I’m fine. Another problem with the Abrams is the extra logistics of bringing in Jet fuel for it’s turbine engine while most other tanks use readily available diesel fuel.
Fay and I have booked a cruise to celebrate … something our other. Possible that I survived to 75 in pretty good health. We fly to San Francisco, visit with Liz and her boys (eldest is now first year at Middlebury VA). Liz has a vast upgrade in her employer … Key Bank that pays her way more than BNS did and doesn’t mess with her bonus like they did. She has offered to get our flights for us with her airmiles (she flies a lot).
After the visit we hop on the cruise ship and sail away to distant islands in the Pacific. We return via a stop in Mexico and do some more visiting before flying back to Halifax. Somehow I managed to wangle US$750 in ‘cruise credits’ … includes $250 as retired military … though I had to fight a bit for those.
Or how about: end the demographic bulge that’s putting 10,000 people a day into the age group that uses these services. Luckily that’s exactly what will happen when, if math is correct, will start to slide down the slope to the smallest cohort in about 6+ years. The Gen X’s, the smallest of the four so-called “generations” (Baby Boom, Gen X, Millenials, Gen Z) will be 65 in 2030. Then for the next 15 years, the demand will decrease and be smaller, and supported by the largest group yet: Millenials.
Do you think we can make it to 2030? I do.
It won’t mean anything to me, but I’d like to see a massive redirection in effort. I’m afraid that we have generals playing with expensive new tanks and planes; it reminds me of those building ever larger battleships in 1940, just as they became yesterday’s news In favor of the aircraft carrier.
The battlefront today exists on multiple levels: yes, traditional hardware and so forth. But it’s also evident that cyber is being used to destabilize democracies, that ransom gangs are running riot using code, not bullets, and leveraging social media, not firing Howitzers.
And we have a “Space Force.” Oh good.
Agreed. And our response is: go ahead, take our IP. Force our companies to co-venture so you can steal even more. Close your markets while we open ours.
Give me 5% of the Pentagon budget and I’ll … OK, I’ll buy an island somewhere. But someone else might gin up some more effective countermeasures than the feckless responses we’ve had to both Russia and China thus far.
If Putin had an endgame it would be to push any forces against Russia out of the entire territory.
The Western Alliance is deciding the endgame instead over Putin’s life. That is the only way this can be dealt with. If not in Ukraine on another front the Western Alliance has to decide the endgame for Putin. He must lose so badly his Russia destroys him from within.
Goofyhoofy:“Do you think we can make it to 2030? I do.”
I don’t.
The 65 & over will grow to make up 22% of the US population. From 2012 to 2022 healthcare portion of the US budget grew by 30%. What makes you believe healthcare won’t continue to grow?
Medicare parts B & D largely comes from the general revenue of the federal government.
By the beginning of 2027, assets in the trust fund will have decreased to $93.3 billion, and with $45 billion more in spending than in revenues that year, assets will drop to $48.3 billion by the end of 2027. And in 2028, the $48.3 billion in assets in the HI trust fund at the start of the year are projected to be insufficient to cover the $56.9 billion shortfall between projected spending and revenues, leading to a deficit in the trust fund of $8.6 billion by the end of that year.
The above is just about Medicare. There is also federal spending on the Medicaid program. THat program continues to expand also.
90,933,769 individualswere enrolled in Medicaid and CHIP in the50 statesand the District of Columbia that reported enrollment data for September 2022.
That is not what I mean. The budget for arming Ukraine can be put to many different uses. The M1 needs to be built for Ukraine that is why it will take a while to be put into action. The bigger issue was announcing delivery to bolster EU actions now. What I am saying before we hand over M1s we might have other plans for the limited US Pentagon budget for Ukraine. Our commitment might have reason to shift depending on Ukraine’s needs in July or August. The money can be effectively used now as a promise and the delivery could be something else that is more useful. I do not know yet but Ukrainians want jets.
The United States military now estimates that 180,000 Russian soldiers and more than 100,000 Ukrainian troops have been killed or wounded in the invasion of Ukraine.
That kill ratio will not lead to a Ukraine victory in a war of attrition.
Zerohedge article quotes from Financial Times article.
NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg in a Monday briefing warned that the West is now locked in a race against Russia to get ammunition to the front lines in support of Ukrainian forces. He specifically affirmed that NATO countries are in a “race of logistics” regarding ammo and arms supplie s at a crucial moment of intensified fighting.
Urging more immediate production among NATO allies’ defense sectors, Stoltenberg said, “The war in Ukraine is consuming an enormous amount of munitions and depleting allied stockpiles. The current rate of Ukraine’s ammunition expenditure is many times higher than our current rate of production . This puts our defense industries under strain.”
It was only this past fall that international headlines presented a battlefield picture of a losing Russian side amid a robust West-supported Ukrainian counteroffensive in the east and south. But after Russia’s very clear victory over Soledar, and with the strategic Donetsk region city of Bakhmut also now on the verge of falling to the Russians (having been nearly encircled), those prior mainstream media reports have proven premature.
As for Stoltenberg’s words saying the major Russian offensive has already started, which was long anticipated headed into spring, he said that Moscow has shown itself willing absorb “a very high rate of casualties”. But while taking on “big losses” - the immense pressure being felt by the Ukrainians is evident.
A race between sanctions and Russian offensive. While the sanctions have hurt Russia, they have not crippled that economy from mounting military operations.
And the West’s ability to provide munitions is waning.
Yes the Ukraine has highlighting the weakness of the Russian military. But also the limitations of the West’s ability to fight an all out war. Perhaps that should enter the US calculation as it continues to pressure China. Nah. Hubris uber alles!
