Robert Borden Stan Account

Appalling.

Benin revolted. Things that shouldn't be happening are happening.
They will proceed to make difficult but salvageable situation into hardcore and completely lost the same way other juntas situation went down.
Only jihadists benefit.
Massive disaster. Massive stupidity.

I also weirdly get Iraq War parallels from the fall of the Seattle QZ, with Isaac in the role of Al-Zarqawi. Probably not what the writers intended, but the snippets we get of the whole civil war lay out a really interesting rough sketch.

Younger me definitely fell for the knee-jerk backlash there, which is unfortunate. Abby in particular proves unexpectedly fascinating to watch, as her burning clown car of a friend group careens into Ellie’s life. She unquestionably has that dog in her.

Finally got around to playing TLOU2 (did a pretty good job of avoiding spoilers too) and it’s been pretty fantastic. Very slick gameplay that makes fights feel weighty and desperate on higher difficulties, backed up by at times harrowing presentation, and a very deep story.

Watch out Europe, Trump is coming for your elections next MAGA’s mission to meddle in European politics should terrify Starmer, Macron and Merz. Will any of them fight back?

Watch out Europe, Trump is coming for your elections next

MAGA’s mission to meddle in European politics should terrify Starmer, Macron and Merz. Will any of them fight back?

Trump administration is not entitled to ideological lockstep from sovereign democracies.
Calling European climate policy, asylum policy, digital regulation, or taxation “civilizational suicide” simply because Washington dislikes them is a rhetorical tantrum,

This chapter needs to be thrown in the face of every European official who has spent the last 12 months optimistically saying things are the same.

Relying on the old Atlanticism is just malpractice at this point, and putting pro-Americanism ahead of leaders' own citizens.

I mean, the Iraqis also ultimately ended up doing combined arms supported by extensive CAS with use of PGMs.

Could you elaborate on the similarities between Pentomic and Continuous Transformatio? I’ve been a skeptic for a while so I’d appreciate a closer look.

people made fun of this in 2014 but every last thing about it turned out to be true

I do think this NSS is a huge blow to rhe sanewashing of the Trump admin’s FP and ideological positions that I’ve seen everywhere in professional spaces this year, so I guess I’m also embracing vindication after watching people gaslight themselves into forgetting about all these insane statements.

Of course there’s also a Kremlinology aspect of trying to divine court politics in the admin from this, because who really knows which faction is in the ascendant, but it doesn’t seem to bode well for whatever’s left of the restrainers in Trump’s inner circle.

Responding to this- it’s a fair point on the NDS. I do think that this NSS is, if not groundbreaking, than highly concerning because of how strongly these ideological priors shone through- I expected weird shit, but it is not tempered by any countervailing force for moderation.

A fair counterpoint from Mike here.

NDS yes, NSS not really

Tbh even though it's authored by DoD the NDS is more of an anchor point even for other agencies than the NSS

bsky.app/profile/mike...

Of course, all of this is largely preaching to the choir on Bluesky, where there’s strong general agreement on these points. By rights I should post this on Twitter but I don’t fancy gore DMs from Based_Aryan_1488.

At a certain point, American officers, analysts and policymakers are going to start fielding questions like ”Do you agree with the official position of the NSS that my country is being mongrelized by immigration and may be expelled from NATO for being insufficiently white?”

Point being, I am skeptical of any assumption that this NSS is meaningless. Ultimately, it is safer for America’s allies to take this strategy deadly seriously. It is also pretty reasonable for this NSS to have consequences for the U.S. natsec community abroad.

I think we have an unreasonable confidence in the belief that up-and coming officers, intelligence analysts etc. will know better than to take this kind of unhinged stuff seriously- especially when the environment for promotions and dismissals is so fraught and politicized.

This is all buttressed by a belief that US defence and intelligence personnel are all in on it, and recognize these pronouncements or policies as meaningless. To which I would observe, how many times have you encountered an officer who clearly drank whatever kool-aid was the official line?

It is also a hell of a lot for American allies to take. At times it seems like the US military and defence community are still entitled to professional pride and the benefit of the doubt, while allies are expected to swallow whatever rhetoric may come without rocking the boat by pressing the issue.

The problem there being that words mean things, especially when they officially come from the United States. It’s exhausting and unreasonable to expect others to guess when American leadership means what it says, and when it’s just lying to keep Trump and Vance happy.

Where the annexation threats, Vance attacking Romanian democracy in his speech at Munich, etc. were continually swept under the rug as “can’t we just get past this? It’s just rhetoric. The alliance is bigger than Trump, disputes between NATO members happen all the time.”

As they no doubt prepare a fighting retreat to “nobody actually reads it/clearly it’s just a sop to Trump”, I’m reminded of some infuriating conversations with journalists and analysts (surprisingly not always American- a pretty even split between Americans, continental Europeans and Brits)…

Instead we have an official policy that climate change is a hoax, immigration is turning NATO partners “non-European”, and elected European governments lack democratic legitimacy in the eyes of Washington for pushing back against their respective far-right movements.

Still reading through the bizarre and unhinged new NSS- I remember when the rumours about early drafts started circulating, some commentators rushed to claim that it would probably just contain boilerplate business-as-usual fare, thanks to an apolitical natsec community.

One must also wonder how allies might feel about the U.S. military’s official position now being that they are woke cesspits in terminal decline.