As I’ve explained before, the Americans have to depart Europe for Asia simply because holding the line on the central front will consume the entire strength of the United States.
Thanks for this clear articulation. A few thoughts.
If the Germans signal seriousness and urgency by properly deposing the reign of the debt break, and the EU more generally signals seriousness by creating a liquid market of eurobonds, I think this would be a hopefully checkpoint. But its not at all clear the European elites are fully bought in or have fully woken up from the end of history yet. Do you have a sense of what other critical points there are that show a serious urgency towards integration and an understanding of the historical moment, at least in political and financial terms? They have a marvelous world-historical crisis right now, and I, too, am afraid they will squander it.
Regarding pooling european security. I'm very curious how the european rearmament will suffer from disputes over how to allocate the benefits of such "military keynesianism" between different nations. In the US this has been solved by distributing the benefits across geographies, but with differing national defense champions, I wonder how this dynamic would play out.
I don't know who said it but someone once said Europe should become a large Switzerland, as a model for its future. Armed and ready, pro-social, and largely non-interventionist outside its sphere -- and importantly, able to conserve its own proclivity for provinciality (Switzerland is a country of small towns, in a real sense). This strikes me as at least a potentially correct rough sketch of what one model of europe could be, but who knows if that's even close to correct!
Russia is done for now. Bankrupt, bled dry and with the stockpile of rusting soviet weaponry running low. It will take russians decades to restore their position of power.
Europe doesn't rely on the US only for security but also for ideological and cultural direction. Remember the Floyd protests in Europe? The Brits kneeling at the World Cup? The Cult of Obama? Without american leadership Europe is a headless chicken. The only thing the european political elite will do in the next few years is to bitch and moan about Trump and wait for a new american leader to restore the thing to how they were. Even if that doesn't happen they will keep waiting.
The War On Russia is not over. The fact that the europeans are cheering the idea of the sham "ceasefire" tells you all you need to know.
If Russia accepts the sham (and Russia has form in believing obvious western shams in the past), Ukraine takes the opportunity to rearm and regroup, then has another go.
If Russia doesn't accept the ceasefire, europe urges Trump, weak, stupid and easily manipulated, to "escalate to descalate". This is another sham, but once Trump gets stuck in, he won't be able to leave without trriggering the Sunk Cost Fallacy.
All this is entirely intentional, and fairly obvious. However, Trump remains weak, stupid, and easily manipulated.
Generally right on the money... except "absorbed by Russia" bit. This is off on so many levels. From Russia's POV, Europe is a hornets nest and Europeans may as well be aliens from outer space; Russia doesn’t want to "absorb" any part of it any more than you want to adopt a rabid porcupine. There are other means to eliminate threats or exploit things to one's benefit.
100% correct that the 'playing field' scenario is the default. In some ways, it is already the status quo.
The Atlanticists will have EU gain a little more authority, and that authority would be used to find the next participant in line to play the part of Ukraine, once Ukraine itself becomes exhausted. As we can see, an actual peace deal has too many opponents, who prefer the war is extended until that point of exhaustion. For geographic and political reasons, that next participant would be Poland as has been suggested by other commenters.
At the same time, the Trump admin must juggle other priorities. A freestanding European MIC is not one of them. They must remain incapable of defending the continent without the consent of the US, that is elementary. Instead they'll buy US gear on credit. Nor is a serious showdown with China realistic, not even a purely economic one. Already even most hawks in DC realize that ship has sailed. Process of elimination leaves more proxy conflicts, and of course the Middle East.
Speaking of signposts of empires gone by, Yemen has again closed the Suez canal to Trump's allies. I'd wager that this - not China, not Russia - is where they'll get sucked in.
"The war is over," writes Policy Tensor above, March 12.
On March 19, Sergey Radchenko ( https://bit.ly/RadchS-2025-3_19 ) writes: "The Ukrainians – who have a better understanding of Putin’s intentions than Trump could ever muster – agreed to the American ceasefire proposal precisely because they wanted to show Trump that his naïve belief in deal-making would not work with someone like Putin... The Ukrainians have been fully vindicated... Putin’s concessions, such as they are, do not get us closer to the end of war. They are intended as face-savers for President Trump, who has put his peacemaker’s reputation on the line only to deliver practically nothing."
