"Russia and China are in many respects keeping up with U.S. developments in AI, but it’s true they don’t have quite the density and thriving entrepreneurship of Silicon Valley"?
China took a different direction with AI, first embedding it in industry, then in EVs. In these respects, the PRC is far ahead.
The China and Russia state systems are superior as per this field of A1, to devolope to scale and for industry as opposed to social media, as Silicon Valley is conventionally unable to produce much more than expensive security and surveillance systems, and complaints about IP
Good point! From my understanding, from the many different AI applications, the ones most advanced and/or hyped in Silicon Valley are the "dematerialized" ones like chatbots, image analysis and creation, or big data, with other fields that are closer to the real world like protein folding / molecule screening or autonomous driving or autonomous robots (relatively) lagging.
At the same time, China is using this tech for building automated factories and advanced designs.
So yeah, Silicon Valley is winning the the narrative wars with its chatbots while China is winning the real world / physical war with industrial AIs and factory automation.
In Ukraine, the “Right Sector” was created with a core of Jews in order to carry out a Jewish coup at the right time. In Russia, a core of Jews was created within the Wagner structure in order to carry out a revolution in Russia at the right time. After Prigozhin turned the Jewish core from a campaign to a coup, he said the key phrase: “Russian blood could be shed on one side.” With this he confirmed that Jews were marching on Moscow. You must understand that there is not a Russian-Ukrainian war going on, but a Russian-Jewish war at the hands of Ukrainians.
Except the "March on Moscow" was done with the full coordination of senior GRU and Putin directly. Your fantasies of a global, uniform conspiracy by one shadowy group are just that - fantasies.
In reality there are always several large scale conspiracies and groups, and a near infinite number of smaller ones.
Like in the Corporate world, while they may agree on wider aims - lower taxes, lower wages, anti-unionisation - they will also backstab each other for advantage at a moments notice.
Leo Bronstein AKA Leon Trotsky was a financier from the Upper East Side of New York City, before sneaking into Russia to organize the Bolshevik Revolution...
In Ukraine, the “Right Sector” was created with a core of Jews in order to carry out a Jewish coup at the right time. In Russia, a core of Jews was created within the Wagner structure in order to carry out a revolution in Russia at the right time. After Prigozhin turned the Jewish core from a campaign to a coup, he said the key phrase: “Russian blood could be shed on one side.” With this he confirmed that Jews were marching on Moscow. You must understand that there is not a Russian-Ukrainian war going on, but a Russian-Jewish war at the hands of Ukrainians.
RE: Healing Russian MOD & Wagner Prigozhin adversarial Partnership through formal dialogue. Real war is intellectual with restorative violence only necessary when violations such as Ukraine's ongoing massacres against its 1/3 Russian speaking minority needed protection. The first line of defence by all successful nations should be 'intellectual' (Latin 'inter' = 'between' + 'legere' = 'to-choose') at all levels of society. Cultivation of dialogue, especially within the military's young & other ages can be a powerful international force, when these & others are given the opportunity & practice to articulate their points of view. Just 5% of present military budgets devoted to formal dialogue / debate by all, would completely alter every battlefield.
Russia, as a society, can begin to restore its ancient 'indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') COUNCIL-PROCESS or 'dialectic' ('both-sided') rights to raise issues & the responsibility for all to respond in Both-sided, Equal-time, Recorded & Published Dialogues, at all levels of society. This intelligent dialogue must include military participants in all ranks & divisions. Adversarial issues, such as with Wagner's ongoing important role worldwide & Prigozhin would be quickly publicly & openly resolved with greater diversity in collaborative intelligent solutions arrived at. The key is the coordinated autonomous intelligence of all parts of each of society's 'body' including the military, mirroring the human body's own gene, cell, tissue, organ & whole body autonomy & integrity. Successful societies cultivate communication within human intelligent diversity. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/1-both-sides-now-equal-time-recorded-dialogues
All fake metal-coin 'money' (Greek 'mnemosis' = 'memory') Oligarch top-down controlled human societies are based in Centrally-controlled popular 'Amnesia', where people are not aware & do not recall the Contributions, Experience, Expertise & Decision-making acumen, each person & businesses represent. Unfortunately Russia still fits into this Oligarch mold, especially after its western Oligarch (Jacob Schiff & Warburg) multi-million dollar financing of Lev-Davidovich Bronstein (Trotsky) & Vladimir Lenin to turn Russia's 1917 Tsar supported & cultivated massive 'community' (Latin 'com' = 'together' + 'munus' = 'gift-or-service') movement violent & unproductive with fake 'Co-operatives' (L. 'co' = 'together' + 'operatives' = 'multi-stakeholders') with one-member/one-vote. One member / one vote fails everywhere, because it doesn't recognize or empower the contributions which each specialized person & part of an economy make. When part of each salary is based in progressive life-long share ownership, then peopled develop invested interest & share-based decision-making rights within their area of contribution, experience, expertise, hence enabling a delegation of authority/decision-making within each department or division in Economic Memory. Economic Memory with bodily autonomy. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/3-economic-memory
WAGNER AS A PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP REQUIRES ECONOMIC-MEMORY & EMPOWERMENT
As one might appreciate, all humanity's 'indigenous' ancestors cultivated very appropriate human social-psychology based solutions quite different from what today's false 'socialists' (L. 'socius' = 'friend') & 'community' advocates have been institutionally Oligarch-indoctrinated to believe. Real Economic Democracy is such an integrated cultural 'fractal' ('fraction, multiplier, building-block, where-the-part-contains-the-whole') paradigm.
ECONOMIC DEMOCRACY includes universal individual ownership & empowerment in the specialized Domestic, Industrial & Commercial Production-Society-Guilds as well as use of bottom-up time-based, equivalency accounting on the once worldwide String-shell Value System (eg. Wampum on Turtle-Island, Quipu in S. America, Cowrie in indigenous Celtic & Slavic Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia & all islands). https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/8-economic-democracy
Lots of interesting stuff in this column. I must say, I found "On secession and civil war" so interesting that I bookmarked it back when it appeared, and I've reread it several times.
I look forward to any follow ups on that topic in the future. We all know 2024 is going to be insane.
"So while I do think ‘reports of Ukraine’s demise are premature’, there’s a high probability they won’t be able to survive past 2025, with even 2024 being 50/50, because the economics and logistics are simple realities that will begin to fail."
No headlines about Russia capturing Marinka. I would've thought that a reason for those in the West to call Zelensky a loser on the way out. Instead, the few reports are focused on the claimed losses of Russians to takeover nothing. A 22-month battle is reduced to media drivel.
Similarly, no glaring knews about Avdeevka being as bloody as Bakhmut. Russia's advances in both places are significant.
And Robotyne will vanish from Ukraine's hands soon.
No one can predict war precisely, but it feel's like we're on the road to closure. Russian missiles on energy supplies over the next 2 months will emphasise this.
On #43 - the Left - like Jimmy Dore - are also being silenced and are targetted. It is all those who cannot be controlled, and they fall on all parts of the spectrum. There will be many conservatives willingly marching the dissidents to the camps - brutally.
