Astrophel

The coining of the phrase "Perfide Albion" is normally attributed to French revolutionary poet, Augustin Louis de Ximénès in 1793. In the beginning there was great sympathy for the revolutionary cause in England and elsewhere. Much of this sympathy was lost by the barbarous tactics of the French revolutionaries, inventors of the guillotine, and the avid propaganda of the monarchists in England worried about their own necks. The French felt betrayed The barbarity of the russians has caused many who would otherwise have been indifferent to take the side of Ukraine. So far Ukraine has behaved in a much more civilised manner. No doubt Priggy is well aware of the psychology and would love to provoke Ukrainian soldiers into performing atrocities on captured russian soldiers saying, hey, we are just as bad as each other. Ukrainians would quickly lose support in the West were they to behave badly. Fortunately Ukrainian leaders seem to have learned from the French revolutionaries whether by accident or design.

The war will be won when the russians give up. The recapture of Mariupol would surely be a massive blow to russian morale and to Putin's reputation. Putin has made Mariupol into a special project to russify and rebuild. Putting a halt to this project might just undermine what is left of his credibility at home. If taking the city would be too costly then a major victory would be achieved by making the military bases russia built there unsustainable.

This is the central concern. Nato has not prepared to fight this kind of war for fifty years maybe. I remember training to deal with an expected russian tank attack and saying "if this is what russia wants to do then we better do something else altogether". In the intervening years we have welcomed the Apache, increasingly sophisticated air warfare systems, empowered infantry, etc, etc. "We" never prepared to fight this kind of war. So, no, we do not have enough russian calibre artillery shells, etc. Personally I believe we need to push through and make sure the Ukrainians win and the post-USSR empire loses. There is a "geopolitical" opportunity that might not come again. The Russian public is already programmed to believe they are fighting Nato and so any "Green Men" will come as no surprise. My main concern is that the US establishment has a big voice in decided what can and cannot be done. And these are the same guys who constructed the fiasco in Afghanistan. Ukraine is getting supplied too little and too late by back room types trying to draw new borders on the map instead of focussing on the internationally agreed borders.

Yes, the population of Ukraine is declining for many years, mostly thanks to emigration. In the last 12 months the exodus has been dramatic thanks to the war. Your taking UN statistics out of context to extrapolate a demographic catastrophe is intellectually dishonest at the very least. There were roughly four million Ukrainians at the end of the 17th century. Today there are 10 times that even by your estimation. Ukraine will manage. Given the beauty of the country and the natural resources and the energy of the people, my expectation is the population will grow once the russian threat is removed. Ukraine has all the potential to be a hugely prosperous and inspiring place to live - but first the russians have to go.

This is classic misinformation. With millions having left voluntarily for the west to continue their children's education, never mind the deportations to the former USSR, how else might an extrapolation look? Ukrainians in exile I have met have the intention to return and get back to loving. A baby boom is in prospect assuming the russian run.

There is a lot I could say on this matter and maybe I will if it is tolerated. To develop one of your themes, the orchestrators of misinformation have recognised the basic fallibility of a democracy in that we count all the votes. The "enemy" targets segments of voters who may just be enough to swing a few percent and make a majority. In the Brexit case the Brexit campaign targeted, among others, the anti-immigrant voters. A future candidate for Prime Minister even looked the electorate straight in the eye and asserted that 80 million Turks were on their way. In such segments people have a strong pre-existing bias and can be persuaded to elevate the issue to the top of their list and vote according to their instincts. Predisposed to bias, people do not want to deal with the facts because everybody brings their own facts to the fight in a democracy and so facts are relatively less important than their feelings. Sovereignty was another segment -- English Exceptionalism. Spending money on the Health Service another. At the back of this is the money and effort spent over decades to compromise key influencers such that they can be pressured to broadcast the party line at the appropriate moment. I think we all have our suspicions about these individuals and I have seen the compromise tactic being operated most systematically in China, but Russia is notorious too. In China and Russia in the 90s they tried to compromise everybody who went there - you never know when it might come in handy. Of course the best influencer is someone who may actually, plausibly, believe what he or she says but let us not underestimate the amount of blackmail going on. In London we also have hard evidence of money changing hands. In the Ukraine situation the game changer for me was when Poland opened the borders for the Ukrainian children with their mothers and grandmothers. The EU followed and suddenly the russians were on the back foot both militarily and morally. They never expected to lose the lightening attack on Kiev and never expected Europe to take ALL the refugees. The fact that the children and families are safe must be a decisive morale booster for those who stayed to fight. But the narrative changed too: Ukraine was seen by the majority to be fighting a just war, and while russian propaganda still seeks to engage swing voters they have lost the information war with the majority.

My own preference at the moment is to build around the proportional representation democratic model we are familiar with in Europe. Decisions tend to get taken reflecting a broad range of views and after thorough debate, rather than reflecting partisan ideologies.

