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Shrike


				

				

				
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joined 2023 December 20 23:39:44 UTC

				

User ID: 2807

Shrike


				
				
				

				
0 followers   follows 0 users   joined 2023 December 20 23:39:44 UTC

					

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User ID: 2807

I'm certain there are numerous records of Western and Russian leaders saying things that totally support any given picture, including this one.

Really? Can you show me records of Putin saying "really Ukraine joining NATO is fine, I don't care"? Or Medevev or Yeltsin, even?

Are Putin's decisions sound, practical? maximizing interests of his own country, roughly based on reality as it can be observed?

It is hard to know the totality of information Putin is acting on. But on balance I think Putin has governed fairly well, from where I sit. You can look at "national vital signs" types of stats like life expectancy to see that. I think that Russians are slightly more paranoid than is corresponding with reality, but I think their general concerns about NATO are quite sane. Whether or not the "SMO" will prove to be a massive win or a massive blunder is probably too soon to tell, but my guess is that it will end up being a win, albeit one with a cost.

Based on Russian rhetoric and expecting from them self-interested actions, you might well argue that moving westward was actually more sound of strategy after 2014 than before.

Yes, I actually think there is a decent argument to be made here. Unfortunately(?) I was following this back before 2014 and so I consider mistakes made at that time and even before to be worth re-litigating.

Basically, I think there's this 'noble savage' view of Russia/Putin in the sense that there are supposed to be totally sound, realistic, predicable motivations in the driver's seat, they're just not easy to grasp for a Westerner, but I don't believe any of it holds up or amounts to more than wishful attempts to force orderly models on a messy world.

Sure, I agree that people are always trying to essentially force orderly models on a messy world. But whatever messy eccentricities there are with Putin and Russia, I think that "great powers are likely to intervene to stop hostile alliance formation on its borders" is just sort of something you should anticipate as a general rule. I think this in part because I, too, live in a great power and when the shoe was on the other foot (as it has been several times) we responded with military coercion.

Now, I agree that this general model is necessarily fine-grained enough to predict exactly what Russia's specific response was going to be. But it's good enough to anticipate a hostile response.

especially if they are held repeatedly, are disturbing to the staff and visitors at a vulnerable moment, and are in contradiction of a court order.

It appears that Scotland is banning silent prayer which is a far cry from violent or even noisy demonstrations.

my point is that an equal infringement of freedoms at a different location not so important to christian fundamentalists would not cause any outrage, so if that's true, it's not at actually freedom that is at issue.

Christians in America have been concerned about the infringement of religious freedom in the military and even – despite the rightwing/business alliance – in the workplace. If the VA forbid silent prayer inside of their medical centers right-wing evangelicals would be livid (and in fact every so often issues like this crop up in the military and the right wing Christian evangelical/fundamentalist types get Big Mad about it). Now, I do think it's true that righties and Christians, like everyone else, often aren't perfectly principled. But I also don't think that having e.g. in-group bias means you are insincere .

I still think it's better to be before a judge who was appointed or elected than one who was hired by your adversary in the case which is how ALJs work.

Where I got the idea is just listening to the drumbeat of criticism of Ukraine and praise for Russia, and the US's willingness to throw away all the bargaining chips immediately.

If the United States had ended sanctions and weapons deliveries, they would have thrown away their bargaining chips (although not really since they could resume them both at a moment's notice). But instead they are expecting concessions from Russia. That's how bargaining works.

Is it apparent to Europe that they now face a transformed world after 80 years of relative confidence in the US's ideological preferences, yes.

I think that wise European actors (the French) have more or less always understood that American ideological preferences (or perhaps more relevantly, interests in Europe) were contingent and not permanent.

Certainly I don't think J.D. Vance giving a speech is at the level of the United States threatening to destroy the British economy (which we did in 1956 after they invaded Egypt) so I'm not sure I buy this idea you seem to have that the United States has just been a team player to Europe since the end of World War Two.

Regarding religious freedoms in Europe, I think that American concerns are pretty much bullshit and an excuse

I mean I dunno what to tell you, it might be that it's an excuse for the administration, but the bottom-up sentiment is real. My recollection is that mainstream right-wing media in the United States has been complaining about this for a long time. Certainly I've complained about this sort of thing on here.

if Trump introduced things like protest exclusion zones outside, I dunno, military hospitals instead of abortion centres (such things were seemingly the thing JD Vance is mainly exercised about at a time of grave geopolitical danger) ... if Trump introduced those then the same people complaining about Europe's restrictions wouldn't bat an eyelid.

