Tag: Ukraine War

Swapping Territory

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Girl Boss Anchor – I’m here in Anchorage Alaska with my former colleague David Books.  Hello David.

David Books – Hello Girl Boss Anchor.

Girl Boss Anchor – David how were you able to get time off from Red Lobster for this remote assignment?

David Books – I’m supposed to be taste testing a large batch of King Crab legs that’s being shipped to us.

Girl Boss Anchor – How plebian.

David Books – Up yours, lady.

Girl Boss Anchor – Moving right along.  We’re here to provide commentary on the historic meeting between President Donald Trump and President Vladimir Putin as they make a vain attempt to broker a peace in Ukraine.

David Books – Well, shouldn’t you at least pretend that you want this to succeed?

Girl Boss Anchor – If you insist David.  And look Trump and Putin are walking out of the conference room smiling and laughing.  Something must be up.  Let’s listen to their statement.

Donald Trump – As President of the United States; a very great country, I am happy to announce that we have negotiated a fair and equitable solution to the Ukraine war.  And just as I said it required some territory swapping.  Right Vladimir?

Vladimir Putin – You said it, Droog!

Donald Trump – I will be in contact with President Zelensky of Ukraine and let him know that Ukraine will not have to cede any land for peace.  But it will be necessary to allow any Russian or even Ukrainian citizens who want to leave Ukraine to report to a relocation center for processing.

Girl Boss Anchor – Mr. President, are you saying that Russian speaking Ukrainians will be migrated to Russia for resettlement?

Donald Trump – Well, technically yes.  But only because these new territories will become part of Russia.

Girl Boss Anchor – What does that mean?

Donald Trump – The Ukrainian thing has been folded into a larger land deal.  You know how I enjoy real estate deals.  Well, sometimes if you combine several deals together the combination is greater than the sum of its parts.

Girl Boss Anchor – But what other deals are there?

Donald Trump – Well, you’ve probably heard that Western Canada is getting ready to vote on seceding from Canada.  That’s British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba.  And you know how I’m interested in picking up Greenland.  And you know how miserable the West Coast; California, Oregon and Washington are.  And the Northeast is just as miserable living under my presidency.  So, I’ve brokered a tentative deal.  Russia gets Alaska, the West Coast and British Columbia.  We get Alberta, Saskatchewan, Manitoba and Greenland and Canada get the Northeast.  As far as I can see it’s win/win/win.

Vladimir Putin – Da!  Santa Barbara much nicer than Crimea, bah!

Donald Trump – See everybody’s happy.

David Books – What are you talking about?  That’s insane.  That would require a constitutional amendment to allow the ceding of US territory.  The Canadians will never agree to it and the Russians are our existential foes that threaten us with nuclear annihilation at the drop of a hat.  And the West Coast will never stand for Russian autocracy.

Donald Trump – Yeah, well, I made a few calls and everybody’s on board.  We can dot the i’s and cross the t’s later but shouldn’t you be down on the dock tasting crab legs Booksie?

David Books – You’ll never get away with this.  Putin is a war criminal and no one will do business with him if he tries something like this.

Donald Trump – Well I wouldn’t get him mad at you if I were you.  After all you’ll be buying Russian King Crabs from him very soon.

Vladimir Putin – Da, Booksie.  Try to keep it friendly comrade.  You wouldn’t want to see a price hike, now, would you?

David Books – I really have to take up drinking.

Girl Boss Anchor – And there you have it viewers.  Donald Trump has used insane Solomonic horse trading to recast the world we live in and apparently my choice is move to flyover country or become a Canadian, bleh.

David Books – Hey shut up!  I’m Canadian!

Girl Boss Anchor – Well viewers, good night and have an anti-depressed tomorrow.

What Have We Got to Lose?

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This week Donald Trump has a meeting in Alaska with Vladimir Putin.  I find this intriguing.  And not because I believe they are on the cusp of agreeing to the end of the Ukraine war.  Far from it.  Ukraine and Russia are killing each other there at an industrial scale and there does not seem to be an end in sight.  So that doesn’t seem to be on the agenda.

