Finland during the Cold War was actually a 1 on the scale I made up, combining being useful (like in trade), not being actively harmful, and being difficult to invade and hold. I faked it with calling it "Full Finlandisation" because I don't remember the word for a state fully at the mercy of a belligerent neighbour (a vassal state is one that pays tribute/is subservient, that doesn't match).
We obviously can't conclude that "the West betrayed Ukraine once again", because it isn't true. First, nobody owes Ukraine, or Estonia, or Sweden, or Europe in general, anything. The EU or NATO aren't obliged to take in Ukraine or Estonia or Sweden, though if they do they are indeed obliged to defend them. Thus the NATO promises are stronger to Estonia than to Ukraine or to Sweden. Which is a headache because Estonia isn't easy to defend, a small, relatively flat country next to some of Russia's largest military bases. Estonia is as much a NATO country as Kaliningrad is Russian. Would NATO go to nuclear war over Ukraine? No, but neither would Russia (primarily because they would lose).
The same goes for economy. Europe is expected to lose 1½–2 trillion euro in lost growth this year due to the Russian invasion. The few billions going to arm Ukraine is pocket money. But EU can be expected to fund Ukraine with hundreds of billions mostly after the war, and perhaps if unlikely Russia will chip in with some war reparation as well. They/we don't have to, and there would be voices that say we shouldn't. It does not seem that these voices are going to be heeded.
Europe does not profit from this war, nor do any European country including Russia. They have exchanged a low-cost frontline inside Ukraine with a high-cost. As long as Ukraine doesn't budge Russia will have to eventually, years from now. And Europe hasn't budged, not even Italy or Greece.
A likely wargaming outcome before the Russian invasion would be a swap: Russia could likely take and hold Estonia and good chunks of Latvia and Lithuania, but lose Kaliningrad.
Now the Estonian position is stronger, and the Russian weaker. Putin or successor might worry less about getting angry glares if they were to "denazify" the Baltic States, their relationship with the West is as bad as it gets, but their position is weakened.
If will be far easier to reinforce Estonia from Finland than from Poland (especially with a Suwalki capture). Russia can't expect air superiority or naval superiority over the Baltic Sea, and Sweden is a good staging point.
I think the tripwire strategy would have been sufficient, given that Russia has far too much other to lose. But you are moving up rank from level 1 to level 2, maybe in time touching 3.
Level 0: Full Finlandisation Level 1: An invasion would not be cost-effective Level 2: An invasion would cost the invader more than the defender Level 3: Outcome of an invasion would be unpredictable Level 4: An invasion would not be feasible
If you look at Europe and Russia as locked in a cold war, it makes sense to look at the relationship as a zero sum game. Europe's loss is Russia's gain and vice versa. In that case the optimal strategy for Europe is not to buy zero fossil fuel from Russia, but a low amount of fuel. The marginal value to Europe for the first 10% is far higher than the last 10%, while the top 10% gives Russia greater profit than the bottom 10%. Fadeout instead of a cutoff is a fair strategy.
If you don't consider Russia an enemy you would buy as much as is profitable. As long as European countries use a noose-like strategy (ever-stricter sanctions) we're good. If on the other hand it is a short squeeze and let off to profit-maximizing, that would less great. But the noose is holding, and there are pretty rigorous preparations for the coming winter(s), so we are decarbonising fast.
Note that at 8 minutes it shows painted gutters, not cycling infrastructure.
Nice to see my old home turf again. The broad street in the beginning, Dronning Eufemias gate, is recently built and in reality a bridge camouflaging as a boulevard. Lived there decades ago "before it got cool" (that is, when it was industrial/harbour area by a motorway, not like now among the most expensive pieces of real estate in Oslo). It is constructed and owned by the national road autority, not the city, and almost immediately was criticised for its subpar cycling solutions. To drive that home a bicyclist was run over by a truck in the street and killed in 2018. Another bicyclist killing happened in Oslo less than a month ago when a truck turned to the right. Of course, compared with the bad old days, there are huge improvements. Now there are only about three fatal traffic accidents a year, while back in 1975 with a population 2/3 of today, there were 41.
You may think that I am going overboard when I attribute personality traits to countries and nations. I understand that it is not fashionable or politically correct these days, it can be perceived racist and xenophobic and whatever. However, as long as it pragmatically works to provide substantial insights, there is no reason to give up the thinking that countries and nations have a more or less permanent character like personalities do.
