he could get the 20k children Russia kidnapped returned to their families in a deal. Trump said he didn't know about that until the day before but said he believes he could get them back. Second Fox news asked the White House briefer who Trump believes started the war. The press sec tap danced, but getting the questions and reality out to Trump from one of his pro media outlets was a source of optimism for me. Let's see what comes here. Not disagreeing with the article but feeling hopeful hearing republican senators reps and news outlets pushing back on some of this nonsense from Donald Dumb. And how about some recognition for Turkey supporting Ukraine?
I find the “mafia families” framing proposed here quite convincing. I would point out a big difference between Putin and Trump in that regard though: Putin has the power to essentially treat as big a part of the Russian government's finances as he wants as his own personal resource / as something that can be funneled to his “family” / as a resource that can be used for bribes. Trump doesn't have that power, or at least he doesn't have it yet. So I conclude that there is a huge imbalance of power in Putin's favor between these two mafia bosses. So much so that I see only one real mafia boss in this picture, and one sycophant miniboss who probably gets paid off somehow in exchange for selling his country out.
With emphasis on the word "yet". Judging from reports of angry town hall meetings even in deep red states we will soon have the opportunity to see who the elected officials fear more: the people or the president. My money's on the latter. Cowards and bullies, the lot.
I only added dystopian s**tshow to my bingo card last year and 2025 left my pessimistic expectations in the rear view mirror. Thanks for keeping up with this sisyphean challenge. I can't even imagine how the Ukrainians must feel.
Has anything come out of Macron’s panic-huddle back in Paris last Monday?
The UN Security Council has already been a lame duck this last few years with Russia vetoing anything not in their interests; With the US now likely aligned with Russia, for how much longer can the UNSC be of any use to anyone?
Might we see a new UNSC-esque and a NATO-replacement alliance coming out of Brussels?
The UK punching itself in the dick with Brexit and then becoming even more dependent on US trade makes things even worse; what’s the prospect for an un-Brexit referrendum?
The UK has damaged itself so badly re Brexit, any form of reentry to the EU is I think off the table for a generation; it's lasting damage. I doubt within my lifetime anyway. The best that could be managed short term is perhaps a treaty aligning with the EU in some way, maybe even a customs union.
Do not forget about the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) that is commanded by the UK, has an existing command structure and I am sure would welcome "willing" additions if that is the direction of travel.
Thanks, i too am wondering why UK commentators have not put a return to the EU back on the table. The growing Trump-Putin threat provides a face-saving opportunity for a do-over.
I could imagine that a "standards alignment" could be negotiated with a quid pro quo being that UK experts have some kind of seat at the table/favoured advisory status for setting future EU standards, thus sidestepping at least some of the "imposing foreign laws" rhetoric. In this capacity the UK would be adopting its own standards and hence regulatory legislation - which just happens to be harmonised with EU legislation.
Ukraine should announce ASAP that the military parade on the Red Square on May 9 will be a legitimate military target, including not only troops and equipment, but also Putin and military commanders standing next to him, and urge Russia civilians and foreign leaders not to serve as Putin's human shields. That alone will probably be enough to keep Trump away.
The White House did say yesterday he would not be going--though you never know
Just to make sure. And scare others away. Lukashenko will have no choice but others will. And the interesting question will be how much Putin will trust his own air defenses. This is a rare case when it is known in advance that he will be at a particular outdoors location (known up to several feet) at a particular time. If Ukraine wants to test some new missile or drone, that may be the time.
Interesting question--I doubt he trusts then much...
I agree. It will not be the real Putin here, but rather one of his many “body doubles”.
Felt like Trump was being dishonest when asked directly.
I'm given to wonder if a Ukranian misinformation/misdirection campaign aimed at Russians might be sufficient? Force russia to concentrate defences in Moscow, and for people to stay away. I'm also curious to see what equipment they actually have left to parade with.
Can they afford to bring the donkeys back from the front?
