Ed @ 100
Thanks for your reply.
It sounds like we are on the same level training wise, some times that can be an advantage.
But again simple is best.
It was made clear that Russian investigators would not be allowed near the site after the pipelines were blown, time to clear all evidence.
Your points on detection of signal i think may be wrong i don’t know but it’s a hell of a big sea. Also ther are modern ways of producing signals and the terrorists like m16 would have them of course.
Perhaps lazer?

Posted by: Mark2 | Feb 11 2023 23:09 utc | 104

Russian officials would sure be pretending that’s not happening. Moscow became fucking weak. I wouldn’t be surprised if most of North Caucasus eventually demand for independence, considering Moscow couldn’t even defend Belgrade from Kievan forces and because of sanctions, being parts of the federation might no longer be advantageous.
Vladimir Putin is such a joke.

Posted by: Morena | Feb 11 2023 23:14 utc | 106

Posted by: Morena | Feb 11 2023 22:50 utc | 102
If they are used to strike Crimea or Moscow, the gloves will come off and you can start digging your survival shelter or looking for a place to live in remote South America or the Pacific islands.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 11 2023 23:19 utc | 108

New cockroach @102 & 108.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 11 2023 23:24 utc | 110

Problem is we said the same about many things that ended up happening and the gloves did not come off…
Posted by: shadowbanned | Feb 11 2023 23:27 utc | 114
Such as what? The mostly failed terror attack on the bridge? The continuing attacks on areas of Donbass that are supposedly under RF control? The sinking of Moskva? You cannot possibly compare those to the implications of long range high kiloton missile/rocket strikes on Russian civilians in Crimea or Moscow. Nothing even remotely similar has happened yet.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 11 2023 23:32 utc | 112

Gloves to come off ? Russian officials hadn’t done anything after Engels-2 getting attacked with some drone.

Posted by: Morena | Feb 11 2023 23:36 utc | 114

# or perhaps a cricket or a mealworm.

Posted by: Dingo | Feb 11 2023 23:39 utc | 116

Such as what? The mostly failed terror attack on the bridge? The continuing attacks on areas of Donbass that are supposedly under RF control? The sinking of Moskva? You cannot possibly compare those to the implications of long range high kiloton missile/rocket strikes on Russian civilians in Crimea or Moscow. Nothing even remotely similar has happened yet.
Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 11 2023 23:32 utc | 115

Such as multiple attacks on the nuclear triad that actually took out some of the strategic bombers.
Such an act would have meant immediate global nuclear annihilation during the Cold War, now it’s just a normal day, as the Kremlin pretends it didn’t happen.
Moscow was attacked directly last week, it barely registered, as the drone failed to reach the target. Which again, would have meant war by the mere fact of launching it once upon a time. But there will be more, and they may reach their targets.
Also, you might want to check your units. But that is a minor detail.
As I said, usually past behavior is the best predictor of future behavior, thus I can definitely see missiles hitting the radar tech R&D facilities and factories in Voronezh and the arms factories in Tula and the Kremlin continuing to sit on its hands.
What will make it easier is that air defense will shoot down most of them (air defense in Russia proper has actually done an amazing job so far against missiles; drones are another issue), the rest will do a little bit of damage, and all will be “fine”.
Meanwhile the US is collecting data on Russian air defense and preparing an actual first strike, but hey, who cares, those are the dear partners (to whom we are still selling oil, titanium, nickel and everything else they need to make the missiles they will be bombing us with), they will never do such a thing, right?

Posted by: shadowbanned | Feb 11 2023 23:44 utc | 118

#113 get on the phone, and talk to Putin.

Posted by: Dingo | Feb 11 2023 23:46 utc | 120

RT reports Vucic is losing his resolve regarding obeying the illegal sanctions on Russia. The man is a wimp compared to Orban.
What clearly needs to happen is a massive pushback by RoW over illegal sanctions–only the UNSC is authorized to interfere in another country via sanctions; all others are invalid under international law. That reality needs to be sang by a global chorus while announcing its complete non-compliance leaving only the Outlaw US Empire and its vassals as lawbreakers. And that’s precisely the stance Vucic must take: Fuck You! Your sanctions are illegal!!
I guarantee that will get a reaction as no national leader has ever stood up and told them where to go with their illegal shit.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 11 2023 23:50 utc | 122

