Here's our summary of key economic events overnight with news markets are in a full risk-off mood with equity prices and bond yields lower, and currencies like the USD and JPY up sharply.
Russia's land-grab of its neighbour is in full hot military mode, unlike its bloodless takeover of Belarus and Kazakhstan in 2021. They have launched a war using justifications straight out of the 18 Century, and one not seen for 70 years. They are moving aggressively to seize Ukraine's key population centers.
The chance of any international disarmament is right out the window now; countries globally will be prioritising defense spending. War, as it always is, will be inflationary. And China's threats of war against Taiwan will take on a new imperative. Retreats into security blocks are much more probably now with open trade and global supply chains more likely to be unwound. Even if the attack on Ukraine remains limited, the political and security responses will upend five decades of relatively peaceful progress. A turn in the progress against poverty will be negative. Globalisation is likely to be ended.
China and India are staying on the sidelines of this war, for now at least.
The war-induced inflationary impulse has seen US Fed officials signaling that rate hikes are still very much on their agenda.
US GDP growth for Q4-2021 was revised higher at a +7% annual rate and up +5.6% for all of 2021 from 2020. Those are 'real' results. In nominal terms, the US economy recorded $24 tln of economic activity, the first time it has exceeded that benchmark, and almost +12% more than for 2021. Improved consumer spending drove the gain. (What is interesting about this data is that in 2021, China's economy was 65% as large as the US's. That is a sharp retreat from the 2020 result when it was 74% the size. The recent US surge has come when China is in a slower growth mode.)
US jobless claims for last week retreated and now just over 1.9 mln people are on these benefits, the lowest since the 1970s. Both came in below expectations.
The National Activity Index compiled by the Chicago Fed recorded a strong expansion in January.
Sales of new-built dwellings fell in January and came in below what was expected even if they are still running at an historically high level. Supply-chain issues are holding back completions.
Globally, shipping freight costs rose last week, both for container cargoes and bulk cargoes.
And prices for key commodities jumped even further. Lithium, aluminium, and nickel were at the forefront. Wheat prices have zoomed overnight. It's going to be tough for the poor, no matter where they are, and more people are going to fall back into poverty.
Aussie capex rose slower in Q4-2021 than anticipated, at about half the growth level expected. Board rooms held back in a way that wasn't foreseen.
And staying in Australia, average full-time weekly earnings rose only +2.1% in the year to November 2021. However they are likely to have risen from there.
In NSW, there has been 8,271 new community cases reported yesterday, now with 99,851 active locally-acquired cases, and another 12 daily deaths. There are now 1,211 in hospital there and holding stubbornly. In Victoria they reported 6,715 more new infections yesterday. There are now 41,257 active cases in that state - and there were also 16 daily deaths there. Queensland is reporting 6,094 new cases and 8 more deaths. In South Australia, new cases have risen to 1958 yesterday and no more deaths. The ACT has 946 new cases and no deaths, and Tasmania 842 new cases and no deaths. Overall in Australia, about 25,000 new cases have been reported.
By the time you read the following financial data, things may have changed in a volatile and dynamic morning. But here they are when this report was being prepared.
The UST 10yr yield opens today at 1.92% and down -6 bps and taking this yield back to Wednesday's level. The UST 2-10 rate curve starts today a touch steeper at +42 bps. Their 1-5 curve is also marginally steeper at +76 bps but their 30 day-10yr curve is flatter at +192 bps. The Australian ten year bond is down -4 bps at 2.22%. The China Govt ten year bond is down -1 bp at 2.82%. But the New Zealand Govt ten year is down -3 bps bps at 2.77%. These shifts seem modest in the circumstances.
On Wall Street, there are losses but not to the extent you might have assumed. The S&P500 is down just -1.0% in Thursday afternoon trading after starting their session down -2.2%. Overnight, European markets however shuddered lower, most down nearly -4% - but perhaps again, not as much as you might have expected, although the Moscow exchange closed down -33% in one day. Yesterday, Tokyo fell -1.8%, Hong Kong, with its own local stresses, fell -3.2%, and Shanghai sell -1.7%. All featured building losses throughout the trading day. The ASX200 fell -3.0% and the NZX50 fell -3.3%, also with sharp selloffs late in the session. No-one is listening to the Buffett maxim of being greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy. Or perhaps some are; there are buyers of course for every trade and they are buying at very much lower prices.