It looks like the funding from the West to Ukraine has hit a end, and its hard to see how Ukr can continue with no money coming in, let alone new weapons or ammo, 2024 is likely to be end-game - right in time to embarrass the corrupt racist assehole in the White House and his attempted electoral re-annointment.
I just have an image of sullivan begging an incredulous Putin to hold off til after the election for Biden's sake, lollol.
With the end of the Piscean Age, which started ~2000 years ago and was subverted by Rome, the most evil society Europe had experienced until that point, and America which is the culmination of that process as the Western Empire, now collapsing far faster than Rome itself did, the 'End of the Aeon' appears nigh.
The danger is the 'Apocalypse' will be brought in by them too. :/
If I were Putin, I'd prefer a President Biden to a President Trump, because if Trump were to try to make peace, Team D and its allies throw out the allegations of conspiracy in an apoplectic rage. And, no, I am not a fan of Biden, LOL.
The difference with Trump is that this time, Trump would actually clear the decks, rather than trust the incumbents as he did in 2017. This is what they are afraid of, and why the ludicrous criminal charges came out and the media burnt all its remaining credibility over the past couple years. I mean it's gotten so bad that the US DoD finally got rid of the MSN agitprop news page as the default home page on Edge. I suppose the complaints finally got to them.
The fact that some actually buy the propaganda is evidenced by the GP post here, but it's disbelieved by most, otherwise the polls wouldn't be reading like they do.
Weak? Yep. Stupid? Not really. Inexperienced would be closer to the truth. Things would be different this time. He was completely out of his depth in the early stages of his administration. Lots of reasons to think he's changed, as if the experiences of the past few years haven't resulted in him learning some lessons. You or I would, certainly, no reason to think Trump didn't from the various betrayals. As for exactly what form the putative new administration would take, it'll depend on who he surrounds himself with as advisers. But it won't be 2017 redux.
Whatever. He got elected, we didn't. Some humility is in order. When the entire apparatus of the government is trying to make you look bad, they'll succeed.
Trump was and is better than Biden, though he always put his own interests first. On being elected, his first tweets said that he was going to stop chemtrails and vaccines. These were deleted within half an hour, and he was the one who set up Operation Warp Speed. He threatened to appoint RFK as a "Vaccine Commissioner", then walked it back in exchange for money from the pharmaceutical industry. How do we know that he won't do more of these same if he is paid enough?
I wonder how much security must surround people like the Rothschilds and company. They can't possibly go anywhere without something comparable to the secret service with them at all times. They live in a very strange, demented bubble.
I'm not sure that any name that is floated to us is ultimately responsible for these ideas. Being in enough meetings with the type, I don't think most of them have two brain cells to rub together. But above and beyond that, the number of sociopaths who are interested in murder who also are rationally interested in altering global affairs is vanishingly small.
Yes, they have security. No, it isn't seriously tested, because the state actors who would most credibly pull this off realize it is pointless. Otherwise there would be a lot more assassinations.
It probably should have been a warning to those of us in the US when the high-profile political killings stopped after the 1960s that the government had jumped the shark and was unrepresentative of the will of the people. There was clearly a point in killing JFK and RFK, the same way there was a point in killing Julius Caesar. It'd be hard to justify in the case of most current politicians.
Brad Stratford , Austin De Bercia and four other volunteer soldiers died at Stepove on November 27. They were from north Vancouver Canada .
The same time four other western adventurist died at Kupiansk , and two of them suffered leg wounds , and got captured by the Russians . Some of this group included Americans . There is no war going on simply between Ukraine and Russia . Russia against the western powers with the banking cabals , and the whole army of laptop warriors , including AI calculations , projections and constantly trying to invent scenarios on the fly . Russia must be defeated according to Jennet Yelen who is not a general have no military background , She is in the banking business , but taking charge financing the war oversees to steal the goods from the othe country . paying the dumb white boys to fight for her money . they are the real decision makers , what is the problem ?
49: Your response to reader’s request is very informative – but does not cover the whole question of armaments production, planning, and numbers, for both EUUS and RF
You say you will write on drones – great
But – please address The Rest – missiles, tanks, planes, electronics, satellite systems, why not subs? etc etc (semiconductors, chips)
Why do EUUS produce so little/so few – economic, industrial, social and political considerations
This applied to artillery shells as well as all other armaments – input costs- materials, energy, construction- factory costs, machining costs, sub supplier costs, the whole web of essential industry which has been off shored, especially by the US
Is re training skilled manpower to anything close to a China/Russia level even conceivable? Let alone practical – why (how) re construct a power base and increase salaries for the working class when you, the EUUS ruling class, has spent 50/60 years or more destroying the working class
Is there any indigenous production of armaments in the Ukraine, apart from garage basement type drone assembly?
Is there any reliable means to assess the quantities of shells obtained by Russia from North Korea?
Are there other sources of arms provisions for the RF? What is the role played by Iran, by China
Nobody knows how many shells North Korea sold to Russia, but the estimate is 2 million. What is known, however, is that both of the Koreas are the only countries on earth (not involved in a war) that are churning out gigantic amounts of artillery shells. Everyone else is just making a few for "top up" purposes or else importing them.
Can you comment on any other aspect of arms production etc?
If you do have the time perhaps it would help to encourage S to address this issue in a 'full scale' but not 'brutal' invasion of the overall subject of armaments
Technically, the Koreas are involved in a war. And they use those shells on a consistent basis, at least the North does. I've been in Korea a few times when the firing has happened. The Southern responses have been desultory.
Ironically, this is what is meant when the West talks about 'frozen conflict' in Ukraine.
12 December 2023 WSJ on EU armaments Facts and Figures
The WSJ has partial facts and figures on the state of NATO disarmament in Europe, specifically U.K. – the article contains few facts and figures about Germany, France, etc - nothing about Spain, Italy...
Still- further evidence that EU has been thrown to the wolves
But their language is still maidenly - Once done with the Ukraine RF might ‘cause trouble elsewhere’! – how timid can you get?
Extensive quotes reproduced below-
‘The British military—the leading U.S. military ally and Europe’s biggest defense spender—has only around 150 deployable tanks and perhaps a dozen serviceable long-range artillery pieces. So bare was the cupboard that last year the British military considered sourcing multiple rocket launchers from museums to upgrade and donate to Ukraine, an idea that was dropped.
France, the next biggest spender, has fewer than 90 heavy artillery pieces, equivalent to what Russia loses roughly every month on the Ukraine battlefield. Denmark has no heavy artillery, submarines or air-defense systems. Germany’s army has enough ammunition for two days of battle.
In the decades since the end of the Cold War, weakened European armies were tolerated by governments across the West because an engaged America, with its vast military muscle, underpinned the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and defense policy in Europe. The U.S. accounted for nearly 70% of NATO’s defense spending last year.
Much of Europe’s industrial capacity to make weapons has eroded over years of budget cuts, and turning that around is a challenge at a time when most governments face budget constraints amid slow economic growth and aging populations, as well as large political opposition to cutting back on welfare spending to fund defense.