@121 that is all entirely factual. And yes Russia will have to fire some s400’s or even s500’s. Do they exist? This war has said that of all the fancy weapons Russia designed and was going to mass produce are all singly produced boutique items. Only a handful of thermobarics have been deployed. Hypersonics are rare. T90’s even a rare on the ground, and the t14 armata? One test model is driving around firing at nothing.
T0s 1a’s are sometimes around, tos 2s? Nope su57’s? Giving Putin rides around Russia’s airspace. How much would you bet on its nukes functioning well? Does the satan missle work? The nuke powered global cruise missle? The Belograd will it fire torpedos? They’re navy can only fire missles and then hide, assuming they have the foresight to keep it under Fucking Cover and not out anchored in the open. The missle frigates arent really worth a strike actually, missles can shoot from lots of places. They just scrapped one of their old big soviet subs. It doesnt bode well, and if they dont step it up, they will have to try to catch the “Ukrainian” ICBM heading towards something irreplaceable.

Posted by: neofeudalfuture | Feb 11 2023 23:58 utc | 124

Karlofi1 @ 111
Long before that…. Ndongo Samba Sylla describes it best.
” For those who have studied the history of colonial Africa through its fiscal and monetary dimensions, the similarities between colonial macroeconomics and neoliberal macroeconomics are striking. One might be tempted to see the neoliberal era as an avatar of colonialism. Actually, the main principles underlying the fiscal and monetary paradigm of the neoliberal era (1980 – 2021) which are – sound finance, regressive taxation systems, central bank independence, and the direction of the credit system by oligopolistic banks—were already applied in the European colonies, particularly in Africa.
In the neoliberal era, sound finance, as a principle of macroeconomic management, is based on the idea that governments should avoid fiscal deficits and should even aspire to fiscal surpluses. This view is based on the misleading analogy between a household and a governing currency-issuer. Indeed, while it may be desirable for households to build up net savings, a government that issues its own currency may not always have an interest in running a balanced budget or even budget surpluses. For its fiscal deficit has as its exact counterpart the financial surplus of the non-government sector. If the government sector wishes to have a balanced budget, this means that the domestic private sector (households and businesses) will only be able to achieve a financial surplus if the rest of the world is in a deficit position vis-à-vis the domestic economy.
During colonial times, sound finance had much more basic and transparent justifications than it does today. As an imperial doctrine by essence, it amounted to saying that the metropolis did not intend to participate financially in the colonial enterprise, which was supposed to be self-financing. The “colonial self-sufficiency policy,” as historians call it, implied that the colonized territories had to pay for the costs of military conquest, the current expenditures of the colonial administrations as well as their investment expenditures, which were often oriented towards infrastructure projects that favored the profitability of private metropolitan capital. The metropolis was just supposed to intervene sporadically, by granting subsidies or loans, when the financial situation of the colonies required it.
In spite of the metropolitan rhetoric on the expensive or unprofitable character of the colonial enterprise, the fact is that the latter had been financed essentially by the colonies, through taxes to move skills and real resources around and forced labor. Public transfers from the metropolis had been relatively minor, both for France and England, the two former and most important metropolitan powers on the African continent.
Since metropolitan governments ruled the monetary operations of their colonies, they managed through the colonial administrations to gradually impose a unit of account in which taxes would be collected. This meant, that they had no intrinsic financial constraint. In principle they did not depend on taxes to finance their local expenditures. The possibility to expand their fiscal space was not used, however, owing to the extractive orientation of colonial economic policy.
The choice to run balanced budgets implied that the colonial government did not usually create net financial wealth for the private sector (and in particular for the indigenous private sector). The accumulation of financial wealth by the private sector—and thus growth of domestic income was made dependent on the external financial balance.
This extractive orientation was accentuated by colonial monetary arrangements and by the behavior of the banking sector, dominated from the outset by oligopolistic banks. In parallel with fiscal austerity, the fixed parity between the colonial and metropolitan currencies in a context of free capital mobility between the colonies and the metropolis and the obligation to cover the money supply entirely with foreign exchange reserves (as with the currency boards in the British Empire) gave a highly restrictive character to monetary policy. The idea that private banks should organize the credit system with some freedom—the freedom not to finance productive activities as opposed to extractive activities—while colonial governments should maintain balanced budgets was part of the imperial credo.
In the major British colonies in West Africa, the Bank of British West Africa and Barclays DCO ruled almost unchallenged for the first six decades of the 20th century. The role of metropolitan banks had generally been to protect the interests of metropolitan businesses at the expense of local entrepreneurs through discrimination in access to credit. It had also consisted in facilitating the short-term financing of the exports of primary products as well as the transfer of local economic surpluses (financial savings) to the metropolis.
As captive markets and cheap sources of supply of raw materials, colonial empires also played the role of financial valve for the metropolises. In the case of England, the over-accumulation of foreign exchange reserves by its most resource-rich colonies had contributed significantly to its financial stability and to the alleviation of recurrent liquidity crises on the London money market.
During the last decades of the 19th century, England had lost its industrial and commercial edge over Germany and the United States. In this context, England was able to maintain both the international gold standard and its financial leadership only thanks to its control over India’s external surpluses. In the aftermath of the Second World War, Nigeria and Ghana played a similar role in the sterling area. Capital exports from England to these two territories were lower than the sterling balances they had accumulated in London. These external surpluses were built up through a drastic reduction in their imports, a reality described by the concept of unrequited exports.
Nowadays, under neoliberalism, for many countries of the Global South, the priority given to balanced budgets and exports, the over-accumulation of foreign exchange reserves in a context where their local resources are under-utilized, the dominant role of foreign banks and financial institutions, the under-financing of the “real” economy, etc., all represent elements of continuity with the colonial period.
Neoliberal economics, it could be argued, is an iteration of the logic of colonial economics in a context where trade and financial flows are less and less hampered by the barriers once created by the coexistence of formal colonial empires. With neoliberalism, the latter are replaced with the networks and agencies of globalized capital. In the Global North, this pursuit of colonial economic logic entails an undermining of the previous socioeconomic and political achievements of working classes and hence a widening of within-country inequalities. In most of the Global South, next to the weakening of working classes power, neoliberalism has consisted in suppressing nations and peoples right to self-determination through the imposition of deflationary policies, forced “free trade,” privatization and financial liberalization.
To break with such an orientation, MMT is valuable in at least two aspects. On the one hand, it provides the elements for a critique of the constitutive principles of colonial macroeconomics (rigid separation between fiscal authority and monetary authority, sound finance, priority to exports, over-accumulation of external reserves, dependence on foreign finance, etc.). On the other hand, MMT allows us to reorient economic policy around the mobilization of domestic resources by emphasizing that, even in an unfavorable external environment, the countries of the Global South can create a fiscal space that is larger than usually admitted.
Achieving shared and sustainable prosperity will necessitate a strong epistemic challenge to neoliberalism’s colonial economics. It will also require concerted efforts on several other fronts: addressing global structures of domination that reproduce the economic logic of colonialism; submitting to popular control the orientation of public policies as well as the management of economic resources and instruments. ”
Ndongo Samba Sylla body of work on the French CAC a colonial currency is excellent if you get a chance you should read it.
Does China get it ? Of course China allows to reorient economic policy around the mobilization of domestic resources by emphasizing that, even in an unfavorable external environment, the countries of the Global South can create a fiscal space that is larger than usually admitted.
Does Russia get it ? I doubt it Putin prays at the alter of sound finance and deficit and debt reduction as if Russia is a business profit and loss sheet rather than what it is, A balance sheet with assets and liabilities.
If Russia had done what you claim they are now doing in an economic sense. Nobody would have wanted to leave them. Maybe they have learned the hard way and are now ready to take a more Chinese approach along with Belarus. The jury is still out.