The price of gold starts today at US$1924/oz and up another +US$14 from this time yesterday. It is doing its job as a countercyclical safe-haven asset, although not with any great enthusiasm in the circumstances.
And oil prices are up of course and at one point earlier touched US$100/bbl. But they are now at US$95/bbl in the US, a net +US$3.50 daily rise. The international Brent price is just over US$98.50/bbl.
The Kiwi dollar will open today down a full -1c at 66.7 USc. Against the Australian dollar we are down slightly at 93.3 AUc. Against the euro we are also softer at 59.7 euro cents. That means our TWI-5 starts today at just on 71.5 with a daily drop of -70 bps. Trading in the ruble has been suspended after a steep dive.
The bitcoin price has fallen -7.4% since this time yesterday and now at US$35,865. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been extreme at +/- 6.5%. Cryptos aren't proving to be either countercyclical, or a safe haven.
The easiest place to stay up with event risk today is by following our Economic Calendar here ».
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161 Comments
Aye Putin has rearranged the apple cart certainly. Wouldn’t have done that without the economic back up of China to alleviate much of the incoming sanctions. The EU had better find themselves a new energy supplier pronto. More or less back to the old cold war status. Russia & China vs the West. Still after this Russia has not got anywhere else to go without encountering NATO land, westwards that is. Whose turn, next move then. China now that Russia is somewhat dependent, could well annex Mongolia, if just to test the water themselves?
If NATO doesn't act, even though Ukraine is not a part of it, but have requested membership, Putin will consider it a toothless tiger. He has threatened the whole of Europe indirectly. My view is that the only way to stabilise this is an all out military response. If Europe is prepared to sacrifice Ukraine, who will be next? He has threatened the use of nukes, but to counter that he must be targeted personally.
It is difficult to predict how things will turn out. Will Russian turns its attention to other places, should they manage to annex Ukraine? Russia will be sanctioned, to the maximum possible level. So Russia will not pay any extra cost for invading anywhere else. That may change Russia's stance, even if they do not want to invade anywhere else at the moment.
Yes, while the UK have been pushing for it so far neither Germany or USA are supporting that move...probably because it's more financially convenient for their commercial trading incomes to just keep blustering out their moral indignation & "thoughts and prayers" bs.
How would US settle it's oil import invoices? - Russia Captures No. 2 Rank Among Foreign Oil Suppliers to U.S.
Unfortunately, secretaries of Energy and the Interior Department Jennifer Granholm and Deb Haaland have not made any serious proposals that could result in lower crude prices or higher domestic production either. Instead, Energy Secretary Granholm laughed when asked about the Biden Administration’s plan to increase oil production in the U.S. Link
Don’t know Muz. Think basically he has done this because he knew he could & it is the last opportunity to get back control of some more territory. What might now emerge as the fuse box is Moldova. Old Soviet territory to the east is still in Russia’s orbit & they have shored up Belarus. So if he advances anywhere else he runs slap into NATO territory he will then trigger a NATO response. Really the west has put Ukraine out there like a tethered goat to a Tiger. Ukrainians must be feeling a lot like the Czechs in 1938/9.
Don't forget Erdogan in Turkey. Although a member of NATO that will have become tenuous lately with his purchase of the S400 SAM system, and denial of F35s, which have all pushed him closer to Putin. Plus Turkey controls the Dardanelle strait out of the Black Sea.
Europe sacrificing Ukraine will tell a lot of countries that Europe cannot be trusted and make Putin's friends list grow a little which will create more problems. This is a long way from over yet.
Don’t think so. Russia have been enemies for ages, never allies. Recent history, 1853 Crimea, 1877/8 Russia invaded, got to the outskirts of Constantinople, and WW1. Turkey has been armed with USA missiles since Eisenhower’s presidency. Turkey is in enough strife of its own making to sacrifice, NATO & western support and become a likely target for Russia. Interesting though isn’t it. The Dardanelles, The Bosphorus, Churchill’s old war cries about the Balkans, the epicentre of strife & conflict between West & East, Europe & Asia, Muslim & Christian.
ps. mind you there’s still unfinished business in Georgia perhaps.
