Then the question is: Who would the next targets be?
🇲🇩? Too far, 🇷🇺can't even reach Odesa.
🇪🇪 🇱🇻 🇱🇹? Then 🇷🇺 would need time to lick its wounds and rebuild its armies.
IMHO the most likely target would be in Central Asia. Northern 🇰🇿 is seen by 🇷🇺 nationalists as a "Russian land". But how would 🇨🇳 react?
Lo que será interesante será descubrir cómo 🇷🇺 solucionará el problema no de los mutilados, sino de los que regresan sin mutilaciones, porque querrán salarios equivalentes a los que recibian luchando en 🇺🇦 ; ¿podrá 🇷🇺 darselos, con su economía teniendo problemas incluso despues del fin de la guerra?
Kinda daunting task.
Last year I compared Trump's poorly thought and disastrously waged trade war to revive USA's manufacturing power with Putin's poorly though and disastrously waged invasion of Ukraine in order to revive Russia's military power.
Looks like the trade war is failing like the real one.
🇳🇬 and 🇩🇿 be like:
"Uhm, what the f*ck about our Trans-Saharan gas link?"
European countries be like:
"Wdym, energy supplies coming from both 🇳🇪 and 🇳🇬 are not safe anymore? Who are those Takbir-shouting people?"
A super-size Arab country of 61 million people (if the 🇦🇪 folds, the others like 🇶🇦 and 🇰🇼 would quickly follow) with potential access to 🇵🇰's nukes and the control of the world's largest wealth funds.
It would be kind of a nightmare for 🇮🇱 and a magnet for a lot of other arab countries (e.g. 🇪🇬)
Which makes me ask some questions.
1)Can European countries afford to throw 🇺🇦 under the bus, now that they are becoming reliant on 🇺🇦's experience and 🇺🇦training?
2)Will 🇺🇦 use these training programs as bargaining chips?
3)Will 🇺🇦 become the partner of choice after the war ends?
"The one with the rifle shoots! One out of two gets rifle. The one without, follows him!"
Like the centrist parties' failures in the 2000s and 2010s were the propellant of the far right's rise, the failure of the 🇺🇸 far right in the 2020s will be the propellant of a centrist revival, if not of a far-left revival. Narrations drive psychology, and that drives economics and politics. 3/3
Trump's victories were, to many, the proofs that right wing parties were on an unstoppable path of ascendance.
The problem is that, in the coming years, Trump will have quite few things to show as a success, and the aftershock of the 🇺🇸 will be too big to ignore. 2/
I think that the side effect of the United States destroying itself into the real-life version of Gilead will be the destruction of the various right-wing movements around the world, those same right-wing movement that were energized by Trump's victories. 1/
Finally, both ignored the complexity of modern supply chains; they didn't take into account that some bottleneck outside their control could hinder its economy.
Trump didn't take into account the hindrances to the tech industry.
Putin didn't take into account the hindrances to the oil industry.
Both men thought that they had the ultimate coercive weapon.
Trump thought that he could force other nations to swallow the tariffs because of the importance of the 🇺🇸 market.
Putin thought that he could force other nations to swallow its invasion of 🇺🇦because of its gas blackmail.🔽
Both discounted the possible reactions of the opponents, having no backup plan.
Putin didn't plan for the freezing of its reserves and the sanctions' impact on its railways and oil industry, something critical for its war machine.
Trump did not stockpile rare earths anticipating a 🇨🇳 response.🔽
Both ignored the dangers of alienating its main economic partner, not taking into account the consequences of it on their own supply chains.
Putin alienated Europe, that was its main gas buyer and the main supplier of items like rolling stocks.
Trump alienated 🇨🇳, its main rare earths supplier. 🔽
Trump and Putin: Two men's poorly thought wars.
True, Trump's war is a trade one, Putin's one is a military one. But both wars' protagonists share some common traits:
1)hubris
2) No back-up plan,
3)Denial of the opponent's agency.🔽
10/10) Exhibit B: MAGAs hope to win an "attrition" trade war ignoring the weaknesses of the 🇺🇸 economy, e.g.