Aren't military hospitals likely to be on military bases where your rights are already restricted...? I assure you if Trump followed the U.K.'s lead of cracking down on silently standing outside of abortion clinics many righties in the United States would be angry. But of course one of Trump's first acts was pardoning anti-abortion protestors.

It harder to get them to stop doing something harmful, but also a lot harder to get them to start.

Yes, this seems like a potential downside.

And while I'm not sure if administrative law judges are "constitutional" I'm pretty sure that having no judges at all isn't going to do anything to preserve my constitutional rights.

The cure for this is actual independent judges, not having disputes between agencies and outsiders moderated by employees of the agency.

Rather the US is actively taking Russia's side in the conflict and ideologically allying itself with an autocracy over (most of) the world's democracies.

From what I can tell the United States is still providing Ukraine with weapons, which means they are actively taking Ukraine's side in the conflict.

Europe's minor encroachments on religious freedoms are obviously far more problematic ideologically to the US administration today than any number of assassinations of opponents, state control of media and corruption that happen in Russia. Don't pretend that this change isn't extraordinary and new.

European divergence from shared Western human rights norms is particularly problematic to Americans because Europe has (kinda sorta) been our ally in promoting traditional Western human rights norms. If Europe refuses to cooperate ideologically with the United States, it disrupts that traditional shared project.

Of course, Europe's encroachments on religious freedoms and other unalienable rights are not minor by American standards. The United States winked at this sort of thing in the past so as not to ruffle feathers and also because there are a contingent of Americans who agree with Europe's approach on these matters (more or less) but America thinking that European speech laws is a problem is not new at all and European leaders should have anticipated the possibility that right-wing leadership would criticize them. However, U.S. criticism of European actions is not surprising or new (again recall that the States passed the Invade The Hague act in 2002!) and does not mean that the US is going to leave NATO and join CSTO or anything like that.

On the flip side, United States is already willing to cooperate with regimes such as Saudi Arabia, Israel, or France that assassinate their political opponents, regimes like England that have state control of media, and regimes like Ukraine that are deeply corrupt, and so on. It engages in trade with China despite that nation's absolutely atrocious human rights record. It should not be a surprise to you that it is willing to drop sanctions on Russia.

The outcome is now looking like a US-Russia led alliance

This does not seem like a serious possibility to me, and I wonder where you got this idea. I've seen the United States talk about lifting sanctions with Russia, which is not an "alliance" any more than Nordstream constitutes an "alliance" between Germany and Russia. Trump trying to hit the same reset button that Obama, Bush, etc. tried to hit does not mean that the United States is allying with Russia.

I hear the opinion that Ukraine did not act wisely in courting the west but it's a great players view of the world that doesn't come naturally to me. The people were given freedom and chose the west, you can say they could have collectively seen the geopolitical writing on the wall and gone against all their own preferences to avoid being invaded, but that sounds like victim blaming to me.

Well for context keep in mind that Ukraine was split on the question of Western rapprochement. In fact the people you mention violently overthrew their own elected government in a coup because their elected government decided not to pursue the West and elements of the people, backed by Western intelligence services, did not like that. In response, the people in other parts of Ukraine, backed by Russian intelligence services, violently overthrew their own government in a counter-coup. None of that is according to normal democratic political norms, at least in the West.

As far as victim-blaming goes – I think that the government has a responsibility to protect its people from adversaries. If a country's government fails to build up its military and is invaded, the invader is morally at fault for its decisions, but the government failed in its responsibility and it is more than fair to assign blame to its actions. But military readiness is not the only way to protect your citizens, and it is perfectly fair to criticize the actions a government takes if those actions lead to back outcomes regardless of whether or not the bad outcomes are the result of malign third-party actors. You can believe that Ukraine made bad political decisions while still believing that moral culpability for the invasion(s) of Ukraine rests with Russia. Criticism of a government's actions is not only defensible but necessary because criticism is how you learn from failure.

Democracies cannot act strategically in that manner, it's one of the reasons they need and deserve protecting.

If democracies cannot act strategically [which is not my position], then they deserve to be replaced by a form of government that is better at protecting its citizens.

