THE JEDDAH SUMMIT

6 July 2023

1. Ukraine mustered 12 divisions which it organised into two core: the 9th and the 10th. The 9th was supposed to break through Russian defenses and the 10th follow through to the Sea of Azof. What happened was that the 9th failed so the 10th was moved in to do its work and it too has failed.

2. The Vilnius Summit had been organised to confirm "mission accomplished" ie announce Ukraine's success and welcome it to Nato (the purpose of the war), but as we know because the offensive had failed there was no place for Ukraine in NATO and it will never join.

3. The purpose of the Jeddah Summit was to confirm arrangements for Russia's surrender.

The whole Enterprise went laughably wrong for simple reasons:

a) no one had read a history book which would have demonstrated Russia's capabilities and determination

b) no one had investigated Russia's current preparations for a war that it began to anticipate when it became clear that Minsk was a delaying tactic

c) America (Jake Sullivan) had only a strategy (of escalation), no plan A (the West ran out of arms) and no plan B (the offensive failed)

d) America did not have what it takes, and is moving the focus to a Trump-free election

e) The conference - including China - was clear that Ukraine's goals of emptying Ukraine of Russia troops back to pre-2014 lines was not realistic and his govt should head for negotiations to achieve a "just and fair"settlement (China's word).

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FRESH HOPE FOR EAST WEST DIALOGUE

5 July 2024

“It is deeply in the US national interest to intensify communication with China on critical issues where war and peace are at stake,” said Scott Kennedy, a China expert at the CSIS think-tank.

America's goal

America's goal is to remain in charge, the global hegemon, for ever. America built its global institutions after the last world war, which express its rules for free and fair trade, and it enforces them globally, using mostly the powers of its reserve currency and its  military alliances, for example Nato. An alliance is built on the basis that there is a common enemy and this would tend foreign policy to war rather than peace.

Problems for America

Small problem at the moment: its currency and military are under threat and there are also serious problems at home from inequality to the Culture Wars. Its current idea is to parley with China, the time to rebuild its economy and military and hold back the Rise of China until China is defeated by its own demographics.

The American plan

This blog has been complaining for a long time about the quality of the West's leaders and the focus on hegemony and military rather than peace and diplomacy. Take the example of Jake Sullivan, NSA, the Ukrainian offensive and the Jeddah peace conference. Or the case of Tony Blinken, US secretary of state, who visited China in June and is now creating two working groups to focus on Asia-Pacific regional issues and maritime issues, and a possible third group to focus on broader areas.

Sullivan, United States national security advisor, is in reality Biden's campaign manager, not a diplomat, not a military man either. He is looking at November 24 and sees this war as a major obstacle to a Democrat victory - as understanding of this war grows the American taxpaying public will turn increasingly against and in any case the truth that America is losing this war is emerging.

Sullivan is a campaign manager, not a diplomat. Diplomacy is about negotiation, not conquest per se. Diplomacy is listening, understanding, reaching agreements where each side can satisfy itself by conceding on points less important to itself than the other side. The object is peace. 

Contrast this with the present American leadership whose object is to preserve American primacy through victory. These people's formative years were the 70s and they are determined to reverse the defeat of Vietnam. To a neocon, seeking peace through negotiation is appeasement. 

Whereas to an older generation, with scary memories of the last war, the objective is peace. Peace requires neutrality of individual countries, rather than military alliances. Austria was one example, Ukraine is another, Stalin himself arranged a disarmed and neutral W Germany, with peace in mind.

(Organisation note

Jake Sullivan, National Security Advisor, heads the National Security Council (NSC) and usually chairs meetings, when it isn't Biden himself, US President, of the Principals Committee of the NSC with Blinken, who is the Secretary of State, and Lloyd Austin, the US Secretary of Defense.)

Here is where our leadership falls down and comes across as mediocre. This blog has already pointed out the futility of Copenhagen, where Sullivan was supposed to persuade the global south to come off the fence, join the sanctions, pressure Russia to withdraw. Now Sullivan has organised this Jeddah "peace" conference to follow through on this aim. And we have Blinken now opening these new lines of communication with China to tackle contentious issues.

Focus on Jeddah

As a peace conference can never work since one of the protagonists, Russia, has not been invited, so it cannot in all seriousness be about peace.

The invitees 

China has already declined and had declined Copenhagen before. Mexico has declined because Russia is not present. Brazil and India look unlikely to send top diplomats, if they attend at all. So failure in terms of peace, or persuading the global South to join the sanctions regime, is pretty much baked in by the absence of key participants.

