The current worldwide rightward trend --- perhaps even in OZ --- may lead to a disaster like Hitler, but somehow the world will find a way to keep-on keeping-on, zig-zagging from left to right and back. Remember the grandeur-that-was-Rome? The path of history, when seen in retrospect, cycles between extremes, yet on average it seems to be on a moderate track, with few points of total anarchy.

The difference is we are now overpopulated and are outstripping resources. We have gone over the hump of the bacterial growth curve. The next time we have civilisation collapse, it will be global and we will leave behind us a polluted planet.

He can probably tell when someone is trying to pull the wool over his eyes. The question is though, will he do anything about it, or just roll over?

From the little that has been released to the media the talks while cordial, were a failure in terms of agreeing anything positive regarding a ceasefire.
Trump is basically agreeing with everything Putin says, while probably saying pretty please, I want a ceasefire, so I can claim my Nobel Peace prize.

I doubt Trump and the yes men surrounding him have any idea what game Putin is playing, as they will have sacked any Kremlinologists that were near government.
Putin is playing a classic game of diversion and delay while picking up any concessions he can along the way. He’ll end up with a long list of things Trump agreed to, conceded, or didn’t oppose before he(Putin) agrees to anything. And he’ll wave the list in Trump’s face and say, my first requirement is that this list is fully agreed to before I come to the table.

Plus he will be convincing Trump of the narrative about Nazi’s trying to take over Ukraine, necessitating a special military operation to remove them etc etc.

They’re called the security services for a reason. And what you are doing posting articles from the gutter press here, I don’t know.

Let's say China is to blame. What is Trump going to do about it?

Trump always said it was the China virus, in a snide way. Implying that it was a Chinese plot, dastedly deed, or something. The lab theory is right up his street.

Human life is a circus and you’re the jester.

If Europeans buy from the US, the problem is still there: dependence on the US + the US (as unreliable partner) could impose constraints on selling weapons to Europeans to help Ukraine. (By the way what if the US sells weapons/intelligence to Russia against Europe/Ukraine?)

I’m not qualified to answer these questions. What I would say those is that it is a very fluid situation. They may buy from the U.S. initially while they build up their own capacity. U.S. foreign policy might change back in favour of supporting Ukraine at any time( it is continuing now). The Democrats might win the next election.
Also it might not require a lot to contain Russia as things are progressing in Ukraine now.

Yeah, it might reach the point where the only way he can keep his grip on power is to declare war on other countries. He’s seen Zelenskyy initiate martial law and postpone elections, maybe he can too.

Article explaining the Putin strategy in reference to the peace talks. He is using the talks to drive a wedge between the European alliance and the U.S. While the European alliance is frantically trying to keep the U.S. with Europe.
https://europewithoutamerica.substack.com/p/the-charade-of-ukraine-ceasefire

The power’s gone to his head now. Looks like it’s going to crash and burn.
https://bsky.app/profile/50501movement.bsky.social/post/3lkkkrvu5as2r

The point is that the whole “defying a court order” thing is overblown, and certainly won’t lead to civil war, not unless the reactionary responses to these actions lead to violence against other citizens.

In which case it will be necessary to introduce martial law.

The two planes didn’t return to the U.S. court order broken.
https://bsky.app/profile/muellershewrote.bsky.social/post/3lkj34vjvvs2b

Oops wrong thread.

Irelands troubles took 75 years to stop and that was on a very small scale.

Anyway as I say Trump is so unpredictable who knows what’s going to happen.
You know those federal rulings, who’s going to enforce them?
And if there is martial law introduced and elections cancelled, will there be political violence, or will those peaceful people just go along with it?

Why would Zelensky go for that deal? If I'm Zelensky, and I can count on EU support and probably U.S. support, aren't I hoping Russia will get tired of all this, like in Afghanistan? Or there will be another coup against Putin? Or Putin might die and be replaced by a moderate? Or the Russian economy suddenly implode? Or a WW1 style French mutiny happen? There are a lot of ways this could end in Ukraine's favor and not all of them are fanciful.