Which does underline the stupidity of the situation. That the Don (aka the world's most powerful man child) is letting Putin off the hook at such a critical time for Russia!
Trump doesn't like losers but he is in love with Vlad. It's all a bit DEI.
Yes, they can issue vague threats (that's why I suggested merely calling the parade a military target rather than explicitly promising to hit it). It's hard for people in the West to understand the full importance of that parade. In Russia there's literally a cult of "Great Victory", created and promoted by the government. The 80th anniversary parade presided over by Putin is greater than Papal Easter Vigil or Christmas Mass are for Catholics. It's the ultimate act of worship of both Russian greatness and Putin personally.
We can only hope that Trump visits the Red Square. I want Trump & Putin to clasp hands and raise them in the air triumphantly.
The #1 challenge is that leaders/pundits in both Europe and the U.S. are clinging to the hope that Trump can be steered into being a somewhat kinder and gentler mafia boss. The temptation to accommodate both Trump & Putin is great.
Accommodating the mafiaoso is tantamount to appeasement and surrender. Believe people when they tell you who they are! Why is it that Europe and others cannot follow that simple rule with the orange narcissist?
No, it's not worth it. The Russians will then be convinced that their country fully defeated Ukraine, NATO and the US. Ukraine's continuing resistance will create a cognitive dissonance, and the domestic pressure on Putin to resolve it with nuclear weapons may become too great for China to counterbalance. It was bad enough that Clinton went to the 50th anniversary parade in the middle of the First Chechen War, but now...
We must totally disregard what Russians think. The decisive game we can win is to influence European public opinion.
How on earth could this have happened to the US? It looks like nearly half of the country voted for a protection racket and is totally fine with it. The other half is suffering from a bystander effect. It's really shocking from a European point of view. It's not the people of Europe that are at fault in the first place, this time it's the people of the US that wilfully voted a dictator in the White House. Really, you should all take a look in the mirror and repent in a Walk of Shame.
Some Republicans are unhappy about the abandonment of Ukraine. But they can't do anything about it now without personal risk.
They are almost all fine in principle with the abandonment of the rule of law in order to putatively destroy aspects of the Federal government they dislike.
It turns out that a majority of Americans support authoritarianism to achieve ends.
I think that will change if they are dissatisfied with the ends.
As George Carlin said, “Think of how stupid the average person is, and realize half of them are stupider than that.” We rely on the character of leaders.
Thanks for your reply. What I think should happen after this sh*tshow has run its course is a fundamental reflection on the political structures of the USA. The current resilience test DOGE style by Trump et al sheds light on system failures. One of the fundamental flaws I see for instance is the lack of labour protection for civil servants. It's far too easy now to fire civil servants and replace them with someone you like better. The civil service should be far better protected against political arbitrariness.
I agree with your advice. But it does seem like you have to restore respect for law before the details of law matter. THe executive is not respecting existing civil service protections. Hell, we've even lost the ability of the legislature to pass laws.
We have executive rule with a declining judicial check. This is the work of a generation.
The structural problems all along have been:
(1) The Senate is malapportioned. This is the A#1 problem. It's undemocratic
(2) There is no procedure for removing bribe-taking federal judges. Congress could create one, but never bothered.
(3) The House is gerrymandered.
This has led to corrupt judges and an overly powerful President.
More like a third of the people voted for this, and the third that didn’t vote in the third that voted for something else or stuck with it. For now. The coward and shamefulness of the other elected Republican leaders I guess shouldn’t be stunning, but it still is.
Arent, as a US citizen and resident it is utterly disheartening. The only good news is that red state residents are already attacking their elected officials over what is happening in DC regarding service and cuts. They are not even paying attention to the foreign policy as they are simply trying to get by, and looked at immigrants and better educated as keeping them down.
I do not think we can wait until mid-terms next year as the damage will be done and the mafia will have firmly entrenched itself and be so hard to remove. Frankly, my wife and I are looking to go back to her native Spain.