The most absurd part is that the conference is supposed to sell the Ukrainian position, which is that Russia must withdraw completely from all "its" territories including Crimea before it will negotiate, ie it will only negotiate with Russia once Russia has surrendered.

And the saddest part is the Ukrainian offensive. This strategy is Sullivan's, it is Sullivan's strategy. The Ukrainian 9th Corps was supposed to punch through the Russian defence lines and the 10th was supposed to follow through to this sea of Asov. 

That plan is a failure with 30,000 Ukrainian losses since 4th June and the 10th sent in to supplement, with the Ukrainians still stuck in the gray zone without having even got as far as the first line of Russian defenses.

Reminder: the Stakes are high

The stakes could not be higher - war and peace, rhe survival of The Russian Federation or The American Order, ultimately of the human race through the avoidance of  nuclear war. 

Just to set the context once again. Remember that this demonstration of American might as well as the strength of its reserve currency is being closely watched by China. Remember too that Russia has complained for decades about NATO expansion and Ukraine is the brightest of red lines which it sees as threatening to its very survival. Could the stakes be any higher? 

Well yes they could, instead of conflict and war, we should be looking at a new architecture for security in Europe if not globally, we should be working together to preserve the planet, with the goal of peaceful coexistence between nation states and the wellbeing and prosperity of peoples everywhere.

Thinking by everyone, for everyone

This is how reality is perceived by those with whom we should be negotiating. Our goal should be to agree solutions to bigger problems, from Security in Europe to Climate Change across the planet. Do you think our current leadership is up to this? What if it isn't?

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GIVE PEOPLE THE VOTE

3 August 2023

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2023/08/02/britain-now-elite-dictatorship-majority-opinions-crushed/

"Britain is now an elite dictatorship where majority opinions are crushed

Start listening to the voters on cars, crime and wokery, or there’ll be an uprising even bigger than Brexit"

What Allister Heath seems to be saying is that Society is run by technocrats working on behalf of an elite, and politicians are just their mouthpieces or spokespersons. In other words, there is only one single governing Elite and our Representatives - never mind which party they say they belong to - all belong to the same Elite.

The upshot is that people have no real choice and there's no real change, no radical new ideas to meet increasingly severe challenges to our world, conformity rules, everything is inside the box.

Is this true? Most people only want things for themselves and for their immediate future. In a diverse Society like ours, this brings everyone into conflict with everyone else or  you get what he notes would be a tyranny of the majority eg on immigration.

Is it true that society is split in two - an elite and the people? Surely there's some social mobility, membership of the elite is actually more like a game of musical chairs... it's true that most of the chairs stay occupied while the music plays; but when the Music Stops there's always some chairs free and many aspirants competing for them; and there are still other people who want to turn the whole effing lot over and sometimes they can trump the wannabees.

This process of change can be accelerated by the elites, excesses like Ulez or the war in Ukraine or the debanking scandal, that open breaches in the elites defenses.

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THE POLICY OF CONTAINMENT IS A FAILURE

1 August 2023

Here is a thoughtful article on George Kennan. Kennan, going back to Mackinder, is credited with the American policy of containment. True but also rather ironical. George Kennan did advise that NATO trying to take Ukraine would be the brightest of red lines for Russia.

Instead of containing Russia militarily, which has the American thread of wanting to divide potential rivals, we in Europe should be including Russia - politically and militarily Russia could have joined Nato as Putin had hoped; economically as supplier of cheap energy and raw materials; and culturally remembering that Russia is more European than it is Asian.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202203/1257094.shtml

All these opportunities lost. America must have its enemy to kick against and understand its young self. Supremacy, exceptionalism, number one - these are all problems of the developing ego.

===

As this column has said from the very start, this foreign policy adventure will end in failure and likely the greatest of all American foreign policy disasters, possibly the end of the American Order. This would be something that we in the West wish to avoid - we wish to be allies of America but free to not be invariably aligned to America because our interests are often different.

The Ukrainian offensive began on 4 June and in two months has made absolutely no progress other than capturing a few hamlets. It has not touched the Russian front line and the muddy season is almost upon us. This will put an end to the offensive and the prospects of renewing it in the winter ice or the spring are zero.