Posted by: Derek Henry | Feb 12 2023 0:01 utc | 126

Posted by: Norwegian | Feb 11 2023 19:51 utc | 34
Have you ever considered that you are the target of a psyop or do you just swallow the BS whole?

Posted by: Longhorn | Feb 12 2023 0:02 utc | 128

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 11 2023 23:19 utc | 110
I advise to visit Patagonia soon and find a spot.
I will.
Otherwise, New Zealand south island was a long time soft spot in my heart, but since this country went full Covid-nazi, I got some doubts.
Same thing about Tasmania.
French Polynesia would be nice, especially southern archipelago, the “Australes”, where you can swim with whales all year long.
Easter island also …
Galapagos,
Valdivia,
Puerto Montt,
I wont go to Punta Arenas or Ushuaia, Falklands too southernly cold and additionally strategic passages that would call for trouble…

Posted by: Greg Galloway | Feb 12 2023 0:07 utc | 130

@600w | Feb 11 2023 19:33 utc | 32
We have had reports that Russia rotates its soldiers out after four months. That would keep the ones in combat in better condition and would build a large base of experienced soldiers to fight against the West in WW3.
Putin said recently that 90% of the foreign weapons going to Ukraine came in through Poland. (We are told that the tanks are there.) He said the same day that there’s going to be a huge party after his speech on February 21st.
Is Putin going to hit Poland with hypersonic missiles? They’ve said that they are outfitting their super-quiet diesel submarines to launch them through their torpedo tubes. Hitting Poland with several launched from submerged submarines in the Atlantic would prove to the West that no ship, shipyard, or other facility was safe from attack. Ukraine would be forgotten.
If the West tried to respond with nukes, China and many other countries would respond quickly. Putin might risk that war. How else is he going to defeat NATO++?