It seems to me that both sides are like exhausted bloody boxers, and Russia is ahead on points, but Ukraine is thinking, if we can hold on another three rounds, and just get a knockout blow....

What I’m talking about is Trump’s efforts to agree a ceasefire. He’s been blackmailing Zelenskyy and offering Putin whatever he want’s.

If Trump wasn’t doing this, then the war would probably end in some sort of stalemate. But both sides are quite entrenched, so it would have a high cost in human lives.

Civil war? Lol. For a country of 340 million people, there is a vanishingly small amount of actual political violence. People attack each other online and then go about their daily routines being nice to one another.

Where do you live? Under a stone?

I may be wrong, it’s difficult to read with how unpredictable Trump is. But he’s seems to be so crazy that he will look for an opportunity to introduce martial law and then he doesn’t need to bother with government, or laws, or lawyers anymore. Then before the next election he will start a proxy war somewhere and cancel all elections. Or maybe Musk will have rigged elections by then and he can hold sham elections. Anyway, the U.S. is so divided that should he introduce martial law it will spark vigilante movements, which is develop into a civil war. There/s plenty of ammo sitting around and people are already organising into protest groups.

Very interesting. I would add the observation that in large populations with a small political elite(which seems unavoidable in the modern world). Certain kinds of people rise to the top and often they are ideologically aligned with either this free market capitalism, or authoritarian rule. They are often sociopathic and able to deal with and thrive under the intense pressures of modern political life. This does not bode well, unless we can find a way to moderate our politics.

You’ve just parroted Trump talking points. It’s all in his head, he’s been saying the same thing for 40 years. It was wrong then and it’s wrong now. Also are you cool with him invading Canada?

Looks like the U.S. is one step closer to civil war. The Democrats caved, but is it because they are washing their hands of Trump, so he can crash and burn without their help? Or were they heading off the imposition of Martial law, for a bit longer?

https://bsky.app/profile/empressmusings.bsky.social/post/3lkffdwwjts2k

The Europeans advised Zelenskyy following the pile on in the Oval Office. They helped him draft the letter which helped mend the relationship between Zelenskyy and Trump. They convinced Zelenskyy that he had to accept, initially, that he would have to concede Russian occupied territory and that Europe would give him full support in security guarantees, so he wouldn’t have to demand security guarantees from the U.S.
This all took a lot of intense negotiations, done in private in the week following the Oval Office incident.

European leaders and negotiators played a big role in shaping the Ukraine approach, behind the scenes.

It’s 4D chess.

They shouldn't have been surprised. In his debate with Kamala Harris, he was asked if he wanted Ukraine to win the war. He refused to answer yes/no; he said he just wanted the war to be over.

It appears he will get his wish- Ukraine is likely to surrender much of the territory Russia has seized. A loss for Ukraine is a "win" for the Trump-Putin coalition.

Yes, the signs were there. But what I think is a surprise is that they were now to become supporters of Putin. They were voting to make America great again and all that involved. But now they are having to endure inflation, to alienate America’s staunched allies and support Russia instead. They were actually voting to make Russia great again. MAGA is actually MRGA.

It will be interesting to see how Putin plays the ball that is ostensibly now in his court.

Yes, Putin will play the idiot Trump like a fiddle. He knows that come the next election and Trump leaves office, that the U.S. might be back to business as usual. That this is his only chance/opportunity to break NATO and the Western alliance. He will probably lead Trump down the garden path right into a trap and champagne corks will be popping in Moscow and Beijing.

I expect the people in the U.S. are surprised at this turn of events, MAGA May feel a bit odd when they realise that they are not MAGA any more, MRGA. And Putin will get his hands on Ukraine’s resources and bread basket ( just as climate change starts to bite).

I keep repeating because you keep ignoring. Do you deny that pivot to Asia and the danger of overstretch (which includes the burden transatlantic alliance) are major issues for American administrations, and especially for Trump?