Europe has “systematically demilitarized itself because it didn’t need to spend the money,” thanks to the lack of an apparent threat and U.S. military dominance around the globe, said Anthony King, a professor of war studies at the University of Warwick. “They have basically gone to sleep.”
The Ukraine war has made clear the depth of Europe’s problem.’
Putin might play the devil, darn him
‘Putin could pressure other non-NATO countries such as Moldova or Georgia, launch sabotage attacks in the Baltics or further bolster Russia’s military presence in Kaliningrad, a strategic Russian enclave sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, said Mark Sedwill, the U.K.’s former national security adviser.’
WSJ states Sweden has joined NATO – is this true? Perhaps there’s been a secret joining…
‘Military spending among NATO countries fell from about 3% of annual economic output during the Cold War to about 1.3% by 2014, according to NATO data. Things began to change after the 2014 Russian invasion of Crimea, but only slowly. In the past decade, EU defense spending rose 20%, according to the European Parliament. Over the same period, Russia and China boosted their defense budgets by almost 300% and close to 600%, respectively.’
‘Germany’s army, which at the end of the Cold War had half a million men in West Germany and another 300,000 in East Germany, now has 180,000 personnel. West Germany alone had more than 7,000 battle tanks by the 1980s; reunified Germany now has 200, only half of which are likely operational, according to government officials. The country’s industry can make only about three tanks a month, these officials said.’
‘Within days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Germany pledged to spend 100 billion euros, or about $110 billion, on defense in a one-off surge in spending, but only about 60% of that amount is expected to be earmarked by the end of this year.’
Despite considerable realism about NATO weakness the WSJ still repeats the copium that the RF army is weak and disorganised
‘“People may say the Russians have taken it on the chin, and we don’t need to worry. That’s a valid point, but it ignores residual Russian strength,” said John Deni, a professor at the U.S. Army War College and an expert on European militaries. “If the Russians present us with a mass problem in Europe, the challenge is, can technology and advanced capabilities do it? And there we see some challenges.”
‘Britain announced its biggest increase in defense spending since the Cold War in 2020. But the overall army size is still expected to shrink to 72,500 full-time troops from a previous target of 82,000. It is replacing its 227 tanks with 148 more-modern versions, but those won’t be deployed until 2027. Of its existing 227 tanks, only 157 can be deployed within 30 days and perhaps only 40 are fully functioning and ready to move, military analysts said, as many are in storage or being upgraded.
The U.K. has pledged to ramp up defense spending to 2.5% of GDP, but only when economic conditions allow’’.
‘’ Sanders declined to comment on how much equipment the army could currently deploy. He said the army will get an average of 200 new armored vehicles a year between 2024 and 2028. It will also address the shortfall in ammunition capacity, though he declined to give a timeline.
“As the bloke who is responsible, not fast enough,” Sanders said.
The Ministry of Defence placed a £410 million, or about $515 million, order with BAE Systems this year for artillery shells and ammunition to bolster production eightfold. But that production capacity won’t be reached for another two years. It also bought 14 Archer artillery systems from Sweden to replace the 32 AS90 long range artillery pieces it handed over to Ukraine, plugging a gap until the U.K.’s own upgraded long range artillery systems arrive in the late 2020s. “We are on the right trajectory,” said James Cartlidge, the British Minister for Defence Procurement.
‘’
‘The British army’s new armored reconnaissance vehicles, called Ajax, show just how long it can take to upgrade a fighting force. On a recent day this fall, a group of army officers stood in the pouring rain watching as two Ajax vehicles cruised over the muddy plains in southwest England. It was the first time the Ajax was used in a military exercise, 13 years after the army first announced it would purchase them.
Initially ordered at a cost of £5.5 billion to replace aging tracked reconnaissance vehicles used since the 1970s, Ajax, made by the U.K. subsidiary of General Dynamics, suffered numerous technical problems. During test runs hundreds of soldiers fell physically ill due to the vibration and noise when driving them. The delays were so long that the army had to extend the use of its ’70s-era vehicles.
Those problems are now fixed. But the nearly 600 new vehicles won’t be fully deployed until the end of 2028. Meanwhile the new high tech communications kit the Ajax is supposed to use is also delayed, perhaps by longer.
11 December 2023 FT on DeathRow : Sanctions Russia
Time to get out of fighting with Russia if we can – it’s bad for business – time to stop economic suicide –
However: as yet no policy directive in place so the articles are still all over the place, some still Putin naughtyman, some still we have almost won, some almost realist
‘Why export controls are failing to cripple their targets’
More forthright – and acknowledges the damage has been done, no going back
The money shots:
‘The challenge for the US and other western governments is that much of Russia’s new crude system has no need for western service providers.’
Nor for western buyers: apart from sales, the RF oil trader service and everything else markets have moved to Dubai
“Russia’s been quite successful at building up its own fleet, finding alternative insurance, building an ecosystem of people who can help move crude and products” said Ben Cahill, a senior fellow at US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, who has studied the west’s energy sanctions on Moscow. “It’s hard to put the genie back in the bottle.”
What the reporter carefully avoids mentioning is that at the recent Zimbabwe meeting of the Kimberly Pact the G7 lost out, once again the EUUS shoots itself in the ….and hands control over the market to the RF, in alliance with the Africans; it is predicted the market hubs will shift from NY and Antwerp to Mumbai and Shanghai
Plus, from August 23
‘European Companies suffer a E100 billion hit from Russia operations’
Often underplayed in the general western press is that sanctions cut both ways – the usual tired trope is that Russia sanctioned the ‘west’ by cutting off their supply of cheap energy, whereas it was the west who sanctioned Russia – these are the same who state with straight face that Russia destroyed NS2
Re the sanctions/confiscations/nationalisations applied to Western companies operating in Russia – these were the result of the withdrawal of many companies under pressure from their own western governments, subsequently their failure to fulfill contractual business obligations; to pay rent, tax, employees etc
Hence the Hundred Billion Hit – plus associated benefits such as forced rebuilding of Russian industry, commercial ties with RoW, etc
By way of contrast - The so called freezing by and in the ‘west’ (EUUS) of Russian state assets, rumoured to be E300 billion, and the promises from various EU politicians to spend this for Ukraine, have proven to be lies
The assets are frozen, but untouchable, elsewise the real power in the EU, the dominant capital class, fear that the RoW will withdraw their assets out of the EU, etc etc – besides they know that to spend such money on the Ukraine is money thrown away, and does this class not have better use itself?
According to Fortune – 400 international companies have stayed on in Russia, despite
"What if they’re able to dig in Vietcong-style, going full blown guerilla insurrectionist, even long after their equipment has run out."
I think this was one of the plans from the start, with Milley's "3 Days" statements. They expected shock and awe and prepared for insurrection style, long-term conflict. Another Russia's Afghanistan-style or Vietnam-style quagmire, if you will.
Of course, many believed Rus would collapse due to the sanctions.
I may be wrong, but the time for a Vietcong style defense may be past.