Hmm. From my point of view, what you describe as the bailey is a subset of what you describe as the motte. Or perhaps the motte here is offering a moral justification while the bailey is offering a prediction.

I do not know that the bailey always follows from the motte here, but in this case I would describe the war as predictable not necessarily inevitable and I describe it as predictable because you can see Obama or Burns or RAND predict it. Obviously Putin has a say, and Putin's not clockwork – I was honestly, as I say, surprised but not shocked when the SMO kicked off when it did and the way that it did (I thought that Russia had locked down their vital assets in Crimea and might try less brazen methods in the Donbass, keeping the conflict at a low simmer to keep Ukraine locked in conflict. I do recall in 2014 when Russia seized Crimea and there was a feeling of shock from some quarters that I did not share.)

Just tragic geopolitical dominos falling and rulers forced into ugly decisions, nothing to do with a septuagenarian autocrat gradually detaching from the real world, ending up spending fortunes and immolating hundreds of thousands of both his enemy's and his own citizens on sacrificial pyre of boomer retardation

I think that individuals and leaders always have a say. But what I think, based on reading Western sources, is that "Russia responds some degree of violently to a coup in Ukraine" was probably not a response that was unique to Putin. I also think that Western sources were well aware that Russia might escalate the conflict in response to what they viewed as Western provocations because they say this and they continued to offer the perceived provocation anyway.

So, predictable. And if something is predictable it is possible to question whether the choices that led to the actions were good decisions even if you think the predictable thing is not justified. Moral correctness does not absolve someone from the obligation of foresight. I think you can think that Russia's invasion is illegal, unjustified and evil while also thinking that Ukraine was pragmatically unwise to pursue rapprochement with the West. I don't think that's a hard baby to split. I'm not sure how that plays into your motte/bailey assessment, but I really think people should be able to isolate their moral judgments from their assessments of how the world works. Once you understand how the world works, you will be better able to reintegrate your moral judgments. At least that's my point of view.

Not sure if this was meant to be a reply to me, but yes, I think this is part of why they might be considered Constitutionally dodgy.

You know, I am not sure about this. Democrats honestly did not do a great job executing on governance under Biden. Their bench and pipeline began to hollow out under Obama and it really felt like the competency drained out of the party in the post-Obama era – maybe some of that was a uniquely Biden problem. But I honesty could see them taking power and mostly spinning their wheels for four years.

Mind you this is not a prediction and I do not think the right should get too triumphalist right now (although it is good for morale to do a few victory laps).

Politically the hardest part about it is that at least Poland and the Baltic states were always going to apply for NATO membership at one point or another. So the US government either has to engage in political 4D chess to prevent that from even happening or reject such requests publicly, which then obviously opens one up to denunciations from the domestic opposition.

Yeahhhh but from a purely realpolitik perspective Poland and the Baltic states are zip compared to getting Russia on your side. I think the real problem is if it's a two-sheriffs one-town situation, and likely it would have been. Sad!

And also Greece

See, if we could get GREECE AND TURKEY into the SAME military alliance we could get Poland and Russia in one. Surely the CIA has a magic mind-control ray that could make that work, or maybe USAID could gainfully employ the entire intelligentsia of Eurasia on the condition that they meme NATO-CSTO into being.

I think the ones Bill Burns polled were the ones near positions of power. Have you heard of a guy named Alexei Nalvany? Not that he ever had a particularly realistic shot at power, but he was the Western-beloved liberal opposition to Putin...and in 2014 after Russia seized Crimea he said "Is Crimea some sort of sausage sandwich to be passed back and forth?" and told Ukrainians to get real, they weren't getting Crimea back. (FWIW, I believe he recanted in 2023 from prison, but at that point I think he had probably realized that he did not need to fear electoral repercussions.)

so the only options were to either kick Russia while it was down or stand by and let it reassemble the borders of the USSR

Well no, there are other options: the US could have tried to integrate Russia into NATO, or simply not tried to project power past Berlin. The former seems very hard to get but has incredible payoff, and I am sorry it didn't seem to get much serious consideration from the West (perhaps there were good reasons it was a nonstarter – but I can't help thinking that if we can put up with having Turkey in NATO Russia could surely have been shoehorned in somehow.)

I don't think State badly misjudged Russia's temperament, at least not for lack of intel and understanding. You can read Bill Burn's diplomatic cables where he talks about Ukraine being an absolute red line for all Russians, even liberal ones.