Long story, I've been following it for decades. The Republican Party turned fascist decades ago, attacked education, suppressed voting rights. They're neo-Confederate racist sexist authoritarian scum. They forced out all the legitimate factions.
Then we got spectacularly weak loser Democratic Presidents who refused to fight them (Joe Biden even lied to people about Covid & actively spread Covid in hospitals), and so a whole bunch of people bailed out and stopped voting (but will probably sign up for a civil war).
The government will run out of funding on March 14, and there's no chance the real funding bill will be passed by then. So there will be yet another CR. Some House Republicans won't vote for it no matter what. So it can't pass without Dem votes (as has actually been the case since at least 2006). The Dems should resist the temptation to make a whole bunch of demands, especially about unpopular agencies like USAID and instead make just one but very consequential demand. The CR must stipulate that the US designates Putin as a war criminal responsible for unprovoked Russian aggression against Ukraine, that he is barred for life from entering the US and that all US officials (including the president) are barred from meeting him in person (and no government funds can be in any way used for that purpose). Trump desperately wants a meeting with Putin, but he'll have to shut the government down in order to do that. Government shutdowns are unpopular (as Trump already learned the hard way) and Putin is extremely unpopular. So chances are Trump will just become more unhinged and say more crazy things driving his approval down. Most importantly, he won't be able to talk to Putin without any Americans knowing what he's saying. Lots of people will be on any phone or video call, and I doubt that Trump will dare to tell Putin e.g. that he won't defend Estonia if Putin decided to grab Narva.
If Trump wants to embrace Putin no legislation will stop him.
The greatest tool we have been handed is that Trump and Vance have so openly and fervently aligned with Putin & the AfD.
Do not try to fix or steer U.S. foreign policy. It's over for years. The hope is to encourage free Europe, Australia, South Korea, Japan, maybe Turkey and others to resist the far right global wave. They hold a winning hand on their own! RU is weak if they aren't permitted to rebuild.
It's not steering, it's denying Trump his childlike wish and denying Putin huge propaganda victory. Support for war in Russia is the lowest ever, with huge casualties, inflation, high interest rates, disappearance of high quality new cars and many consumer goods. That's one of the best hopes for Ukraine's victory. A meeting with Trump will be a physical proof to the population that Russia is winning the war, and there's light at the end of the tunnel. The added domestic benefit of preventing it is that instead of talking about popular parts of his agenda, Trump will keep ranting about not being allowed to meet with Putin.
Can you imagine any scenario where the Supreme Court rebukes President Krasnov for breaking a law related to national security?
Our president is above the law, that ship has sailed.
The budget fight will be interesting indeed.
My guess is that the deficit extremists in GOP will be under immense pressure to give Trump a win and, ultimately, they will fold. The CR will pass with no Blue votes, I sadly predict.
For the GOP holdouts in the House, conservative principles of fiscal responsibility have far less traction now that Biden is gone.
They have never folded before. And right now they need literally ALL of them. Musk has made it even harder with all his lies about massive waste and fraud. Those who have never voted for any budget are not going to start now.
US politics is about US issues (foreign policy ALWAYS takes a back seat) and the demand the Democrats are going to make is going to be about Trump's attempts to evade US law -- it's going to be something along the lines of the No Kings Act, ousting Musk and DOGE, or forcing Agent Krasnov to obey the courts in some way
Silver lining - the most important countries in Europe, The UK, France, Germany, Poland and Italy, are all lead by pro-Ukraine governments and that won't change for years to come (only France could change I guess). Mertz looks highly likely to win today. Let's hope he does. He's better than Scholz on Ukraine. If there has ever been a set of European leaders to stand up to the appalling betrayal by the US, then we have it here today. And general support for Ukraine in European populations remains relatively high.
The problem is that it may take months to form a coalition, effectively leaving Germany on the sidelines till then. It would be nice if at least they lifted restrictions on weapons use until then.
Terribly sad, but true.
Terribly terribly sad
Europe has to take the lead, while America deals with Trumpism unfortunately. I hope Mertz wins.