This is less about geography and more psychology I think, and you're forgetting about Erdogan. Edogan is trying to be the Turkish strongman, so psychologically he and Putin are closer than Erdogan is to the west. Putin is not interested in the facts. Many historians have already pointed to the myths that he bases his moves on. I think when it come down to it Erdogan will look for support on his position and Putin will give before the west will.
Is Putin an ultra nationalist for Russia? While some think so, I don't agree. I think this is all ego, and once on a roll he won't be easy to stop. I hope NATO and the US are literally tracking his hot little body. That may be the only way to stop him.
I’m arguing more about the history than the geography. The first is about people & their culture, the identity that builds over centuries, geography stays the same. Psychologically you cannot exclude history & pivot it on just one individual, a harried one at that. Turks have, a deeply embedded distrust, hatred even, of anything to do with Russia. It goes back centuries, Orthodox Christian vs Muslim conflict. Erdogan himself has trouble aplenty. Not so long ago he had to imprison a good percentage of his judiciary. He must be a good target for either assassination or a coup d’état or both. Turkey is in strife, inflation ripping through, covid still active, trying to persuade an unsettled, unhappy, volatile at the best of times, population that they can look to an age old enemy as the great redeemer, would be nigh on impossible and easily could ignite an uprising, to the point Erdogan is fated as above. When sitting on a powder keg, best not to play with matches.
Agree and I am very critical of US foreign policy.
Closest thing in recent history this reminds me of is Cuban Missile Crisis. Russia said explicitly that it's red line is a guarantee Ukraine won't join NATO, which is probably sensible given the potential for NATO weapons to be in Russia's backyard. The US should have agreed to this. They didn't. So now Russia launches an invasion (Bay of pigs?) to force the other side to see sense.
Of course he may have greater designs, but this is the current issue. Probably could have been avoided had the US agreed, but they don't like to be told what to do by anyone, so if it wasn't their idea, they don't want it.
Putin shows he wasn't bluffing, so now NATO finds itself in a hell of a predicament and the US unlikely to be willing to commit to a hot war. Poor foreign policy shown from the US and NATO, even poorer actions shown by Putin, but not unsurprising that Putin has done it.
NATO is an organisation set up to explicitly counter the Russian threat. Keeping a decent distance between the two aggressors is simply sensible, if you want to maintain peace. For that reason the US should have accepted the Russian demand, much like Russia accepted to not put it's nukes in Cuba.
"Russian threat" No - you mean the Soviet threat. While true in the time we often conflated Soviet with Russia because the Soviet states were ruled by Russia, but it was an aggressive Marxist Leninist union and NATO fully bordered Soviet states to provide a unified front against their aggression.
And as I pointed out to Carlos below, the US stopped the positioning of nukes in Cuba, but they did not stop the Soviet military being positioned there. And NATO does not maintain a nuclear arsenal in Europe. Never has. France is the only one who does besides Russia.
Stop repeating bulld%$t murray and you might find me more sympathetic.
They even say they are nuclear on their website.
I stand corrected - but their website clearly states they are non-strategic US weapons held at five locations. France withdrew from NATO because it would not place the control of its weapons under NATO. I was always under the impression that NATO was intrinsically non-nuclear because apart from the UK and US none of the other countries maintain a nuclear arsenal.
But think about it - those weapons have never been a point of NATO but as a deterrence. Putin literally in the last couple of weeks stated he would use his if NATO comes to the help of Ukraine. Putin is the aggressor here not NATO, not Europe, not the US.
A weapon is a weapon, no matter it's purpose. All nuclear weapons are a deterrence, by nature, but can be used as first strike weapons as well. Russia has no idea if America can come up with a stealthed nuclear missile that they can reposition in the Ukraine (if they had joined NATO).
Try and understand it from the Russian side, NATO has been steadily expanding towards its influence for decades, now it wants to admit a member directly on their border, putting nuclear missiles within 500km of it's capital. The US did NOT stand for exactly the same tactic from the Russians in the Cuban missile crisis, we expect Russia to just accede? Double standard much?
So called "buffer states" have been used since forever to provide some sort of strategic buffering from one countries military against the other. With the US not saying that the Ukraine would never be part of NATO and the Ukraine actively wanting to join, it put Russia in the same position as the US was during the Cuban Missile Crisis. During the 2021 Brussels Summit, the NATO leaders said that Ukraine was going to be accepted.