The Vietcong benefited from a large cadre of 'true believers'. Ukraine had many of those types at the beginning of the conflict -- however, nearly 2 years of peer-level war and offensive actions seems to have significantly 'wiped out' (or very severely denuded) those assets. The legitimate 'patriots' (my short hand term for those who were not ideological like Azov but primarily motivated for 'defense against invasion' once Russian troops crossed the border) flocked to the colors in the early part of the war --- however, they are mostly now dead or severely wounded or disenchanted. The ideological Azov-type fighters have been lessened as well, although not as severely, since many of those units appear to have been re-assigned to internal security (protect the regime) and as anti-retreat forces. But even these ideological troops may not be as ready, willing, or able to fight in a guerrilla war (as they might have been in the beginning). So, there is a problem with the motivated and troops needed to pull-off a Vietnam or Afghanistan type guerrilla war.
This is further complicated by the material wealth of Ukraine (and war fatigue). One of the problems with the US's approach to 'bomb Vietnam back into the Stone Age' was that, in some regards, Vietnam (at the time) was still in the Stone Age -- it wasn't a modern, industrialized, society dependent on modern conveniences and necessities (I realize that this statement is not 100% true with regard to North Vietnam in the 1960's, but I am exaggerating to make a point). Ukraine, unlike 1960's Vietnam, is dependent on the steady supply of electricity to keep food fresh and available to an urban populations. It needs fuel to transport goods and heat homes. Its populace is more susceptible to electronic news and information and can readily find out what is going on. The more rural, isolated, traditional, self-sufficient, and resilient populations of 1960's Vietnam and Afghanistan had a better potential for sustaining a long, grueling guerrilla war full of hardship. The 'war weariness' of Ukraine also plays a role. A guerrilla war from the start might have added hardship, severe personnel loss, etc over time allowing such a war to continue for some time before society's 'will to resist' falters. Ukraine, by most accounts, is already 'at the edge' of despair -- so it may not have the 'reserves of willpower' to embark on or sustain a guerrilla war at this point.
I don't know any of these things for certain --- perhaps Ukraine will enter into a Guerrilla war against Russia their effort would be one 'for the ages' and make Vietnam and Afghanistan look like amateurs -- I just don't think that that outcome is likely.
I think you are right - guerrilla warfare as Vietnam or Afghanistan was fought by very very tough country people - young and old - living as you state lives largely autonomous of outsiders' capability to influence, even detect
The Ukrainians are neither as tough nor as young and are dependent on easily degraded city comforts, nor as dedicated - have not most of them abandoned their country to write software in Dublin, or wherever
Besides AI drone swarms will put paid to any foolish enough to
That's a good point. You need young 'True Believers' to sustain a partisan campaign. The Ukrainian youth that flooded out of the country won't come back unless an entirely different government is in place that they could support.
The fact that half the population of Ukraine has departed the country as a result of conscription pressures argues vehemently against any kind of guerilla warfare. It's similar to the "Red Dawn" illusions about the US. The problem is that civilian reprisals against the surviving population and its required services will assure that any resistance will be short-lived, both there and here.
Question 40: "I think Russia and China are both very active in ‘opening new fronts’ against the Atlanticist empire in Africa as well, which is causing major problems."
I don't think it is actually necessary that China and Russia drive this intentionally. As the US hegemony and power projection throughout the world clearly visible for all to see is fading, naturally locallized geographic frozen conficts are breaking up, that were kept frozen by US power.
E.g. Neither African recent events nor Venezuala strike me as pushed by Russia or China. What happens now looks to me like a natural process where the world starts to open its eyes and sees that the "King" meanwhile got rid of (nearly) all his clothes. And Russia was the "kid" getting the world to see it.
However – Lavrov last year was very active in African journeys, for good reason the time had come - he worked hard to revive old memories and rhetoric, and sponsor the idea of re making them anew - quite apart from signing security treaties
His visit to Sassou (July 2022) was conducted in Russian! - the foreign minister was educated in Moscow, as the larger part of higher ups in the bureaucracy
They were already talking about a solution to Libya….Gaddafi is held in very high esteem in Central Africa, and Sassou was Chair of the AU Committee on Libya
The Sahel and CAR countries were already permeated by Wagner - their full scale and brutal rejection of French presence was their own affair, but irrigated by old time liberational language - La Patria o muerte, and so on
It is rumoured, convincingly enough, that the President General installed by coup in Gabon, a very much more prudent and restrained/partial coup than took place in the Sahel, was whisked off to see Putin by his close compatriot (not in the weak ‘national’ sense, but in the powerful tribal sense) President Teodoro of EGuinea - the PG is from a town just one side of the border, the P from a town just the other side, both are Fang, borders in that part of the world are non existent for locals, and so forth
It would hardly be surprising, however, if they were to suggest an alliance along Sahel lines - The Gabon in particular has long been over dependent on French and now US spies, barbouzes, soldiers, predatory oligarchs, invasive faux exploitation NGO's, propaganda...the list is long you name it it'll be there somewhere
Right, agree as well. What I specifically mean is not that they don't talk with other countries and build relations, but they don't need to stirr the pot, scheeme, construct artificial conflicts to divide and conquer/harm relations with US/West. They can just let it evolve naturally, and go along with it.
– of course French colonialist domination over Sahel et al needed just the suggestion that there is a path to resistance to begin to stir, spurred subsequently with the evidence of success on display
Above all by the contrast between, on the one hand, the efficient resolute and even handed conduct of war diplomacy and propaganda, and on the other all evident signs of indecision, lack of control and purpose, allied with foolish breaking of all norms of diplomacy and propaganda which can only be described as delirious
"Russia and China are in many respects keeping up with U.S. developments in AI, but it’s true they don’t have quite the density and thriving entrepreneurship of Silicon Valley"?
China took a different direction with AI, first embedding it in industry, then in EVs. In these respects, the PRC is far ahead.
Today, even Chinese LLMs are as good as ours.
Thanks for this comment -
The China and Russia state systems are superior as per this field of A1, to devolope to scale and for industry as opposed to social media, as Silicon Valley is conventionally unable to produce much more than expensive security and surveillance systems, and complaints about IP
Speaking of which Look at patent numbers China US
Good point! From my understanding, from the many different AI applications, the ones most advanced and/or hyped in Silicon Valley are the "dematerialized" ones like chatbots, image analysis and creation, or big data, with other fields that are closer to the real world like protein folding / molecule screening or autonomous driving or autonomous robots (relatively) lagging.
At the same time, China is using this tech for building automated factories and advanced designs.
So yeah, Silicon Valley is winning the the narrative wars with its chatbots while China is winning the real world / physical war with industrial AIs and factory automation.
In Ukraine, the “Right Sector” was created with a core of Jews in order to carry out a Jewish coup at the right time. In Russia, a core of Jews was created within the Wagner structure in order to carry out a revolution in Russia at the right time. After Prigozhin turned the Jewish core from a campaign to a coup, he said the key phrase: “Russian blood could be shed on one side.” With this he confirmed that Jews were marching on Moscow. You must understand that there is not a Russian-Ukrainian war going on, but a Russian-Jewish war at the hands of Ukrainians.
Except the "March on Moscow" was done with the full coordination of senior GRU and Putin directly. Your fantasies of a global, uniform conspiracy by one shadowy group are just that - fantasies.
In reality there are always several large scale conspiracies and groups, and a near infinite number of smaller ones.