Posted by: barstool | Feb 12 2023 0:11 utc | 132

Karlofi1 @ 111
The sick part is 99.9% of people who post on this site understand what I posted above as a reply to your 111 post. Most would nod their heads in agreement of how neoliberalism and globalism works. It’s not rocket science after all. As everything written above is embedded in the EU and NATO treaties and charter and runs through both like Blackpool rock.
Yet, over 50% of the 99.9% vote for the exact same policies when they Q up to vote in their own elections in the US and UK and most of Western and Eastern Europe. No common sense, can’t connect the dots and driven by ideology. That’s what those who want peace are up against.

Posted by: Derek Henry | Feb 12 2023 0:19 utc | 134

The newest concern trolls started off talking about very specific, very deadly weaponry being supplied to Ukraine. I pointed out that if such weapons were to be used against Moscow or Crimea, the gloves would come off. I’m sorry, but talking about drone attacks (successful or otherwise) is not refuting anything that I said.
Also: Posted by: Longhorn | Feb 12 2023 0:09 utc | 134
Come on dude. Pull your head out. You’re spewing pure fiction re: Chinese designs on Russian territory.
https://scheerpost.com/2023/01/04/patrick-lawrence-the-sino-russian-summit-you-didnt-read-about/

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 12 2023 0:24 utc | 136

I will just remind those posting with reference to the history of Ukraibe (and some as newcomers can be excused for returning to the subject) that Putin has always stressed that as the segments of what has now been called Ukraine passed from one national body to another, the people themselves were not consulted. Whatever its future holds, Russia will be changing that situation, and has already changed it for the portions that have now joined the Russian Federation. Which is why there will be no returning to the previous status for any of them; their people have chosen where they wish to be.

Posted by: juliania | Feb 12 2023 0:31 utc | 138

https://twitter.com/NOELreports/status/1624170782719893513
Same thing that we saw in Kharkov and Kherson.
And there is once again no missile strike even though they are neatly lined up. Zero interference.
How is that possible a month into the war?
Posted by: shadowbanned | Feb 11 2023 23:35 utc | 39
I have seen that video and some others recently, and they have been debunked as training from last winter before the SMO. Pretty sure if the Ukes bunched up like that these days, they wouldn’t be doing it anywhere near the front lines. Maybe Pooland?

Posted by: LGB! | Feb 12 2023 0:33 utc | 140

The difference between Russia with Ukraine and China with Russia is Russian minority is about 29% in Ukraine’s eastern region while Chinese minority is less than 1% in Russia’s far eastern region and is actually decreasing over years.

Posted by: Malade | Feb 12 2023 0:45 utc | 142

@shadowbanned 98:
Let them ethnically cleanse themselves by leaving en masse for their preferred homelands of Europistan and Canazida.

Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Feb 12 2023 0:55 utc | 144

Re: Blowing up NS
No divers needed.
Look up Limpet mines. Computer detonated Shaped charges easily carried by divers or drones. Magnet attach. Can penetrate 36mm – 1 1/2″ Steel. They have been around since WW2
Lots of Anti Mine Drones used during NATO exercises before the explosions. Maybe some of the drones were Pro Mine. 😉