The character of Russia has been the same all along from the beginnings of Muscovite Russia: Centralising and centralised, expansive colonial. Russia views certain lands as "ours" and will never back down from trying to acquire them. For Ivan the Terrible, the lands include everything from Arkhangelsk to Constantinople (Moscow being the Third Rome, superseding the Second Rome). For Catherine the Great, the lands also include everything from Poland to Alaska (or California, why not).
No, historicism has a dismal track record, except for being useful in war propaganda. So in WWI the Germans were "Huns", a remarkably unhistorical historicism, but fidelity or clarity has never been the goal, but to get an idea across. There is an echo in the Muscovite invaders being described as Mongolians by the Ukrainians. That has slightly more truth to it, but on the whole about as accurate as the German Huns.
There are many threads, ideas and groups that make up a nation. Putting it down to Putin is obviously a gross oversimplification, though in this case the responsibility for the invasion is down to one man, it was teamwork that led up to it. Putin had reason to believe that his actions would be popular, and they probably would have if they were successful. Success has turned out to be wildly more popular than failure, not only in Russia, but in every other country, in the past as in the present.
Russia is at the end of an empire. This is a period where empires often did stupid things because the leaders' upbringing and mindset is at odds not just with the current situation, but even more so with future developments. It will be up to a new generation to reassess.
The desirable long-term (now very long term) outcome for the relationship with Russia is a friendly one. There is no reason why that shouldn't happen eventually. It would be beneficial for Russia, and it would be beneficial for Europe.
There are factors in Russia that favours a destructive rather than constructive role, but these are not permanent. Before Russia had this role of being irretrievably bad, Germany did. And before Germany France. That said, while that should be the long-term outcome, that is not the state of Russia we have today.
While I certainly don't agree with Mearsheimer, Finlandization in itself can often be the best available option. Your country wouldn't have full sovereignty, as the neighbour gorilla would limit the scope of your foreign policy. However that is a fairly modest price to pay, compared with the alternatives: mostly vassal state or being a forward base of enemy-gorilla-of-neighbourhood-gorilla. Both parties would have to know the constraints. The finlandized country must know how not to upset the gorilla, and invest enough in defence not to make an attack worthwhile. The gorilla must know his limits as well. Finlandization can be a cheap way to use your power for political gain, but too much interference and the finlandized country would look for other alternatives.
Finlandization worked fine for Finland during the Cold War. Of course it was never the preferred alternative, but Finland could do about as well as neutral Sweden or NATO Norway. Could finlandization been a path for Ukraine. Possibly, but not with Putin. It is pretty much the state of Kazakhstan.
Amazingly, for all the evil and stupid things that Trump did, he did not manage to overturn USA or the world. This, to me, indicates that there is a rather strong internal logic to the American administrative tradition that stays the course regardless of who is in power.[1] I'd say that while W's excesses were *not* contained or constrained, but his excesses activated a counter-reaction that contained and constrained Trump's excesses.
My commonly repeated point. The country with the best bureaucracy wins in the long run. That has been Sweden's secret of success.
However, while Sweden has a partially excellent bureaucracy, this is not a fixed state. A bureaucracy must be in perpetual renewal, and to do that we need a government capable of implementing reforms, and too many minority governments have prevented those from happening. That is a medium-term problem for Sweden.
Norway was unique in actually being part liberated by the Soviets (liberated as the Nazis being kicked out without subsequently being occupied). When the Nazis decided against a last stand in Festung Norwegen, victory in Europe was also victory in Norway.
International relations are like that, very behavioristic. If you behave well you get candy, if you don't you get coal. That applied to Putin too. He got plenty of candy his first years, but now he sits on a pile of coals. Like any other weapon, it's more efficient used sparingly.
This goes for other leaders across the world as well. There might be a Reset button waiting for them in their future too, but it depends on what they are doing and how needed they are. Russia was once part of G8, another candy.
Trade policy is one such relationship. 11.2% of Estonian imports are from Russia. That is five times as much as the 2.2% of German imports. This does not make either Estonia or Germany into "Putin's puppets", nor is it "corrupt" unless the trade or interaction is against the interests of the country or corporation.