I think that Russia could have actually been a partner against China. But I think that was fumbled by various US presidents, and probably finally and irrevocably by Obama.

You don't have to be a Russophile to think that Ukraine, collectively, made a poor national choice by trying to court a Western alliance when Russia was bound to react negatively. I don't actually think the "Ukraine shouldn't have started it" comment will play particularly well here unless Trump manages to steer the narrative very aggressively (he might be able to, I am sure there are interesting CIA documents he could declassify) but peace probably will.

And when I say predictable – Obama himself – hardly a Russophile, I don't think – said that Russia would always control the escalatory cycle over Ukraine simply because they perceived of it as a core national interest and the West didn't. Bill Burns' declassified cables reveal similar knowledge. It is not particularly shocking (although I do admit to being a bit surprised but not shocked by the SMO, if that makes sense) to anyone who listened to Putin, or Obama, that this would happen. Given that knowledge, you don't have to be a Russophile to believe that Ukraine played its hand poorly by choosing the West over Russia. (I am not saying that is the only opinion that is valid, just that it is a valid opinion.)

being suddenly turned on by a former friend

Outside of England, Europe has not exactly acted like our friend – we spy on them, they spy on us, they build massive natural gas pipelines to Russia after we tell them that is not a great idea and they should stop, they laugh at us when we tell them that is a silly idea, they try to tell Jeff Bezos what he can do with his own social media companies, they accuse us of human rights violations, we pass a bill authorizing an invasion of Belgium if they do anything about it. Friendly, maybe, but friends? Maybe that is overstating it.

And suddenly? The United States told Europe during the Obama administration that they needed to pay more in defense spending and that the United States was going to pivot to Asia. This is not new. This is longstanding US policy priorities working themselves out.

Just glancing at this –

  1. Just pragmatically, I don't think agencies like the FCC, FTC and SEC have ever really done anything for conservatives, so why would conservatives want to protect a bastion of their enemies? This could be a good idea long term since it means conservatives can remove their ideological enemies from those organizations regularly instead of running the risk of them turning blue with no practical recourse.
  2. From a principled point of view, the establishment of such agencies is somewhat constitutionally dodgy – I believe they often use administrative law judges (who don't have to go through the normal political appointment process) and because they are independent they aren't really responsive to the will of the voters and thus arguably don't fit into the Constitutional schema. (The counteragument to this, I think, is holding a strong view of legislative power, but of course the legislative cannot legislate contrary to the Constitution, so it seems like there is a chance that SCOTUS decides these agencies are carrying out executive power and Congress can't really delegate that out.)

I thought they were half decent!

Well, they can carry the Meteor, which is something. There's a possibility radar will be if not obsolete then somewhat more limited in utility in World War III than it was in prior wars, so perhaps it won't be as much of a handicap as it seems.

But yes, the fact that they are apparently still running around with mechanically scanned arrays does not inspire me with confidence in Europe's military readiness.

Yes tactical nukes are one field where I think there's a real case for further development. Poland's conventional forces won't be much good if Russia starts vaporizing them and demanding unconditional surrender, trusting that France and Britain won't risk their own infrastructure.

Bingo.

But it seems unlikely that either party would take such risks. Does Russia really want to subjugate some extremely unruly and recently irradiated Poles? Why would they so greatly desire to conquer the tiny Baltic states? There are potential strategic gains but huge risks.

Well it's interesting, I had the chance to speak to a former KGB officer about Russia's geopolitical situation once. (This would have been about a decade ago.) He told me that due to USSR central planning - which distributed various parts of Soviet industry to various SSRs, essentially specializing specific regions - Russia wanted to essentially reintegrate its old economy that was cleft from it by the fall of the USSR. Now, I don't think this necessarily needs to involve force - you'll notice that Russia did not start coercive measures against Ukraine [which is in any event more important in Russian consciousness than Latvia or Poland] until Ukraine started attempting to disentangle itself economically from Russia. Even after 2014, the Ukrainian arms industry continued to deliver arms to the Russian military as Soviet central planners had intended.

And of course there's always the intense Russian desire to put more space between Moscow and potential hostiles.