Like in the Corporate world, while they may agree on wider aims - lower taxes, lower wages, anti-unionisation - they will also backstab each other for advantage at a moments notice.
Jew? ))))
Non-paranoic, whatever that 'race' is.
Leo Bronstein AKA Leon Trotsky was a financier from the Upper East Side of New York City, before sneaking into Russia to organize the Bolshevik Revolution...
In Ukraine, the “Right Sector” was created with a core of Jews in order to carry out a Jewish coup at the right time. In Russia, a core of Jews was created within the Wagner structure in order to carry out a revolution in Russia at the right time. After Prigozhin turned the Jewish core from a campaign to a coup, he said the key phrase: “Russian blood could be shed on one side.” With this he confirmed that Jews were marching on Moscow. You must understand that there is not a Russian-Ukrainian war going on, but a Russian-Jewish war at the hands of Ukrainians.
Simplicius, Thank you for your call to resolution
RE: Healing Russian MOD & Wagner Prigozhin adversarial Partnership through formal dialogue. Real war is intellectual with restorative violence only necessary when violations such as Ukraine's ongoing massacres against its 1/3 Russian speaking minority needed protection. The first line of defence by all successful nations should be 'intellectual' (Latin 'inter' = 'between' + 'legere' = 'to-choose') at all levels of society. Cultivation of dialogue, especially within the military's young & other ages can be a powerful international force, when these & others are given the opportunity & practice to articulate their points of view. Just 5% of present military budgets devoted to formal dialogue / debate by all, would completely alter every battlefield.
Russia, as a society, can begin to restore its ancient 'indigenous' (Latin 'self-generating') COUNCIL-PROCESS or 'dialectic' ('both-sided') rights to raise issues & the responsibility for all to respond in Both-sided, Equal-time, Recorded & Published Dialogues, at all levels of society. This intelligent dialogue must include military participants in all ranks & divisions. Adversarial issues, such as with Wagner's ongoing important role worldwide & Prigozhin would be quickly publicly & openly resolved with greater diversity in collaborative intelligent solutions arrived at. The key is the coordinated autonomous intelligence of all parts of each of society's 'body' including the military, mirroring the human body's own gene, cell, tissue, organ & whole body autonomy & integrity. Successful societies cultivate communication within human intelligent diversity. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/1-both-sides-now-equal-time-recorded-dialogues
COMMUNICATION IS THE FIRST LINE OF AN INTELLIGENT BATTLEFIELD 'Media' (Latin 'medium' = 'middle') should as well represent all sides in issues presented enabling a shift from our present counter-productive MONOLOGUE to real DIALOGUE. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/1-communication-converting-social-media-from-mono-to-dialogue-libya
All fake metal-coin 'money' (Greek 'mnemosis' = 'memory') Oligarch top-down controlled human societies are based in Centrally-controlled popular 'Amnesia', where people are not aware & do not recall the Contributions, Experience, Expertise & Decision-making acumen, each person & businesses represent. Unfortunately Russia still fits into this Oligarch mold, especially after its western Oligarch (Jacob Schiff & Warburg) multi-million dollar financing of Lev-Davidovich Bronstein (Trotsky) & Vladimir Lenin to turn Russia's 1917 Tsar supported & cultivated massive 'community' (Latin 'com' = 'together' + 'munus' = 'gift-or-service') movement violent & unproductive with fake 'Co-operatives' (L. 'co' = 'together' + 'operatives' = 'multi-stakeholders') with one-member/one-vote. One member / one vote fails everywhere, because it doesn't recognize or empower the contributions which each specialized person & part of an economy make. When part of each salary is based in progressive life-long share ownership, then peopled develop invested interest & share-based decision-making rights within their area of contribution, experience, expertise, hence enabling a delegation of authority/decision-making within each department or division in Economic Memory. Economic Memory with bodily autonomy. https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/d-participatory-structure/3-economic-memory
WAGNER AS A PUBLIC-PRIVATE PARTNERSHIP REQUIRES ECONOMIC-MEMORY & EMPOWERMENT
As one might appreciate, all humanity's 'indigenous' ancestors cultivated very appropriate human social-psychology based solutions quite different from what today's false 'socialists' (L. 'socius' = 'friend') & 'community' advocates have been institutionally Oligarch-indoctrinated to believe. Real Economic Democracy is such an integrated cultural 'fractal' ('fraction, multiplier, building-block, where-the-part-contains-the-whole') paradigm.
ECONOMIC DEMOCRACY includes universal individual ownership & empowerment in the specialized Domestic, Industrial & Commercial Production-Society-Guilds as well as use of bottom-up time-based, equivalency accounting on the once worldwide String-shell Value System (eg. Wampum on Turtle-Island, Quipu in S. America, Cowrie in indigenous Celtic & Slavic Europe, Asia, Africa, Australia & all islands). https://sites.google.com/site/indigenecommunity/c-relational-economy/8-economic-democracy
Lots of interesting stuff in this column. I must say, I found "On secession and civil war" so interesting that I bookmarked it back when it appeared, and I've reread it several times.
I look forward to any follow ups on that topic in the future. We all know 2024 is going to be insane.
I’m just incredibly impressed with your knowledge base. To be able to wax eloquently at that level is quite the skill.
"So while I do think ‘reports of Ukraine’s demise are premature’, there’s a high probability they won’t be able to survive past 2025, with even 2024 being 50/50, because the economics and logistics are simple realities that will begin to fail."
You'll learn. LOL
I'd like to hear your thoughts on this, Richard.
I read one of your articles which explained it to me. The manpower isn't there to last beyond 2025.
No headlines about Russia capturing Marinka. I would've thought that a reason for those in the West to call Zelensky a loser on the way out. Instead, the few reports are focused on the claimed losses of Russians to takeover nothing. A 22-month battle is reduced to media drivel.
Similarly, no glaring knews about Avdeevka being as bloody as Bakhmut. Russia's advances in both places are significant.
And Robotyne will vanish from Ukraine's hands soon.
No one can predict war precisely, but it feel's like we're on the road to closure. Russian missiles on energy supplies over the next 2 months will emphasise this.
On #43 - the Left - like Jimmy Dore - are also being silenced and are targetted. It is all those who cannot be controlled, and they fall on all parts of the spectrum. There will be many conservatives willingly marching the dissidents to the camps - brutally.
It looks like the funding from the West to Ukraine has hit a end, and its hard to see how Ukr can continue with no money coming in, let alone new weapons or ammo, 2024 is likely to be end-game - right in time to embarrass the corrupt racist assehole in the White House and his attempted electoral re-annointment.
I just have an image of sullivan begging an incredulous Putin to hold off til after the election for Biden's sake, lollol.
With the end of the Piscean Age, which started ~2000 years ago and was subverted by Rome, the most evil society Europe had experienced until that point, and America which is the culmination of that process as the Western Empire, now collapsing far faster than Rome itself did, the 'End of the Aeon' appears nigh.
The danger is the 'Apocalypse' will be brought in by them too. :/
If I were Putin, I'd prefer a President Biden to a President Trump, because if Trump were to try to make peace, Team D and its allies throw out the allegations of conspiracy in an apoplectic rage. And, no, I am not a fan of Biden, LOL.
