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Ukraine

 So Putin invaded Ukraine. I didn't expect him to. I thought the military threats were a distraction to divert attention away from spies, poison, and social infiltration tactics. Now that he has attacked we have had an outpouring of words and actions from western governments, and of memes on social media.

One popular meme says "Why Ukraine matters", and lists Ukraine's industrial and agricultural output. Another says "I stand with Ukraine", another "My heart is with Ukraine". NATO will meet tomorrow to discuss options. There is an emergency meeting of the UN Security Council going on right now. Biden has made a speech on supporting Ukraine, and imposed banking sanctions. The US has ostentatiously moved military units nearer to Ukraine. 

Not one bit of this makes a difference.

While surprised by invasion, Putin was always going to retake Ukraine. Please see my prior blogs on Putin for further explanation. Russian foreign policy for 700 years has been to secure an ice-free port and to move their western border westward. Since 1991-92 the Russian border is as far eastward as it has been since 1650. Putin retook Crimea and the port and naval base of Sevastopol. He then took a strip of land to ensure rail communication with the Crimea, and fomented rebellion in the Donetsk region, a heavily industrialized area with more direct rail communication with Crimea. Now he has attacked the rest of Ukraine.

Western reaction has been swift, and pointless.

NATO is meeting tomorrow. Wow....Great, decisive military leadership. The invasion began last night. You're 36 hours late, and Russian forces are already approaching Kiev. Are you meeting to discuss your irrelevancy, or how you will manage the defeat? Are you going to admit Ukraine to NATO now? A UN Security Council meeting is just as impotent a response. Russia is a permanent Security Council member; clearly in the spirit of international amity they will vote to censure themselves. No, wait- they will veto any proposal that is aggressive or condemnatory, making the meeting pointless.

Biden certainly took decisive steps. He has deployed 6000 US soldiers (somehow they're now always 'troops') to more forward locations in Germany, Poland, and Rumania. Why? Because 6000 US soldiers will stop 190,000 Russian soldiers? Perhaps to show we're brave and support our allies....It achieves absolutely nothing. Biden has already said he will not involve US units in direct fighting in Ukraine against Russian units. This is despite the agreement in which Ukraine got rid of its nuclear arsenal, the third largest in the world, in return for western security guarantees. So much for our credibility and aggression.

Surely sanctions will work! Biden froze Russian bank assets worth 1 trillion dollars. That's OK; Russia accumulated 630 billion in hard currency prior to making the attack. Russia' total GDP is 1.3 trillion dollars. They have a currency reserve equal to 50% of their entire national economic output. The equivalent is if the US had 10.5 trillion in cash on hand. Much more importantly, sanctions are unlikely to work because so many nations work around them. This is especially likely given Russia's position relative to Europe.

Russia supplies 38% of all natural gas to the EU. Germany gets half its natural gas, half its coal, and one third of its oil from Russia. There is no way for the EU to impose any meaningful sanctions on Russia without being frozen to death and running out of electricity. And this dependency is not related to the Nord Stream pipeline, which isn't even on line yet! 

There are other significant practical issues that prevent a serious Western response. Ukrainian railroads use a gage of 5 feet, the same as Russia, and different from the Western gage of 4 feet 8.5 inches. To bring significant military equipment into Ukraine requires unloading train cars and reloading them at the Ukrainian border. This issue drove the Germans nuts in WW2, and it will again. No major military force since 1861 has fought without rail supply. The West also does not have enough active military force to intervene. To build up men and materielle will take 4-6 months, just as it did in preparing for Operation Desert Storm. In the meantime, western Europe will be without electricity. Not happening, not possible.

The West is in a bind of its own making. We flirted with putting Ukraine in NATO but did not, frightening and annoying Putin while doing nothing to improve Ukraine's safety. At the same time, the US has dithered over natural gas fracking and the building of LNG terminals to supply Europe, who turned to their long-time strategic enemy for energy. The US has done no better. China owns 1.3 trillion of our debt while we run up a balance of trade deficit of 310 billion every year. We but computer materials, phones, and most importantly computer chips from China. We cannot finish new cars because we don't have the computer chips to run their fuel injectors. China by itself assembles 35% of the WORLD's electronic devices. The US now makes just 13% of the world's semiconductors. The US cannot confront China any more than Europe can confront Russia.

Putin has, it seems to me, made a calculation that Russia with possession of Ukrainian production and capacity and sanctioned by the West is better off than Russia cooperating with the West but having to trade with Ukraine. And he's right. Putin seems to me to be the foremost practitioner of Realpolitik. There's no political or moral driver here, only what is practical and right for Russia.

Our response is reduced to a Kliban cartoon. It shows a man keeling over on the street, and another man saying 'Quick, call the uh-oh squad!' A group of people stand around, looking at the man, saying 'uh-oh, uh-oh'. That is all our response is. We have no economic leverage, no military options, and cannot attack our greatest adversaries on the world stage because we rely on them economically.

In The Marriage of Figaro, Susanna whispers to Figaro 'Senz'avocato hai gia vinta la causa'- without a lawyer, I have won our case. Russia and China are winning over the West on the world stage without firing a shot. This is happening not because of their aggression but because of our weakness. The West doesn't want to fight over Ukraine. only 25% of Americans are willing; 75% are against it. We do not have the will to fight, the means to produce, the fuel to generate electricity.

We are well and truly screwed. Ukraine will be Russian, and the days of Western hegemony are over.

Ted

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