Now, I don't think Poland or Latvia are nearly as emotionally central or economically important to Russia as Ukraine is. It's also been a couple of decades and Russia has been able to develop their own internal industry. I tend to agree that going after Poland or even Latvia is unlikely while they have NATO protection. But on the other hand, I was a little surprised (although not shocked) when they went into Ukraine.

And Europe's population is so high that they can afford to buy time with hundreds of thousands, millions of lives in low tech, defensive trench warfare. They might have readiness problems, they might have shortages of this and that. But they're so big that they have the time and space to fix this stuff and fight a long war. Russia does not have the blitzkrieg capabilities to reach the European industrial core before they can militarize.

I think the concerns most people have are a bit more limited than "reaching the European industrial core," it's things like carving a land bridge to Kaliningrad and NATO being unwilling or unable to fix the problem after the blitzkrieg (which wouldn't need to drive more than 200 miles or so through the weakest NATO members).

Bombing Ukraine is one thing but Russian PGM production surely isn't sufficient to bomb out the combined military industry of Europe.

On a quick Google, Russia launched more than 10,000 missiles between 2022 and 2024. Wikipedia says the Shahed Geran-2 has a possible maximum 1,600 mile range which, if true, means Russia could hit targets in France even without staging from Belarus. A more conservative estimate of 600 miles merely threatens Poland. Russia looks to be able to make at least 6,000 a year, plus 10,000 decoy drones to screen them. And the Geran is bottom-shelf technology, cheap built stuff for mass attacks. For a more top-end option, consider the Kh-101 cruise missile (range of 2000 miles or so) and Russia is supposed to be able to make about 100 per month on wartime footing.

So in other words, if you assume Russia gets two years of respite at current production levels they could probably have a theoretical opening day salvo of 12,000 Gerans, 20,000 decoy attack drones, and maybe 2,500 "conventional" cruise missile, of just those two types alone.

Obviously Russia may not continue wartime production after Ukraine winds down. However on the other hand their production might be so high during the war, should it continue, that even winding it down to nominal peacetime levels afterwards leaves them with stockpiles of thousands.

Anyway I do not believe that all of NATO could intercept nearly 35,000 targets even if they were fired piecemeal. On the other hand, 10,000 missiles isn't necessarily as devastating as it sounds when split across a large enough target set (as Ukraine shows - although I believe Ukraine has access to plenty of old Soviet hardened industrial sites and I am not sure if Germany is quite so hardened). I doubt even a 10,000 missile salvo can totally destroy all relevant European military industry, but I confess I don't have a good idea of how large a target set that would be. But definitely I can imagine a force like that being capable of a series of week-one salvos on the order of "kill thousands of sleeping troops in garrison" or "delete the Polish air force and navy in port" or "destroy dozens of major ammo depots and vehicle servicing facilities."

Has Russia attacked any of its neighbors that were not considered for NATO expansion?

ETA: I think you could maybe make this case for Moldova, although Russian action there seems very different than in Ukraine. There might be other cases that I am missing. But to be clear I don't think I buy either the narrative that Russia does everything out of fear of NATO or that NATO expansion has no connection to Russian actions.

In reality Europe doesn't need any additional militarization. The European half of NATO has about 2 million troops, a population of about 600 million.

So Russia has around as nearly as many or more troops (if you count reservists) despite having less than a third of the population?

If Russia is struggling to burn through Ukraine's male fighting age population, how are they supposed to cut down 20x more? How is Russia supposed to man a frontline from Turkey to Finland? How is Russia supposed to contest huge navies with submarines and aircraft carriers? How is Russia supposed to deal with large and powerful air forces, Eurofighters and F-35s?

Have you read about the readiness problems that European countries, in particular Germany, are experiencing? (Also, note that in reality Russia's air force, which is not its strong suit, is larger than the German air force even if we are counting only modern Russian aircraft like the Su-30, Su-35, Su-34, Su-57 and counting German F-35s which haven't been delivered yet. The Russians also have strategic bombers, which no European military possesses. Removing American air power from the picture considerably curtails European capabilities.)

Anyway, I think it's very very clear from Ukraine that Europe needs more artillery production and more mine clearing capabilities. IMHO, while I haven't done the napkin math, the odds of Europe beating Russia on its own are actually not as high as you'd like if they can't sustain artillery production or clear minefields, including minefields that can be laid behind your own lines via rocket.

Why would Russia attack such a gigantic, powerful, nuclear-armed alliance?

