Russian Foreign Policy

Here's my theory.
"I'll solve Ukraine in a week" election promise.
Putin sees that he now has all the cards. (Though he did want Karmala to win coz he fell for her smile)
Trump has a phone call with Putin.
Putin plays his cards to perfection: no land given back, in fact we are constitutionally entitled to all of the Donbas, no exchange of territory for the Kursk, Europeans no way acceptable as peacekeeping force.
"Jayz" say Trump to Vance "this is not going to go down well.
In panic he stages a thirst for minerals (well he is a tee-totaler) hoping to force Z to refuse, which would establish a sort of excuse for the humiliation that Putin is about to deliver to him.
But that doesn't work, Z is prepared for some arrangement over the minerals.
So He and Vance stage this GUBU Reality TV row with Z.

I never thought that I would support Putin but I really hope he takes this opportunity to utterly humiliate T & V.
I think it could trigger an internal Republican Party coup, which I think is only a matter of time anyway. Here's hoping.
 
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Itchy said:
Zelensky only got in the door of the place to sign the mining shakedown deal. But, he got played, he got baited, he took it and didn't even realise what was happening. He didn't even try to reverse course before it was too late. Major inflection point for him personally, for the war, for Europe
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he actually didn't get played because he fought back, they expected him to go in there like a lap dog and then they would humiliate and diminish him but it didn't work out like that because zelensky destroyed Vance argument about "diplomacy" with Putin, thats why they got so angry because Zelensky made them look like idiots in front of the world's media.
Also Trump can't walk away from Ukraine now as he has invested so much political capital in it now, he would then have no credibility in the Middle east and gaza. He wouldn't be able to get any deals done and would be a lame duck president, that would be the end of MAGA and Vance hope of running (he is unelectable anyway as he has no personal charisma which unfortunately Trump has)
 
I'm calling the end for Trump (in hope)

The Ukraine fiasco plus his moves on tariffs. Both against historical allies of the US.

The WSJ are calling him Tariff Man and the editorial is entitled: "Trump Takes the Dumbest Tariff Plunge" is written in a language the orange man can read.

www.wsj.com

Opinion | Trump Takes the Dumbest Tariff Plunge

He says the 25% levies on Mexico and Canada will begin Tuesday. Stocks fall.
www.wsj.com www.wsj.com

President Trump likes to cite the stock market when it’s rising as a sign of his policy success, so what does he think about Monday’s plunge? The Dow Jones Industrial Average took a 650-point header after he announced that he’ll hit Mexico and Canada on Tuesday with 25% tariffs.

Mr. Trump said at the White House there was “no room left” to negotiate with the two American trade treaty partners. Some of his smarter advisers have been hoping he’d start renegotiating the USMCA and delay the tariffs. But Mr. Trump wants tariffs for their own sake, which he says will usher in a new golden age.

We’ve courted Mr. Trump’s ire by calling the Mexico and Canada levies the “dumbest” in history, and we may have understated the point. Mr. Trump is whacking friends, not adversaries. His taxes will hit every cross-border transaction, and the North American vehicle market is so interconnected that some cars cross a border as many as eight times as they’re assembled.
Mr. Trump also objected when we reported an analysis by the Anderson Economic Group that the 25% tariff will raise the cost of a full-sized SUV assembled in North America by $9,000 and a pickup truck by $8,000. Is this how the new Republican Party plans on helping working-class voters?
Mr. Trump is volatile, and who knows how long he’ll keep the tariffs in place. Retaliation that hits certain states and businesses may also cause him to reconsider sooner than he imagines. Investors are trying to read this uncertainty as they also watch growing evidence of a slowing U.S. economy. Unbridled Tariff Man was always going to be a big economic risk in a second term, and here we are.


I think ultimately the stock market is going to fall and when that happens, he'll have no place left to hide.
 
Firefly said:
I think ultimately the stock market is going to fall and when that happens, he'll have no place left to hide.
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they are hiding out in european stock markets now , trump is an idiot for doing this now when US tech stocks are at all time highs, if he bursts the bubble removing tarriffs again won't stop the air escaping and he will be blamed for bursting the bubble, blaming Joe Biden won't wash then.
The time for radical economic moves like this is during deep recessions like Reagan did in 1980 after the 1970s inflation and oil shock not at full employment and bumper stock markets like recently
 
Trump’s State of the Nation speech last night portrayed himself as an abject blackmailer with some shouts of opposition protest which were akin to a Junior B hurling team trying to get rid of its under performing Bainisteoir. He added further to the insult by reading a letter from V Zelensky advising Ukraine’s willingness to sign over mineral rights. One Democrat from Texas seemed to be the only person with a fairly meaningful protest.