So to what will happen next, especially with an election year 2024? It seems to me that the neocon and other nasty elements of the foreign policy elite will be driven out of town and more reasonable minds, more mature egos, interested in combining assets rather than divide and rule, will take over and enter a negotiated settlement.

What will such a negotiated settlement look like? Probably it will meet the initial aims laid out in December 2021 for a neutral Ukraine and a changed regime in Kiev with a government more understanding of Russian security needs and how these might be compatible with its own.

Russia is interested in taking territory that will push back its front line with Nato, and that it can hold with support from the local popn. Russia would not want to return land to find the shelling restarts, or it's reoccupied by the nasties, by Nato even.

In the case where Russia needs land as a buffer but the local people are not sympathetic, there it would need to change the government I'd have thought, meaning the kievian regime. But even a new and Moscow-leaning gov in U would need solid security arrangement that benefits both sides....govts come and might go.

Surely it is not just Ukraine: the whole of that line from the Baltics down to Romania and Bulgaria needs fixing and not an arms race, not just balance of power, but an agreement to limit troops and weapons the length of the E-W divide. How to disarm and to verify? Strikes me that Russia would have to join Nato for security arrangements to be made permanent.

Russia with the upper hand and backed by BRICS+, we'd be looking minimum at a Ukraine about 55 to 60% of pre-2014 (4 oblasts, plus another 4, Odessa), no access to the Sea, a sympathetic govt watchful of the interests of Poland to its West and Belarus to its North. And long term acting as one part of an East - West  buffer.

Sad to say but is this a new Iron Curtain? And how ever can anything be built between two parties who thoroughly mistrust each other?

All so lamentable and regrettable. When I think about how things could have been so very different with Russia included in NATO, with Russia included in European culture to which it is much closer than Asian culture, with a Russia included economically as a supplier of cheap energy and raw materials, a Russia included socially technologically and educationally.

When I think of a Europe more independent of America, which could be a global leader, for example in matters of the environment or security, and instead is relegated to a third class after thought in world affairs.

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NEW EUROPEANS - SWOT, GOALS, STRATEGY, POLICIES

31 July 2023

PROBLEMS / REQUIREMENTS - FOCUS ON DEINDUSTRIALISATION

De-industrialization is the loss of manufacturing jobs - Trump's rust belt from 80s/90s, Obama's Detroit after the 2008, now Germany's turn from sanctions cutting off cheap Russian energy and raw materials.

Not just sanctions, rising interest rates must also be a factor as Germany is an export-led economy and now its products are more expensive than the competition. Though demand for the Euro from EU trade partners makes the Euro cheaper than would be the Deutschmark. 

To sum up, troubles in manufacturing arise from rising costs: energy and raw materials import prices, interest rates and thirdly not forgetting the Green Deal - however you see the benefits, you have to agree Go Green is way costly.

ECONOMIC - KPIs

It's about the manufacture of finished goods: aviation, cars & parts; chemicals; electrical; machine tools. 

It's measured in GDP and employment. 

It's targets are relative - Germany's and the EU's loss is presumably America's and China's gain as the jobs must go somewhere, even in a recession?

ROOT CAUSES

It is looking like a near permanent loss and that's disastrous for Germany and so for the EU.

The EU is responsible for applying these sanctions, the ECB for monetary policy, and the EU again for the Energy Transition and for Industrial Policy.

Europe is allied to the US, but also aligned to. It has no goals of its own, little real independence. That's what being vassalised means and that's why the UK left - nobody wants to be a dogsbody.

WHAT TO DO?

To return to dynamic growth, the EU could set a goal of having the largest GDP of the three trading blocks by 2043. 

Just planning out the strategic consequences for political independence and for industrial policy would dynamise and invigorate Europe's economies. 

Free Movement of Labour should be delegated to a member-level decision and the UK could be invited to rejoin.

Change on this scale would require replacing the political elite with a younger class of aspiring - can this be done within the confines of late-stage "Liberal democracy"?

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AND IF AMERICA LOSES AGAINST RUSSIA?

30 July 2023

Some risks to pursuing war.

*Losing* is one risk most here this afternoon haven't thought about.

If America loses in Ukraine it's a foregone conclusion that it will lose in Taiwan. Losing against China means it has lost its global supremacy. Many would suggest cancelling the offensive and starting negotiations before it's too late. Means this month or next, if we are lucky.