Russia could not accept a potentially nuclear armed neighbour who was working at the discretion of the US leadership who hold the keys to NATO nukes. And NATO idiocy didn't take him at his word that he could not allow it. So here we are, Putin said he couldn't accept it (and rightly so, unless we accept double standards), so he invaded. Pretending that he is solely to blame is forgetting recent history.
Too bad with this weakest government in US, they've lost the war in Afghanistan and let Russia invade Ukraine to threaten Europe and Nato. Biden is weak, so weak that Russia and China can smell his weakness from miles away. Guess what's gonna happen after Russia invaded Ukraine?
The draft-dodger Trump would have handled this no differently. He withdrew the US from most of it's international theatres/commitments. The reality is that the soft liberal West have lost the grit and resolve to confront the China/Russia axis, we cannot afford it (look at the debt burdens of UK & US) or the recession it will bring. We are pursuing our own liberal ideologies of inclusion and net zero while Russia and China look on rubbing their hands in anticipation.
Taiwan will be next.
I don't think US should be heavily involved either, especially its military presence. But this entire thing should've been avoided from happening if US has a strong leader, knows what he is doing. Biden is too old for his role, the last US election was entirely about getting rid of Trump, that was about it. I don't like Trump, but Biden needs to be replaced, period.
What will happen next? Iran and North Korean nuclear crisis, Taiwan, you name it. The truth is, we have lived in freedom and peace for decades now, most of us forgot about what freedom and peace actually cost us. Those don't just cost money, resources, life styles, but also lives. We are so focusing on our own benefits and slowly let our freedom and peace to be taken away as long as our own wealth and benefits not touched. You wonder how German could invade so many countries in such a short period during World War 2...
I think you allude to a bigger problem. To be fair I do think the US thinks it should be able to drive world affairs and in some form or another dictate to others (ironically all while proclaiming to be a proud democracy). But the war in Afghanistan in my view was never winnable. Indeed i suggest that much like Viet Nam, their entire strategy in the middle east is flawed and too ideologically driven.
The lead should be being taken by the UN, but as discussed the other day, the Vetos cripples that institution too. Not sure that this is solvable although idealistically, the solution is visible.
Well inflation will take off now , petrol prices will further increase this flows to costs of doing business across the spectrum. Trump has shown his treasonous character to the world surely the Republicans must now question their direction. I hope the nations get their sanctions together to act in a coordinated way to be effective. This could be a game changer for the American mid term elections, I can't imagine Republican voters supporting a pro Russian stance by their representatives. As a trading country nz will be affected by these sanctions and the economic fallout .
Thats my grandfather's favorite saying who was a decorated world war one vet and lost both brother's at Gallipoli. One on field the other severely wounded was finished off by influenza on the boat home. As he actually saw active service I'm inclined to listen to his view.
Look behind what holds a society together - any society: all will have, to some extent, morality ingrained in ‘normal’ behaviour, but ultimately it’s the threat of punishment by the people, through government or dictatorship they tolerate, that prevents anarchy. Appeasement has its limits
That sounds nice.
Reality is different and the world is full of compromise.
Imagine Russia entering a full military and economic alliance with Mexico.
You think the USA would just sit back content to not be evil?
Most of the reports I have seen today read more like propaganda narrative than facts.
start with a pro states elected Mexican govt first being toppled in a Russian supported coup. Russian forces being sent to the country. What else would happen?
The US has been sanctioning, controlling, invading and sponsoring coups in the Americans, more or less continuously for the last 100 years.
Hell the US have been highly active in regime change bloody everywhere in the world in the last 50 years. Multiple wars and invasions resulting in hundreds of thousands killed and displaced.
Both Russian and China are literally surrounded by USA military bases. A US that continues to spout strong anti Russian rhetoric.
What do you expect Russia to do? Roll over and play dead?
I'm not pro Russian any more than I'm pro anything, but they have been pushed into a corner and the rank hypocrisy and 1 sided imperialism coming from the MSM commentary lacks perspective.
And any aggression shown here by Russia pails in comparison to the misery dished out via American/UK munitions over the last 20 years.