Prices continue to rise and add to US inflation. The US stock markets continue to fall. And the ordinary Americans are complaining about the availability and cost of eggs. Europe can’t go it alone, but the sooner it re-arms the better to obviate that super tanned mad raving lunatic Trump.
 
While Trump is absorbed by isolationism, with Republican backslapping acquiescence and recklessly making enemies of former allies, one wonders what would happen were history to repeat itself and the US were attacked?
 
It's not thar the US would be attacked but more that it might need allies in the future if China were to start acting like putin, that's why trumps treatment of Ukraine is very selfish and short sighted. It's not just Ukraine and Europe that trump is alienating but also Canada and Australia (also deeply concerned by trump isolationism) . So what allies will the US then have in the future , Russia, Belarus and N Korea?
How long before mass protests in the US regarding trump administration?
So far they seem immune to criticism, but if they get mocked and ridiculed in the media widely, trump won't like that
 
Well there is one theory the US would be worried about Russia helping China in a future conflict with the US.
Trying to disengage Russia from that.
But it all seems a bit Nazi Soviet Pact. Its current allies would be far more reliable in that scenario, and Trump is going out of his way to push them down the queue.
 
Roger Boyes in today's Times (UK) argues that Trump is trying to settle the Ukraine invasion as quick as he can so he can focus on the real battle ahead...with China

US leader wants swift denouement in Ukraine so he can pivot to main business of his presidency
 
And a defeat of Russia and collapse of putin regime would have been the best deterant to China. Putin is not going to dump China for US because he knows trump only there for 4 years and the next president could reverse everything trump has done.
The mind boggles at how he has convinced so many republicans that this is the course to go. Soviet Nazi pact is a good comparison
 
The more I read about the whole sorry picture - the more I think Europe is in serious denial about the new realities. They've been coming down the tracks for years if not decades.

In addition I see that the EU imported record levels of LNG - from Russia - last year. And it continues to do so, despite the so called "sanctions". You couldn't make it up!

www.theguardian.com

European imports of liquefied natural gas from Russia at ‘record levels’

Rystad Energy releases data days after Ukraine stopped flows of Russian gas through its pipelines
www.theguardian.com www.theguardian.com

On defence, I tend to agree with Cormac Lucey in last week's Sunday Times when he said this:

"Europe’s bleating at JD Vance, the vice-president, for stating the obvious — that Europe should pay for its own defence — is pitiful. Europe’s criticism of Trump for pushing for an end to the Ukraine war is shameful. We have become a superficial society consumed by ritualised processes that judge people on what they say and how they say it — are they polite people with advanced degrees? — rather than on the substance of what they do, especially if they are uncouth, bombastic New York property developers."

On a wider note, Trump's address to Congress was painful to watch; the Democrats holding up pathetic little signs while looking stony-faced and tearful as Trump defiantly spoke about border control, changing Climate policy, ending men in female sports - and the dismantling of extreme DEI was hilarious. Nancy Pelosi and others wiping the tears away was more likely in mourning for the Dems as they knew, it rather than at Trump's goading at them.

There is simply no way they'd roll back on these measures if back in office anytime soon. They must be kicking themselves in abandoning their base and going along with some of the insane stuff that has been allowed to creep in over recent years. (Similar, if not worse here.)

Anyway, we'll probably end up paying crazy money for the fighter jets Simon Harris thinks we need so badly. No doubt the OPW are on the case...
 
Howth Head said:
On defence, I tend to agree with Cormac Lucey in last week's Sunday Times when he said this:....
Europe’s criticism of Trump for pushing for an end to the Ukraine war is shameful.
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That's actually a scandalous assertion. Of course it's not the push to end the war that's the issue, it's the treachery and extorsion of the victim and the undermining of others who support them, whilst not a whit about the belligerent who can actually effect a change to the situation.
 
Howth Head said:
Europe’s criticism of Trump for pushing for an end to the Ukraine war is shameful.
Click to expand...
Not really. Everyone wants an end to the war but it’s the terms under which it would be ended that are more important.

A Ukrainian surrender in the morning would end the war but what kind of outcome would that be?

What ultimately matters is the detail of any peace deal. You can understand the reluctance of anyone to stand behind any deal which doesn’t commit to the protection of Ukraine from Russia.
 
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