Posted by: Golddiggr | Feb 12 2023 0:57 utc | 146

Karlofi1 @ 111
I’m pretty sure the “economic team Russia” now understand that foreign exchange reserves are a fixed FX phenomenon instead of a floating FX one. They must do because of August 17th 1998. Even though billions of voters still get mixed up between the two because of the wall street propaganda that flows out of their TV’s and computer screens.
Pre August 17, 1998 – The marginal holder of ANY rouble bank deposit, at any Russian bank, had a choice of 4 options before the close of business each day.
The 4 choices were:
Hold rubles in a clearing account at the Central Bank
Exchange ruble clearing balances for something else at the central bank.
Buy a Russian GKO (tsy sec), which is an interest bearing account at the central bank.
Exchange roubles for $’s at the official rate at the central bank.
For all practical purposes, 3 and 4 competed with each other. Russia had to offer high enough rates on its GKOs to compete with option 4. In that sense interest rates were endogenous. Any attempt by the Russian Central Bank to lower rates, such as open market operations, would result in an outflow of $US reserves. The conditions for a stable rouble could not coexist. The net desire to save roubles by households and businesses was probably negative, the failure to enforce tax liabilities resulted in deficit spending even as the government tried to reduce spending, and the higher interest rate on GKO’s increased government spending even more.
At the time GKO rates were around 150% annually, and the interest payments themselves constituted at least the entire rouble budget deficit. The higher rates of interest were the driving factor behind the excess rouble spending which led to the loss of $US reserves.
With the $ in high demand due to a variety of factors, such as domestic taxed advantaged $US savings plans, insurance reserves, pension funds, and the like, and, exacerbating the situation, what could be called overly tight US fiscal policy, there was, for all practical purposes, no GKO interest rate that could stem the outflow of $US reserves.
The main source of $ reserves was, of course, $ loans from both the international private sector and international agencies such as the IMF. The rouble was overvalued as evidenced by the fact that $ reserves went out nearly as fast as they became available. The Russian Treasury responded by offering higher and higher rates on its GKO securities to compete with option 4, without success. This inability to compete with option 4 is what finally leads to devaluation under a fixed exchange rate regime.
Floating the rouble – On August 17th it was announced that option 4, for all practical purposes, was no longer available. This meant the rouble was now a floating currency. Option 3 now competed only with option 1, so the interest rate was suddenly exogenous. It would be and could only be whatever the government determined to pay when it offered its GKO’s for sale. It could, for an extreme example, decide to pay 0%, and the excess clearing balances would have no choice but to remain as excess balances and earn no interest. That would make the interbank rate 0 bid between credit worthy counterparties.
Previously, with option 4 open, the penalty for excess government spending was higher rates on GKO’s and loss of $US reserves. With a floating exchange rate the penalty for excess spending is the exchange rate of the rouble.
And I quite sure that ” economics team Russia ” now understands that it can now automatically issue GKO securities at any rate it chooses and no longer needs to defend the outflow of foreign reserves like it had to under a fixed FX regime. Even though a large % of the commentary around such matters says otherwise.

Posted by: Derek Henry | Feb 12 2023 1:00 utc | 148

An accurate history lesson of the prelude to the Ukraine incident that led to the impoverishment of Europe from Jeffrey Sachs rendered in 5 minutes.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Feb 12 2023 1:26 utc | 150

The Ukraine event is a Hollywood production wargame. No actual fighting is happening and nobody is being killed in a battle. Every photo and video has actors and cgi editing.
They robbed the USA treasury for billions of dollars including metal commodities.
You have been lied to once again.

Posted by: Greg | Feb 12 2023 1:29 utc | 152

” The Ukraine event is a Hollywood production wargame. No actual fighting is happening and nobody is being killed in a battle. Every photo and video has actors and cgi editing.
They robbed the USA treasury for billions of dollars including metal commodities.
You have been lied to once again.
Posted by: Greg | Feb 12 2023 1:29 utc | 157 ”
I dont know about that. I can show you some videos in which the horror of war is beyond any human’s imagination. Hollywood doesn’t even come Close.

Posted by: Deplorable Commissar | Feb 12 2023 1:32 utc | 154

the pair #156
“scoop” is right. Meanwhile USA is destroying weather balloons, exhibiting its criminal meanness and ignorance toward Syria and sustaining the dumbest political class since Jean Bedel Bokassa was a President.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Feb 12 2023 1:38 utc | 156

Posted by: Morena | Feb 11 2023 23:14 utc | 108
Take it easy Ukraine people are part of the embrace of motherland and here is something special for you to cheer you up,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EkT4w-X9VHA

Posted by: Grishka | Feb 12 2023 1:43 utc | 158

I have a 1911 Encyclopedia Britannica. In it one finds no mention whatever of Ukraine. On maps one sees only New Russia and South Russia where present day Ukraine sits. Just an FYI

Posted by: A.Pols | Feb 12 2023 1:45 utc | 160

Longhorn you should consider the global picture beyond your paddock. Russia is a vast multi ethnic nation with many religions including a large islamic community. Mostly they abide in peaceful relationship with each other and Russia undoubtedly assure that multi ethnic tolerance is a solid practice. Especially so after the USA triggered a jihadi destabilisation through Chechnya not so long ago.
For the Russia and China relationship to endure and enrich each other the last thing China would do is to antagonise Russia in the east.
Stick to the grass and be mindful to avoid those little mushrooms growing in the sh!t.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Feb 12 2023 1:54 utc | 162