Yes indeed
Many thanks for this assessment. I concur with everything your say about the US sliding towards a mafia state. Interestingly, you make no mention of Kellogg, who seems to have had a good meeting with Zelensky and made some sensible comments afterwards, which will obviously displease his boss. it will be no surprise if Kellogg is soon fired or simply ignored from now on.
Waiting with trepidation for the German election results this evening. Independently of the main parties who will be candidates for a coalition (except the AfD) the point to watch will be how many of the smaller parties (FDP, die Linke, BSW) clear the 5% hurdle to enter the Bundestag. The more that do, the more difficult it will be to form a viable coalition.
Additionally on the European side, Macron will be in Washington on Monday, Starmer later in the week. Both have been working together and behind the scenes to put together "a coalition of the willing ", that most players are now saying will be neither all NATO nor all EU. This is a step forward. Hopefully, this time next week we shall have some positive news from Europe.
The theory that Kellog is a honorable man has been debunked. He just executed the mafia extortion hit on Zelensky. I read his comments, he's doing disaster control over the act he never wanted to go public.
It is possible that Kellogg is not a sociopath and genuinely feels shame for his participation.
Or Kellogg might resign- he has already publicly disagreed with Trump
Yes, the honourable course of action would be to resign - and make it clear why he is doing so!
Let’s hope.
One thing I take away from this is the threats aimed at Zelensky, personally. If anything happens to him, a hard look at potential U.S. involvement should be undertaken. Trump has no compunction when it comes to ordering assassinations...as Iran found out. What better outcome for Trump and his buddy, Putin, if Zelensky is removed from the equation. Now Ukrainian intelligence is going to have to review their relationship with U.S. intelligence services, including the military. Do not allow them to know where Zelensky is. What a world that we have come to this.
Ukraine stopped giving the US most intel after the Jack Texiera leak. You're right, they'll have to secure Zelensky's location too.
It would be the ultimate historical irony for Germany to rise up and defeat the forces of facism emanating from the US and Russia!
The mafia language is an accurate descriptor, not an analogy. We're seeing fascism in full flower. It's important to note the reported brutality with which Kellogg delivered the initial "sign or else" papers. He's supposed to be the good cop. Yesterday Kellogg was talking nice publicly. Probably damage control and genuine personal shame.
What I'm struck by is the resistance of European leaders/pundits to fully accept that America is a lost cause. They are horrified and correctly analyze what is happening. But they calculate it is too hard of a problem to face so they respond with strategies to bring Trump around.
The Trump presidency was the necessary shock to get Europe moving, and if anything Trump-Putin alliance is still insufficiently terrifying. The financial and political risks are daunting. Did I read that Keir Starmer is going to visit Washington? To what end?
Europe will have to build the plane while they fly it. Starlink is gone, but surely they have inferior alternatives. France, Germany and GB can and should send symbolic troops & advisors to Ukraine quickly. They say it will take a decade to build a fully integrated army. Fine, this is going to require a less effective, ad hoc start. North Korea isn't integrated into the Russian system. Europe has to accept that their security requires that Ukraine endure.
Richard, as I understand it Starlink has not yet gone but the US is threatening to switch it off at any time. The British company OneWeb which is part owned by the UK government has capabilities that could replace Starlink. Their satelites have a higher orbit and as a result have greater latency. I've looked at the figures and for the type of uses in Ukraine it should be comparable the only issue is delivering sufficient hardware to ensure that the US threat is negated.
I would like to think that the UK government had foreseen this and had already started delivery but I suspect, given the competence of the Ukranian military and their experience previously of Musk switching off the system during an operation, they will have already put in place a contingency to ensure that Musk's on/off capabilities cannot be replicated.
Hi, I know Starlink is operating but Europe must accept that it can be pulled away at any moment. For planning purposes it's gone. Gotta face the worst fears a step forward.
Thanks for your detailed insights!