Yeah they prolly won't. But if the US is sending all its effort to the Pacific, the alliance is much less gigantic, much less powerful, much less nuclear-armed.

Talk of defence spending should be wound down and replaced by talk of what specific capabilities are needed to achieve specific objectives.

I tend to agree with this, tbqh. From my armchair: in specific capabilities, Europe needs to actually have the capacity to produce millions of artillery shells per year, to clear tens of thousands of mines at a minimum, and they need lots of anti-drone capabilities that actually work, they probably need lots of drones/loitering munitions. I don't see any real evidence of this. (They need the artillery shells because artillery is the prime killer on the battlefield and being at a fire disadvantage means they will lose like the Ukrainians are losing; they need the ability to clear thousands of mines because the Russians have millions of mines and if they don't have robust mine clearing capabilities they will not be able to reclaim lost territory; they need anti-drone capabilities to defend their ability to meaningfully maneuver and drones to prevent Russian maneuver formations.)

I am also skeptical about their ability to sustain a prolonged air-to-ground air campaign due to a lack of munitions and inability to defeat Russian counter-PGM surface-to-air missiles, which can target anti-radiation missiles like the HARM. I am likewise skeptical about their ability to defeat Russian cruise and ballistic missiles due to a lack of surface-to-air missiles – e.g. Germany has only 7 Patriot batteries as per Wikipedia – which, if you assume 4 launchers with 8 missiles per, means they can optimistically defend against about 200 missiles before running dry and needing to be reloaded; Russia has supposedly launched mass attacks consisting of about 300 missiles and drones at one time against Ukraine. (They need to be able to defeat Russian SAMS to use aircraft offensively at all, and in particular the Eurofighter, which is not stealthy – which as an aside I think is still largely using a mechanically scanned array, and should for that reason thought of as inferior to modern Flanker variants. They need air-to-ground munitions to make multirole aircraft relevant, they need to be able to defeat Russian cruise missile raids to protect air bases, electrical generation, command posts, etc. I think the reason they need all of this is fairly clear.)

If we're positing a US pull-out of NATO, they need tactical nuclear weapons as well. (They need this because it's unlikely that France or England will be happy about using their strategic arsenal to retaliate if the Russians use a few low-yield tactical nuclear weapons on air bases, ships, entrenched troops, etc.)

Look, I think that Russia is afraid of NATO for a reason, and I don't think it's good to exaggerate their capabilities or overlook their weaknesses. But on the other hand, I don't think now is a time for NATO triumphalism for a reason. Here's the truth about the Russian military right now:

  • They are competing successfully with the entirety of NATO + Ukraine in military industry
  • They are successfully defeating the largest European land force despite significant assistance from NATO states (and even non-NATO states)
  • They are the most combat-experienced force in the world (outside of Ukraine)
  • Their military is roughly on par with Europe's in size
  • They have successfully adapted to numerous modern front-line Western systems, including tanks, infantry fighting vehicles, aircraft, stealthy air-launched cruise missiles, ground launched ballistic missiles, loitering munitions, anti-tank weapons, anti-radiation missiles, all while fighting handicapped under a NATO ISR umbrella that would be challenged in the event of an actual war with NATO.
  • They possess a decisive advantage in tactical and strategic nuclear weapons over Europe

I think Europe should on paper be able to deter Russia successfully. But when it comes to the US out of NATO, or US tied up in the Pacific, I think there's a reason that Europeans are nervous. I do not believe they are ready to defend themselves alone against Russia if Russia wins in Ukraine. This does not imply that Russia has the appetite to attack even an EU-only NATO, or that Russia would defeat the EU. It just means that Europe's security situation, if the US substantially leaves NATO, becomes substantially more precarious because they will be roughly at parity* with Russia instead of having overmatch.

*just going off of troop numbers here, I'm sure I could do some napkin math to see how that stacks up in equipment.

Interesting info, thanks.

That makes sense. But I assume either we've cut Germany a sweetheart deal (in which case I imagine that will be revisited soon!) or US LNG is cheaper than LNG from most other countries (otherwise Germany wouldn't buy US LNG). In either case, hiking US LNG prices is Bad For German Industry. I'm not saying you can Stop Eurotank 2.0 with this One Simple Trick necessarily, but it does seem to me that if the US wants to make their arms deals a more attractive option, they have some tools to do it (and indeed from talking to you it sounds like they are leveraging tools I hadn't even considered to do so!) As you say, some of them are very escalatory, and I doubt the US is going to break with Europe simply over arms deals (or a lack thereof). But I could definitely see the US stepping in if European industry is shaky.