-over-realiance on wealthy consumers
-hyperfinancialization of the 🇺🇸 economy
-3 out 10 🇺🇸 have more credit card debts than emergency funds)
-Millions of 🇺🇸 in a precarious financial situation.
9)Both MAGA and Russia hoping for a blitz, then stumbling into an attrition war, ignoring they are far weaker than expected.
Exhibit A: 🇷🇺 hopes to win a military attrition war even though its birthrate is low and its industry is much weaker than the european ones.⬇️
8) Both MAGA and 🇷🇺 have contradictory beliefs.
MAGA: 🇪🇺 is dysfunctional and dying, but at the same time is an all-powerful trade power and has been "robbing" 🇺🇸through trade surplus
🇷🇺: 🇪🇺 is the land of degenerates but at the same time is an industrial power hell bent on destroying 🇷🇺⬇️
7)Both MAGA and 🇷🇺 believing they have "the ultimate weapon" to coerce anyone. See the 🇷🇺 never-ending nuclear threates (during the war in 🇺🇦) vs Stephen Miran's paper about the all-encompassing use of tariffs for both public debt financing, industrial policy and burden sharing.⬇️
6)Both "wars" are waged by people with zero experience in the trade. The 🇺🇸 trade war (in the name of reshoring) is being waged by people who don't have industrial experience (since they come from academia and finance), The 🇷🇺 invasion is being planned and waged by former KGB people. ⬇️
5) Neither movement had a plan B in case they met resistance, therefore they both went into full chaos mode. 🇷🇺 leaders have been shifting between "escalation" to "we are open to negotiations", 🇺🇸 leaders are now shifting between "trade war escalation" and "look, so many deals, we're here!" ⬇️
4) Both movements started recklessly planned "wars" on their partners, thinking that they would not react. MAGA started the trade war thinking that the world would simply fold, 🇷🇺 invaded 🇺🇦 thinking that 🇺🇦 would fold and Europe would not dare respond. 🇺🇸 tariffs on 🇲🇽 and 🇨🇦 vs 🇷🇺'sHostomel blitz. ⬇️
3)MAGA resents the world because it "robbed and abused them" by "stealing" 🇺🇸jobs. Russky Mir resents the world because it allegedly "stole " historical 🇷🇺 lands. Both movements believe they are in a mission to recover "what was lost".⬇️
1)Both MAGA and Putinism are backward looking (MAGA looking backwards to pre-1990 🇺🇸 economy with booming 🇺🇸manufacturing, Putinism looking backwards to pre-1990 🇷🇺military power.
2)Both feed on resentment due to "lost status"⬇️
Well, if you compared MAGA and Putinism/Russky Mir ideology you would find a lot of similarities.
For a start: Both movements are led by old men in their 70s who base their political vision on grievance and nostalgia for the period of the 1960s. Here are the other similarities I see.🧵
Orange toupee is gonna have the side effect of crashing the 🇷🇺economy thanks to the "reciprocal tariffs" on the world.
Guess what Putin is thinking, now that he's planning a summer all-out offensive against 🇺🇦in order to take advantage of the cessation of 🇺🇸support.
April 2022: After 🇷🇺 starts an attrition war and the 🇷🇺 military casualties pile up, 🇷🇺 authorities tell people to "resist" and that "the war will not be easy". 🇷🇺 TG channels warn about the possible disaster.
April 2025: After 🇺🇸 starts an attrition trade war and the financial casualties pile up...
5/5 In such a nightmarish scenario, 🇮🇱and the 🇺🇸 troops in the Middle East would find themselves cut of from resupplies coming from North America (the Mediterranean being unpassable for the 🇺🇸ships). And it was the 🇺🇸 intervention that prevented 🇮🇷 missiles from saturating 🇮🇱 morgues in 2024.
4/ What if those supply lines were to crumble because 🇺🇸 troops in the Mediterranean and Europe came under attack or were unable to operate because of European hostility? Would they still be able to resupply Israel and the Gulf States?