And maybe that’s the point.  I think both men are getting together despite knowing that no peace deal is currently possible.  So why are they getting together?  I’m not really sure of the answer but maybe it’s because they both know they are in a sort of unique position.  I think that maybe both of them want to find a way out of this nightmare and maybe they figure if they meet up without those in their orbits who want to keep the war going forever, that maybe they can figure something out that would satisfy both sides.

I know that Trump doesn’t want any part of this war but the neo-cons are very powerful in the Congress and even to some extent in his administration.  As for Putin, he’s in a million dead Russians so he can’t just walk away.  And even if he could there are a lot of Russians in Ukraine and he’s carving out a homeland for them.

But all and still, there may be a way to move this thing forward so that the killing stops.  And maybe that’s why both of them are there.  Trump’s whole persona is “the art of the deal.”  He probably figures it couldn’t hurt to talk to the other head honcho.  It’s not as if he’s afraid the other guy will talk him into a bad deal.  So how could it hurt?

Of course, if the two of them walk away accomplishing absolutely nothing and can’t even come up with some story about how these are the “first steps toward peace” then it will look like a loss for Trump.  And Trump must know this.  So, he must think there is something to be gained that outweighs that risk.  And that’s what intrigues me.  Could both of them be there for entirely the right reasons?  Could these two supremely egotistical and cynical men be getting together because they want to change the trajectory of the world?  Because if you think about it, they’re the only two men on this planet who have the authority and clout to actually do it.  Between the two of them, they control about 90% of the nuclear weapons on the planet and between the two of them they control some enormous amount of the resources (both natural and financial) of the planet.  Now certainly, both of them are constrained by the political systems they exist in.  Believe it or not Putin is considered a moderate in his regime structure and Trump has to deal with the military-industrial complex that is still insanely powerful.

But they still are the chief executive officers of two very, very powerful entities.  And imagine if the reason they are going to meet is to try and untangle the conflagration that Biden and the neo-cons has allowed to engulf us.  Maybe they can find a path.  Or maybe it’s hopeless.  But I give them both credit for trying.  What have we got to lose?

August 2025 Update on Ukraine War

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I thought I’d do a short update on the Ukraine war.  Over the course of spring and summer 2025 the Russians seem to have increased troop strength significantly and adopted strategies and tactics that involve very slow encirclement of large cities like Pokrovsk, Kostyantynivka and Kupiansk.  These tactics were aimed at limiting Russian casualties while attritting the Ukrainians during counterattacks.  The glacial speed of the Russian advance was mocked by Kiev.  They kept saying that it would take a hundred years for this type of warfare to reach Kiev.

But it appears to be working.  Trump recently shortened his window for the Russians to avoid additional sanctions by calling for a ceasefire.  And the reason is that the situation on the ground is deteriorating rapidly for Ukraine.  Ukraine is finding it impossible to reach its conscription targets.  And the United States has fallen far behind on the originally promised weapons aid.  Even worse, the state of the art of Russian drone warfare has begun to cause the Ukraine army real problems.  Anti-drone drones have become very good at knocking out the large drones that Ukraine uses for dropping grenades on Russian troops.  And long-range Russian drones have wreaked havoc in the supposedly safe regions far behind the lines in places like Pakrovsk and Kostyantynivka.

And this week the Russians announced that they had finally taken complete control of the strategic high ground in the town of Chasiv Yar, to the west of Bakhmut.  Kiev denied this and claimed that their soldiers were still on the ground there but the geolocated photos showed Russians with their flags in front of the rubble that once were high-rise buildings in Chasiv Yar.

So, Trump has said that he’ll sanction Russia and the customers that buy oil and gas from them if a ceasefire isn’t called in eight more days.  But the Russians have already signaled that they aren’t interested in a ceasefire at this time and it will have to be the Ukrainians agreeing to their conditions that will stop the fighting.

What will actually happen?  If Trump adds more sanctions and nothing changes; then what?  The way things are going by the end of the fall fighting season so many troops may have been lost and so much territory ceded that Ukraine may decide that the Russian war objectives represent the facts on the ground. In which case ending the bloodshed might make sense to them.