Posted by: Bill Smith | Feb 12 2023 1:31 utc | 158
Re: The wargames, I didn’t re-read the articles, just pulled the URLs from Google based on the search terms that I knew would return the ones I remembered reading in the past, so I could be slightly off on this, but IIRC – in particular the Iranian wargames – the US side basically had to cripple the Iranian side’s capabilities (i.e., pretend they didn’t have weapons systems that they do actually have, that they couldn’t wage any offensive campaigns of their own, etc.) in order to even come close to winning.
Certainly one of the main goals is to assess one’s own weaknesses and learn from them, no disagreement there. But the next step – if a country is intent on addressing them – is implementing the lessons learned in real life and that’s not always very easy.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 12 2023 1:58 utc | 164

Do you have any examples of German Corporate moves to the US? The only ones I have seen have been moves to China!
Posted by: SwissArmyMan | Feb 12 2023 1:38 utc | 163
I can’t spend much time researching this, but I thought I’d put in my own two cents. Several large German automakers already have plants in the US that build cars for the North American and other markets. One thing they may be considering in light of the dramatically increased energy costs in Germany is shifting production of European market models to the US. But that’s just a guess for the sake of keeping the conversational ball rolling.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 12 2023 2:01 utc | 166

jgalt #165

The latest object over Alaska was not identified by US pilots. They could not recognize it, it had no identifiable propulsion system and it interfered with their sensors.

Perhaps with the mesosphere being saturated with H2O and metallic oxides and ions from the Tonga volcanic eruption a year ago, the high altitude amanita are flourishing and coagulating in the higher vortices causing radar images and resembling ‘targets’ as only USAians would think of such things.
I see that some pilot assured us one was ‘shot down’ and landed on an ice flow. That might account for the large number of stoned polar bears and sea lions found singing and hugging in the locality.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Feb 12 2023 2:06 utc | 168

I have seen many people say German Industry will move to the US but so far see zero evidence of that happening.

Posted by: SwissArmyMan | Feb 12 2023 2:14 utc | 170

Thanks for returning to this, karlof1 @ Feb 12 2023 0:25 utc | 140 – in the back of my mind has been a comment Michael Hudson made on nakedcapitalism.com when I first read the transcript – Yves had objected (she usually doesn’t) that the target was Russia – (I had a ‘to and fro’ with one of our regulars on the apparent conflict, saying in general that he had commented tactfully allowing her objection.) So, reading your post, I went back to archives, and here now is Michael’s comment below the NC posting:

Michael Hudson
February 6, 2023 at 9:17 am
Well, Yves is of course right that the INTENT was to squeeze Russia’s economy and export earnings. But I think that as soon as U.S. officials caught on to the effect on Germany, they smiled and rubbed their hands together.
Think for a minute of what it implies if the US did NOT make a scenario of what would happen when the sanctions were imposed on oil, gas and crops. What does this tell you about the inability of U.S. officials to take “blowback” into account?
I always did that when I worked for the Hudson Institute in the 1970s (before it changed ownership and moved to Washington). Can it really be that US officials are so irresponsibly tunnel-visioned?

I think this comment answers any questions about what came first, the chicken or the egg; it answered mine, anyway! And I love letting the trolls play – my thought was it’s winter and it’s cold under them thar bridges. So, we’ll let ’em have a little sunshine against the covid.

Posted by: juliania | Feb 12 2023 2:18 utc | 172

SwissArmyMan | Feb 12 2023 1:38 utc | 163
Search engine of choice
Search term: “german companies move to US”….

Posted by: Melaleuca | Feb 12 2023 2:35 utc | 174

Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Feb 11 2023 22:12 utc | 86
—————————————————
Ma Laoshi, i am sur it is just a coincidence, but you, the US/NATO. and Zelensky all seem to want the same thing: You all want Russia to charge full steam ahead and expend themselves in one glorious battle.
The Russian MoD is not stupid, they know what they are doing, and so far, the slow and methodical meat grinder is working quite well. If you think so highly of the balls to the wall’s military tactics, why don’t you write Zelensky and advise him about it. I am sure that he and his Generals will become excited to receive such wonderful advise.

Posted by: Ed | Feb 12 2023 2:41 utc | 176

Re: Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Feb 11 2023 17:45 utc | 6

Same deal in Zaporozhie: one of the resident trolls was gloating here a couple weeks ago about Russia getting stalled on the “southern front”. Troll or not, seems in retrospect he was mostly right?