No I don’t deny it, but getting into bed with Russia doesn’t reduce overstretch. It increases it. If the U.S. really doesn’t want overstretch, all she needs to do is enable Europe to take on the role of policing Europe and Western and Northern Asia. Then the U.S. can pivot. Although that pivot will trigger an arms race and increased tensions between U.S. and China. Again, more overstretch of a different kind.

In this unholy alliance between the U.S. and Russia, Russia will be planning the downfall and Balkanisation of the U.S. from day one. She was planning the same for Ukraine from the day that Ukraine began to disarm following the Bucharest memorandum. https://bsky.app/profile/igorsushko.bsky.social/post/3lk5qg6eh5c2e Putin will continue and increase his efforts to destabilise Europe. Europe will become a thorn in the side of the U.S., while Russia cannot be trusted. Just to deal with this is level of global overstretch would require a vast army of spies to keep Europe under check, see that Russia doesn’t undermine the U.S. and to manage the new arms race with China. And of course none of this will have occurred to Trump, or his sidekicks.

You see, Russia is an imperial expansionist, can’t you see that? Just talk to a Kremlinologist or something. She has been doing it for hundreds of years, it’s not going to stop. As far as she’s/Putin is concerned if the whole world is in disarray and fighting amongst themselves the Soviet Union will stand proud. She will be great again.

All your talk of mineral deals is just trade and money, Trump is a used car salesman, he has no idea about the geopolitical implications of his wheeler dealing. He will mess up big time, although it looks as though the U.S. economy will implode before he does too much damage.

Also Trump is out on a limb, as I was pointing out, Putin is Kriptonite to most people in the West. Trump is pretty much going it alone. While the West (including 99% of the U.S. population) looks on in horror with a bitter taste in its mouth.

Yes, I definately do!

Thanks for laying it out ssu, I don’t really have the time to go through all this with neomac right now. It certainly does seem that the U.S. has got some big problems to sort out. Her greatest enemy at the moment is the U.S.

Musk expresses support for rival to Reform UK as feud in Farage’s party intensifies:

That article is behind a paywall, I don’t need to read it though. The Reform party is Nigel Farage, this is what Musk doesn’t understand. Just like the way that the Republican Party is Trump. Take Farage out of the party and Reform reverts to some form of the BNP. A fringe party of racists that the electorate won’t go near.

The prospect of Europeans re-arming still looks more like a knee-jerk reaction under emergency than a raising trend spanning over years, if not decades (as it was the case for Russia and China), right? We will see how persistent, consistent and integrated the European effort will be in building up a credible deterrent against the big sharks.

You obviously don’t understand the European people, Germany has flung open the doors to over a €trillion for defence spending. Including large grants for member states to invest. The U.K. with the EU is looking at some kind of associate membership of the Single Market so as to streamline the process of cooperation in this endeavour. This development itself will bring the EU into new economic growth in one move. The U.K. and France alongside some others already have the skills to usher in a military industrial complex.

You do understand don’t you why European countries haven’t re-armed significantly over recent decades? And that the reason for this “complacency” has disappeared in an instant.

Europeans was more a burden than a deterrence to rival powers, do you deny that? And if Trump's manages to bring Russia on a strategic partnership to contain China,

You keep repeating this, it would only have some validity as an argument if Trump had become an authoritarian dictator. At the moment, Trump’s “rule” is looking like a temporary aberration and we will be back to business as usual come the next election. But the trans-Atlantic alliance will be in a much stronger position with a re-arming Europe.

But you suggest the U.S. for some reason would want to strengthen Russia,, have a blind eye to her expansionism and the resultant turmoil this might engender in Europe. Lose the alliances with Europe. For some notional strategic goal re-China. It’s a weird take, even if Trump were a dictator.

Broadcast on Russian TV last night. Solovyov saying that there is no need for a ceasefire now, JD Vance is their man.
https://youtu.be/5QyOiYAkWPM?feature=shared

And the possibility of Trump exiting NATO is growing. Because the next issue is when Europe starts to replacing US systems with its own to help Ukraine, Trump might get angry about it.