Or maybe not.  The sunken cost fallacy is a pretty powerful rationale in a war.  Maybe they really will fight to the last Ukrainian soldier.  Who knows, maybe they can fight until Putin has had enough and goes for a Korean War permanent ceasefire approach.

I watch way too much information on this war.  It’s a depressing but mesmerizing spectacle.  The losses on both sides are horrific.  But based on what I’m hearing from both sides the Ukrainian attrition is becoming unsustainable.  Pokrovsk is a very important place for Ukraine to hold.  But it seems to be falling faster than Bakhmut or Avdiivka did.  If it doesn’t hold out till winter, I think it will have a very negative effect on Ukraine and its European allies.

Well, the madness continues.

Waiting for Friday

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Five down, two to go.  And tomorrow is the killer.  Well, here goes nothing.

I was gonna review, “The Fifth Element.”  I hadn’t seen it in a long time so I couldn’t remember my overall impression.  Well, I rewatched and remembered.  It’s a movie that has a few “elements” that are interesting or fun but there are enough factors that are awful to make the sum negative.  Gary Oldman has a small but pivotal part as a villain and as always, he is great fun.  Bruce Willis plays Bruce Willis as he always does and he has a few fun moments but it’s a very silly movie so he can only succeed at moments.  The movie itself is a live action fairy tale/cartoon with very broad humor and very wooden characters.  Chris Tucker’s character was among the most bizarre.  But in fairness he was also one of the funnier aspects of this comedy(?).

I’m sure some folks will enjoy this exercise in science fiction fairy tale but I have to give it a thumbs down.  There were just too many annoying factors to allow me to wholeheartedly embrace it.

So, President Trump is really playing up the international agenda this month.  Even his enemies are intrigued by his efforts to talk to the Iranians and normalize our situation with the Arabs.  Of course, the pundits on the Left were horrified by Trump’s speech where he said he is backing away from nation-building and demanding the Middle East adhere to Western mores and customs.  But from my way of looking at it, that’s exactly the message we should be putting forward.  “You live your way in your country and we’ll live ours over here.”  Seems reasonable to me.  But Capon and Books got the vapors hearing it.

As for his efforts to get a ceasefire in Ukraine, I tend to doubt it will come to anything.  The Russians don’t want to give the Ukrainians a breather.  Apparently, they’ve calculated that they will finish off enough Ukrainians before the Ukrainians finish off enough Russians so that Kiev’s defense will collapse this year.  The question is whether Trump has the sense to just walk away from the whole thing and let it end sooner than later.  But looking at the tiny geographic gains that account for thousands of deaths a week on both sides is gut-churning.  Well, I don’t see any change before the fall.

As for the fact that Joe Biden has some kind of cancer; well, he’s eighty-two.  Is it surprising at that age that cancer has come on the scene?  I think as we get older that possibility becomes more real every day.  The only question I have is when did he actually get the diagnosis?  Three, four years ago?  Well, I don’t celebrate his ill-health but I consider him an evil man and maybe this is a good time for him to think about his finish and maybe consider making amends.

I saw that James Comey was trying to get his name back in the news by acting like a moron.  In my youth in Brooklyn, we would have described someone like that as a lousy scumbag.  And that would be playing it down.  I think having the IRS audit him a few times just for fun would be very appropriate.  Just a thought.

Well, that’s enough for today.  Waiting for Friday.

Let Me See What’s Going on 31MAR2025

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Well, first of all, Europe has gone all in on lawfare to prevent their own people from electing candidates on the Right.  I guess I can paraphrase this as. “If you can’t beat them at the ballot box just round them up and jail them.”

“Monday’s court sentence declares Le Pen ineligible to stand for president in 2027 and gave her a four-year prison sentence – half of it suspended – for embezzlement of European parliament funds.

Italy’s Deputy Prime Minister and leader of the League party Matteo Salvini called the court’s ruling a “declaration of war by Brussels”.

“A bad film that we are also seeing in other countries like Romania,” wrote Salvini on social media.

“We don’t let ourselves be intimidated, we don’t stop: full speed ahead my friend!”