How might one reconcile these statements? Is one right, the other wrong? Both wrong? Both right in some aspects, somehow?
Thanks for this clear articulation. A few thoughts.
If the Germans signal seriousness and urgency by properly deposing the reign of the debt break, and the EU more generally signals seriousness by creating a liquid market of eurobonds, I think this would be a hopefully checkpoint. But its not at all clear the European elites are fully bought in or have fully woken up from the end of history yet. Do you have a sense of what other critical points there are that show a serious urgency towards integration and an understanding of the historical moment, at least in political and financial terms? They have a marvelous world-historical crisis right now, and I, too, am afraid they will squander it.
Regarding pooling european security. I'm very curious how the european rearmament will suffer from disputes over how to allocate the benefits of such "military keynesianism" between different nations. In the US this has been solved by distributing the benefits across geographies, but with differing national defense champions, I wonder how this dynamic would play out.
I don't know who said it but someone once said Europe should become a large Switzerland, as a model for its future. Armed and ready, pro-social, and largely non-interventionist outside its sphere -- and importantly, able to conserve its own proclivity for provinciality (Switzerland is a country of small towns, in a real sense). This strikes me as at least a potentially correct rough sketch of what one model of europe could be, but who knows if that's even close to correct!
Russia is done for now. Bankrupt, bled dry and with the stockpile of rusting soviet weaponry running low. It will take russians decades to restore their position of power.
Europe doesn't rely on the US only for security but also for ideological and cultural direction. Remember the Floyd protests in Europe? The Brits kneeling at the World Cup? The Cult of Obama? Without american leadership Europe is a headless chicken. The only thing the european political elite will do in the next few years is to bitch and moan about Trump and wait for a new american leader to restore the thing to how they were. Even if that doesn't happen they will keep waiting.
The War On Russia is not over. The fact that the europeans are cheering the idea of the sham "ceasefire" tells you all you need to know.
If Russia accepts the sham (and Russia has form in believing obvious western shams in the past), Ukraine takes the opportunity to rearm and regroup, then has another go.
If Russia doesn't accept the ceasefire, europe urges Trump, weak, stupid and easily manipulated, to "escalate to descalate". This is another sham, but once Trump gets stuck in, he won't be able to leave without trriggering the Sunk Cost Fallacy.
All this is entirely intentional, and fairly obvious. However, Trump remains weak, stupid, and easily manipulated.
Generally right on the money... except "absorbed by Russia" bit. This is off on so many levels. From Russia's POV, Europe is a hornets nest and Europeans may as well be aliens from outer space; Russia doesn’t want to "absorb" any part of it any more than you want to adopt a rabid porcupine. There are other means to eliminate threats or exploit things to one's benefit.
100% correct that the 'playing field' scenario is the default. In some ways, it is already the status quo.
The Atlanticists will have EU gain a little more authority, and that authority would be used to find the next participant in line to play the part of Ukraine, once Ukraine itself becomes exhausted. As we can see, an actual peace deal has too many opponents, who prefer the war is extended until that point of exhaustion. For geographic and political reasons, that next participant would be Poland as has been suggested by other commenters.
At the same time, the Trump admin must juggle other priorities. A freestanding European MIC is not one of them. They must remain incapable of defending the continent without the consent of the US, that is elementary. Instead they'll buy US gear on credit. Nor is a serious showdown with China realistic, not even a purely economic one. Already even most hawks in DC realize that ship has sailed. Process of elimination leaves more proxy conflicts, and of course the Middle East.
Speaking of signposts of empires gone by, Yemen has again closed the Suez canal to Trump's allies. I'd wager that this - not China, not Russia - is where they'll get sucked in.
"The war is over," writes Policy Tensor above, March 12.
On March 19, Sergey Radchenko ( https://bit.ly/RadchS-2025-3_19 ) writes: "The Ukrainians – who have a better understanding of Putin’s intentions than Trump could ever muster – agreed to the American ceasefire proposal precisely because they wanted to show Trump that his naïve belief in deal-making would not work with someone like Putin... The Ukrainians have been fully vindicated... Putin’s concessions, such as they are, do not get us closer to the end of war. They are intended as face-savers for President Trump, who has put his peacemaker’s reputation on the line only to deliver practically nothing."
How might one reconcile these statements? Is one right, the other wrong? Both wrong? Both right in some aspects, somehow?