Pascal

A Trump-Putin meeting could happen as soon as next week, White House official says A bilateral meeting between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin could happen as soon as next week, according to a White House official.

Trump and Putin get ready to carve up the map between themselves

Our leaders should be clear - nothing about Europe, without Europe

Any deal from these talks should be rejected from the outset so long as we are not involved in negotiations on our own future

abcnews.go.com/Politics/tru...

Failure to impose deterrence virtually guarantees that Ukraine will again become a war zone. That means forcing Russia to understand that breaking the ceasefire risks a war with Europe itself. Can Europe afford to allow Washington to impede that deterrent?

/END

How does extending our dependence on US military kit fit with a strategy of making ourselves less vulnerable to US threats?

There's no cost-free route to a better place than our current status quo. Either we learn to bear that or we continue to live with the consequences of American dominance

'Neither side can win' and other such nonsense is just cope to avoid reckoning with the consequences of a war of aggression where Russia ends with substantially more of Ukraine under its control than before

There is a slow motion disaster unfolding and basically no one in the West is willing to say the simple truth: Russia is winning and we are losing

Pressure on India/China, nothing directly on Russia seems to be the way Trump's latest move is playing out

And probably most of Europe will cheer him on, while the Russian troops keep moving forwards

How to Negotiate with Moscow Based on Experience of a Ukrainian Diplomat We are publishing this piece because Roman Bezsmertny is a Ukrainian diplomat who participated in nearly 60 rounds of talks with Russian representatives during the Minsk peace process. His experience ...

A worthwhile read
jamestown.org/program/how-...

Spain scraps plans to buy F-35 fighter jets Spain has shelved plans to purchase F-35 fighter aircraft, Spanish newspaper El País reported today. Preliminary contacts for the purchase of the fifth-generation American stealth fighters have bee…

Spain has shelved plans to purchase F-35 fighter aircraft, Spanish newspaper El País reported today.

What Kids Told Us About How to Get Them Off Their Phones Children who were raised on screens need more freedom out in the real world.

I was interested by this take that argued that kids are less interested in going outside when online is the space with more effective freedom
www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archiv...

That wasn't the end. Another big win of the "cardboard protests" waves: the gov't has appointed the winner of the competition Oleksandr Tsyvinsky as the head of Ukraine's Bureau of Economic Security. This agency is instrumental for improving business climate & fighting against economic scams. Great!

Fear of power Europe’s psychological barrier

Following the EU-US trade deal, my latest is on the instinctive aversion to power in Europe's leaders, how it destroys the effectiveness of our foreign policy and how it prevents us ever becoming more than we are

pascallth.substack.com/p/fear-of-po...

This fallacy, increasingly repeated everywhere, is particularly important

Our willingness to bear absolute costs matters more than our relative power relationship

Fear of power Europe’s psychological barrier

Following the EU-US trade deal, my latest is on the instinctive aversion to power in Europe's leaders, how it destroys the effectiveness of our foreign policy and how it prevents us ever becoming more than we are

pascallth.substack.com/p/fear-of-po...

How Europeans' fear of their own power makes them impotent.

"A continent governed by leaders with a fear of power will never make sufficient use of it and will never make Europe powerful." pascallth.substack.com/p/fear-of-po...

‼️A new special operation by the Security Service of Ukraine:its drones hit 5Russian aircraft at Saky airfield,Russian-occupied Crimea,destroying 1 of them completely

An aviation weapons depot was hit.A Su-30SM aircraft was completely destroyed,one more was damaged.Three Su-24 aircraft were also hit

The worst case scenario for Hamas is one where the West proves they also care about Palestinian lives and Palestinians are given a real choice

"No one has the right to make children starve," Poland tells Israel in Gaza warning

"No one has the right to cause children to starve," Poland's foreign minister @radek-sikorski.bsky.social has told Israel.

"Even when Israel acts in self defense, it is still not exempt from respecting international humanitarian law...[as] the state occupying Gaza and the West Bank."

It's less about the length and more about how long it takes to get back into it each time. Even a long game is not so difficult to fit in if you can easily pick up and play

Brexit has failed and people want their voice to be heard

I suppose miniseries have taken the role of the very long film in this regard

Agree with this. Multi-part films are not favoured it seems but sometimes it does need to be Das Boot

Another point to '2016 really is when everything started to go wrong'

US to impose sanctions on Palestinian organisations - BBC News The US says both the PLO and the Palestinian Administration continue to support "terrorism".

Denying Palestine's right to exist is as objectionable as denying Israel's right to exist

www.bbc.com/news/article...

Positive, but not incompatible with expanded military production

Even an impoverished Russia will not be docile

But Trump won't want to raise domestic energy prices

If the stoicism in oil markets breaks, and prices jump up, that will probably lead to a shift

So tariffs may be lower than expected or not around for very long

Seems likely that Trump will do something - partly because he is getting more publicly irritated with Putin

Also partly because this would give more leverage over two trade partners he considers difficult

Obviously Russia won't stop its war on Ukraine so in theory we should be getting news on US secondary tariffs for big buyers of Russian oil (China and India) around this time next week

The point would be to shut down non-Western demand for Russian oil, hurting Russia's vital fossil fuel revenues

Will Trump Follow Up on Threats to Stifle Russia’s Oil Exports? | OilPrice.com Analysts say the market is cautious but skeptical of a sustained disruption, noting Trump’s desire to keep U.S. energy prices low and Russia’s proven ability to circumvent sanctions.

With a series of new US tariffs confirmed today, I find it interesting that oil markets are pricing that Trump won't follow through on threat to Russia (and by extension India and China)

I think that's probably half-right
oilprice.com/Energy/Energ...

Russia fired more drones at Ukraine in July than in any month since it launched its 2022 invasion, intensifying its deadly bombardment of the country as peace talks stalled, an AFP analysis showed Friday.
u.afp.com/SMom