Romania’s electoral bureau in early March rejected the candidacy of far-right politician Calin Georgescu for the re-run of presidential elections in May.

The fierce EU and NATO critic shot to prominence last November, when he unexpectedly topped a first round of presidential voting before the constitutional court annulled the election after claims of Russian interference and a “massive” social media promotion.

Georgescu, who denies any links to Moscow, has slammed the vote annulment as a “formalised coup d’état” and the subsequent banning as “a direct blow to the heart of democracy.”

So that’s interesting.  It’s kind of what they tried against Trump only their people are so cowed that it’s successful.  I guess the question I’ll ask is are their people such slaves that they’ll put up with that forever?  I guess we’ll find out.

The other big “international” development is that the New York Times admitted that the United States military has boots on the ground in Ukraine.  And in fact, the CIA is coordinating missile attacks on the Russian homeland.

Ultimately, the U.S. military and C.I.A. were allowed to help with strikes into Russia.

The hardest red line was the Russian border. But in spring 2024, to protect the northern city of Kharkiv against a Russian assault, the administration authorized the creation of an “ops box” — a zone of Russian territory within which U.S. officers in Wiesbaden could provide the Ukrainians with precise coordinates. The box’s first iteration extended across a wide swath of Ukraine’s northern border. The box was expanded after North Korea sent troops to help fight the Ukrainians’ incursion into Russia’s Kursk region. The U.S. military was later allowed to enable missile strikes in an area of southern Russia where the Russians staged forces and equipment for their offensive in eastern Ukraine.

Longstanding policy barred the C.I.A. from providing intelligence on targets on Russian soil. But the C.I.A. could request “variances,” carve-outs to support strikes for specific objectives. Intelligence had identified a vast munitions depot in Toropets, 290 miles north of the Ukrainian border. On Sept. 18, 2024, a swarm of drones slammed into the munitions depot. The blast, as powerful as a small earthquake, opened a crater the width of a football field. Later, the C.I.A. was allowed to enable Ukrainian drone strikes in southern Russia to try to slow advances in eastern Ukraine.

So, we’ve been playing chicken with the Russians for several years in Ukraine.  Is this still going on?  Why?  Have we officially lost any personnel to the war officially?  Unofficially?  Is there any reason why we should?

From what I can see of Europe’s approach to “democracy” I don’t see any meaningful difference between Russia, Ukraine, France or Romania.  None of them are really democracies in any real sense.  So why are we choosing winners and losers there?  They’re supposed to be grown-ups.  Why can’t they sort out their own messes?  Why should American money and blood be involved in any way?

From what I can see we have no more place telling the Russians or the English how to run their lives than we do the Afghans or the Chinese.  They’re not us.  We’re not them.  If they don’t shoot at us, they can do whatever they damn please.  They can even say mean things about us.  Now as far as buying whatever crap they make in their country, as long as we have the same tariffs on them as they have on us, have at it.  The crap we get from China is no better or worse than the crap we get from Mexico or Canada.  It’s all still crap.  If they want to make their crap here and pay Americans to make it, well, that’s another story.  Now we’ve got something to talk about.  If Toyota builds a plant in Tennessee, then God bless Toyota.  They’re my kind of foreigners.  We can do business and we can even be friends!

I hope Donald Trump understands that blowing people up to “make the world safe for democracy” is just a globalist bumper sticker.  Minding our own business to make America safe for Americans is a policy that can help make America great again.

Just my two cents today.

Kursk and General Thoughts on Ukraine

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Kursk and General Thoughts on Ukraine

The story I heard was that the Russians used a natural gas pipeline to move hundreds of troops several miles behind the Ukrainian lines and the panic this caused in several locations within the Ukrainian Kursk front has disrupted the situation and according to some reports is leading to a rout.

It will take a day or two before reports can be confirmed.  But this may be the beginning of an overall shift in the battlefield situation.  Up until now the words, meatgrinder, attrition and horrendously slow seemed to be the best way to describe the war.  Russia has been making steady but glacially slow progress in capturing the four provinces they’ve declared their own.