In a resolution adopted with 513 votes to 22 and 19 abstentions on Thursday, MEPs call for additional punitive measures, including “an immediate full embargo on Russian imports of oil, coal, nuclear fuel and gas”. This should be accompanied by a plan to ensure the EU’s security of energy supply, as well as a strategy to “roll back sanctions in case Russia takes steps towards restoring Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty, territorial integrity within its internationally recognised borders and completely removes its troops from the territory of Ukraine”. Exclude Russia from G20 and other multilateral organisations Existing sanctions must now be fully and effectively implemented throughout the EU and by the EU’s international allies as a matter of priority, insist MEPs. They call on EU leaders to exclude Russia from the G20 and other multilateral organisations, such as UNHRC, Interpol, the World Trade Organisation, UNESCO and others, “which would be an important sign that the international community will not return to business as usual with the aggressor state”.
To make the sanctions more effective, the Parliament calls for Russian banks to be excluded from the SWIFT system, for all vessels connected to Russia to be banned from entering EU territorial waters and docking at EU ports and for road freight transport from and to Russia and Belarus to be prohibited. MEPs also demand the seizure of “all assets belonging to Russian officials or the oligarchs associated with Putin’s regime, their proxies and strawmen, as well as those in Belarus linked to Lukashenka’s regime”.
Pointing to Belarus’ involvement in the war in Ukraine, the resolution demands that sanctions on Belarus mirror those introduced against Russia in order to close any loopholes allowing Putin to use Lukashenka’s aid to circumvent sanctions.
I do appreciate your views, jax; and those of ersi and Frenzie. And you make fair points... But I think I have a better grasp of the whither and whence we can expect from the Biden administration. "Masterful"! Really?
Really. You yourself gave several reasons why it was masterful. Countries, their leaders anyway, have interests. France's relationship with NATO was uneasy long before Macron. Macron is arguably one of the most pro-NATO presidents in history. France is also dead-set against any EU eastwards expansion. Never mind Ukraine and Turkey, even tiny Ex-Yugoslav republics about as far east as Italy, and west of Bulgaria, are a bit much for the French. The French talk of strategic autonomy is just that, French, but it is still EU policy. Most of us would read this as Europeans should better do European things in Europa, which people on both sides of the Atlantic should agree on. But there is an undertext of duplication and displacement of the Trans-Atlantic partnership with a pure European.
This wouldn't go well with the Germans, the European Atlantic countries, or any country bordering Russia. Germany is very Pro-American to a point, but while it is more instinctive with Germans above their 40ies, it's more transactional with those younger. There is a similar age divide in the relationship with Russia. The announced huge defence spending increases after the invasion not only pushes Germany over the 2% of GDP like Obama, Trump, and Biden (and many European countries) wanted, and Germany promised in 2014, it will turn Germany into the third biggest spender on defence in the world, after USA and China (and before India and Russia). It is a massive policy shift, with permanent consequences.
I am sceptic to the goal of spending money, when the spenders in question have no idea on what and for what purpose. Peacekeeping in Ethiopia? Islamic terrorists? However the invasion of Ukraine has (presumably and hopefully) focused minds, and in particular which spending gives the best results. Some war machines have performed badly in the last wars in Europe, the Middle East and Africa, others well. There will be traditional orders, expect more European orders of F-35 because it is easy to do when you have the money, and that should make Lockheed-Martin thrilled. But also some true 21st century fighting platforms.
All this care of Putin, you say, and not Biden. That is largely true, but not completely. 2014 changed opinions on Putin and what he was up to, there were sanctions and not Reset Buttons since then, but it didn't fundamentally change priorities. Now priorities have changed. This didn't happen over the night of 24/25 February. It's been happening over the last half year. Putin is the main protagonist and antagonist, if he had restrained himself none of this had happened and FOX News would have said that Biden was crazy or senile or both. But in second position comes the US administration and bureaucracy. The US clearly had the best intel (Vidaud may have been a bit of a fall guy though).
In third position there is a bit of generation shift with European leaders, less tied up with the past (we still got many old fogies, mind you). Hopefully Hungary will perform in the election tonight, though it is against the odds.
It's difficult to distinguish which came first, the anti-Americanism or the pretentious know-it-all-ism! But it's not quite a chicken-and-egg situation. Since you couch your barbs in the guise of observations, I'll reply in kind: The Europeans have always looked down their noses at America. Their history makes them all-but incapable of escaping the silly class structures that color their world view, and they readily revert to denigrating their fellow Europeans when America loses their limited attention!
Why is there no thread about the current U.S. administration? (Not that I'm surprised...)