99.99% of this rhetoric coming from people who have never visited the place, nor have any real empathy for the people, its driven by basic tribalism. Russian bad! Amurica freedom!
No one is being genocided.
While the theory might look attractive, you miss a very big point - ideology. Putin's ideology is that of a dictator. After the collapse of the Soviet Union for some years, despite the rampant corruption of the former Soviet apparatchiks, Russia actually started to become quite wealthy and became more active in many areas where they had been previously quite constrained. Under democracy Russia began to shine, under Putin's rule that shine has significantly faded as the corrupt classes are able to entrench their wealth and strangle hold. Putin has put Russia where it is not the west. In the decades following the collapse of the Soviet Union, there had been some discussion even that NATO was no longer required. Not any more.
Well there was the Cuban Missile Crisis, so we don't need to speculate about the US response to a neighbour entering into a defence pact with Russia/China.
We can debate this issue ad nauseum but really the outcome is known. If Nato were to enter the conflict in a conventional ground war, and were winning, what do you think would happen? Would Putin allow himslef to be humiliated or would he launch a nuclear strike. or even call in China???
Either let them have Ukraine or launch a nuclear strike. The rest is just noise.
I went for a drive across Auckland out to rural areas yesterday. It was unusually pleasant. Not much traffic. I wonder if its the partly the price of petrol which did that. And its going to go a lot higher given what is mentioned above with Brent price and the $US exchange rate.
Going for a drive will become like a bottle of expensive wine. Something which is done less often but which should be savoured and appreciated.
Not a bad thing!
Vladimir Putin controls the supply chain of western technology, so who is bluffing?
Russia has the power to hobble key industries in the US and Europe by restricting supplies of metals
Most companies are now experiencing close contacts etc, I know my current worksite is only 20% capacity. Most people are staying at home.
Yes very pleasent on the roads.
I must say the lack of road noise and pollution was something I very much enjoyed during lockdowns.
I predict the fallout from Russia's invasion won't be as significant as people fear. After a few days people will become accustomed to the situation, just another day in Eastern Europe. I can already sense this is happening. The West is largely impotent and we are all aware of that so why worry about Ukraine?
Russia is not hell-bent on global world domination however Russia feels it must exist.
Russia was never under threat of its existence. You're just buying Putin's egotistical BS. He's trying to be the next Stalin. Remember that Stalin is estimated at killing 50 million of his own, and aspired to ruling Europe.
Just because it is on the other side of the world don't think we will not be impacted.
You and several others in this post, need to learn a bit of history before commenting on current affairs. There is more to this and you need to find out the truth. And please oh please do not read and trust mainstream media. Specially when labelling current leaders to those from WWWII. This is not good vs bad only so be careful NOT too choose side (so quickly).
"China's economy was 65% as large as the US's. That is a sharp retreat from the 2020 result when it was 74% the size. The recent US surge has come when China is in a slower growth mode.)"
Perhaps more pertinent is the make up of those comparative economies....services (financial and otherwise) are of limited use.
Exactly:
Fragility.
Start with the US Treasury yield curve itself, particularly its long end where, Irving Fisher, yields are an absolute combination of growth and inflation expectations. Up to February 24, 2021, the yield curve almost exclusively the long end had been steepening. Higher rates (and spreads between those rates) into the future are a wonderful sign of, well, the real potential to get back to normal by at least moving significantly in that direction.
For the curve to suddenly stop steepening, and then move – for an entire year (tomorrow) – back the wrong way is a substantial and substantially unwelcome development. CPIs to the moon, tapering QE, double taper, now aggressive rate hikes, the world public convinced of a massive wave of inflation, yet for all this time in between flat, flatter, so flattened that just a few days ago parts of the curve nearly inverted (the 7s and 10s have touched on a few occasions now). Link
Perhaps more pertinent is the make up of those comparative economies....services (financial and otherwise) are of limited use.
Indeed: - Twitter Is Selling $1 Billion of Junk Bonds to Fund Share Buyback
Firstly, war sucks in any part of the world and my heart goes out to those affected in the Ukraine.
Secondly, I am looking forward to interest.co.nz becoming a panel full of war experts, myself included!
China watching closely as they plan their inevitable invasion of Taiwan.
Putin and Xi, two psychopaths with egos bigger than their countries.