The politico article is well worth a read. Thanks for bringing it to our attention. I am surprised how far China is with their construction of an ideology and vision for competing with the west. We should do some deep thinking about the effectiveness of our democratic models, especially the two party systems in UK and USA particularly. A number of democracies in the world are teetering on the edge - South Africa particularly, but Brazil, India, and several others including some close to home like Hungary.

Individual Sticks and Carrots are too complicated for 28 democracies having agreed to do something consequential like supporting Ukraine. Ukraine will determine when this war is over and if and when to "move things along". EU is meanwhile on Ukraine's side as stated regularly by the representatives of the European Council and backed by various concrete actions.

EU does NOT have this kind of agenda. EU is 28 nations figuring out what makes sense for all of us. Ukraine should figure out what makes sense for Ukraine and EU supports this 100%. Nato membership requires all Nato members individually to support - including Turkey. EU requires 28 sovereign nations to agree. Maybe you think this is a weakness, but it is in fact a strength. You see this now with support for Ukraine both in public and behind the scenes.

There are many sane believers in reality politics who will be thinking along with Grenier and trying to figure out how to settle, or freeze, what looks to some like a stalemate. I think Xi has the timing about right for his May meeting with the Central Asian republics. We will all know a lot more about the Ukrainian state of readiness and russian morale by then. This winter russia did what nobody expected - they attacked day after day through the harsh weather. They did not make much progress but neither did they fold. I have no idea how the soldiers on the ground feel about this. If it were me I would be figuring how to shoot my officers and make it out of there. Russians seem prepared to make yet another suicide run for the glory of mother russia. On the russian home front the protestors are either in jail or left the country - everybody else it seems is nodding along with Putin. A revolution seems far from possible. Opinion polls in US show strong support for Ukraine and stronger even among Republicans. With an election around the bend nobody is going to abandon Ukraine. EU too is solid. Military and economic support continues to flow and even the current Italian government is on-board. Ukraine is getting stronger by the day, militarily speaking, and the russians must know this. The Chinese certainly do. Russia better do something spectacular or the first Chinese-Central Asia meeting in May is going to have a challenging agenda. Putin is running out of time. His military is culminating the impossible winter offensive without any success. His main ally is on the verge of seducing his central asian sphere of influence. His economists are reduced to endorsing an renminbi currency and trying to sell gold on the quiet through London and Switzerland. Putin's retort is to threaten stationing tactical nukes in Belarus! Talk about a loser .... It would be great when Ukraine could organise a serious counter offensive before the Chinese meet with Central Asia sometime in May.

Talking about the Putin-Xi meeting, supposed to last three days but finished in two, this link is interesting with a African spin on what the Chinese were setting up as the meeting in Moscow progressed. https://www.thecitizen.co.tz/tanzania/news/international/xi-invites-central-asian-leaders-to-first-summit-in-china-4167150 As it seems that no military help is on its way from China, and no details about the construction of the gas pipeline to China were announced, one wonders what the russians did achieve at the meeting. Curious what Xi and Putin did discuss slowly over tea in front of the fire? The first meeting between China and the formerly Soviet central asian republics is targeted for May. The Ukrainians might be setting the agenda with their rumoured spring offensive.

Nordstream 2 is not actually blown up, at least not entirely. 50% of its capacity is still intact and Russia offered to supply Germany via this remaining pipeline in October. Germany refused - again. It always struck me as a strange coincidence that NS1 should be comprehensively destroyed while NS2 - the pipeline Germany had been refusing to bring into service for several months - somehow survived miraculously.

Chipping in. I live close to a Nato airfield which is shared with civilian traffic. These days it is mostly civilian. Normally the military element is very low key. However, right now we have AWACS practising low level take off and landing all day, and the same with transport aircraft. This is causing a lot of loud noises and exceeding all agreements with local residents. Last times this occurred were prior to engagements in Iraq, Afghanistan, etc. My feeling is that tensions are very high at the moment and NATO preparedness at a high level. Something is about to happen.

A long time ago I thought the military world in the west had left behind the idea about special requirements for military applications. State of the art applications are best based on consumer technology for quality, leading-edge performance, and price. The old world of "military specs" (mil specs) resulted in too many failures in the field, obsolete performance, and huge costs - bit like the russian performance today. Probably this is not what you mean. But for the military applications you describe we do not need state-of-the-consumer-art technology such as enabled by ASML (Netherlands). At least not in the short-term. Conceiving of China as a military opponent does change the equation as they are very familiar with consumer technologies - unlike the Russians - and can likely develop new weapons needing the features of the latest chip technology. Drone technology is educative. Simply applying readily available consumer technology with some smart software and basic robotics makes a big difference, as the Ukrainians are demonstrating.

It can be done but it is non-trivial. Key technology is manufactured in Netherlands but that should not be a problem. Some key knowledge and IP and people are in Taiwan. The costs are enormous. A European CEO of a semiconductor company told me Europe is looking at $500 billion minimum and the US bill will not be less. Huge amounts of money for no actual benefit if only we could make a lasting peace with China - it is just added cost on our societies. Timeframe I would estimate is 7 years give or take when we start now. An open question for me at least is how much of this chip manufacturing is really strategic in a military sense? The state-of-the-art chips are going into high volume-low power-massive processing-miniature applications like a mobile phone. Much of the military equipment making a decisive impact in Ukraine is 20 years old technology or older.