Nick Cohen did a superb job of expressing the points I was trying to make today. It's an extension of Phillips's piece. Please, check out "Can Europe resist Trump’s gangsterism?"
https://substack.com/home/post/p-157740072
The initial deal is already rejected and while I was initially against the concept the idea of American infrastructure and Americans in Ukraine is useful for Ukraine. I was given some optimism by two separate Fox News reporters. First in an interview of Trump himself the Fox radio interviewer stated that Russia invaded Ukraine and cut in successfully on Trump several times. At the end the interviewer asked Trump if he could get the 20k children Russia kidnapped returned to their families in a deal. Trump said he didn't know about that until the day before but said he believes he could get them back. Second Fox news asked the White House briefer who Trump believes started the war. The press sec tap danced, but getting the questions and reality out to Trump from one of his pro media outlets was a source of optimism for me. Let's see what comes here. Not disagreeing with the article but feeling hopeful hearing republican senators reps and news outlets pushing back on some of this nonsense from Donald Dumb. And how about some recognition for Turkey supporting Ukraine?
To be fair the article is about the US and it's relationship with Ukraine.
I find the “mafia families” framing proposed here quite convincing. I would point out a big difference between Putin and Trump in that regard though: Putin has the power to essentially treat as big a part of the Russian government's finances as he wants as his own personal resource / as something that can be funneled to his “family” / as a resource that can be used for bribes. Trump doesn't have that power, or at least he doesn't have it yet. So I conclude that there is a huge imbalance of power in Putin's favor between these two mafia bosses. So much so that I see only one real mafia boss in this picture, and one sycophant miniboss who probably gets paid off somehow in exchange for selling his country out.
With emphasis on the word "yet". Judging from reports of angry town hall meetings even in deep red states we will soon have the opportunity to see who the elected officials fear more: the people or the president. My money's on the latter. Cowards and bullies, the lot.
Here in the US, we will fight them. This is what you have a country where ignorance reigns.
I only added dystopian s**tshow to my bingo card last year and 2025 left my pessimistic expectations in the rear view mirror. Thanks for keeping up with this sisyphean challenge. I can't even imagine how the Ukrainians must feel.
Has anything come out of Macron’s panic-huddle back in Paris last Monday?
The UN Security Council has already been a lame duck this last few years with Russia vetoing anything not in their interests; With the US now likely aligned with Russia, for how much longer can the UNSC be of any use to anyone?
Might we see a new UNSC-esque and a NATO-replacement alliance coming out of Brussels?
The UK punching itself in the dick with Brexit and then becoming even more dependent on US trade makes things even worse; what’s the prospect for an un-Brexit referrendum?
The UK has damaged itself so badly re Brexit, any form of reentry to the EU is I think off the table for a generation; it's lasting damage. I doubt within my lifetime anyway. The best that could be managed short term is perhaps a treaty aligning with the EU in some way, maybe even a customs union.
I could also see a European replacement for NATO happen in a possible near future, with Britain part of it.
I think the "coalition of the willing" is probably the seeds of this.
Do not forget about the Joint Expeditionary Force (JEF) that is commanded by the UK, has an existing command structure and I am sure would welcome "willing" additions if that is the direction of travel.
You are describing a psychological barrier.
The mind-bending Krasnov-Putin tag team resets the psychology.
Thanks, i too am wondering why UK commentators have not put a return to the EU back on the table. The growing Trump-Putin threat provides a face-saving opportunity for a do-over.
I could imagine that a "standards alignment" could be negotiated with a quid pro quo being that UK experts have some kind of seat at the table/favoured advisory status for setting future EU standards, thus sidestepping at least some of the "imposing foreign laws" rhetoric. In this capacity the UK would be adopting its own standards and hence regulatory legislation - which just happens to be harmonised with EU legislation.
Of course the UK will need to move away from the deregulation mindset that has filled the rivers with excrement.
A sad state of affairs indeed.
I'm hoping for the best from the German election and helped what was in my powers 🤞
US is indeed a "mafia state". A useful, if horrifying, statement of where we are.