America losing in Ukraine could be like Britain losing in Suez. At the time, other countries were buying gilts because gilts were the safest of homes for your money. There were four US dollars to the pound before Suez, today it's nearer one. In America's case, how would America continue to meet the interest payments on its gov bonds and avoid a run on the dollar and the RMB going convertible?

*Nuclear war* is another risk noone takes seriously.

It is plain that the West is upping the ante in Ukraine with delivery of ever more sophisticated weapons and technology, because America must not lose. What is to stop an eventual nuclear World War?

*Collapse in civil society* another risk.

We have all this propaganda aimed at getting the consent of our own people, to avoid a collapse in morale and gov.t authority. How to spin a settlement as a victory, pull ourselves together and avoid massive civil strife at home?

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TRUMP HEADING TO PRISON FOR THE REST OF HIS NATURAL

28 July 2023

So the charges are piling up and Donald Trump is heading to prison for the rest of his life. I wonder why that could be.

You have to realise that this is supported by almost all members of Congress, both Senate and the House of Representatives and on both sides of the chambers.

What have they got in common? It looks like they all support these mad foreign wars, for reasons we can guess. Whereas before we had been thinking that America was run by the "military-industrial-congressional elite", now we can see that it's true, at least in the case of foreign policy.

And Trump has said - did say, way back in 2016 - that he will put a stop to these wars.

In fact, America today looks much like the Roman Empire of yesteryear. Or Britain under Elizabeth I and later, the one before this American Order. They are a military with a taxpayer funded government attached, who forage the world in search of new countries to plunder.

That is the nature of empires, but civilisations come and go, soon it will be our turn.

AND EUROPE WILL RISE AGAIN

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THE FUTURE OF NATO

27 July 2023

Beyond NATO membership lie the fodder and the enemy.

Europe's turn comes next - it has already started paying the price economically, with the sanctions.

Do you think Western Europe will get involved militarily? Never mind the nuclear, it doesn't have the resources to tackle a resurgent Russia, certainly not now; maybe NATO's eastern fringe would like to have a go?

American put their own boots on the ground? Certainly not! Sure about the nuclear? Not sure.

Someone asked "One more non-negotiable demand for the ceasefire talks -- the Black Sea is to become a Nato lake". I'm sure that is a NATO objective, but would Russia show up to any such talks, or maybe this doesn't matter.

Here is a metaphor for this war. When a tier1 customer orders supplies of a complicated sub-assembly from a first line supplier, it first of all clarifies the requirements and checks the capabilities and capacities of its supplier, before placing the order. 

It doesn't stop there, during execution of the order, the customer purchasing department will make regular audit inspections of the supplier's production facilities.

All this to ensure the timeliness quality and cost of deliveries.

What planning did the Pentagon undertake in its preparations of this offensive with Ukraine's political and military leadership? Can it really only be now that the Pentagon and the National Scurity Council realise that this offensive is being defeated?

To all the evidence, America's planning was woefully insufficient, while Ukraine's execution is a costly failure.

The western powers need to renew our leadership and review the whole way of working, from the goals downwards.

Of course Russia is not without its problems. Take the Prigo affair. Prigo was deeply angered at his Military Headquarters for not supplying him with the munitions he needed to defend his men.

But then you have to understand that the Ministry wanted to keep the Bahkmout "meat grinder" trap open. 

The proof of this is that though Prigo took the town, he had received no instructions to build a defensive post capture line. Indeed if you look at a map, Bahkmout lies east of the defences that the high command had been building since October.

So this dispute was caused by a conflict of objectives and a refusal to accept the strategy of the Ministry. This is what insubordination means. The result is Prigo is in exile (so it is claimed), Ukraine is having another go at Arkiomsk the former Bahkmout and Russia is having to transfer troops from Malinka to defend its latest capture.

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THE EFFECT OF TROLLS ON THE OUTCOME OF THE WAR IN UKRAINE

24 July 2023

Just a reflection on the Western Government trolls. 

Propaganda means the things which are to be propagated. It is about information and misinformation, concerning your strengths and weaknesses, what you present and what you hold back.

When you are the defender, you present yourself as strong, fearsome. When you are the attacker, you present yourself as weak, the more easily to slip under the radar, attack and kill.

Now, propaganda is not sloshing about negative or meaningless comments. Propaganda has a purpose: it serves the aims of the war.

What are those aims? For Ukraine, it is about land and borders, also ethnicities. For Russia, it is as stated at the start to “demilitarize” and “de-Nazify” the country.