Whoever did it almost certainly did their best to point the finger elsewhere or they would have claimed responsibility by now. What is sure is the only party with an interest to keep this story alive is russia. Nobody else cares. Germany did a brilliant job with help from at least 3 friends around the world to move away from russian gas and they had more or less achieved this by the time the 3/4 of the pipeline was blown - essentially after the event and why leave 1/4 open? For me all the circumstantial evidence is pointing at russia - their pipelines after all. They could have just turned off the supply - nobody was depending on it anymore.

The Chinese approach reminds me of the guy admiring a beautiful piece of furniture and deciding "I could make that if only I had the right chisel".

My compliments for your forward thinking. Personally I could not have imagined the Imphal madness with russians attacking artillery with 50 cm long entrenching tools and actually carrying out the orders to effectively commit hari-kiri, suicide, or whatever word Dugin has conceived for this madness. I was expecting russians, being citizens of the modern world, to refuse such orders. The truth revealed is that most russians are not living in the modern world. Ukraine is reduced to fighting this war on russian terms - the war of brutality and attrition in which success is measured in metres per day. I wake every morning hoping for a paradigm shift. Hopefully the historians will have their turn after a Ukrainian victory and then I suspect the West will be criticised for timidity rather than the guy who did not order enough mortars. Thank god for Biden I sometimes think, but then reflect that he was instrumental in rejecting the first proper democratic election in Iraq and endorsing Nouri al-Maliki the man who was NOT democratically chosen - "our guy" Biden said in a tone reminiscent of the 1970s. And then the tragedy really got going. Ukraine has to avoid being a footnote in history. They need to continue to trust their own judgement and the courage of their own people and I hope and trust they will win through. The west should do everything because fundamentally Ukraine is fighting for western values in a world where too many countries are on the dark side. Enough of my opinions. I'll stick to facts next time I post.

Surely it is the West who should be grateful: Eastern Europe in the shape of Ukraine is doing the dying to fight an enemy we almost all believe needs fighting. Poland set a great example by opening their borders for mothers and children, an example followed throughout EU. The Baltic States seems to be giving what they have, etc. Leave Hungary out of it perhaps but Ukraine especially will deserve our gratitude when the russians are finally defeated.

Without capitalism we would not have personal computers, iPhones, the internet, or many many things that are useful for society. I met and worked with a lot of the people involved in creating these worlds and none of them did it for the money, even though several have become rich beyond the dreams of avarice. The thing about capitalism is that bad ideas die and good ideas continue to get funding. In the non-capitalist system bad ideas just keep on going. Polemic arguments should focus on mitigation of the undesired outcomes via regulation for example, rather than broadcast sweeping and false judgement about the system as a whole. Now perhaps we can get back to the war in ukraine. If anything the flexibility and depth of the capitalist system is making a good showing against the dogmatic intransigence of the autocrat in moscow in which failure is rewarded not by bankruptcy but by doubling down.

Maybe this is a desirable end state, maybe not. Right now it seems advantageous to have an Erdogan-enabled ambiguity about the status of those northern lands bordering the denuded russian defences. We do not know how the current situation evolves and it is wise to keep options open. Keep the kremlin guessing I would say.

Vjatsjeslav Volodin, chair of the Doema, today warned via Telegram for a "tragedy of worldwide scale" should Leo 2 tanks be delivered to Kiev. Apparently he threatened to use more powerful weapons should US and Nato deliver weapons with which terrain could be recaptured. Reportedly he said that attacks on the currently occupied lands would be considered as attacks on russian terrain. This appears to be a clear threat to use nukes should Leo 2 deliveries be made. Maybe some Telegram followers can confirm this - I saw it reported in a reliable Dutch newspaper. We appear to be back in mode call my bluff.

Still struggling to understand why russia is fighting so hard (with mostly mercenaries) in Soledar/Bakhmut. More and more Ukrainian resources are being sucked in too - with the plan that keeping on killing russians while withdrawing slowly is just fine. Meanwhile the whole area is looking like a target for a nuke. I am sure russia does not care about the wagnerian prisoners. Perhaps the trigger might be the German decision to send Leopards - there are back channels we have no knowledge of - and for sure there has been a clear threat made in the direction of Germany behind the scenes, and by extension the US. Mounting missiles in Moscow would support the narrative to the russian people that the war is getting very serious and more mobilisation is urgently needed. It is indeed looking scary. Glad I'm not having to make the tough calls on high level.

I hope some attention will be given to helping the refugees return and reintegrate. This is the first time I know that so many refugees are women and children - the future of Ukraine. As the war drags on and the infrastructure is destroyed it becomes harder and harder for them to think of going back as a realistic possibility. A plan for helping when the war ends and peace is secure would give much needed hope and perspective.