In particular, I imagine the French will probably continue to do their own thing. But I would not be surprised if the Americans try to horn in on traditional German territory with arms deals to e.g. Spain, Scandinavia, the Baltics.

Not by LNG exports, at least not without significant direct embargoes. Qatar, Norway, Algeria, Canada, ect. all ship a lot of gas, and would supply gladly.

Germany imported less from Russia in 2022 than they do from the US now, and it caused a minor energy crisis and cost spikes when they stopped importing Russian gas. They had to build terminals to receive US LNG. Or am I wrong about that?

But I don't think those steps are very realistic, measures like that would be unimaginably antagonistic.

I kinda think this is less antagonistic than cutting off gas (although more realistically the US would just raise prices) - the US already has thrown its weight around with e.g. Turkey. But we'll see - I am not convinced that Everything That Happens is part of a massive conspiracy to make Lockheed Stonks go up. It's just interesting to map out the possibilities.

Oh, my bad. I was going by the start of the development cycle, but I mistakenly thought the JSF's development had gone back earlier than '95, so it's just a mistake on my part. (In my defense, the JSF was sort of the continuation of earlier pre-Cold-War aircraft programs, but I think 1995 is a fair start-by date).

Why would America want to keep Germany down? We don't expect another reich anytime soon.

Nobody did in 1920 either, did they? Remember, NATO was founded to keep the Germans down, the Americans in, and the Russians out, and even if Germany is not going to form another Reich anytime soon, the United States (like the United Kingdom before it) arguably benefits greatly by disrupting the formation of alliances that could threaten it. The EU is such an alliance.

Energy is largely fungible, even if not 100%, so this doesn't really matter.

Well traditionally Germany got their gas from Russia. Now it doesn't. I do think it matters - there's not unlimited LNG out there.

And if relying on American military power means freeloading like they have been for years that isn't a benefit either.

I think this depends on your calculus of things. If the United States does not have to worry about resource preservation, it can afford to let Europe free-ride, and arguably benefits from doing so. If the United States must worry about limited resources, it needs to prioritize, in which case as you say the free-riding is not a benefit. I think it's been signaling since the Obama administration that it is trying to maybe someday prioritize the Pacific and that Europe needs to step off and stop freeloading. Of course if the EU develops its own military power and no longer needs American assistance to deal with Russia, then that also gives them more freedom to make foreign policy decisions (France has always been like this!) There are a lot of different ways to try to thread this needle, but it seems to me that the Biden and Trump administrations have different ideas about the limits of US power - the Trump administration seems to think that prioritizing is necessary; the Biden administration was trying to walk and chew gum at the same time.

Outside of an actual defense emergency (where they would absolutely buy everything on offer - as Poland is doing right now, because they correctly perceive the situation to be an emergency already)

One definitely wonders if recent moves by the Trump/Vance administration are going to push the rest of Europe into seeing things as the Poles do.

they are more than capable of arming themselves with domestic systems

Shrike's oversimplified view of the world is as follows:

  1. Industrial capability is downstream of energy availability
  2. Germany has always been a, perhaps the, industrial backbone of major European defense programs (such as the Leopard tank and the Eurofighter).
  3. German energy availability is substantially controlled by the United States, since they fill most of Germany's LNG needs and a fair portion of its oil needs as well.
  4. QED, the United States can probably credibly threaten to throttle German and thus European domestic arms production if they so choose.

Doubtless there are alternatives to US LNG, so I am not saying that attempting this would work flawlessly (and indeed such a hardball move might backfire) but between that, recent energy costs and reports of "de-industrialization," and the reported high price of European weapons systems I have seen rumblings about, I would not be surprised if Europe finds that standing up large numbers of domestic weapons systems is more troublesome than it was during the Cold War, when the Eurofighter and Leopard programs were stood up.

Indeed, both Europe and Russia (and the United States!) have been coasting on Cold War era stockpiles and technology for most of their main weapons systems for some time now in air and land equipment. (It's ironically the Russians with the Su-57 that have fielded the first advanced post-Cold War aircraft, although I will also give the Super Hornet at least partial credit).