David, appreciate the "big picture" analysis of what's going on in Europe. Most news organisations are reporting on relatively insignificant things like troop movements, and quotes from world leaders trying to outdo each other in how outraged they can be.
Great to see some focus on the broader implications of this conflict, ones which are likely to impact us even way down here.
Yep, international factors combine in a perfect storm to drive the prices of imported goods through the roof during 2022. But, fear not my fellow countrymen; the mighty RBNZ has cranked up the OCR to reduce the disposable income of a few million people living on an island at the bottom of the pacific. Once kiwis spend less at the shops, and we add a few tens of thousands of people to the dole queue, all of the villainous price-inflating behaviour across the world will cease. Praise be.
Until then - can we threaten Fletchers and Carters with nationalisation to reduce price-gouging, introduce rent controls, and subsidise the hell out of clean energy solutions?
Yes. Inflation is driven significantly by things RBNZ cannot control and as such, will persist. All raising the rates does is further reduce disposable income, all at a time when shops are apparently crying out for people to spend. 2022 is going to be pain. Genius.
It's interesting that no one was making the reverse argument, for the last two decades, about low rates on a small pacific island being unlikely to take all of the slack out of global supply that was causing deflation within the economy. The argument could always have been made both ways yet we seem to have discovered a few one eyed kiwis.
Pretty clear that rents in NZ sit at the very maximum that people can afford to pay (many with a Govt subsidy). When rents do drop or stagnate (post GFC, March 2020 etc) they quickly catch-up and settle back into a steady 3.5% (ish) rise per annum. January's figures show this clearly.
What astounds me is that between dropping rates to near 0 and pumping money into the system, they seemed to be surprised that it only fuelled the housing crisis. It's like they don't understand the macro picture of our economy?
And yesterday they were looking at Child Poverty, a portfolio Jacinda took for herself, and it seems she bare scrapes through for a pass mark. I don't get that they don't realise that today one of the biggest drivers of child poverty is the cost of housing? They are more scard of big money than doing something for the people who need it most.
And there is a snake in the toilet too. In the last few days the capital gains subject has risen again.
That's absolutely valid.
The actual cost of living - housing apart - is determined mainly by factors outside our control (oil prices etc). We benefited from global deflationary pressures for the last decade, and now we are being hit by global inflationary pressures. My point is that there are much smarter ways of insulating kiwis from these global changes than increasing the OCR - just like there were smarter ways of stimulating the economy than reducing it.
Big-time investors across the West will be firing up their offshore accounts in a rush to buy shares on the Moscow exchange, particularly Russian listed companies with mining assets.
When the US goes on a limb to protect democracy, aren't natural resources what their usually after?
Trying to think of some positive things to say about all this...
Higher energy prices should speed the transition to electric transport and renewables.
Should bring the west closer together with more purpose and lots of defense and tech spending.
Higher inflation even more great news for the end of the kiwi property mega bubble.
Maybe we can now all stop arguing about pronouns and woke garbage and start dealing with the real enemy. Authoritarianism.
The West, specifically USA, the EU, mainly Germany fell asleep at the wheel regarding Russia's concerns in Ukraine joining Nato. Ukraine went from a Russian sympathiser president, at worst a Russian stooge, to a hugging the USA/EU president, with the encouragement of the US and EU. The Ukraine didn't follow a middle road in satisfying the Bear and drawing closer to EU without upsetting the Bear. Since this route was never tried we are now in the current situation.
The buck stops at Poland where at the outbreak of the 2nd WW there was a Treaty with UK and France. Czechoslovakia was the sacrificial lamb then as is Ukraine now. Poland is a NATO member.
The bitcoin price has fallen -7.4% since this time yesterday and now at US$35,865. Volatility over the past 24 hours has been extreme at +/- 6.5%. Cryptos aren't proving to be either countercyclical, or a safe haven.
Bitcoin has entered the chat.
US$38,500 (+2.2%)
It’s just about clawed back it’s losses since the Ukraine situation exploded.
The immediate effect of the Ukraine kerfuffle is to cement the Russia-China-Iran Axis as a trading bloc. As such it has inherent advantages:
- FF supplies galore, and C needs both R and I for those
- Minerals supplies galore, and the world needs those in spades
- Nascent financial interchange systems which I surmise are in late-UAT stage of implementation. So expulsion from SWIFT holds no terrors. Get ready for a new reserve currency.