The exception was Ukraine’s lightning strike into Russia’s Kursk region that seemed to catch Moscow off balance before stalling out.  Zelensky had hoped that Kursk could be used as a bargaining chip in eventual negotiations with Russia.  But this new situation may be Russia’s determination to put an end to the Kursk front.

If Ukraine retreats from Kursk, I think it might signal a broader collapse of Ukrainian military resolve.  But as I said above it’s too soon to know if some of these reports are Russian bravado over their pipeline strategy.

But even regardless of the impact of this attack it almost surely seems the Russians have the wherewithal to eventually wear down the Ukrainian army into submission.  These are two stubborn enemies and the attrition is mutually destructive.  All Russia has as advantage, is size.  As I’ve said Russia will lose two million men and Ukraine will lose one million and Russia will win.

That’s victory?

From my point of view, Trump will not arbitrate this negotiation.  At best he is forcing the Ukrainians to the bargaining table by refusing continued military aid.

But he has no special insight into the psychology of these two closely related peoples.  This is very, very close to a civil war.  And considering how many Russians live in Ukraine it’s even more personal than that.  The only ones who might be able to negotiate an early end to this war are Vladimir Putin and whoever the Ukrainians pick as their leader.  Is that Zelensky?  I doubt it, but it’s possible.  The reason I doubt it is that Zelensky has rejected much better Russian deals in the past and vowed that he would force Russia out of all Ukrainian lands including Crimea.  I think he would fear for his own safety if he came back with a worse deal that cedes the lands Russia demands.  But whoever it is I believe that the sooner they start talking the better, for Ukraine.  Every day that passes more Russians die and more Ukrainian land passes into Russian control.  Eventually Russia will win on the battle field everything it currently wants through negotiation.  However, as the Russian casualties continue to mount so will their demands.  Eventually it might come to include all Ukraine.

And not all the blame goes to Russia and Ukraine.  Joe Biden and Boris Johnson convinced Zelensky that the Turkish peace talks weren’t as good as what they would get with the help of western weapons and intelligence aid.  This terrible advice was a siren song that seduced the Ukrainians into thinking we knew what we were talking about.  That was a crime.  Because we were stupid or maybe we didn’t care and just wanted to see Russia damaged even if it meant killing every last Ukrainian.  Because we knew or should have known that the Russians weren’t going to let Ukrainians mistreat the Russians living in Ukraine.  They’ve been living there for hundreds of years.  It’s as if California somehow became part of Mexico again and then the Mexicans started to abuse the Americans living there.  Who thinks that the United States would just stand by while our countrymen were abused and killed.  We would do just exactly what the Russians are doing right now.

So that’s my thought.  Ukrainians and Russians know the psychology of their relationship better than anyone else.  The sooner those two sides sit down at the negotiating table the sooner the killing can stop.  Hopefully for good.  Because it’s not as if they’re going to somehow move farther apart.  They better learn how to be neighbors of some sort.

Ukraine – Endless Death

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I’ve probably said too much already about the Ukraine War but it’s one of those horrible things that can’t just go away.  So, ignoring it is just denial.  At this point there are no longer any good options.  Both sides have lost so many men that they feel they must win in order not to appear to have sacrificed a generation of young men for nothing.  But one of them will have to.  And if I were to guess I’d say it’s the Ukrainians that will lose.  But I think it will take another year for them to get to the point of collapse.    By then, the Russians will have lost a million men and the Ukrainians will have lost two million.  At that point the Russians will be so enraged that they’ll inflict crippling conditions and may increase the ceded territory beyond the four provinces they’re currently claiming as theirs.

And most of the blame for this should be laid at the feet of the neo-cons who put together this whole war during the Obama and Biden administrations.  They organized and sponsored the color revolution and armed the Ukrainians and told them that with the aid of the United States and Europe they would not only beat Russia but they would become a part of NATO.  The neo-cons saw this as an opportunity to test out all of their weaponry on a battlefield against the Russians without having to risk many of their own troops or nuclear war.  And they figured it would bleed the Russians dry and then humiliate them in the eyes of their own people and thereby destroy Putin.

