23 April 2022Why is Russia in perpetual insecurity?Putin is treated to madman or throwback to Soviet or czarist (caesar) times, but careful examination of the geopolitical, demographic, economic and social constraints show how he perfectly rationally interprets a country's - his country's - primary need for security.As the West seeks an adequate response to Russia’s annexation of Crimea and invasion of Ukraine,
it is useful to understand what Vladimir Putin thinks he is
doing, and why. Understanding Putin is not to
apologize for him, but understanding...
Saturday, 23 April 2022
THE STATE OF THE MARKETS THIS WEEK 17
23 April 2022The market leader industries at the moment are food and farming, and the laggards biotech. From leaders to laggards, the whole market has been falling these last two days. It is very unusual for leading as well as lagging sectors to all fall at the same time.This is bear territory, heading maybe for recession, who knows.....I don't! There are surely technical indicators, indicators that I don't understand and indicators that are anyway probably no longer valid because the economy is so wei...
LEAD UP TO THE WAR
23 April 2022 https://youtu.be/zSZokTkBIfsBaud points out in his new book "Putin, Master of the Game", that the Minsk accords were and then modified and re-signed, by Ukraine and the two self proclaimed republics, witnessed by Russia and by Fr and Germany, then registered and approved with the UN and its five permanent members.So in 2015, there was a political solution. But instead we have war and his book explains how the West is responsible for the devt of this conflict. The Americans, he says, admit this and Baud draws on mai...
Tuesday, 19 April 2022
THE SINKING OF THE MOSKVA
19 April 2022is.gd/YHTz8v From what I can gather there were 12 Russian navy ships
in the Black Sea and now there are 10 and I would imagine that in the
next couple of months there will be none.
It is hard to see how any of those 10 ships could leave
the Black Sea and rejoin other Russian Navy fleets in the Baltic or
Arctic ports, sailing past NAT lands; and similarly it is hard to see how those ships in other
ports could come to support the 10 in the Black Sea or...
Sunday, 17 April 2022
POLITICAL DIRECTION OR CRISIS MANAGEMENT - WHAT FUTURE DEMOCRACY?
17 April 2022 We are led by managers responding to crises with technical solutions that are costly and limit our freedom. Instead, what we need is what he had, politicians responding to the people with programs and policies.For anyone following the French elections the
campaigning and has been very very thorough and everyone all the
candidates have had plenty of time to present their particular programs
and the electorate has had a lot of time and still more to come to reach
their conclusions and vote.
...
Friday, 15 April 2022
THE HEARTLANDS (Sir Halford John Mackinder)
15 April 2022John J Mearsheimer has been spot on for years.
https://youtu.be/XgiZXgYzI84
He has a theoretical framework understanding that he can lay over any IR security problem and explain it and offer solutions. But those that be (the people who1 govern us), they don't listen, not to him, and not to the people in this "democracy" of ours We are there to vote them in and give our support to their madness and a sense of legitimacy.You could argue they flannel us with distractions like covid or wokism. So there is geopolitics, propaganda,...
Sunday, 10 April 2022
A STUPID WAR
1 min ago
This is just Stollenberg trying to plump up his remit, on the basis the Russians cannot be trusted.
The truth is that there is a fault line in Europe that
runs from the Baltics to the Black Sea. This is the buffer zone that
Russia needs having been invaded by the Swedes, the French and twice by
the Germans.
Russia requested three things in its Note. It requested
that NATO never admit Ukraine. It...
Saturday, 9 April 2022
MASTERING THE ART OF MANIPULATION
8 April 2022Robert Greene:https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Greene_(American_author)https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Laws_of_Human_Naturehttps://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mastery_(book)Greene is a bit of a master manipulator machiavellian figure, except he tells all through a string of best sellers on POWER, SEDUCTION, WAR, STRATEGY, MASTERY and THE LAWS OF HUMAN NATURE.His last book - the one on human nature - explains how we work, as a biological and human being. What drives us - me, you, others - and how to optimise our life and fight...
Thursday, 7 April 2022
EUROPEAN STRATEGIC COMPASS
8 April 2022WIP Here is a negative review of a positive developmenthttps://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/2022/04/06/ultra-remainers-mobilising-prepare-ground-rejoining-eu/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhrhttps://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/european-union-unveils-new-strategy-become-global-power"European Union Unveils New Strategy to Become a Global Powerby Soeren Kern • April 3, 2022 at 5:00 amThe goal is "strategic autonomy" — the ability for the EU to act independently of, and as a counterweight to, the United States and the North...
ROTATOR CUFF AND CHARACTER
7 April 2022Sunday, day 0Tomorrow is Friday, day 5 after the operation on my shoulder, which was last Sunday. That op. put me into a light trauma, a kind of post traumatic shock syndrome someone said to me. Monday, day 1So Monday I was quite disoriented. Some friends noticed this and rallied round, asking me questions about the experience and getting me to talk; for those here in CM, offering practical help as the shock of a six hour operation was one thing, but in practical terms, I've only got one arm! Just try to imagine that!!Tuesday,...
Friday, 1 April 2022
PUTIN'S PLANS
1 April 2022As to Russia's goals. Looking at a map, the trouble for Russia geographically, is that its western border opens smoothly onto the plains of Eastern Europe and there are those gateways that give access to invaders.So a Russian leader would like to plug the gaps with neutral buffer states, all the way from from Estonia to Bulgaria included.That's the dream. Perhaps from the Baltics, or Finland even, down to Ukraine and Moldovia. The minimum a Russian leader would want is what Biden referred to, in the first of his many gaffes,...