- Captive markets, especially for natgas. Germany and Italy for starters.
- Recent head of state meetings to keep each other apprised of potentials and intentions.
David Goldman at Asia Times labels the US response (or more properly, the lack thereof) as the strategic blunder of the century. ' Biden throws Putin into Xi's briar patch'. I read it before it disappeared behind the pay wall, and it is hard to fault.
For amusement: How the greens brought war to Ukraine...
That green article is interesting.
Not sure we will get any real progress on converting to sustainable energy Whislt war machinery is more effectively run on petrol.
Iraq, Syria, now this.. the future? A fight to the death over the last dwindling supplies or fossil fuels, using said fossil fuels to do the fighting.
Sadly I'm pro Russian on this one. The West needs to quit poking the Bear with crap like keeping the door open for Ukraine to join NATO and supplying arms to Ukraine. Ukraine can never become part of NATO its simply to close to Moscow and now Russia are going to make sure of that. Biden could have stopped this now the whole world is going to pay for it.
Stupid comparison. Perhaps try the comparison on the Cuban missile crisis. There was no way the USA was going to have Russians park themselves that close to the USA and that was not even a land border. All we get is one sided media from the West. Try looking a little deeper, multiple European countries have been supplying arms to Ukraine, its simply not acceptable.
Carlos you are miss-using the Cuban Missile Crisis. It wasn't about Russia being firmly ensconced close to US borders. They were there in Cuba militarily and financially, supporting and supplying Castro, for years. It was the missiles. With the missiles so close to the US there was no way in the technology of the time to defend against them. And the missiles they stopped were nukes. So the analogy falls apart very quickly. NATO is decidedly non-nuclear. France withdrew from NATO because of that. The UK has nukes but the prohibition is not on the continent.
The Russians regularly had their navy drop by, and deployed air force units there with the latest and greatest hardware of the time, all of which just meant the US kept an eye on them but did nothing else.
NATO is non nuclear? What about all those US B61 nuclear missiles sitting on German airbases that they maintain the old tornado fighter jets for? And then consider they are upgrading those missiles to be compatible with F35s.
Carlos is right, it's just like the Cuban Missile crisis. Putin has said before that it's all about not having US missiles right on his doorstep, that's his "red line" as to why Ukraine could never join NATO.
But there are none of "those missiles" in Poland, Romania, Hungary or the other former Soviet states that now are in NATO, and other states that directly border Russia like Latvia, Estonia, Lithuania and Poland. If Putin's position is valid for Ukraine why doesn't he apply it to them?
He wasn't happy about them joining either and has demanded numerous times in the past that the steady encroachment of NATO into the countries on his border is a threat which he would respond to. With the Ukraine, he put a line in the sand and said "no more". With the West all but admitting Ukraine into NATO they have decided to test his resolve. He has responded.
NATO also explicitly does not state where it's nuclear arsenal will be stored, though it's pretty well known. At any moment, a bunch of nuclear armed typhoon fighters could head over to Latvia, refuel and be on it's way to Moscow, all at the discretion of the US leadership. That's not a threat that he is comfortable with just as the threat of potentially nuclear armed weapons in Cuba, under the control of the Soviets leadership, was not a threat that the US leadership was comfortable with in the 1960's.
It seems like it's easier for people to believe Putin is Hitler reincarnated and trying to recreate the Soviet Empire, than to take a bit of time and learn. The Ukraine revolution where they purged all public sector positions of anyone with any Russian background and made it illegal for anyone of Russian ethnicity in Ukraine to ever be elected to anything was the point where this all started. Now we are at the point where the president of Ukraine wants nuclear weapons and to join Nato. Obviously Russia doesn't want a violently anti Russian regiem joining the worlds most powerful military alliance while in posession of nuclear weapons. Their goals are clear, destroy the military hardware (mostly from the breakup of the soviet union) and bring in more moderate leadership.
First of all, it is sad to see another war to dampen the Euro after Kosovo War.
Second, on "No-one is listening to the Buffett maxim of being greedy when others are fearful, and fearful when others are greedy" - I believe margin of safety is the highest priority from Buffett
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