Insane it is then. Will this mean all the U.S. military bases in Europe being put under wraps.

On the good side, Musk backed down from shutting down starlink from Ukraine. At least Elon understood that his commercial product will face problems, if the producers shuts down the service from customers so easily.

We’ll Tesla stock is tanking, he’ll have to keep his Starlink clients on board to avoid bankruptcy, or at least to keep his ambitions in space flight going.

Also going back to the point about how feeble Trump is about worries of economic recession. Has it not occurred to him that the economic prosperity the West has enjoyed over the last 80years is reliant on peace and stability and good relations between trading partners around the world. And that all this strong man disruption that he’s doing is only going to disrupt that peace and stability resulting in recession, or depression?
I bet that in the minds of the republicans driving this madness forward. Everyone is equally prosperous, indeed the economy is booming and by cutting all the bureaucracy, red tape and global supply lines. All their consumer goods will still be supplied on time and with up to date tech’. In the minds of the Brexiters we were going to alight in the sunlit uplands of free trade and prosperity, freed from the shackles of the single market. The reality was the exact opposite.

Who has given Ukraine's autonomy away? Surely, if the Ukrainians were autonomous the only ones who could have done so is they themselves.

Trump would blackmail the Ukrainians into capitulation.

He won't, because he can't. I recall seeing your mention in other posts that the Russians are militarily in a weak spot and can be pressured. I think the opposite is true.

All Trump needs to do is say if Russia doesn’t compromise, U.S. support for Ukraine would be doubled. Or they would give them full air support. A Strong U.S. leader would be able to do this. I suspect Trump is weak.

Yes, but Ukraine’s autonomy has effectively been given away before the negotiations have begun. And Russia will not soften her line that Ukraine must not join NATO, and there must not be a peacekeeping, or deterrent forces on the ground in Ukraine. The negotiations are over before they have begun. Unless that is Trump finds some cajonas and forces Russia into a much weaker position.
Do you think he will go there?

Here is an expert to explain the situation,
https://youtu.be/vyCS1GSLqzk?feature=shared

It's a very long way for Europe to become a united world power. See, UK is not even in the EU (the Brexit, remember?). I don't see the point of getting enthusiastic over strategic revisions that are still on the making. And then let our imagination jump to desirable future scenarios as if they were already within reach. Things can go awfully wrong in so many ways.

Yes, it’s a long way off for Europe, but the forces against this outcome have taken a knock.

This is not about enthusiasms for outcomes, but rather looking for trends. I gave you my reasoning before for why the U.S. turning against her closest allies in Europe puts her in a weak position globally, resulting in a pincer movement whereby the U.S. becomes distracted by developments in Europe while she becomes overstretched in her pivot to the east. That thinking that Russia is powerful is flawed out of date thinking. She is small, ie, the state and run by a tinpot dictator, who relied on oil and gas revenues. There may have been a time a generation ago when Russia was a world power. But that time is long gone. Although by turning against Europe the U.S. may enable Russia to regain her world power status.
So for the U.S. there are two choices. A powerful U.S. allied with Europe as a counter to China, with an inconsequential Russia. Or a powerful U.S. alone in the world against a powerful Russia allied with China, with an inconsequential Europe.

Now if the U.S. sees China, rightly, as the greatest threat. Then the first option is the logical one and the second is insane.

Did you watch the interview with Oleksandr Chalyi, where he literally states he believes the Russians were serious and ready for a negotiated settlement during the Istanbul agreements?

There will be many people who think Putin can be trusted, but the only person who can answer the question is Putin. All we can do is judge him from his actions and the verdict is not good.

There is a narrative coming out of Russia which we can assess. Which is basically saying our safety, autonomy, sovereignty etc can only be protected, secured, with the emasculation of Ukraine.

Any negotiations which Putin agrees to which does not achieve this is sure to be reneged on. Presumably this is why Trump is pushing for this. Whether he is happy to facilitate this end for Putin, or he is being blackmailed, or conned into it.