I was just reminded (by a former general officer appearing on a Fox News program) that the Biden administration's first reaction to the Russian invasion of Ukraine was to offer Zelenskiy "a ride" out of town... President Zelenskiy replied "I don't need a ride... I need weapons!" Makes me wonder who's "side" the Biden administration is on...
Did that "news" ever get featured by European journalists?
You are showing your age. There have been superiority and inferiority complexes, admiration and contempt, on both US and European sides through the entire history of the US. By now the relationship has matured and those younger than us have a fairly normal sideways view of the Trans-Atlantic relationship.
The generalisation "group X has always done Y against group Z" rarely apply for non-trivial values of X, Y, Z and "always". European anti-americanism has ebbed and flowed. With Trump gone it is currently at an ebb. The failure to come up with something resembling a green deal and a less than elegant withdrawal from Afghanistan did count against the Biden administration, but the masterful handling of the Ukraine crisis that became a full invasion has more than made up for that. And Ukraine and Russia are far closer to us than Afghanistan is. I am about 800 miles from Kyiv, Ersi 600 miles, and Frenzie 1100 miles. My cottage is further away from me than Kyiv is.
Unlike you, we followed the invasion in real time (well I did, but was hardly alone). The prevailing view (which I also subscribed to) was that Russia could take, but could not hold. As it turned out Russia couldn't take either, but that was less than obvious at the time.
Zelenskyy would be very valuable to Putin captured, less so dead, and a problem if alive and broadcasting, especially inside Ukraine. I thought he was brave but stupid to stay in Kyiv. Posting that video of himself outside in central Kyiv was show-off, an effective one. The US offer came the night after, the Russians had taken Hostomel, and were getting closer to fully encircling Kyiv, It was a reasonable offer, but not a necessary one. And then the Russian advance in the north ran out of gas.
If you don't know what your company is releasing into the environment, you probably shouldn't be running it. It is a question of accounting.
Targets and what you are going to do in the future are different, but not fulfilling them can be breach of contract. The new SEC rules don't seem to require that, just that if you say "I have a plan", you have to show what that plan is, not that it will succeed. But investors should then be able to discern between those who don't have a plan and those who do, and among the latter who has got a good plan and who has not. Companies with no or bad plans, and/or big climate exposure will be riskier investments.
1. Well, yes. We don't need any more fossil gas pipelines anywhere. Burning gas is an expensive and filthy habit that we should stop. That said it didn't really matter, apart from the gross waste of money. EU could have gotten, and did get, the gas from the existing tubes. Now, as a temporary tide-me-over we will get fossil gas in the form of LNG, which is even more wasteful than in tubes, but there we go. But the good news is that it is Russian wasted money.
2. That too, yes. It matters a little more, but still just a moderate amount of energy. Nuclear power is not cost-effective, and has been losing money through the 2010s. However, extending the life span of nuclear power plants is relatively cheap, and energy is not going to be as cheap in the 2020s as in the 2010s and the 2030s. That is a problem with new reactors, in a number of European countries. They will most likely not be profitable. On the other hand, if looked through the perspective of energy security, it might make sense to have a share of nuclear power. Unsurprisingly these power plants will be government paid.
3. Now this one is tricky. Germany and France would have been against an eastwards expansion of NATO on principle and instinct. But even if they were against it doesn't mean that it is a good idea. The most likely outcome of such an application would be that the invasion would have happened earlier, and time has been on Ukraine's side. The longer it took, the less likely a Russian invasion would succeed. It would also be easier for the Russians to claim that this invasion was in defence of Mother Russia. I would like to see Ukraine in NATO, but on the other side I don't believe in making promises you cannot keep. That would make the countries less secure, not more (thus I am not keen on Georgia in NATO, unless the Article 5 irrevocably and believably would apply to them).
"Stealth NATO" is fine, like the training and equipment of Ukrainian soldiers. The Turkish media star may have triggered Putin, but on the whole it has helped. As has the Swedish/British Robot 57, and the less famous domestic arms industry.
Russia has over 5k nuclear warheads, several of them in working order. If nothing else that constrains the available options, and how to achieve the goals. As do the other substantial warfare resources of Russia.
Turkey, like Russia, and like every country on the planet, have a range of relationship options, from reasonably friendly to outright hostile. But every choice constrains the subsequent choices. And we have to build on the actual actions, not scenarios and modelling. This is not Minority Report. So 2014 cut off all overtures of rapprochement with Russia, since then the operating principle has been to constrain Russia. The sanctions, the 2% of GDP by 2024 resolution, the NATO Enhanced Forward Presence "tripwire" in 2016.