*Top European officials are furious with Joe Biden’s administration and now accuse the Americans of making a fortune from the war, while EU countries suffer. *
“The fact is, if you look at it soberly, the country that is most profiting from this war is the U.S. because they are selling more gas and at higher prices, and because they are selling more weapons,” one senior official told POLITICO.
The explosive comments — backed in public and private by officials, diplomats and ministers elsewhere — follow mounting anger in Europe over American subsidies that threaten to wreck European industry.
The US response: Nonsense! The U.S. rejected Europe’s complaints. “The rise in gas prices in Europe is caused by Putin’s invasion of Ukraine and Putin’s energy war against Europe, period," a spokesperson for Biden’s National Security Council said. Exports of liquefied natural gas from the U.S. to Europe “increased dramatically and enabled Europe to diversify away from Russia,” the NSC spokesperson said.
The biggest point of tension in recent weeks has been Biden’s green subsidies and taxes that Brussels says unfairly tilt trade away from the EU and threaten to destroy European industries.
The Ukraine war is a win-win for the USA. It eventually destroys Russia as a world power & cripples EU competition.
“The U.S. is following a domestic agenda, which is regrettably protectionist and discriminates against U.S. allies,” said Tonino Picula, the European Parliament’s lead person on the transatlantic relationship.
Sure because we can. The tab for decades of protection from the Soviet Union behemoth & the resulting benefit of reduced defense spending of the EU has come due. USA! USA! Sole war power. This is just a little peek at the future under the USA colossus.
I believe in the last few days a general in the Russian army explicitly said Poland was next. No, they have no desire to stop there. Peter agrees, and has some dire warnings about this as well. Russia going against a NATO member, things will get VERY UGLY.
I believe NATO & the US are already belligerents in the Ukraine war.
The US has gone from no tanks and 50 mile range of munitions for HIMARS to providing tanks and long range missiles plus targeting information from our satellites.
And likely the requested F-16s will follow if the escalation trend continues.
I also believe we are closer to WW3 than even during the Cuban missile crisis. And I have less faith in current leaders avoiding a misstep.
But there seems to be little concern within our government, population or Main Stream Media.
Now in regards to a Poland invasion. That only happens if Putin is going for broke as there are 10,000 US military personnel tripwire in Poland. And I doubt Russia would have an adequate number of men & equipment even if they are victorious in Ukraine. The outcome of that costly war is still in doubt.
But perhaps Putin believes the EU NATO forces are a house of cards and that US has inadequate transport capability to reinforce Europe in time. And that the US would not use nukes to defend Western Europe.
Would a proposed Poland campaign be a catalyst for a removal of Putin from power within Russia?
Fear of nuclear war in the west has always been Putin’s ace in the hole. He operates under the nuclear umbrella seeing how far he can go without a reaction. Reaction to Crimea was minimal, so he aims for more of Ukraine.
With our system of government he can always count on someone somewhere to cry wolf. And get headlines.
Does Putin think he can win a nuclear war? If not he is bluffing. And merely testing to see how far he can get the west to back down!!!
That is, of course, the only way he can rebuild the Soviet Union. He knows now he cannot face a NATO Army, such as in Poland. His only path forward would be nuclear. The threat of nuclear war. What would the West do? Sacrifice Poland to stay out of nuclear war? And if we called his bluff and fought him anyway, what would he do? Send them flying?
No kidding we are closer to WWIII than ever, even during the Cuban missile crisis.
Europe could have tried fracking to produce more of its own oil and then refine it into petrol. At the same time, IIRC, Europe has been dependent upon imported oil for almost a century.
Or are they talking about natural gas? The Europeans are sitting on one of the largest natural gas fields on the planet.
Groningen gas field - Wikipedia.
“The Groningen gas field is a natural gas field in Groningen province in the northeastern part of the Netherlands. With an estimated 2,740 billion cubic meters of recoverable natural gas it is the largest natural gas field in Europe and one of the largest in the world.”
When someone quotes the ZH credibility is not their strong point.
There was a Russian tank column taken out less than 24 hours ago.
Interesting how the Russians reading our press must think Ukraine’s military is unprepared. Who would plant such stories? Why would ZH take the bait? There is very little to ZH. Thinkers need not apply.
We have always made money from war. What is the surprise there?
The German’s need to learn how to make money from this as well. That way when it is necessary to fight it makes even more sense.
Hopefully we can ratchet that up a lot more. We need to finish this job with Putin being dragged through the streets of Moscow. What else would any of us expect?
With all due respect to Mr. Zeihan, I think he’s wrong.
In Russia, who has the most to lose from a nuclear confrontation? Certainly Putin, one of the richest people in the world. Oligarchs for sure, and it seems the military didn’t even want to invade Ukraine after milking the army dry. The upper echelons of the FSB? I bet they’re pretty well off, too. Why would any of them want to kill the golden goose?
I think Putin may be crazy, but he’s not insane. Also, I suspect Putin would “commit suicide” if he pushes for the nuclear option. I bet his office window is on the upper floors of the Kremlin. It’s not the fall that kills you, it’s the landing.
Of course Russia’s worst enemy is Russia. They chased out all of their best and brightest and now they’re using the rest as cannon fodder. We have states with larger economies than Russia. When was the last time you purchased a product that had a label “Made in Russia”? They’ve exposed their military as third rate. They’re bribing convicted murderers to do their fighting. They’re buying weapons from Iran. Even China and India, their closest “friends” told them don’t even think about it. It’s not like they were the ones that were invaded.
I think the “Give us what we want or we’ll kill the world” is a little hard to swallow.
But that’s just me and maybe I’m the one that’s crazy.