Well, they were half right.  We have managed to cause the Russians great harm.  But from where I stand what we’ve accomplished is making them our implacable foes for the next hundred years.  And we’ve thrown them into the arms of China and hastened the end of the US dollar as the global reserve currency.  Well done, neo-cons.

But now Donald Trump is stuck with this mess.  That sideshow he put on with Zelensky in the oval office is part of some plan to get the Ukrainians receptive to a peace treaty.  I assume what he’s setting up is a take it or leave it deal where he negotiates with Putin, and then Zelensky gets his side to accept.  Well, Trump likes to negotiate but I’m not sure how much give there is on the Russian side.  I think the things that are written in stone are:

  • No NATO membership ever.
  • Permanent Ukrainian neutrality.
  • Substantial reduction in Ukraine’s military.
  • Some proviso against the Azov leadership ever holding power again.
  • Complete protection of Russian ethnic institutions (language, religion, etc.) in Ukraine.
  • Substantial territorial transfers to Russia.

I think there is probably some give on exactly how much land will have to be ceded to Russia.  I think the Russians are very tired of the meat grinder that transfers Ukrainian territory to Russia at a rate that translates to just a few square feet per hour but also can be measured in hundreds of deaths per week on each side.  It’s a sickening spectacle.

I don’t envy Trump’s job in trying to negotiate a peace treaty.  Not only does he have Putin and Zelensky to reckon with but he also has that pack of idiots in Europe.  The clown car filled with all the globalist “leaders” from Britain, France, Germany and all the rest of those useless countries will be howling and shrieking and demanding that we provide enough arms and money to continue the war until the last Ukrainian is dead.  If he does manage to negotiate an end to the war, he shouldn’t just get a Nobel Peace Prize they should also take back the one they gave to Obama.

But I’m not so certain anything but time will end this war.  If (when) the Ukrainians are forced to capitulate the outrage they will experience because of the brutal conditions of surrender will probably result in a witch hunt for the leaders who were responsible for this debacle.  I’m guessing that if Zelensky doesn’t have a bunker in a friendly nation that won’t extradite him he’s not going to live much beyond the end of the war.

And there will be other consequences of this brutal war.  What’s left of Ukraine will be destabilized and there are hints of Hungary, Poland and Romania looking to make territorial claims based on ethnic enclaves that were long ago added to Ukraine.  All in all, the fallout from this brilliant geopolitical catastrophe threatens to haunt the world long after we’re all dead.  Once again, well done, neo-cons.

Super Power Relations

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Glenn W sent an email with a link to a podcast where Jeff Nyquist and Alex Benesch discuss how Donald Trump’s election impacts the global power struggle between the United States, Russia and China (link below).

https://youtu.be/OOiVNxt9I0M?si=bUOHY_mfan-wEOGu

It’s an analysis of the Chinese strategy to undermine Trump’s domestic political coalition.  There is also discussion of how Trump’s handling of the Ukraine war will impact Chinese/Russian relations.

Thank you, Glenn for passing this along.  It’s interesting to know how much the Chinese think about and plan to undermine the American domestic political situation.  And if the CIA were any good at their job, they’d have all of this intel available for Trump in a useful and convenient form as soon as it is available.  But, of course, they’re so busy trying to undermine him themselves that they can’t get around to something like that.

Watching the video made me think about how American domestic politics is viewed in such different places as Putin’s Russia and Xi’s China.

But it didn’t change my belief that almost all the problem in our country and most of the problems in the world are a result of the dysfunctional and even destructive system and culture that has taken hold of our country and by extension is being imposed on the rest of the world.  The adoption of a culture that celebrates above all else aberrant sexual identities and practices, but also emphasizes the vilification of European peoples and cultures and the need to eliminate their identity from their own countries, is singlehandedly bringing about the destruction of Western civilization.

I believe that most of the problems in this country stem from these two cultural projects of the Left.  And I think if these programs are eliminated it will cure most of the social dysfunction, we see around us today.