I think it’s still too early to be optimistic about European reactions.

Already Reform in the U.K. is split and in disarray. Established rightwing political commentators, such as Andrew Neil are washing their hands of Trump. Putin is Kryptonite, on a level in the public opinion with Hitler. I haven’t been following the reaction from the right in other European countries. However the resolve and camaraderie between EU leaders is clear to see.

Regarding the geopolitics of the situation my position hasn’t changed much from our previous conversation. Trump is not as yet an authoritarian leader, it’s just cosplay at this point. I very much doubt that he will be able to overturn the democracy in the U.S. In which case, this is a blip and we will be back to business as usual once Trump leaves office. Or it would result in a civil war. In which case, the U.S. will withdraw from the world stage while they sort out issues at home for a few years.

Although if the U.S. were to step back from the world stage for some time(for whatever reason), geopolitics would return to a peaceful state for that period. Russia would be licking her wounds and China would continue as before, playing the long game. With the noticeable difference that Europe would be a strong world power, conducting trade and cooperation with China and the U.S. may well find herself in third place.

That’s what I keep doing, but you do not want to listen. I’ll repeat it in short. Pivot to Asia, the burden of Globalization, EU parasitism are the main premises of the reasoning. Russia is needed to contain China (Israel helps too) and keep it isolated from Europe. To Trump Russia looks enough depleted of power projection means and always jealous of the US attentions. While the EU looks too opportunistic about US economic and military support while being too snobbish about US global policing.
Now both the Russian-Ukrainian conflict and Israeli-Palestinian conflict must end to redirect energies where they need to be.

So this is what Trump is thinking? It’s still looney and quite a stretch.

These are details, Putin is still at the top of the pyramid. There is nothing else to be said. Unless you would like to demonstrate that Putin can be trusted.

And Putin wouldn’t invade if an agreement had been signed?
It doesn’t matter what argument is put forward, everything goes back to Putin. Someone who can’t be trusted.

Trump doesn't quite get it, because he cannot quite say publicly why Zelensky is insisting on fighting on: the US and UK urged him to fight on in March/April 2022, when a reasonable deal was about to signed concerning the neutral status of Ukraine.

A deal with Putin, yeah right.

Thucydides

SSU has covered this.

The small Baltic states and Poland would by now have been invaded, subjected to brutal abuse and assimilated into Russia by force. Or had Putin puppet governments installed, if they had not joined NATO. This why those countries requested NATO membership.

Making comparisons with other countries doesn’t account for these circumstances. Again we have been gaslit with Russian propaganda for decades on these issues. Propaganda behind which naked imperialist ambitions were played out.

Anyway, none of this matters.

There will be peace in Ukraine, and Europe won't be going to war with Russia, no matter how hard some disgruntled intellectuals might find it to swallow their words.

Correct, but Europe must re-arm quickly, this is why many people are shouting about the Russian threat. It takes a lot of effort to overcome the inertia that you hit when it actually comes to working out and funding how you are going to do it.
Russia’s special military operation is a failure. It has weakened her capabilities, reduced her to a pariah and resulted in the opposite of what it was supposed to achieve.
Russia had an opportunity to become a respected partner and actor on the world stage when Relations between the West and Russia were good following the fall of USSR. But it was all squandered and thrown away by a tinpot dictator. All it required was a bit of humility in accepting that the smaller now independent states that used to be in the USSR had a right to autonomy. They will have to wait another generation, or two now before they can come in from the cold.

It’s a myth that “we” said we wouldn’t expand NATO to the east.
https://www.brookings.edu/articles/did-nato-promise-not-to-enlarge-gorbachev-says-no/

Also the idea that NATO is a threat to Russia, that there needs to be a buffer zone of neutral states between NATO and Russia are Kremlin talking points. A narrative used to mask Putin’s plans to invade and absorb all the previous states that formed part of USSR. An ambition thwarted if those states are members of NATO, a purely defensive alliance.