Your logic is incomprehensible.
How is someone who tells you accurately what is going to happen a so-called “troll”?!? They sound more like a logical and dispassionate observer.

Posted by: Julian | Feb 12 2023 2:43 utc | 178

# 178 the chicken or the egg: is a tautology, you can have a chicken without an egg. But you can’t have an egg without a chicken. Therefore which came first?

Posted by: Dingo | Feb 12 2023 2:57 utc | 180

Paul McGrory | Feb 12 2023 2:42 utc | 183
Thanks Paul.
The attempt to discredit Hersh by diverting to minutiae on the “how” while ignoring the *who* and *why*, is a well known tactic.
Someone upthread mentioned the distraction of 9/11.
I personally spent about a decade down that rabbit hole, from 2004 when I saw mention of Building 7. I’d seen it collapse at 3am my time, and had been confounded that it had barely been mentioned in all the blanket coverage.
Years later, I realised I’d been played with like a kitten chasing a laser pointer.
*How* is for engineering – architect and demolition specialists.
Who and why and cui bono are the questions to pursue.
I don’t have a fucking clue *how* the U$ and fiends blew up the pipeline.
Our newly arrived and self described “investigative” journalist doesn’t know *how* either.
Barflies will focus on whatever they choose. But I’m not wasting my latterly significantly reduced and thus valuable (to me) screen time Indulging speculation.
The pipeline was blown. The US did it. What is Germany going to do about it?

Posted by: Melaleuca | Feb 12 2023 3:06 utc | 182

juliania @178–
Thanks for your reply. Yes, there’s some excellent material in that interview and I eagerly await their next podcast. I’ve been musing over the international non-dollar trade issue since Brazil/Argentina made their announcement to initiate what’s essentially a bancor for their use and could also be expanded to include other nations. I don’t have time to write on it now, but perhaps Monday will be the day I do after some further thinking and research.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 12 2023 3:16 utc | 184

Feb. 07 2023
a sober, frank interview with Col. Douglas Macgregor,
more on the geopolitics —-
the D.C. neocons, badly miscalculated on Ukraine the true state of affairs… no one is telling the truth about the bond market. Forget the balloon, Americans need to wake-up.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rnut-E_eEM0&t=2s

Posted by: Likklemore | Feb 12 2023 3:23 utc | 186

@ bevin | Feb 12 2023 2:15 utc | 177
…the quote from SC:
“But even Biden couldn’t have planned or expected that the EU sanctions against Russia would so sensationally backfire on EU governments. Presently, there is a certain air of desperation by the Europeans who want an end to the war in Ukraine
“EU governments” — that’s a good one. The Europe national governments gave up their sovereignty to a bogus illegal “European Union” which has sold Europeans down the river. We can’t blame Biden for that. The European Union is a one-of-a-kind in the world governing bloc with autocratic leadership, including four presidents, and members of a “parliament” serving five-year terms. The EU is not a nation and therefore it need not recognize the UN Charter nor be subjected to any scrutiny by UN bodies including the Security Council. The EU is a needless renegade largely unaccountable government which is also a key driver of the ongoing war in Europe.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 12 2023 3:33 utc | 188

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Feb 12 2023 0:24 utc | 139
Thanks for the link. Teleconferencing and providing military support are two different things. China always present its “Panda Face” for public consumption. In “Unrestricted Warfare” China makes clear it intends to dominate the World. Russia has the two commodities China needs the most…food and energy. China and the US are co-dependent economically, and that trade dwarfs China-Russia trade.
So if you were China would you could you nose off to spite your face i.e. destroy your trade relationship with the US? Or would you look West at a weakened Russia (from fighting a stupid war) and solve your your strategic problems. Russia has teamed-up once before with an authoritarian dictator (Ribbentrop agreement), how did that turn out?
I am not saying it will happen, but the risk is increasing every day that Putin takes his country down the total war path.
Cheers

Posted by: Longhorn | Feb 12 2023 3:36 utc | 190

bevin #177
on Martin Jay report:

“Was the long-term plan by Biden and his chief advisers to push Putin towards the trap of invading Ukraine? Was the invasion itself really all about destroying the pipelines and cleaning up on the profits? Biden’s naked lust to boost the U.S. economy at the expense of Europe’s sacrifice and suffering is clear. But even Biden couldn’t have planned or expected that the EU sanctions against Russia would so sensationally backfire on EU governments. Presently, there is a certain air of desperation by the Europeans who want an end to the war in Ukraine as they have woken up to the idea that the war of attrition plan only works in America’s favour and not Europe’s?…”
https://strategic-culture.org/news/2023/02/11/biden-blew-up-nord-stream-pipelines-but-did-he-allow-the-ukraine-war-go-ahead-justify-covert-operation/

There is sense in what Martin Jay says when you consider that Biden was the main USA plenipotentiary in Ukraine through the Obama years. He is so arrogant that he would by now be full of himself as the know-it-all of Ukraine and ably egged on by Nuland Blinken et al.
After all the strong arm coercion Biden performed in Ukraine for a decade and more to get the USA way done, he would be incapable of considering failure or erroneous adventures. Just threaten and ignore consequences has been the NATO way since its inception. No room for diplomatic subtleties in rigid mindsets.
“F#ck the EU” as Nuland said and no doubt the entire US team shared the view.
Now that the EU is (perhaps) beginning to view each other as plucked chooks there will be some depth to the EU/UK shoe shuffling of the past fortnight.
Clearly the USA has won its battle to subjugate and plunder the EU economy. Credit Suisse being loaded up with debt and then asset stripped is just one small example of the Washington piracy of the past decades.
Blowing up the pipelines is one metric of their supreme arrogance and it sure won’t be the last time we experience that arrogance. I am sure Russia and China expect more and that Syria and Iraq and Iran can attest to it.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Feb 12 2023 3:45 utc | 192

@ LoveDonbass | Feb 12 2023 3:35 utc | 195
Quite so. Inculcated. Ignorance is bliss. Knowledge or insight irrelevant. Addiction to seeking instant gratification. Hurry the war up, it’s too slow! Casual extreme or mass violence/casualties is normative because the best form of negotiation/compromise/resolution is with a weapon, the more powerful or numerous the better, ideally with mass body counts. Collateral, so what. Oh, & all over in under two hours, tops.
Peace

Posted by: Outraged | Feb 12 2023 3:52 utc | 194

malamatias @74
thanks much for the link to the emmanuel todd interview in english.
and to all.

Posted by: polarbear4 | Feb 12 2023 4:01 utc | 196

Posted by: LoveDonbass | Feb 12 2023 3:35 utc | 195
Agreed. Thanks for the link to Black Mountain – I’ll read their stuff later.
– RSH

Posted by: CharlesLutherThanos | Feb 12 2023 4:15 utc | 198

⚡️🇷🇺🇺🇦⚔️ War Map and the Situation on the Fronts in the Evening of 11 Feb 2023, pub. 00:04⚡️
⚔️ Situation on the Fronts for the past Day
🔹#Svatovo – #Kremennaya Direction:
➖ There is no change near #Kremennaya. Local battles and counter-battery fighting.
➖ In #Makeyevka LPR our artillery has worked off a cluster of militants.
➖ The Russian Ministry of Defence (MoD) reported strikes on the enemy near #Novosyolovskoye LPR, #Gryanikovka, #Krakhmalnoye and #Novomlynsk in the #Kharkov region. Russian artillery, aviation and heavy flamethrower systems also hit militants near #Stelmakhovka, #Nevskoye LPR and #Yampolovka DPR.
🔹#Artyomovsk (#Bakhmut) Sector:
➖ The “orchestrators” have squeezed the militants out of their positions at Krasnaya Gora, and ours are also advancing in #Paraskoviyevka.
➖ At the moment the AFU defence north of #Artyomovsk is disorganised. The enemy is sending reserves, but this is not helping.
➖ To the south of the city our forces are advancing near #Krasnoye and #Stupochki.
➖ Militants even blew up a road bridge over the Seversky Donets-Donbass channel on the #Artyomovsk (#Bakhmut) – #Konstantinovka highway, which hints at the imminent retreat of the enemy, and the morale of the militants speaks directly about it.
🔹#Zaporozhye Direction:
➖ According to MoD, artillery and aviation strikes were launched against AFU militants near #Ugledar, #Pavlovka and #Novosyolka in the DPR. Enemy losses amounted to more than 95 militants, two BMPs, two vehicles, an M109 Paladin artillery system, as well as three D-20 howitzers and a Hyacinth-B howitzer.
➖ The Nazis also distinguished themselves, but not by their ability to fight, but by shelling an Orthodox monastery.

https://t.me/sitreports/4421

Posted by: Down South | Feb 12 2023 4:28 utc | 200