To be fair to Germany every government in the western world is kind of shit right now not just them.
peter Zeihan 2020
- Thread starter Cherico
- Start date
Bear Ribs
Well-known member
For the longest time, Globalism preached that nuclear power and self-sufficiency were bad, because international trade would bring peace. As long as nations were financially and infrastructually dependent on each other, the theory went, they couldn't go to war without wrecking themselves so world peace would be attained. Building nuclear plants and generating your own power instead of trading for oil was thus a direct threat to world peace, and horribly unethical.
These days we've seen the hilarious dividend it actually gave us. Trying to stop some asshat from invading his neighbors has become impossible because everybody else is financially and infrastructually dependent on them so Europe can't prevent war without wrecking themselves.
These days we've seen the hilarious dividend it actually gave us. Trying to stop some asshat from invading his neighbors has become impossible because everybody else is financially and infrastructually dependent on them so Europe can't prevent war without wrecking themselves.
people said the exact same shit before WW1 and it wasn't true then either.
Lord Sovereign
The resident Britbong
Oh yes, but what with their vast armies and coal and oil reserves, it was far less dogmatic for the Europe of 1913.
Eh, I have basically no respect for what they're doing for the total spinelessness of it. I have much more respect for them if they had done what India's doing and gone "screw you America, were looking out for ourselves". Instead, they're placing themselves completely under America's thumb. All the talk of European independence was just talk. Which I guess was clear for a while now.
There was no stomach for hard choices then, and no stomach for hard choices now.
a) They are stuck with the EU. If they go "were looking out for ourselves" openly, that's a death sentence for their whole economic strategy related to it.
b) They never cared about "European independence". Some left and liberal establishment people have their kneejerk anti-Americanism, but that only means they would rather be dependent on China and Russia. Hell, they would rather be dependent on China's manufacturing and Russian gas than build own nuclear power plants, or Greta forbid, mine own coal. That's how little they cared about "European independence".
To be fair to Germany their time as americas little buddy has been some of the most prosperous and liberty filled time in german history. wanting that to relationship to continue is rational if there was better leadership all round every one would continue to prosper.
Eh, part of the EU pitch was going their own way: I remember reading a book layout out a vision of independent Europe. I think it was published in 2005, certainly some time during the Bush pre 2008 crash, probably the peak time of European sense of superiority over Americans and probably peek optimism of the EU.
Since then, the EU has often seemed to be punching itself in the face.
That faction has definitely been there and been in fairly prominent positions. They were talking about the European army as late as, what, last year?
I'm not close enough to know if they were just always louder than their power, or they lost at some point.
To the second point, independence generally is having the choice between multiple sources: most people can't supply all their own stuff: European independence is being able to switch between American, Russian, and Middle eastern sources at will, so non can really pull you over a barrel. Cutting off the Russian sources for American interests undermines European independence by making them more dependent on American ones.
A neutral Europe in this fight would be excellently placed to very handily profit off both sides in this conflict. That requires a mindset of self interest and real politic the European elite seems incapable of.
Meh. Of course they have visions. You can have visions. I can have visions. But they can say anything, it's a good idea in politics to look what people do rather than what they say or what visions they have.
Of course they did. But they certainly didn't do that with plans about creating a powerful land army to checkmate Russia with.
They did it with a power grab in mind, cushy European positions, various defense industry grifts for countries that have disproportionate influence but small military, and getting other countries to help float up France's not so ex colonial ambitions.
Well, let's see how that ability to switch is working out now...
You don't build pipelines if you want an ability to switch as the winds of geopolitics blow, that's the exact opposite of the intended effect. You build ports. Ports can take ships from anywhere. Pipelines go only where they were built, there is very little to no choice there. What they were doing definitely gave Russia an idea that they absolutely do hold Europe, or at least Germany over a barrel, and it's very painful for them to do the switch even with a lot of allied help.
Either Germany wanted to be dependent on Russia and got exactly what it wanted, or took an incredibly stupid way to become "independent" that has achieved the exact opposite effect, and i don't believe Germany's politicians to be so obviously stupid.
And last but not least, there are means to at least reduce need for foreign energy - after all, USA is also undergoing that debate. The EU has the choice of relying on domestic industry and nuclear power, but they would rather import "renewable" generators manufactured in China to show off their leadership in unimportant to any normal people CO2 numbers than do that.
Would it? Nor really. Even then, this attitude implies an Europe that is not a major actor in global affairs that has own plans and strategies, but some hyena that has to catch opportunities to grab a piece of meat when others fight. That's not an attitude glorious enough for European elites to adopt it.
Frankly, European elites care far more about "setting an example" in climate policies than profiting off any sides in any conflict, they would prefer to wish conflicts away, at least the physical ones, they would rather settle conflicts by means of whiny ads about climate catastrophe and spending taxpayer's money on politically correct grifts.
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Peter talks about how local control vs centralized control causes tons of China's problems, and how Xi is completely cut off from reality:
Ixian
Well-known member
Guaranteed oil at 90 per barrel vs Uncertain oil at 40 per barrel.
Yall took the cheap uncertain oil, and now you're paying the true price.
Its less their fault and more the fault of their greens, who were also massively anti nuclear which would have solved the carbon and power issue.
In long term this can have major effects on the politics around Iran. Europe was always soft on Iran, but now suddenly Iran is directly screwing with Europe's backyard.
Russia was always trying to be the "mediator" between Iran and USA regarding the nuclear deals, but now Russia can no longer claim neutrality, not to mention the shitty overall relations with the West and limited leverage on Iran that comes with it.
Finally Iran has given US hawks exactly what they have dreamed of for decades - a realistic perspective of anti-Iran Europe.
Said greens being funded in no small part by Russia.
Russia honestly has a lot to anser for as a country its why I have so little pity for them.