And that is why I believe that if Trump continues on with his program to eliminate things like the recognition of multiple “genders” and DEI and other affirmative action programs from the US federal government he will single-handedly solve the majority of societal ills that we find ourselves engulfed by.

Now as far as foreign policy goes, I see a clear linkage between the war in Ukraine and these same cultural dysfunctions.  Russia is a pariah for the Left because it eschews the LGBTQ movement absolutely and refuses to accept the “white shame” culture within its borders.  Whereas Ukraine was willing to accept the rainbow flag as the price it paid to get CIA and State Department funding for its color revolution.  And you can see a similar dynamic in Hungary where Orban refused to bend the knee to the homosexual mandate and so he also became an enemy of the left.  They tried to overthrow him in a recent election, pouring in all kinds of USAID money into the effort.  But he won and now he’ll benefit from Trump’s reform of the State Department and foreign relations in general.

It was heartening to see JD Vance meet with the AfD candidates for parliament in Germany and confront the government there with their refusal to stem immigration and their anti-free speech polices and attitudes.  It’s this kind of confidence in the advantages of a free and populist society that will advance our point of view in many places.

And that brings me to the question of what I think American policy should be toward the powerful countries like China and Russia.  We should be neither fearful of nor bellicose toward them.  The United States has ample enough stockpiles of nuclear tipped ICBMs to ensure that neither Russia nor China will attack us or our allies.  But by the same token, what business have we rattling sabers at Putin or Xi?  Our neocons in the State Department initiated the color revolution in Ukraine and then provided massive military aid and convinced the Ukrainians that the Russians would just capitulate to Ukraine joining NATO.  Up until Obama’s administration it was understood that attempting to bring Ukraine into NATO would be crossing a glowing red line that Putin would retaliate against.  So, they did it anyway and he invaded.  Now he’s been bloodied by our Ukrainian proxies using our most sophisticated weapons systems and so we’ve turned this into a war of attrition where Russia will lose a million men and Ukraine will lose two million men and a third of their country and we’ve possibly made the Russians our bitterest enemies for generations to come.  And they’ve embraced China because of it.

If Trump can figure out a way to blunt some of this damage, he should get a Nobel Peace Prize for sure.  But in general, I hope Trump’s foreign policy is guided by the precept that our foreign policy should be primarily concerned with improving the security and prosperity of the American people.  That’s it.  We’re not out to spread democracy and we’re not trying to save the world.  Climate Change and Ending World Hunger are not our priorities.  Evicting the illegal aliens and bringing the price of a dozen eggs down are.  So that explains my myopic vision of foreign policy.  If the Chinese try to get involved in undermining the Trump voter coalition, I’m guessing they’ll be a lot less effective than the Democrats are.  The Left knows the American lingo better and they’re much better liars than the Chinese are.

So, Donald Trump, just keep pummeling the Left and everything else will follow along like a master plan.

Counting Down the Days

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At the rate things are going there won’t be much left of the world by Trump’s inauguration.  Israelis, ISIS, Turks and Iranians are scrambling to claim parts of Syria.  Romania has overturned their elections because the people chose the right-wing candidate.  Belarus, Georgia and Kazakhstan are seething with unrest.  South Korea has arrested the head of the military and is investigating their president for treason.  France’s parliament was dissolved through a vote of no-confidence and Trump has told Canada and Mexico that if they want any more money from him, they’ll have to agree to become parts of the United States.  And that’s on top of the usual carnage in Ukraine and the threat of nuclear war if NATO continues to allow their long-range missiles to target Russia.

Well, I don’t suppose that the State Department and the Department of Defense have anything to do with any of these events.  Do you?

I think what the geniuses in those departments don’t realize is that Trump thrives on chaos.  I forget which of Bill Clinton’s psychopathic advisors said, “Never let a good crisis go to waste.”  But Donald Trump has learned that lesson by heart.  I suspect that he will be using his authority to apply leverage on his enemies foreign and domestic.  The crises he will put to good use are the migrant crisis and the wars in Ukraine and Syria.