Sort of like how "only Nixon could go to China".
The difference with Trump is that this time, Trump would actually clear the decks, rather than trust the incumbents as he did in 2017. This is what they are afraid of, and why the ludicrous criminal charges came out and the media burnt all its remaining credibility over the past couple years. I mean it's gotten so bad that the US DoD finally got rid of the MSN agitprop news page as the default home page on Edge. I suppose the complaints finally got to them.
The fact that some actually buy the propaganda is evidenced by the GP post here, but it's disbelieved by most, otherwise the polls wouldn't be reading like they do.
Would he? In his first incarnation, Trump proved, weak, stupid and easily manipulated. There is no reason to think he's changed.
Weak? Yep. Stupid? Not really. Inexperienced would be closer to the truth. Things would be different this time. He was completely out of his depth in the early stages of his administration. Lots of reasons to think he's changed, as if the experiences of the past few years haven't resulted in him learning some lessons. You or I would, certainly, no reason to think Trump didn't from the various betrayals. As for exactly what form the putative new administration would take, it'll depend on who he surrounds himself with as advisers. But it won't be 2017 redux.
I've never been president, but I could see that Trump was stepping into pitfall after pitfall.
Basic bonehead stuff, like "getting appointments lined up and a transition team in place". Not the clownshow that was Trump staffing.
It's silly to think he'll change, and even sillier to make excuses for him. The man is what he is, no more, no less.
Whatever. He got elected, we didn't. Some humility is in order. When the entire apparatus of the government is trying to make you look bad, they'll succeed.
Trump was and is better than Biden, though he always put his own interests first. On being elected, his first tweets said that he was going to stop chemtrails and vaccines. These were deleted within half an hour, and he was the one who set up Operation Warp Speed. He threatened to appoint RFK as a "Vaccine Commissioner", then walked it back in exchange for money from the pharmaceutical industry. How do we know that he won't do more of these same if he is paid enough?
I wonder how much security must surround people like the Rothschilds and company. They can't possibly go anywhere without something comparable to the secret service with them at all times. They live in a very strange, demented bubble.
Believing in the 'great man' theory, that putting a bullet in someone's head makes a difference, is incorrect.
I didn't say I believed in any theory of the sort, but it's a fact that many others do.
I'm not sure that any name that is floated to us is ultimately responsible for these ideas. Being in enough meetings with the type, I don't think most of them have two brain cells to rub together. But above and beyond that, the number of sociopaths who are interested in murder who also are rationally interested in altering global affairs is vanishingly small.
Yes, they have security. No, it isn't seriously tested, because the state actors who would most credibly pull this off realize it is pointless. Otherwise there would be a lot more assassinations.
It probably should have been a warning to those of us in the US when the high-profile political killings stopped after the 1960s that the government had jumped the shark and was unrepresentative of the will of the people. There was clearly a point in killing JFK and RFK, the same way there was a point in killing Julius Caesar. It'd be hard to justify in the case of most current politicians.
"...anyone who emailed me questions rather than posting them in the appropriate thread stood some chance at being lost in the shuffle..."
Can anybody please tell me where that "appropriate thread" is? Thanks in advance!
Thats the thread where Simplicus declares the upcoming mailbag, atleast to my understanding, latest being https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/subscriber-mailbag-your-questions
which ones he now finished answering with this post.
Thanks!
Brad Stratford , Austin De Bercia and four other volunteer soldiers died at Stepove on November 27. They were from north Vancouver Canada .
The same time four other western adventurist died at Kupiansk , and two of them suffered leg wounds , and got captured by the Russians . Some of this group included Americans . There is no war going on simply between Ukraine and Russia . Russia against the western powers with the banking cabals , and the whole army of laptop warriors , including AI calculations , projections and constantly trying to invent scenarios on the fly . Russia must be defeated according to Jennet Yelen who is not a general have no military background , She is in the banking business , but taking charge financing the war oversees to steal the goods from the othe country . paying the dumb white boys to fight for her money . they are the real decision makers , what is the problem ?
11 December 2023 S Armaments
49: Your response to reader’s request is very informative – but does not cover the whole question of armaments production, planning, and numbers, for both EUUS and RF
You say you will write on drones – great
But – please address The Rest – missiles, tanks, planes, electronics, satellite systems, why not subs? etc etc (semiconductors, chips)
Why do EUUS produce so little/so few – economic, industrial, social and political considerations
This applied to artillery shells as well as all other armaments – input costs- materials, energy, construction- factory costs, machining costs, sub supplier costs, the whole web of essential industry which has been off shored, especially by the US
Is re training skilled manpower to anything close to a China/Russia level even conceivable? Let alone practical – why (how) re construct a power base and increase salaries for the working class when you, the EUUS ruling class, has spent 50/60 years or more destroying the working class
Is there any indigenous production of armaments in the Ukraine, apart from garage basement type drone assembly?
Is there any reliable means to assess the quantities of shells obtained by Russia from North Korea?
Are there other sources of arms provisions for the RF? What is the role played by Iran, by China
Nobody knows how many shells North Korea sold to Russia, but the estimate is 2 million. What is known, however, is that both of the Koreas are the only countries on earth (not involved in a war) that are churning out gigantic amounts of artillery shells. Everyone else is just making a few for "top up" purposes or else importing them.
Thanks for this comment -
Can you comment on any other aspect of arms production etc?
If you do have the time perhaps it would help to encourage S to address this issue in a 'full scale' but not 'brutal' invasion of the overall subject of armaments
(guerrilla tactics)
Technically, the Koreas are involved in a war. And they use those shells on a consistent basis, at least the North does. I've been in Korea a few times when the firing has happened. The Southern responses have been desultory.
Ironically, this is what is meant when the West talks about 'frozen conflict' in Ukraine.
12 December 2023 WSJ on EU armaments Facts and Figures
The WSJ has partial facts and figures on the state of NATO disarmament in Europe, specifically U.K. – the article contains few facts and figures about Germany, France, etc - nothing about Spain, Italy...
Still- further evidence that EU has been thrown to the wolves
But their language is still maidenly - Once done with the Ukraine RF might ‘cause trouble elsewhere’! – how timid can you get?
Extensive quotes reproduced below-
‘The British military—the leading U.S. military ally and Europe’s biggest defense spender—has only around 150 deployable tanks and perhaps a dozen serviceable long-range artillery pieces. So bare was the cupboard that last year the British military considered sourcing multiple rocket launchers from museums to upgrade and donate to Ukraine, an idea that was dropped.
France, the next biggest spender, has fewer than 90 heavy artillery pieces, equivalent to what Russia loses roughly every month on the Ukraine battlefield. Denmark has no heavy artillery, submarines or air-defense systems. Germany’s army has enough ammunition for two days of battle.
In the decades since the end of the Cold War, weakened European armies were tolerated by governments across the West because an engaged America, with its vast military muscle, underpinned the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and defense policy in Europe. The U.S. accounted for nearly 70% of NATO’s defense spending last year.