My point is as always a simple and obvious one. When the trolls talk of Putin's wish to be a dictator, or to conquer new lands, or to re-form the Russian Empire or Soviet Union; when the trolls tell us that Russia is out of weapons, out of men, out of morale; what is the effect of their words?

Who is their audience? Surely not the Curious truth Seeker as their comments are hardly worth reading therefore Their audience must be themselves and those already suffering from russophobia.

All I want to say that it is very strange that in this war Russia does not generate any propaganda, as far as I can see There are open conferences and meetings with journalists that are recorded and no doubt questions are pre-prepared, but other than that Taas is not read by anyone and just generates basic facts.

And why might this be, why is Russia a black hole emitting no "information" to the West? Probably because the trolls here are doing the Russians' work for them. They are painting the Russians as essentially weak, ill-equipped, unprofessional and lacking fibre and morale. And Ukrainians read this and believe this.

That is exactly what the Russians want.

Not only that, but by their inane comments, the trolls present a picture of western publics as foolish and culpable. Imagine the shock and public reaction when confronted with reality. How many politicians and journalists will lose their jobs?

THE TROLLS ARE BATTING FOR THE OTHER SIDE

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THE INDONESIAN SPICE ISLANDS

24 July 2023

"This Kashmiri dish is a very famous traditional dish. My friend's kashmiri wife cooked this for us in the 70s and the taste still lingers. We are going to cook this dish this week and thought of sharing it with you all. If u dont have  garam masala use your own garam masala. Zafrani garam masala is not available in Doha but i am getting it fm Kochi this week. But always manage with substitutes."

I do have garam masala. Perhaps not Zafrani, but Bali. 

The best spices come from The Spice Islands,. These are the dozens of tiny rain-soaked forests, luxuriant, verdoyant, volcanic islands on the equator pretty much, that make up the Indonesian archipelago of the Moluccas, aka the Maluku Islands if you prefer. 

Today, you can buy these spices in Dewata and Bintang supermarkets and the very best brand is Nox.

Until the 1700s, all the world's cloves, nutmeg, and mace (which is the powdered skin of the meg nut) came from here, though noone knew this as the Arab traders had kept this secret since the 4th century.

Then came Vasco da Gama on his famous voyage in 1497, round the Cape to India. The Portuguese proceeded to figure out where these Arab spices were coming from.

It is said that local people planted a clove tree each time a child was born, thus through the generations, through practise and custom, man (which includes women) and his destiny were wedded to the forest.

But the Dutch, who eventually took over the Moluccas in the seventeenth century, in order to limit supply and raise wholesale prices, tore down the forests except on Amboina and a few other islands, making cloves worth more than their weight in gold! ... But also making mad the native Polynesians. 

Slowly slowly, the spice was cultivated in other parts of the world - Brazil, the West Indies, Zanzibar ... and today you can buy cloves for your Sunday pork roast with crackling, and your apple pie & custard, in Sainsburys and Tesco.

The British when they colonised converted the people to Christianity, taught them English, introduced them to the latest hot playwright, left behind the rule of law and strict accounting principles. The Dutch by contrast left the people as ignorant as they were when they found them. You have only to compare Singapore or Malaysia with Indonesia....but the latter are fast catching up!

More than that, the Portuguese took great risks in order to discover the Spice Islands and along the way going round the Cape they got lost and found the new world, full of red Indians - Christopher Columbus sailed West across the Atlantic, in fourteen hundred and ninety-two Columbus sailed the ocean blue; and Magellan did the world's first luxury cruise round the entire globe, returning East across the Pacific.

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THINGS ARE GETTING HOTTER

24 July 2023

"I am in Doha and getting roasted everyday. Temp was 46C yesterday with govt warning that it could go up to 55C and requesting citizens to avoid exposure to sun between 10 am and 3 pm, avoid keeping gas cylinders outside, avoid gas filling during day time, avoid filling gas full tank etc. First time I see these warnings.

Back home in Kochi it is raining non stop with temp in the 20s."

Yes, climate change is another catastrophe catching up on our past bad behaviour faster than was predicted. We pushed nature into a corner, it came roaring back once with covid, now we really reap the whirlwind with climate change. The world burns while the boys fiddle with their toys in Ukraine. 

How mad is that?

Bali we experienced a week of torrential rain, the water from heaven was falling in chords and sheets. Was it a de-regulated monsoon? Nobody knows, our clocks are still spinning in the hurricane.

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