This week Trump met with France’s Macron and Ukraine’s Zelensky.  I think he gave both of them the same general message; prepare to make a deal with Putin.  We don’t know what Macron’s reaction was but Zelensky went ballistic.  He was so upset that he declared that Biden must allow Ukraine to become part of NATO before Trump gets into office.  Well, that’s not going to happen.  What will happen is unknown.  The neo-cons unleashed the chaos in Syria in hopes it would deter Putin from continuing his progress in Ukraine.  It doesn’t seem to have worked.  Chasiv Yar, Pokrovsk, Kurakhove and several other major Ukrainian defensive centers are on the edge of collapse and there does not seem to be a pause in sight.  The Ukrainians have decided to drop the draft age to eighteen to provide an additional 200,000 soldiers for the front but there seems to be a significant desertion rate occurring and mass surrenders are also increasing.  I suspect by January 20th things will be increasingly desperate for the Ukraine.

As for Syria, well, I hope Trump will be wise enough to leave Syria to those who want to burn their fingers on a boiling pot.  We have no business there.  And it looks like a trap for anyone who is stupid enough to think that trying to referee a free-for-all of raving religious lunatics is a good idea.  Think of Iraq.

As for his domestic enemies, cutting off the checks to sanctuary states like New York and California should be great sport.  New York especially has gone out of its way to antagonize Donald Trump through lawfare.  The least he could do is return the favor.  Something tells me there is an imbalance between what Albany can do to Trump and what Trump can inflict on the Empire state.

And finally, there is Trump’s main event; waging war on the Deep State.  There is the place where his personal desire for revenge and the country’s interests intersect beautifully.  Any and all havoc he can wreak on those bureaucratic tyrants will lessen their ability to torture us.  I think the DOGE initiative is exactly the way to tame the monster in Washington.  Freeze their salaries, brutally slash their ranks and reduce their power.  Actually, closing down divisions and departments would even be better.

Well, it’s a little more than a month so we’ll continue to hear about the chaos that the desperate minions in Washington are unleashing on the world.  But their days are numbered and they know it.

Guest Contributor – Milo Mindbender – 28SEP2024 – Hot Spots

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Democrats policy is to screw things up and then point at the Republican co-conspirators and blame them for everything.
We have no business in the Ukraine, only by offering NATO statehood which under different presidents was not an option did we intentionally provoke a response from Russia. We almost went to war in ’62 over the weaponization of Cuba, and there is no land connection to the US. NATO statehood would allow for weaponization of a physically attached neighboring state, similar to allowing the arming up of Baja California, and expecting no response from the US.
The “wag the dog” scenario created by the MIC, and the state department to justify more expenditures on unneeded toys that have the newest “Gee, Wow” factor, and donors in your district co-opt many who enter the Swamp, there is no immunity to the corruption created in DC. It eats to the bone on almost everyone who succumbs to the lure of power.
Regarding the Israeli situation, I liked the simple elegance of arming the Hezbollah, Hamas supply chain with weaponized pagers. It was utterly ruthless, laser targeted, and minimally damaging collaterally. If you are forced into a defensive war you protect yourself from a 3 way attack, cut the heads off the snakes and let the bodies wither from neglect. Somebody did their job accurately, and correctly. Bravo Zulu from my viewfinder. I have no dog in the fight against Israel, and believe the Palestinians are a self inflicted injury upon themselves, they can not seek refugee status with any of their neighbors because they try to overthrow and disrupt anyplace they infest. They screwed up on Egypt, Jordan, Lebanon, and Syria when they were still possibly able to claim aggrieved status, now it’s sorta expected that they always bite the hand that feeds them.
They voted to be administered by terrorists, deal with it.

 

Update:

War Pig commented:

Israel can handle Hamas and Hezbolla. If Iran sends their special forces that may escalate things. If Iran tosses a nuke Israel can obliterate them in return. And if Israel has to throw nukes, Iran won’t be the only target, so the other naughty actors in the region will tamp Iran’s desires that way. Israel seems to have pretty good infiltration or Iran’s military operations.

If the Iranians want to use their navy to make trouble in the gulf, they can look back to 1988 when our navy’s Praying Mantis operation sank half of their navy in one union shift. Imagine what our navy could do to theirs now?