Much of Europe’s industrial capacity to make weapons has eroded over years of budget cuts, and turning that around is a challenge at a time when most governments face budget constraints amid slow economic growth and aging populations, as well as large political opposition to cutting back on welfare spending to fund defense.
Europe has “systematically demilitarized itself because it didn’t need to spend the money,” thanks to the lack of an apparent threat and U.S. military dominance around the globe, said Anthony King, a professor of war studies at the University of Warwick. “They have basically gone to sleep.”
The Ukraine war has made clear the depth of Europe’s problem.’
Putin might play the devil, darn him
‘Putin could pressure other non-NATO countries such as Moldova or Georgia, launch sabotage attacks in the Baltics or further bolster Russia’s military presence in Kaliningrad, a strategic Russian enclave sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania, said Mark Sedwill, the U.K.’s former national security adviser.’
WSJ states Sweden has joined NATO – is this true? Perhaps there’s been a secret joining…
‘Military spending among NATO countries fell from about 3% of annual economic output during the Cold War to about 1.3% by 2014, according to NATO data. Things began to change after the 2014 Russian invasion of Crimea, but only slowly. In the past decade, EU defense spending rose 20%, according to the European Parliament. Over the same period, Russia and China boosted their defense budgets by almost 300% and close to 600%, respectively.’
‘Germany’s army, which at the end of the Cold War had half a million men in West Germany and another 300,000 in East Germany, now has 180,000 personnel. West Germany alone had more than 7,000 battle tanks by the 1980s; reunified Germany now has 200, only half of which are likely operational, according to government officials. The country’s industry can make only about three tanks a month, these officials said.’
‘Within days of the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, Germany pledged to spend 100 billion euros, or about $110 billion, on defense in a one-off surge in spending, but only about 60% of that amount is expected to be earmarked by the end of this year.’
Despite considerable realism about NATO weakness the WSJ still repeats the copium that the RF army is weak and disorganised
‘“People may say the Russians have taken it on the chin, and we don’t need to worry. That’s a valid point, but it ignores residual Russian strength,” said John Deni, a professor at the U.S. Army War College and an expert on European militaries. “If the Russians present us with a mass problem in Europe, the challenge is, can technology and advanced capabilities do it? And there we see some challenges.”
‘Britain announced its biggest increase in defense spending since the Cold War in 2020. But the overall army size is still expected to shrink to 72,500 full-time troops from a previous target of 82,000. It is replacing its 227 tanks with 148 more-modern versions, but those won’t be deployed until 2027. Of its existing 227 tanks, only 157 can be deployed within 30 days and perhaps only 40 are fully functioning and ready to move, military analysts said, as many are in storage or being upgraded.
The U.K. has pledged to ramp up defense spending to 2.5% of GDP, but only when economic conditions allow’’.
‘’ Sanders declined to comment on how much equipment the army could currently deploy. He said the army will get an average of 200 new armored vehicles a year between 2024 and 2028. It will also address the shortfall in ammunition capacity, though he declined to give a timeline.
“As the bloke who is responsible, not fast enough,” Sanders said.
The Ministry of Defence placed a £410 million, or about $515 million, order with BAE Systems this year for artillery shells and ammunition to bolster production eightfold. But that production capacity won’t be reached for another two years. It also bought 14 Archer artillery systems from Sweden to replace the 32 AS90 long range artillery pieces it handed over to Ukraine, plugging a gap until the U.K.’s own upgraded long range artillery systems arrive in the late 2020s. “We are on the right trajectory,” said James Cartlidge, the British Minister for Defence Procurement.
‘’
‘The British army’s new armored reconnaissance vehicles, called Ajax, show just how long it can take to upgrade a fighting force. On a recent day this fall, a group of army officers stood in the pouring rain watching as two Ajax vehicles cruised over the muddy plains in southwest England. It was the first time the Ajax was used in a military exercise, 13 years after the army first announced it would purchase them.
Initially ordered at a cost of £5.5 billion to replace aging tracked reconnaissance vehicles used since the 1970s, Ajax, made by the U.K. subsidiary of General Dynamics, suffered numerous technical problems. During test runs hundreds of soldiers fell physically ill due to the vibration and noise when driving them. The delays were so long that the army had to extend the use of its ’70s-era vehicles.
Those problems are now fixed. But the nearly 600 new vehicles won’t be fully deployed until the end of 2028. Meanwhile the new high tech communications kit the Ajax is supposed to use is also delayed, perhaps by longer.
11 December 2023 FT on DeathRow : Sanctions Russia
Time to get out of fighting with Russia if we can – it’s bad for business – time to stop economic suicide –
However: as yet no policy directive in place so the articles are still all over the place, some still Putin naughtyman, some still we have almost won, some almost realist
‘Why export controls are failing to cripple their targets’
https://www.ft.com/content/10f1f080-8eb3-44a0-b4c6-1106b457c915
The usually timid prose, but the reader will gather that sanctioning Russia has not worked, au contraire
However, for every article on business/economics/sanctions Russia-Ukraine there are at least 6 on China
The west’s Russia oil ban, one year on
https://archive.ph/c4HUq#selection-4633.0-4633.359
More forthright – and acknowledges the damage has been done, no going back
The money shots:
‘The challenge for the US and other western governments is that much of Russia’s new crude system has no need for western service providers.’
Nor for western buyers: apart from sales, the RF oil trader service and everything else markets have moved to Dubai
“Russia’s been quite successful at building up its own fleet, finding alternative insurance, building an ecosystem of people who can help move crude and products” said Ben Cahill, a senior fellow at US-based Center for Strategic and International Studies, who has studied the west’s energy sanctions on Moscow. “It’s hard to put the genie back in the bottle.”
G7 to ban diamond imports from Russia
https://www.ft.com/content/cc636fc6-607c-41ce-8fd4-ade2337f24ba
What the reporter carefully avoids mentioning is that at the recent Zimbabwe meeting of the Kimberly Pact the G7 lost out, once again the EUUS shoots itself in the ….and hands control over the market to the RF, in alliance with the Africans; it is predicted the market hubs will shift from NY and Antwerp to Mumbai and Shanghai
Plus, from August 23
‘European Companies suffer a E100 billion hit from Russia operations’
https://www.ft.com/content/c4ea72b4-4b02-4ee9-b34c-0fac4a4033f5
Often underplayed in the general western press is that sanctions cut both ways – the usual tired trope is that Russia sanctioned the ‘west’ by cutting off their supply of cheap energy, whereas it was the west who sanctioned Russia – these are the same who state with straight face that Russia destroyed NS2
Re the sanctions/confiscations/nationalisations applied to Western companies operating in Russia – these were the result of the withdrawal of many companies under pressure from their own western governments, subsequently their failure to fulfill contractual business obligations; to pay rent, tax, employees etc
Hence the Hundred Billion Hit – plus associated benefits such as forced rebuilding of Russian industry, commercial ties with RoW, etc
By way of contrast - The so called freezing by and in the ‘west’ (EUUS) of Russian state assets, rumoured to be E300 billion, and the promises from various EU politicians to spend this for Ukraine, have proven to be lies
The assets are frozen, but untouchable, elsewise the real power in the EU, the dominant capital class, fear that the RoW will withdraw their assets out of the EU, etc etc – besides they know that to spend such money on the Ukraine is money thrown away, and does this class not have better use itself?