This was also when existing Russian low-level disinformation become weaponised. Pre-Crimea Russia would not have interfered in Western politics. IRA was founded in 2014. Russia also tried (unsuccessfully) to sanction-proof their economy and weapons industry, and cozied up to China and to less extent rest of Asia.
It still wasn't a Rubicon moment. It would have been possible to deescalate. Ukraine had learned their lesson, but the rest of us could have gone through trust-building exercises, reset buttons and the rest. But there is no stepping back from this invasion. A regime change would lead to many bygones be bygones, but not under Putin.
Quote
We have no eternal allies, and we have no perpetual enemies. Our interests are eternal and perpetual
— Lord Palmerston (and Henry Kissinger)
Half the world's economy (in PPP) and 5/6 the world's population are not in OECD countries. OECD countries are mostly open and democratic (Turkey is a member), other countries are not in the majority of cases (some are getting there, others are going in opposite direction). This multipolar world is messy, and there will be many alliances seemly and unseemly. Hardly anything new though, going back to e.g. the Cold War it was far worse.
As I keep pointing out: The Baltic countries were almost betrayed while *in* both Nato and EU. Damn lucky for Nato and EU, Ukraine is the test case now, instead of the Baltic countries.
It's a long game. It would be a stretch to call it an extension of the Great Game, but there are reverberations. Ukraine belongs in Europe, if they want to (they do). So does Turkey (they don't). Russia is too big and ornery, but could be on friendly terms (they aren't).
That is a problem that goes beyond Putin. EU is a club that Russia can't be a member of and cannot influence. NATO is not only that, but a protective alliance against Russia and anyone else that could be a threat to their interests (that includes Turkey, Middle East, North Africa, Sahel, China, worst case India or the US). Moscow will never like the EU or NATO, no matter who is in Kremlin, because the more powerful either will be the less powerful Moscow will be. We can sweeten the deal with trade and common projects, and if the world goes that way a common threat in China (or worst case India), or any other headache major or minor. We all have spent years in Afghanistan for instance (that Great Game again). We are all concerned about islamists. But in the end, and certainly under Putin, Moscow wants us dead. If the US goes insane again and elects another Trump, so does the US.
In Ukraine the goal was to avoid bloodshed. For the talk about rebuilding Ukraine, war sets you back decades. The countries in former Yugoslavia have only partially recovered from a war thirty years ago. If we go back ten years: before Maidan, before the first and second invasion, before the coup attempt in Turkey, when Erdoğan was still trying to join the EU, the Arab Spring was about to happen (and thus Syria and Libya hadn't yet), Osama bin Laden was killed, and Xi wasn't yet in power (and there was an epic power struggle, most dramatic was the Wang Lijun incident). Anyway, for Putin these were good times, of a sort. The EU – Ukraine Association Agreement was on the way, there were still things to do, but Ukraine was just as corrupt as Russia was. And a big chunk of the country felt closer to Moscow than to Brussels. That dramatically changed in 2014. Russia got control over Crimea, but at the cost of Ukraine. Under a different lider than Putin this could have gone differently, but it didn't, and the slow process of wrestling Ukraine from his grasp started.
Putin's countermoves are divisions and dissent, trying to split the EU apart, trying to split the US apart, the US from the EU, and Turkey in particular might be a target, Erdoğan spots opportunities. So do Iran. But by Twitter measure the Russian disinformation is less directed towards US and Europe, more towards India, Pakistan, South Africa and Nigeria. Of course Twitter is a narrow channel too easy to monitor, but while the actual war is limited to a few fronts in Ukraine, the information war is global.
Thanks for making it clear that Ukraine was betrayed and abandoned in 2014. What's going on now is pretending that it wasn't a (complete) betrayal. A similar scenario was clearly in store for the Baltic countries, but the scenario started to play out in Ukraine first.
For Ukraine to be "betrayed" there would have to be promises made that were not kept. There aren't. Ukraine was not and is not a member of NATO. Nor is it a member of the EU. Getting Ukraine out of Moscow's grasp has not been straightforward. Ukraine has prepared for war now for 8 years, and far more successfully at that than Russia. Primary assistance has come from the US, but also other NATO partners. Since the Armenia-Azerbaijian war, the Turkish Bayraktars have played a starring role.