According to Fortune – 400 international companies have stayed on in Russia, despite
https://fortune.com/2023/07/11/the-feckless-400-these-companies-are-still-doing-business-in-russia-funding-putins-war-sonnenfeld-tian/?utm_source=search&utm_medium=suggested_search&utm_campaign=search_link_clicks
https://www.russia-briefing.com/news/76-of-foreign-investors-in-russia-did-not-exit-the-russian-consumer-market-in-2022-we-identify-the-2023-opportunities-and-evolutionary-tactics-required-for-those-who-stayed-or-wish-to-enter.html/
"What if they’re able to dig in Vietcong-style, going full blown guerilla insurrectionist, even long after their equipment has run out."
I think this was one of the plans from the start, with Milley's "3 Days" statements. They expected shock and awe and prepared for insurrection style, long-term conflict. Another Russia's Afghanistan-style or Vietnam-style quagmire, if you will.
Of course, many believed Rus would collapse due to the sanctions.
I may be wrong, but the time for a Vietcong style defense may be past.
The Vietcong benefited from a large cadre of 'true believers'. Ukraine had many of those types at the beginning of the conflict -- however, nearly 2 years of peer-level war and offensive actions seems to have significantly 'wiped out' (or very severely denuded) those assets. The legitimate 'patriots' (my short hand term for those who were not ideological like Azov but primarily motivated for 'defense against invasion' once Russian troops crossed the border) flocked to the colors in the early part of the war --- however, they are mostly now dead or severely wounded or disenchanted. The ideological Azov-type fighters have been lessened as well, although not as severely, since many of those units appear to have been re-assigned to internal security (protect the regime) and as anti-retreat forces. But even these ideological troops may not be as ready, willing, or able to fight in a guerrilla war (as they might have been in the beginning). So, there is a problem with the motivated and troops needed to pull-off a Vietnam or Afghanistan type guerrilla war.
This is further complicated by the material wealth of Ukraine (and war fatigue). One of the problems with the US's approach to 'bomb Vietnam back into the Stone Age' was that, in some regards, Vietnam (at the time) was still in the Stone Age -- it wasn't a modern, industrialized, society dependent on modern conveniences and necessities (I realize that this statement is not 100% true with regard to North Vietnam in the 1960's, but I am exaggerating to make a point). Ukraine, unlike 1960's Vietnam, is dependent on the steady supply of electricity to keep food fresh and available to an urban populations. It needs fuel to transport goods and heat homes. Its populace is more susceptible to electronic news and information and can readily find out what is going on. The more rural, isolated, traditional, self-sufficient, and resilient populations of 1960's Vietnam and Afghanistan had a better potential for sustaining a long, grueling guerrilla war full of hardship. The 'war weariness' of Ukraine also plays a role. A guerrilla war from the start might have added hardship, severe personnel loss, etc over time allowing such a war to continue for some time before society's 'will to resist' falters. Ukraine, by most accounts, is already 'at the edge' of despair -- so it may not have the 'reserves of willpower' to embark on or sustain a guerrilla war at this point.
I don't know any of these things for certain --- perhaps Ukraine will enter into a Guerrilla war against Russia their effort would be one 'for the ages' and make Vietnam and Afghanistan look like amateurs -- I just don't think that that outcome is likely.
I think you are right - guerrilla warfare as Vietnam or Afghanistan was fought by very very tough country people - young and old - living as you state lives largely autonomous of outsiders' capability to influence, even detect
The Ukrainians are neither as tough nor as young and are dependent on easily degraded city comforts, nor as dedicated - have not most of them abandoned their country to write software in Dublin, or wherever
Besides AI drone swarms will put paid to any foolish enough to
Moreover, if you look at successful insurgencies in the past 50 or so years, the one thing they all have in common are populations that skew young.
The median age in Yemen is something like 19. The median age in Ukraine is over 40, and that figure dates to before the war.
Guerilla war is a young man's game.
That's a good point. You need young 'True Believers' to sustain a partisan campaign. The Ukrainian youth that flooded out of the country won't come back unless an entirely different government is in place that they could support.
The fact that half the population of Ukraine has departed the country as a result of conscription pressures argues vehemently against any kind of guerilla warfare. It's similar to the "Red Dawn" illusions about the US. The problem is that civilian reprisals against the surviving population and its required services will assure that any resistance will be short-lived, both there and here.
Question 40: "I think Russia and China are both very active in ‘opening new fronts’ against the Atlanticist empire in Africa as well, which is causing major problems."
I don't think it is actually necessary that China and Russia drive this intentionally. As the US hegemony and power projection throughout the world clearly visible for all to see is fading, naturally locallized geographic frozen conficts are breaking up, that were kept frozen by US power.
E.g. Neither African recent events nor Venezuala strike me as pushed by Russia or China. What happens now looks to me like a natural process where the world starts to open its eyes and sees that the "King" meanwhile got rid of (nearly) all his clothes. And Russia was the "kid" getting the world to see it.
I think you are right - as for Russia
However – Lavrov last year was very active in African journeys, for good reason the time had come - he worked hard to revive old memories and rhetoric, and sponsor the idea of re making them anew - quite apart from signing security treaties
His visit to Sassou (July 2022) was conducted in Russian! - the foreign minister was educated in Moscow, as the larger part of higher ups in the bureaucracy
They were already talking about a solution to Libya….Gaddafi is held in very high esteem in Central Africa, and Sassou was Chair of the AU Committee on Libya
The Sahel and CAR countries were already permeated by Wagner - their full scale and brutal rejection of French presence was their own affair, but irrigated by old time liberational language - La Patria o muerte, and so on
It is rumoured, convincingly enough, that the President General installed by coup in Gabon, a very much more prudent and restrained/partial coup than took place in the Sahel, was whisked off to see Putin by his close compatriot (not in the weak ‘national’ sense, but in the powerful tribal sense) President Teodoro of EGuinea - the PG is from a town just one side of the border, the P from a town just the other side, both are Fang, borders in that part of the world are non existent for locals, and so forth
It would hardly be surprising, however, if they were to suggest an alliance along Sahel lines - The Gabon in particular has long been over dependent on French and now US spies, barbouzes, soldiers, predatory oligarchs, invasive faux exploitation NGO's, propaganda...the list is long you name it it'll be there somewhere
Right, agree as well. What I specifically mean is not that they don't talk with other countries and build relations, but they don't need to stirr the pot, scheeme, construct artificial conflicts to divide and conquer/harm relations with US/West. They can just let it evolve naturally, and go along with it.
I misunderstood you, please excuse me
– of course French colonialist domination over Sahel et al needed just the suggestion that there is a path to resistance to begin to stir, spurred subsequently with the evidence of success on display
Above all by the contrast between, on the one hand, the efficient resolute and even handed conduct of war diplomacy and propaganda, and on the other all evident signs of indecision, lack of control and purpose, allied with foolish breaking of all norms of diplomacy and propaganda which can only be described as delirious